BabaMail
Well, maybe not THIS one, but maybe
Unsplash
this one – ahhhhhhhhh!
Delightful David Zinn Art
Filed under David Zinn - Street Artist, drawings
Nicky Litchfield 3
Filed under animal paintings, Nicky Litchfield
Tomatoes Will Come
The tomato plants are looking healthy and are more than twice the size they were when I first planted them. They needed some rearrangement of young branches for better support, but I decided to wait a bit longer on watering them.
This shows you that the plants are now about 1/4 the way up the supports. I brought out some bamboo stakes to add to the mix for the best support possible. No blossoms on these yet.
This is the 8-foot-long planter, and the plants are thriving right now. I rearranged branches here, too. There are three small yellow blossoms on one of the plants. I’ll see what other supports I have in the garage and bring them out for next time.
Just wanted to share my joy on this one. One of the buds started to bloom! Hooray!
Filed under Gardening, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
Tuesday Thoughts 5-2-2023
“Dorky Dogs” – BoredPanda.com – Liucija Adomaite and Justinas Keturka
This picture made me laugh out loud. I have no clue what’s on the other side of the fence, but they’re sure interested. :0)
I have a new lease on life this morning. A package arrived from Amazon with new jeans and a top. This is usually not a cause for “celebration,” but I’ve gained some weight recently and my jeans have become too tight for any comfort at all. I now have some with elastic at the top, rather than a zipper and button, so I’m sitting here comfortably for the first time in quite awhile.
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I told you, though, that I’m trying really hard not to eat anything in-between meals. I’ve lost 4 of the pounds I gained so far. I’m determined to keep doing this. We were up in the middle of the night (Imagine that!) last night, and my husband asked if I wanted him to make us hot chocolate. Oh, wow. I said, “Yes, but no thank you.” I’m patting myself on the head just a bit. :0)
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I’m also doing my yoga sessions daily, albeit more slowly and carefully than I was previously, in an effort to try to relax, stretch out, alleviate some pain and stiffness, etc. I’m putting silver sparkly stars on my desk calendar, earning two stars per day the last few days. If I can keep this up, I’ll be delighted.
I’m heading out to my tomato planters now to see what they need. I hope you have a wonderful Tuesday.
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
Excitement
Quora
I’ve never been caught up by American Idol before. I’ve watched some clips and been impressed by the talent, but never actively watched and rooted for contestants before.
I started this because my husband is really into violent movies with the sound turned up so high that I went into the office and wore my earphones at my computer as a defense. :0)
I immediately fell for two contestants: Iam Tongi and Oliver Steele.
Iam is Hawaiian, but is living in Seattle, having had to move from his home due to too-high prices. He lost his dad – who taught him to love music and sung with him, providing harmony – a couple of months ago. His dad bought him a guitar, using his holiday paycheck. Iam’s voice is soothing. He is creative, making every song his own. I REACT to everything he sings, feeling happy or tearing up.
Oliver is a singer, song writer, and musician. His dad was the same, but had a stroke that made him lose the use of the left side of his body. Oliver is trying to take care of his dad. He has a distinctive voice and style, and is also a wonderful human being. When Iam’s guitar broke right before their duet, Oliver supported Iam, got him through the song, and they have become friends for life.
The Top 7 competition was last night. Iam was voted into the Top 7. Oliver was not, but was the Judges’ Choice to continue in the group as #8.
I wish both of them could win the competition. I hope that both of them have garnered enough attention that they both get music contracts. Time will tell.
They have both won my heart. I feel motherly (though I’m old enough to be grandmotherly) toward both of them and wish them the best that life has to offer. Their next performance is this coming Sunday, May 7th.
Filed under music
Mouse Art
Irina Garmashova
G. Weiner
Tanya Bond-redbubble.com
I don’t like REAL mice at all, but I love this artwork.
Filed under paintings I love
Hopeful Signs
Before winter I cut back our Rio Samba rose bushes. They had gotten to the point where I figured they would either like the pruning a lot or would croak. The jury was still out until a couple of weeks ago. In fact, my husband was talking about digging out the plant below and replacing it with a new one. I asked him to give it a bit more time.
Happily, the plants are not only putting out new growth, but there are BUDS on the plants. (I’ll have to check a third plant today while I’m wandering around in the yard later to see how it’s doing.)
Perky Pet
Another hopeful thing is that my husband told me yesterday he saw a hummingbird at the feeder. We aren’t “awash in hummingbirds” by any measure, but the fact that we’ve seen three thus far gives me hope that we’ll have a nice spring.
May Day 2023
Encyclopedia Britannica
I’m feeling a bit hostile about being older than dirt this morning. I was fine until I started trying to find a May Day image and had to scroll nearly to the bottom of the page until I found an actual “May pole,” or any mention of it – and this was from the Encyclopedia Britannica!
Another small thorn was as I was trying to spell “encyclopedia” I remembered Jiminy Cricket from the Mickey Mouse Club singing it – and STILL need to sing it in order to spell the word correctly – “E-N-C-Y-C-L-O-P-E-D-I-A!”
AND – I always wanted a set of the Encyclopedia Britannica or The World Book when I was a child. I was a pain in the rear about it to my parents, having no concept of how much money I was asking them to spend. I never got either, of course, and by the time I might even CONSIDER buying it for my family, the Internet had been born and most people had switched to using IT, rather than any other source, and had given up phone books, maps, and other things, as well.
It doesn’t MATTER that I never participated or saw anyone dancing around a May pole. I guess that I just never thought about the whole idea “going out of style – or even mention” I think the idea is a pretty one, so I’ll just think about it today, quietly, trying to get my nose back in joint.
Filed under holidays
Nicky Litchfield 2
Filed under animal paintings, Nicky Litchfield
Garden Love 2 – Veggie Planters 4-30-2023
hayneedle.com
Thankfully, the veggie garden box plants are doing well, too. I have lettuce and spinach planted so far. If my husband feels up to it tomorrow, we may go look for something else interesting to plant.
You can see a few small weeds in the spaces around the plants, but it shouldn’t take long to take care of that.
I will also do another harvest in the next day or two. We haven’t finished eating what I gathered the first time yet. :0) I harvest the outer leaves of each of the lettuce plants for harvests, leaving the center leaves to form around the ‘head’.
The spinach is looking good, although ‘something’ is eating holes in some of the leaves. I love the fact that we can eat the leaves fresh from the garden in salads. I can also saute the leaves in olive oil, adding bacon bits for additional flavor. And, finally, I can freeze what we can’t eat right away.
If things continue as they are now, I’ll be able to take fresh lettuce and spinach to my friends soon. Such a FUN thing to be able to do.
Filed under Gardening, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
Garden Love 1 – 4-30-2023 – Tomatoes
Little Pine Learners
The tomatoes seem to be doing fine. We have this square planter with 4 plants and then a 2nd, 8-foot-long brick planter of tomatoes this year.
This is the same planter as above, farther away so you can see how much taller the plants are than the last pics I took.
This is the 8 foot planter. There are 6 plants in this one.
This close up shows we have some blossoms on one plant!
Filed under Gardening, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
Sunday Thoughts 4-30-2023
Smit Creation.com
This last day of April here is sunny and bright – something we have had little of, so it’s really welcome. It finally was dry enough – and my husband was feeling well enough – for him to mow around the house for the first time this season. He has a nice riding mower and he did a great job, so we look reasonably civilized right now :0)
We will have to drive slowly down the driveway soon, stopping for me to hold, and my husband to clip/cut/saw branches that are now hanging down in the driveway on both sides, making it almost like a tunnel to go down or come up. It looks kind of pretty, if you don’t have to worry about the branches scratching your vehicle…
Yesterday was a “2-Star” day because I
- Didn’t eat anything in-between meals or add salt to anything, and
- Did a 45 minute session of very careful yoga stretches. It’s been awhile since I’ve done my practice, and I was really stiff and sore. (It took over a minute for my back to stop hurting when I just lay down flat on the floor, for example). I find that I’m a hard-head and slow to learn on some things. I’m proving to myself – yet again – how much I need a daily session of stretching and relaxing to feel my best.
I just came in from checking the garden boxes and the tomato plants. All are looking good, and I’ll share pics in another post today.
I hope that this last day of April is a good one for you.
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
It’s In the Stars
Clipart Library
I’m going back to an ‘old faithful’ for me – rewarding myself with a sparkly star on my desk calendar when I achieve one of my goals.
- I’ve been stress eating and I’m really trying to stop that.
- I’ve been liberally sprinkling salt on everything, plus eating salty snacks
- I’ve been making excuses for not doing my daily yoga session
Otherwise, I’m a reasonably nice person… :0)
SO
I started yesterday (DAY 1) in a serious effort to mend my ways. I got one star for not eating in-between meals and not putting any extra salt on anything. I made an excuse for not doing my yoga, so I only got one star yesterday, but put that silver sparkly star on my calendar a couple of minutes ago.
Today I’m trying for 2.
Filed under DIET!, exercise, motivators
Nicky Litchfield Art
Filed under animal paintings, Nicky Litchfield
The Gift of David Zinn
Filed under David Zinn - Street Artist, drawings
Another Soggy Day 4-29-2023
The rain continues. It started in again yesterday and rained pretty much all day and evening, so I didn’t go check on the garden plants. I’m hoping that it will clear up this afternoon so I can at least see that things are still going okay out there.
The Paducah Sun
We saw our first pair of hummingbirds at the feeder yesterday! I would have missed them if I hadn’t been in the kitchen refilling my coffee cup. We’ve had the feeder out for a week or so because my brother-in-law sent my husband a video of several hummingbirds at their feeder and we were feeling quite envious. It’s early here for them, as we usually don’t see them until May, but we were hopeful. I saw one try to stop at the feeder and the second one dive-bomb the first and then they were gone.
The Cozy Cook
Since it’s been cool and rainy with intermittent severe weather threats, I made us a comfort food dinner of beef stew in the crock pot. We had a nice bowl of it and had enough to freeze for a couple more meals.
My husband is finally starting to feel a bit better. We went to a couple of places in town yesterday and he was completely exhausted afterwards, taking a long nap in his chair when we got back. He slept well, though, last night and said he thinks ‘a couple more days’ and he’ll feel like himself again. I predict a little more recovery time than that, but I’m SO glad he’s on the mend. :0)
Have a wonderful Saturday!
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
Saturday 4-29-2023
“Dorky Dogs” – BoredPanda.com – Liucija Adomaite and Justinas Keturka
This wonderful picture reminds me of a story my dad used to tell of one of several rare ‘camping’ trips he and several friends shared. These men were city guys from way back. They knew what a sleeping bag was, and the only camping skills they had were the ones they learned by sharing duties as part of their participation in the Boy Scouts when their boys were young.
He said that they had figured out a place to camp reasonably close to the river where they had been traveling down it in flat bottomed boats. They were all tired and sunburned, so ‘dinner’ was snacking food and beer. They finally called it a night and settled down.
Part of this was some laborious digging. They had learned to alter the ground so they could sleep more comfortably. They dug out the dirt so they could feel ‘part of the ground’ with it supporting their backs and their butts in a carefully dug hole, with ‘fittings’ as the holes were dug and shaped.
They climbed into their sleeping bags feeling reasonable full and a bit buzzed on beer. Suddenly, one of my dad’s friends was furiously cursing. When asked what the problem was, the guy said, “I just realized I sleep on my stomach.”
My dad would laugh helplessly trying to tell this story. This was the same poor guy who earlier, when they were trying to get ready for bed in the dark, let out a stream of profanity because he discovered he was trying to brush his teeth with Unguentine….
Filed under Funny Signs - Humor, memories
The Gang was All There!
The core bunch for Lunch Bunch was there today for the first time in awhile. I commemorated the occasion by taking a couple of pics quickly. This is Patty, Linda, Kay and Bud.
And the gentleman at the far end of the table is my husband, Harvey.
It was good to catch up on things. Patty and her husband will celebrate their 40th anniversary with a trip to Greece soon! I told her that they ‘had a good start now.’ :0) I think that Kay and Bud have been married about as long as we have (54 years in June), and Linda lost her husband, Dick, several years ago now.
We went to the library book sale right after Lunch Bunch and saw another long time good friend, Martha. She was helping her daughter run the sale. I hugged her neck. We agreed that trying to age gracefully was sometimes more of a challenge than either of us could handle, but that the effort was probably character-building.
After a quick trip to Walmart, we’re home for the day. The trip was a bit too long for my husband. He’s resting now and will probably take a nap after he finishes looking at the new magazines he got in the mail.
Beef stew tonight for dinner, a check of the garden stuff, a yoga session, and that’s our day.
I hope you’re having a good one.
Filed under Friendship, Thoughts on a ________
More Wonderful Sketches
GiveAmasterpiece.com
Google Play
Grant Fuller-Start-Sketching-and-Drawing-Now-Artists Network
myDaVinci.com
Filed under drawings
It’s Friday! 4-28-2023
ebaum’s world
It’s not actively raining right now. We’re supposed to get more tonight and tomorrow. I wonder if I start singing, “Here Comes the Sun” the weather will improve or Mother Nature will send me a tornado to protest.
NatGeo
My husband is feeling enough better this morning and he’s going to come to Lunch Bunch with me for the first time in 3 weeks! Hooray! I’m not sure if we’ll go to the grocery after that or not yet. We’ll play it by ear, depending on how he’s doing.
When we get back, if it’s not raining I’ll get out and check on my veggie boxes and tomato planters to see how the sweet plants are. I’ll try to take some pics to share.
Gfycat.gif
Nothing big planned for today, but it’s celebration mode that my husband is feeling a bit better. :0)
Filed under Thoughts on a ________
Civilized
Sent to me by my friend, Marsha.
Now THIS, in my opinion, is the way protest should be done. Maybe she might be a bit more specific about WHAT she is a little upset, but I love this.
Filed under Attitude
Beautiful Sketches
GiveAMasterpiece.com
Pixabay
muhammad-zakky-muhammad-hanafi-Pxfuel
Filed under Uncategorized
creativeartworksblog 