Finally.... It's Done!!!

Have you ever had a project that you started and then for one reason or another just couldn't finish? You put it aside, but every time you walk past it it calls your name and sticks it's tongue out at you, mocking you and calling you names, like:

"You procrastinating loser!", or

"You lazy bum!".

No? Yeah, probably not. You're probably all super focused on finishing something once you've started, and nothing can get in the way of you achieving your goal.

It's kind of like writer's block, only with wood, instead of words.

Well, I've finally finished the wood project that I started well over a year ago. It's been sitting in my garage in various stages of unfinishedness for all that time. In between, I've finished several other projects: 10 walnut and maple cutting boards, my Daughter-in-law's solid cedar hope chest, Grammy's birthday music box, and a few others that I've forgotten, I'm sure.

But no more will it be called "Unfinished"! This very morning, I put the finishing touches on it and installed the drawers and it now sits in our family room with our stereo on top and the drawers full of our CD's and some DVD's.

So here it is:

The cabinet ready to stain:



The open cabinet with the drawers for the CD's:



The finished product:



Done!!!!

Finally!!!

Now, what to make next????? Hmmmm???

We'll have to think on that one for a while.

I don't think these things are weird, but......

1. I like to eat baked potatoes with soft boiled eggs on top of them.

2. My favourite treat in my Christmas stocking is smoked oysters.

3. I can remember my Canadian Social Insurance number even though I haven't had to use it in 12 years, but I can't remember what it was I wanted to Google 5 minutes ago.

4. I enjoy getting older, even with the ever increasing aches and pains.

5. Nantiemeg's thing about having her left foot out from under the covers..... She comes by it honestly. Me to!

6. I had an appendicitis attack at the age of 18 while wrapped from head to toe in tin foil. (No, it was not what you might think... I was playing the Tin Man in a Wizard of Oz play and had my appendix out the next morning.

Lastly, I don't tag.

TELL ME A STORY, GRANDPA

When my kids were little, they always used to want to hear stories about the "olden days" - you know - when I was a kid. Well, that's about the time that I would break out the old standby's:'

"When I was a kid, we had it rough! Yup! We used to have to walk to school through 10 feet of snow, uphill..... both ways!!. You kids think you got it tough? You don't know nothin'".... Blah, Blah, Blah , Blah, Blah!

Seriously, they used to like to hear about what kinds of things I did, and where I lived - the farmhouse with no indoor plumbing for a while, trips to the outhouse when it was 30 degrees below zero. Getting trampled by a bull calf, stepping on a rusty nail, learning to swim in a muddy pond. Going on trips with my parents to the Grand Canyon, Lewis and Clark Caverns, Disneyland. Meeting Grammy. The list goes on..

A few weeks ago, I blogged a bedtime story for Laylee, Magoo and the Bean. It got me thinking about telling them stories and how when they get older, how neat it would be to have them say, "Tell me a story, Papa."

When I was young, we lived close (a couple of blocks) from my Mom's Dad. I used to go over and visit on a regular basis and Grandpa would tell stories. I remember one about a girl he used to know. He said "She weren't much for pretty, but she were hell for smart!" I thought, "Grampa said "hell"!, hee, hee, hee!" He used to call me up and ask me to come over and listen to his latest Bill Cosby album, you know, the one with the story of Noah and the Ark. We'd be in the living room listening to it and Grandma would be in the kitchen slamming pots and pans around saying, "I don't know how you can listen to that Sacrelig!!" But me and Grandpa laughed and laughed! I really miss him.

But this blog isn't just about him. It's more about this guy:



This is my Dad's Dad. He's in his World War I uniform. He was killed at Vimy Ridge in France in WW I when my Dad was only 4 years old. Dad was only 2 1/2 years old when Grandpa went away to war, so my Dad never got to hear stories about when his Dad was little, and I never got to hear stories from this Grandpa either.

From things we've been able to piece together over the years, we know that he must have lived an interesting life. His Mom died when he was young. He went to live with his Grandparents, but for whatever reason, left their home when he was about 14, lived in California for a while, spent some time in South America, where he "came in possesion of a large ruby". Paid his passage to South America by signing on as a hand on the ship. Worked as a dynamite blaster on road construction crews in Idaho, where he met my Grandma (who also died before I was born). Immigrated to Canada, homesteaded in the Canadian Rockies. Joined the army and fought as a sniper in the Battle of Vimy Ridge where he was killed by a German sniper.

I never knew him, but I miss him terribly as well. There are so many things I want to know about him: Why did he leave home? Why did he change his name? Why did he go to South America? How did he "come in possesion of a large ruby"? Why did he move to Canada and never contact his family again after a single letter written to them when he was about 21 years old? Why did he go to war? Why didn't he keep his head down? Again, the list goes on......

Someday, I'll meet him. And when I do, I'll say, "Sit down, we've got some catching up to do. "

"Tell me a story, Grandpa. Let me find out who you really are."