Monday, July 22, 2013

Let Me Try That Again.....PET PEEVE

One peeve is someone who tries to post their PET PEEVE and then doesn't write anything, lol. As it turns out, I did actually write something and went back to edit it, erased it, thought I would write it later and the title on the post was published anyways.....

Actually my peeve was trying to talk and have a conversation with someone and in the process of explaining the situation the other person starts to talk so fast and so loud to drown you out so they can get their 2-cents worth in over your point. I will also add, that I never did get to say what I wanted to, I'm sure she never heard me, and in the process, she was so busy trying to be the one who thought their point was more important. She started talking while I was still talking. Since I was talking first, I was interrupted and I never heard one word the other person had to say and I'm sure she never heard anything I had to say either. RUDE PEOPLE!!!!!!

Some people make it hard to love them, especially when they think you are a door mat under their feet.

I could add more to this but won't. No sense in stewing over the past and being mad only wastes precious energy. 

Other than that.........I am peeved out for the moment, lol :)


Saturday, July 20, 2013

Mom's African Flowers, New Books, Thoughts

 
 I am back in the flower business again. Although nothing makes me happier than to use up bits of leftover yarn, I'm afraid if my friend Barb (in Florida) doesn't soon send that yarn that she promised, I will be going out to purchase more yarn. I will be right back where I started, another batch of leftovers just waiting for the right pattern to come along. A couple of posts back I told you all about my mom's reaction to my African Flower blanket.


I just couldn't turn loose of the first one I made during my husband's treatments. So many memories are attached to that blanket, so much suppressed heartbreak and silent prayers. My sanity was all wrapped up in those stitches, the constant counting to myself, the business of my hands to keep my mind from being in overdrive, knowing that eventually all these trips to the cancer center and what laid beyond would bring me to these days of loneliness and overwhelming grief. I had spent more than half of my life loving my man.


 It is a whole new ballgame, this being a widow. People say, "it will get easier as time goes by." Does that happen when you become 80 years old and forgetful? I don't know. I do know that you don't stop loving someone just because they are gone. True love does not have a switch to turn ON and OFF, and unless you have experienced the very same heartbreak, you have no real idea. The old saying, "walk in my shoes" comes to mind. So many well-meaning people try in their own way to give comfort. I find the real HOPE is FAITH in GOD, that endures when others have forgotten you.

 
I don't sit around feeling sorry for myself, I have no time for that, I am too busy never quite getting everything done. I can laugh at that because I have always been accused of "being too slow" when I do anything, being the "perfectionist". I look around here and I don't see anything perfect. I seem to run around in circles, like that little hamster in the exercise wheel, always doing, but never getting anywhere.


Regardless of my feelings, I still have the bug to enlighten myself with good books. I have always liked Joyce Meyers, and I watch her program 5 days a week and love her messages about God and His word. I wanted to go to her next speaking engagement in Hershey Pennsylvania, but good luck finding anyone who isn't busy at that time. I bought Paula Deen's newest cookbook. I have loved Paula, her story of how she got started and became successful. It breaks my heart that she is being persecuted for something she said 25 years ago. At least she was honest, and who hasn't said something over their lifetime that they are sorry for or regret? We all have. I was more miffed when she came out as being diabetic and still promoting her recipes that were far from healthy, but Type II diabetes usually hits when we are older and I'm sure she didn't want to be diabetic. She was only cooking the foods that she knew from her Southern upbringing and family traditions. No one holds a gun to our heads and tells us to "eat that (to die for) mac & cheese".


I also purchased many new patterns, honestly, the very last thing I needed because I have a ton already. I mentioned before how my brother would not take any money for working on my tree removal, well I will make him a lovely Aran Afghan and so I searched Ebay and found plenty of patterns. Now I just need to figure out which one to make. I will make his wife one too, only maybe one with a flower motif, in the colors she has decorated with. Winters in Ohio can be cold, we folks use our afghans and blankets.



More indulgences to feed my addiction..........



I have always wanted to do a Christmas tree in crocheted snowflakes. I have a couple of leaflets already, but these new additions will give me more variety if I ever decide to go ahead with this plan. Otherwise, snowflakes always make sweet little gifts when attached to a present. The receiver can always add it to their tree decorations. I am thinking if you block, stiffen and then spray with some fabric adhesive then sprinkle a white glitter, they will sparkle like the real thing. Is there a more breath taking site than the sun or moon shining on fresh and sparkling new snow.


I invested in this pattern book too. I thought it would come in handy when doing something less blah for the edge on a blanket. I seem to rely on the same ole, same old border, well this aught to change that.

 

I love Country Woman magazine, and use to subscribe to it. I never threw out the older issues, there was always a recipe I planned to try or article I planned to read. The thing is, the company who publishes it still sends me complimentary issues and so the pile grows. It is a good wholesome read, with lots of good things inside it's cover.

As always, I need to get busy and accomplish something so my day is not a waste. Thank you for visiting me. Blogging is an outlet for me. I hesitate at times to write some things, I don't want to bring anyone to the point where they don't want to come back here to visit me. I will say my life has it's ups and downs, good days and bad. Mostly they are good and I refuse to allow the bad days to take over and to become depressed. One last thought.......

I read this on Pinterest the other day and can kick myself for not pinning it.....for some reason I had to read it a couple of times to wrap it around my mind as to the meaning, it kinda caught me off guard:

"She has bite marks on her tongue for all the things she didn't say."  

I find myself thinking this many times in my day. How many times do we keep our mouths shut and bite our tongue because we know what we would say will cause trouble, hard feelings, anger and resentment? Even with our adult children, sometimes it is painful to bite back the words that we want to say, so my prayer,

Lord, help me to keep my mouth shut, or at least put the wisdom in my mind and the right words in my mouth so I can be a bright and shining light to others. Please let me be a blessing in their lives. Amen ♥

Saturday, July 13, 2013

Thank You



 BEFORE........



Here is the "AFTER" picture of my daughter Meghan's back yard. I went over yesterday morning for 2-3 hours and helped her clean things up and then this pic is the crew who came later in the afternoon. Someone had cut the smaller limbs and stacked up the firewood, but she had no clue since it was done while she was at work the evening before. Just a random act of kindness, she thinks maybe her neighbor who lives across the street????.

  Thanks to everyone who commented on my last post. After reading the comments I went back and replied to your messages.


I am taking a bit of a break from mowing. I have all the riding done, now to fortify myself for the trimming with the push mower. I have to get this done today. Weather man says our humid weather will be returning tomorrow which is Sunday. I try not to work anymore on Sundays. For years it never seemed to matter what day of the week it was, my husband and I worked regardless. The Sabbath is a day of rest and I have changed my views on it. One works themselves into a frenzy for 6 days a week and needs the 7th for a rest. Back when I was still in nursing and had to work my weekends (not by choice, but it was required) I had to work Sundays. I asked my mother-in-law about that because she was a firm believer in Sundays being a day of rest. She told me, "If you have to work on Sundays, then you should make your Sabbath on a day when you are not having to go to work." It made sense. Besides, we all know people who HAVE to work on Sundays, nurses, doctors, policemen, firemen, just to name a few.

Well, I better get busy. I am burning daylight and really want to be done with this job. Oh yeah, I started my mom's African Flower blanket last evening. I have 3 motifs done so far and will share a pic of the progress in my next post. I also ordered some books from Amazon. I'll share them too. Hope your weekend is going fine. ♥ you all.

Thursday, July 11, 2013

Aftermath of the Storm, Clean-up

My back yard. The picture doesn't do the mess justice.
Meg's back yard after the storm.


What do you think? We do have plenty of eagles around this area, but we also have plenty of hawks.
 On Wednesday morning around 1am it stormed to beat the band. My little Trixie does this little bark, bark, bark, long before I hear the first rumble of thunder. She knew it was coming, then I knew it was coming. I was trying to fall asleep, but when the storm hit the little bark becomes a full blown annoying rampage of serious barking that lasts till the storm has passed. I don't know what she thinks she can accomplish by doing that. Then Chewy chimes in and there is no rest for the wicked. Trixie has been with us almost 8 years.......8 years of storm barking, trying to sleep with the pillow over your head.

Then Wednesday afternoon around 3pm another storm, this one greater than the earlier one. Only this time I was babysitting my little grandson and sitting in the basement of my daughter's next door neighbor's (Wayne & Dee's) house. My daughter doesn't have a basement and thank God her next door neighbor does. When we came out of the basement Wayne pointed to a tree that was completely uprooted out by their tennis court and another big tree limb that was down between the houses. Dee noticed that the storm had taken their screens right off of some of their first floor windows. The electrical power was off.  I left then to see what damage was next door at my daughter's house.

There were about 6-7 roof shingles lying around the yard, her umbrella table and chairs were all blown up toward the house and the glass from the table was laying next to the table frame. There were smaller limbs and leaves all over the yard. The neighborhood looked to be a mess. When she got home she mentioned all the damage over at Birchard Park which is located one street over from Hayes Avenue where President Rutherford B. Hayes's home and memorial are located. This neighborhood is a historical landmark area and has many huge trees that have been there since President Hayes's time in office. They have a huge Civil War re-enactments on the grounds complete with tents and campfires, etc. every year and one is coming up soon. Rachael told me that the park with all it's huge trees doesn't even look like a park anymore because of all the wind damage.

The bird was wet, it kept fanning it's tail feathers to dry them out. Eagle or hawk?

It took me 45 minutes to get home. I have to cross the Sandusky River and it was raging. One route was blocked with fallen trees all over the road. I had to turn around and come back the way I came to take an alternate route. When I got home my power was off, the garage door would not open. I left myself in the house and the dogs were glad to see me. I had so many sticks and leaves all over the driveway and the yard, but no fallen trees thank goodness. My next door neighbor had a decorative crab apple tree out of the ground, their neighbor on the other side had several trees down.

I called my brother Mike and his community had a tornado. Trees down everywhere, some on houses. There were windows blown out of a store down town. His neighborhood is fairly new and so the trees are smaller, some leaves and branches down but no real damage to anything.

This morning I went out and started the clean up job. I swear, I do not know why I don't have the slimmest waistline in the country, I know I picked up a million sticks and smaller limbs, leaves and tree bark. Now I should not complain, every bit of the stuff I picked up on the one side of the house belonged to the dead trees in the neighbor's woods next to our property, we have no trees over there. My sciatic nerve pain is screaming at me now. I am sore and this is not the end of all this. Tomorrow I go to my youngest daughter's house and help her with the mess in her yard. A neighbor's tree fell in her yard and she has a mess over there with all her walnut trees. Our weather has improved today. The humidity has improved. We had about 18 days straight of severe thunderstorms. Walking in the yard is like walking on a wet sponge, and the low spots are like a marsh. I won't be mowing till maybe Saturday........Then Sunday I will rest. I need it, I'm beat.


I did find this feather out in the yard. Looks almost like polka dots doesn't it? Now, I wonder what kind of bird that feather came from?

I didn't post any damage pictures of my back yard. I don't want to see anymore sticks or branches please, unless they are still attached to the trees, and the trees are still upright. I think you get the idea from seeing Meg's yard. There was plenty of that all around.

Have a good weekend ♥


Thursday, July 4, 2013

Corn Is Head High by the 4th of July & Beef Jerky



Across the road from my house is a huge corn field. We have had so much rain that it is not "knee high by the 4th of July" but over your head.


I snapped a few photos on my way out of the driveway to Joann Fabrics.


This is what I see right before I pull out on the highway at the end of my driveway. The road is wet, and it is sprinkling rain. We had rain all day.


When I got down the highway I ran into this torrential down pour all the way to the shopping center. The trip takes me about 30 minutes. And this is what was happening as I sat in my parked car, waiting for it to let up. I had my umbrella, but the wind was blowing so hard. I wasn't the only one stuck in my car. I noticed several other shoppers doing what I was doing.


I should have worn boots.........


And there was the store. Can ya see the red letters? It finally did let up enough for me to get across the street, with umbrella in hand. I went in and bought 6 big skeins of Lion Brand Pound of Love Yarn in an Antique White, and several skeins of RH Super Saver, color Frosty Green(I swore I would never buy any more of that brand of yarn), and 2 skeins of some variegated RH. Now don't be too disappointed, but I didn't take any pictures of the newest additions to my stash because I simply forgot. I honestly thought I was done with yarn for awhile. I was sooooooo ready to turn the page and dust off my sewing machine, but something happened about a week ago last Sunday. I made the mistake of showing my mother a few of the afghans I have made these past 2+ years and I showed her this one.........


The first words out of her mouth were, "Are you going to sell this, you should sell this!" Now those of you who have followed my blog since early 2011 know that this is the afghan/blanket I made during my husband's first months of chemo. It holds weeks/months of memories and it is what I did to help take my mind off of our troubles and helped me cope so I could be strong enough for him. This African Flower Hex was a God send pattern and when I wasn't crocheting the flowers I was tucking in the tails. It was a portable project. If I remember right it took me about 2 days to hand sew all the hexes together. Anyways, I told her no, it was not for sale. I then proceeded to show her 2 other blankets I had made, but although she thought they were pretty, she said she liked the first one better (of course). Again she yaks to me that I should sell it, and she would "buy it" (all the time I am thinking stubborn old German woman). I told her it was NOT for sale and there was No amount of money could buy it. A week passed and one morning my phone rang........yep, you guessed it, mom! (I give her credit for being almost 83 years old she is persistent). She tells me she will buy one of the other 2 blankets......I really hate to say this, cause I love my mom, but I know her well enough to know that she is not really wanting to buy the other ones, she is hoping to wear me down, make me feel sorry for her, and besides, last fall I "gave" her a beautiful shell afghan made from Lion Brand Vanna Yarn. I told her I would call her back.....she had woke me up and I was still trying to sleep, I had gone to bed at 3am. Now you know how that is, I couldn't go back to sleep, I got up and let the dogs out, got them fed, made some coffee to fortify myself before calling her back.
So I told her if she was willing to wait about 3 months I would make her an African Flower afghan, but right now with all the yard work every week and babysitting, I was just way too busy. Besides in my mind I really didn't want to sell her the other 2 either......now I know that sounds selfish and bad of me, but I have 2 ratty afghans in my living room that have been abused all these years by the kids, hubby and of course the dogs, yet I wash them up and continue to use them, and one I made when I was pregnant with Rachael, 36 years ago!!!!! I have made over 15 in the past several years and have given most of them away. I  would really like to keep the new ones I made. I have given so many away in the past, now I feel selfish in my old age. So she never said either way and that is why this trip to Joann Fabrics. I will start her flowers soon as I find some free time. And I plan to make my brother Mike an Aran Afghan in the Antique White Pound of Love yarn. His will be surprised. I want to do something for him for cutting the trees. Tree cutting and removal is by no means a cheap cost, and he has saved me over $1,000 I am sure. Besides, this past 2 weeks I have trapped 2 ground hogs and he took them off for me. Then he set a killer trap and we got a 3rd, only this one was deader than a doornail and he took it off to his pole barn way in the country. He was going to set it out in the field for the buzzards to eat. He reset the traps, they are wicked looking, and I was warned to make sure my dogs are not to go out where they are set. They never do anyways, but those ground hogs have dug big trenches under the privacy fence and now the dogs can get out into the outer yard if I don't keep them confined to their pen.


This past evening I loaded up my food dehydrator with the thin beef strips I marinated for a day and a half. I have made jerky many times over the years. I have a recipe I found and I tweaked it a bit (sorry I can not share this one) and it is so good that the finished jerky never lasted but a couple of days around here especially when the kids were still at home. Rachael has made it and given it as a gift and was told later that everyone was fighting over the bag, they loved it that good. So I made a batch for my brother. He absolutely has refused any payment for working on the trees. He refused any money for gasoline and oil to run his chain saws. He refused money for his fuel to drive over here and to haul the logs to my oldest daughters where he cut them in pieces. He is a body builder and in excellent shape, and I give credit where credit is deserved, he has done more than 85% of all that work. All I did was to pick up brush and help to stack the wood after it was cut in smaller pieces. Then he again refused any $ for dealing with the ground hog problem. He refused money for the 2 killer traps he went and bought. I throw up my hands, so about the only thing I can do to repay him in some small way is to bake him some  nut bread, make some cookies, beef jerky and crochet the surprise afghan.


It smells good even when it comes out of the marinate.
 

The whole house smells like a jerky factory.


(I have thought several times to buy a better brand of dehydrator, but as long as this one holds up I will use it).

Next day...4th of July. The jerky is done and I will run it over to Mike's house this evening. He is working today patrolling the Ohio Turnpike. I got 2 quart freezer bags for him. I will make him some cookies and nut bread later in the week, well that is my plan as long as it fits into God's plan.


Oh it smells and tastes so good.


I have been racking my brain as what else I can do for my brother. I know he isn't expecting anything, but I feel it is better to give than receive and my little pittance seems small compared to what he has done for me. I am so blessed and grateful. He loves to feed the birds so I will go and find him some things for his back yard bird feeding station........well enough about this, I'm sure I have brought you all to tears and wondering just when I will hush about all this. So, what have you done in the past to repay a random act of kindness that was done for you? Honestly, I would love to hear about it. In the meantime, have a safe and happy 4th of July ♥

Just a thought....July 2nd would have been our 43 year anniversary. I have been staying busy, too busy to sit around and dwell on sad thoughts and to feel sorry for myself. I appreciate all of my family and friends, and all of my blogger buddies who make me smile and allow me to be a small part of their lives by letting me have a connection from afar. It feels good to learn from all of you and I hope in some small way I bring something good to your lives as well, even if it is a smile. Each and every one of you are special to me and I want to thank you for all the kind words and comments left on my last post as well as all previous postings. I read once that "we are all spiritual beings going through the human experience, not humans going through a spiritual experience". And in the end it is all about Love. I love you all. Thank you for being a part of my life. I am so glad we found each other. ♥
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THAT THE ONES YOU LOVE ARE LIFE'S MOST PRECIOUS GIFTS~