What Snow?

They showed the Panic-o-meter on the news last night. The one that shows when you should get eggs, bread and milk or if they expect a lot of snow, it goes over to the sled and boots. We are officially in the eggs, bread and milk area of the meter.

Unfortunately, what usually happens when we get all built up for a big round of bad weather is that it misses us and we get nothing but a big let down.

However, it has been a year since the big freeze that left our area looking like a war zone and this is still very fresh in the minds of everyone in this area. They promise this will be nothing near that scale, but that we will have some ice and maybe 5 to 10 inches of snow. It's wierd that everytime I try to type 'snow', I type 'snot'.

If it snows, school will dismiss, and the campus here will probably close. That means a day off for us. We are just hoping the power stays on. But just in case it doesn't, I have the heater shown in the picture. My son, The Contractor, installed it for me after Christmas. And, I've been using it to heat my house. I set my central unit down to 50, and have been allowing this little gem to keep me snug and warm. I have closed all the bedroom doors, and open mine about an hour before I go to bed.

So I say, Let it snow, Let it snow, Let it snow!

What are you waiting anxiously for today?

I hope everyone has a great day. Pray for snow, Love one another.

Spring Oh Spring, Where Art Thou!

I've gotten two seed catalogs recently. There's nothing I enjoy more than looking through these catalogs thinking of all the things I'd like to plant. I think about how good those tomatoes will taste not only during the summer months, but this next winter in canned tomatoes. How much I'll love making that fresh summer salad with cucumbers, onions, oil and vinegar. And some fresh corn. There's nothing like fresh corn. Oh, and do I want to plant hot peppers or sweet peppers, or maybe both. I had no idea there were so many varieties of peppers.
I remember my mother ordering her seeds and getting the package back with everything in it. The box would be much smaller than a shoe box, but would produce an acre of fresh food which wasn't allowed to go to waste. Aside from what we ate, she canned everything she grew in that garden.
I can't say I've ever been as good as she was when it came to waste. She believed in the old proverb, 'waste not, want not', and we never went a winter without good food. She even shared with family and friends who had not laid by in store as she had.
Then I get to thinking about all the hard work it takes to make that garden and how hot it will be when it's time to gather everything and all the late nights required to can and preserve everything. That makes me tired.
I end up not planting anything, and hoping that someone takes pity on me and gives me a few fresh tomatoes and maybe a mess of okra.
I know I sound much more like the grasshopper than the ant. I used to be the ant, but not anymore.
I hope your garden plans turn out better than mine will. Tell me how you plan for your garden to grow.
Have a great day. Pray for those less fortunate. Love one another.

School Reunions

We have a school reunion every 5 years, and it's that time again. The school in our community is a consolidated school, and is called Riverside. When I was in school, it was just plain Lake City. We didn't have other schools among us. We were pure.

We now gather to remember that school, see old friends and classmates, and spend time thinking about how much everyone else has aged. Our school came into existence in 1929 with a graduating class of 9, and in the year 1985 had it's final graduation of 24. That's not very large classes considering some schools graduate hundreds each year, but we are very proud of our graduates.

We have lost most of those from the early classes. If you graduated in the first class and were seventeen, you would now be 108. When we met yesterday, we determined the oldest living graduate is from the class of 1942. He is 85. Our last graduating class is now 40. Our group is aging and eventually there won't be anyone left who remembers the Alma Mater, or that we were proud to be the mighty, mighty Catfish. Which brings up another point. We were one of two schools in the US that had unusual mascots. Why, you ask, would anyone want to be a fish that is the bottom feeding scavenger of the river? Well, our town is built on the banks of the St.Francis river, and we are known for producing some of the best catfish in the tri-state area. I don't know who picked the mascot. Maybe the child of a fisherman from that first class of 1929. Who knows. But we were proud to be called catfish and many of us own license plates that have our beloved mascot on it displayed on the front of our vehicles.

Those who met yesterday have a lot of work ahead, geting letters out, working on the program, finding entertainment, planning the meal, making sure everything is in place so that everyone who comes will have a great time.

I hope everyone is having a wonderful day. Pray for our troups. Love one another.

This is What I Should Be Doing Today!

See this photo. I finally got my new light fixture put up. Unfortunately it wasn't as long as the old one, so as you can see, I have some work to do.
And that white strip to the right of the light, there's another one just like it on the other side. First, I'll have to use my scraper and get some old paint and wall paper remnants off. Then I'll have to prime it, and paint it.

And it's supposed to rain all day tomorrow, so this will be an all day event. That and I have a place around one of my ceiling vents in one of the bedrooms that used to sweat and mildewed. The Contractor took care of the sweating problem, but now I have to prime that area and repaint it. You know it won't look exactly like it did when it was first painted. Fortunately, I didn't paint the ceiling white. I painted it and the trim an off white, some of which I still have, so maybe it won't be so bad.
The work involved in maintaining a house is never-ending. It just keeps eating at my pocketbook.

Hope you are having a great Saturday. Stay Warm. Love one another.

Way Too Much TV!!!

All my friends and family know that I watch entirely too much tv. In the summer, I'm pretty much hooked on Cardinal's baseball. The rest of the year, it's Grey's Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, Brothers and Sisters, Three and a Half Men, Dog the Bounty Hunter, White Collar, Burn Notice, any John Wayne movie. The list goes on and on.

With the programs I love, there also comes commercials. You either love them or hate them, and I have both. I hate the Sonic commercials. I hate the Geico commercials, I hate the ones with the cavemen, and the new ones with the perky girl selling all kinds of insurance.

On the other hand, there are some that I love. The capitol one commercials with the vikings are favorites. There used to be one about a car where a bird was trying to hit it with bird droppings, and in the process hit the garage wall. But my newest favorite, and this one won't be seen all over the country is one about a car dealership in the Little Rock, AR area. When I see it, I stop and laugh--sometimes outloud. It's a man and his two grown sons all three dressed in nice business suits. The dad is sitting and the boys are standing like they are about to get a portrait painted. The dad starts off, and blows his line. Then he says he's starting again, and about the time he starts one of the sons begins to fiddle with his cell phone. To which the dad says, 'put your phone up', and he starts again. He manages to say his line, but then the other son forgets his. They all end up laughing.

I think this is a perfect commercial. You get to see the fun they had making it, and see them as real people. Personally, if I were in the market for a car, would definitely go see these fellows. I bet they have a great time at work.

What programs are you hooked on? Which commercials do you dislike and which ones do you like?

Hope you are having a wonderful Friday. Pray for all the people involved in the Haitian relief effort. Love one another.

Superhero and the Principal!

Superhero, that handsome young man who just turned 6 a few days ago, had to visit the principal's office yesterday. He was in music when, as his side of the story goes, another kid jumped on his back, and he was just trying to get him off. The teacher saw the disturbance, and sent both to the office.

His story continued that he didn't get into trouble, but the other boy did. We're finding that a bit hard to believe since he's known to embellish stories of his feats of daring do.

Funny thing is he told his other memaw that he only had to tell one person and since he'd told her, he didn't have to tell his parents. When she pointed out to him that he would have to tell them since they'd find out anyway, he said then he'd get in trouble at school for telling more than one person. We are either raising a con artist or a policitian. Guess we need to start working on a legal defense/campaign fund soon.

But in his defense, he's made it over half the year without any problems, so I'm not terribly worried. In fact, I think it's kinda funny until I begin remembering some of the stunts his father pulled when he was in school.

I hope everyone is having a great day. Keep Haiti in your prayers. Love one another.

A New Adventure!

As you get older, how do you feel about new adventures? I don't mean a vacation, or a new hobby. I mean a new life adventure. I've noticed as I get older(61 now), I am not much in favor of new life adventures. I'm not interested in starting a new job, or moving to another city or even a different house. I just pretty much want to keep the status quo(whatever that means).

My 84 year old neighbor lady has lived in the house behind me for 40 years. She was married to a minister and in the early years of raising five girls, they moved several times. But her husband decided to go into public work and they bought the house in which she lives.

Time is catching up with her, and she had pneumonia twice last winter and has had it already this winter. Each time she seems to grow weaker and after this episode her daughters set up nursing visits and physical therapists to come in and check on her and work with her. Of the five daughters, only one lives within 30 miles. Three live 2 and 1/2 hours away, and one lives in Colorado. So the bulk of caring for their mother falls to the one living nearest.

I knew last week something was in the works because this daughter came and spent a day working on business affairs with her mother, and Saturday she came and took her mother to look at assisted living apartments. She will be moving into one the first week of February.

This neighbor lady is good spirited, kind and would never offer a complaint about much of anything, but she did tell me last night she's having some mixed emotions about this move. I encoraged her to look at it as a new adventure. We talked a while about the good and exciting things that will come with the move(being close to the daughter is the main one). Since I live alone, I know this may also happen to me some day. I already wish I lived closer to my children, and they are only 20 to 30 minutes away, but I would like for it to be 5 or 10.

I know she will do just fine, but it will be hard looking toward her house and knowing she no longer lives there and never will again.

I hope you are having a great day. Pray for the Haitian people. Help if you can. Love one another.

It's Monday and the Sun is Shining!

We've had some nasty weather here in our little corner of the world lately. First it was almost unbearably cold, then it warmed up and rained part of Saturday and Sunday.

However, on the way to church yesterday, as I drove west, there was a faint rainbow in the western sky. That told me it wasn't going to rain much longer, and when I got out of church, sure enough the sun was shining.

It's supposed to get up to 60 today and is at 57 now. Unfortunately, I'm stuck inside but I do have a window that allows me to look outside.

I appreciate the comforting comments about my grandson moving away. I know I'm not the first to feel this loss, and it helps to know others have survived.

When my husband and I first married, we lived in a small mobile home attached to his grandparent's house. While we lived there, we had our first child, who happens to be the mother of the grandchild who just moved away. I was a stupid young girl when this child was born, and gave not a second thought to moving away from this older couple who had fallen in love with our baby.

I'm sure they knew we wouldn't always live in a trailer attached to their house, but they certainly weren't ready to see us move. I later learned from another relative, how upset this grandmother was when we moved 30 minutes away. That same grandmother also told me often that you pay for the things you do on this earth before you ever leave it, and I am now paying for taking that precious great grandchild away from her. It's true, what goes around, comes around.

I hope you are having a great day. Pray for the people of Haiti. Love one another.

Spreading Our Wings

My oldest grandson is grown, and has decided to try his wings. He'll be 25 in a few days, and this past Sunday morning, he put all his earthly possessions into his small car and pointed it southeast. He has transferred with his job to somewhere in Florida. It's 2 miles north of Orlando. He will stay with a friend until he finds an apartment, and he's planning to go to school there.

He has always lived with his mother, and I guess we just assumed he would continue to do so. But about a year ago, he began making rumblings about moving south. It has taken this long for everything to be in place the way he wanted it before he moved. I guess I should be thankful he is a patient person and didn't just jump in his car and go there with no plans, no job or money.

He has always been a good kid, and he'd better continue to be since none of us can afford to go there and bail him out of jail. He spent a lot of time with me when he was little. His mom and dad divorced when he was very small. He can't even remember them ever living together. So on the weekends when he wasn't with his dad, he would come to my house. I literally dragged him everywhere. I took him on a float trip with my office buddies once, and we used to go to the local wrestling matches(we prounce it 'rasslin', but I was afraid no one would know what that was). Then there was the time when he was little that I forgot he was at the house. I decided to go to the store, got in the car and was driving down the road when I remembered I had forgotten him. I turned around, went back and took him with me.

He eventually outgrew me as grandchildren are prone to do, and I got used to not seeing him except on special occasions, but I knew he was just a few miles away.

He is my firstborn grandchild, and for about 8 years, he was the only grandchild, so he is exceptionally special to me. I know he will make it fine in his new adventure, but I'm sure going to miss him.

I know others have sent their grandchildren off in different directions...to other states, to other countries, to war, and I know it is hard regardless if they are 2 or 22 or even 52. So to all of us with that separation anxiety, I say, let's all say a special prayer, and hope we see them soon.

I hope you are having a great day. Pray for our country. Love one another.

Super Hero is Six!

Six years ago today, I was in a hospital in NW Arkansas looking at my precious newborn grandchild. The first for my only son, we were all excited.

He is a good natured loving little guy, and handsome to boot. He started Kindergarten this year and is loving it. We all worried that my son would pay for his raising with this little boy, and that my daughter-in-law would have to pay for my son's raising as well. However, he has been a relatively easy child to raise. I realize he's not grown yet, and if I remember correctly, my son was a good little boy too.

Super Hero loves to laugh and play. He comes to spend the night with me as often as we can make arrangements, and I get to go to his house and keep him and his little sister sometimes. They only live about 20 minutes away now, so I get to see them often. He is going to Karate this afternoon, and if she doesn't forget, his mom is going to let him call and tell me how it went. That way I can wish him a Happy Birthday. His party isn't until Saturday, but everyone should be remembered on the actual day.

Hope you are having a good day. Pray for our country. Love one another.

New Year's Lunch

I started a new tradition last year. I cook lunch New Year's Day. I cook the usual southern fare for New Year's, including black-eyed peas, hog jowl and cornbread. I also usually make some type of potatoes and greens.

This year, I fried the potatoes in some of the hog jowl grease, and I made creamed collards. I had never cooked collards before, but I had seen Pat and Gina make them on their cooking show so I thought I'd try them. Let me tell you, they got rave reviews. One of the fellows at the table went back for 3rds and I think everyone went back for 2nds.

If you are interested in the recipe, you can go to this link and follow their directions to the letter and you will have a dish you will love. http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/neelys/creamed-collard-greens-recipe/index.html.

I hope you had a great New Year's. Pray for our country. Love one another.

Another Day Older!

I'm thinking maybe one of the reasons I'm not too fond of the holidays might just be that soon after, I turn another year older. Yes, I've had my 61st birthday. It happened back on the 3rd. My kids took me out to breakfast after church. They gave me two new skillets. Unfortunately, I don't have anyone to 'whop' with them. But I'm using them already. They are very heavy Calphalon, and should last me the rest of my natural life.

The following Tuesday, we celebrated my birthday at work. I had two cakes. One of the girls brought an Italiam Cream cake and another brought a Mandarin Orange cake. That night 'the girls' took me to a movie and then gave me gifts. I got some of the best smelling body butter by Arbonne(Ginger Citrus) and another cake, I got a throw and a new wallet, I got a bottle of Cherry Blossom lotion from Bath and Body Works(My all time favorite) and some candles. I got some chocolate, and trivet with my initial on it.

By the end of the day, I'd had three good birthday celebrations and three wonderful cakes. How blessed am I?

Hope you've had a good day today. Pray for our country. Love one another.

The Holidays are Over, Back to the Grind

I get two weeks off at Christmas. It's one of the perks from working at a University. We save up our small holidays, and then use 2 or 3 days leave and have wonderful time to finish shopping, do some baking, go carolling, decorate the house and put up the tree, re-learn the words to all the favorite songs, spend time with family, and all that other wonderful stuff I like to do during the holidays-----NOT!!!!! except the spending time with family. I do enjoy doing that.

My middle name should have been Scrooge. Its not that I'm tight. I'm just not a festive Christmas person. Christmas has never been a fun filled holiday for me. I always put up a tree, and did all the baking and stuff when the kids were at home. I tried very hard not to let my feelings about the holidays influence them.

But now that I don't have kids at home, I don't have to do all that stuff. I didn't put up a tree, I didn't do a lot of baking, I did no shopping(actually, I managed to wrangle the girls into doing what little I needed done) And basically, I stayed home and denned up like an old bear and enjoyed my time off. I did make 4 dresses, 3 sets of pajamas, 2 cowboy vests and a Santa Suit for Super Hero. I called the little ones Christmas morning to see what Santa brought and then settled back and took a nap.

Now I'm back at work and looking forward to Spring.

I do hope everyone had the Christmas they wanted, and are looking forward to a bright new year.

Pray for our country. Love one another.