This one-of-a-kind Thanksgiving turkey tote bag is hand painted on both sides and then protected with several layers of Scotchgard to prevent stains. Dimensions of the tote are 10.5″ x 12″ not including the handle. Ready to ship to celebrate Thanksgiving at your home this year! FREE SHIPPING to contiguous U.S.
Use the link above to purchase this tote bag. If it doesn’t work for some reason, please paste this URL in your browser –
Filed under Uncategorized
Shelley Hallmark.me
16. PRIMATE: Removing your spouse from in front of the TV.
17. RELIEF: What trees do in the Spring.
18. RUBBERNECK: What you do to relax your wife.
19. SELFISH: What the owner of a seafood store does.
20. SUDAFED: Brought litigation against a government official.
Thanks for the email from Marsha Koenig
Filed under Funny Signs - Humor
Amber with bit of green plastic bone
I was helping my husband put a gigantic box that the TV came in up into the attic over the garage this morning. After we accomplished that, we swept out the half of the garage that was easy to get to with one of the cars out on the pad.
We went back into the house, but I couldn’t find Amber. I checked with my husband, and he glibly said, “I let her out when we went out to the garage. She’ll be fine.”
I ran out to the front yard and started calling her. I went all the way around the house, calling, but no Amber. I was in tears, still calling when Amber came running across the yard to me, smiling.
I gave her some treats, put her into the house, and then calming told my husband that his life was on the line if he did that again.
(We had agreed that HE could let her run first thing in the morning when breakfast followed. I have taken her out without the leash, walking from the house to the shop. I did it again yesterday, keeping a close eye on her and keeping the walk short. She is coming better now, but I don’t trust that she would come if she were distracted by a rabbit, squirrel, cat, or another dog. We even have COWS across the street that runs in front of our yard.)
My husband gave me the lecture about ‘mistreating the dog’ by not simply letting her out and letting her come home when she’s ready. I told him that we would build to that, but NOT YET!
And so continues the disagreement about when Amber truly knows where home is, when she’s coming on a reliable basis…..
Filed under Amazing Animals, Family
allstrungup.com.au
elsabags.blogspot.com
homedit.com
Filed under Creativity, String Art
Imgarcade.com
Marina Kim Portrait Art Gallery – marinakimart.com
Mary Sauer Art – marysauer.blogspot.com
picmia.com
Filed under Creativity, paintings of children
This is Molly. She’s a cocker spaniel/schnauzer cross who has been a member of our family for over 12 years now. She and our pit bull, Bambi, got along famously, in fact she is such a happy dog she added joy to the life of a rather serious dog – and his people – who needed some laughs.
When Bambi died, she wandered around the house looking very lost. She would bark to go out, searching the yard, then bark to come back in, searching the house again. It killed me that we couldn’t share the hard decision we had to make with her, help her understand. All we could do was hold her a lot, hug her, and grieve.
We then found Amber, our completely doofus, now almost 60-pound labrador retriever puppy. Since we brought her home in May at 10 weeks old, she has pretty much dominated our days. Molly’s reaction was to hide, leave the room, try to disappear.
Lately she seems to have made the decision that she’s not going to give up her rights as the dog who should be the head dog in the family, the one with seniority. Now when Amber dive-bombs her, she bares her teeth, growls, and maybe even gives Amber a little snap. Amber’s reaction is to jump straight up in the air, and then decides Molly must be playing with her.
We’re still trying to monitor the doggies when they’re together and curb Amber’s exuberance as much as we can. Molly seems to understand that it’s not a free-for-all, but she also won’t cower in the corner anymore.
She DOES still leave the room, if possible, but I’m glad to see her standing up for herself. (Our two cats are learning to deal with Amber lumbering toward them. They hiss and spit, if she corners them, and jump up where she can’t get them. Smoke actively stalks Amber when they’re outside. Our fish couldn’t care less about any other family members.)
Hopefully, Amber will begin to see the pattern on approaching Molly, adapting her behavior a bit.
Filed under Amazing Animals, Family
“A Tired Pigeon” – Paul Militaru Photography
“Flying” – Paul Militaru Photography
“Pigeon in the Tree” – Paul Militaru Photography
“Please, Do Not Leave – Just a Word to Tell You” – Paul Militaru Photography
“Relaxation” – Paul Militaru Photography
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
Shelley Hallmark.me
11. MISTY: How golfers create divots.
12. PARADOX: Two physicians.
13. PARASITES: What you see from the top of the Eiffel Tower.
14. PHARMACIST: A helper on the farm.
15. POLARIZE: What penguins see with.
Filed under Funny Signs - Humor
therealkenjones.wordpress.com
Every once in a while, our electronic stuff goes ‘wonky.’ (There is probably a technical term for what happened in each case, but ‘wonky’ suffices for me.) Sometimes it just wants to be looked at. Sometimes it wants to be taken apart and put back together. Unplugged and plugged back in….
Yesterday it was the TV. It simply died. No warning, No waning. Just died. As with a lot of things these days, it’s cheaper to buy a new one than even THINK about fixing it or paying someone else to fix it. We looked on the log we keep of stuff we’d like to remember, and discovered the TV was over 10 years old, and we paid over $1200 for it. We discussed the problem, then decided to list the features we thought were mandatory and go from there.
We decided to go to WalMart, and then, if we didn’t find anything, go to Fort Smith to Best Buy. My husband insisted we get a larger one than we had, which was 48″. He wanted 4K (Ultra High Definition Television), HDR (High Dynamic Range) – this has been explained to me that it can handle whatever resolution we get on upgrades for the TV, better resolution on DVDs, etc. He wanted at least 3 HDMI ports (plug-in places for our Playstation 3, Roku, amplifier, etc.) AND a price tag below $600….
We found a Philips 5000 at WalMart. It’s 55″, has all the things mentioned above, and cost $428.00. It’s also much lighter than our former TV.
We spent the rest of the day and evening getting the old one out, the new one in and hooked up. My husband is trying to teach our remotes to handle the new stuff so that we don’t have to play ‘juggling remotes,’ if possible. He’ll get them to do as much as he can, and for that I’m grateful.
I just hope that this is the last in the line of electronic thingies that suddenly doesn’t work, can’t be revived, and must be replaced!
Filed under Challenges
abcnews.go.com
I’m officially pathetic.
I don’t know what I did, so it’ll be hard to avoid doing whatever it was again. Bottom line is that I’ve been doing very little the past few days, and had to cancel bowling with good friends this evening because of back spasms and pain that keeps changing location, but doesn’t go away.
My doctor gave me a prescription for some muscle relaxants, telling me to try half a pill twice a day, up to one pill twice a day. I’m on the latter now, plus a heat pad. I’m trying to get to the point I can get down on the floor and do some slow, gentle yoga stretching, but I think I would need a crane to get back up. Back pain is the pits and I’m ready to get through the pain cycle. Thankfully, I have a massage scheduled for Thursday. Maybe THAT will get me over the hump.
Filed under Challenges
purpleclover.com
I’m feeling really lazy today.
Poor Amber desperately wanted me to play, so after I took her for a walk, we played with her basketball and small purple squeaky ball on the back porch. She only brings something back every once in a while, so once you get it going, she pretty much entertains herself – while someone is there. She teases you, acting like she’s going to bring it to you to throw again, and then, when you try to get it from her mouth, she either runs off again or tries to change the game to tug of war.
She also drops the ball a LOT, giving her oodles of chances to run, jump, play, and growl.
Amber on the dog run yesterday.
We played for about 15 minutes before she finally had enough. She’s asleep on the floor beside my chair as I type….. YAWN.
Filed under Amazing Animals, Family
This is the nice handle my husband made to go on the garden mixer. It not only makes it much easier to move, it allows the mixer itself to move in all different directions for use.
Here’s the mixer hanging in a moveable position.
If you look carefully, you can see the long, straight metal handle coming down from the round, black disk thingie. This allows you to turn the mixer into a position where you can toss the components of Mel’s Mix (vermiculite, peat moss, and three kinds of compost) into the bin. Then you can plug it in and mix it thoroughly. Unplug it and move it down for dumping into the wheelbarrow to take wherever you would like.
Here you see the mixer in place beside the bins holding the components of Mel’s Mix.
We used bungee cords to tie a tarp in place over the mixer to protect it and the extension cord from the elements.
We can also use it for its intended purpose, to mix concrete, but we don’t do that often. I mix Mel’s Mix all the time, and who would have thought of using a concrete mixer as a garden tool?
Filed under Gardening, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
Yesterday we changed our mailbox decoration on the way to Lunch Bunch. This is Wyle E. Coyote paying Sonic the Hedgehog to strangle the Roadrunner. This is the back of the piece. My husband is pleased with this one because we managed to add a bit of 3-dimenionsal quality to it with the legs welded onto the main piece.
Here’s the front of it.
The school bus goes by our driveway on week days. I hope that the kids get a kick out of seeing what we put on the mailbox.
Filed under Lewis Art, Lewis Mailbox Decorations
As we were eating breakfast this morning, we were trying to get Amber to lie down quietly on the floor beside us.
Yeah. Right.
It was as if she were on a trampoline!
We would say, “DOWN.” And she would comply.
We would pick up our spoon – “DOWN.” And she would comply. Before we could pick it “DOWN!” –
I think you get the picture. Up and down. Up and down. Down and up. Down and up.
We ARE making a bit of progress, but it’s very distracting trying to eat breakfast – or talk – or swallow…..
Filed under Amazing Animals, Family
This is the last of the spaghetti squash harvest. I pulled out the vines today. I could have gotten a few more, since there were still flowers on some of the vines, but I need to get things cleared out to try to get a fall garden going.
I’m still really pleased that I was able to save the seeds from one spaghetti squash I bought at the store, planted two seeds in pots in the kitchen and put them on the window sill. When they got large enough, I transferred them into my raised bed, square foot garden. I had no clue whether they would grow or not. The vines ended up taking up two of the 4×4 foot planters. The plants weren’t very ‘pretty,’ but I think getting at least 8 spaghetti squash from this experiment could be called a success. :0)
This is today’s harvest of tomatoes. I should get a few more. I’ve cleared out the plants in the ‘nook’ planter, but I still have four plants left in the 8 foot planter to the east of the house. I planted one new tomato plant on each end of the planter last week. I have no idea if we still have enough time to get to harvest with these, but it’s fun to hope.
On the first session in the garden today, I brought Amber. She was good until she got bored. She then decided to try to dig some holes under the planters. My husband brought her out – on the leash this time – on my second gardening session. The most significant thing in the square foot garden right this minute is marigolds. They’re everywhere. My husband said I should cut some and put them in a vase for us to enjoy inside.
He saw some wasps climbing around and into the pipes that form the framework of our garden. He decided to spray them – so instead of just having to be wary of them, we actively had to dodge the really angry wasps! It was easy to decide the second gardening session of the day was over.
So here are today’s flowers – marigolds and zinnias.
I think I’ll wait until later this evening or tomorrow to finish getting the square foot planters ready for a fall garden. My chair and a cold drink are calling to me….
Filed under Arkansas, Gardening, Greenwood, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
The Best Years in Life
This weekend I’m cleaning out our raised bed, square foot garden planters, getting ready for the fall garden. I harvested some more spaghetti squash, and I’ll show you pics of those later.
Amber went out with me to ‘help.’ We discovered she likes to play with grape tomatoes! I would throw one to her every once in a while, and she would happily treat it as if it were a toy. But then, after half an hour, she got bored and started to dig under the planters. I couldn’t allow that, so we came in.
I’ll cool off for a bit, drink some cold water, and then head out there again. I want to be ready in case we find some lettuce and spinach plants in Fort Smith when we go on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, if I can get the garden cleared out, I’m planning to set out 4 new celery plants, and plant some carrot and radish seeds. I’m pretty sure the radishes will do well, but I haven’t had any good looking carrots yet. I’m not going to plant a lot this year. I told you recently I started two new tomato plants, in the hope that they’ll produce before it freezes. If I can get those, and some spinach or lettuce and radishes, I would be happy.
We’ve just had too many projects, plus trying to spend lots and lots of time with Amber, to try to do a large garden.
Are YOU growing a fall garden?
Filed under Arkansas, Gardening, Greenwood, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
“Orange Dahlia” – Paul Militaru Photography
I LOVE the light Paul captured in this photo.
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
source unknown
Change is difficult. It’s SO much easier to simply ‘keep on keepin’ on.’
Change means leaving your comfort zone, getting up off your duff, doing things might be scary, challenging, even unpleasant sometimes. But if you stop making the choice to take the chance to make a change, you stop living. You gradually quietly implode, your world becoming smaller and smaller until it’s gone.
Sometimes I think my husband is on a mission to make us UNcomfortable – with WAAAAY too many changes at one time.
One example of this is our CHOICE to cancel our subscription to DISH TV. Living in the sticks outside a small town in Arkansas, we’re very lucky to have two satellite TV choices: Dish and DirecTV. Now we’ve tried both. Both offered a lot of stations in the package we chose, but we couldn’t JUST get the channels we wanted, and we had to pay extra for the channels that weren’t included, plus the rental of the DVR, plus a charge for HD, plus……over $98/month.
So now we’re free of that, and that’s a good thing. BUT now we have to learn how to use Roku, Hulu, AmazonPrimeTV, and about 4 other choices right off the bat that all sound the same to me. Nothing is relaxing, mindless anymore. That’s a good thing for us, too, but it isn’t enjoyable at the moment. We had to order another Roku remote, because I can’t take the idea of my husband being in charge of what we’re watching, how loud the sound is, etc. Now, instead of leaving a news channel on, buffering it for about an hour so we can skip through commercials, plus being able to hit “DVR” and see a list of stuff taped, ready to be watched, we have to figure out how to get the Roku service on (particularly if we watched a DVD the night before), then go to the service that provides the channel or program we want to see, then figure out (again) how to get the sound on.
We’re having to adjust to the fact that you can’t pause a show. You can mute the sound, but you can’t pause. So, if you get a phone call, need to get up to do something, get a call of nature, etc., you either miss whatever happened while you were gone or watch it again. We have to mute for commercials, although we’re paying a bit extra for services that offer no commercials.
Instead of $98/month, we’re paying $36. We have almost all of the channels and programs we wanted. I’m finding that watching 24 hour news programs was stressful. Since they all hashed the same news with their unique spin or opinions, we aren’t missing much. Between my online news and the ones we watch now, we know pretty much what’s going on.
We’re still researching to find out what’s being offered or updated. We’re still working together to figure out how to make things work. We’re having to strain our brains, rather than mindlessly staring at the tube.
We’re reading and talking and playing with our animals more.
So we made the CHOICE to take a CHANCE so our lives have CHANGED – for the better.
Filed under Acting Like a Grownup, Attitude, Bright Ideas, Challenges, Changes, Encouragement
“Ornamental Flowers” – Paul Militaru Photography
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
Right at this very moment, Amber is lying down beside my office chair, asleep. Ahhhhhh!
We’ve had a busy morning. We’re still having a bit of trouble giving Amber food that agrees with her. And, even if THAT is all good, we can’t keep her from acting like a vacuum cleaner outside, eating everything dogs find appealing. UGH.
Obviously, something didn’t agree with her that she ate yesterday. I had to hose and mop the porch first thing this morning. Since she’s been having trouble off and on, we’ve been leaving her crate door open at night. My husband did the initial clean up and then I followed with the hose and mop.
We fed her lightly, and then checked on her in half an hour – my husband had left the Clorox Clean Up bottle on the table. She had knocked that over, spilling about half of it on the porch floor. I leaped up to get THAT cleaned up, hoping she didn’t ingest any of that. I then admonished my husband that we’re at least PRETENDING to be smarter than the dog….
We went out to play with her later and ended up hosing and mopping the porch again –
We took her out and walked her quite a bit, gave her some water and went inside to get ready to go do errands. I checked on her before we left – to find she had taken her bedding from the crate and was in the process of shredding it all over the porch floor.
I put the the intact piece of bedding back in the crate, closed and latched the door to it, put her on the string on the deck since she won’t allow mopping or sweeping without a game of tug of war. I swept everything up and put her on the porch once again.
Amber on her dog run, waiting for me to get the porch mopped.
Amber with her purple bone on the office bed.
We were gone about an hour. Amber was delighted to see us when we got home. Her porch was still clean! We took her out again, and then let her come into the office. (If you look behind her head, you can see where she discovered the reams of copy paper on the shelf yesterday –
So far, so good. Fingers crossed.
Filed under Amazing Animals, Family
Incredibly Lifelike Felt Paintings of Pets and Plants by Dani Ives
by Laura Staugaitis on August 22, 2017 – Colossal
“Fiber artist Dani Ives conjures the natural world in her unique take on the traditional craft of needle felting. Ives describes her method as “painting with wool,” in which she applies her love of animals and her background in biology to build intricately layered portraits of a variety of flora and fauna.”
“Dogs, cats, birds, and farm animals come to life alongside toadstools and fruits, and Ives’ ability to capture the moisture and glint of animal eyes and noses adds an impressive degree of realism. While her plant life depictions take more of a traditional botanical angle, most of Ives’s animal subjects take center stage on the embroidery hoop, peering out at the viewer, further adding to the strong sense of unique personality, and it’s no surprise that she is in high demand for pet portrait commissions.”
“Ives sells originals and prints of her work on Etsy, and she continues her love of teaching by traveling from her home in Northwest Arkansas to lead workshops around the country, as well as offering e-courses in needle felting. You can also follow her work on Instagram”
Thanks again to Laura Staugaitis from Colossal for bringing us the work of this fine artist.
Filed under Creativity, Embroidery/Sewing Art
Thanks to Marsha Koenig for her email.
Filed under Amazing Animals, Awe-Inspiring Photography
Towering Charcoal Portraits of Women by Clio Newton
by Christopher Jobson on August 28, 2017 – Colossal
Swiss artist Clio Newton has been hard at work on a series of larger-than-life portraits of women portrayed entirely with compressed charcoal. The towering drawings can reach nearly 8 feet tall and capture near photographic detail of her subject’s faces, hair, and bodies. Several of the new portraits will be on view in an upcoming show at Benjamin Eck Galerie in Munich titled ‘Realism‘ that opens September 14, 2017. You can read an interview with Newton on Quiet Lunch and see more of her recent work and studio photos on Instagram. (via Supersonic Electronic, Gaks Designs)
Thanks to Christopher Jobson of Colossal for this article on Clio Newton
Filed under Creativity, drawings
Incredibly Lifelike Felt Paintings of Pets and Plants by Dani Ives
by Laura Staugaitis on August 22, 2017 – Colossal
Fiber artist Dani Ives conjures the natural world in her unique take on the traditional craft of needle felting. Ives describes her method as “painting with wool,” in which she applies her love of animals and her background in biology to build intricately layered portraits of a variety of flora and fauna.
Dogs, cats, birds, and farm animals come to life alongside toadstools and fruits, and Ives’ ability to capture the moisture and glint of animal eyes and noses adds an impressive degree of realism. While her plant life depictions take more of a traditional botanical angle, most of Ives’s animal subjects take center stage on the embroidery hoop, peering out at the viewer, further adding to the strong sense of unique personality, and it’s no surprise that she is in high demand for pet portrait commissions.
Ives sells originals and prints of her work on Etsy, and she continues her love of teaching by traveling from her home in Northwest Arkansas to lead workshops around the country, as well as offering e-courses in needle felting. You can also follow her work on Instagram.
Thanks to Laura Staugaitis of Colossal for her articles on the artwork of Dani Ives.
This just amazes me. I just can’t believe this is SEWING!
Filed under Creativity, Embroidery/Sewing Art
graphics
Yesterday we had our quarterly primary doctor appointment.
Our doctor was really happy with our blood test results. I’m doing well on my current dosage for thyroid and my numbers otherwise continue to improve – all in the normal range now, when I used to have high cholesterol, triglycerides, etc. My blood pressure was the best ever. – 124 over 68. My husband’s A1C showed the best results since we had the scare about a year ago. His number then was 16.1 (this is a ‘call-the-medics’ SCARY number on diabetes). It is now down to 7.3. We’re shooting for under 7, and our doc says this is doable, and he was REALLY happy with my husband’s efforts to cut out sugar. :0)
Now, all ‘I’ have to do is get the lard off.
To date I’m down 25+ pounds and 18-1/2 inches.
We’re following a low carb diet with as low numbers on sugar as possible. I’m trying to stay under 1200 calories and 40 carbs per day.
Yesterday I had my best day ever on steps – almost 8,000. I’m seriously trying to move more – a bit of a challenge lately since my back keeps having spasms. My doc checked it out, confirmed it was in the muscles rather than the spine, and put me on muscle relaxant meds for about a week. He wants me to take them for two days and then I can EASE back into my yoga. Then I’ll try for a yoga session and a half hour on my elliptical daily.
I’m tracking what I’m eating and my exercise on MyFitnessPal.com. The fixing of problems on their website isn’t great. The main page where you can see how many days in a row you’ve checked in, see how much weight you’ve lost, etc., is STILL not working (over 3 weeks now), but their foods data is the best I’ve seen, so I’m staying with them.
My husband and I are finally on the same page on motivation to eat right. This is really helpful. My willpower isn’t that great, and it doesn’t take much at all for me to throw in the towel and go get a pizza. Last night, though, when we were exhausted from our efforts all day long, my husband suggested we go to Subway. I can get a double chicken, bacon, and ranch salad that is really good and on my diet, and my husband can indulge in a foot long sandwich. He was good last night, except for getting 2 oatmeal raisin cookies… :0)
SO – WE CAN DO IT!
I’m hopeful that by the end of September, I can report a reasonable weight and inches loss. I’ll keep on keepin’ on, and concentrate on
TaoLife.com
Filed under Attitude, Challenges, Changes, DIET!, exercise, getting the lard off
creativeartworksblog 