Have you ever heard someone use that phrase, “For the love of Pete!”  I have  and I think it means someone can’t believe what they are seeing or hearing or just amazed at something.  I always wondered just who this “Pete” is and why do we have to love him?  Anyway, I thought this when I realized it has been a while since I wrote here so here goes nothing!

So October came and went fast as every other month in this year has gone.  David and I did a couple of road trips and went down to French Lick where this animal ranch is. We have been down there before on our fiftieth wedding anniversary where we stayed in this grand hotel.  We visited the zoo and got up close to elephants and even got to touch them.  This time we went on an animal safari where we drove this road into this enclosure where animals waited to get treats from each car.  We bought two cups  of their feed and proceeded in to their area.  A camel came right up to the window on David’s side and David  stuck the cup out his window and the camel took the whole thing out of his hand!

This wasn’t the camel.  David  still has his cup of feed.

This was an alpaca,I think and it very daintily ate out of my cup.

Another white one.  The animals were very persistent in getting to the food.

See this guy?  The Emus scared me a little.  I would not open my window for them and they gave me the evil eye.

I was feeding this llama when the

white one  came up alongside him with its ears laid back in anger and I was afraid it was going to spit, like llamas are known to do, so I stuck the cup to its mouth so it wouldn’t get the chance!

See this beautiful, white deer or is it an elk?

Nothing like the behind of a zebra.

But it turned around for some feed.  Aren’t they beautiful animas?

Here comes another Emu!

Giving me the evil eye through the window!

Lots of deer.

Buffalo.  They are a gigantic, gorgeous creature.  I see them on Facebook  tossing silly tourists at Yellowstone who are foolish enough to get out of their cars for a closeup.  You don’t fool around with buffalo.

They even had longhorn steers.

Part of the tour included  going into their dinosaur habitat.

We drove through this entrance.  Rather scary, don’t you think?

What awaited us on the other side?  Visions of Jurassic Park came to mind at that moment.

Oh, dear!

There is one now!

Now I know why we needed to stay in the car.  These guys will eat you!


This one was chomping leaves

Oh, no, it sees us!

Push on the gas, David!

Good, we got away!

Oh,oh.  They are reproducing. Gotta get out of here!

This one has already reproduced.  Time to leave.

Hurry, David, he’s catching up!

We left the park just in time, but we planned to come back that night for their light show.

This Jack-o-lantern greeted us that night. My pictures aren’t the best at night.

Bats above us.

A bridge we crossed .  We saw a few lights and then journeyed through dinosaur land, but no lights.  What was going on?  Were the dinosaurs loose?  We came down the hill where a man stopped us and told us their electricity was down so we got a complete refund and were saved from the dinosaurs!

Inour drives we see the silliest things. Being Halloween time there were decorations everywhere.  We saw several hay bales painted.

Lots of pumpkins displayed in different towns.

Skeleton people were in many yards.

In the little town of Orleans we found dipped ice cream.  We are always on the  lookout for good, dipped ice cream.

I saw this house, right next to a railroad track and fell in love.  It needs some tender,loving care, but it could be a beauty.  I know. Our house once needed a lot of work and now it is a gem.  We are always looking at old houses wondering who lived in them, what is their story.

Houses like this.  They are dotted all over country back roads in my state.  Like the family just packed up and left one day.  Sad, little house.

Nestled among the trees and weeds this little house cries for attention.  If I were very rich, I would travel the country roads and find these houses and fix them up and give them to families who promise to take care of them.  And I’d keep tabs to be sure they did!

Here’s another one. These use to be starter homes.  When we first got married we lived in a three room apartment, then bought a tiny, three room house in the country for $10,000 and lived there until we were expecting our second baby and needed something bigger.  Our second house cost $16,900 and we lived there until David’s job moved us to where we live now.  I did not want to move.  It was far from my family and friends.  I cried for a week when we moved.  I hated everything about it. David told me once he was afraid I was going to leave him!  I never would, but I was not a happy camper until the kids got settled into their  new school and I had met some people and made friends.  Now Iwould not move back.  I have made many friends, raised my family and love my home.  I think I will stay here until the good Lord calls me home!

So, Ithink I have sort of caught up.  Did I tell you we went to a comedy show starring  Jim Gaffigan?  I always thought he was funny in a low key kind of way and he even made bourbon sound funny as most of his jokes were about that beverage that night.

Now it is on to Thanksgiving and then Christmas.  How can it be! Bye.

Today the phone rang.  David and I were getting ready to go buy some apple cider and then go out to eat.  But the phone rang and David answered it.  Let me say this first before I go on.  I don’t always answer the phone if I am busy or think it might be a salesman.  We do get sales calls at about the same time every day and I stopped answering the phone at those times.  But David cannot stand to hear the phone ring and always answers.Then he will engage with the sales person to tell them to take our phone number off their list, but they never do.

Anyway, the phone rang just as we were getting ready to leave and David answered it. He came carrying the phone to me saying it was my sister on the phone with an emergency.  I took the phone and my sister was sobbing on the other end.  It seems she and her daughter, my niece,were in a car accident.  She kept talking through her sobs so I asked her if someone else could talk.
Then a policeman came on the phone and told me they had been in an accident and that they both did not have life threatening injuries.  Then he said that my niece had alcohol in her and I told him she did not drink.  Then he said she had told him she had not been feeling well and was taking cold medicine that had alcohol in it.  She was going to be taken to jail nevertheless for wreckless driving and would I like to speak with her?  Of course and she got on the line still sobbing saying she didn’t want to spend the night in jail so they had a lawyer to talk to me. Now this is where my spidey  senses should have been alerted, but no.  The lawyer got on and I asked him what happened and that my niece said the accident was not her fault.  That the lady had pulled out in front  of her.  I asked about the other driver and the lawyer said she was a pregnant lady.  My heart sank. Back on line to my niece.

I then asked my niece where my sister was and she said she had been taken to the hospital.  She was hysterical about spending a night in jail and the lawyer said she needed bond money.  I asked her where her Dad was.  She said he was out of town. My sister and her husband never go anywhere without the other.  Again, my spidey senses should have been alerted, but they were not. Then I asked her why she didn’t call her brother and she said something I did not understand and then the  lawyer got back on the phone to explain to me the circumstances that she would need bail to stay out of jail.  I asked him how much was bail and he said, $90,000 and my heart sank  again.But then the court would take ten per cent which was $9,000.  Then he asked, well,how much could you send? Now, dear reader, my spidey senses should have been jumping off the charts, but nooooo.  I said I would have to talk to my husband and I asked the lawyer for his call back number.  The phone suddenly went dead.

I told David we were going up there, a one and a half hour drive.  My sister and niece needed me!  We both packed bags expecting to spend the night and off we went.  I proceeded to tell David what the lawyer had told me.  I had even taken notes!  We had to make a stop for gas out of town when David told me, “Call your sister.”  I said, “ What, she is in the hospital!”  “Call your sister,” he repeated so while he pumped gas, I typed in my sister’s number and it rang and rang and my brother-in-law answered.  I said,”Are you home?”  “Yes,” he said.  “Is(my sister’s name) there?  By that time something was dawning on me.  He seemed confused by my questions.  Then my spidey senses finally started working and I realized we almost were scammed.  If not for David thinking maybe things weren’t exactly kosher we would have continued on to see my sister in the hospital where she obviously was not!

When we started putting the pieces together I noticed that things did not add up.  How was the lawyer at the accident so quickly?   How did they know my niece and sister’s names and I realize I had given them to the person on the phone. And why did the lawyer hang up when I asked for his callback number?  I think they knew the jig was up when I wanted the fake lawyer’s phone number! I was so thankful that my sister was well and at home, that my niece was not going to jail , that there was no pregnant lady. All there was were some very good actors on the phone. The girl who played  my niece deserves an Academy Award!

I am writing this as a warning.  I never thought I could be easily tricked like I was today.  These thieves are good at their work.  They know how to play  on people’s emotions.  All I could think at the time was my loved ones needed help. I was an easy prey.  Thank God for a husband who sensed something was not right.  Don’t let this happen to you. Never send money, we didn’t.  Ask for a callback number, I did do that. And never offer up too much information to a stranger on the phone.  I unwittingly did just that,  I learned valuable lessons today and will never be that gullible again.  I do know never to send money or give credit card numbers or bank account numbers to people you do hot know or have not called yourself.

I hope you have learned something from what happened to us today. There are very scary people waiting to prey on us.  Bye.

Now I know why many bloggers wait forever to write new blogs.  Life gets in the way.  The past couple of months have gone by in a whirlwind and now it is October, one of my favorite months of the years.  It usually starts to get cooler now, but we have been having Summerlike days for weeks now and hardly any rain.  We are living in a drought area now where we are not allowed burning outside.  Today it is grey and cloudy and they say it is going to rain, but they have been saying that almost daily and no rain.

We went to a wedding last month. Our oldest grandson’s. He met the love of his life at college.  He was a lacrosse star and she played on the basketball team.  So two athletes got together and got married.

Ahh, the kiss. The best part of the ceremony!

They washed each other’s feet during the ceremony which I thought was extra special.  Shows how they will serve one another in this marriage.

Jesus washed feet in the Bible. It shows a humbleness and love and shows He was also here to serve His Father.

Somebody isn’t happy at all to be married!   It is now two become one for all the rest of their lives.  So proud of both of them and so blessed to have another granddaughter.

This is the groom’s brother.  I asked him if he was going to be next and he kind of acted like it might just happen!  He has a girlfriend he has been dating since high school.  So…..

This is David and me and our daughter and younger son.

My son and his wife, my daughter-in-law.  Very nice lady.  She makes beautiful jewelry.  They got married a few years ago and since then I have worked on something to give them and brought it to the wedding and gave it to them finally.

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I started this quilt several years ago and always thought I would give it to them if I ever got it done and this Summer I sat down and began hand quilting thinking I would get it done for Christmas, but it went faster than I thought and I got it done and knew I would see them at the wedding so decided to take it there and give it to them as a late wedding gift.  Thousands of stitches in this quilt. Done with love.  They live in Florida so I hope they can use it.  The quilt measures 108 inches by 108 inches and fits a kingsize bed very well.

Our granddaughter and her husband who have been married just a few years.  The girl beside them is my grandson’s girlfriend and the girl on the end is my son’s stepdaughter.  I didn’t recognize her at first because I haven’t seen her is a few years, but we had a nice conversation. She is going to be an animal ophthalmologist if I understood her right.  Sounds interesting!  Our granddaughter has a good job at Conner Prairie an 1820 pioneer reenactment village.

Groom’s mother, my daughter-in-love, and her husband who has helped raise the kids. Yes we are an American family with his, mine and ours and whoever else wants to be in the family.  I will take them all and love them all.

My daughter and her husband, my son-in-law.  A very good one, too.

A small wedding cake for the bride and groom to cut. Thankfully, they did not shove pieces of cake in each other’s mouths like I have seen done on Facebook.  I really believe some marriages end right there when this happens because it shows lack of respect for the other person.  David and I fed each other little pieces at our wedding.

250 cupcakes later!  Red velvet was what I got and it was good.

Here is my grandson with the girl he walked with down the aisle. Right now he is the tallest person in our family.  Well over six feet and still growing, I think.  Very handsome, but it seems like only yesterday I was babysitting him while his parents worked.  He reminds me of my daddy in manner and personality.

I think they enjoyed this too much!  Ha!  I don’t blame them.  When you came into the door of the building where the wedding reception was held there was a table with pictures of the parents’  and grandparents’ weddings and of course, David and I were kissing in ours.  Guess our grandchildren take after us!

It was a happy day and we had a good time.

I think I told about our old dog, Molly, who had surgery last month on her mouth and her tail.  She had a growth on both places and her poor tail had to be bobbed.

Went from a long Labrador tail to this.  I call her Molly Pugtail now.  She doesn’t seem to mind. I think she feels so much better and has lost some weight and acts like a puppy most days.  So glad we could get it done for her.

Then there are these two…..

Lucy and Sugar.  Look at Lucy. She looks like I am going to beat her. She always gets this look every time I take her picture.  Her ears all droopy and “please, don’t beat me, mama.” look on her face.  Don’t know why she does it, but every time.  She wouldn’t know what a beating is.

Now this is a Labrador tail.  Look how shiny Sugar’s coat is.  Like a seal almost. I love all these dogs so much.  I always say if I were rich, lived on a farm with a big, heated barn I would have ten or fifteen dogs.  I have been looking at silver Labs online, but don’t think we can manage four dogs and I worry what will happen to them if we are gone.  My son-in-law told me once they would take care of our animals so I feel better about that.  When they say dogs become almost like your children, they are right. They are dependent on us for everything like children and need to be around us like children do.

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We went to a comedy show last night featuring Jim Gaffigan, who is from our state.  He had a series on tv for one season several years ago that I watched and enjoyed.  Anyway, we drove to Indianapolis and driving through downtown on a Saturday night was quite the thrill. There was something going on because there were women dressed in formals and men in dress suits all going into this one building. There was a picture of one the Indiana Pacers outside so I was wondering if it had to do with the Pacers.  There was also a knifing last night in Indianapolis if you saw it on the news.  There is not a lot of violent crime there so this was not the norm. Evidently some drinking was involved and an altercation about where a truck was parked.  Tempers flared and someone got knifed.  Why I don’t like being in big cities anymore.  Especially at night.  But that is me.  I like the country, but it is not like bad things don’t happen in the country, also. I  watch a lot of murder shows and there are a lot of murders in the southern part of my state. David and I just did a road trip and went through this town where two young girls were walking a train trestle and evidently got accosted by a man who shot them both.  It was on one of the shows I watch.  Anyway, one of the girls had the presence of mind to take a picture of the man as he walked toward them with her cellphone and it was a pretty good picture, but it took forever it seemed for the police to find the murderer. They finally did and he got arrested, put on trial and convicted. I don’t know if he got life or the death penalty, but either one would have been appropriate for such a horrible crime.  Two young girls barely in their teens.  I don’t know how their parents stood it all.  But back to where we were going……

When we got to the venue, David showed his cellphone to the gatekeeper who was supposed to help us download our tickets.  He sent us to the box office where we found out Stubhub had sold the same tickets twice and that a couple were already inside in our seats!  The cashier told David Stubhub is good at doing that and found us seats that were far better than the ones David bought. Eight rows back, center stage!  Anyway, don’t buy tickets through Stubhub.  They, in essence, steal your tickets that you buy and sell them to someone else.  We learned our lesson well.

Anyway, Jim was funny although he talked mostly about Bourbon.  I know.  That doesn’t sound like it would be funny, but it was.  David and I were talking about bourbon before the show.  I don’t know why.  But I was wondering how it tasted.  It’s big at the Kentucky Derby.  I don’t drink, but for some reason I have always wanted to know how it tasted.  Maybe because I read Gone With the Wind when I was a girl and the men were always drinking bourbon.

After the show we were hungry.  Neither of us had eaten anything all day but a package of peanut butter and crackers and me a Snicker bar.  We like Pizza King and I found one on Garmin so we took off down the streets to the restaurant,but when we got there, it was already closed.  It was 10;30 at night so I was afraid we would not find anything open but fast food which I don’t like anymore.  I looked up on Garmin and found a Bubbas which we both like so we set it on Garmin and went to look for it.  It was open until 11;00 and I asked the girl at the desk if it was too late for us, but she asked this one waiter and he said he would wait on us, so we got our seats and ordered our meals. The waiter was so nice and did a great job getting our drinks and food out.  I got a hamburger with sausage cut up on it, queso cheese, lettuce and tomato and it was so good.  Probably because I was so hungry.  David got the same.  We left the waiter a very nice tip because he was so nice.  I told him we would be coming back.  We usually eat out in Greenwood when I have to go to my eye doctor.  I have to go again in December.

Our motel was very nice except we had to ask for something to help me get up on the bed it was so high and I am short.  The manager was kind enough to bring a bench for me to crawl upon.  I have to use a stool to get up in our Jeep also and this trip, David forgot it. Left it in our driveway when we left so he and I had fun getting me up on my seat in the Jeep.  I wish we had added the extra step you can buy when you buy a Jeep.  I cannot get up on high seats. You know those high stools some restaurants have.  We ate out with some people once and I could not get up on those stools.  Finally, after being helped by two strong people, I got up there, but it was not comfortable so I steer away from those.

Another thing about some motel beds is they have four little bitty pillows on them that are not at all comfortable so we always take our own bed pillows.  The bed in this particular motel was very comfortable once I got up on it and I slept like a baby.  I need my creature comforts.

David will be taking another short vacation before the Holiday chaos starts at the store.  We have some plans and I will tell you about them later on.  Hope to do some Autumn leaf looking trips and there is a light show we are interested in so stay tuned.  Hope the cooler days come soon as I want to start wearing sweaters and socks again.  Been barefoot almost all Summer!  Bye.

What happened?  Summer has gotten completely away from me.  Let me tell you it has been a busy, busy season.  Gardening, quilting, playing with the pups, going to a shower, painting and various other things have monopolized my time.  We managed to freeze over 25 quarts of sweet corn along with a few of the cherry tomatoes I grew from seed.  My first ones in my green house.  We moved everything out of the greenhouse for Summer and in a few short weeks, we will be moving things back in again.  It is a constant job of one sort or other around here.

We also managed to take a few short road trips.  We took one today and almost ended up in Illinois, but we had to be home in time to feed the dogs so we had to turn around.  I have taken several pictures of our road trips and will include them here, some with description in a little bit.

David and I celebrated our 57th anniversary this Summer which we still cannot believe.  We met when I was sixteen and he was seventeen.  He was a transplant from another city, the cousin of one of my best friends.  I had met him when I was twelve at a basketball game, but hadn’t had him in my thoughts before that fateful day at a Dairy Queen when me and my girlfriends went there for lunchbreak from school and I saw this boy sitting, smoking a cigarette, with a short haircut(all the other boys’ hair was long and shaggy like the Beatles), wearing a worn leather coat and I asked my friend, “Is that your cousin?’  And she told me he was, in fact, the boy I had met years before.  He captivated me at that moment.  That Friday, at a football game, he sat behind we girls tormenting us and I really thought he was interested in another girl. But that weekend, his cousin called me and asked if I would like to go to a movie with her and her cousin and I said, “yes.”  So we all went to see “Joy in the Morning” with Richard Chamberlain and he held my hand.  The rest is history.  I fell for him bad.  When I got home my mother actually looked at me and her very words were, “You are in love, aren’t you?”  I couldn’t deny it and from that moment on, David and I were together as a couple right through his graduation, my graduation, him going to the military, me going to college and when he got out, getting engaged and marrying by the time I was nineteen.  I have never regretted one day of making that life choice.  I have been very blessed in having a mate who loves me as much as I love him and we like being together all the time.  We have been through good time, tragic times, sad times, happy times, poor times,  richer times, and everything in between and I would not have had it any other way.  I wish everyone could have a relationship like we have had.  Sometimes I think we leave others out of our little cocoon we have made for each other, not on purpose, but because we just like being together.  I have even been told by some to get away from David for a while, but I really don’t want to be away from him.  I had a girlfriend in high school who told me I was too good for him and I told her no, he was too good for me.  It is funny how people don’t understand a relationship like we have had.  Anyway, another year and I pray we have several more before we are separated.

Here are some pictures from our road trips.

You don’t see these much any longer.  We had a drive-in theater just down the road from our house for years and we would pack up the kids and a big bag of popcorn and take them to the movies.  Most of the time they were asleep before the movies were over, but that was okay.

We went to a town that I had seen on one of my murder shows. Yes, I picked it because I saw the town during the show and thought it looked like a nice little town despite a murder having taken place there and it was a really nice town. Old houses and this restaurant had good food.

I love taking pictures of flower gardens when we travel.  This one was in front of a little house and it was just full of flowers.  Pictures never do justice, but this was a very pretty garden.

We see some different structures in our travels.  This was a little log cabin with a moose beside it. The last time we saw a live moose was leaving Alaska fourteen years ago!

Gorgeous.

Some history along the way.  Not sure where this was, but the sign was in Indiana.

Ate at our favorite pizza place on one trip.

This double decker bus is inside it and you can eat in the bus if you like.  We never have but there were children enjoying being in it.

The little church where we were married.  I still have family that goes there.

I am always baking and this was the best rhubarb pie I believe that ever was!  I don’t usually brag about my cooking and I am not the best cook, but I can bake and this pie, well, it looked wonderful and was so delicious.  I hope I have not reached my peak in baking.  We froze a lot of rhubarb this Summer also.  So I will be making more pies.  Which is a story. I went to the doctor a few days ago and we talk about a lot of things and he was talking about baking peach cobbler and asked me if I baked and my exact words were, ” Look at me. Do I look like I bake!”  I love to bake and I love to eat what I bake.  So I am not a string bean by anyone’s imagination.  But, hey, I am getting old so I don’t have to keep up appearances any longer!  I feel sorry for older women who think they have to.  We have earned the right to be ourselves whoever that is. If you want to be skinny, fine.  Like to eat.  Fine.

David picked a lot of strawberries from his new bed this year.  Next year should be even more bountiful.  They were so good.

This is the young couple who will be marrying in a couple of weeks.  My oldest grandson and his fiance. Don’t they look happy!  A match made in Heaven.   I had made him this quilt a while back for his first apartment, but he decided to live at home until they got married to save some money so I gave it to them both for their first apartment.  It is full size, they just have it folded here.

Here are some pictures of our drive today.

You see the strangest things on Indiana backroads.

We passed this old barn in the middle of nowhere, nothing else around.  Look closely.

It had this beautiful barn quilt on it, but something else not expected.

Someone hanging from the hayloft window.  Poor soul.

Then David said. “Look cat crossing!”  He meant this…..

But I saw this….

A real cat hiding in the weeds. When it realized we were looking at it,  it slunk off.  A real cat crossing.

So many back roads to travel.  So many things to see.  It really is fun to travel the road less taken.

I joined a little quilt group on Facebook and we make one small quilt of our choosing from this particular author’s quilt books and show them to the group each month. We started back in October and I have made a small quilt every month.  Since next year is our country’s 150th birthday, I am making patriotic themed quilts now.

Here is the one for August.  I got some really patriotic fabric from a line by Lori Holt called Americana.

This is the quilt I made for July.  I am working on some more I cannot show as they may or may not be gifts at some point.  I am also making patriotic potholders to give away or sell.

This quilt wasn’t for this group, I just like chickens and made patriotic ones.  This is a Country Threads pattern from way back.

Here is another.  I am having so much fun making these little quilts.  You can almost make them in a day and feel like you have accomplished something.

And I liked this pattern so much, I made another in reproduction fabrics.

Some of my potholders.  Miniature quilts that can be used for baking or cooking or as a friend told me she did with hers, she put it on the back of an old antique chair she has and just looks at it!  Whatever makes you happy!

Here are some scenes from our soon to be granddaughter’s bridal shower.

She got a lot of nice things.  I remember how rich I felt after my bridal showers when I got so many nice, new things for my new home.

Here is my grandson who also got a gift at the bridal shower!

This is my darling, little granddaughter whose marriage we celebrated just a few years ago. She just got a job at Conner Prairie, a reenactment town of the 1820’s.  People dress up and speak as they did back then. There are several buildings to go through, an old school house where the school marm puts you through your paces and just lots of historical things to see. She works behind the scenes. Not exactly sure what she will be doing as she just started, but I hope to hear more about it.  We took her and her brothers to see it years ago when they were all little.

I think I am pretty well caught up with the news although I am sure I will think of something else after I sign off.

I will leave you with this sign.  We here in Indiana have our dark secrets, but then we put them on signs for all to see.

Saw this sign just outside where the bridal shower was held!  Perfect ending to a fun day!  Bye!

This month David and I celebrated 57 years of marriage.  How can that be? We were just kids who loved each other enough to get married and start life together. We had all our lives before us.  We had no children, owned no property and didn’t have much money.  David always tells people I was the rich one as I had money in the bank and he didn’t.  Little did he know that after  I paid my college tuition,  I had no money, either.  And to top it all off, I got pregnant immediately and spent my last quarter at college trying not to be sick.  I was taking swimming classes at the time and doing belly flops in the pool. I never really learned how to swim until years later when we got a pool.  So I quit school, went to work at Stucky’s Pecan Shop where I had friends there and had worked there before.  My boss actually bought me nursing bras as I was too dumb to know I would be needing them.
David worked at a factory and belonged to the National Guard where he had to be gone two weeks every Summer for annual training.

We settled into an apartment in our little town, right across from the gas station and above a pinball store where we would spend time playing pinball.  My sister had washed, starched  and ironed some beautiful, frilly curtains for the windows that faced the street and we had bought a whole houseful of furniture for, get this, just over one hundred dollars.  With that money we got a bed, a couch, a chair, two end tables, a coffee table, two table lamps and a floor lamp.  I felt rich!  We still have the floor lamp, but have gotten new furniture since those days. David went to work every day and so did until  I got  too pregnant. Our baby boy was born ten months after we were married.  I see these young couples who wait years to have their first child, but I am glad I had mine while I was young.  I always say I grew up with my children.  I loved being a wife and mother..

Anyway, David took two weeks off so we could do a few things and make some short trips as we like to do now. We drove to one of our favorite restaurants.

These are the doors of the little church where we came out of on our wedding day.

Clara’s Restaurant has been there for as long as I can remember.  They sell Pizza King pizzas which are the best tasting pizzas in my humble opinion.  I worked at a pizza King years ago, but that is a whole other story!  The decor is beautiful and it even has a double deck bus you can eat your pizza in.  You place your order on a phone at your table. It is so much fun. David “accidently” ordered an extra large pizza so we had plenty to bring home to eat for days.

We initially wanted to drive down into southern Indiana to see this little town I hate to say I saw on one of my murder shows I like to watch. A young girl was shot there, sadly, but they showed the little town and it looked so interesting, I wanted to see it.  It is on the Ohio River.  I love river towns.  I could very happily have lived in one. They all have these amazing old houses.  And women have such beautiful gardens.  I always say when I see a beautiful garden like this one that the lady who lives there, and I are kindred spirits.  I would love to meet her and talk about her beautiful garden.  We passed several on our trip. We also drove through Indiana’s first Capitol, Corydon, where we saw the preserved stump of the tree under which Indiana’s first Constitution was written. David thought it was a fake stump, but I like to think it is the real thing.

We saw flags waving along streets, beautiful murals painted on the sides of buildings and lots of old antebellum houses.We drove through sunshine and rain.    It was a fun trip. Plus in Corydon we found an ice cream shop with hand dipped ice cream that was really good.  We are always on the lookout for hand dipped ice cream. Today, July 20th is national ice cream day so, of course, we were on the lookout for some ice cream.  We went to church this morning and I was  telling David what day it was.  When we left church, lo and behold, a brand new ice cream shop had opened almost right next door to our church.  The Lord works in mysterious ways!  We had ice cream there and it was very good. We really needed a nice cream shop in our  town.

It has been a good and busy month.  We are starting to freeze corn. We plan to freeze some every week until Summer’s end so as to have plenty for the Winter.  We have a bridal shower and a wedding coming up.  Love is in the air!

Hope all is well in your neck of the woods!  Bye.

What can I say?  I have  let almost the whole moth of June go by without visiting here.  I’d say I’ve been busy and I have,  but not that busy.   Too much time looking at animals and beautiful redos of houses on Facebook.  I can’t resist looking at cute animals doing cute things. And I love seeing how people take an old house and make it beautiful and up to date.  Makes me want to remodel our house sometimes.  Our old house has been remodeled so many times in the forty some years we have lived here, but there are still things about it I would like to change.

Any of you have a walk-in closet with lots of space?  I really would love to have one central place for clothes and other things that are stuffed in our closets.  We actually have two closets you can step inside with hanging rods on both sides.  Both are full of clothes, old toys, puzzles and quilts.Then we have four other closets stuffed with more clothes, towels, sheets and memorabilia. no room for much else.  We have done a cleaning out of my clothes, but I still have too much.  We also have what we call the coat closet, stuffed with coats, hats, scarves and shoes.  Believe me when I say, stuffed.

But this is not what I want to talk about.  Since next year,2026,the United States will be celebrating its 250th anniversary as a country, I have decided I want to make some patriotic quilts and potholders.  I’ve already got a good start and have been amassing a lot of red, white and blue fabric.  Every week, it seems, I receive another parcel of fabric.  I keep telling David after each one that this is the last I’ll need and then I see some gorgeous fabric online and I just have to have it.

Here is one little quilt I made in the last few weeks.  There is a potholder there also.

I liked the pattern so much, I made another one in reproduction material.

I will post quilts as I make them except for some that will be gifts.  It’s going to be a patriotic year!

This year was the first time we had our own strawberries.  David started a little patch last year and this year it provided us a couple of quarts of berries and they were so good.  I ate mine in bowls of Corn Chex and yum!  The milk turned pink and tasted just like strawberries.  Next year we really should get an abundance of strawberries as the patch has grown and expanded and he started another patch.  These, with all the rhubarb we should get, will have us eating well next Spring.  It is nice raising your own food.  I use to keep a big garden years ago, but it is too much for me now.  I have started cherry tomatoes and some herbs in my greenhouse and in a few days,I will be eating tomatoes from my own vine.  My greenhouse smells like basil,too!

We had a pool party Sunday and our  daughter and her family spent the afternoon in the pool.  It was in the nineties all day and we all got a little burned.  It is supposed to be hot all week.  I don’t  do hot well anymore.  When I was  young I use to lay out in the sun for hours and I always had a good tan.  Now I would  rather be in the shade where it is cool.  And talking about the pool and dogs.  Oh, I wasn’t?  Well, we have a black Lab called Sugar and she sneaks into the pool when no one is around.  David said this morning as soon as he opened the door here she came running dripping wet from being in the pool.  She refuses to get into the pool with us, but when we go outdoors we can see where she has gotten out of the pool before we can catch her.  We are thinking about putting a camera up.  Little sneak!  Our chocolate Lab, Lucy, won’t go near the water which is odd for a Lab.

David has some days off coming up.  We don’t have any big plans, but we probably will go somewhere for a day or two.  We don’t do long vacations any longer.  Neither of us like sitting in a car for hundreds of miles anymore and we won’t fly so there you are!  Maybe that will change one day.  I do get wanderlust sometimes and wish I could just drop everything  and go far, far away.  That may happen sooner than I think!

It looks to be a very busy rest of Summer. A wedding is coming up so there will be a shower for the bride to be and I want to  visit some friends and relatives I don’t see enough.  I really can’t wait to see all my grandchildren.  Now that most are grown or nearly so, and  their lives are busy, too and we live miles apart, it is hard to get together.  I just realized this week my baby grandchild will be a junior in high school this Fall. A junior!  He was just a baby yesterday.

And I just realized I will need to buy a new dress and shoes for the wedding.  More things to put in already stuffed closets!

Hope your Summer is going well whether you will be traveling or staying at home.  Bye.

March, April and May are my favorite months, but since March and April galloped by like a herd of wild horses, I will try to give a shortened version of all three months even though we do have  couple weeks of May left.  March was my birthday month and David took the week off and we ate out a lot and took a ride and I did just what I wanted to do which is sew and play with the dogs.   In April we celebrated Easter.  First we went to church where our choir sang a cantata.  The we drove over to Brown Country to eat Easter dinner with family and friends.

Our grandson had two boys from Japan staying with him.  I guess a whole planeload of Japanese students came over and stayed with various families to learn our culture.  Well, those two boys jumped right into the culture.  The attended school with our grandson, went fishing with their Dad, ate out at various restaurants. They said our bacon was way too salty.   And sushi was not the same.  They took part in our annual Easter egg hunt.  We brought 300 eggs and for each egg found the hunters would get a dollar, plus there were eight golden eggs worth five dollars.  The boys thought they were hunting for eggs with candy in them, but, oh, no. When we gave them money they were so surprised.  It was fun to watch them take part in our family tradition.  That afternoon our older grandson and one of the Japanese boys took part in an ice water challenge for some charity.

Waiting for the water to be poured.

And getting drowned. He was such a good sport.  The boys also got a shopping trip to the Ralph Lauren store where David works and they bought some clothes.  Ralph Lauren clothing is much more expensive in their country.

Not sure what the boys are looking at?  It must be something amazing!  They stayed two weeks and our daughter’s family were sad to see them go.  I hope they can come back one day.

Spring sprang almost overnight it seems, but now that we are in May everything is so lush and beautiful.  I am loving the meadow we are creating in our backyard. David spread a bunch more wildflower seeds and If just half of them come up it will be a show.  Here are a few pictures of the blossoms that have appeared in our yard the past few weeks.  Some are already gone and some are still around and I didn’t even get pictures of the peonies which are at their peak right now.

The lilacs were gorgeous as usual and smelled so good.

An azalea in my kitchen garden.

Only one Iris out of several different varieties I have growing.

This is a Weigela shrub we just started last year and this year it was full of blossoms.

It has a cage around it because of dogs.  The pups love to dig.  In a year or two they will be use to it being there and we will take the cage away.

Sprirea. We have this shrub all along the north side of our house.  They were here when we moved in over forty years ago.

The Snowball bushes never disappoint.  They were loaded with flowers and the limbs bent under their weight.

This is a miniature lilac bush.  It was so loaded with blooms and smelled so good.    This is about as big as it will get.

Closeup of the Azalea.

There are lots more plants blooming and we planted Three more new shrubs this year.  Two have white leaves and one is bright yellow.

David and I have been planting and planting. David is becoming a gardener. He is cultivating a rhubarb patch and a strawberry patch, plus he planted a couple of pumpkins I started in the greenhouse.  I made something delicious with the rhubarb.

I don’t usually brag, but this was the best pie I have ever made.  It was so good and David and I enjoyed it for several days.  My next pie might not be as good, but this one, oh my!

We took a drive Sunday.  We had a destination picked, but we take back roads and never made it.  We decided our next drive we would pack a suitcase, just in case, and drive directly to our destination and then drive slowly home on back roads. If we don’t make it home, we will be prepared.   Here are some of the things we saw on our drive.

Roads not taken are our favorite roads.

There was a burnt down house behind these trees.

We got into the Hoosier national forest which goes on forever and drove and drove down this one road and this is what we met.  A bar across the road and we had to turn around. On the way back, we passed several motorcyclists driving the same road and I wanted to warn them the road dead ended, but we drove on.

We came upon this.

A fire tower.  You could climb it if you chose to. David and I chose not.  I can remember the day I could have climbed that with no problem.  Now if I made it to the first level, I would be completely out of breath if not dead.

Someone up in the tower was flying a drone.

Not sure if he was taking our picture, but we took its picture.

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There are a lot of old abandoned homes in southern Indiana.  This looks like a little cabin. I wonder who lived here, why they left and why they didn’t sell the house.

We had a tornado go through last week. In fact, our house was right in the line of the storm that was coming.  We got some wind and a deluge of rain which I was happy for as we had just planted several flowers. But southern Indiana got hit hard and we passed places like this.

Trees down everywhere.

These people were cleaning up their lot from the damage the storm had caused.

People in southern Indiana seem to have a lot of horses.  We saw these and stopped to look.

This one came right up to us and I wished so hard I had a carrot or apple, but I apologized to it for not having anything.  I hate disappointing animals.  I have always loved horses. I was quite horse mad when I was a girl and I did have a horse of my own, and I miss not having one.

It was a nice trip and we stopped for ice cream.  I always said if I reach eighty years old I will eat ice cream every day.  I am getting might close and I am practicing now.

I, of course, am sewing quilts.  I have a plan to sew several patriotic quilts to celebrate our country’s 250th birthday next year.  Here is one I started.

I actually have it all pieced and will be showing it to you.  I call it “Patriotic Chicks.”

I ordered fabric.

And then I ordered more.

Hey, I don’t smoke, drink, get my nails done and haven’t been to the beauty parlor since Covid so I have to spend my money somewhere!  Yes, I have too much fabric if that is possible which I really don’t think people who sew can ever have enough.

I bought one of those elliptical machines where you sit and pedal. It counts each round as a step and I have been doing 10,000 steps or more every day.  I hope it starts to show soon.  I love doing it.  I also have one of those machines that vibrates and shakes you and I use that too and it has helped with the swelling in my legs.  I really wish I could get out and walk like I use to, but ever since I got my pacemaker I get dizzy and weak.  I cannot walk very far which perturbs me to no end. I have had my heart checked every which way, even an MRI and I am going in for a sonogram which I have had before and they found nothing.  I just have a slow heartbeat.  I can’t complain, though. I still can get out and do things and play with the pups and work in my greenhouse and go places to I am blessed.  There are people my age in nursing homes so I am thankful I am still able to stay in my home.

I know this month will breeze by, too and Summer will come and go as fast as it did last year, so I plan to enjoy every day and count my blessings.  I hope you are enjoying your days and feeling blessed.   Will be back again soon, I hope. Bye.

Here I am, again.  Finishing the blog I started yesterday.  I am using a new computer and still getting use to it so if this blog suddenly goes away, I will throw up my hands and say, “I give.”

More pictures of the moon.

Like a big, red rubber bouncing ball.  It was beautiful.  David stayed outside for the whole duration of the eclipse.  Next time I will dress warmer and stay out with him.

Spring has sprung finally.  Old Man Winter keeps hitting us with cold weather, snow, tornadoes and cold, wet rains.  It seems it has rained every single weekend for the last month.  I really hope it will be nice this Sunday for Easter and our Easter egg hunt.  David and I have prepared 300 eggs to hide for our grandchildren to hunt. They are all teen-agers or older so no candy for them.  They get money.  My grandson is hosting two boys from Japan and I am wondering if they have ever hunted Easter eggs.  They will be here for two weeks and I am looking forward to meeting them.

With Spring comes beautiful flowers, bushes and trees.

This flowering Quince is one of the earliest bloomers.  This bush has bloomed every year we have lived here which is over forty years and it probably bloomed many years before that.  Someone planted it long ago and I thank them because it has provided us much pleasure in seeing it bloom every year.

Redbuds are so pretty. They bloom wild in Indiana, but I planted this one. We have a couple more in our back yard.   You can see this tree from a mile away when we are coming home.

Our poor magnolia got burned by the frost.  We had some warm weather and it bloomed and then a cold snap that burned the flowers.  This has happens too often in the Spring which is why I am not that happy when warm days come in February or March.

This picture does not do the Weeping Cherry justice. It has beautiful pink blossoms all over it.  Our whole front yard is a vision of pink.  We also have an Azalea that I didn’t get a picture of, but it is so pretty, too. Reminds me when we drove through the south one time and it seemed every house had an azalea blooming.  We also went to the Azalea Festival in Wilmington, North Carolina. The whole town was blooming and they had antebellum houses we could go through.  One year we went to Natchez, Mississippi and I did a tour of antebellum houses.  I love the south and at one time we thought about retiring in the south, but life got in the way.  We got too many dogs, then chickens, then health issues and we decided we were better off where we are and I do like the changing seasons.

Got some more pretty fabric.  That is another reason we cannot move. I have too much stuff!   And a lot of that stuff has to do with quilting. And I do have quite a hoard of fabric.  I could make a quilt every day until the day I die and there will still be so much fabric that my poor children will have to dispose of.  Sorry, kids.  And I will probably buy more before it’s all over.   Right now I am working on a major project that is going to take some time to finish and I cannot show it as it will be given to someone at some point.

Fruit bar cookies.  Only fruit in it are raisins. My husband’s very favorite cookie. My mother use to make these when I was a girl and they have stood the test of time.  I still like them, too.

Here is the recipe:

Be sure to use a large pan and follow this recipe above, cool a bit and then add 4 cups of flour, 2 teaspoons of baking powder, and two teaspoons of baking soda. It will be thick.   Spread this in a 9 by 13 greased and floured jelly roll pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 8 to 12 minutes.  Before completely cool ice with a mixture of confectioner’s sugar. 1 teaspoon of vanilla(I use imitation vanilla which is probably a sacrilege to some of you)  and milk.  I don’t have measurements for the icing.  I just mix the sugar and milk together until is spreads nicely.  I hope if you make these they come out alright for you and that you will like them as much as we do.

So Easter is this Sunday.  It comes late this year.  We will attend church and celebrate the resurrection of our Lord and Savior, Jesus with our church family and then we will go to our daughter’s house for dinner and the Easter egg hunt.  I hope the weather will be nice.  It is supposed to be 80 degrees tomorrow!  Yikes!

A blessed Easter to all of you.  He is risen!  Bye.

What past am I writing about?  Just a few days or weeks really, but they seem so long ago now.  I look up and the year is already three months old with nine more to go and if they go as fast  as these three did, I will be writing about Christmas again!  I don’t know if it’s my age or if time is really traveling faster, but it seems to be a blur at times.  Back in the fifties there was a movie “The Time Machine.” It starred the man who was in the tv show “Mr. Ed,” a show about a talking horse. You have to be old to remember that!  Anyway, in the movie, the man was in a time machine where he could watch out a window and see the seasons changing rapidly.  That is how fast it feels time is going for me.  I didn’t mean for this to be about time traveling, but that is where my mind has wandered.

Last blog I said I would tell you about an author I really like.  Her name is Jenny Colgan and she writes about a little island off the northern coast of Scotland.  A made  up island called Mure  between the North Sea and Norway.  An island where seals live and puffins and where whales come to mate.  Where everyone knows everyone else.  She picks one main character on the island to write about in each book, but they all are connected and you feel like you know them and their families.  There is the book mobile lady who is also a caretaker of the children of a man whose wife has died.  You can imagine how that will end.  Another book tells of a girl who has a tiny bake shop who becomes the head of a group of employees in a grand hotel.  There is a chef who does things his way, but is so good at what he does, he gets away with being obnoxious.  Another book is about the island librarian.  These are just a few of the characters she writes about.  Ms. colgan has written about another island  off the Cornish coast and about other things.  She is just so good at describing the characters and the landscape and the beauty in all of it.  Her books are a delight to read and I usually hate to finish one I am so engrossed in the lives of the people in them. To me that is what makes a great author.  I am reading a book now by a different author and I really don’t think she has anyone editing them because she writes about something and a few pages later she changes where it was taking place or what they are looking at. For instance, the heroine in this book was looking out a window,presumably during the day as she was describing the flowers and lawn of a particular house and then proceeds to say how dark it was and how  many stars were in the sky.  If it was so dark, how did she see the lawn and flowers out a window?  Maybe I am  nitpicking.  I love to read. Rather do that than watch television in many cases.  David and I have discovered a show on Britbox called Shetland about a detective solving murders on the island with his comical,at times, sidekick called Tosh.  I have become engrossed in that.

Remember when I told you we went outside in March and watched the partial eclipse of the moon and I was in my nightgown and got too cold to I went inside?  David took some pictures of the moon and it was beautiful.

I just lost half my post and it is late so I will end for now and finish this blog another day. So, bye, for now.  See you later!