T Stands for Last Week's Chores

    Hi everyone. Happy new week to you. And hello to everyone who stops by  Bleubeard's and Elizabeth's blog for T.

    Last week I had a much needed "quiet" week without any planned outings. Besides some art and reading time (❤), I had some "chores" I've been wanting or needing to get done. Some of them I'd been putting off for awhile too. 

     I haven't really decorated for Christmas, but I did put up my winter tree in the dining room.  It's in a rather dark corner  and with these short days, the tree really adds some light. I keep this tree up until late January or early February until the days start seeming longer so I don't really think of it as a Christmas tree.

This second photo makes it look like there's no light on the bottom, but there is.

    I also managed to do some more cleaning out. I had donated 3 bags of art supplies earlier this month when I did an art supply pick up and clean. This past week I organized my closet  and switched over from my summer to my winter clothes. While doing that I cleaned out another 2 bags of clothes to donate.  😀 

      

   And after a windy start to last week, it finally was still enough that I could do some fall leaf cleaning. I don't really care if I get all the leaves cleaned up, but living in an area surrounded by oak trees means I'd be knee deep in leaves come spring if I just left them.  Plus in some places (if we don't clear them) they clog the snowblower and get really slippery to walk on. I'd rather not fall if at all possible. 

   I usually rake them out for the garden and then take the leaf blower to get them off into the woods. The problem with the leaf blower is that the battery is heavy and by the time I get done (and go through a few batteries) my dominant arm is pretty sore for awhile.

    It seems to me like I do a lot of leaf cleaning, but on most of my property I don't clean them. Mainly it's just in  a couple of my gardens, the decks and along the driveway. The wind (luckily) blows most of them off of the lawn, and the rest of the property is just left natural so the leaves can remain.

    Luckily that chore was finished on Sunday afternoon because that evening we had a dusting of snow. 

     I've almost completed my November chore list. Not that I made an actual list, but the list I had in my head. I'll have this same list come April (minus the winter tree) when it's time to switch the clothes from winter to summer and when the snow melts and the leaves need to be raked once again. 😏

   Before the Sunday evening flurries we had our first hard frosts last week. My roses that were still in bloom (on my climbing rose bush) a couple of weeks ago went from looking like this

to looking like this.

    I need a photo for T also. I did a bit of baking last week. I made some cranberry orange muffins which ended up tasting more like  cranberry orange scones (not the super hard kind of scones, but real scones). I guess these would be called scuffins. I'm not sure that's an actual word, but if not, it is now. 😏

    I also made some peanut butter chocolate chip cookies. I had one for a snack the day I made them and I included my Diet Coke with it in the photo for T this week.

   That's it for me. If you're in the US, I wish you a happy Thanksgiving this Thursday, and to everyone, now matter where you live, have a great T day and week ahead too.