Happy New Year

I hope to return to blogging soon.  It's been awhile, but life has been getting in my way.

My husband who has been ill for several years, which most of you knew that, but he became sicker and was in and out of the hospital, and then home with Hospice briefly. He passed away this month on the 3th, here at home, with me by his side. He was struggling there at the end so it was a blessing to see him not suffering anymore. It's so strange without him here and I miss him terribly.

I was with my family at Christmas and I'm taking things a day at a time.

I hope everyone has a Wonderful Blessed New Year!

I'm Alive

Well, it's been over a month again, but yes, I am alive!!!  My computer had a meltdown, or so I thought. You all should know that I'm computer illiterate, so when it crashes I toss my hands in the air and holler, "HELP!"  I have used the same computer guy ever since my first computer. The last few times it has had problems he has been in California. Same thing this time! Someone at church recommended someone else to me and I took my computer to him. He got it fixed fast and was MUCH cheaper than the guy I had been using. So now I have a new computer guy!

Blogger has changed the looks of things. Hmmmmm..... I'll have to try and figure it out. Remember...illiterate! I don't see anywhere to post photos....hmmmmm.....No photos this time folks!

What have I been up to you wonder???  Well, not much really, just life things. The usual things. Housekeeping. Fighting cobwebs and puzzling over where all the dust comes from. Taking care of my husband. Last night he called for help and I went in to see what he needed. He said he needed "Attention." I asked him what kind of attention he needed. No response. I asked again and got no response. So then I stood up very straight at attention and I gave him a salute! That did get a smile from him! It was finally determined that he didn't know what he wanted. I told him to just try and relax and think relaxing thoughts and go to sleep. He did. Well..I don't know if he had relaxing thoughts but he did go to sleep!

Ohhhh...I do have a new great nephew. He was born last week and came into this world weighing in at 11 lbs. 9 ozs!  Needless to say some of his newborn things will not fit that big fellow!! I was surprised at his weight but shouldn't be really. His parents are both 6 feet tall. I have not gotten to see him in person yet. Only photos! He is cute and very alert!

The other day I was eating at one of our downtown restaurants and I had a piece of pecan pie. I can't recall the last time I had a piece of pecan pie, so it was really delicious.

A friend of mine had one of their barns go up in flames on Saturday. It was the biggest barn on the farm and had all the hay stored in it to feed the cattle this winter. It also had their biggest, best, and newest tractor, as well as a hay roller they had gotten last year in it. Luckily no one or no animals were hurt. The fire marshall is investigating to try and determine what caused it. She was very upset but also grateful that no one was injured, as material things can be replaced. I go buy meat from them since they raise their own beef. It is so much better than what I buy at the grocery.

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay
My, oh my oh what a wonderful day!
Plenty of sunshine heading my way
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay!!

Just thought I'd best check in and let you know I'm among the living! Ya'll come back now, ya hear?

A Memory

Wow, over a month since I last posted. Each day I say "Oh, I'll get a post up today." Then the day passes and it doesn't happen. Next thing you know over a month has gone by. That's kind of how it is with me losing weight;  "Oh, I'll start my diet tomorrow!" Tomorrow comes and then I say the same thing over again. And so it goes!

I just love these barns with the nice quilt patterns on them. There are lots of them around and I think they sure do brighten things up. In the top photo it had just came a rain shower and was still sprinkling and not the best photo. Harder to see the log cabin quilt pattern on the top but you should be able to click on them and enlarge the photos.

I was thinking today about  a car my brother had when he was a young man. He bought a new 1969 Plymouth Roadrunner. His was green...kind of  a grassy green color. He sure loved that car and it was pretty. I drove it a few times but we lived way back in the country and when you met another car you had to get over to pass and he'd have a fit if a tree limb or the weeds raked against it. No, I was never allowed to drive it without  him being along! I did love the Roadrunner beep-beep horn it had. I remember my Dad was riding with him and when they were at a stop light, Dad warned him not to take off too fast. When the light changed to green my brother took off so fast that it threw my Dad's cap off his head and into the back seat!! I was thinking about that today and couldn't help but laugh.  This photo below I found online. I don't have any photos of my brother's car.

Keeping Cool and Happy 4th!

Things here are HOT and DRY. I have been staying inside a lot where it's cooler. Unfortunately, just when it's sweltering outside, our HVAC decides to die. It's about 20 years old, so I guess with all this heat it just couldn't hold up anymore. It'll be Monday before they can put a new one in so, in the meantime, I went out and purchased a window unit. I am so glad I did. We are under a heat advisory and I think I, and my husband, would have had a major melt down by now without it. Our house is small, so the window unit keeps it cool enough for us to be comfortable. I had to go to 3 stores before finding one. They said they are selling out as soon as they hit the shelves, especially the smaller ones. The one I got was the only one on the shelf. I stood guard over it while I called my nephew to see if he could come and put it in the window for me. I was ready to fight anyone who tried to take it!! I know this drought and heat is reaching a lot of states, so I hope that everyone is staying cool and that things aren't too bad where you are.

Hope everyone had a wonderful, safe, and happy Independence Day!

Random Things

"What'cha looking at? This happens to be a very comfortable position."




I had shown these pretty flowers I had found while walking the dog and had no idea what they are.  Mr. Bowles gave the closest thing to what they must be. He thought they were a Castor Bean Vine and would get bean like pods on them. He was right about that! I went back to where I got them and took some more photos.

Most of the blooms were gone but this is the vine and it does have some bean pods on it. Trying to figure it out, the closest thing I could find by Googling it, that looked like it, was a Hyacinth Bean Vine. I couldn't really find anything about a Castor Bean Vine.

In this next photo below you can see the bean pod on the vine. You should be able to click on the photos to get a better look, if you want to that is!

We have been having Bible School at church and we had a good crowd of kids each night with an average of 101. Kids enjoy coming to Bible School and I don't blame them. So many fun things to do and learn!

This year the theme was Babylon and below is the props they used in the sanctuary. They do so much work that I am amazed at what all they do and I admire them for it. All this below is hiding the choir area and the organ. To get to the organ she has to pass through that curtain on the right side. All of this is particle board with cloth that they painted over it. Not only this prop but they had several of the Sunday School rooms decorated to fit that time period as well. I did some of the helping with taking things down. Sure easier to take it down than to put it up! They start months ahead of time preparing.

Here's a little something that may make you smile!

(And yes....I have called wondering where my paper was on a day that we do not get one. Sigh.)

'Where Is My Paper?'

The irate customer calling the newspaper offices, loudly demanded to know where her Sunday edition was.

'Ma'am, said the employee, today is Saturday.The Sunday paper is not delivered 'til Sunday.'

There was quite a pause on the other end
of the phone, followed by a ray of recognition.

'So that's why no one was in church today.'

_______________________

Hope everyone has a better than great week!!!

I took Rusty for a walk yesterday and I came across these beautiful flowers growing wild. These were growing on some sort of vine, which kind of reminded me of the wandering Jew plant with the leaves being long and pointed and the vine was very thick. I think these flowers are so very gorgeous, but please excuse the not-so-pretty vase!!  I don't ever recall seeing this plant anywhere before.

Here we are at the start of another weekend and I hope everyone has a great one!!!

Sunday Sign

Happy Mother's Day and Catch UP

Oh my it's been so long since I posted. Blogger has changed things since the last time I posted, so we'll have to see how this goes.

I've come this close to writing a post so many times, but seems something always came up to distract me; too tired, nothing to blog about, not enough time, too tired, watching something on TV, my husband needed me, too tired, the dog needed to go out.....well....you get the picture.

Now here I am in a Mardi Gras mask. Hiding my face definitely makes me look better!! I do like the colors of this mask, and even though you can't really tell it here very well, I did have a purple/pinkish hat on too.  I still have the hat but the mask fell into the claws of the cat who then dropped it on the floor to the dog who chewed all the feathers out of it.

I wish there were lots of exciting things to tell you about, but alas...just a couple. Let's see....I did take a trip to London (Kentucky, not England) awhile back, with some other 'seniors' from our church. This was a senior event with workshops, singers, speakers, etc.  It was quite enjoyable and I'm glad I went. I went to a Chinese cooking class and enjoyed that very much. It was so interesting to hear our cook/instructor, who is Chinese, tell about how she met her husband, and also about the way people cook here. She said Chinese restaurants here are 20% authentic and 80% not, as far as cooking like the Chinese really do. However, some restaurants vary in that. She had a Wok and she put some safflower oil in it and then garlic cloves, and then she added sliced up cabbage along with a little bit of soy sauce and sea salt. Afterwards we all got to sample it and it was quite tasty! She then cooked some spinach the same way, which was also yummy.

As for meeting her husband, they met via the internet and he flew to Shanghai, China to meet her. She said he was absolutely scared to death being in that huge airport with so many people around and him not able to speak a word of Chinese! He is from the Eastern hills of KY and I just cannot imagine the cultural shock for both of them. They have been married a few years with children, so it's working out well. She was very sweet.

I also took a Body Recall workshop. It was informative and showed me how out of shape I am! We did chair exercises and you might thing they'd be easy and nothing to it. Wrong!!! It was truly a workout and you felt the impact of slow slow slow movements of the body. I think I really need to do this one. It's hard to slow down and exercise slow, at least for me it is. She emphasized doing the exercises slow and doing the deep breathing, etc.

I also took a day trip to Clarksville, IN to the Derby Dinner Playhouse where we saw "Happy Days." It was a musical and was based on the TV show. They were all so good in their parts, and really good singers. They also did some dancing. The lunch was buffet and yummy. After the play we got dropped off at a huge Lousiville mall for 2 hours of shopping! I wandered around some and saw stores that I had never heard of before! The mall was so big there was no way to cover it in 2 hours. I bought a couple of small items but nothing major. This trip was with a group with one of the banks I have an account with.

I thought some of you might like to see how the corn is growing in these parts.  I just took this a few days ago

and if you click on the photo it should  enlarge. We have been getting rain today and it rained all last night, so this corn probably has already grown a couple more inches!

Well, my eyes are getting heavy and my bed is calling my name,  For all the Mother's out there, I hope you had a wonderful, blessed Happy Mother's Day!!