Sunday, December 29th., 2024…… Another rainy day. We are both
tired of the gloom, so when we do get sun, we rejoice! I know – we could always
move to the sunny climates. But we put up with the rain to get the green! And
we won’t trade that for anything! Today was just light rain but the wind has
been pretty bad. Last couple of days we have seen some constant rain. As
mentioned before, we are getting a lot of water in the fields and the streams
are full. That means the water table is building up. As for us personally, we
don’t notice too much difference. Our lawn is soggy and will stay that way well
until Spring. Rylee’s dragstrip is full one day and empty the next. But she doesn’t
run as much in the winter, so we’re lucky in that respect! But we still have to
wipe down all 8 paws whenever they go out and about. Cathye went off to church
and on the way got a call from Gail, our cuer for New Year’s asking if we were
going to Sweet Home’s new dancer class starting today. Her husband Bill, was
going to be our New Year’s Baby at the dance but he is sick. So, she wanted to
pass on his apparel so we could go find another person. They live in Sweet
Home, so it would be an easy drive for her. Since Cathye’s church is in Sweet
Home, she called to say she would just hang there and go shopping and would
meet me at class. No worries, but we were in two cars. It’s 15 miles there so
that’s not too bad. Cathye was there
when I arrived and Gail came by and dropped off the bag. After class, we had
time to go home and eat a bit before heading off to our Club’s beginner’s
class. That went well (and we found another recruit to be our Baby!) but we
declined the after party and just came home and rested. Tv and then bed.
Monday, December 30th., 2024…… I had it in my mind to drive over
to Corvallis and look into getting parts for the canopy for our truck. So, we
showered and walked and fed the dogs then headed out. We went to the gym but
instead of hitting Kevin’s, we drove the truck over to Corvallis and went to
Wisecracks for breakfast. After their delicious coffee and breakfast, I stopped
by Pro Truck and got two struts for replacement on the back window ($40.00
total so not too bad). When we got home, I had the old ones off and the new
ones on in less than 10 minutes. We are good to go! When I came in, Cathye was
already working on her project for today – Christmas packing! I finished up the
Christmas villages and we got the base out to the back porch. I think we are
90% done. We just have a few items to wrap and pack and then get to the back
porch. My next order of business was to get the hams sliced up. We had them out
yesterday and they were just right to run through our slicer. We spent 20
minutes or so on that project and then cleaned up the slicer and the kitchen.
We rested for a while before I went to work on filling up some balloons for
tomorrow night. We have a check list (ok – I have one in my head!) for things
we need to do tomorrow to get ready before we leave for the dance. I probably
won’t sleep tonight!
Tuesday, December 31st., 2024…… I’m still buzzing about our New Year’s dance tonight! I was all over the place this morning, going through the boxes and making sure my costume was all packed. We don’t want to leave for the dance and have to come back for anything! After all that, we got the roaster going and heated up the ham slices. Cathye poured pineapple juice in it for more flavor. I think we are ready, so we relaxed for the morning and afternoon. Later, we got the roaster loaded and I got dressed for the dance. Cathye stayed in her street clothes and will change at the dance after we get everything set up. We got there and waited for Grace to use her keys and unlock the doors and turn off the alarms. Then we unloaded everything and went to work. There were probably 10-12 people there by then and we all went about our tasks. Everyone was checking in with me for how we wanted the dining tables and chairs and serving table set up.
Cathye took charge of the serving tables and got that set up. We got a lot of comments as to why it was so long and why it was out in the room so far? You will see later…. I had no issues getting the fishing line up and over the ac pipes in the ceiling and had the ‘ball’ installed and set up. Then I went to work setting up the photo op booth.
We
have a bunch of fun signs on sticks to have them pose with and they were set
out too. Cheryl was in charge of the gift table and set up for that. I went
behind stage and stored my costume for later. Cathye got her charges going and they were
ready for the food and guests before the scheduled 6:00pm time! I think everything took maybe an hour and 20
minutes. But we were ready! Folks came
in and signed in and found tables in the back. The 2 callers and two cuers had
already set up on the stage. I welcomed the guests and asked that they start in
on the buffet. Our Club members were astonished that we had all of the guests
(we had 62 for dinner) through the line and seated in 10 minutes! That meant they had time to eat before Jackie
cued the pre-rounds at 6:30pm. At 7:00, Shaun handed me the mike and I welcomed
our guests and gave them our schedule for the evening. Cheryl explained the
gift table and how to see if they had won.
The night went well. My special
‘no-hands tip’ went well. We had six squares and everyone got a special no
hands badge just for dancing, calling or judging.
I think the dancers had fun and
they did really well dancing the calls without using hands. It took Shaun quite
a while before he had one square left. The last square got a special color
badge…
It was great that that square had both seasoned as well as brand new dancers in it! Later, as we got close to the 9:00pm ball drop, I went over the process with Shaun. Gracie (baby new year) and I went backstage and changed. Shaun found a countdown app on his phone and was ready. Cathye and her crew had poured the sparkling cider toast and folks got their drinks and went out to the floor. As we got to the countdown of 10…9…, Frank started slowly lowering the ball. I came out from the right side of the stage and we pushed 2024 out and as we got down to 3…2…1… the 2025 baby came out from stage left. I don’t think the crowd expected that! HAPPY NEW YEAR! Shaun played Auld Lang Syne and we all celebrated! After that, they called the first tip of the year and our crew could finally relax. We danced the final hour and finished at 10:00pm. Next up was cleanup, which went quickly. The only issue we had was when we were taking things out to the truck, the skies opened up! I was now in my t-shirt and shorts and sandals so I got wet coming and going! But we were all out by the required 10:30pm time. The drive home was sooo relaxing! All of the work we and our team had put in had paid off! We had a final count of 76 (some came after dinner to just dance) and we had planned for 80 so it worked out. We watched tv for a few minutes and unwound to where we could finally go to sleep. Happy New Year to All!!!
Here are some pics from the evening....
Wednesday, January 1st., 2025…… When we got in last night, I had backed the truck up to the garage door and we just left it there. The roaster that was in the back of the truck was good to go outside because it was in the high 30s last night. I brought that in and we put the ham in baggies and cleaned up the roaster. I emptied the truck out. I think we totaled up 4 totes and 4 tote bags of decorations and stuff. Some of the stuff like tape and pins and the fishing reel and such were ours so I went through all of that and got that separated. I left the rest for tomorrow. I had taped the Rose Parade so when Cat got up and going, we had coffee and breakfast and watched that. The rest of the day was spent just relaxing. Cat had planned on making bean soup with the trimmings that we had saved after slicing. She uses lima beans for her soup which I always love! It was a quiet day!
Thursday, January 2nd., 2025…… We wanted to go to the gym and breakfast this
morning but today we have an appointment to have the washer looked at. The
fabric softener dispenser isn’t working right. They told Cat that they would be
here anywhere from 10:00am to 12:00pm, so we couldn’t leave. So, we ate in
today. The guy showed up at 10:30am and got to work. We will need a new internal
dispenser tray which he will order. Should be two weeks. Cathye went to get
eggs from our neighbor and then on to visit with Judy. I finished up with the
New Year’s boxes and they are now ready to turn in. While I was resting, Cat
called and asked if I wanted to go to Kristi’s for lunch. She drove back and
picked me up and we had a nice burger meal. Hey, we missed going there for breakfast!
After that, we came back home and I worked on getting all of the Christmas
boxes out on the back deck. Rains are
still around. They say we are going to get even more this week and into next.
Friday, January 3rd., 2025…… We slept in this morning. The
rains were pretty steady so we skipped the dog walk. When Penny came by later
and saw the garage doors were closed, she called to see if we were home! Later,
I went over and helped her put her Christmas decorations away in the garage
racks. We still need to do ours. They are still on the back porch but at least all
of them are out of the house now! Nothing
left on our to do list so we just relaxed today.
Saturday, January 4th., 2025…… Tonight is our Club dance. Just a
regular dance so we don’t have to do any more setup other than chairs and
tables. The next item on our square dance list is our Mid-Winter. That will be
1/23-1/26. We already are registered and have our rv reservations. At the dance
we were also told that we were on the committee for Camp Koinonia coming up in March
after we get back from our cruise. Since
we were on the committee last year, I guess Cheryl assumed we would do it
again! She and Mike were on our New
Year’s committee so she is calling in the favor. It’s no big deal because
Cheryl has it pretty much in hand. After the dance, we headed back home and
relaxed and watched tv until bed.
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