The Finished Job…

My baby brother sent me these photos… He came in from his shift at Fast Track at the hospital where he works about 11 p.m. on last Wednesday night, heard the ruckus and knew what was happening.   He managed to snap a shot of yours truly doing one of the things I most love to do… DEMOLITION.   I had my hammer drill with the chisel bit and I was gettin’ it done.  He knows how much I love my power tools.  And while a lot of times when I’m really concentrating on what I’m doing I might stick my tongue out of the corner of my mouth,  ala Michael Jordan, I do NOT do it when using my hammer drill because the dust is gritty and tastes nasty.  Anyway, after he did the caulking around the firebox he was kind enough to send me a photo of the finished project.

By the way… that is mostly my t-shirt hanging down, not my belly… 

But here is the finished project and it was done and dry for them to entertain probably about 30 family members for Thanksgiving today.

And they were thankful for so very many things, but one of them I know for sure is that I ran down and helped bust out the old tile that they had been wanting to change out for several years and then helping get it all back together in time for Thanksgiving.

And it’s good to know that there are folks in this world that are thankful for me… at least once in a while.

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving filled with many blessings.  I know that despite everything else in my life I have many more blessings than woes and all of you that stop by and visit and have become my friends through this blogging world are right up there after my family, and once in a while, before them…

Everywhere…

You’ve seen a lot of here through my posts of the past and I’ve shown you quite a bit of there through the last few posts. I’m having trouble finding the rest of the photos I wanted to wind up there with so now we are going to everywhere so you can see the blank slate that I am starting with… This is a rental home so I won’t be able to be as comfortable in doing any radical creativity but I can certainly make the place feel more like a home.

Here we go…

The house is on a corner and has this fourteen foot wall in the front yard. I’m already planning on what I’m going to do out here.

There are a few neglected and older shrubs along the about 3 foot wide bed that goes along the walk heading up to the front door.

then the walk is right along the house to the nook where you find the front door. This is looking north to the stockade fence. The shrub on the right is a rose of sharon that was there when we rented. Our rose of sharon that I’ll be bringing is younger and shorter and I will plant it closer to the brick pillar.

This is a crepe myrtle and there is one planted on either side of the drive way and you know that something else is going to be planted in there so it doesn’t look so plain.

This is looking up the side yard from another gate in the stockade fencing. I love the fence, SueSue doesn’t. She can’t see what’s going on in her world except for the occasional squirrel that drops into the yard, the she is on a mission to get that critter. Being the ornery and lazy woman that I am, I’m going to start feeding the birds AND the squirrels. After I need some entertainment to lighten my day occasionally, too. And if she catches one and kills it, I know how to skin them and fry them. I’m not too worried about that happening, because while Suess is fast she is not quite bright. She runs straight at them and you know squirrels can twist and turn on a dime…

This is the back yard. It is pretty large which the girls love, except with the stockade fence they can’t keep track of what all might be going on in their corner of the world.

This is the side of the house that the front is on, just the other side of the fence.

As I do my planting thing, I will take pictures along but I must tell you that Carol’s sister has her ideas about how we should plant the place. She, besides being rapid cycling bi-polar, has got to be ocd as much as she likes and needs order in her life.

She likes things in a row, I like things the flow. When I got to the house I took my babies out and looked around. When I saw a number of plants all along the back fence all in a row and almost exact distance apart. I just got my shovel out of the truck and started working on them… even as boring as she like it. Carol and I have lived together for so long that she know that there is method to my madness and whatever I do usually comes out somewhat unusual. And usually she loves what I do even if I do things somewhat with odd combinations that I enjoy trying odd colors and/or textures. So I know that while I will keep as many plants alive as I can, this will be essentially a plain, basic garden because the riots of color and shapes of a garden that Carol and I both enjoy is like raucous noise to her sister.

So as I get things planted and growing I’ll keep you posted but for right now, besides my life being bland, I’m so exhausted from the moving that I probably won’t be a very interesting blogger. And if I don’t live through this move I just want to say thanks to all of you who have become my friends through this wonderful blogging medium.

Anybody Thirsty?

Staci, over at The Bliss Of It All, gave me the Lemonade Award, for attitude and/or gratitude. I'd like to think I have all of it, although some folks around here would say that some days they don't appreciate my attitude...

However I do know that I have all my life tried to be grateful for everything that has come my way. I've basically had pretty good health, even with the fibro, I have great siblings and I have had and still have some pretty wonderful friends, even back to school days. I love to go outside and feel the wind on my face, the dirt under my fingernails, even the rain on my head. I might gripe at one point and the next turn around and say how wonderful the day, weather, dinner, movie, whatever is...

When I get hit with the joy of living, I just have to share it. Please don't get me wrong, I'm no PollyAnna, but dang, it's good to be alive! Especially now when the days are getting longer, more sunshine, and I'm taking a break from working out in the garden, cleaning up getting ready for the fellow that's coming tomorrow to turn up the garden for us. Can anyone tell that I'm seasonally effected?

Okay, here's the Lemonade Stand Instructions:

1. Put the logo on your blog or post. 2. Nominate at least 8 blogs which show great attitude and/or gratitude. 3. Link to your nominees within your post. 4. Let them know that they have received this award by commenting on their blog. 5. Share the love and link to this post and to the person from whom you received your award. So here goes...

My Random Insanities

My New Thing To Do

Adopting M.E.

Twisted Fencepost

From Here To Anxiety...My Lapband Journey

Life Just Keps Getting Weirder

Blind Pig And The Acorn

Gingerjar

All of these folks, for one reason or another exemplify the attitude/gratitude aspect of this award. I enjoy reading each and every one and I can say that I think all of you would find them fun to read.

So, Staci, thank you for feeling inclined to send this award my way. I'm very thankful for you and all my blogging friends out in this wonderful world.

Well, There's More To Add...

I don't know if you remember me writing a post about losing my a... or not, but now, obviously from the photo, there's more. It seems I'm also shiftless. My poor laptop is slowly but surely going to pieces.


The best thing about it is that it is my laptop going to pieces, not me. If I had realized how, in times of stress, pain, heartache, loss, and in good times, joyous moments and feeling great times, sharing my life is so cathartic I would have started blogging a long time ago.


Of course I am beating my laptop to death with all the blogging, reading other blogs and leaving messages, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera (from one of my all time favorite movies), but I think that is a small price to pay for the peace of mind from just putting myself and my thoughts for the world (or not) to read and contemplate (or not).

It isn't so much that I think my thoughts are so all-fired important to the masses, it is more like I like to throw it out there and see what comes back to me. So far I have had wonderful things come back to me, such as my Red Dirt Woman doodle (thank you Rick), friendships all around the country and even another continent (thank you Nola). I've enjoyed reading and posting on other people's sites, some of which are right here in my own backyard, in a manner of speaking (thank you Lisa J.) others I come to find by my love of critters such as dogs (thanks, Hallie), horses, and family (thank you, Ree) and so many others.

I guess I'm finding (in my older age) that the world is such a wonderfully diverse place that even if I live to be one hundred, which is not entirely unthinkable thanks to my gene pool, I will never, ever tire of exploring all the places I'd like to go and meeting all the wonderful people I'd like to meet. Of course if I live to be one hundred I probably won't remember them all, but I would enjoy meeting them at the time.

I think that is well worth being a shiftless old woman that's lost her a..., don't you?

A Grass Roots Movement...

HALLIE TWOMEY FOR PRESIDENT!!!

This just in off the blogging wire....

There is a groundswell rumbling through our country. An event of epic (maybe) purportion, preportion, porportion, well, a big damn event. And it was conceived in the mind of a retired militant, errrrr, a retired military person, a blogger, a woman. I am now formally endorsing this candidate. You want someone to clean up the government? This woman can do it. Big business? No problem. Fuel costs? She will handle that, too. How do I know this? She has two teenage sons and two wiener dogs, and, lest we forget, a marvelous husband, and if she can deal with them, she can deal with anything!!! Want proof? Go check it out...

http://wonderfulworldofweiners.blogspot.com/
Wonderful World of Wieners

Stand up America! Stand up for women's rights! Stand up for wieners! Stand up for the rights of the little guy... Now get out there and VOTE.

(this is not a paid political ad... this is just part of the ground swell of a swell idea...)