I made these name cards to add to my work in the local shop, Rags & Roses Collective, in Greenwood. I’m hoping that people will enjoy them as something to put in a basket of goodies for a baby shower, include with a gift to a child, decoration for a child’s room or door, or….
I made 10 cards of boys’ names and 10 cards of girls names. I’ll also include a sign that encourages people to preorder a card for me to make, giving me a name they don’t find in the ones I’ve made so far.
Filed under Uncategorized
Reading Books via Stephanie Youmans Wilson
I have just pre-ordered the paperback versions of #50 and #51 of Nora Roberts’ “In Death” series. (#50 will be out in July and #51 at the end of December.)
The day before yesterday I settled down with #1 in the series, “Naked in Death” and thoroughly enjoyed the re-read. It was like seeing old friends after a long absence, even though “I” have changed a LOT since I first discovered the series. The characters remain fascinating to me, and the interaction and dialogue just as intriguing as the first time.
I have the ‘luxury’ in my ongoing maturity of forgetting many of the details of a book, so I can read them again with as much enjoyment, or more, than the first time, absorbing more details.
Roberts creates characters that are real. They all have their flaws and quirks and I find them endearing. I admire the main character, Eve Dallas, because she overcomes inner fears and doubts to do what she feels is right. She has quite high standards and won’t give an inch to achieve her goals. Quite a woman. My heart breaks for her, reading of her early life, and I find her endearing and believable.
I feel lucky to have found Nora Roberts as an author. She has given me countless hours of pleasure and a richness I wouldn’t have had, otherwise. I’ll enjoy living in Eve Dallas’ world through the first 49 books, and then welcome #50 in July.
Filed under Favorite Authors & Books
Marabou Stork-photographer unknown via Penny Yaffe Krakow
If I come back to the world as something else one day, I either want to be this Marabou stork (above) or a shoebill stork (below.)
San Diego Zoo Animals and Plants
I love both of these birds. They are ugly – and they look like they have a sense of humor – like they’ll say something to make you laugh any minute. A great combination!
The sun is finally shining here!!!! We have had an entire week of rain, storms, gusty winds, gray days. It was SO nice to have to put on my sunglasses when we ran a couple of errands earlier today!
I fixed a big salad this morning. I will offer to share it with my husband, but he has some things he really likes, instead. I will eat part for lunch and the rest as part of my dinner. It’s wonderful to be able to use spinach and lettuce from our own garden in it! :0)
My husband is going to try to mow the yard later today, if it will dry up more. We are actually watching the grass grow now that the sun has come out.
I’m going to play in my art room this afternoon, trying to finish up a new idea I had.
Have a fun day!
“Silk Water” – Paul Militaru Photography
“White Magnolia Petals” – Paul Militaru Photography
See more of Paul’s photography.
WHAT A PITY KULULA DOESN’T FLY INTERNATIONALLY—
WE SHOULD SUPPORT THEM IF ONLY FOR THEIR HUMOR:
On a Kulula flight, (there is no assigned seating, you just sit where you want),
passengers were apparently having a hard time choosing their seats, when a
flight attendant announced, “People, people, we’re not picking out furniture here,
find a seat and get in it!
On another flight with a very “senior” flight attendant crew, the pilot said, “Ladies & gentlemen, we’ve reached cruising altitude and will be turning down the cabin lights, this is for your comfort and to enhance the appearance of your flight attendants.”
On landing, the stewardess said, “Please be sure to take all of your belongings.
If you’re going to leave anything, please make sure it’s something we’d like to have.”
“There may be 50 ways to leave your lover, but there are only 4 ways out of this airplane”
“Thank you for flying Kulula.
We hope you enjoyed giving us the business as much
as we enjoyed taking you for a ride.”
As the plane landed and was coming to a stop at Durban Airport,
a lone voice came over the loudspeaker:
“Whoa, big fella.
WHOA!”
After a particularly rough landing during thunderstorms in the Karoo, a flight attendant on a flight announced,
“Please take care when opening the overhead compartments because, after a landing like that, sure as heck everything has shifted.
From a Kulula employee:
“Welcome aboard Kulula 271 to Port Elizabeth.To operate your seat belt, insert the metal tab into the buckle, and pull tight.
It works just like every other seat belt; and, if you don’t know how to operate
one, you probably shouldn’t be out in public unsupervised.”
“In the event of a sudden loss of cabin pressure, masks will descend from the ceiling. Stop screaming, grab the mask, and pull it over your face. If you have a
small child traveling with you, secure your mask before assisting with theirs.
If you are traveling with more than one small child, pick your favorite.”
“Weather at our destination is 50 degrees with some broken clouds,
but we’ll try to have them fixed before we arrive. Thank you, and
remember, nobody loves you, or your money, more than Kulula Airlines.”
“Your seat cushions can be used for flotation; and in the event of an emergency water landing, please paddle to shore and take them with our compliments.”
“As you exit the plane, make sure to gather all of your belongings. Anything left
behind will be distributed evenly among the flight attendants. Please do not leave children or spouses.”
And from the pilot during his welcome message:
“Kulula Airlines is pleased to announce that we have some of the best flight
attendants in the industry. Unfortunately, none of them are on this flight!”
Heard on Kulula 255 just after a very hard landing in Cape Town:
The flight attendant came on the intercom and said,
“That was quite a bump and I know what y’all are thinking.
I’m here to tell you it wasn’t the airline’s fault, it wasn’t the pilot’s fault,
it wasn’t the flight attendant’s fault, it was the asphalt.” (ash fault: get it?)
Overheard on a Kulula flight into Cape Town, on a particularly windy and bumpy day:
During the final approach, the Captain really had to fight it.
After an extremely hard landing, the Flight Attendant said,
“Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome to The Mother City.
Please remain in your seats with your seat belts fastened while the Captain taxis
what’s left of our airplane to the gate!”
Another flight attendant’s commention a less than perfect landing:
“We ask you to please remain seated as Captain Kangaroo bounces us to the terminal.”
An airline pilot wrote that on this particular flight he had hammered his
ship into the runway really hard.
The airline had a policy which required the first officer to stand at the door while the passengers exited, smile, and give them a “Thanks for flying our airline”.
He said that, in light of his bad landing, he had a hard time looking the passengers in the eye, thinking that someone would have a smart comment.
Finally everyone had got off except for a little old lady walking with a cane.
She said, “Sir, do you mind if I ask you a question?”
“Why, no Ma’am,” said the pilot.“What is it?”
The little old lady said, “Did we land, or were we shot down”?
Filed under Blog Repost - Wonderful Posts
Graham Colthorpe – Shimmering Light – Whitby Harbour
Filed under Oil Paintings I Love
We are having a stormy weekend. Between storms, I went out to check our veggies, and wanted to share their progress with you.
These are the tomato plants in what I call the “nook” planter. They are in a spot on the back of the house with our porch on the left side of this picture. They are more protected from wind than the other tomato plants.
These are the tomato plants in the other brick planter we converted to square foot gardening with the soil alternative. I saw some sweet yellow blossoms!
This is the main veggie garden. I hope you can see that we are finally rid of the thigh-high weeds that were on the ground under the boxes. There are a couple of areas I’ll spray again – if the rains ever stop – but mostly I have them under control now.
A little bit of head lettuce and then the sweet red onions.
Spinach in the foreground and head lettuce behind.
The head lettuce is forming heads now! I’m still going to harvest leaves for salads while the heads are growing.
The spinach is putting on lots of new leaves.
I’m encouraged by the garden so far. I’m keeping my fingers crossed that, with all this stormy weather we’re having, we don’t have a lot of hail that will kill the plants. We are sure enjoying lots of big salads!
Brooke Hampton via Chrissie Anderson Peters
I am particularly aware of this while mostly staying at home due to the pandemic.
Music has always been a big part of my life. It transports me – taking me back to junior high school patio parties where I danced with boys who made my young heart throb; to places I have never been, but would like to go; expressing feelings I hold deep inside. I have so many artists I love and never enough time to listen all I would like to. Lately, I’ve been creating mini-concerts for myself while I work at the computer – listening to song after song that lift my spirits as I write posts, balance my checkbook, or…. When I finish, my heart is filled with wonderful thoughts, memories, and happiness. It’s a wonderful escape.
Another thing I’m doing is re-reading favorite books and authors, revisiting favorite characters and stories. While my husband watches yet another “Cowboy Be-Bop” or equivalent movie as HIS escape, I can immerse myself in my book while keeping him company in a fashion. I’m lucky in that I have books all over the house, so I have a wonderful supply of wonderful worlds to dive into.
My art room is an endless source of possibilities. I actually have to set an alarm so I don’t totally lose myself in the joy of experimenting with colors, textures, techniques, and ideas. Sometimes I have an idea rattling around in my brain. Other times I go in there to ‘clean,’ and end up starting a project. I go in there, start one of my CDs, and suddenly the alarm goes off…
I love watching demonstrations on YouTube. You can almost pick a subject and find lots of great information and step by step demos on how to do things. I think YouTube is a treasure.
When it’s not raining —— I can play in my flowers and my veggie garden. I truly love seeing flowers bloom around the yard, and I’m like a kid at Christmas watching my veggies grow.
I will love it when the world gets back to normal. But, in the meantime, I’m a happy lady.
National Geographic
We caught the second member of the raccoon family overnight that not only cleans out each and every seed in all the feeders, but trash the feeders, as well. We have a humane trap that allows us to ‘relocate’ the raccoon elsewhere, hopefully far enough from our house that he doesn’t return.
On the way down the driveway, we noticed leaves all over that indicated we had yet another gusty storm last night. At the bottom of the driveway, we found that the robot we made was leaning over, caught by the two chains we tied on him and attached to trees. One would THINK that when a robot weighs 150 pounds, one wouldn’t have to worry about him blowing over. We learned the hard way many years ago that it is REALLY difficult to stand up a heavy robot that has fallen off the driveway down to the slope beside it. Thankfully, it is now an easy thing to pull him upright.
Lewis welcome robot
If you look carefully, you can also see one of the two owls we made for either side of the driveway. Each sits atop a pole. (We have a closure we could swing shut to block entrance to the driveway.)
So this morning we have pulled the robot upright, relocated a raccoon, and I’ve started regular chores. We will have lunch soon.
I’m going to try to check my garden veggies today before the forecasted rain begins. Once it starts, it’s supposed to continue until the end of the day tomorrow.
I hope you are having a good Saturday.
Filed under Lewis yard art, Thoughts on a ________
Bored Panda
Bored Panda
Bored Panda
Filed under Creative Woodpiles, When Wood Comes Alive
email from Marsha Koenig
Our GPS can’t find our house – it directs you to drive into Lake Greenwood – or the Greenwood Post Office.
My Facebook account was hacked. I tried to find someone to help me, but apparently there is no actual person actually working at Facebook. If you can’t sign in, they decide you are a terrorist. I have given up.
My LinkedIn account was also hacked, just a couple of days ago. Same problem. I have given up on LinkedIn, too.
It seems that forecasts and models are just ‘best guesses.’ Mostly, at the moment I’m happy they are proving to be wrong.
I will just take one day at a time, hoping my PHONE isn’t possessed, or hacked, or whatever.
Filed under Attitude, technology
My two feisty gold fish have a new lease on life since my husband pitched in and helped me clean the aquarium out today. I usually do this alone, but my husband is feeling sorry for me since I caught my toe on the corner of our bed and am limping around.
Together we can do the whole job from start to finish in half an hour.
The fish don’t complain when the water needs to be changed, and they don’t praise us when the water is squeaky clean, but I KNOW they appreciate having new decorations, as they check everything out thoroughly each time we change the water.
They both got in the corner of the tank, wriggled their bodies and blew bubbles at me until I fed them again – even though I fed them as usual this morning.
Happy, feisty fish are a lot of fun to have in a family.
Filed under Family, Housekeeping - Maintenance
Adams All-Natural Cedar
Today I feel rich.
The Lunch Bunch – a group of long-time friends who has met every Friday possible for over 17 years now – FINALLY got to enjoy sharing lunch again for the first time since the start of the pandemic.
We were afraid that Mother Nature was going to rain on us, but she held off. The Pizza Barn has put up two picnic benches with umbrellas in the parking lot, and is about to put up another two. Though it was gray and looked like it would rain very soon, we had a glorious time talking, grinning, laughing, and eating – catching up in person. It was truly wonderful to see their faces and laugh together for awhile. I’m still grinning.
I love our home. I have more things I want to do on any given day than I have the time or energy to do. I can honestly say I’m never bored. But there is nothing like sharing time with good friends to lift your spirits and feel that may sometime we will come to a new-normal that will be good once again.
After lunch I took my small signs with quotes to Rags & Roses Collective, the local shop where I share a booth with another good friend. I hope someone likes them enough to want to take them home or give them to one of THEIR friends.
Oh, I almost forgot. I listed the newest batch of earrings – the ones with studs or posts – on my earrings website, EyecatchingEarrings on Etsy, if you’re interested. There are separate sections for clip-ons, pierced with French Hooks, and pierced with studs or posts.
It’s very dark outside now. The forecast said we would get rain – up to 4 inches – by the end of the day on Sunday. Guess who will spends lots of time indoors!
Stay safe and well.
Filed under Friendship, fun in my art room
I am still walking around limping today from catching my toe on the corner of our bed in the middle of the night two nights ago – still feeling stupid. Yeah, everyone makes mistakes, but I KNOW where the bed is. It has been in the same place for over 30 years now. I KNOW it’s made of solid wood. My husband and I built the base for the bed years ago. I KNOW that confronting furniture with body parts is not a good thing to do. And yet here I am.
I’m still wearing slippers because I can’t wear a shoe. I’m limping around like a person twice my age – and that’s saying a LOT when you consider my “maturity.”
It would be NICE if I could simply pay better attention – even though it was the middle of the night and I was practically sleep-walking – rather than learning yet another lesson in such a painful way.
I’m glad that if I hurt myself, at least I didn’t do anything that required a trip to the emergency room. If I actually broke my toe, they would simply tape my little toe to the next one and call it done. I’m keeping it elevated as much as possible and am taking it easy otherwise.
I promise I will do something ELSE stupid next time…
Filed under Challenges, Funny Signs - Humor, taking care of yourself
“Midnight” – Small disk and teardrop post earrings.
I will add these new post style earrings to my EyecatchingEarrings website on Etsy as soon as possible.
“Glorious Green” post earrings
Super light-weight painted wood.
“Starry Night” – large purple disk post earrings
One-of-a-kind designs.
“Let’s Party!” – large red disk post earrings
“Favorite Purple” – small disk and 3D disk post earrings
“Blushing Rose” – small disk post earrings
“Southwest” – Turquoise and Green Leaf plus disk post earrings
Filed under playing in my art room
This is “Winter Molly.” she is a cocker spaniel/schnauzer cross. She is about 25 pounds and is 15 years old. She has really thick, amazingly long hair for a small dog. I use the defurminator on her all through the winter, trying to keep her from leaving a whole dog’s worth of hair all over the house every day. It’s a full time job trying to keep her reasonable clean, since one of her favorite things is finding or digging a hole in the yard and then sticking her snout in it, all the way up to her eyes.
This is “Spring/Summer/Fall Molly”. We have her sheared like a sheep, cut short all over. Our land is wooded, with lots of burrs. She had been already coming in covered nose to tail with small green burrs that I had to comb out, much to her distress. Keeping her hair short allows me to find ticks before they attach, treat her well for any possible fleas, keep her free of burrs, and be able to wash her quickly in the kitchen sink when she has enjoyed another hole.
Our vet/groomer is handling the pandemic aftermath situation well. We drove up in the car, called them to tell them we were there. A lady came out with Molly’s file, confirmed what we were going to do, made sure she had our contact phone numbers, and said they would call when she was ready. When we picked her up, we called from the parking lot again. They brought out a credit card reader and Molly, and we were on our way.
This is a really sweet little doggy, and I love BOTH of my Mollys.
Filed under Family
These are done on 6″ x 8″ canvas hard board. I used Unicorn Spit paint for the design and then acrylic paint for the quotes. They are sprayed with polyurethane for protection.
I’m planning to put these in Rags & Roses Collective, the local shop in Greenwood, where I share a booth called, “Blasing Bright” with my good friend, Carla.
I’m hoping that people will enjoy the quotes as much as I do, as good reminders.
Filed under fun in my art room
PictureQuotes.com
Excuses abound. I’m setting the excuse bar at a higher and higher level. (Everyone has to strive for something! )
The pandemic. Staying home. Cold, rainy weather. Husband asking for comfort food.
Then the real reasons – my laziness, my lack of motivation, my weakness.
All combine to add lardage when what I INTEND to do is to continue my efforts to lose the lardage and exercise regularly.
Now I am trying to re-lose previous loss in order to get where I was before so that I can enter new territory on the scales and with my tape measure.
BUT WILL SHE REALLY DO IT?
Hopefully, the answer is “yes.”
Right soon now.
Maybe tomorrow…
Mary Deason Christenson via Penny Yaffe Krakow
Filed under Awe-Inspiring Photography
creativeartworksblog 