Having only spent one complete winter here (this is our second), I can’t purport to be an expert on weather trends in the Valley of the Sun. However, Jen and I came to Phoenix every Presidents Day weekend for, I don’t know, a half a century, and Bill and I have spent a lot of time here in the winter since we bought the house, so I’m not a complete neophyte. What I know is that winters in the desert are unpredictable. Some years we were able to swim in the heated hotel pool on Presidents Day; some years we wore sweaters or coats.

This Presidents Day 2014 I wore shorts and a sleeveless shirt. Spring is here to stay I think. I am very happy about this fact. The people who live here year round are not quite so happy. They look ahead to the long summer – seriously something like six months of 100 plus temperatures – and think “don’t start already!”

Bill is in a continuous fight with our Acacia tree in the front yard. He has it nicely shaped, no easy task as the son-of-a-gun is loaded with sharp thorns, making it difficult to prune. And while the tree catalog says it has “golden yellow puffballs that provide lovely color late winter into spring” (and doesn’t that sound pleasant?) what it doesn’t say is that these “golden yellow puffballs” drop like rain onto the ground, making a terrible unsightly mess that requires constant raking. That wouldn’t sound nearly as nice in the catalog. Furthermore, once the “golden yellow puffballs” are finished puffing, little hard brown pods appear and ultimately

Golden yellow puffballs or beebleberries?

fall onto the ground. Don’t put that rake away yet. It really is one continuous battle. By the way, Bill doesn’t call them “golden yellow puffballs.” He calls them beebleberries. Do any of you Baby Boomers remember Little Lulu?

Anyway, the good news about that Acacia tree is it seems to be the location selected by our lovely little mockingbirds to nest. I hear a lot of rustling going on in the tree (thereby resulting in more “golden yellow puffballs” dropping onto the ground). And the mockingbirds have taken residence there in years past. I’m keeping my fingers crossed. The other day there was a bird on our neighbor’s roof having quite a conversation with one of the birds in our tree. Back and forth. The mockingbird would give two whistles, and the other bird would give two whistles in return. It went on for 10 minutes or so. Very funny.

While I love to see the cacti come alive as spring fully develops (I will post photos because it really is gorgeous), the warm weather bring out more than flowers and mockingbirds. The news people are already talking about the rattlesnakes coming out as soon as the weather reaches 80 – and yesterday and the day before, the temperature was near 90. Yikes.

In fact, the other night we had an unwelcome visitor – a centipede. Seriously, what in the world was God thinking? It was making its way across the floor of our den when I spotted it and hysterically hollered for poor Bill. I must admit I always feel a bit guilty making him kill the critters as I’m certain he doesn’t like them any more than I. But I pick out the grandkids’ birthday presents. It evens out.

Now that I’ve finally gotten over the Super Bowl, I have been enjoying the Sochi Olympics. Well, at least some of the Olympic events. Some I find boring; some I find puzzling; some I find absolutely insane.

I try to like the downhill skiing events. I really do. But mostly the participants are just skiing downhill at an unbelieveably fast and dangerous speed. I do like the ones who  spin in the air, though I always wonder, how did they talk themselves into doing that the first time? Was it on purpose?

Curling is fascinating and puzzling at the same time. I must admit I haven’t been able to actually watch a curling, what? match? game? event? from start to finish. I can’t seem to find it on the television. Perhaps it’s on live, at which time it is the middle of the night in AZ and I am sound asleep in my little bed. At any rate, I have decided that if I ever take up curling, I want to be the one who throws the what? ball? puck? doohicky? and then screams. I did enough sweeping in the bakery when I was younger.  I don’t want that particular job.

And what is up with the skeleton racing? The people who participate in that event are certifiably insane. Who thinks it’s a good idea to lay down on a tiny little metal sled wearing nothing more than a bike helmet like my 5-year-old granddaughter wears when she’s on her Razor scooter and race down a frozen track at 80 mph? At least the racers don’t have Barbie on their helmets. But I’m telling you, that helmet is not going to do a thing for them if they run into a frozen wall at 80 mph. They might as well have Barbie on the helmet because it’s not good for anything else.

Really, the only thing I really look forward to when it comes to any of the Winter Olympic events is the figure skating. I have been enjoying watching both the men and the women. I must admit, however, it was somewhat unpleasant to sit next to my husband and watch Yuzuru Hanyu, the Japanese man who took first place in the men’s long program last week. Bill simply couldn’t get over the fact that the man was wearing a blouse. It didn’t matter how well Hanyu skated. Bill simply couldn’t forgive the blouse choice.

As an aside, my best friend going all the way back to elementary school  still laughs when she recalls trying to teach me to ice skate at the skating pond in Columbus when I was 10 or 12. At her urging, I skated onto thin ice, quite literally, and one of my feet fell through. My guardian angel kept me from falling completely through the ice while she laughed. The pond was only a couple of feet deep, but still…. Junior high pride and all that. She got her comeuppance, however, when she went to the warming hut and the back of her navy blue pea coat caught on fire. Our guardian angels were kept very busy. No future Olympians among us.

As for my love of Olympic figure skating, blame Dorothy Hamill.

My blog is the musings of a baby boomer, and Dorothy Hamill is a creature of the Baby Boomer Generation. Despite my increasingly failing 60-year-old memory, I recall like it was yesterday what it was like to watch Ms. Hamill on the ice. She was remarkable in the 1976 Olympic games.

First off, there was that haircut. Oh, oh, oh, did I love that haircut. And I wasn’t the only one. That cut could be seen on girls all over the United States in 1976-77. I high-tailed it down to the beauty shop to get my hair cut in the Dorothy Hamill “wedge.”

Hamill’s performance in 1976 was nearly flawless. She took home gold medals in both the short and the long programs, earning first-place scores from all nine judges. She is also credited with developing a new skating move, dubbed the “Hamill Camel”, a camel spin that turned into a sit spin.

I was curious to see how her skating compared to the skating of today’s Olympians, so I watched a You Tube video of her performance. Yes, she was masterful. She was beautiful and graceful. And her hair would spin around. Oh, the glory of it all.

But her performance today wouldn’t even begin to compete with current skaters, who do triple quad thingamahookies, give a leap, and then do them again.  But no one can spin on the ice like Dorothy Hamill could. And there was that camel spin that turned into a sit spin. So pretty.

However, she had to pick up her own flowers instead of having skating fledglings to do it as they do nowadays.

There have been many great skaters since Dorothy Hamill (Kristi Yamaguchi? Glorious.) But Ms. Hamill is the one I will always remember. Because she is a baby boomer, just like me.

She was dismal on Dancing With the Stars, however.

My 3-year-old great nephew Austin loves, loves, LOVES  Lightening McQueen.

The movie Cars runs on an endless loop on the DVD player in their car. Austin quietly mouths the words as they are being spoken because he has them memorized. He owns somewhere around 15 or 20 No. 95 Lightening McQueen red cars. Some are big; some are small. Many, I’m sorry to say, are exactly alike. But nothing makes him happier than receiving another No. 95 red car. He can take your hand and lead you right to where they are located at Target, Walmart, and Toys R Us.

So we probably shouldn’t have been surprised when other day he looked at his grandmother (my sister Jen) with his big blue eyes open wide and said, “Grammie, I want ice cream. Will you take me to Dairy McQueen?”

I had another smiling moment one morning this week when Bill came into our kitchen where I was already sitting, poured himself a cup of coffee, sat down next to me, and announced that he had just woken up from a dream in which he was flying around the country wearing an anti-gravity space suit. Seriously, his dreams are hilarious.

Have a good weekend.

As part of its 10th anniversary celebration, Facebook offered its subscribers the opportunity to look at, and subsequently share, one-minute “movies,” really a collection of their photos over the lifetime of their membership set to music.

The first one shared with me was from my friend Monique, whose collage of photos brought a smile to my face. Of course, it helps that she has a set of adorable 5-year-old twins who are featured. And then the movies started showing up on my Facebook feed in earnest.

Generally I don’t really care for a lot of the self-indulgence that happens on Facebook, and one would have expected me to be annoyed by this proliferation of so-called movies. On the contrary, I enjoyed each one very much. I must admit my two favorites were my sister Bec’s and our son David’s. Both made me tear up. In a good way.

I would have shared my own but, upon looking at it, quickly realized that nearly every single photo in my personal movie involved food. It was either a photo of us before, during, or immediately following a meal at home or at a restaurant; a photo of something I ate or ordered; Bill carving some sort of meat or fowl; or my grandkids helping me prepare a meal. I kid you not. I was horrified. I really do partake in other activities besides eating. I do. Really.

And there is always the follow-up paradies for such activities. Here is a Facebook movie parady for Justin Bieber that made me laugh. Don’t let your kids watch!

Have a good weekend.

Seriously, I watch so many PBS Masterpiece Theater and/or Masterpiece Mystery programs that I find myself thinking with a British accent. I apologise. My behaviour is uncivilised. In my defence, Masterpiece Theater offers some of the best shows on the telly.

I hope you aren’t taking offence at my new practise of spelling words the British way. I realise that it probably looks odd to you, seeings as you’re not British, and it would have driven my mum entirely daffy. Spelling was her favourite subject.

Ok, ok, I’ll stop. It’s too difficult anyway. But I’m serious about thinking with a British accent from watching too much British television.

You’ve got Foyle’s War, a police procedural featuring Detective Chief Superintendent Christopher Foyle. DCS Foyle faces off with criminals during and immediately following World War II who are taking advantage of the chaos caused by the war. He is smart, kind, and entirely honourable (again with the British spelling; I can’t seem to stop). He would make a perfect husband for one of my sisters (except for the fact that he is a fictitious character. Drat.).

Call the Midwife is the absolutely beautiful program about four young nurses who come to work with an order of nursing Anglican nuns in the East End of London in the 1950s. The program is based on the memoirs of Jennifer Worth. The stories are poignant and lovely. The nurses and the nuns work primarily as midwives. I think it’s my favorite television program; I especially like the music – all songs I remember my mother listening to as I grew up.

I couldn’t possibly talk about my favorite Masterpiece Theater programs without bringing up Downton Abbey. So many people have become fans of this show that it’s almost gotten embarrassing to admit that you’re a fan. But I admit it. I AM A FAN. It’s become a bit soap opera-y as of late, I’m afraid. I’m nearly OVER Bates’ brooding and Anna’s heavy sighs, but still…..those beautiful clothes worn by the ladies upstairs. I do wonder if Elizabeth McGovern (who plays Lady Grantham) ever gets tired of smiling. She did have those two episodes where she was sad about Sybil’s death. I must have been a relief to give those cheekbones a break. I am fully and completely addicted to the histrionics that take place both above and below stairs, however. And I would love, simply LOVE, to spend one weekend having a ladies maid who would pick out my clothes and dress me, feed me breakfast in bed, and listen to me complain about my husband without telling a soul (unless she is one of Thomas’ cronies).

But what got me thinking about Masterpiece Theater is that yesterday afternoon I watched my first episode of Sherlock. Oh. My. Heavens. I totally loved it. The acting is fabulous, the story line is clever, and the overall look of the show is spectacular.

I have been enjoying CBS’ version of Sherlock Holmes – Elementary. I think that’s one of the smartest programs on television. I think Jonny Lee Miller nails Sherlock Holmes, or at least how I always pictured him. And I could look at Lucy Liu all day. I think making Dr. Watson a woman was a brilliant change. I hope they keep her sharp and unwilling to back down to Sherlock’s bullying. And Miller’s accent allows me to continue thinking with a British accent as well. Good news for me. Bad news for my friends and family.

Masterpiece Theater’s Sherlock is a bit different, a bit spiffier. I can’t speak much about it because I have only watched the pilot episode. My sister Bec is watching it and has encouraged me to get on board. I will definitely be frantically watching Netflix episodes to catch up with this year’s Season 3.

Funny thing is, I never enjoyed reading Conan Doyle’s stories about Sherlock Holmes. Being such an avid fan of mysteries, I always thought I would. They just wouldn’t hold my interest. I should try them again now that I have moved into the British empire, at least mentally.

And the good news is that the flag of the United Kingdom, the Union Jack, is red, white, and blue, the same colours as the American flag. (I just had to get one more funny spelling in. Now I have to go and check to make sure there is a spare tyre in the boot of my car.)

Do you watch Masterpiece Theater programs? What do you think of them?

I wrote my first blog in 2008.

I had just retired and Bill and I were preparing to leave on a long-planned adventure where we would spend three-and-a-half months traveling around Europe. I was considering ways in which I could stay in contact with my family. I knew telephoning was difficult. Email was a possibility. Someone mentioned I should write a blog.

I had no idea what that meant. A bit of research opened me up to the then-relatively new world of blogging. I developed my first blog – The Reluctant Traveler. Each day for three plus months I shared our delightful, sometimes frightening, often funny experiences as we explored a world where we didn’t know how to ask for directions to the bathroom. Der badezimmer. Los Servicios. Cabinet de toilette. Il Bagno. The loo.

When we returned from our travels, many people asked if I was going to continue blogging since they had enjoyed reading what I wrote. I always said I would love to, but my everyday life was pretty quiet and uneventful. What would I say?

But I missed writing. I dabbled, but never dove right in.

Late last summer, my sister Jen suggested I start a blog. She convinced me that I didn’t need to be living the life of a movie star to blog, but only needed to be willing to share my family, my life, my feelings, and my time with others. I could write a blog about nothing. More specifically, I could write a blog about anything that was tickling my fancy. My whimsies.

I initially thought I would do a blog largely dedicated to cooking. I love to cook. I had sort of a vague notion that I would like to show others who fear cooking that there was really nothing to it. It didn’t take me long to realize that a cooking blog – at least a blog dedicated specifically to cooking – wasn’t really what I wanted to do. For one thing, I’m not a terribly good cook. I follow recipes. My siblings are much better cooks.

I went back to my notion of writing about whatever interested me, and decided I would gear my words to an audience of Baby Boomers — people like me (though anyone is welcome!). That’s what I have been trying to do. It’s not always easy. Don’t get me wrong. For me, the writing is always easy. But as I said earlier, I live a simple, unspectacular life. Who cares about me? Many days the most exciting thing I do is sort laundry.

I mostly am excited about developing my blog and expanding my audience. But I have terrible moments of great anxiety and self-doubt. It didn’t help yesterday when I asked 3-year-old Austin, who at the moment was running in circles around his house, his thoughts. “Do you like my blog?” I asked him as he ran by in a blur. “No,” he said over his shoulder as he ran away from me. Maybe he’s just a tough audience since he can’t read.

“Do you like my blog?” I asked my sister Jen a little later.

She assured me she did. She said her favorite posts are the ones in which I share my soul. I’m never one to be reluctant about sharing my thoughts and fears and joys with others. It’s just that for me, like everyone else, most days just pass without my even thinking about my soul. I’m too busy worrying about the guacamole stain on my jeans.

I mentioned a couple of days ago that I am going all-in with nanaswhimsies.com, and I’m excited about it. Kind of scared, but mostly not. I want to entertain people. I want to share my soul. I want to teach. I want to let my family and friends know what we’re up to. I want to write.

So I will keep plugging along. Tell me how I’m doing. Give me suggestions. Share recipes and family stories. Send pictures. Stay in touch.

Come gather ’round people
Wherever you roam
And admit that the waters
Around you have grown
And accept it that soon
You’ll be drenched to the bone
If your time to you
Is worth savin’
Then you better start swimmin’
Or you’ll sink like a stone
For the times they are a-changin’.

-Bob Dylan

 Well, those lyrics are a much too dramatic for the change I’m telling you about in this post, but those lyrics just give me goosebumps. Things really did change in the 60s and 70s, no question about it. Baby boomers were growing up and changing the world.

Anyhoo, I want to tell you about an exciting change in my blog.

Nana’s Whimsies is moving to a new platform, with a slightly different address. I gave Blogger everything I could, but I couldn’t get it to do what I wanted it to do for me. Perhaps it was user error on my part, but in the end it doesn’t matter. It had problems. The most significant issue was that some of you could comment, but many, many of you were unable to do so. I don’t know why. My friend and new web designer Will tells me it might have something to do with third-party cookies. Friends, the only cookies I care a hoot about are those that have sugar and flour and butter and chocolate chips or peanut butter or cinnamon sugar. Those I understand. The kind of cookies that keep you from communicating with me – no clue, no desire to get a clue.

I love blogging. Truly I do. I love to write, and I love to share my quirky life with friends, old and new. I have been taking baby steps because I needed to know if I really had the commitment it takes to blog. I wasn’t sure if 1) I was disciplined enough to sit down and write every day, and 2) If enough happened to me to write about.

I have found that I LOVE to sit down and write. It makes me happy and stretches my brain. And while not a lot of exciting things happen in my quiet and simple life, I always have something to say. Being the owner and publisher of a blog has helped me to look at life in a different way, and that’s a good thing.

So I’m going all in. My old blog – nanaswhimsies.blogspot.com – will be going away. I have obtained my own domain name – nanaswhimsies.com – and I will be operating from that platform. I’m serious about blogging, and I’m serious about being able to communicate with the people who read my blog. I’m also serious – very serious – about building my readership. You all can help me with this process. Tell your friends. Share me on Facebook. Help me get the word out about my blog. And communicate with me. Respond to what I say and give me ideas about what to blog.

This will be a work in progress. For a period of time, I will likely run both platforms until I’m fully satisfied that my new domain is working just fine. Please, please try to comment on the new site. I want to hear from you. I want to know who is reading my blog. I continue to fear my two sisters are my only readers and they only read it because otherwise I will glare at them at our next family function. Or tell Mom.

New address:

www.nanaswhimsies.com

That’s it. Simple, huh?

See you at nanaswhimsies!

One word about the Broncos….

I am happy we made it to the Super Bowl. Only two teams do that each year, and we were one of the two. Yay for us. However, I’m sad for Peyton Manning because I know he wanted to put this one in the win file and bring home a ring. Many of us understand sibling rivalry, and you KNOW Eli sits around the dinner table with a ring on two of his fingers and allows the light to reflect off them into Peyton’s eyes and says, “Oh Peyton, is the light off my ringSSSSS bothering you?”

It would have been fun if the Broncos had made it a good game, but que sera sera. And there’s always next year. And I love my Denver Broncos.

Every year I’m sad when football season is over. It’s a long time until preseason. But at least we have something to look forward to this year.  On to the Olympics!

Beginning today, my Saturday blog post will be called Saturday Smile. I am going to devote a couple of sentences to something that made me smile during the past week. It may be something I blogged about; it may be something I witnessed or heard about; it may be something one of my grandkids or great nieces or great nephews or friends said or did. It’s whatever made me smile that week.

So:

My granddaughter Mylee has had a stuffed monkey since she was a baby. The monkey’s name is Mo Mo. When you see photos of Mylee, it’s like reading one of those “Where’s Waldo” books. Where’s Mo Mo? Because you know he’s there somewhere. And if he doesn’t happen to make it in that photo, he is somewhere just out of the lens’ reach.

For example:

So, the smile this week was a photo of a picture that Mylee drew this week:

Yes, Friends. It’s a portrait of Mo Mo.

Lillyana Marie Eve Jensen is five days old. And I believe that, using Kaiya’s emphatic question as inspiration (see yesterday’s post), Lilly is saying, “What the……?

Imagine that she spent nine peaceful months in her mommy’s tummy, floating in warm liquid, floating….floating….floating. Suddenly, much to her surprise and consternation, and through no choice of her own, she is flung into the light, into a chilly operating room, hearing loud voices and other noises. She is being handled by these odd creatures wearing blue gowns (though of course she didn’t know they’re blue because she still sees in black and white and anyway she can’t see more than six inches in front of her face, but you get my point).

Now, suddenly, she feels hungry and cold and gassy, and plus she has this bow on her head. Why do I have a bow on my head? Mommy has waited a long time for a girl…..

Yeah, I’m sure of it. She is saying, “What the……?”

The Jensens are all getting used to each other. Three-year-old Austin seems to be quite taken with her, though he likely expects that she will go away soon and he will be happy to walk her to the door. He likes to spend a lot of time bumming around with his grandmother, away from the baby’s cries. Maggie and Mark just have that glazed-over look that is part terror and part sheer unadulterated exhaustion.

They will be just fine. She is the second newborn in our family in the past few months. Faith Naomi Gloor was born at the end of November. She, too, undoubtedly was shocked to be born, but she and her parents have fared nicely.

I have been remembering when I gave birth to my son 33 years ago. I recall when the doctor handed him to me I looked at him like he was a stranger instead of someone who had been a part of me for nine months. Suddenly I realized that his mouth looked exactly like his dad’s mouth, and I understood he really was part of us. It’s an amazing feeling.

But I also remember when we got home after the few days in the hospital. His dad left to go to the store, and I had this strong sense of terror. Don’t go! I don’t know what to do with this baby. I don’t know how to be a mom! There were no classes on motherhood. There might be now, but at that time they handed us the baby and the Dr. Spock book, and threw us in the deep end.

He survived and so did I.

Being a parent is a glorious job – the hardest and most important job any of us will ever have, and the most rewarding. The good thing is that our children are resilient, and for the most part, forgiving. And generally they just simply love their parents, no matter what.

The Jensens know all of this because they have a child already. But right now they just want four hours of straight sleep. That will come. Give it a few years.