Swinging into fall

Whew! Things got busy over the last couple of weeks! Youngest son turned 6 last week, we had unexpected house guests for 4 days and things are just plugging along.
Good news. The gallery here in town wants us to put some of our copper and wood jewelry in her storefront. This is so great. Galleries generally take 40 percent profit but the owner has offered to knock it down to 30 percent. It sure eats into any money we could make( putting a ton of time in to only make a teeny bit over the cost of supplies) but I guess any little bit helps right?!
Eldest son went to the environmental club for the past two weeks and it has gone so well. My last post I was feeling pretty down about the whole thing but this has been such a booster in morale! I know the mom who runs the program ( a happy surprise!) and she has been so helpful in checking in. She has been sure to make the food they cook together gluten free ( which is cool because I was a support for her family a couple of years ago when they tried gluten free for thier family) and has phoned to check in to make sure things are going well. I can't say enough how much I appreciate the support. ( Thanks Janet and Louisa for the comments last week as well. It really means a lot!)
Papa still isn't working yet. Still little trickles of stuff here and there. We were waiting on a new condo project which would have ment months of steady work... then the owner/ contracter had a heart attack and died. All of the construction just stopped for the project now. We are trying not to panic but slowly we have gotten into the hole over the past half of a year. EI runs out in March. We could really use a bit of luck right now. We sold our old lathe this week for grocery money. Bonus though,oil is wayyyy cheaper this year than it was last year. With a coupon we managed to fill the tank for the same price that it cost for half of a tank last year.
The last week has taken a different turn for us. An elderly gentleman in the community had approached my hubby a few months ago to do some editing and to type up a chunk of his biography for him. My hubby did it as a favour to him and now it has turned into more editing and visits. He hasn't said anything but I know that he is dying right now. He doesn't have any family around and is super lonely. He wan'ts to pay me to cook for him... I have got too much on my plate already. And I just CAN'T take money from someone who just needs a little bit of help. I am going to try to save portions of what we cook so that he can freeze them for meals. He has lost so much weight already. I know that truly he just wan'ts our company and that is the most important thing. I just feel a little bit overwhelmed. Dang! Yesterday he took me aside and asked me to make him a necklace with a very special cherokee arrowhead( he has a cherokee background) that he has been saving. Like a talisman for this last bit of his journey.( I am actualy excited about this project. It kept me up last night trying to come up with the perfect design.)He is SUCH an interesting character. He gifted me with some cut burmese emeralds that he was saving as well as a jar of raw opal. He gave the boys a bunch of his fossil collection too. He is so kind to us... I hope that I can be there to help him. What a bizzare existance we live sometimes! No groceries, but opals and emeralds!lol The universe takes care of us in unexpected ways!