Friday Things #466
1. I hope you all had a fabulous holiday season and that it brought you peace, joy, and contentment. The kids enjoyed all of the magic that comes along with Christmas ❤️
2. I owe you an update on Dominic! The last time we chatted, I told you that Dominic was being switched to a different immunotherapy treatment but that it could be done in Pittsburgh.
WELL, it CAN, but Pittsburgh’s oncology unit was full for all of the remainder of December and in January, so we had to return to New York for Dominic to receive that treatment the week after Christmas. We left home late afternoon on Christmas day, Dominic was inpatient and receiving treatment Monday through Friday, and then we returned home on New Year’s Eve afternoon.
Dominic handled everything pretty well, a few mild side effects and a lost appetite for a few days, but all in all, it went very well. We will return in a couple of weeks for the next round, after which he will have another full-body scan and bone marrow biopsy.
3. It was nearly 50 degrees and rained so much here yesterday; I kept dreamign it was 30 degrees colder and loads of snow! We got a little bit of snow the week before Christmas, but nothing substantial; what about where you live?
4. What have you done with old photo albums? My mom moved five months ago and gave me boxes of my old photo albums, mostly pictures from middle school, high school, and college, and the boxes have been sitting in the corner of my closet ever since. I have no desire to store them (I hadn’t seen them in probably ten years!), but will I regret just getting rid of them? Should I digitize them?
5. I still haven’t seen The Great British Baking Off, but this list of 15 British Baked Sweets You’ll Want to Try makes me want to binge it! Do you have a favorite British dessert? Mine so far is sticky toffee pudding!
6. Do you have to declutter on your list of to-do’s this year? If so, this list of 20 “First Step” Decluttering Ideas might be a good place to start! My current Achilles heel is my side of the office; it’s a disaster, and I hate walking in there. I need to rip off the band-aid and get to it!
7. Burning question – do you ever quit books? I’m not sure that I ever have, but I’ve gone through a couple of books recently that just seem to take FOR-EV-ER to finish and I’m not anxious to open them up and see what happens next. I don’t like the idea of quitting a book, because it MIGHT get good (I found The Nightingale slow until I was about ½ to ⅔ through the book, and then it flew and I loved it), but I also feel like I could be moving on to something else I can’t put down! Weigh in please 😊
8. A good read >> Why Talking to Stragers is Good For You, Them and All of Us
9. I’m so sad I have to wait until the summer to pick up on Yellowstone again! Beth and Jamie, gah! BUT, we’ve been loving Tulsa Kind and 1923, both are awesome. We also watched The Stranger on Netflix, a good suspenseful show that we both enjoyed. We also started watching All Creatures Great and Small on BritBox when we’re between shows or waiting for a new episode to drop.
10. TGIF! These two snuggle SO much, I can’t get enough…
Continued prayers for your Dominic
I have followed your posts for some time but have never commented. This one about your family and specifically your son, touched my heart! I have three grown and healthy sons and am grateful every day for their lives entangled with mine. I love them so much! I will continue to follow your posts more often and will be praying for your son.
Don’t worry about reading every book to the end – sometimes the book I read before it was so good the current book just never peeked my interest (tried reading it again a year or so latter and enjoyed it)
Some books on the second try ended up in the eek pile. Reading is the important thing it’s good for your brain and sets an excellent example for your children.
(I read the Harry Potter books to my son every night before bed – when the first movie came out he told me he liked the Hogwarts his brain saw better than the movie one)
I def quit books sometimes…life is too short ;) also, love the British dessert list!
Sending all the healing thoughts to Dominic.
What a truly wonderful picture of your beautiful children! Thank you for the update on Dominic, continued prayers for him and you.
HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!! Have you sent Dominic a happy card lately? Let’s keep his spirits up.
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Please send cards to: Dominic Lettrich. PO Box 597, Wexford, PA 15090
Continuing prayers for Dominick and your entire family.❤
Happy New Year to you and your family! Cheering for Dominic, and praying you all have a year of good health.
I struggle with the book-quitting too! I almost always power through something even if I don’t enjoy it much, but then end up thinking… isn’t the point of reading for pleasure, to enjoy it? I loved this article about the matter and thought you might as well!
https://www.self.com/story/quitting-books-shows-you-dont-like
Hello Michelle, so glad to here that everyone is doing well, expecially Dominic,
wishing you all the best for 2023, keeping trusting God.
MAY THIS YEAR AND THE ONES TO FOLLOW BE FILLED WITH HEALTH, JOY, PROSPERITY AND PEACE…
IT’S ”SO” GOOD TO SEE YOUR BELOVED KIDS ESPECIALLY LITTLE DOMINIC WHO LOOKS SO MUCH HEALTHIER THAN BEFORE… IT SEEMS TO ME OUR CONTINUOUS PRAYERS WILL SEND HIM HOME VERY SOON HEALTHIER THAN BEFORE….
GOD BLESS YOU ALL AND THANK YOU FOR THE UPDATES!
Continuing prayers for good health for your family!
I highly recommend the Great British Baking show. It’s the nicest, most supportive “competition “ show ever. The level of talent in a lot of the home cooks is incredible! Nice, relaxing TV to watch :)
Thank you for the update on Dominic, he is a real trooper. I am sending healing thoughts and prayers his way. As far a reading goes I give a book 25-50 pages tops and if it doesn’t grab me I put it down. There are too many good books in the world to read a book that does not grab you. I am with you on sticky toffee pudding so delicious. If you find yourself on Grand Cayman make sure you eat at the Calypso Grill, their sticky toffee pudding is so delicious and so is the rest of their food.
Michelle, I love seeing your precious children smiles! We are keeping Dominic in our prayers for his next journey of tests! He’s such a Super Hero! Keeping your beautiful family in our prayers. May each day be a blessed day! 🙏
Thank you so much for the update.
Blessings and prayers to you and your family.
So glad that Dominic is doing well! Please tell him how proud we are of him.
Yes, you may regret throwing out old pictures. My mother-in-law passed away 4 years ago. Finally this year I have made it a goal to go through the 5 totes of pictures and written records, and make a book of memories for the family. My husband is reading through old records and has actually found a distant cousin living only 5 miles from us. It will be a year long project, but we are learning and enjoying so much!
Michelle thanks for the update! Love hearing how everything is going and praying daily for Dominic and your family. One of my sisters ended up with most of our family photos when my mom passed. She was going to organize them for us and that was 12 years ago Ha!
That forever.com website sounds like it might be a good one.
I also have quit books but I am not a very avid reader either.
Glad to hear you had a lovely Christmas. You have beautiful children. Thank you for your update on Dominic. Brave boy. One more trip/infusion down. Praying for perseverance, strength, and encouragement each new day.
The Lord Bless your entire family.
*Declutter ideas make sense. Of course those aren’t my areas. The
Terrifying office is (can barely walk in to sharpen my pencil! LOL)
*Im trying to decide about all my family photos as well. Until then…they’re in boxes..IN the office!
*Why we need to talk to strangers. I loved ALL of those reasons. I do try to implement many of those comments when I’m in a store, Etc. Profound statement that once we leave home ‘everyone’ is a stranger!!
Btw, I’ve been retired 1 1/2 yrs, my husband. 2 months. By this time next year we will have NO EXCUSES for all of our clutter!! Wink wink!!
As for your old photo albums, I say keep them. A few years ago, we had a major high school class reunion and so many of us that kept our old photo albums brought them and really enjoyed them. We also had a video running that a classmate had put together, but the actual photo albums were a hit. On occasion, my daughter will sit down with photo albums from her growing up years and it is a blast. I am personally glad that I have kept my actual photo albums. Take care!
Glad to hear Dominic made through chemo with little side effects.
For books , I would say if you are not totally interested in it don’t keep it. Maybe just stick to your favorite author if you have one .
Thank you for your list of British deserts. I love The Great British Baking Show!
Life is too short to read a book or books you are not interested in reading. Put it/them down and move on to something better.
As for the photo albums… if you simply cannot deal with them, just throw them away. Your time with your kids is more important than agonizing over the past.
Same thing for books… don’t give your time to something unworthy.
I’m so glad Dominic is doing well!
Glad to hear that Dominic made it through treatment okay. Continued prayers for him and your family. The weather here (SE Mass.) is all over the place! Snowed 2 nights ago, started raining last night and still is now but tomorrow back down to the 30s and they’re calling for maybe 1-3 inches of snow. My old photos are mainly in shoeboxes (very few actual albums!) in a closet in a rarely used bedroom. They’ve moved from house-to-house-to house like that for years! As for books, I have definitely stopped reading some books because I just can’t get into them and I figure that there are so many other, better books out there just waiting for me to read them.
Beautiful family. Keeping Dominic-all of you—in my prayers. Regarding photos, I am going through years of them, throwing away blurry ones (why I ever kept them is beyond me), duplicates, etc., keeping only the special ones. Regarding books—I have finally allowed myself to stop reading ones I don’t enjoy. There are too many good ones to be read. I recall going to a play which my husband and I did not enjoy. People were leaving like crazy but we felt obligated to stay (the tickets were expensive) and I felt badly for the performers. We did leave at intermission.
I’m glad to hear that Dominic is getting through this latest round so well.
We got snow here (NE Illinois) and blistering cold the day before Christmas and it lasted for 2-3 days. Since then it’s been 40s-60s. At least until 2 days ago. Since then it’s been in the 30s and we got snow flurries last night and early this morning. It’s more like November around here than January.
Yes, I have quit books. If the book doesn’t suck me in and I have a hard time reading it and getting in to it I’ll quit it at a certain chapter or number of pages. I all depends on the size of the book. I struggled with Girl With the Dragon Tattoo and gave up on it after 150 pages. I don’t do it often.
I 100% quit books! Life is too short to spend reading a bad book! If I have to struggle through a book, I end up just not reading at all and that’s definitely not a good thing. I keep a “did-not-finish” list on Goodreads to keep track of them so I don’t get sucked back in!
;)
Continued prayers for Dominic and your whole family!
Michelle, an answer to your albums, you should select all the pictures that are special to you and digitize them, put them in a book. There are several companies that do this for you. And you can add the captions to the photo. We have done this and it wonderful.
I read a lot and my rule is if at about 100 pages, if I’m just not into the story, I stop. There are so many books to read why slug thru something your not enjoying. Have you read The Lido, by Libby Paige? It’s a cute story.
Love the smiles on the children at Christmas.
Love and hugs to them all.
Sue
Those photos are both a joy and a burden. I finally had mine scanned and archived the photographs. In retrospect, I should have edited them before scanning as there were duplicates and others I really didn’t need to keep. Keep a simple data base of the the scans so you can print or email them as needed to friends and family. And we are thinking of your family and praying for your son’s recovery.
Love seeing your beautiful children! Continued prayers for your family.
I received several bins of old photos from my parents. I had them digitalized. I kept the photos as well but they are now a lot more organized.
I go through these phases with reading too. I just finished the seven husbands of Evelyn Hugo and loved it so much!
I would keep the albums, but if you do not have room for them, then definitely digitize them. I am a Creative Memories consultant and many other consultants use a company called FOREVER. They do all sorts of things for digitizing your photos and can even convert old VHS and Reel to Reel and audio tapes. You then have them saved in your account where you own it Forever. They are different from say Google photos, which I do use also. I have had these converted with phenomenal results. Just go to forever.com and check them out.
Love your pics of the kiddos, they are growing up fast. Thanks for the update on Dominic, he looks great. He’s in my daily prayers (along with another little guy in Louisville, he had a bone marrow transplant before Christmas). I hope & pray you & your family life will get back to normal soon. May God give you strength to cope with your difficulties at present. Take care of yourself. (Love Isabelle sparkly shoes).
Dominic looks wonderful! Praying for him every day!
A happy, healthy New Year to you and your family!!!!! Keep the old photos! Your children will be happy you did! My adult children are 37 and 40. They truly wish they had hard copies of my photos from childhood and as adult!
Photos are hand held, just as books from Library at Alexandria are now held at Library of Congress!!!
My oldest son’s first grade teacher told him there are too many good books out there; if you’re not loving the book you’re reading it’s ok to set it aside and pick a new one. I found that soooo freeing!
God is so GOOD! The Blessings going on with your family and Dominic! I will continue to pray for all Blessings and healing for Dominic! Have the strength that only the Lord can give!
For years I have tried different white bread recipes and had little to no good results. That was u til I tried your everyday white bread recipe that makes 2 loaves at a time. From the first time and since, this bread ALWAYS turns out great. The taste is wonderful too. I’m so happy to have a go to bread recipe that I know will be successful every time! Thank you so much for sharing that recipe.
I continue to keep Dominic in my prayers.
Clutter? I have lots! I especially need to get to my basement to just throw away junk! I seem to throw things down there just to get them out of the way and then they just stay there and are forgotten.
I hope 2023 is full of health, happiness and prosperity for you and your family.
I used to think that once I started a book, I had to finish it. But life is short. Now my rule is, I’ll read the first 100 pages. If it still hasn’t caught my interest, it’s time to move on to something else.
Thank you and your sweet children and furry family for allowing their pictures to be shared.
Yes, I have “quit books”. It is rare, but I remember what a Book Club friend one said-there are way too many books out there waiting for me to read to waste precious time on one that does not hold my attention. And she is right! Not All books are for everyone no matter what the critics say.
Hang on to those pictures—-some cold, snowy day, you may have time to look through and smile.
Thank you, too, for keeping us updated on Dominic’s progress. You are all still in our prayers. Wishing everyone a happy year ahead.
So happy to hear Dominick is doing well. The kids are getting so big! Wishing your family all the best things this year.
Oh and there are WAY too many good books to stick with a not good one. If you don’t have me in 50 or so pages or 15% usually I quit.
Yes I will occasionally quit a book. My time is too important to waste on a book that doesn’t grab me. Sometimes reviews are deceptive. Book descriptions often leave out key aspects too. It’s like that box of chocolates—you never know what you’re gonna get! If it’s that Brazil nut one that makes your throat swell up, toss it and move on! 😆 Too many good books out there still waiting to be read!
So thankful Dominic is on the right path. As far as putting down a book, It happens, Emily Giffin is one author I love to read they are addictive her books. i live in central west FLORIDA we had no power Christmas day my birthday the air conditioner froze it was in the low 20′ windy, Just moved from south Florida where its a totally jungle climate going to have to buy warmer clothes to live here..We have to drive 2 or more hours for medical care this is a retirement extreme rural area with lots of animals and fresh vegetables not no quality medical care. HAPPY NEW YEAR…
I really like the new show Will Trent. Watched The Mayfair Witches, not sure yet if I’ll keep watching it. I follow the author Jeff Wheeler, I like that type of fantasy stories.
I love getting your blog updates and praying for the best outcome for your family.
I bought my daughter who is around your age the book “The Measure”. She told me the other night that she started reading it before bed and couldn’t put it down. It’s by Nikki Erlick.
Thanks for keeping us posted on Dominic!
Yes, I definitely quit books- I can’t stand it when it becomes a nagging “to-do” that never gets done or clutter on my nightstand. I donate those books to the library for someone else to love.
My mom and my grandparents gave me tons of old photo albums and loose pictures (by the thousands). I started digitizing them slowly, then uploading them to Office365 and sharing the links with family so everyone had the same set of pictures. I took them all out of the albums and didn’t put them back, mostly because those old albums fell apart anyway. The really old photos I’ve kept. The rest I didn’t- they can take over your entire house!
If you had asked me a year ago I would have told you to persevere through the book. However, in the last year I’ve stopped reading several books because they were slow, uninteresting, pedantic, or just not my cup of tea. Reading is my favorite way to unwind and my time is valuable, so if I’m not enjoying the book it was not time well spent and I could have been doing something else I don’t enjoy-like cleaning my office. 🤣
I TOTALLY quit books that I don’t like. There’s no upcoming test, and no requirement to finish a book I don’t like. I only have a limited time to read and I’m not wasting it.
Thank you for the update on Dominic. I continue to pray for his healing.
Thank you for the encouraging update on Dominic, I love seeing your children’s smiling faces and seeing how much they have grown. So glad to hear Dominic is doing well.
You mentioned old photographs and what to do with them. Well, after holding onto many photos over the years and inheriting even more, we finally discarded the majority of them. We saved meaningful ones, but do not regret discarding them.
I have given up only on one book not out of tedium, but rather the subject matter was too gruesome in nature. I have slogged through some real losers though and remind myself that my time is important so I do skim through chapters. 😉