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!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Did we really have a month of February?  I know it’s a short month, but, really?  It simply flew by.  I managed to get a Christmas gift completed, David did most of our Christmas shopping because the store where he works had a great sales plus he got his discount.  I know we sound kind of crazy, but the more we get done before next December, the more we can enjoy the  holidays.

February had some brutally cold days.  It seems we spent the time letting dogs in and out of my shop because we had below zero temps.  We are going to put heat in what once was the chicken coop and insulate it well so next Winter they will have a warm place to sleep where David doesn’t have to get up early to let them out.  It’s been hard on him, I know, even though he doesn’t complain.

I have made a couple of quilts for the quilt group I joined on Facebook.

This is the one for February.

This is March’s quilt already pieced.  I am also working on April’s quilt.  I want to get ahead because when it gets warm out,I want  to be outdoors.  I am quilting them all on my sewing machine which only takes an hour or two to do these small quilts.

We took a short trip to Martinsville to visit their candy shop there.

I was like, well, a kid in a candy shop!

On the left are all kinds of wonderful candies you can buy.  On the right is their ice cream bar and seating.  We both got two dips of ice cream on waffle cones.  I chose Oreo and caramel pecan.  David chose orange pineapple and black cherry.  They were good.  Only candy we bought was a small bag of lemon drops.  I have  had way too many sweets lately and my birthday is this week and although I am not going to have a cake, David will get me donuts for my birthday.  Then it is back to fruits and vegetables for me.

Another place we drove to was to the Ice Tree.  The only Ice Tree in Indiana, I believe.  It is truly a work of love for this one family who has been building this tree for decades and they allow people to drive onto their property to see it for free.  We took a couple of our friends to see it a few years ago, but we wanted to see it again.

It is a lot bigger than it looks in this picture.  Pretty colors all through it.

Here I am  in front of it.

This looks like a person got frozen by it!

it was fun to see it.  Some tv channel got permission for someone to climb up it, but it is off limits to everyone, otherwise.  We have had warm temperatures the last week so I imagine the tree has melted a lot.

David is off work this week and we plan a little job for us.  Guess what it is.

it involves this…..

and this…..

Doing this……

And this.  Our front hallway.  We were going to hire painters, but decided we could do this small area ourselves.  I have  picked a blue color I am not sure about, but we will paint a coat to see how it looks and if I don’t  like it, David saved some paint chips from the wall now so we can match it again if we have to   The walls have several cracks because this old house has settled some through the years so they needed repairs.  I have future plans of painting our hallway upstairs and our bedroom plus maybe the kitchen cabinets and walls next Autumn.  We will have the professionals do that.

I have been planting a few things in my green house.  Some herbs and leaf lettuce.  This week I will plant some tomatoes.  It really won’t be long until we will be planting flowers outdoors again.

That  has been our life this short Winter we are having. Seems we are rushed through the seasons by the retailers, but I plan to take it slow.

Hope you are keeping warm where it is cold and cool where it is hot.  If it is perfect weather where you are, congratulations!  Bye.

Ever write a complete blog and it just disappeared on you?  It just happened to me.  I have been having trouble with my blog for a while and finally thought it was all sorted out and then, poof, I lost one again. Tried saving it to draft, but it didn’t work.  So here I am again pounding down on the keys hoping what I write  won’t disappear into the netherland again..

I will write a shortened version right now and fill in the dots later.  I had a recipe for you that I will now share later, but here is what I baked yesterday.  One of David’s favorites.

It is called Fruit bar cookies, but no fruit in it, just golden raisins.

We had three inches of snow and it is very cold outside so church was called off this morning.  I was all dressed and ready to go when we got the message.  Going to be cold in the single digits all week.

bad picture, but my Valentine’s Day tree I decorated with felt hearts and quilted cats that I made a couple of years ago.

 

This is one of the cats.  I got the pattern online, but I can’t remember where at the moment.

And Ibought more fabric.  Told myself I was not going to buy anymore for a while, but I lied. Saw some Tilda fabric I could not resist.

Honestly, I don’t know how they keep designing prettier and prettier fabrics, but they do.

I will write more next time, I promise.  Just a little leery about losing this blog so Bye.

I have been having trouble with my blog for a couple of months now and still don’t know if this post will go through, but I am going to try.

Since I wrote my last post David has had some health issues to take care of. He has had this red spot on his neck for over a year and finally went to the doctor to have it checked out. Had to see a dermatologist that he saw today and he has basal cell carcinoma, a slow growing cancerous growth that he will have to have removed. In April he has an appointment to have it done. They will remove the growth, look at it under a microscope to see if they got all the cancer cells and if they didn’t, they would cut out the rest. All under local anesthesia. Please keep him in your prayers because that isn’t all he may have done. He has had a pain in his neck, and it’s not me, for a while and had it checked and will see a neurologist this week to see if he will need surgery. I really hope he won’t need surgery, but we shall see Friday.

Other  than that,it has been a very calm year at our house. After the rush and business of the holidays,I really enjoy January to just chill and do things I want to do, which, of course, involves quilting. I have been working on a Christmas present, yes, I’m crazy, but I think of Christmas all year and if I can make some of the presents, all the better. I really wish I could show you what I am making but I can’t

What I can show you are a couple of little quilts I have made. I joined a group on Facebook where we are challenged to make a small quilt from this particular quilt designer, Kathleen Tracy.

Here is my January quilt. I used reds for Valentine’s Day. The pattern is called Friendship Star. I made a bunch of pot holders before Christmas and I sent two to my best friend who lives in Oregon. I sent her one with the Friendship Star on it. She sent back a really nice letter and pictures of her grandchildren. I .ove getting letters, but it is becoming a lost art.

This is the one I finished for December. And the book I got the pattern from. I have several of Kathleen’s quilt books.

now I am working on my February quilt and will show you when it’s done.

I got on a Facebook group called Find your Doppleganger.( Lookalike.) I put David’s picture up. Guess who they thought he looked like?

If you said Santa Claus, you are right! To a person that’s who they said he looked like. One lady even wrote it was the sweetest face she had ever seen! What a compliment! And he is sweet to my sour. I won’t even show you the picture I put on and not one person could name anyone I looked like. At least they didn’t say the Grinch!

we finally had a good snow in January. Indiana hasn’t had a good snow for years. I keep wishing for a blizzard like we had in 1978 when I was a young mother with two small boys and a baby. It was an adventure. David went out with the Guard and we were snug as bugs with plenty of food because I have always kept our cupboards and freezers well stocked. David did have some Guardsmen bring me some milk although I didn’t really need it. He was gone three days. He told me the snow was so deep on the roads he was driving above fence posts!

Today we have rain which we need to fill our reservoirs and wells. Speaking of reservoirs, wasn’t it terrible that reservoirs were empty in California when they had those fires? I cannot imagine losing everything like many did. And of course, there are those people in North Carolina who are still living in tents or campers. I really pray they get their circumstances worked out.

Hope you all are keeping warm and well this Winter. The groundhog told us only six more weeks!

 

I wanted to write several blogs in the past few days but I could not get on my site. Someone had hacked it! I didn’t know this until my computer savvy son did some checking and discovered it. He thinks it is fixed now so I will be able to play catch up. I have several pictures to upload so I will get that done and write a longer blog next time.
We had a wonderful Christmas and had a couple of big snows in the past few weeks. I just love to see the snow piled up especially since I don’t have to drive in it! We haven’t had much snow the last few winters so it’s been nice to see it. The year had a sad start as my cousin lost his wife quite suddenly. She got food poisoning and had surgery and passed away. My cousin and I are the same age. I was born a month before him. Another cousin was born three months before me. Three sisters all pregnant at the same time! We planned to go to the funeral, but it snowed all day and the night before and we weren’t sure about the roads

David got a pain in his shoulder and his fingers in his right hand were not working properly so the doctor sent him for a cat scan and he found out he has something called Saturday night palsy! Never heard of it and looked it up and it’s where someone sleeps too hard on their side after a night of carousing! We laughed about that because David doesn’t carous. Anyway he may have to have surgery. He was told to call the surgeon’s office to make an appointment. He did and was told they would call back. They never did so today he went to their office to make an appointment and was told they couldn’t make the appointment. He had to call the number they gave him and then another person would call him to give him another number to call for his appointment. Sounds very odd to me. He may or he may not one day get a number to call for his appointment. Sounds like a spy ring to me, not a doctor’s office.
He also had a biopsy on a sore he has had on his neck for about a year. I hope this is not what we will doing all 2025, going to doctors. Oh, yes, and I had an appointment with my eye doctor to check my eye for histoplasmosis. I haven’t had any shots in it for several months now.
And every doctor you go to see wants you to come back in three or six months whether you are sick or not.
I made over forty potholders to give away at Christmas. I had it in my mind to give every lady in our church a potholder. I still have some ladies I haven’t got to, but I have the potholders ready. I also sent a couple to my friend who lives in Oregon. She and I were best friends in elementary school. We kind of lost touch in Later years, but started writing letters to each other after we were married and I got to visit her several years ago. We hadn’t seen each other since school, but it was like we had never been parted, we had such a nice visit and I met her husband and children. He has since passed a way and she is now a grandma. We share the same birthday. Our mothers were even in the same hospital room when they had us. I can’t remember which one of us is the older.
I’m going to finish now, but I hope to be back with pictures. I’ve been making things as usual.

Happy New Year. Hope it started better than mine has. Bye

Autumn is my very favorite season. As I grow older, the hot Summer weather is just not for me. When I was young, I would lay out in the sun for hours on end baking. I always had the nicest tan, but not sure I was doing any good to my skin, but then I didn’t think about those things. So when the cooler weather of Autumn comes I am always so grateful. October is the epitome of the Autumn with the glorious foliage on the trees, the brightest blue skies and a little nip in the air. So far we haven’t had too many of those days yet, but this week it is supposed to get cooler.

David has taken the month off from work and he has been busy finishing up some of the chores outside. He cleaned out the chicken house and since we no longer have any chickens, our last one dying a few weeks ago, he spread cedar chips in it for Molly to lay in. She now has two dog houses. I will show you her brand new, insulated one later on. I am getting my flowers that I want to save into my greenhouse and cleaning up the flower beds. We put back up the shutters the painters took off this Summer. Our house is dressed outside for Halloween and inside, too.

Here is our fireplace mantle all dressed up.

I have gathered these fenceposts toppers at the Country Neighbors sale we go to every year. A group of ladies open their homes and shops four times a year and sell seasonal things.

These lights flicker and look like a fire on the hearth. I have had that jack-o-lantern for years. I still have some of the masks our fifty year old kids use to wear on Halloween!

And the pumpkin garland, years and years old, too.

I really need to make my little lady some clothes. Here she is almost bare in front of Jack Pumpkinhead. And his little brother!

As the nights are getting cooler I wanted Mollie to have a warmer place to sleep at night. She has two old doghouses she can choose from, but we are giving the pups them so she needed a new house. David spent a couple of days building her one. He insulated all over to include the floors.

Here is Molly proudly sitting by her brand new house. It’s up off the ground and will protect her from the elements. I still will bring her in my shop when the temperatures get too hot or too cold. Molly is ten years old this year. Seems like only yesterday we went to get her and she was a tyrant of a pup. She has turned into a sweet dog except with Lucy and Sugar which is why she has separate accommodations. She tries to beat up the pups. I don’t know what brought it on, but we have to keep them separated.

I believe she likes it although David did see her coming out of the chicken house today.

We have taken a couple of road trips while David is off. Driving the back roads of Indiana has become our favorite thing to do. You see so many different and sometimes odd things, too.

Doesn’t everyone have a teepee in their back yard? In Indiana some people do.

These one room schoolhouses are scattered all around our state. Back in the 1800’s and early 1900’s children in the country went to these little schools. Many walked to them although there were horsedrawn “schoolbuses” that would pick some up. Some people use them for storage now and some have even made homes out of them. In fact, when David and I were in our house hunting days, we looked at a renovated schoolhouse. We liked it, but it smelled like cat which turned us off so we didn’t buy it. We pass it now and then and people are living in it still.

When I took this picture yesterday, I thought this was a turkey, but looking at it now I believe it is a turkey buzzard that eats carrion off our roads. We have both in our state. We see wild turkeys all the time and vultures fly in our skies every day.

One day we drove over to Nashville to visit our daughter’s family. Our youngest grandsons are not so little any longer.

Our youngest grandchild. He had a mop of curly hair, but his mother told me today he buzzed it all off in her bathroom and left hair all over the floor! He did clean it up later after his parents discovered it.

His older brother has a mop of curly hair. None of us know where the curly hair comes from. We all have stick straight hair. But he is a handsome lad.

Here is one of our granddogs. They have two goldren retrievers. I wrote a story about the third one who has since died, about the time he was caught in a trap in the woods and they never found him for weeks and he got loose and walked to a road where he was found. It’s in one of my older blogs.

My daughter also gave me two big bins of fabric she didn’t need. Like I needed more fabric like a hole in the head but I took it and have found some nice fabric I can use and I will give the rest to a local charity where some other sewer can find it. I have already used some of the fabric in a quilt I am making.

We went to look at a house that is for sale just a couple of lots past ours.

Someone had carved this man in a tree. Hoosiers are so talented.

Someone was very talented. Anyway, we saw the house and I wasn’t impressed.

No, there were not ducks floating in water before us. That’s our Jeep ducks David has collected. People put them on our Jeep’s doorhandle. The house is what I think is called Industrial Farmhouse style. I have seen several houses like this all white with black trim and the siding is metal or aluminum. The garage looks larger than the house. They want $650,000 for the house and a few acres that go straight downhill behind the house. Knowing what our daughter and son-in-law paid for their house and what we paid for our property right beside it, they are trying to make a lot of money to pay for another house they built nearby, plus this one and have money left over. I can’t imagine anyone paying that much, but if they do, our property is worth a whole lot more than we thought!

We have some houses ready for occupancy. David put these up the other day and I have enjoyed watching birds checking them out. It may be too late in the season to start a new family, but maybe they are looking for next year. We have one birdhouse the birds had about four families in it. I got these birdhouses at some of the Country Neighbors sale.

This birdhouse has been used over and over.

This is a guest cabin by our property. I peeked inside it one day and it is really cute and cozy inside. If you want to stay in a cabin in Brown County this would be a nice one, up a hill where it is very quiet and peaceful. It’s not my cabin so I am not trying to advertise it.

Now this is a house. We saw it on our drive yesterday. I love everything about it. I like the dogtrot between the house and garage. The house of my dreams is divided into two sections with a dogtrot between. The livingroom, kitchen and a bath in one section and a master bedroom with a bathroom and laundry room in the second. That is what I want my retirement home to be like. All on one floor, too. Not much to clean, but just right for two.

One of the backroads we took this weekend. The trees are just starting to turn. By next weekend they ought to be at their peak.

You can see how the trees are turning. It’s both sad and glorious at the same time. But isn’t it always sad to lose one thing to gain another?

We have the Hoosier National Forest in southern Indiana where thousands of acres are set aside for woods and animals. We drove through miles of it and even took a short off the main road up a hill trip that ended in a dead end and we had to turn around, but it was a nice drive. I love the peace and quiet in a forest.

We forded and little stream where there was no bridge. Lots of little streams and rivers in southern Indiana. We followed a river for a time, but I don’t know what one it was.

Suffice it to say Indiana has some beautiful views. You don’t have to go to Nashville and the Brown County State Park to see beautiful views. Just drive off the main roads. We could drive for miles and not see a car. Maybe I shouldn’t advertise it too much or it will get crowded on the back roads.

We are a state full of people of faith also. Little churches dot the countrysides and always there are churches in the small towns. Most of the churches are well kept and I hope are full on Sunday morning. We all need to pray for our nation. We are in big trouble and we cannot allow the next four years to be like the last four. That is as political as I will get on here right now.

Bye the way. This is one of our ducks! Don’t you just love him!

Made this quilt in the last couple of weeks. I joined a group on Facebook where we try to make one of Kathleen Tracy’s small quilts each month. She has designed a lot of quilts and written several quilt books and I have made probably dozens of her quilts. They are so much fun to make. I am working on two more right now. If you want to join, it is not too late. Just type in Kathleen Tracy and it will take you to her blog or Facebook page or the page for the quilt challenge. If you want a quick and fun project you will find it there.

Something else I have finished this week is a painting of my sister and brother-in-law. You can send a picture to Masterpiece Paint by numbers and you can get a paint by number set with that picture and all the colors you will need to paint it. I usually order extra paints because I always get really low on some of them.

This looks funny close up, but the farther away you stand to look at it, the more lifelike it gets. I can’t show that to you here, but trust me. Up close it looks like a bunch of splotches of paint, but looks just like them when you step back. I can’t explain it, but it has happened with every paint by number I have done of family members. I painted all my grandchildren last year. This year I want to do couples.

I think I have told about everything I need to tell so I will leave you with my dying garden. We are supposed to get our first frost next week so David and I have been moving the flowers I want to keep into my greenhouse and cleaning out pots and getting ready for the cold. My flower beds won’t last much longer so here are a few pictures of what is left for the season.

Saying good-bye to my garden is both sad and relieving. I have spent hours watering it all and now it will be put to rest. I have gotten a lot of seeds from all these flowers to plant next year and I am already planning my garden and David is making it bigger for me.

Have a wonderful October. I will try to get back to you before election day. Bye.

I seems like Spring and Summer have lasted a long time this year and yet they have seemed to go fast also. We have done a lot of things this Summer. Painted our house. David and I painted my shop to match the house. Planted hundreds of flower seeds. Got a greenhouse and started flowers in it. I actually swam a few times in the pool because the temperatures were so hot. Played with the puppies. Attended graduations. Had a couple of pool parties with grandchildren and friends. Worked on quilts. I am now working on some Christmas presents.

Yes, it has been a busy, yet relaxing season, but now we are on the cusp of Autumn and I am glad. I love the cooler temperatures. Love the Fall clothes. Love the colors of Fall.

This zinnia epitomizes the color of Autumn to me. Orange is becoming my favorite color. It is such a happy color and calls out to be looked upon.

While I have always leaned to pink flowers in my gardens, this year I planted a lot of orange zinnias and they have made me so happy. I am thinking next year I will plant more.

Speaking of pink flowers, I bought this plant and I cannot tell you what it is, but it flourished in the greenhouse, but needed a lot of watering so I moved it outside and it wilted and I thought it was dying, but David suggested I place a pan underneath it to catch the water so that it would sit in water and that seems to have done the trick. It is now flourishing again outside and the flowers are coming back in abundance. I will probably over Winter this plant in the greenhouse.

Zinnias are on my top five favorite flowers list. They are so easy to grow. Give quite a show and don’t ask for much except a little watering when it is dry. I have several beds of them around the shop and in the back yard and in my kitchen garden.

Lucy and Sugar enjoy the backyard. We have left half of it to go to seed. We had a bunch of sunflowers come up and we have been watching the Goldfinches and the Cardinals eating the seeds from them. I planted more in the garden area and the birds have just about cleaned them out. Since we have let our grass grow and planted wildflowers and other grasses we have seen an abundance of birds in our backyard. Also it seemed there were a whole lot more lightning bugs this year. And I am seeing more Monarch butterflies since we have planted milkweed where they like to lay their eggs. I am hoping our back yard will become a Mecca for more birds and butterflies as the garden becomes more dense.

I come out here almost every evening and play ball with the pups. I try to play until they are worn out.

On hot days they stay in my shop with me where it is cool. We put in a new heat pump this year and it keeps my shop nice and cozy in cold or hot weather. Don’t let that sad look make you think Lucy is sad about being in the crate. She loves it in there and both dogs beg to come inside every day.

Of course, David and I have taken a few rides this Summer. The back roads of Indiana call to us and we must go. There are so many back roads, we won’t see them all in this lifetime.

Off we go down the treelined, shaded country roads. You see some of the funniest sights on country roads, too.

How about a fake horse on the front porch of a house?

You won’t see that everywhere!

Or how about a house full of bones.

I can’t remember what town this was in, but it appears full of skeletons and bones and you can go through it at special times.

Someone has gone to a whole lot of trouble to get this many bones in one place! This time of year you are liable to see anything on Indiana back roads.

You might even have to watch out for the headless horseman. At Conner Prairie, north of Indianapolis, a town that is always in 1820, has a headless horseman ride you can take. You get on a wagon and head for the woods when suddenly, you hear the pounding of hooves, and there he is! The headless horseman. it is pretty scary. I was sitting in the back of the wagon one year and I could feel the horse’s breath on me.

Did some baking. I love to bake. Not much for cooking. Cooking is too repetitious for me. Baking is slow and easy and everything always turns out so good, except for the time I forgot to put sugar in a chocolate cake or one Thanksgiving when I made four pies and forgot the sugar in them. I had to go to the grocery story and buy more sugar and everyone in line heard about my baking fiasco. That doesn’t happen often, thank goodness. Anyway, these rolls and cinnamon rolls were delicious. One year when I was a child, my mother was in the hospital and this older lady from our church, Mrs. Winters, sent us some rolls and sugar cookies and ever since, I have used her recipe for both and they are always called Mrs. Winter’s rolls or sugar cookies.

I can almost smell these, hot from the oven and icing melting on them. Yum.

I started our own tomato plants this year and we have had an abundance of tomatoes. I have eaten tomatoes with everything, had fried green tomatoes and they are still setting on. Two plants seems to be plenty for us. Anymore and the tomatoes would go to waste although I have frozen some for chili.

Several reasons I love Autumn. Warm hand knitted socks, catalogues full for cold weather clothes, and Autumn fabric.

I love when the new Fall catalogues start to arrive. I love cool weather clothes. I have my eye on a couple of things from Coldwater Creek. They have beautiful clothes. They cost a little more, but I have clothes from them I have had for years and still wear. Buy the classics and they will last you forever. This fabric is going in a Fall colored quilt I have in mind. After I get the patriotic quilt done that I am piecing.

And, of course the Fall magazines. This is one of my favorites. Doesn’t it look like it has so many interesting articles? Their pictures are beautiful, also.

Well, that is all for today. I am sure I will be back with more meanderings before too long. David has been working for Ralph Lauren for twenty years and this year he gets a whole month of vacation with pay so we are making plans to do a few fun things. I also want to go visit my sister and brother-in-law. They have both been in the hospital, she with sepsis and he with bladder cancer. They are both in their eighties and are taking care of themselves and do not want any visitors until they feel better. Their daughter is trying to take care of them, but she isn’t in the best of health, either. If you are a praying person, please ask God to care for them. I know He is, but He still likes to be asked. Hope you all are in good health and having a wonderful end of Summer. Bye.

Tomorrow August begins. I can’t believe it. I also cannot believe the schools around here are having their open houses and in a week or two classes will be in session again. I remember when summers lasted from May to after Labor Day. Three solid months of freedom from classes. That was not to say we didn’t read at my home. We all were readers except for Daddy who spent his days farming and working in a factory. But the rest of us liked to read. Every two weeks we would pile into the car and drive to Hagerstown where there was a wonderful library. There were some older ladies at the front desk and they always welcomed us. My mother would head for the adult section and I would head downstairs to the children’s department where I found a whole new world to explore. During the Summer months the library held a Summer reading program where they kept track of how many books you read. At the end of Summer there were prizes. I don’t remember what those prizes were, but I wanted to win. I could never read as many books as my friend, Mary Jean, read. She was a great reader. She even read from the adult section! I admired her for that. Me, I loved the Mother Westwind stories about different animals, the Oz books, Beverly Clary books, any book about horses or people who owned them and books about historical characters. I read about every book in the children’s department I could until the day I finally moved up to the teen and young adult books. I spent long Summer afternoons swinging on the porch swing and reading. It was heaven to me . I still love getting lost in a good book and have several favorite authors whose books I could read over and over again.

I don’t read as much during the day now. I read before I go to sleep and sometimes when I first wake up. Nowadays I get up, watch some news and then go out to my greenhouse and water the plants inside. I have to water them two times a day because if I don’t, they will dry up and wither. Not going to plant so many flowers in small pots next year. I already have my outside flower garden planned for next year. Zinnias in the back of the border, Rudbeckia(black eyed Susan’s) in front of them, Shasta Daisies next, then Lavender. In front of it all I plan to plant a row of leaf lettuce because I love wilted lettuce salad. I may fit one or two other flowers in there, but that’s my main plan right now. My recipe for wilted lettuce is a whole bunch of leaf lettuce rinsed and dried, place in large bowl. In a skillet fry a few slices of bacon, remove and crumble the bacon, set aside. In bacon grease stir in some diced onions until,tender, then add vinegar, I use white vinegar, brown sugar to make a thin sauce. Pour this while hot over the lettuce and then add the crumbled bacon. Eat immediately. I can eat a whole big bowl of this. I usually make it once or twice if I have enough leaf lettuce. It takes a lot to make this as the lettuce does wilt. Next year I plan on it.

I like being outside as much as possible, playing with the dogs and watering all the gardens planted everywhere, but I also love going into my workshop and sewing. I have been working on nine patch quilts. It’s fun making the little 3 and 1/2 inch blocks. I’ve made hundreds of them,but I thinking I am going to need some more to complete a quilt. I always say I won’t start another quilt until I get some of my other ones done, but I have some quilts in mind I really want to make.

I also want to paint some more barn quilts and David and I have some painting to do on my shop and his shed when it gets a little cooler. David is also going to build a new insulated dog house for Molly and we are moving her to a larger yard for her to play in Now that we are down to one chicken, it doesn’t need as much room so Molly gets that space. I am pretty well done with the chicken business. It was fun, but we are down to this last one and she doesn’t lay any longer so we are running an old age home for her until she goes to the big coop in the sky! I wonder if there are chickens in Heaven? I know there are horses because the Bible mentions them in the last days.Jesus and all his saints will ride in on them one day.

David and I went to see the movie,Twisters, the other day. First movie we have seen in a theater since before the Covid debacle. It was good, but not as good as the original with Helen Hunt and was it Bill Pullman? Is it me or have the movie producers run out of original ideas for movies?. If you have seen a really good movie, mention it in the comments. I don’t like movies with bad language or grisly scenes.

We finally had a pool party a couple of weeks ago. Most of our grandsons were there with their girlfriends and our daughter and son-in-law and our daughter-in-love were there. It was fun to have the pool full for a change. I miss those days when there were children in the pool every day. I babysat for six children one Summer plus our three and it was always noisy and fun. We spent hours in the pool. At that time we had an above ground pool and with that many kids, it was full.

One day when I was sunning myself with a girlfriend, one of our sons came running up screaming that his brother had been hit by a car. I knew they had been out on their bikes. They were pretty responsible so I felt okay with them riding around town and out in the country so this scared me. I think I vaulted over the railing of the pool, ran inside, skidded on my stomach to the phone to call for an ambulance. I had bruises days later! The lady who answered told me they had already been called and were on their way. Leaving our son with my friend’s kids, she drove to the site. I saw someone covered in a blanket and was sure my son was dead, so my friend, who is a nurse, went up to the police who were there and found out he was alive,but had broken bones. It appeared that another teen age boy had driven his car left of center and hit our son. They knew each other. Ii rode to the hospital with him in the ambulance. When we got to the hospital, David was already there! Our son had called him at Camp Atterbury and he raced to the hospital. Our son spent several days in the hospital and the rest of the Summer with a cast on his leg. I am so thankful he was alive and on the mend. He is now in his fifties! How can that be?

This has been a busy Summer, but I wouldn’t have it any other way. As we turn the calendar to a new month,I look forward to enjoying the last few days of Summer and thenit will be Autumn, my very favorite season. Hope you are having a pleasant Summer or Winter in other parts of the world. May you all be blessed with health and happiness inthe months to come. Bye.

To say I have been busy is an understatement. Since my greenhouse arrived I have been planting and replanting flowers, tomatoes, cucumbers and a few pots of green beans. I am having so much fun.

Mary, Mary, quite contrary, how does your garden grow?

With silver bells and cockleshells and pretty maids all in a row.

Not sure I know what those things are Mary planted, but I know what I have planted and flowers are coming up everywhere. I asked David to take my camera and go around our property and take closeup pictures of our flowers and he did.

Didn’t plant these. Sunflowers came up in our meadow we are trying to grow.

We have these old fashion day liles all over our yard. We try to get rid of them and they just keep coming up. My mother loved these and I think I got my first start of them from her. Didn’t know they were invasive. They will be around for a long time. You see them growing wild by the side of the road here in Indiana.

We went on the Country Neighbors tour where several women and a couple of men have things for sell in their shops on their property. This particular lady had some really pretty flowers in cute containers and, of course, I could not resist. She also makes the nicest birdhouses and we have bought several over the years and we got a really neat one this time. When David gets it hung, I’ll do a blog on our birdhouses. All our birdhouses have bird families in them and we can sit on our back porch and watch Mama and Papa birds feather their nests and feed their babies.

A close up of one of our geraniums. They are in my top five of favorite flowers. I can never have enough of them. I have some started from seed in my greenhouse right now and I hope to over Winter all my geraniums this year.

Gerbera daisies are fast becoming some of my favorite flowers. Deadhead them and you will get twice as many flowers. They go well with all my geraniums.

More Gerbera daisies.

Aren’t these gorgeous? I got these at Lowes. More geraniums.

I have these beautiful daylilies all over my yard, front, side and back. A few years ago a man stopped at our house and asked if he could get a start of them. I said, “Sure, and do you have any plant you would like to share? ” I dug him a flower and a few days later he brought me three lilac bush starts. I planted them all, but only one survived and it is now producing flowers every Spring. I love to share my flowers and I love trading flowers with fellow gardeners.

These teeny flowers are on a vine I was given for Mother’s Day a couple of years ago. I over Wintered it and it spread it’s vines all over. I had to cut it from different places it had grown so I could repot it and set it ourside. It is flourishing and spreading and has dozens of these tiny flowers on it. I will put it in the greenhouse when it gets cold. We are going to hook up gas to the greenhouse and we already have a small gas furnace to keep it warm in the Winter.

One of the first Zinnias to bloom. Love the little tiny yellow flowers inside it. This is just a small view of all my flowers. Every season there are an abundance of them growing. I planted flowers every year since we have lived here and we have lived here almost forty-seven years. That is a lot of flowers. Some have grown and expanded. Some have died and I have had several do that. Some were dug up by dogs and I expect that. Sugar and Lucy’s favorite place to lay is right next to one of my lilies.

I watched Sugar wagging her tail and knocking the petals off this plant the other day. It is really amazing that any of my flowers survive the backyard with three dogs roaming it, but, they do.

Now that you have seen a few of my flowers I will show you inside my greenhouse. Come with me as we walk through the door.

I decorated the shelf with garden paraphernalia.

My daughter gave me that little toad years ago. He’s been keeping me company in my shop and now he has found place of honor in my greenhouse. I love him so much.

This is a working greenhouse so I have a lot of pots and things around. David was so glad to get all my gardening things out of his shed. I have collected pots for a while and it is a good thing I did because I use them to repot my seedlings. I am so excited that I can start geraniums from seed. One plant costs as much or more than a packet of seeds.

I bought this solar powered chandelier and it is pretty day and night.

This is the little vine I was talking about. See its tendrils reaching out. Just like the beanstalk in Jack and the Beanstalk. If I one day appear with a goose that lays golden eggs, you will know it grew way too fast!

This is a fountain we bought probably twenty years ago. The birds like to drink from it.

I love my little greenhouse . Wish I had gotten it years ago.

A few weeks ago I got a call from one of the managers at Ralph Lauren Polo store where David works. She sounded very secretive and I soon learned why. David’s twenty years of working there was coming up and they wanted to throw him a surprise party. Well, I am not one to tell to keep a secret. It’s a real problem for me, especially if I have to be around the one I am supposed to keep the secret from. I had two whole weeks of keeping my mouth shut and trying to not act guilty. Ever see that skit on SNL where the lady could not keep a secret and she went to all extremes not to tell the secret? That is me. One year my daughter-in-law was throwing a surprise party for her then husband, our son’s birthday. She was flying in his sister and brother-in-law from Florida to Chicago. The day of the party David and I were to go to the airport and pick them up. Well, the day before we were all sitting around when out of my mouth popped, “What time is Sara and Jeremy supposed to get here?” I knew immediately what I had done and I went up their stairs into a room and cried because I had spoiled the surprise. The thing is, no one held it against me and our son did have a fun party even if he did know his sister and her husband were coming.”

Well, I managed to keep the surprise. David was shocked to see me sitting in the room waiting for him. He got a call from the District manager thanking him for his time at Polo, a hand signed letter from Ralph Lauren thanking him for his long service and a Ralph Lauren clock that I won’t tell you how much it would cost to buy, but it’s not cheap as most of Ralph’s things aren’t. They had a picture of David set up and a very nice spread of food for everyone. Some employees came in and celebrated with us. I thanked the managers over and over for what they had done for David, but they told me they really depended on him. He has been at this particular store since it opened. He’s been everything from the trash takeout person to Assistant manager and now he folds clothes all day in the back room which he says he likes because he can have a video on and work at his pace. The thing is, this store was lauded for having the most organized backroom where all the clothes that come in are folded and prepared to go on the floor. This was due to David. I wish you could see the back room at a Polo store. Racks and racks of clothes and they all have to be neatly folded and David does most of it. He has trained others to help him. I know he is a good folder because he folded all the clothes in my closet one day. I have to admit it is not as neat any longer, but he did do a good job of it at the time. My closets tend to be messy.

David got this basket of his favorite snack foods. It was packed. And it is all gone now! Ths little box with the brown ribbon held the clock he received. The signed letter from Ralph Lauren is in the frame. David loves working there and hopes to stay until his 25th year when he will receive a gold watch. I pray he makes it as he will be 80 when that day comes.

We finally got our house painted and I love how it looks. The barn quilts I painted go so well with the colors of the house.

I love painting barn quilts. These patterns I got from one of Lori Holt’s quilt books. I have made quilts with those barn patterns.

Father’s Day came and went rather quickly, but David did get a card that gave him a laugh. If you are not a Trump supporter, you might want to look away now. But we both liked it and were surprised our daughter picked it out.

When you open it up, you hear in Trump’s voice, “I love you!” David got a kick out of it.

We have had some very hot days here and I have actually been in our pool a few times. The water has to be 82 degrees or hotter before I will even think of getting in, but it’s been 86 for a few days and felt wonderful.

Our pool looking towards the meadow. I feel like Moses in the bulrushes when I am swimming. The tall grasses are so lovely and with the flowers among it, it really is a pleasant place to be.

We have had the Summer Solstice and now the days are getting shorter so enjoy every minute of each one…We only have a little time on this earth, so make the most of it, but remember the One who created it and who you want to spend eternity with. I have been reading a lot about the Rapture lately. If you don’t know what that is, look it up or better yet, read a Bible. I feel so blessed that one day in a little church in my little town a pastor came to preach who led me to Jesus and I have been blessed ever since even during the bad times.

Here’s to long days of Summer and surprise parties, if you can keep it a surprise! Bye.