Wednesday, February 27, 2013

Matryoshka AKA Russian Nesting Dolls


            The other day I decided it was time to pack up my Russian Nesting Dolls (Matryoshka).  Eventually they will live in my bonus room (a room above the garage), which I am calling my collection's room.



I have always liked to collect things. At a garage sale when I was young I got a book of stamps and casually collected stamps. When I was older I turned my attention primarily to coin collecting (more on those when I get around to packing them) and Russian Nesting Dolls. In a few years my collection has grown very nicely.



             The Russian Nesting Doll is very simple. They are made from wood and each doll fits inside the others. I believe the first Russian Nesting doll was made in 1890 and was a set depicting a family. Traditionally there are five dolls in each set with the most basic being a set of Russian peasant girls. However there are sets that can have dozens of dolls (I don’t have any of those . . . . . . .yet). Also some sets are themed, like the sports dolls or the set I have of Czar Nicholas's family. The first set I ever had was a round set that consisted of the moon, sun, and planets.


A few of my sets:

This is a church set with each doll featuring different church designs. The center design is done by burning the wood rather than painting it.



The set of dolls with the blue hood is my most recent addition. I found them at a street fair in St. James, NY. What first got my attention was the baby (smallest doll). It is the smallest one I have and still painted with detail, an amazing talent. Here is also a close up of the three smallest dolls with a penny.



The set in this picture is one of my favorites. I bought it in Brighton Beach (Brooklyn, NY) a couple of years ago. Unfortunately I was told that the store I bought it at was damaged when hurricane Sandy blew her way through NY.


And finally this is a fun set that my Mom got me for Christmas last year. It is a set of five. The largest doll is a clown who can hold the two smallest dolls on his hands.


Saturday, February 16, 2013

My sister and I

So as we were packing the other day my Mom wrote this on one of the boxes:



Sadly, I didn't snap a picture of my Mom’s Red Riding Hoods before we packed them. They are a set of ceramic cookie jar and salt and pepper shakers. The cookie jars are numbered and they are adorable. The funny thing about this is the no fighting bit! As if she has to tell us that  :-)    


Meg and I are very close (we have to be since we are making monthly 1800 mile round trip drives). Meg is by far my best friend. Being twins has been awesome; it is like having a built in best friend since there has always been someone my age. We have also done everything together. I was thinking about this the other day. Part of why we get along was great advice my Mom and Dad drilled into our heads growing up every time we had fights. They would tell us, "Some day we will be gone and the only one who will know everything about you will be your sister. She will know more about you than anyone else: than your friends or your husband. She will know you better then everyone else. She will be the only one who knows what life was like as you were growing up.


            We took that advice to heart fully. I’m not saying we don’t fight. But when we do it doesn’t last very long. We will get snippy and then silent but pretty soon we are laughing and joking again. I think my parents gave us a great head start in a very important life lesson. There isn’t any material thing in this world worth fighting over. We can have different tastes and opinions and none of that is worth fighting over.  We can have friends and husbands who won’t get along and that isn’t worth fighting over either. 

Saturday, February 9, 2013

Nemo Found!

That went much better than I thought it would. I thought we would lose power for at least an hour or four. 


But we didn't lose it for even a minute. Shoveling wasn't so bad either. I shoveled early, then shortly before bed, and finally at four am I shoveled out my truck in case I had to go to work. ONce I knew I didn't have to go I made myself finish shoveling. We got 15 inches of snow (14.5 I'm rounding up)


Once it was all shoveled it was time to play. I won't miss the snow but I can't say the same about Schultzy. Her favorite game is to catch snowballs. If she misses them she actually looks to the ground to find them and eat them. Here she is catching a ball

and running around 

The good news for her is that every once in  awhile TN will get snow. The good news for me is that it melts quickly and hardly needs shoveling. 

Friday, February 8, 2013

Winter Storm Nemo

So a winter storm (or actually two combined into one)has moved into the area that could be dumping anywhere from 12-18 inches of snow on us. Makes me think I should move south . . . . oh wait- I am!!! We had snow early, then rain, then sleet, and now we are back to snow. It may fall as quickly as three inches each hour at some points.


Hopefully this is my last winter storm. I've shoveled once already and will do so again at least two more times and possibly more.

After hurricane Sandy we lost power for two weeks. And I am a little concerned we will lose power again. The snow is very wet and heavy and with winds up to 50 miles per hour (and LIPA's stupidity) I have little confidence that we won't lose power.

The best news is we should get a lot of packing done!

Monday, February 4, 2013

A little about me: I'm a Hockey fan


I am not just a hockey fan .... but one of the crazy kind of hockey fans. Which is why the fact that Nashville has a hockey team is very important to me.... not that I wouldn't find a way to see a game if they didn't.

Driving in the snow to Nashville made me think about some of the craziest things I have done as a hockey fan and I came up with three crazy trips.

1. When the movie Miracle came out about the 1980 USA hockey team I knew I had to go see it. The only problem was a slight blizzard blanketing the area of NH I was in. I mean we couldn't see much further than the hood of the car kind of snow. But when you gotta see a movie sometimes there is no choice. Our reward was a private viewing (well four other people braved the snow too but a theater of eight isn't bad).

2. A few years ago the Rangers were playing the Penguins in the playoffs. The series didn't look good and I was pretty sure the Rangers had played their last home game of the season. We had enjoyed the year and thought it was possibly the last NHL games (and definitely last game as Rangers for Jaromir Jagr and Brendan Shanahan). So we loaded the dog in the car and Meg, my Mom, and I drove to Pittsburgh with signs so that as the team bus pulled in we could hold them up. Then we drove home (listening to the game in the car). We meet some nice and entertaining Pittsburgh fans that day :-)

3. Finally the movie Slap Shot starring the great Paul Newman was filmed at least partly in the stadium used by the Syracuse Crunch (an AHL team). Well shortly after Newman passed away the Crunch had a celebration to retire  number 7 in honor of Newman's character Reg Dunlop. So what else could I do? Again my sister, Mom, and I jumped in the car and drove all the way to Syracuse to see a minor league hockey team honor a fictional character.

Sunday, February 3, 2013

Well that could have gone better



            It all started out great! We picked the van up at noon. Once we were home we put down the back seats and removed the middle seat and had lots and lots of space!





            I have been getting boxes from work and had estimated we would be able to fit 27 boxes! I am happy to say that estimate was correct (this time was a few less because I had two large chairs for my den/library. . . but in the future it will definitely be 30.



            We were off by eight and right on schedule. Schultzy was comfortable behind the driver's side seat and relaxing on her bed. Meg and I had used bungee cords to make a net so that in the event I had to  . . .say slam on my brakes. .  .. we would not have a flattened pooch!  We were on the jersey turnpike when a large 18 wheeler in front of me slammed on it’s brakes and twisted (I thought it was going to jack knife) luckily it did not but it did cause me to slam on my brake. Our netting worked . . .so that was a good test.







Then we hit the snow in  Pennsylvania and Maryland and Virginia and West Virginia . . .  not only was it snow but it was late night and for a chunk of it we were driving through mountains. The van did not handle very well in the snow and was slipping and skidding everywhere. The only good thing is that everyone was behaving (and that tells you how bad the conditions were). Everyone was driving about 10-15 miles per hour in a single file line in the right lane. We were using the treads of the car in front as a guide, especially because we couldn’t see the painted lines.  Then the maintenance required light came on in the van (roughly about 400 miles into what was 2000 mile round trip drive). Then another light came on. This one was a yellow triangle with an exclamation point in it. We looked in the glove compartment. .  .  .you know where people normally keep the manual . . .nothing! A quick google search told us that the symbol meant the tires were having traction issues. . . . .which we already knew! I am now very comfortable in a skid. Eventually we pulled over to rest and wait for daylight when plows would be out to start clearing the highways. 

As if enough had not gone wrong yet we had a new issue. The windshield wiper fluid wasn’t working. We guessed that the van (so close to a 3000 mile check up was probably out of fluid) Meg bought a gallon and we filled it up, it took the whole gallon. Unfortunately that didn’t help. While the street was still wet I used passing trucks as washer fluid. Every time my windshield needed to be cleaned off I pulled up to the corner of the truck until the wheels threw off enough moisture to clean my windshield. Once the street was dried up I had to pull over to clean my windshield.

I should have gotten to my house in TN around 11 or noon. . . . we got there around four. We emptied the van and went right to sleep.

As we had been driving to TN we had been checking the weather to see if it was possible to stop and wait out the storm. We discovered one very important fact. There was another storm coming on Saturday for almost our entire route once again.  This meant that we had to leave at midnight. This way we could try and stay ahead of the storm.  We were pretty successful too! We managed to out run the storm (literally at one point we could see the threatening clouds to our left, a few times we had light flakes, and eventually we saw staged plows along the highway) until we got to Dauphin county in PA. The snow wasn’t as hard as the night before so I didn’t skid as badly.

We got home around 8pm. The next morning we cleaned the car and brought it back. At the office I told them about the maintenance light and the other light. I told the woman at the counter that I looked for the manual but couldn’t find it. Her response . . . . . “Oh yeah they usually hid it in the back so people don’t steal it.”   Is that a big issue. . . people stealing manuals. .  . . and if you are going to hide it why even bother putting it there in the first place?

Hopefully next trip will go better . .. timing and weather wise.