Sunshine, freedom, and a little flower

I’m going to start by saying that never in my life have I put holiday decorations away as late as January 19. After New Year’s, there’s nothing that gets old faster than Christmas as far as I’m concerned. It’s just how I’ve always felt about it and so all of my adult life since I began decorating for the biggest holiday of the year, I would always have it all put away by the weekend after New Year’s.

I’m sorry to keep going on about it but glad to say that it’s all finally done.

My husband had already taken down the two small trees, putting the ornaments into a new cardboard storage box with drawers that I bought on sale last year.

 

And early this morning, I walked around the house, gathering all the detritus of the holiday and depositing it on the dining room table, my staging area for packing. Surprisingly, I had it all done within two hours, my husband helping by taking all of the crates to storage.

In retrospect, I guess I really could have squeezed two hours from one of the previous weekends but with everything going on, it was all just too much.

 

I did some cleaning before putting everything back in its usual place. Then I brought in some of the geraniums that have been wintering in the mudroom, cleaning them up and giving them a good dousing with water before placing them in the west windows where they’re sure to get a lot of sun.

I finished my book, The House at Riverton by Kate Morton. It was a decent read and kept me interested. Next up are The Thirteenth Tale, and The Book Thief, both of which I really look forward to. I read outside in the sunshine this afternoon in a protected spot. Sunshine can do a world of good in the middle of winter, can’t it?

"Just living is not enough," said the butterfly, "one must have sunshine, freedom and a little flower."  ~Hans Christian Andersen

 

 

This afternoon, the light coming in the west windows was beautiful. So I picked up the camera. Here at the kitchen window, I have the remnants of the poinsettia plants on one side of the deep windowsill and geraniums on the other.

 

And then I turned the camera to the window, focused on what was up close to my lens and caught the sun going down.

I love the blur and the colors.

Tonight I’m going to watch a movie that I received in the mail from Netflix yesterday. It’s up for an Oscar and a co-worker recommended it. It’s Beasts of the Southern Wild. I’ll keep you posted.

And now for a question, a single one this time.

What was the last movie you watched? Doesn’t matter if it was on tv, through the mail, at the movie theater . . . wherever.

See you in the comments.