What I did on my Christmas Holiday...

What crazy, permie things did you all do over the Christmas Season? I'll start off with Monday evening's fun!

I'm visiting my sisters in Ontario for the holidays. I was sitting reading Monday evening after two days of lots of rain, when I heard a suspicious noise...

"No, not rain outside", said my brain. Stand up, wander towards where my brain says the noise is - Arrggghhhh... my sister's ceiling is leaking onto one of her chairs - steady drops, but onto fabric, so the sound was more of a 'thud' than a 'drip' - if that makes any sense!

Good thing I brought wind pants and a N95 mask, as I was now getting introduced to my Sister's attic and all it's lovely fiberglass insulation as I crawled oh so carefully towards the area in question. I found where it was dripping off a rafter and woman-handled a bucket under it.

The rain was slowing down, and we got a dusting of snow overnight, but not so much that her roofer couldn't come and patch the most likely spot and fix a few other iffy spots and charge her $400 for the visit.

Merry Christmas!

Ha Ha, Jay;
Good Job!
This is the price you pay for being a "handy" person!
This happens to me all the time, hey Tom while you're here would you look at this?
Or I see an issue (say a new water leak) and offer to investigate it.
Soon I find myself crawling into a dirty, wet, or hazardous environment... all at my own prompting!

All I can say is I would rather BE the handyman rather than call one.

Yup! I get it, too. "Hey! While you're here, can you help me figure out why ______ isn't working?" Or, "Will you fix this?" Or, "How do you ____?" I might be making repairs, teaching cooking/baking/crochet/nahlbinding/spinning/ embroidery/remedy making... OR it could be "My _______ hurts. Will you make something for it?"


One of the funnier things is actually 2 separate events, just over 3 decades apart; when my son (oldest child,  who was speaking in paragraphs at 18mos) was 3 & I was 23, he brought me a volume from our encyclopedia, and asked me, "Mom, will you teach me to read this, today?" I responded with, "I think it's going to take a little longer than just today, but yeah! I'll teach you!" 31 years & 3 home-schooled kids later, preparing for a less than 72hr visit, my youngest daughter, at about 24, asked, "Mom, will you teach me how to teach my boyfriend's son how to read?" I've been asked similar by friends and a sibling, who wanted to teach their children or grandchildren, too - but, the connection between my son's & daughter's requests, I though were both sweet and funny.

I remember my dad always packing his tools, for the 12 - 15hr trips for visits to Grandma Helen's, too. He knew there would always be something to fix, when he got there.

Way to go, Carla! To me, reading is such an important and basic skill.  I can't think of a better way to spend the Christmas Holiday! Unfortunately, not all kids learn how the same way, or with the same ease, so it isn't quite as easy as following a recipe for simple cookies. A public school teacher is trying to teach bunches of kids at once. Some one-on-one with someone looking at how the child is approaching the skill and what helps or doesn't, is priceless!