On the Edge of the End…. An update since it’s been a while

So a lot of us were impacted in one way or another by the pandemic. It was a shock for sure. I had so many plans for 2020 as we all did most likely and in a moments time it all just came to a halt. When the whole world locked down me and my husband and countless others fortunate not to lose our essential working jobs kept working draining ourselves and in no way am I counting myself anywhere near the nurses and doctors on the front line as they were impacted far worse.

 

By May of 2020 I had to take a leave of absence from my job to work on my mental and physical wellbeing. It’s hard to work in a place when the world had seemed to have gone crazy and people all around you could be sick and you’re trying to keep shelves packed and the carts you bring out are swamped by desperate people and you are caught in the melee. The greed and desperations running rampant drained me a lot so I took a small break.

 

By June of 2020 I was back to work but still feeling the strain of things. My husband Anthony got covid in November of 2020. Two days later I got it even though I tried to quarantine separate after we found out he had it but I got it anyway. We tried to do the right thing mask, sanitizer, wash hands ect but somehow it wasn’t enough and we had got it. At the highest my temperature reached 102.9 and it was just awful, but we pulled through. The aftereffects are just as crippling at times including the fear of crowds for me and I often just can’t concentrate or stay to doing the same thing for long periods of time and exhaustion as well. As well not taking care of my health by eating properly and exercising.

 

The desire to craft, blog, read or write just went away most likely from burn out and stress. We still hadn’t seen family except quick socially distanced stops for a few mins and they were rare and our Christian meetings up until early 2022 to protect everyone had been on Zoom. So March 2020 to April 2022 it was all done on zoom.

 

Then came the vaccine and it’s a personal choice and after some talk my husband and I got the vaccine in the end of April 2021 and it affected Anthony pretty bad and he wound up in the ER with 103 temp that was not budging. Finally, with that under control we got back to life. I think the vaccine was a good idea for our family I just wish Anthony hadn’t gotten so sick the first day. Then in 2021 the cat I rescued when he was a baby, Tommy, suddenly passed away from a heart attack at the age of 14. He was with my parents. 

 

Now here we are April of 2023, vaccinated and boosted, and roughly 3 years from the first lock down and I’ll say I really do hope things go back to normal soon, most have but not everything. For the first 2 years it was scary hearing of the new variants popping up and equally scary hearing of people that just have so much hate and anger that fills the news feeds more and more. You would think after a tough few years of reflection one would come out with a better attitude toward life and the people around you but it’s not. I deal with the nastiness on a daily basis at work and it had made me so sad and weak its hard at times, but I know a better future is ahead and we are just on the edge of the end. However, more was still to come…

 

                                                ***

 

That leads me to the saddest of updates and it’s taken 14 months to be able to really come on and say it. February 27^th, 2022 my dad, Leonard Fred Coker, died at the age of 86. He had dementia and other health problems for over 5 years but late 2021 and early 2022 he was getting progressively worse. He was falling more and going to the hospital more often because of the falls. After one of the falls he went on hospice care and was on hospice for 3 weeks before he passed away. I kept telling him he had get better but he couldn’t stand and didn’t want to eat or drink much. My mom Linda did a great job as his nurse and taking care of him 24/7 during those 3 weeks well more than just those 3 weeks but taking care of all his needs while he physically couldn’t. To protect the dignity of him and my mom I won’t go into details on the struggles those 3 weeks.  

 

The Saturday before he passed my mom called and said we needed to get over there he was getting worse. I had that day off from work but Anthony didn’t but he didn’t want to miss seeing my dad if it was his last day so we called work and waited forever before we got ahold of the only manager on duty who didn’t work on our side of the store but after we explained she said take the day and she would email our manager and the day would be cleared, she was kind and accommodating, a rarity where we work. We got there and my sister, brother-in-law and nephew who had come down a few days before were there to see my dad as well. We spent the day and night there with him. When Anthony leaned over to talk with my dad, my dad held his hand up to Anthony’s face and we knew he remembered us. That day there were times like in the last weeks that he seemed somewhat normal like during the super bowl and playing with a squeezy ball and pop it we bought him to fidget with but he was getting weaker. That night we told my dad we knew he was tired and if he needed to go, we understood, and we’d see him again.

 

I thought I would be ok writing this but its so much harder than I thought it would be.

 

Sunday the 27^th arrived and we came over. The day was normal enough. We were watching my dad’s favorite channel, the weather channel, I laugh thinking about it, he loved that channel. We all sat around talking about anything including the shows on the weather channel. We each checked on him through out and talked to him. I didn’t think it would be that day. I silently prayed I wasn’t the one to find him but I stood up that day around 4 and I walked over and his chest wasn’t moving. I stood there scared to say anything. I looked to my sister who sat on the couch, and I whispered I don’t think he was breathing but I wanted to be sure before we told mom who was sitting on a bar stool in the kitchen. However, mom heard me and came over along with my sister and it was, he was gone.

 

I’m sorry I can’t finish the update, it hurts too much.

 

I love him so much and I miss him even when people don’t know and they think I don’t morn like them, I do.

 

Its taken years to write this update even the last part. I start crying and I can’t see to finish. There is more but I can’t.

 

Thank you for reading this and I hope that your well and I hope anyone that’s lost someone knows Jehovah God has given a beautiful promise to see them again and I know ill see my dad again.

2019 International Convention of Jehovah’s Witnesses “Love Never Fails”

August 16-18 2019 in St. Louis Missouri we attended a very special convention of Jehovah’s Witnesses, it was an international convention which had in attendance 5,000 international delegates and in total we had 27,000 to 28,000 which included the international and local state wide delegates and had over 8,000 to 9,000 others patched in from other conventions in the united states and abroad during certain talks at our convention!

The theme was “Love Never Fails” from 1 Corinthians 13:1-8. It was such an uplifting convention and we all spent over a year preparing to attend and volunteer, which me and Anthony did volunteer. Usually we have smaller conventions of 5,000 closer to home but this year was an international in our state of Missouri and we were all invited and it was the first international convention we have been able to attend. There are other international conventions worldwide and several more smaller conventions still occurring. 

https://www.jw.org/en/jehovahs-witnesses/conventions/2019-convention-video/#?insight[search_id]=62e74994-4bb3-4afc-b259-034e0b11a4ad&insight[search_result_index]=0

Me and Anthony and my parents when they could made gifts for the delegates and they did likewise. We made marble magnet bags. So we got little green, blue and off white with blue or green string mesh bags which we put the marble magnets in. We used clear and sometimes mottled flat back marbles and printed out in different fonts JW.ORG for the one set of marble magnets. The second set had galaxies and I got those pictures from scrap book paper at a local scrap booking store. The 3^rd set was small animals (hummingbird, lion, wolf, turtle, sloth, fox, skunk and a few others), again from scrap book paper at a local scrap booking store. Each bag had one of each of the marbles.

They were made by putting mod podge on a foam brush and applying to the back of the marble and then the marble was pressed to the image. Once the image was dry, using scissors or an x-acto knife we cut it out and then using scissors we cut around to make sure no excess image was sticking over the edges. Then we applied another layer of mod podge to the back of the marbles. Once the second layer was dry we took a roll of self adhesive magnets and cutting pieces down to size applied to the back of the marbles and voila marble magnets.

We placed one of each set per bag and then added a message for the delegates. Each message we wrote we then used mod podge and placed different color and designed scrap book paper to the back and then placed the messages inside the bags.

We met different people from Sweden, Canada, USA, Japan, all over. During breaks for lunch and before and after the convention sessions we saw the international delegates dressed to represent each of their countries and it was pretty cool. I was taking it in and didn’t get any pictures of them in dress but my mom did and one is below, though in one of my pics you can see the back of two women with outfits that look German kind of.

The last day we all waved cut out hearts and sang Kingdom songs and didn’t want it to end. The programs themselves were full of so many things to help us show love more and to endure. The drama video was about Josiah and that was very good. This convention was so wonderful and everyday since then I wish I could be back there. 

https://www.jw.org/en/jehovahs-witnesses/conventions/story-of-josiah-trailer/#?insight[search_id]=20fcd8fa-4297-4595-af5d-53b0de2e4682&insight[search_result_index]=0

That Saturday my Nephew Jakob, 12 years old, was one of 224 who got baptized.

Here is a link so you can read about the convention:

https://www.jw.org/en/news/jw/region/united-states/St-Louis-United-States-2019-Love-Never-Fails-International-Convention/#?insight[search_id]=fef62a1a-bc9c-42e5-a2c8-4a50838ac4fe&insight[search_result_index]=0

New Crafting Blog: Relaxing Crafts with Cass!

So I am super excited to bring my blog readers and followers to my newest blog: Relaxing Crafts with Cass! I’ve added quite a few crafts to this Bookworm blog over the last few years but finally decided to create a blog exclusively for my crafts. I’ve added my crafts from this Bookworm blog over to my new blog Relaxing Crafts with Cass and will use that blog exclusively for my future crafts from now on so that this Bookworm blog can be used for all things book and lifestyle related.

My crafts aren’t the best like many YouTube and bloggers that have many viewers and make such wonderful things but I try my best. I began to craft more some years ago mainly hair accessories at first. It was a way at the time to use my creative juices aside my writing. As you all know as I’ve put up here I got into a serious courtship in 2017 and got married but also that year I got a first time real job not just here and there job and with it came many stresses. Since then maybe almost 2 years I haven’t written but a few sentences for my stories and it plagues me very much but because of a busy life and working I haven’t had much time for writing but I miss it. But beyond deep down that creative part has been squashed in a way and so crafting has helped me still be creative in another way.  

When I craft it allows me to get out of my head or rather only focus on the creative part of my mind and not the bad things that happen. I’ve been on the same job 2 years now and its been not so good for a long while. There have only been maybe 3 or 4 times in that span I was happy while there. More times than not I am anxious and stressed. I don’t trust anyone apart from my husband up at our job, he works there too just a different department. Many mangers mainly those there in the beginning but are gone now were extremely cruel and admitting it is hard employees, customers and some managers had me in the bathroom in tears after a hard day and mean treatment. I used to and sometimes still do still get physically sick before, during or after work because of the stress and its hard but the hours and money are the only reasons I stay right now but I might be forced to change jobs soon as its just too much. Anyway crafting helps me to step away from it and be creative and just make something that makes me smile. 

So please feel free to stop by my new blog and check out some of my new and old crafts on my new crafting blog! 

Oh and by the way only ones moved over from my Bookworm blog will have the label originally posted year for reference but new crafts won’t, it will be from then forward already there on post date. 

https://relaxingcraftswithcass.blogspot.com/

Or you can find my new blog by going to the About Me page and clicking on my new blog Relaxing Crafts with Cass!

Summer 2018 Wreath!

My summer 2018 wreath came out closer to fall as I was running behind but none-the-less it was a nice wreath though my husband’s grandma gave me an idea about this wreath but at the time I couldn’t change it as I had used quite a bit of hot glue putting this one together so it was already finished when she saw it and suggested it. The idea was to spray paint it an aqua or ocean blue color and looking at it that would have made maybe a better overall impression for the wreath.

To start off with I took some really pretty bluish elastic cord, it came in a group of 5 different colors, and wrapped it as I would like and cut it to measure and then put a knot at one end and then strung the pearlized beads through it with a serious being white and then a black pearl popping up ever so often, the pearls brought in the ocean theme and matched the pearls already on the star fish decoration. Once the pearls were strung, I wrapped it around the wreath as I liked, I didn’t use glue I just weaved it and stuck it into the wreath at parts so it held.

 The next thing I did was I took my two fish, pearl strung star fish, sea horse and water flower decorations and figured out where I wanted them and then I hot glued or clipped them onto the wreath but because of the material they are made of I had to re-glue a few to get them to stick better. I then moved or repositioned the strung pearls to make them lay well with the other decorations and look fluid.

Once the two fish, star fish, sea horse and water flower were well in place I took sea glass in light blue, dark blue, clear and frosted and picked out the best of these and began to determine how close to the other decorations I wanted and when I had that figured I hot glued the sea glass pieces to the wreath and even piled them in certain placed and I think it looked beautiful but I’ll admit the sea glass didn't adhere well to the wreath too and had to be re-glued several times and during the coarse of it hanging on the door a few pieces fell off and shattered by the front door outside or were stepped on but most of the rest stayed on there really well. Next I took a few different size seashells and placed them in empty spaces where I didn’t have or want sea glass and where there wasn’t any decorations or pearls.  

I think the wreath looked pretty and I got a compliment from one of our neighbors who said it reminded him of Florida so gave him something to look at when he was sitting out front during the day, he said we have nice wreaths and likes to see what we come up with next. But looking back I wish I had added or done more for this wreath as it kind of looks bare because of all the brown showing on the wreath and think maybe had I spray painted it or added something else it would have been even better. But all in all it was nice and lovely and was very iconic summer!

• Grapevine Wreath-$4 at Walmart  
• Seashells- $1 for a bag at Dollar Tree
• Sea Glass- $5.85 for a 34 oz bag at Walmart or now they have them in a smaller bag at Dollar Tree but at the time I was doing this wreath they didn’t
• Faux White Pearlized Beads- $1.99 or around that at Walmart
• Faux Black Pearlized Beads- $0.99 for a small bag at Walmart
• Sparkle Elastic Cord- $3.97 at Walmart 
• Two Fish Decorations- each fish was either $1.48 or $1.97 at Walmart around the Christmas season
• Star Fish with Pearls Decoration- was either $1.48 or $1.97 at Walmart around the Christmas season
• Sea Horse Decoration- was either $1.48 or $1.97 at Walmart around the Christmas season
• Water Flower Decoration- was either $1.48 or $1.97 at Walmart around the Christmas season

Spring 2018 Wreath!

In Spring of 2018 I did a pretty nice and simple technique wreath. I just bought a grapevine wreath and bought and or used left over flowers I had to make this colorful wreath. No hot gluing was necessary for this. After I gathered my materials, I placed them out in different ways to decide what was best before I got to work. So, using my wire cutters I cut the flowers at the stem a little further down than the flower so that I could bend the wire and wiggle it into the tight wreath branches so that I didn’t have to hot glue it and it worked pretty well. I then attached a purple and blue sequence dragon flies clips to the wreath and that was pretty much that.

I took some time deciding where to place the flowers and cutting them but once started it didn’t take very much time. The top of the wreath with the Blue Delphinium the end of it has a little round piece to the flower and I tucked that into a curly q piece of the wreath that was sticking out and it kept it looking nice without being stuck too far into the wreath or having to be hot glued. On each side of the Delphinium the blue and purple Hyacinths made the wreath look delicate and very spring like and they were some of my favorites I even put a few extra springs in my hair as a decoration for last years The Memorial of Jesus Christ Death (Lords Evening Meal) which we attend once a year and last years I wore a floral skirt with a yellow flowing top and so the florals looked great in my hair!

The two Sunflowers in the wreath gave a vibrant pop of color and seemed to go away from the blue and purple theme of the wreath but added some cheeriness to it that brought it all together nicely. For the purple and pink Roses, I did a two-one thing so two purple to one pink and two pink to one purple, so it was unique and fun! The white beady foliage I placed two sprigs by the roses to take up empty space and to make the Roses pop even more and look delicate and lovely. I played around with the placement of the blue and purple sequence dragon fly clips and when they were arranged nicely I put sprigs of Honeysuckle flowers in front of them as if they are eating in mid-flight. I did think of hanging a real mini-hummingbird feeder from it as I even bought some but it didn’t flow well with the wreath so I left it out.

So all in all it gave a beautiful pop of color to our front door last Spring and honestly this could be a look used all year if you like or even decorated in so many different way! Just  have fun in making a beautiful spring wreath to lighten and brighten any day!!

• Sunflowers- $3 for a Bushel at Walmart or you can get for $1 for similar size and look at Dollar Tree but I used what was left on my $3 bushel which was left over from a previous project
• Pink Roses- $1 for a bushel at Dollar Tree
• Purple Roses- $1 for bushel at Dollar Tree
• Honey Suckle- $0.97 at Walmart or $1 at Dollar Tree, I can’t honestly remember where I got these but either way they were either $0.97 or $1 for a small bushel of them and again I used what was left over from another project
• Blue Delphinium- $1 at Dollar Tree for one long branch
• Blue Hyacinth- $1 at Dollar Tree for a bushel or $0.97 at Walmart but again I can’t exactly remember where I got them as it was a while ago but I’m thinking Dollar Tree
• Purple Hyacinth- $1 at Dollar Tree for a bushel or $0.97 at Walmart but again I can’t exactly remember where I got them as it was a while ago but I’m thinking Dollar Tree
• White Beady Foliage supposed to be Baby’s Breath I believe- $1 for the bushel these were part of at Dollar Tree
• Purple Sequenced Dragon Fly Clip- $1.48 at Walmart during the Christmas season
• Blue Sequenced Dragon Fly Clip- $1.48 at Walmart during the Christmas season
• Grapevine Wreath- $4 dollars at Walmart

DIY Toilet Paper Holder!

After we were married, I moved into the apartment my husband had just moved into prior to our marriage and of course I helped decide on it, but one issue is the bathroom has two parts a place where the sink is and room for a vanity but then an inner bathroom through a door where the toilet and shower tub is. So the issue is where the toilet is around the corner from the sink and I was housing the toilet paper under the sink in the cabinet but it was like wrapping your arm around the corner and digging in the cabinet for toilet paper and it was doable but hard lol. So I started researching different DIY toilet paper holders and many were cool but I didn’t really want to spend very much money.

So at Walmart where I work in the Lawn and Garden department we have these boxes used for Suet Bird food, any boxes that had housed non-chemicals should be ok for these kinds of projects, and so I went up when I had an idea and collected some empty ones from a co-worker. As you will see the boxes are level on three sides but the front is much lower and I liked that a lot as it would be easier to pull the toilet paper out. So what I did was I thought about the different colors I could paint to cover up the sides of the box and I thought I have an acrylic paint called Cinnamon Apple and it matches some of the colors of my main set of towels and how I designed it matched the second set of towels. Originally I was in a two bathroom apartment then went back to living back with my parents and so when I went to my husbands one bathroom I just used all the towels together. So I colored the outside of the box with the Cinnamon Apple colored acrylic paint and it took several layers to cover up the work on the outside of the box.

The layers of paint made the box heavy and parts started folding outward so I used some journals and books to hold them in as they dried after the second layering and then it bent the box too much in so I had to bend them back out so be warned just the right amount of paint and then pressure should be used so it doesn’t bend too much in or out. Also some pictures it looks wet it's because I applied more paint even after decorating and then photographed them and so it wasn't dry yet. 

After the paint had dried for a few days I measured out my orange and white designed ribbon which I had gotten on clearance for a quarter and measured it to the length of the top of the box and starting at the front I used E6000 Adhesive spray and sprayed and applied the ribbon little by little till the one side was complete and then I snipped it at an angle at where it had begun so it aligned with the box. They I waited a few until it was holding enough and I continued around the box spraying E6000 Adhesive spray and then applying ribbon and holding until it held enough, it was a challenge at first to get it to hold and so another alternative could be hot glue if you like. So after the top ribbon was arranged I did like wise for the bottom of the box ribbon.

Once the paint and ribbon was dried I then went and collected my clear and frosted white and green glass gems and before gluing, again using E6000 Adhesive spray, I arranged them different ways until I thought of making them look like flowers. So each flower had a pattern the center gem was either clear or frosted green or white and the petals around it were then the opposite color and went clear and then frosted. Then the stem and leaves were the same color as the center of each flower so opposite of the petals of each flower. So I did that on both side, though one side has the flower heads going toward each other and the other side has the flowers going the same direction though I prefer them facing each other, and then did just the flowers on the back of the box. With the back of the box flowers you will see I did center of flower different color as petals like the other flowers but this time instead of the petals being clear and frosted I did one all clear and one all frosted and liked that. The small front area I just glued in a line a few alternating frosted and clear green and white gems. So each side took some drying time as the E6000 Adhesive spray took a bit of time to dry but so far I haven’t had to ever re-glue them since I made it, I mean I did have to re-glue one right after the first set dried but since its been in use none of the gems have fallen off.

The last element was how do I make the inside of the box look nice and brought together and not look so much like a box. So I bought a Fat Quarter of Green Printed Fabric at Walmart and measured and cut it to fit the box but my measurements and such weren’t quite exact but it looks pretty good to me. So again I used E6000 Adhesive spray and going little by little I glued and pressed down the fabric until it stuck and then moved onto the next section.

So once everything had dried I put it on the back of my toilet and I think it works perfectly there and looks so nice! There are many different methods to use for toilet paper holders but this one worked the best for us!

• Suet Bird Food Box- Free at Walmart
• Cinnamon Apple Acrylic Paint- $0.50 At Walmart
• White Clear and Frosted Glass Gems- $1 at Dollar Tree
• Green Clear and Frosted Glass Gems- $1 at Dollar Tree
• Orange and Printed White Ribbon- 3 Yards for $0.25 on Clearance was originally $1 at Walmart
• Fat Quarter of Green Printed Fabric- $0.97 at Walmart

Season Scape Jars- Summer Sandy Treasure!

I bought a wide round and tall glass neck jar. I took my nautical rope and hot glued the end to the bottom of the neck of the jar and began to weave the rope over the other going up the rope and hot glued the new rope to the other rope as I went so that the neck of the jar was covered in nautical rope. I took a larger seashell and two smaller seashells and hot glued them to the nautical rope in a crown formation. After that I took some white sand, I’m not sure how much I used but close to a bag or so but each jar will depend on how deep you want it, and poured the sand into the jar and moved it around so it’s not all level but some rising higher up the sides then others so it looks more natural like. Then I took more seashells and stuck them under the sand and or sticking out of the sand, again go for a natural straight out of nature look.

I then took red and green sticker gems and placed them under a seashell as if they are a pirates hidden Ruby and Emerald gems lying to be plucked from the sands but wait…. A trusty lobster has been given the task of protecting the hoard of treasures! I placed the lobster with seashell support as if he is coming over the shell claws at the ready to stop anyone from touching the Ruby and Emerald gems.

So this Summer Season Scape Jar is a very iconic sandy seashore like one but this season scape has near endless possibilities to play around with! So go have fun in making the Summer Season to last all year long!

• Wide Round and Tall Glass Jar- $1 at Dollar Tree
• Bag of White Sand- $1 at Dollar Tree
• Seashells- $1 for a Bag at Dollar Tree
• Nautical Rope- $1 at Dollar Tree
• Crab- $1 at Dollar Tree
• Red and Green Gems- $1 for each Red and Green at Dollar Tree