Quilts

For some years now my wife has been making quilts. Most of these quilts have been donated to Access Community Health and designated for their perinatal clients (I think that is medical speak for a woman around the time of birth. The prefix peri refers to around the time of). The quilts are about the size of a lap quilt. This is a story of her quilting for charity.

One benefit of her organizing and reorganizing what she organized is that she took stock of scrap material she had from her many years of sewing quilts, and clothes. Frugal with her fabric, she cut the fabric into pieces to make quilts. This is just like it was done in the old days when quilt making was an pioneer way to use fabric scraps, to make something useful. We purchase the batting and she uses larger pieces of fabric for the back of the quilt. In some of her quilts I could recognize pieces of fabric which brought back memories of their use, mainly in clothes or items for our sons, although she recalled much more than I did. The quilts are well liked at Access Community Health. Her first donation was to Hospice, but they never again contacted her after her initial donation so they apparently lost interest. She came across someone who works for Access Community Health and she has been making the quilts for that organization, specifically the perinatal care unit ever since. Access Community Health will take all she can make. 

It looks like a tackling dummy
but it is batting for the homemade quilts

The high demand for the quilts poses a couple problems. First, she has run out fabric and scraps and has depended on fabric received from other people like friends, cousin, her mother, and some of her mother's friends. That supply ran out. Access Community Health so wants the quilts they took up a fabric collection for her and awhile back dropped off a few big boxes of fabric that she is now using. Not all fabric is useable for such a quilt, however.

On 29 November they contacted her and told her they were down to four quilts, and wondered if she had more. Luckily she had a supply ready to go, which they picked up the same day. Access Community Health delivers 20 to 45 babies per month. A quilt seems to be offered to the perinatal clients and some will take a quilt, others not. As only females and nurses can do, the staff at Access Community Health ooh and aah over the quilts, because they can become a prized possession to a young mother and her infant child. My wife was told that her quilt was the only covering one mom had for her newborn, which was wrapped in the quilt when the mom and baby came to appointments. 

Quilts awaiting pickup, 29 Nov 2023

So far, my wife has donated 284 quilts, of which 264 of those went to Access Community Health and the perinatal clinic.  (This is those that have been kept track of, the total may well be greater.) This keeps her down in the basement, I refer to it as her dungeon, for good parts of many days. It is for a good cause. It also keeps her out of my hair for a bit of time. As the saying goes: "A retired wife is a husband's full time job." Or, do I have that saying backwards?

On 9 Dec she saw a post on Facebook Marketplace of a person selling a homemade quilt; it turned out to be one of her homemade quilts which she had donated to Agrace Hospice. The woman said she bought it at a quilt sale. Her handmade quilts have obtained buyer status. Apparently the family who received the quilt, or Hospice itself, sold the quilt to make a few dollars.

Quilts are cozy and comforting, wrapping infants, children and adults to keep them warm on cold days of the long winter. It is like comfort food. It is a great gift, from a hearty and kind soul, to welcome an infant into the world.

Fourth Week

The week of Dec 17 we celebrate the third week of Advent. Next week, or to be more precise, one day we celebrate the fourth week of Advent. The fourth week of Advent is like me, a middle child. We are always squeezed by the older siblings and younger siblings, and the fourth week of Advent is squeezed between the end of the third week and Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Because Christmas falls on Monday this year, the fourth week of Advent is a day, just one day. Yet, the 4th Sunday of Advent is a religious event, not a secular event, so it is not even a day. It is, maybe, 16 hours. I came up with sixteen hours as the time from midnight to 4 pm; why 4pm?  Four in the afternoon happens to be the time when a mass, in this situation Christmas Eve mass, counts to Christmas Day. So, sixteen hours maximum. By the church calendar, the fourth week gets short shifted, just like a middle child. If a household has an Advent wreath, that wreath, I suspect, is only lite during the evening meal, not at breakfast or at lunch. Many persons now start celebrating Christmas on Christmas Eve, and Christmas Eve is the 4th Sunday of Advent. It does not take a genius to know what takes precedence. It is not lighting that fourth purple candle. As a middle child, I can certainly sympathize with the fourth purple candle. 

Advent Wreath, Google Images

Middle children, are well, caught in the middle. But, that allows us to build resilience. We are not used to attention, and we go on working hard and doing what is required of us. Yet, there are more practical ways in which we middle children were affected. In terms of clothes, got both hand me-downs and hand me-ups. For my college graduation, I wore the suit my younger brother wore to his 8th grade graduation. One thing about us middle children, we were at the vanguard of the reuse movement. In society today, there are fewer and fewer middle children, and our general culture may well be the worse for it.

The fourth Sunday of Advent, gets little attention. The first week of advent is exciting as we prepare for Christmas, and that carries over to the second week. Then comes the third week of rejoicing as the day draws near. Heck, the third week even gets its own special Advent color candle--rose, or pink. Then there is that fourth week  of Advent, ignored as much as a middle child, but still resilient in playing its role no matter how short its week is. It really does not get much respect, either by people, or even the Liturgical Calendar. Middle children have their own day, August 12. This choice speaks a great deal, as it is only a five days after the middle of the summer solstice. I am not sure who made this selection, but I guess it is better than 3 Feb, which is halfway through the winter solstice and the day after Groundhog's day. 

Malcom in the Middle, he may be the most famous 
middle child, due to the television show.
I only saw part of the show once or twice

Of course, last year Christmas was on a Sunday, which meant there was a whole week of days of the fourth week of Advent, but since Christmas Eve was on a Saturday, it really fell a day short. I am not sure the fourth week of Advent is able to build much resilience since its days change so regularly. Next year, because of a leap year, the fourth Sunday of Advent will be three days. Maybe Pope Gregory, when setting the Gregorian Calendar (went into effect in 1582), decided to throw an extra day to the fourth week of Advent. Although that is countermanded by the leap year of 2028, as in 2028 we will be in the same situation as this year--Christmas on a Monday, and the fourth week of Advent being less than one day. Like a middle child, the fourth Sunday of Advent just cannot get a break. 

Yet, like us middle children, the Rodney Dangerfield's of the family, the fourth Sunday of Advent, the Rodney Dangerfield of Advent, keeps showing its resilience, by showing up every year, no matter how short it is celebrated. Here is to the 16 hour celebration of the fourth week of Advent. May its star shine bright in its short lifespan. 

Alexa Weather

Last week Friday night, my wife was already in bed, and while I was in the bathroom to get ready for bed. While brushing my teeth, I could hear Alexa going on about something, but I could not understand what the device had to say. When I got in bed the wife tells me we are to get almost a half inch of rain that night. This was a surprise, since I had just looked at my weather app and it said to expect up to quarter inch. Why did it all of a sudden double?

The comedy resulted when my wife tried to get Alexa to reinforce her earlier statement about near a half inch of rain. She must have asked varied versions of "Alexa, when is it going to rain?" which sometimes triggers and amount, but Alexa did not provide an amount. She then tried something like: "Alexa, how much rain are we supposed to get?" That only elicited the response that it might rain and what ever percent chance. I think it was on the wife's fifth try when Alexa finally gave an amount. It was .24 inches. This aligned with up to a quarter inch my weather app had. I am not sure what had me laughing more, her questioning of Alexa that Friday night, or the incompetent and poor play of the Packers on Monday night against the Giants. The Packer team as a whole was a comedy of errors. 

Alexa device

Weather apps are not always accurate and neither is Alexa. Perhaps, it is near several weeks ago when it was cloudy and looked threatening, and had rained, and I looked at the weather app for rain, and it said for the next few hours about 17%. My wife went for a walk with her walking partner and I left on my bike ride. I got to Lussier Center and turned around and a few minutes later it started to rain. So much for an 83% chance that it would not rain in my vicinity. It would be my luck.

I hurried home, to avoid getting too cold. I thought the wife would already be home, but she was not. I was well soaked and had to dry my shoes and orthotics not to mention the clothes I had worn biking. I am hanging my wet clothes up in the basement to dry when the wife arrives home. Unbeknownst to me she and her walking partner had changed their route. I think the first thing she says to me is she heard my cough when she was walking down Exchange St, and without a stop says, "I saw you blow through that intersection." "That intersection" is the main four way stop in town by the Gazebo. The worst part was her tone and the look. Because they changed their walking route, I was caught blowing through the intersection. I think I would have been better off if a constable had stopped me.

The intersection I blow through

There are times when she is pretty much right on. For example, one time I asked when it was going to rain, and the device responded, "Rain is expected in five minutes." And sure enough, in five minutes it was raining. The best part is when asking for the wind speed. "It is breezy right now with winds at 2 mph, and expect a light breeze today at 12 mph." I still don't know who 2 mph is breezy and 12 mph is a light breeze.

And, just last night, my wife is sure she heard Alexa say the low was about 29, when in fact when the 6 am weather had it as 18 degrees. Now, these two scenarios point to one of two, although possible a combination of issues: 1) that Alexa can be wrong, or 2) that the wife needs her hearing checked. I can already hear her reaction! It will be worse than her stifling comment when she said, I saw you blow through that intersection." Ouch!

I have come to believe that Alexa is appropriately a female in both voice and name.  After all, when I play question of the day she rattles on about varied things at the end, trying to get me to join some trivia club, or see if I am smarter than a fifth grader. I am not sure what weather device she uses for her information, but perhaps it needs an upgrade.

The Team

A few years after my mom died in 1980, my dad remarried a woman named Barbara. Dad was generally known by his middle name Bernard. At the time, the A-Team television show, with Mr T, was a hit, although I never watched it, even I heard about it. At that point I started calling them the B-Team. Some of my siblings and their spouses became teams--L-Team, J-Team, P-Team. My wife and I became known as the T-Team, which we use in our common email address. While we are under the radar, so to speak a new T-Team is making waves throughout the country.

Last night, before going to bed I suggested to my wife that there is a new T-Team, Tay and Trav. She seemed perplexed for a bit who Tay and Trav are, and I wondered if it would be up to me to explain the current cultural phenomenon that certain people can not get over. It is a sad situation if I am the one who has to explain a cultural trend. 

Last week it came out that the nation's newest power couple, that he calls her by a shortened version of her name Tay, and last night, some Green Bay Packer post I see on Facebook had her referring to her male friend in a shortened version of his name-Trav. These nicknames have been referred to as sweet. I think, how original. But the fashionistas who clamor over such stuff, and go gaga, over this new power couple. Of course, I am referring to the new T-Team--Taylor Swift, an award winning singer-musician, and Travis Kelce, a tight end for the World Champion Kansas City Chiefs, and the favorite target of THE BEST QB in the WORLD, Patrick Mahomes. I am not sure how many times they referred to the Chiefs as world champions. Which is kind of odd, because, as far as I know, every team in the NFL is from the United States. But, marketing does such things.

Taylor must be important, or at least to Time magazine, who identified her as their Person of the Year. I just saw that this morning, so I am not sure if it is related to Trav at all or not. Trav has made headlines in his own right, and he and his brother and mother became a phenom of sorts during the Super Bowl last year as Trav's brother Jason plays for the Philadelphia Eagles, who lost to KC in the Super Bowl. The mother, who has made sure to garner more than 15 minutes of fame sucked that all in and now even appears in a vaccine commercial with Travis. 

A cultural phenomenon even I am aware of
Source: Google Images

For much of this football season one could not get news on a football game without hearing about Taylor and Travis and what games she may attend. I think things got rather dicey when she upstaged Patrick Mahome's wife, but things were apparently patched over as they now share the same luxury box. I suppose the NFL did not wish a fit to occur between the wife of THE BEST QB in the WORLD, and their now world famous tight-end. They shared a luxury box at Green Bay last Sunday night. A former KC Chief player did not like Travis spending part of his bye-week in South America while Taylor was on tour. 

Before, the game, I was wondering if the number of times NBC would show Ms Swift would turn into a drinking game. I watched the whole game, perhaps a first for this year, and only saw one instance where they focused on the luxury box containing Taylor and her entourage. Taylor is so important, that she arrived with her entourage an hour before game time, when it was snowing, in two large black SUV's at the loading dock of Lambeau Field. I am not sure what is worse going through the check in line, or being dumped at a loading dock. I don't know if Green Bay put out the red carpet for her or not. Monday morning, the local newscaster played part of the song "Lady in Red" and reported on some fashionista web site who tracks such things, about Taylor Swift arriving at Lambeau Field in a flowing red coat. She appeared to have a black outfit on in her box. Meanwhile, it was reported that there was a fan frenzy over Taylor Swift at Green Bay's Lambeau Field, which you can see in this news report. As an aside, in that news report, when it shows her walking at Lambeau, I swear it is Matt LaFleur walking behind her from left to right. I think he was wondering what the fuss was all about. He just went up a notch in my mind.

L: Tay and Brittany Mahomes in Lambeau Luxury box
R: Simone Biles on the Field

What is little said, is that Green Bay QB Jordan Love, outplayed THE BEST QB in the WORLD, and did it facing a better defense than the one THE BEST QB in the WORLD faced in the Joe Barry led Green Bay Packer defense. The broadcast team really liked to focus on Patrick as the THE BEST QB in the WORLD. They may not use that exact phrase, but that is what they mean. They were so wanting some penalties so he could direct a KC comeback that was not to be. The referees apparently not getting the message from the NFL Commissioner and Swiftie fan Roger Goodell. Roger has enjoyed the attention the NFL has obtained by the nation's newest power couple. Me not so much. Luckily, I only had to take one shot of brandy in my drinking game of how often they showed Taylor. 

As an after thought, the NBC broadcast team then mentioned that Jonathan Owens, a back up safety for GB, is married to Simone Biles. Simone Biles is the most decorated, and perhaps greatest gymnast ever. Which is saying a great deal given how many Soviet Bloc gymnasts were very good. I guess this shows that to the adoring American public musical talent overshadows athletic talent. Simone was on the field at Lambeau to watch her husband play. I suppose if a player careened off the field, she could do vault right over him. I suppose I have heard a Taylor Swift song, but I have to say I probably would not recognize it. 

Jordan Love's girlfriend and Mother
at 2021 Packer game in Kansas City
Described by even Chief fans as worst seats in the house.

Simone on the field, and Taylor in a luxury box. Two years ago Jordan Love had his first start as an NFL QB (his only start until this season) when the Packers played at Kansas City. His mother was present to watch the game, but was placed at the top seat level of the stadium, and I don't mean a luxury box. Quite a contrast to where Brittany Mahomes and Tay watched Patrick and Trav play in Green Bay this past Sunday night.

Jordan Love's comment on his mother's seat 
during the 2023 GB-KC game at Lambeau Field

While Tay and Trav may become known as the T-Team, I can say we have had that moniker for over 34 years. I heartily welcome this power couple as another T-Team, as long as they don't try to fly under the radar more than my wife and I.