Archive for January, 2025



Your prompt for JusJoJan January 31st, 2025 is “fini.” Find a word that has “fini” in it and use that as your prompt word. Have fun!

Well, that’s easy! It is Finishing Friday! A great way to keep track of hobbies and passions. A way to see progress when, at times, it seems the end is as far as infinity. Row at a time, an inch at a time, a chord played right, or a rhythm that stays where it belongs is fun to keep track of. Many keep track of grievances or pain. I have. I probably will again and again. But I feel more fulfilled if I can see good and beautiful things done from the same place as the bird’s song. It feels right. It gives me pleasure. Not because I am looking for praise. I thank you for that, but it is more for me to feel like I am moving forward.

This felt good as it hit. Some days I do a lot of lessons. For others, I just do the one to get the points. I love languages, so it is fun for me.

The last two hats were for smaller heads. So I decided to make one a little bigger. I just finished the ribbing and started on the basket weave part. It is easier on my hands than crocheting or knitting, so while I am feeling the arthritis, I’m being gentle on the fingers.

My brother’s socks are coming along. Less than an inch to the end of the arch ribbing. Then, an inch to the beginning of the heel. I feel I am at the beginning of the end of this pair.

The middle section of the ‘smiling turtle’ diamond painting is almost done. It is a fun project. I love all the colors.

I have, in all essence, finished this book. Most of it was a review of things I’ve learned all my life, especially as a music major. But toward the end, it started meeting my needs. It has a lot of ways to improvise. I still find myself trying to play every single note rather than play, but I’m seeing ways to do it. I’ll be doing the review for this book soon. Mostly, at this point, I am in love with the last song presented. It’s called Coming Home.

So my favorite songs to play right now are Baby Elephant Walk, Just the Way You Are, God Bless the Child, and Coming Home. They drive me to the piano. I actually spent an hour there today. Remember in the summer or fall when I stated I could barely get five minutes in before pain or boredom pulled me away. Now, I have the joy of actually hearing and feeling the earworms that crawl through my head the rest of the day. My own music!

My ukulele, violin, and recorders sit sadly, waiting for my hands to feel better. I miss the learning process with them.

Well, that’s my Friday report. Fini!


Thank you, Wendy! Please visit Wendy’s blog to read her posts and say hello. And follow her while you’re there if you’re not already.
Your prompt for JusJoJan January 30th, 2025 is “hesitation.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy!

It is said that he who hesitates is lost. But I am here to say hesitation is important. A wise decision needs a moment. Sometimes, the moment taken to crawl back down the high-dive ladder is important to build the courage needed to try again.

But sometimes, when the Kim Chi, tasty though it was, wants to escape, hesitation can leave you to rue the day. Sorry. Must go!


How many years does January take?

This seems to be the longest month in history!

And not because of JJiJ. That was the fun part.

And, sorry, this one-liner is staying with the longest-month theme!

Thank you, Linda, for Just Jot It January!

Courageous (Afterlife, #4)Courageous by Willow Rose
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was a satisfying ending to a semi-completed boxed set. I found the whole story a bit confusing until I let go of my preconceived notions of what the afterlife should be and accepted this as the author’s young adult fantasy.

The whole story is fun and a little different. Give it a try if you need an escape from the confusion of the real world.

View all my reviews

Per Linda: Hello! I’m here with our twenty-eighth prompt for Just Jot it January 2025. Today, our prompt is courtesy of our dearest Dan. Thank you, Dan! Please visit Dan’s blog to read his posts and say hello. And follow him while you’re there if you’re not already.
Your prompt for JusJoJan January 28th, 2025 is “confusion.” Use it any way you’d like. Have fun!


The Afterlife Series Box SetThe Afterlife Series Box Set by Willow Rose
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I have finally finished reading not only this but the fourth book. This book was supposed to be the complete series. And probably when I got it, it was all the author had ready. But the ending was a cliffhanger. Had that been all, I would have been very disappointed.

Still, the three-book set was fun. One has to put aside theology and think of this as fantasy; the characters’ abilities were so fun. I loved the main character, Meghan, and how she cared for others.

On the other hand, the antagonist is too much.

Oh, the people you meet along the way. Einstein, can you believe it? No? Well, it’s fantasy, okay?

This is definitely a young adult series. There is far too much romance. Ugh! But hey, it’s a story, and it was a fun read.

View all my reviews

~~~

 

Our prompt today comes to us from the sensational Sadje. Thank you, Sadje! Please be sure to visit Sadje’s blog to read her posts and say hello. And follow her while you’re there if you’re not already.
Your prompt for JusJoJan January 27th, 2025 is “glamorous.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy!

So, to add the Jot to the above review, it was one of the abilities that appear in in fantasies is the gift of glamour. Bingo! It is used in this book set.

Just Jot It January, Jubilee


Your prompt for JusJoJan January 26th, 2025 is “jubilee.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy

What is the difference between jubilee and jamboree?

Per the online Thesaurus:

Jubilee is a synonym for jamboree in festival topic. In some cases you can use “Jubilee” instead a noun “Jamboree”, when it comes to topics like noisy celebration.

Sorry, I got nothing. But did I earn the jotting gold star?


Your prompt for #JusJoJan the 25th and Stream of Consciousness Saturday is: “in line.” Use it any way you’d like! Enjoy!

Thinking in this post all day should have given me more inspiration than my original idea. But here it is.

It amazes me what one bit of yarn knits or crochets into a garment. One string kept in line can make something soft and warm.

One string attacked by a cat makes a puzzle. So best keep cats and yarn in line.


Please visit June’s blog to read her posts and say hello. And follow her while you’re there if you’re not already.
Your prompt for JusJoJan January 24th, 2025 is “hobbies.” Use it any way you’d like. Enjoy!
One of my hobbies is diamond painting. My ‘smiling turtle’ is coming along. I’d say about halfway.
Because crochet has been hurting my thumb, elbow, and shoulder, I went back to loom knitting. The ribbing is two-by-two knit/purl. I am not a fan of e-wrapping. It seems too bulky. But it’ll be warm for someone out there. I’ll make a top-knot puff to finish it.
My second loom knit hat is a basket weave. I only e-wrapped the cast-on. I’m using the green, 36-peg loom. The weave look is three knits, three purls, and alternating the order every three rows. This one needs a top-knot, too.
My brother’s socks are coming along. I hope he likes the ribbed arch like I do. Once the arch is done, the rest of the sock seems to come along quickly. Hopefully, they will be done soon.

My other hobbies are musical in nature. Having gotten back to piano this past summer, starting at one song or five minutes, only as long as it was fun. Now I can go as long as an hour but seem to average half an hour to 5 minutes.

After summer and fall, working on classical, suddenly winter brought some fun carols. I loved some of the more modern rhythms. So when I had to put them away, I made a bit of a resolution or goal to learn more modern beats. I want to be able to improvise and even compose my own music. So I started working through a few books like

Much of it is elementary. I assume I am of intermediate level. But my rhythm is horrid. Especially modern beats, blues, or jazz.

I pulled out another book and started at the beginning with the song, Just the Way You Are, from this book:

Version 1.0.0

It seems easy enough, but it sounded nothing like the beloved Billy Joel’s golden hit when I started. But gradually, the beat is growing in my soul.

I was trying other instruments to get back into music. Recorder, soprano, alto, and tenor. Ukulele. And finally, a violin. When my thumb, elbow, and shoulder started hurting, these also had to go by the wayside. I miss them, but the piano doesn’t hurt my arms or hands. My back, yes. But I am working on posture and yoga to help with that. Hence the shorter sessions.

I love being 75. Retired. Older than my piano teacher was when I was 12, older than my mother, who never got to play for fun. I’m trying to play for them now. And my inner sprites and muses.

I take it seriously!

Just Jot It January, Emphasis


Your prompt for JusJoJan January 23rd, 2025 is “emphasis.” Use it any way you’d like. Have fun!

Thank you all for participating. When I did the random word generator, I rejected many, like ‘fork’ and ‘then,’ but finally, a word that could move my muse. Or so I thought back then.

When you are a reader, and your parents only made it to eighth and tenth grade, you soon learn their answer is to go to the dictionary. And rather than break up the story with the tome of words, you pronounce it out yourself. So, I learned words wrong. Often, I put emphasis on the wrong syl-LA-bol. One of the reasons I adore audiobooks is that someone reads words correctly, even foreign words. Even Kindle Text-to-Speech gets things wrong. Like the soft G in ‘finger.’ What?

Yeah, that blog part jumped out at seeing the word. Then, the crazy streaming thoughts drifted away.

Rhythm has always been the hardest part of music. Nope, not a dancer here. Since I went back to the piano, I think it was this last summer that my sight-reading has improved, and many of the songs I revived are reasonable. As of this New Year’s, I made up my mind to make the goal of being able to improvise and compose music this year. I have always admired the people who could just sit down and riff out music. But I tend toward reading and playing every single notated note.

Today, one of the books I’m learning from was about teaching how to do blues and jazzy bass lines. See, most of the classical stuff I play is 4/4 time, emphasizing the first and third beats. I’m learning the second and fourth beats and stagger out beats for syncopation. I remember my piano teacher, Mrs. Skinner, teaching me Alley Cat and Baby Elephant Walk. To my young, early teen self, she looked ancient. And she told me to do this little wiggle to get the beat right. As I tried these beats today, I saw and felt her emphasizing that wiggle. I’m smiling right now at the memory. I can’t wait to make her proud.


It’s Linda’s birthday! Happy Birthday! These are just a couple of her fun prompts.

#JusJoItJan and One-Liner Wednesday

I found this on Facebook. It still has some wisdom buried there.

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