Maybe this will help relieve my stress

A while back I fell in love with ear cuffs. I also found out that they are not easy to find. I have quite a collection but am always looking for more.

Yesterday I found a place that sells blanks with holes. Now I can create my own designs.

One day, I will no longer carve pumpkins…

 

Okay, so I bought a Funkin the other day.  Now I’m going to carve it in my favorite Frankenstein monster pumpkin carving.  Eventually I plan to carve all of my favorite pumpkins over the years into Funkins so I will no longer have to carve real pumpkins.

I’m finding that the older I get the more my hands pain me when I do those intricate carvings.  However, I refuse to disappoint all those kids who come up our street just to see the pumpkins every year.  Heck some of the kids are grand-kids of kids who came to see the first pumpkins we put out each year.

 

The ink went up to how much?!

 

     When the cost of the ink cartridges for the old decrepit printer is almost as much as the cost of a brand-new three-in-one printer, it’s time to buy a new three-in-one printer.  Yep, I bought one yesterday.  (Happy birthday to me…)

     By taking my old printer in, I received a fifty-dollar rebate, which lowered the cost of the printer even more.  I am a happy camper.

     Now I can scan, fax, and print.  It also has a port where I can put the card from the camera and directly print photos from there. 

     We have so many photos over at the MIL’s house I had no idea of what to do with them.  Most of the photos we have no idea who the people are in them, no children to pass them down to, and no place to store them.  Yes!  I can scan them, store them on a flash drive, and toss away the mountains of photos.  This idea works!

Since it’s my birthday I’m going to be lazy…

 

Patty and Gavin wrestling.

Dogs and cameras

 

     Did you ever sit there and think; “Now there are several minutes of my life that I won’t get back” I did tonight.  I wanted to put up a new picture of Patty but she wasn’t cooperating.  One of her best tricks is ‘stick ‘em up’ I wanted a shot of that.  Twenty minutes later and I still didn’t have a picture. 

     Did you know that it is impossible to take a picture and work a dog at the same time?  You also need to be quick on the button to catch the dog doing the trick.  I wasn’t.  Butt shots as she walked out of the picture didn’t work.

     Tomorrow, I’ll ask DH to have her do the trick while I attempt to snap a good picture.  I’m certain Patty will do better when she has her Daddy asking her to do her trick.  She’ll do anything for him.

     The next problem will be to keep Gavin from trying to hog the shutter time.  He likes the camera.  He never enjoyed the show ring but he certainly enjoys getting his picture taken.  I can’t pick it up without having him try to get my attention.  “Look at me, I’ll give my paw.”

A little flag waving in honor of yesterday

 

     After a day loaded with food, fireworks, and military band music, it was nice to take time to remember why we celebrate the 4^th of July.

     The freedoms we have are precious gifts given to us by those visionaries who fought hard to achieve the birth of a great nation.  What an amazing accomplishment.  Do not let their dream fade in apathy.

     Hang tightly to those freedoms and be proud of who we are as a nation. 

     This is a great country.  It is my country and I’m proud of it.  I am grateful to be a citizen.

Mittened kitten found a home

 

     I received some good news from G today.  It seems that the kitten who has been living on her deck has found a home.  That is if it stays around for a few more days.  G says that with her luck he’ll disappear when the woman comes to get him and then reappear a few weeks later.

     I’m keeping my fingers crossed that this doesn’t happen and he goes on to live happily ever after with his new owner. 

     While I was visiting G today he curled up on my lap and stayed put for quite a while purring all the time.  He’s going to make a wonderful lap cat. 

     He’s gained some weight since he came to live at G’s.  He certainly has enjoyed the food they’re giving him.  You no longer see each rib, his hipbones don’t look like knife blades, and his spine isn’t sticking out.

     The day his new owner comes to get him, he has a vet appointment for neutering before she takes him home.  Poor baby is in for a big surprise.  He’ll get over it soon enough.  I’ve a feeling she’s going to enjoy spoiling him.

Holey pepper Batman

 

     I check the growth of my veggies every day.  Yes, I’m impatient for them to ripen.  So far it’s bugs two, me one.  The bugs have managed to destroy one patty pan squash and an Ancho pepper.  I’d been eyeing up that pepper every day since it was a blossom.  By the time it grew to the size of my thumb, some bug managed to nibble a large hole into it. 

     I declared war.  At night I haunted the garden by flashlight, picking bugs off the plants and depositing them into a jar filled with soapy water.  I rubbed the same mixture onto the tiny peppers every night.  Now I have quite a few nice sized peppers that will soon be ready to pick and they have no holes in them.

     The melon and cucumber plants are also bug free now and growing with wild abandon.  I have pea sized watermelons and cantaloupes on the vines.  There are enough baby cucumbers out there to choke a horse or fill a large gherkin pickle jar.

     There will be at least three eggplants since that’s how many blossoms we have today.  It makes me glad that I have my mother’s moussakka recipe.  That is a real treat.

Monet skies

 

     I gave away more plants today.  The perennials have flourished and are elbowing each other for space.  M’s mother and father in law stopped by and took several plants.  They barely put a dent in the crop.

     I may have to resort to pulling some of them out like weeds to make some room.  I hate to do that.  Better to expand the garden edges and weather DH’s complaints.  He shouldn’t complain since it would mean less for him to mow, but he is rather particular about the lawn.

     After a hot and hard day’s work in the gardens, I sprawled out on the hammock to cool off and relax for a bit.  The clouds drifted across the sky on the tip of an impressionist’s brush.  The results were astonishingly gorgeous.  I daydreamed under a Monet sky.  

      As the day moved into night, the back yard became nature’s light show.  It began with a colorful sunset and ended with hundreds of fireflies doing their winged dance.  The neighborhood was quiet.  All I heard was the sound of the waterfall and fountains.

G now holds the title of Queen Klutz

 

     Do you remember when I sprained both ankles after taking the tumble on the uneven sidewalk in our back yard?  Then all the other Klutzy things I’ve done?  I have been dethroned.  I bow down to my dear friend G.  She outdid me on Thursday night. 

     G and a friend went to a local college theater to see the Mikado.  She was going to tell me all about it today, but when I didn’t hear from her, I thought I’d go over and visit.  As I normally do, I walked through her back gate, up her deck steps, knocked on the screen door, and gave her a ‘yoo hoo!’  Imagine my surprise to see her limping to the door.

     “What the heck did you do?”  I stared at her.

     “I tumbled down some steps.”

     “What steps?”

     “Over at the college by the theater entrance.  I didn’t get to the play.”

     “Holy crap, woman.”

     “Yeah, I did a real good job falling.”  She began to point out her injuries.

     Her badly sprained, very swollen ankle, the cut on the outside edge of her eyebrow, the beginnings of a hell of a shiner, her left wrist—wrapped in an ACE bandage, and the shinbone on the other leg was looking quite colorful. 

     “Geez and I thought I held the record for klutziness.”

     “I think I’ve got you beat.  There’s more.”  She showed me the bruise on her elbow and her chipped glasses.

     “Egads!  I do believe you’ve taken the title from me.  Do you want me to get you a couple of fresh ice packs?  Want to borrow my crutches?”

     “No, I just iced everything.”  She showed me a cane.  “My hands are both so sore I have trouble using this so I don’t think crutches would help.”

     “I don’t suppose they would.  Can I get you anything?”

     “No.  I’m fine.”

     “You let me know if you need anything. 

     “I will.” 

     “You know you’re my blog post tonight.”

     “Gee, thanks.”

     “Anything for you.”

     “Yeah.  Anyway, they were very nice to me at the college.  They wanted to call an ambulance but I said no.  They even exchanged our tickets for a later show.  We’re going to try to see the play again, next Thursday.”

     “Stay away from those stairs.”

Surprise! A new look.

 

     I thought it was time for a change.  I hope you like it.  One thing I noticed was the print is larger, which I like.  However,  it is lighter, which I don’t like. 

     I may have to play a little.

     The Blogrolls are now on the bottom of the page along with everything else that isn’t a post.  Not sure if I like that, but we’ll see.

     This is going to take some getting used to.  I hope you all like the changes.  If not, let me know.  I do want your opinions.

Time management

 

     You have to be kidding.  Me manage time?  I wish.  That’s as much a pipe dream as organizing the house.  I’ve tried to do both and have yet to succeed.

     It never fails to amaze me that no matter when I get up, the day doesn’t have enough hours in it for me to do the things I’d like to have done around here.  Maybe if I could clone myself…

     I’d need more than one clone.  However, that would pose another problem.  Where would I put my clones?  This house is tiny.  How would I feed them?  If they eat like I do that would put a hurting on our food budget.  Clones won’t work.

     This, in turn, brings us back to time management.  How does one manage time?  I have no idea.  I remain clueless.  I’ve tried making schedules but between DH, his mother, and the dogs schedules don’t work.  Something always comes up to scotch it.

     I would try delegating chores and projects but when there’s no one else to delegate those things to, that doesn’t work either.  I need more hours in the day, or in my case, the night.

     How do you manage time?