Dreamflower's Mathom-house

(Cross-posted from hobbit_holidays)

Every year I try to come up with a new song from the Shire for Yule. This year's offering turned into something a little different!

A New Year's Game of the Shire
 
This is a game played on the first day of the New Year, which by the Shire Reckoning is called Second Yule. It's a popular feature at most New Year celebrations, and often even the adults will join in before the song ends.


The game is started by some of the children beginning to sing:


Now the year is spent,
We don't know where it went!
(A few children begin the game, holding hands and skipping forward in time to the song.)


Don't look for it behind;
A new one we must find!
Take my hand and help us look!
(At this they break apart and grab other children into the line, and then begin to skip once more. This is repeated after each chorus, so that the line gets longer and longer. The children may weave throughout the hole, and even go outdoors.)

It won't be in the larder,
It won't be under the bed.
Look for it a little harder--
No, it's not in the shed.

Don't look for it behind;
A new one we must find!
Take my hand and help us look!
(Repeat the actions of the chorus)

It isn't in the garden,
It's not up in a tree.
Oh, I beg your pardon,
Is it anywhere you can see?

Don't look for it behind;
A new one we must find!
Take my hand and help us look!
(Repeat the actions of the chorus)

Perhaps it's in tomorrow!
Is that what you say?
But the future we can't borrow;
Could it be here today?

Why, it's right here today!
Why, it's right here today!
We found it! We found it! Yay! Yay! Yay!
(The children drop hands and jump up and down at each "Yay!", and then fall to the ground at the end.)

This particular game is not played on any other day of the year, but may be played several times on that day.

Thank you to the_mad_hobbit for pointing me in the direction of this idea.



It's a tiny thing, but a good idea.

Watching the local news: in OKC an expectant mother in labor insisted on stopping at the polls to vote on the way to the hospital. She made it just in time, and gave birth to a little girl.

I made this on a whim!



I kind of imagine that if politics had never entered Hilary's life, she'd have been a lawyer who spent her work days doing pro bono work, and on Sundays she'd be active in the local UMC, and she'd probably be on a couple of the boards, and probably teach a Sunday School class. She'd probably bring fried chicken from the deli to the potlucks, because she wouldn't have much time for cooking. And even if she wasn't running for anything herself (and her husband wasn't--though it's harder for me to imagine Bill as non-political) she'd definitely be working hard to get the vote out locally, maybe even a poll worker or something.

So that's why I volunteered to do some calls for the Democratic candidate for County Clerk. And tomorrow I'm supposed to give a lady and her son a ride to the polls so that they can vote. It's not much, but it's a little way of showing my appreciation for all her hard work over the years.

We had a terrific Halloween!

I spent most of the day putting up the finishing touches on my hobbit lass costume. ( Read more... )

I just spent some time re-reading some of my favorite stories by mews1945 over at the old West of the Moon Archive.

Here is a link to my very favorite one:
In Frodo's Hands in which young Pippin spends time with his older cousin.

For any who are interested, 53 of her stories are posted there. I still miss WotM archive.

Kind of gloaty political stuff behind cut. If you like Trump, skip it.( Read more... )

1. I got a challenge up for October at the lotr_community! I was so upset that I did not get one up for September! I hope people will like this one! Very fitting for October.

2. Finally got to make my pickled cherry tomatoes.



These are all the ripe ones we had left, but we still have quite a lot of cherry tomatoes still on the vine!

3. We finished getting our Halloween decorations up! There are a few things we will wait until Halloween eve to put out, like our noisy ones and our animated ones, and we have some ideas for some new homemade ones.

4. I made something new for supper, a recipe I found in "Cooking Light" at the library: Black-eyed Pea Cakes with Corn Salsa and Sautéed Tomato and Onion KaleSpinach (Because I didn't have any kale and I like spinach better.) I accompanied the Pea Cakes, Corn Salsa and the Sautéed Spinach with a couple of small baked sweet potatoes.
It was a delicious meatless meal! And I think it would be perfect for New Year's Day!

BTW, I've been planning to post some pics of our sweet potato harvest.

These were harvested first:




A couple of weeks later:


This week (a couple of weeks after the previous harvest):



That's all of them!

5. This happy is really from yesterday, but it still makes me happy today (I couldn't resist watching it again), so for those of you who have yet to see it, Michelle Obama's speech in New Hampshire:



I love this woman so much--she is the best First Lady of my lifetime, and I go back to Eisenhower. Her classiness, strength and high standards are amazing.

I don't count the weekend, because I was too busy to count. So let's start with Monday.

1. Updates by three of my favorite authors at Stories of Arda.
2. We found a pretty Queen sized brass headboard at a local second hand/antiques store. It was going for $85, but the owner is letting us have it for $50 because we've been good customers over the years.
3. We went to Stillwater on our usual Monday errands, and also we found fall flowers: we picked up two 4-gallon mums, one yellow and one light rust, and two 4" mums in dark rust and white, and four 4" pansies, in white, light and dark purple and orange. I also picked up jelly jars to make cherry tomato pickles.
4. I finished the body of my crocheted blouse and am working on the border. I will soon be on the sleeves.
5. I went to knitting circle.

And today (Tuesday)

1. The DH and I quickly knocked out our morning housework, and went to pay for our new headboard. The owner's husband will deliver it tonight.
2. I picked up some groceries, and found two (only two left) 4-ounce juice glasses! My other two have been broken for a while, but it's hard to find glasses in that size. AND they are blue, which goes with our kitchen color scheme.
3. My co-writer and I made a LOT of progress on our "12 walkers" AU today. I thought her idea was wild when she proposed it, but I actually think it's going to be pretty good. The premise really does sound cracky, but it's not turning out that way.
4. We got out all the Halloween decorations. One of our homemade ones needs a little refurbishment, but the rest are in good shape. All our noisemakers and animated ones are working just fine! It's going to be fun getting them up this week.
5. We had tacos for supper. I cooked about three pounds of ground beef, saved some of it for the tacos and divided the rest up for the freezer. And I picked up some crunchy shells for myself at the store, since the DH can only eat soft ones, and we already had those.

I wasn't sure I'd have a post today. I was sick much of last night, and still felt crummy this morning, so I pretty much slept in my recliner until around noon. BUT some good things did happen!

1. I checked the bank online and was shocked to see two rather substantial DEPOSITS from SS. It wasn't our regular SS checks, those don't come until next Wednesday. It was something called post-adjust. Still, it added up to over $200.00! That was really needed, since we were going to be broke until Friday when our paychecks from work come in.
2. My wonderful DH! While I was feeling so bad, he changed the bed, dusted the floor and mopped, washed the dishes and did the laundry!
3. When I wasn't sleeping, I was watching YouTube: Eowyn is on WatchMoJo's list of top ten movie princesses, along with Buttercup!
4. "Dancing with the Stars" had a Cirque de Soleil theme tonight!
5. Cherry Limeade sherbert. Enough said.

I am still a wee bit under the weather, but I think a good night's sleep will help to set me right.