Beaded Garden Stake

 Twice a year my retirement community has Swap Shop. It consists of items people no longer need or want: clothing, household items, books, jewelry, hobby supplies, stationery, etc. A resident does not have to contribute to be able to claim items so it is not really a swap, just a way for residents to clean out clutter and give unused items a new life. The Autumn Swap Shop ended yesterday. There will be one again in the spring.

When I went over to the main building Friday where the swap was taking place, I noticed all but one item I had donated was gone.

 The only thing that caught my eye was a metal "pole" with beads on it and capped by a glass knob. I didn't know what it was, but I guessed maybe it was a lawn ornament since the bottom of the metal was rusted. After some internet sleuthing, I see it is called a garden stake.

Places like Walmart sell these as DIY kit projects with the stake, beads, and screw-on knob so you can design your own.

I have no desire to own a garden stake, but I thought the beads might be able to be used somehow, such as making a bracelet. Most of them have metal rims which is not typical of jewelry-making beads, but they would probably work OK. A project for this winter possibly.

If I decide not to use them, there is always the Give 'N Take Table year-round to give somebody else a chance.

 

 

I recently finished Jean Chatzky’s The Forever Paycheck

published in 2026. If I were 5 to 10 years from retirement, I

 probably would purchase a copy; instead I read it on Libby. I

 learned from it, but for us already in retirement a lot of

 information given was no longer relevant. We had made our

 decisions without this helpful book, and for the most part I felt

 validated in those decisions.

 Would I do some things differently if I had this knowledge?

 Sure. However, some steps were not available to us. QLACs

 which interest me did not come into being until 2014, for

 example; and even Roth IRAs were only available starting

in 1998. We have a Roth but we only accumulated over a

 small period of time compared to our 403(b)s and IRAs. We

 did a few conversions, but one has to be careful of tax

 consequences in any given year.

I wish we would have had a similar book back in 2007 when

 we retired (and the few years leading up to that date). It isn’t

 that we did not read books, newspaper articles, magazine

 articles, and internet stories about retirement. We did, but the

 emphasis was on accumulating money. Nobody talked much

 about what to do when the accumulating period ended and

 the spending period started. They might suggest withdrawing

 funds from taxable accounts first, preserving the tax

 advantage of IRAs. I had read about 4% withdrawal the first

 year with inflation-adjusted withdrawals each subsequent

 year. Ms. Chatzky addresses this procedure and shows that it

 no longer holds up very well. We did not adopt it anyway,

 though it was nice to have a concrete target.

The book’s subtitle suggests it is offering a new strategy; not

 exactly because annuities have been an option for retirees for

 a long time and most pensions are money annuitized by the

 employer for the employee’s retirement. I found the Indexes

 about Investments and Annuities more fully developed than

 most books. The book offers other ways to develop a

 “paycheck” and definitely states there is no one option to fit

 all.

The “new” aspects are the emphasis on spending more of

 your accumulated funds. People fear they will outlive their

 pool of money. I have seen information suggesting that fear is

 greater for pre-retirees than those already in retirement. As

 this book intimates, retired people who have done the work of

 introspection and discovering what is really important to them,

 set their priorities to spend on what they value and in most

 cases reach a point of contentment. There might be some

 worry about how long the money will last, but they know how

 to adjust. The Forever Paycheck is designed to remove that

 last bit of worry and to offer a comfort level for spending on

 your bucket items and vision of retirement.

As you probably recall, 2008 was the start of the Great

 Recession. Not a good time to be starting down the

 retirement road. We had not found a financial advisor leading

 up to retirement that we felt gave us value for the fees

 charged. However, we went to a fee-based advisor in

 Indianapolis for several sessions who helped us restructure

 our portfolio and gave us courage to stay the course. As all

 good advisors do, she gave us “tests” to determine our risk

 comfort. Ms. Chatzky does likewise in her book.

In 2019, we signed up for a Financial Advisor with Vanguard.

 We had “teleconferences” through the internet. We liked Bill.

 He was a great help in bringing my husband’s IRAs scattered

 with several companies into the Vanguard fold. Our portfolio

 became less complex and easier for us to monitor. He called

 about every 3 months wanting us to update him on our

 retirement expenses and even our personal situation. I think

 we had him for about 18 months before he left Vanguard. The

 replacement advisor was not as personable. He lasted about

 6 months. The second replacement was not a great

 improvement. These advisors did some rebalancing of our

 funds and answered a few questions, but again we found

 ourselves thinking we were no longer getting value for the

 fees we paid. We ended the relationship.

One of the things Bill brought up several times was that he

 thought we should be spending more of our investment

 money. We did take a few cruises and bought a new vehicle;

 but we were used to living in a simple way. We found

 enjoyment in non-expensive ways.

I sometimes think about the help an advisor would be in

 reducing taxes now that we have to take RMDs. I have

 thought again about a QLAC. I could do it with my funds as I

 am still age-eligible (my husband is not), but at this stage of

 life it seems like a not so beneficial effort. We would not get

 the regular “paycheck” if I did not do it, but we would still have

 those funds which only have to last us probably 10 to 15

 years anyway. I mainly was thinking of replacing the income

 that would be lost when one of us dies and my Social Security

 would end.  We have Social Security and my husband’s small

 pension (which is not protected against inflation and has lost

 purchasing power), but we really do not tap into our

 investments despite Bill’s encouragement to do so.

 We are not concerned about leaving an estate to heirs, but

 we are concerned about long-term medical care (assisted-

living or nursing home).

The Forever Paycheck is very good at helping people

 estimate the costs of retirement, assess risk tolerance,

 evaluate what is important to their vision of retirement. She

 offers many options to create a “paycheck” and gives detailed

 guidance. She even offers advice to those who did not

 accumulate funds for retirement.

 I have read that she is affiliated with companies that sell

 annuities. There are really two camps when it comes to

 annuities: pro and con. She is definitely pro, but she does

 discuss CD ladders, real estate and other ways to give you

 regular income (a paycheck). I find her writing style easy to

 comprehend. It is a long book to get through, however. I have

 one quibble with the way she structured the “Indexes”. After a

 thorough and detailed description about different options

 (kinds of annuities for example), she ends with a list of pros

 and cons for that product. That should be listed at the

 beginning of the description. It would help her readers avoid

 tedious details about products they can see from the pros and

 cons they do not want. I suggest that you read that ending

 summary before plowing through the details. You will save

 yourself time and brain-cramping.

If you are not yet retired, read this book. If you are early in

 retirement, read this book. If you are 19 years along the

 retirement journey like me, you might enjoy the introduction

 which discusses new studies about retirement, and a few

 other topics in later chapters, but the return on your time

 investment will not be as rewarding.

Air-Drying Cockscomb and Celosia

 

I enjoyed my bouquet I bought at the Farmers Market for 4 or 5 days. When I saw that the statice was drying naturally, I decided to try drying the cockscomb and celosia. I would have had better results if I had started the process within a day of buying the flowers.

The best and fastest way to dry flowers to retain color is using silica gel. I have no flower garden to harvest; buying an expensive substance that would be used rarely did not seem like a good idea. I tried air drying. 

Some of the cockscomb was starting to brown in places. I only tried drying 3 stems by leaving them in 2 inches of water and placing the vase in a closet. Eventually, two dried. The third one collapsed into the bottom of the vase. Not too excited about the results.

The celosia did better. I put rubber bands around the stalks of 3 clumps, then I tied string around each clump and hung them upside down in the same closet as the cockscomb.

Most of the celosia lost its vibrancy but did not brown up or shrink as much as the cockscomb.

The lighter pink celosia came out best, but I only had one clump of that. 

Here is some of the statice which dried on its own when spread out on newspapers. It is not as fragile as the celosia and retained color better.

The whole air-drying process in the closet took over two weeks. It was a messy process. When I read on the internet about air-drying cockscomb and celosia, it mentioned that one should try drying before the seeds showed up. Well, I do not know if it was my timing or if all the teeny seeds would have fallen out anyway.

The suitcase below the hung and vased flowers ended up with many small seeds about the size of a grain of ground pepper. So did the carpeting in the closet. 

When I untied the dried flowers, I hit the flowerheads along the side of my kitchen sink to see what would fall out. Still lots of seeds in there!

Now that I have waited several weeks for drying to finish and cleaned up the mess, I do not really know how I will use these dried plants. I added them to the statice stored in a brown paper bag and put the bag back into the closet. 

I have always liked dried flowers when I see them in magazine and book photos, but I am thinking the real thing is not too great. I guess I will stick with fresh flowers from the Farmers Market. 

Last Batch of Favorite Personal Photos (Finally)

 

County Road 175 North, Warsaw, Indiana

Winona Lake,  Indiana

Hesston Steam Museum, La Porte, Indiana

 Galena, Illinois

Warsaw, Indiana

(Modified by FotoSketcher)

Winona Lake, Indiana

I hope these photos will remind you to focus on the beautiful and interesting things God has given us to enjoy. Thank you for browsing through them.