It's been a full and busy -- BEAUTIFUL WEATHER -- week! Full and busy because I am taking off a few days next week to get some things done here at home. Everyone at my a.m. job is feeling the same - we're just pooped. And believe me - MY job is a cake walk compared to some of theirs. I mean even I know that.
Throughout the week I was skampering around trying to get enough done that I could take the few days off without letting anyone down, or making myself come back to a pile of stuff that should have been done. Still will, but you know what I mean. Wanted AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE done before I left.
We have been talking about needing new carpet in our family room since Jaimee was born. It's pretty gross actually. We've been here 13 years and it was here when we came. Not sure how long it had been here before us. AND the hard surface floor (kitchen, small dining room, closet, laundry, bathroom area) had gouges and scuffs and was discoloring (I thought it was where I put rugs on it, but it was not just there ... weird!) and then our dishwasher started leaking and that got under the vinyl and darkened it -- in about a 3 1/2' x 1' area right in front of it.
So after much store shopping and hunting for what we want (talk to 10 sales people and you get 10 reasons why you shouldn't buy any carpet except the one they are holding in their hand). Finally after internet and internet SHOPPING - we got the best deal we could find (saving overall about 40% -- maybe 30% -- but still saving a lot) we ordered from the same place we ordered our carpet when we lived on 5th Street. Straight from Dalton Georgia -- carpet capital of the USofA!
First they said 3 weeks for delivery. Then they said - "it's been shipped" after only 1 week. Then they said "it's sitting in a spot in St. Louis until the next delivery to your area NEXT WEEK". Uff da!! So it came last week on some day .. maybe Wednesday, no maybe Tuesday. Not sure anymore. The carpet layers came on Thursday and Friday and got the carpet all in. They will be back on Monday to start the tiles. That means this weekend we need to empty the laundry room, closet and pantries. That's where they will start.
Right now it is almost impossible to SIT anywhere - all of our furniture is crowded into the front room and big dining room. We did take our old chewed up (that's literal -- dog chewed it) sofa to the basement, so I guess I could go sit there.
I like the carpet so far -- hope we like the other hard surface floor (anything would be an improvement at this point!).
Friday my day off was not to watch the carpet layers, but to go to Des Moines for a regional gathering for Stampin' Up people. Tammy P and I do the SU stuff to get our products discounted and to have fun. Neither of us spend THAT much time doing any of it -- mostly it's a collecting thing. All the stuff we have and don't use ... ahhhh though there is the POTENTIAL to make cool stuff! And SOMETIMES we do.
Anyway Friday was the day. I was looking forward to it. Before I left Randy checked the tires. The back passenger one was a little low and he discovered a nail in it. Even though I was already about 30 minutes later getting off than I wanted, I thought I better go get it plugged/patched or whatever. It turned out to be whatever. So about 40-45 minutes later I began my trek to Des Moines with a new tire. Grrr!
Beautiful day. Perfect driving weather. There could have been a few less cars and trucks on the road to be GREAT traveling, but none-the-less it was good. 3/4 the way there-- I heard a clicking sound. At first I thought it was something chinking together like maybe some coins in the coinholder, or ?? something like that. But I noticed when I accelerated the clicking accelerated and got louder, when I let up the clicking wasn't as rapid or loud. So I continued clicking along.
I was, at that point, glad I had replaced the tire and didn't have that AND the clicking to worry about. I called Randy and he said it sounded to him (from the symptoms I described) like what it had done when we went to Lincoln awhile back. At that time we discovered that the oil was TOO FULL. (Even though the oil stick indicated that the oil was low-a little was added to bring it to FULL-and should have been okay.)
So I clicked to a parking spot. Went in (last one there I think) to the SU convention site. Enjoyed what I saw and heard, but constantly thinking about the car and needing to get home. And that Sabbath would start and ... so I left the thing an hour early. Went to Walmart and had them change the oil (it was time anyway) and put a new filter, etc. The clicking was gone and it ran perfectly all the way home. It was STRESSFUL all day because of that. I probably should have just stayed home. But ... I didn't. I'm so glad that God took care of me!
Saturday, October 16
Tuesday, October 12
TANNER'S SHOWER
Saturday night after the meeting Wynter and Rhiannon went over to Fulton Place and began preparing for a baby shower for our new cousin/nephew/grandson Tanner! He is due to make his appearance any time now. I personally hope he stays put until either October 24 or 29 -- to commemorate either Marlon or dad (Gene)'s birthdays! JoDe of course is hoping for ANY DAY prior to those dates! I think she is about ready to be done!
Gr'ma Shirley (Hinkhouse) aka mom made a whole bunch of yummy sandwich spreads, apples and caramel, pickles (or tickles as Jaimee says), etc. The cake the girls ordered was adorable with little dinosaurs. And the decorations - well, with Wyn on the team of decorators you KNOW it's gonna be good. And it was! Very 'boy' - but still baby!
Our group wasn't huge, but it was a good group with relatives from both sides of the family and a couple of church family. We had some games - baby bingo which both Reese and Jaimee liked playing. While we were trying to get 'bingo' - they were having fun looking at their cards finding the objects.
One was particularly difficult. It was "cow rattle" ... which in and of itself is sort of weird. Like WHOEVER heard of a COW rattle? Maybe a rattle with a round end on it or ??? well, anything but a cow. So to make it even more difficult - the COW rattle looked just like a PIG. I kid you not. So anyway - in some foreign country where they have never seen a cow OR a pig - they design baby shower bingo cards, don't you think? *smile*
So here are some pictures from the shower. Again you'll have to 'x' out the stupid little Super Poke Pets thing (below) in order to see the full picture.
Gr'ma Shirley (Hinkhouse) aka mom made a whole bunch of yummy sandwich spreads, apples and caramel, pickles (or tickles as Jaimee says), etc. The cake the girls ordered was adorable with little dinosaurs. And the decorations - well, with Wyn on the team of decorators you KNOW it's gonna be good. And it was! Very 'boy' - but still baby!
Our group wasn't huge, but it was a good group with relatives from both sides of the family and a couple of church family. We had some games - baby bingo which both Reese and Jaimee liked playing. While we were trying to get 'bingo' - they were having fun looking at their cards finding the objects.
One was particularly difficult. It was "cow rattle" ... which in and of itself is sort of weird. Like WHOEVER heard of a COW rattle? Maybe a rattle with a round end on it or ??? well, anything but a cow. So to make it even more difficult - the COW rattle looked just like a PIG. I kid you not. So anyway - in some foreign country where they have never seen a cow OR a pig - they design baby shower bingo cards, don't you think? *smile*
So here are some pictures from the shower. Again you'll have to 'x' out the stupid little Super Poke Pets thing (below) in order to see the full picture.
Monday, October 11
PLAID DRESSED DRUMMER
Burlington Coat Factory -- cutest kid's clothes and THE BEST PRICES! I don't know how I ended up going there one day. But there they were all those adorable outfits and AFFORDABLE prices.
Made a trip up there a week ago (with Randy in tow) and he HAD to buy her this little dress. It was available in a green and this purple. Since Jaimee was with (and Rhiannon) - Jaimee got to make the selection ... poople or green ... she chose poople.
Rhiannon put her in it for church this week. It was chilly in the a.m. so she had on little black tights and shiny little dressy shoes. As the day got progressively warmer (edging over into the HOT category) the pieces came off. Shoes, tights, sweater ...
Later going to the evening meeting her mommy threw on some ankle socks and her light up shoes.
I brought J home from the meeting. She and I were both tired. But she was in the most fun mood every. Smiling and chattery and pleasant. Not at all like a tired baby can get.
She discovered the long sticks that are to stir the 5 gallon pot of paint that I got Randy ... he's so excited ... and proceded to become a drummer. I got LOTS of pictures. I figured they might be the key to a lavish lifestyle for me in retirement ... providing she grows up to be a famous female drummer (and I have the 'remember when pictures' to sell to the paparazzi!)
Anyway - we had a good time. A few minutes later I made the night-night suggestion again and she very willingly put down her sticks and we went up to bed!
Again you'll have to click the "x" on the stupid little advertisement at the bottom of the pictures. Grrr. Also you have to 'hover' on the pictures to get the captions.
Made a trip up there a week ago (with Randy in tow) and he HAD to buy her this little dress. It was available in a green and this purple. Since Jaimee was with (and Rhiannon) - Jaimee got to make the selection ... poople or green ... she chose poople.
Rhiannon put her in it for church this week. It was chilly in the a.m. so she had on little black tights and shiny little dressy shoes. As the day got progressively warmer (edging over into the HOT category) the pieces came off. Shoes, tights, sweater ...
Later going to the evening meeting her mommy threw on some ankle socks and her light up shoes.
I brought J home from the meeting. She and I were both tired. But she was in the most fun mood every. Smiling and chattery and pleasant. Not at all like a tired baby can get.
She discovered the long sticks that are to stir the 5 gallon pot of paint that I got Randy ... he's so excited ... and proceded to become a drummer. I got LOTS of pictures. I figured they might be the key to a lavish lifestyle for me in retirement ... providing she grows up to be a famous female drummer (and I have the 'remember when pictures' to sell to the paparazzi!)
Anyway - we had a good time. A few minutes later I made the night-night suggestion again and she very willingly put down her sticks and we went up to bed!
Again you'll have to click the "x" on the stupid little advertisement at the bottom of the pictures. Grrr. Also you have to 'hover' on the pictures to get the captions.
THE THINGS WE DO FOR FUN!
My niece Maggie's school had a special day where people could dress up as "old" people. So Maggie ended up going in a most 'stylish' pair of glasses. Upon seeing her picture - I harked back to the 80's -- ahh those were the days!
For some odd reason I still have my glasses and I knew where to find them. (Amazing since I can't find my phone 1/2 the time and I use it every day!) I pulled them out and shot some cool glasses pics of myself to share with Maggie!
Next time Jaimee was around - she saw the the 'gaagaas' and had to try them on. I thought she looked pretty cute. She had a bit of a runny nose - but even with that ...
Saturday, October 2
DEVIL WEARS PRADA
You'll have to 'click' the little X on the super poke pets thing ... sorry.
Sunday, September 19
MEMORABLE DAY IN LUDKE-VILLE
Well - I have to share this! It's been a MOST memorable day here in Ludke-ville! *LOL*
The kids finished packing up their truck last night - and headed out this a.m. to unload it in Orland Park, IL. (I continue to let my son-in-law know that this is a bad decision - for me! - he continues to ignore me. I don't know if he realizes how much I love having them near us and how he is driving me to an early grave ... people have died from broken hearts you know ... are you feeling guilty Ryan? *smile*)
Anyway 'pa-pa' and 'ma-ma' (our Jaimee given names) - were in charge of the now 19 month old girlie.
I heard her wake up so picked her out of her bed and brought her in ours so we could snuggle. We turned on the TV to public TV and watched for ... about 7 3/4 minutes. Then we had 'no more monkies jumpin' on the bed' time. Then she and I got up and had some oatmeal.
'Ma-ma' gave her a bottle of juice -- she doesn't get a bottle (which reminds me I better wash the evidence and put it away). She sat all snuggly with me for a long time. Then I went potty - and she sat on her potty (made me take her diaper off). After that she kept wanting to go back in and sit on her potty. Kept saying 'poopy' (weak stomached folks fast forward) so I sat her on the potty with no pants. She sat a long time.
She got up and ran around, tiny naked bottom! Then she'd go sit some more. Up and down, up and down. When she was sitting she wanted me to sit there also and keep her company - so I did. Finally she shooshed me out the door. It was funny. She didn't want me IN there anymore.
But she kept popping up and looking out the door to make sure 'ma-ma' was standing close by. We did this about 1/2 dozen times ... 'ma-ma?' and back she'd go to sit. Finally she came out and instead of saying 'ma-ma?' she said "poopy". And sure enough it was her first ever potty in a potty!
Of course we called mommy to tell her - so mommy could make over her accomplishment. We called daddy (he was in a different vehicle). And then we took a picture and printed it off so she could show 'pa-pa' and Nick and mommy and daddy when they come home. She is very pleased with her picture (which I will spare you! I hear her mom posted it on Facebook. She's going to HATE you when she's grown up, you know!)
So yes, a monumental day in Ludke-ville!
And the day continued to be a great day with her - she's been extra good. We got NOTHING accomplished, but who cares?!
The marrieds got home in time for the meeting to start tonight - and when we got home after the meeting Jaimee showed her 'poopy picture' to her mommy and daddy (everyone praising the accomplishment that they missed this morning). Then she wanted her diaper off and she went in and went pee-pee on the potty.
What a proud - proud ... and did I mention ... MONUMENTAL day in Ludke-ville!
Hope you had a great weekend!
The kids finished packing up their truck last night - and headed out this a.m. to unload it in Orland Park, IL. (I continue to let my son-in-law know that this is a bad decision - for me! - he continues to ignore me. I don't know if he realizes how much I love having them near us and how he is driving me to an early grave ... people have died from broken hearts you know ... are you feeling guilty Ryan? *smile*)
Anyway 'pa-pa' and 'ma-ma' (our Jaimee given names) - were in charge of the now 19 month old girlie.
I heard her wake up so picked her out of her bed and brought her in ours so we could snuggle. We turned on the TV to public TV and watched for ... about 7 3/4 minutes. Then we had 'no more monkies jumpin' on the bed' time. Then she and I got up and had some oatmeal.
'Ma-ma' gave her a bottle of juice -- she doesn't get a bottle (which reminds me I better wash the evidence and put it away). She sat all snuggly with me for a long time. Then I went potty - and she sat on her potty (made me take her diaper off). After that she kept wanting to go back in and sit on her potty. Kept saying 'poopy' (weak stomached folks fast forward) so I sat her on the potty with no pants. She sat a long time.
She got up and ran around, tiny naked bottom! Then she'd go sit some more. Up and down, up and down. When she was sitting she wanted me to sit there also and keep her company - so I did. Finally she shooshed me out the door. It was funny. She didn't want me IN there anymore.
But she kept popping up and looking out the door to make sure 'ma-ma' was standing close by. We did this about 1/2 dozen times ... 'ma-ma?' and back she'd go to sit. Finally she came out and instead of saying 'ma-ma?' she said "poopy". And sure enough it was her first ever potty in a potty!
Of course we called mommy to tell her - so mommy could make over her accomplishment. We called daddy (he was in a different vehicle). And then we took a picture and printed it off so she could show 'pa-pa' and Nick and mommy and daddy when they come home. She is very pleased with her picture (which I will spare you! I hear her mom posted it on Facebook. She's going to HATE you when she's grown up, you know!)
So yes, a monumental day in Ludke-ville!
And the day continued to be a great day with her - she's been extra good. We got NOTHING accomplished, but who cares?!
The marrieds got home in time for the meeting to start tonight - and when we got home after the meeting Jaimee showed her 'poopy picture' to her mommy and daddy (everyone praising the accomplishment that they missed this morning). Then she wanted her diaper off and she went in and went pee-pee on the potty.
What a proud - proud ... and did I mention ... MONUMENTAL day in Ludke-ville!
Hope you had a great weekend!
Friday, September 3
IN THE SUMMER TIME WHEN THE WEATHER IS HOT!
Wow! July was the last time I blogged?!! I knew it had been awhile, but even I was shocked when I saw HOW long!
And so here I sit enjoying fresh evening air with a crispness that reminds me of fall. Can it be that the days of triple digit heat and (high) double digit humidity are over and behind us already? If not, it soon will be.
Our summer included:
COUNTY FAIR! We had a church booth featuring our church school. I got to make balloon animals. Before next year comes I think I will teach myself a few things. I'd never made ANY balloon creatures before arriving at our booth. It was FUN. Would have been MORE fun if I'd had a clue what I was doing. Abby Paul had helped with a VBS in Alaska where they did some - so she was our instructor!
JAIMEE TIME! When the kids arrived at the beginning of summer we had a hectic mess. Gradually over a bit of time (and lots of work by my daughter) - things became 'normal' here. Randy and I have SO enjoyed having that tiny girl here. Hearing her sweet voice saying 'Pa-pa!!' or 'Ma-ma!!' is like music. She's had some rough times mostly because her little mouth decided to sprout all sorts of molars and other teeth this summer. But those times are usually a few days - and then the happy little girlie returns. She has been so much fun! We took a walk with her to the arboretum and as we walked along, we discovered our shadow! It did exactly what we did! And it was both amazing and fun!
JOB CHANGE TIME! Nick left his employment with Aaron's and has gone to work up in Iowa City at Riverside. While it's a longer drive he only has to do it 3 or 4 times a week and makes as much or more $$ than he did in more days and hours here.
YARD SALES! I can't remember how many yard sales we did this summer. Probably not as many as it seemed. But in an effort to make room for two families to live together, it was necessary to rid ourselves of some things! Whew! It always feels good to get things cleaned out a bit. We got rid of the pool table and I think I have a buyer for the air hockey table. So we will get our basement repurposed for other types of living soon. I think we want to repaint the floor down there before we do much. It's been a few years since I painted the floor.
In getting ready for one of the sales, Ryan hopped out of the back of the truck and hurt his ankle. Turns out he cracked it. No casts required, but hobbled for awhile. I think he is doing okay now, as he has been paintball shooting and other things.
DAD AND MOM ... July and August were tough on both of them. Dad has had an open sore on his foot for almost a year now. Mom has nursed it and nursed it. When dad began feeling very ill and weak, he ws taken to the VA hospital and admitted. Infection. They did that a couple of times. When they sent dad home he took home an intravaneous IV to feed antibiotics. That actually caused some problems to his kidneys, so they had to change it up. The wonderful thing about this all was that at one point mom took dad in - and they were going to cut off a portion of his foot (at best) and up to his knee (most probably). Prayer warriors around the country sent petitions heavenward on behalf of his situation. When they went in - after some tests and consultations - the doctors decided that the wound was healing and they were NOT going to do an amputation at all. He did go home with a huge wound on his foot. They cut down into the bone and cleaned out bad flesh. The opening was probably as round as a quarter and probably quarter of an inch deep. When mom cleaned it out - she touched bone. Now she says the wound is about as big around as her pinky finger tip and she only cleans flesh - no bone. God is HEALING him. Keep dad on your prayer list. It would be wonderful, if after a year of fighting this - he and mom could be relieved of this stress.
Mom is such a wonderful worker and caregiver. I know dad appreciates that - and at least as far as I am concerned, I am in AWE of her giving spirit.
WORK WORK WORK - Summer is my busy time at my afternoon job. Annual recertifications take up most of the summer months. Never mind that it also seems that it is time when everyone decides to move and also when auditors, investors, and inspectors seem to come around to do their work. AND the person who works afternoons at City Hall - to my mornings went on a 2 week vacation which I was happy to cover for (more hours!!!) - but on the other hand ... it meant some long, long days when I would go to my afternoon job after doing a full day at my a.m. job. But I am SO thankful for a job(s). So not really complaining.
DRYER DECEASED - The dryer we've had for a dozen years finally had to be replaced at the beginning of August. It still heated. But there was a rubber thing inside (that's the technical term for what was wrong, in case you were wondering) that was getting shaved off somehow and then those little shaved things were melting and adhering to the clothes so when you took your clothing out of the dryer, it looked like you had been assaulted by a chocolate bar. The cost to repair mirrored the cost to replace. Nick was still at Aaron's and we were able to get a very good 'employee' discount.
SHELTER IN THE TIME OF STORM(s) - We have been deluged with rain and storms this summer. Not so much in the last few weeks, as earlier on. In all these years at my afternoon job, this is the first time I have had to spend time in the lower level of our building (at work) with my residents. They are so precious - they don't understand. And when they said that a tornado had been spotted near Muscatine, they were certain that meant it was headed straight to their building. In our own yard, we lost more limbs this year. Our backyard has so many fewer trees than it did a few years ago. In our front year, because of all of the rain, and a perpetual puddle in one area -- we now have a little spot where there is no grass because it just couldn't hold it's breath any longer and it drowned.
TOOTH FAIRY ALERT - We've been looking for the tooth fairy this summer. Not only because of all that Jaimee has sprouted, but poor 'Pa-pa' was eating an Arby's sandwich of all things! And he bit down on something hard. The tooth HURT bad. He went a couple of days later he went to the dentist, but they didn't find anything wrong. It settled down some, but then FLARED big time. On a Sabbath morning he was in such pain that we tried to call his dentist thinking they'd be in on Sabbath a.m. NOPE. Called his doctor thinking the same thing. NOPE! Ended up at going to an Urgent Care Walk In place. WHAT a JOKE! Left about an hour and 1/2 later - we left with no pain relief. It's still bugging him, though he has been back to the dentist and they still don't find anything.
AUNT NITA - My dad's sister Juanita - aka Aunt Nita came to visit this summer. She is so pleasant and nice to visit with. It was Randy's and my privilege to pick her up at the airport and enjoy a meal at Maid-Rite with her. With the busy time this summer, I didn't get time to invite people in for a get-together, but mom did and naturally it was so much better than anything I could have offered. (BTW - Kathy I still don't have your email address ... Aunt Nita - can you forward this and get her email for me. Not sure what happened.)
CHICAGO TRIP - Rhiannon and I have had several opportunities to get away for a weekend over the years. Its always been fun. We tried it this year again - and it was probably NOT the best trip there we've ever had. On the other hand inspite of it not being the best trip, there were good times like walking along Lake Michigan - the water was beautiful. The day was marvelous and it was relaxing. Baby J loved playing in the fountain at Millenium Park. That was about an hour of pure unadulterated JOY as far as she was concerned ... at least until she was knocked flat by a speeding little boy who didn't see her in his pathway. She really got knocked down hard and cried and cried! Eventually she came around and enjoyed the fountain some more, but a bit more cautious of speeding children.
BURGLARIZED, NOT ROBBED - I learned last week that it is NOT robbery when someone cuts the screen out of your livingroom window and comes in and takes your flat screen TV, remote control, and manual. It is BURGLARY. Our friend Barbara had just this thing happen to her. She didn't wake up - yes! she was sleeping in the next room. Her little dog didn't wake up either. I think her guardian angel was plugging their ears! What if they had come out and surprized the BURGLAR? We know they had something sharp to cut the screen ... bad things could have happened.
MOVE OVER! Starting last Thursday the guys loaded up all of the stuff for our Loud Thunder camp meeting. Then Friday they unloaded and set up camp. At home we were cooking and getting ready for the event in our 'womanly' way. Saturday night was breaking camp and unloading back at the school and church. Sunday a good group of us went to Aledo (twenty-some miles into Illinois) and moved the belongings of a church couple to their new apartment in Muscatine. That was the a.m. In the afternoon - we headed to Bennett (twenty-some miles north of Muscatine) to move the Pastor and his wife to their home in Muscatine. It was in the nineties. Everyone was pooped at the end of the day. Monday and Tuesday both I was feeling it in my joints and bones. Boy I am OLD! And I didn't work as hard as some. The GUYS lifted and hauled stuff upstairs and down ... HEAVY stuff. Glad that is done.
STAMPING TIME Next weekend is our all day stamping event at the church school. We only do this 3 or 4 times a year and the last time was in JULY. So there is another way to see how much time has elapsed. I look forward to this day. I hope everyone who comes brings a project they are going to work on. I think that makes it more fun for everyone! I know that I like having time just to myself to think and create without a lot of distraction. My creativity works better then! Thursday night is our monthly stamping night (which is different than our all day event) ... so I better think about what project to work on for that night! Fortunately I have a three day weekend to think about it.
I think it is time for me to let you get back to your life. I am sorry to go on and on. Take care - let us hear from YOU! Abbie and Jill ... I haven't forgotten that I said I'd send that bag. I still will! PROMISE!
Love to all! And especially welcome home to Mark and Bellie who arrived home to Muscatine from their other home clear over there in the Philipines. They'd been there for 3 weeks and got home today.
And so here I sit enjoying fresh evening air with a crispness that reminds me of fall. Can it be that the days of triple digit heat and (high) double digit humidity are over and behind us already? If not, it soon will be.
Our summer included:
COUNTY FAIR! We had a church booth featuring our church school. I got to make balloon animals. Before next year comes I think I will teach myself a few things. I'd never made ANY balloon creatures before arriving at our booth. It was FUN. Would have been MORE fun if I'd had a clue what I was doing. Abby Paul had helped with a VBS in Alaska where they did some - so she was our instructor!
JAIMEE TIME! When the kids arrived at the beginning of summer we had a hectic mess. Gradually over a bit of time (and lots of work by my daughter) - things became 'normal' here. Randy and I have SO enjoyed having that tiny girl here. Hearing her sweet voice saying 'Pa-pa!!' or 'Ma-ma!!' is like music. She's had some rough times mostly because her little mouth decided to sprout all sorts of molars and other teeth this summer. But those times are usually a few days - and then the happy little girlie returns. She has been so much fun! We took a walk with her to the arboretum and as we walked along, we discovered our shadow! It did exactly what we did! And it was both amazing and fun!
JOB CHANGE TIME! Nick left his employment with Aaron's and has gone to work up in Iowa City at Riverside. While it's a longer drive he only has to do it 3 or 4 times a week and makes as much or more $$ than he did in more days and hours here.
YARD SALES! I can't remember how many yard sales we did this summer. Probably not as many as it seemed. But in an effort to make room for two families to live together, it was necessary to rid ourselves of some things! Whew! It always feels good to get things cleaned out a bit. We got rid of the pool table and I think I have a buyer for the air hockey table. So we will get our basement repurposed for other types of living soon. I think we want to repaint the floor down there before we do much. It's been a few years since I painted the floor.
In getting ready for one of the sales, Ryan hopped out of the back of the truck and hurt his ankle. Turns out he cracked it. No casts required, but hobbled for awhile. I think he is doing okay now, as he has been paintball shooting and other things.
DAD AND MOM ... July and August were tough on both of them. Dad has had an open sore on his foot for almost a year now. Mom has nursed it and nursed it. When dad began feeling very ill and weak, he ws taken to the VA hospital and admitted. Infection. They did that a couple of times. When they sent dad home he took home an intravaneous IV to feed antibiotics. That actually caused some problems to his kidneys, so they had to change it up. The wonderful thing about this all was that at one point mom took dad in - and they were going to cut off a portion of his foot (at best) and up to his knee (most probably). Prayer warriors around the country sent petitions heavenward on behalf of his situation. When they went in - after some tests and consultations - the doctors decided that the wound was healing and they were NOT going to do an amputation at all. He did go home with a huge wound on his foot. They cut down into the bone and cleaned out bad flesh. The opening was probably as round as a quarter and probably quarter of an inch deep. When mom cleaned it out - she touched bone. Now she says the wound is about as big around as her pinky finger tip and she only cleans flesh - no bone. God is HEALING him. Keep dad on your prayer list. It would be wonderful, if after a year of fighting this - he and mom could be relieved of this stress.
Mom is such a wonderful worker and caregiver. I know dad appreciates that - and at least as far as I am concerned, I am in AWE of her giving spirit.
WORK WORK WORK - Summer is my busy time at my afternoon job. Annual recertifications take up most of the summer months. Never mind that it also seems that it is time when everyone decides to move and also when auditors, investors, and inspectors seem to come around to do their work. AND the person who works afternoons at City Hall - to my mornings went on a 2 week vacation which I was happy to cover for (more hours!!!) - but on the other hand ... it meant some long, long days when I would go to my afternoon job after doing a full day at my a.m. job. But I am SO thankful for a job(s). So not really complaining.
DRYER DECEASED - The dryer we've had for a dozen years finally had to be replaced at the beginning of August. It still heated. But there was a rubber thing inside (that's the technical term for what was wrong, in case you were wondering) that was getting shaved off somehow and then those little shaved things were melting and adhering to the clothes so when you took your clothing out of the dryer, it looked like you had been assaulted by a chocolate bar. The cost to repair mirrored the cost to replace. Nick was still at Aaron's and we were able to get a very good 'employee' discount.
SHELTER IN THE TIME OF STORM(s) - We have been deluged with rain and storms this summer. Not so much in the last few weeks, as earlier on. In all these years at my afternoon job, this is the first time I have had to spend time in the lower level of our building (at work) with my residents. They are so precious - they don't understand. And when they said that a tornado had been spotted near Muscatine, they were certain that meant it was headed straight to their building. In our own yard, we lost more limbs this year. Our backyard has so many fewer trees than it did a few years ago. In our front year, because of all of the rain, and a perpetual puddle in one area -- we now have a little spot where there is no grass because it just couldn't hold it's breath any longer and it drowned.
TOOTH FAIRY ALERT - We've been looking for the tooth fairy this summer. Not only because of all that Jaimee has sprouted, but poor 'Pa-pa' was eating an Arby's sandwich of all things! And he bit down on something hard. The tooth HURT bad. He went a couple of days later he went to the dentist, but they didn't find anything wrong. It settled down some, but then FLARED big time. On a Sabbath morning he was in such pain that we tried to call his dentist thinking they'd be in on Sabbath a.m. NOPE. Called his doctor thinking the same thing. NOPE! Ended up at going to an Urgent Care Walk In place. WHAT a JOKE! Left about an hour and 1/2 later - we left with no pain relief. It's still bugging him, though he has been back to the dentist and they still don't find anything.
AUNT NITA - My dad's sister Juanita - aka Aunt Nita came to visit this summer. She is so pleasant and nice to visit with. It was Randy's and my privilege to pick her up at the airport and enjoy a meal at Maid-Rite with her. With the busy time this summer, I didn't get time to invite people in for a get-together, but mom did and naturally it was so much better than anything I could have offered. (BTW - Kathy I still don't have your email address ... Aunt Nita - can you forward this and get her email for me. Not sure what happened.)
CHICAGO TRIP - Rhiannon and I have had several opportunities to get away for a weekend over the years. Its always been fun. We tried it this year again - and it was probably NOT the best trip there we've ever had. On the other hand inspite of it not being the best trip, there were good times like walking along Lake Michigan - the water was beautiful. The day was marvelous and it was relaxing. Baby J loved playing in the fountain at Millenium Park. That was about an hour of pure unadulterated JOY as far as she was concerned ... at least until she was knocked flat by a speeding little boy who didn't see her in his pathway. She really got knocked down hard and cried and cried! Eventually she came around and enjoyed the fountain some more, but a bit more cautious of speeding children.
BURGLARIZED, NOT ROBBED - I learned last week that it is NOT robbery when someone cuts the screen out of your livingroom window and comes in and takes your flat screen TV, remote control, and manual. It is BURGLARY. Our friend Barbara had just this thing happen to her. She didn't wake up - yes! she was sleeping in the next room. Her little dog didn't wake up either. I think her guardian angel was plugging their ears! What if they had come out and surprized the BURGLAR? We know they had something sharp to cut the screen ... bad things could have happened.
MOVE OVER! Starting last Thursday the guys loaded up all of the stuff for our Loud Thunder camp meeting. Then Friday they unloaded and set up camp. At home we were cooking and getting ready for the event in our 'womanly' way. Saturday night was breaking camp and unloading back at the school and church. Sunday a good group of us went to Aledo (twenty-some miles into Illinois) and moved the belongings of a church couple to their new apartment in Muscatine. That was the a.m. In the afternoon - we headed to Bennett (twenty-some miles north of Muscatine) to move the Pastor and his wife to their home in Muscatine. It was in the nineties. Everyone was pooped at the end of the day. Monday and Tuesday both I was feeling it in my joints and bones. Boy I am OLD! And I didn't work as hard as some. The GUYS lifted and hauled stuff upstairs and down ... HEAVY stuff. Glad that is done.
STAMPING TIME Next weekend is our all day stamping event at the church school. We only do this 3 or 4 times a year and the last time was in JULY. So there is another way to see how much time has elapsed. I look forward to this day. I hope everyone who comes brings a project they are going to work on. I think that makes it more fun for everyone! I know that I like having time just to myself to think and create without a lot of distraction. My creativity works better then! Thursday night is our monthly stamping night (which is different than our all day event) ... so I better think about what project to work on for that night! Fortunately I have a three day weekend to think about it.
I think it is time for me to let you get back to your life. I am sorry to go on and on. Take care - let us hear from YOU! Abbie and Jill ... I haven't forgotten that I said I'd send that bag. I still will! PROMISE!
Love to all! And especially welcome home to Mark and Bellie who arrived home to Muscatine from their other home clear over there in the Philipines. They'd been there for 3 weeks and got home today.
Tuesday, July 6
IS YOUR BURDEN HEAVY?
Heartbreak. I spent 4 hours with a lady who lives in my building today. She was so teary and sad (she's always got a sadness to her - I often think of her as Eeyore - from Winnie the Pooh). We talked a LOT. She lost her mom to cancer when she was 9 -- said her mom was dying as long as she can remember her mom, she remembers having to give her mom enemas. Can you image? A child? Dad died at about 10. At some point she was in an orphanage. Then stayed with an aunt who died when she was 16.
I'm not a psychologist - but I know she has deep deep problems, that part isn't a secret - but I couldn't help but feel that her life sort of ended before she even got started. It's like she never moved past those traumatic losses, and those losses were 3 1/2 to 4 decades ago.
Pray for her - we talked about Jesus and she says she believes. She likes music she said (you talk about a LOT of stuff in that amount of time). She wishes she knew her Bible more. She had an abortion and feels guilty about it I told her Jesus would forgive that. I talked to her about Paul and how he murdered Christians, but yet became such a 'warrior' on God's behalf ... A FORGIVEN warrior. Something told me I needed to come home and get my scripture song CD's and give them to her. I did. I now pray that the words in those scriptures - put to music - will speak to her and be a salve to her wounds.
Pray also for a friend of mine who will be having surgery on the 9th. They believe (she said 90%) that she has cancer. I am praying for a miracle on her behalf, please join me. I believe with my entire being that God heals. I also believe that He knows the beginning from the end and that all WILL be to His glory.
Oh - the sadness of the world weighs on us sometimes, doesn't it?
The joy is there too -- like when I finally got off work at 8 p.m. tonight and drove up in front of my house a few minutes later ... a teeny little girl was walking outside with her mommy and daddy. When she saw my van she came FLYING to the car. She knew Gram(me) was home and we hadn't seen each other the whole entire day! Little arms and legs wrapped around me - and happy little smiley face and jabbery voice ... this is awesome having her here.
That was today ...
Over the 4th we had LOTS of fireworks and fun. Drove up to JoDe and Josh's house in Davenport for supper - they grilled (love grilled vege-chik patties!!) and we all brought some stuff to add to the feast. I made a couple of things that turned out pretty tasty - or at least people liked them. A pasta salad and smores dessert!
Not very often do I have requested recipes ... but here you go for the Bow Tie Pasta Salad ... YOU ASKED!
BOW TIE PASTA SALAD
Prep Time 20 minutes
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
½ teaspoon dried basil leaves
1/3 cup prepared Italian salad dressing
3 cups (6 ounces) bow tie (farfalle) pasta, uncooked
20 pitted ripe olives
16 cherry tomatoes
1 medium cucumber
1 ounce fresh Parmesan cheese, grated (¼ cup)
Salt and ground black pepper (if desired)
1. In Small Bowl, mix mustard and basil with Whisk. Gradually stir in dressing and whisk until smooth. Set aside.
2. In 4-Qt. Casserole, cook pasta according to package directions; drain. Rinse with cold water and drain well. Place pasta in bowl.
3. While pasta is cooking, prepare the vegetables. Cut olives and cherry tomatoes in half.
4. Cut cucumber in half lengthwise. Remove seeds of each cucumber half. Place cucumber halves, cut side down, on cutting board. Remove thin strips of peel by running a fork down side to create a striped effect. Cut cucumber halves crosswise into slices.
5. Add olives, cherry tomatoes and cucumbers to pasta in bowl. Pour dressing over pasta mixture and mix lightly.
6. Sprinkle grated Parmesan cheese over salad and mix lightly. Cover bowl with lid and refrigerate 30-60 minutes. Before serving, sprinkle salad with a little salt and pepper, if desired. Makes 8 servings.
We went to fireworks in Davenport -- a fruitless attempt to meld 4 or 5 cars full of people into one group of fireworks viewers! Not sure where everyone actually ended up - we parked in a big dirt lot and walked to the river front where we had a nice grassy spot to watch.
July 4th was a special day! Mark came over with Holly and Zach. We get to see Zach often, which we love! But we hadn't seen Holly in a very long time. It was so nice to see her (thank you Holly for making time in your visit back here to come see us - we love you! ... oh you too Zachary!!! I know you were thinking it!) and catch up a bit. Hoping you can be here for Turkey-day too!
Then Nick, Rhiannon, Ryan, Jaimee, Randy and I went to the parade. We joked as we drove that we should go to our old 5th Street house and walk down (we were so close to it then!) - and ended up parking at the alley of our old block! On the way back it's sort of 'up' hill. I saw an old man pushing a big lady up the hill in a wheelchair! I told the guys to come help him - he looked like he was about to expire as he was pushing! Poor Randy ended up pushing her all the way up the up the hill by himself. He was so sweaty and stinky! I was proud of him for doing that kind thing.
Well, it's getting later and later! I needed to go down and finish my card project tonight - but will do it tomorrow sometime! Thursday is our monthly stamping night. I have a couple of projects I think are pretty. Well - one isn't totally done, but it's mostly created. I still need to cut the pieces for the 2nd project.
Remember that Jesus is coming soon. We need to make that our central theme! At least I do!
Love to all of you!!!
I'm not a psychologist - but I know she has deep deep problems, that part isn't a secret - but I couldn't help but feel that her life sort of ended before she even got started. It's like she never moved past those traumatic losses, and those losses were 3 1/2 to 4 decades ago.
Pray for her - we talked about Jesus and she says she believes. She likes music she said (you talk about a LOT of stuff in that amount of time). She wishes she knew her Bible more. She had an abortion and feels guilty about it I told her Jesus would forgive that. I talked to her about Paul and how he murdered Christians, but yet became such a 'warrior' on God's behalf ... A FORGIVEN warrior. Something told me I needed to come home and get my scripture song CD's and give them to her. I did. I now pray that the words in those scriptures - put to music - will speak to her and be a salve to her wounds.
Pray also for a friend of mine who will be having surgery on the 9th. They believe (she said 90%) that she has cancer. I am praying for a miracle on her behalf, please join me. I believe with my entire being that God heals. I also believe that He knows the beginning from the end and that all WILL be to His glory.
Oh - the sadness of the world weighs on us sometimes, doesn't it?
The joy is there too -- like when I finally got off work at 8 p.m. tonight and drove up in front of my house a few minutes later ... a teeny little girl was walking outside with her mommy and daddy. When she saw my van she came FLYING to the car. She knew Gram(me) was home and we hadn't seen each other the whole entire day! Little arms and legs wrapped around me - and happy little smiley face and jabbery voice ... this is awesome having her here.
That was today ...
Over the 4th we had LOTS of fireworks and fun. Drove up to JoDe and Josh's house in Davenport for supper - they grilled (love grilled vege-chik patties!!) and we all brought some stuff to add to the feast. I made a couple of things that turned out pretty tasty - or at least people liked them. A pasta salad and smores dessert!
Not very often do I have requested recipes ... but here you go for the Bow Tie Pasta Salad ... YOU ASKED!
BOW TIE PASTA SALAD
Prep Time 20 minutes
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
½ teaspoon dried basil leaves
1/3 cup prepared Italian salad dressing
3 cups (6 ounces) bow tie (farfalle) pasta, uncooked
20 pitted ripe olives
16 cherry tomatoes
1 medium cucumber
1 ounce fresh Parmesan cheese, grated (¼ cup)
Salt and ground black pepper (if desired)
1. In Small Bowl, mix mustard and basil with Whisk. Gradually stir in dressing and whisk until smooth. Set aside.
2. In 4-Qt. Casserole, cook pasta according to package directions; drain. Rinse with cold water and drain well. Place pasta in bowl.
3. While pasta is cooking, prepare the vegetables. Cut olives and cherry tomatoes in half.
4. Cut cucumber in half lengthwise. Remove seeds of each cucumber half. Place cucumber halves, cut side down, on cutting board. Remove thin strips of peel by running a fork down side to create a striped effect. Cut cucumber halves crosswise into slices.
5. Add olives, cherry tomatoes and cucumbers to pasta in bowl. Pour dressing over pasta mixture and mix lightly.
6. Sprinkle grated Parmesan cheese over salad and mix lightly. Cover bowl with lid and refrigerate 30-60 minutes. Before serving, sprinkle salad with a little salt and pepper, if desired. Makes 8 servings.
We went to fireworks in Davenport -- a fruitless attempt to meld 4 or 5 cars full of people into one group of fireworks viewers! Not sure where everyone actually ended up - we parked in a big dirt lot and walked to the river front where we had a nice grassy spot to watch.
July 4th was a special day! Mark came over with Holly and Zach. We get to see Zach often, which we love! But we hadn't seen Holly in a very long time. It was so nice to see her (thank you Holly for making time in your visit back here to come see us - we love you! ... oh you too Zachary!!! I know you were thinking it!) and catch up a bit. Hoping you can be here for Turkey-day too!
Then Nick, Rhiannon, Ryan, Jaimee, Randy and I went to the parade. We joked as we drove that we should go to our old 5th Street house and walk down (we were so close to it then!) - and ended up parking at the alley of our old block! On the way back it's sort of 'up' hill. I saw an old man pushing a big lady up the hill in a wheelchair! I told the guys to come help him - he looked like he was about to expire as he was pushing! Poor Randy ended up pushing her all the way up the up the hill by himself. He was so sweaty and stinky! I was proud of him for doing that kind thing.
Well, it's getting later and later! I needed to go down and finish my card project tonight - but will do it tomorrow sometime! Thursday is our monthly stamping night. I have a couple of projects I think are pretty. Well - one isn't totally done, but it's mostly created. I still need to cut the pieces for the 2nd project.
Remember that Jesus is coming soon. We need to make that our central theme! At least I do!
Love to all of you!!!
Tuesday, June 22
TOE's WOEs
Woe is me ... woe is me ... screams my little pinky toe.
As you know we're doin' a little creative rearranging in our house these last couple of weeks. This included moving a fairly large TV (not a flat screen plasma TV silly, a BIG tube type TV) from it's perch safe a-top a dresser in a bedroom to a temporary spot on our bedroom floor.
Fast forward 2 days and nights. Mother Nature called to me ... "Von!!! oh Vonda!!! -- it's 3 a.m. time to ... ". So up I get, and begin my trek to the bathroom. B--OING!!! Suddenly my toe or toes (remember I was walking in my sleep, sorta) met up with that huge honkin' TV there in the dark. I remember thinking ... "that's gonna hurt". Went potty, back to bed ...
Now, you young-uns won't understand this part until ... later! But there are days when this hurts or that hurts and you sorta get to the point where you acknowledge "hmm? this is today's pain-o-the-day" and on you go. All the next morning my foot hurt. I'm just thinking the sore foot was the pain-o-the-day.
UNTIL I get to my afternoon office where I often will kick off my shoes under my desk. Well, FLIP! goes the shoe and OUCH! went the foot. I took the first look at the ailing foot and suddenly the purpleness reminded me "HEY!! I kicked a TV last night! I was right, it IS gonna hurt!" (Der!)
So I march on (that's funny, isn't it? marching on a sore toe?) through life. Kicking and banging my poor little pinky toe on everything in site (and some not in site).
And then yesterday afternoon ... (der!-- I'll just PRE-'der myself here!) ... I had to run pick up something at home* and deliver it to one of my group homes. I had to run to the store and get some WD-40 to help one of my visually impaired residents find the key hole on her door so she could get in (yes, even I don't understand how WD-40 helps her FIND a key hole).
Then I put WD-40 in all the locks at Fulton Place - 22 doors, not counting closets and stuff. ALL THE WHILE ... I'm thinking MAN! my toe REALLY hurts today. Limp-limp-LIMP.
Finally I'm done with all this running around and walk into my office. I look down as I go to kick off my sandal. There is my poor purple pinky toe poking OUT of my sandal. Somehow his swollen little toe-body apparently didn't fit smoothly into my sandal as I slipped it on earlier and popped out the side where he was hanging on for dear life through the whole ordeal of the afternoon.
I wonder how many people saw my toe in woe and didn't even mention -- "hey lady? you know you're 'sposed to put ALL your toes in your sandal? not just a few?" (Really now, if you saw that you'd say -- how dorky is that woman anyway?)
You can't imagine how much better a purple pinky toe can feel once it's not poking outside of a sandal and being sawed at by a piece of leather strap every step you take.
So how's stuff at YOUR house?
Love and kisses to all!
*PS The TV is gone now -- the thing I had to run home for was the remote control. We gave it to a young man who is moving into one of the group homes and needed a TV.
As you know we're doin' a little creative rearranging in our house these last couple of weeks. This included moving a fairly large TV (not a flat screen plasma TV silly, a BIG tube type TV) from it's perch safe a-top a dresser in a bedroom to a temporary spot on our bedroom floor.
Fast forward 2 days and nights. Mother Nature called to me ... "Von!!! oh Vonda!!! -- it's 3 a.m. time to ... ". So up I get, and begin my trek to the bathroom. B--OING!!! Suddenly my toe or toes (remember I was walking in my sleep, sorta) met up with that huge honkin' TV there in the dark. I remember thinking ... "that's gonna hurt". Went potty, back to bed ...
Now, you young-uns won't understand this part until ... later! But there are days when this hurts or that hurts and you sorta get to the point where you acknowledge "hmm? this is today's pain-o-the-day" and on you go. All the next morning my foot hurt. I'm just thinking the sore foot was the pain-o-the-day.
UNTIL I get to my afternoon office where I often will kick off my shoes under my desk. Well, FLIP! goes the shoe and OUCH! went the foot. I took the first look at the ailing foot and suddenly the purpleness reminded me "HEY!! I kicked a TV last night! I was right, it IS gonna hurt!" (Der!)
So I march on (that's funny, isn't it? marching on a sore toe?) through life. Kicking and banging my poor little pinky toe on everything in site (and some not in site).
And then yesterday afternoon ... (der!-- I'll just PRE-'der myself here!) ... I had to run pick up something at home* and deliver it to one of my group homes. I had to run to the store and get some WD-40 to help one of my visually impaired residents find the key hole on her door so she could get in (yes, even I don't understand how WD-40 helps her FIND a key hole).
Then I put WD-40 in all the locks at Fulton Place - 22 doors, not counting closets and stuff. ALL THE WHILE ... I'm thinking MAN! my toe REALLY hurts today. Limp-limp-LIMP.
Finally I'm done with all this running around and walk into my office. I look down as I go to kick off my sandal. There is my poor purple pinky toe poking OUT of my sandal. Somehow his swollen little toe-body apparently didn't fit smoothly into my sandal as I slipped it on earlier and popped out the side where he was hanging on for dear life through the whole ordeal of the afternoon.
I wonder how many people saw my toe in woe and didn't even mention -- "hey lady? you know you're 'sposed to put ALL your toes in your sandal? not just a few?" (Really now, if you saw that you'd say -- how dorky is that woman anyway?)
You can't imagine how much better a purple pinky toe can feel once it's not poking outside of a sandal and being sawed at by a piece of leather strap every step you take.
So how's stuff at YOUR house?
Love and kisses to all!
*PS The TV is gone now -- the thing I had to run home for was the remote control. We gave it to a young man who is moving into one of the group homes and needed a TV.
Tuesday, June 15
FROM HOUSES TO MOUSES ... and mouse's houses?
Here is a recipe!
1 house (over) full with stuff (some good, some junque ... but thankfully big!)
1 other house full with stuff (its all newer stuff - so not so much junque as 1st house)
4 dogs
3 men
2 women
1 adorably sweet little girl
Mix it all together with rain water, dirt, backaches, headaches, and tired muscles.
Sometimes short tempers - (Add a little more rain water to it just for good measure.)
Stir and mix - pushing and pulling until everything fits into one container (aka house).
Sprinkle with even yet more rain.
Here you have a a wonderful mix of everything and the beginning of an adventure!
No, the process hasn't been easy. I know that especially the marrieds are sick to death of the shuffle and not knowing where their things are. But each day it shows progress. Rhiannon has worked herself silly cleaning and making a little bit of a nest for themselves. I don't hate any part of it - except for maybe the dog hair everywhere. But with two housefuls of vacuum cleaners there, we should be able to keep it at bay.
Like I said, Rhiannon has been working so hard. She pulled apart her entire bedroom and did walls, and surfaces and shampooed the carpet. She did the same with our family room. It was SOOOOooo bad. I knew it was, I just hadn't faced the HOW BAD part square on. I think having the windows open during the summer and the corn burning heat - has dirtied things up a lot. (Plus not having attentive house owners hasn't helped!)
My husband is going to be in BIG trouble though. If not by me, then by his daughter. He loves to buy those nasty marrow bones from the grocery store butcher department and give them to the dogs. The DOGS love them. MmmmmMMMmmMMMM! But then you have these awful things in the house. It's always been bad - but now that the carpets have been shampooed I was REALLY mad (yes, MAD) when I saw some on the floor last night. If I wanted a dead cow on the floor of my house, I'd butcher one myself. RANDY!!!
Speaking of dead. One of Mickey and Minnie's country cousins came to visit us. I knew because on my ever-so-cluttered craft table there was EVIDENCE (ewww!) that he had been there. I got FOUR mousetraps and TWO containers of DeCon (don't mess with me!!!) and put the mousetraps out around the floor of the basement and sat the DeCon high out of the other furry beasts' reach.
It was not long before all of the traps had been snapped. WOW! We must have more than ONE country cousin there. Randy reset them and very soon we had one fat mouse snagged and dead. YEAHHHHHH!!!!! Found out also that when Ryan vacuuming in the basement he snapped off the traps. Soooo anyway now I'm just hoping that one fat mouse and one dorky son-in-law (I love you anyway Ryan!!!!) is all that is visiting.
The fun part is that we get to see our sweet Jaimee every single day. She has been a wonderful little trouper through it all. As long as she has Mommy and Daddy (aka RYAN ... which she says 'oh-so-clearly' ... RYAN!!!) she seems to be happy. She's not bothered by the ifs/whens/whys/ and wherefors of her little life as long as she has them ... and food.
I love my kitchen sink! It is the perfect size to fill up with water and plop her tiny little booty in and let her play and get cleaned off. Nothing cuter than a little soft skinned naked baby bottom!
We were happy to see Aunt Nita - though with our wild schedules we didn't plan anything at our house for when she was here. We picked her up at the airport and made a stop at a Maid-Rite for lunch. Aunt Nita says there are two things she has to do when she comes to Iowa - one being Maid-Rite and the other being to eat a pork tenderloin. Mom had us down to her house for one of her magnificent meals. I can't even tell you all the yummy stuff that she had. I'm really hungry right now - so everything sounds excellent. She made a 'maid-rite' type burger from vegetarian burger and it was scrumdillyishus!! And mom ... I want your shortcake recipe. Nick ate the shortcakes plain that I brought home because they were so good. Anyway - Aunt Nita's visit is over and she has returned to California with a trip to see Kathy's new house and to go camping with Marjie and Kelly. I'm sure there will be a stop to see her grandbabies too.
I do have to ask ... Aunt Nita? You sent a note today that said, "Had a great visit with almost all the family in Iowa..." Just wondering which ones you didn't have a great visit with!!! *smile* (I make myself chuckle!)
Got a phone call today from the dentist. I lost a humongous filling in a back tooth on Friday I think it was. Didn't hurt - but needed to get myself in and get it fixed. The appt. was set for Thursday. So anyway the phone rang and it was the dentist's office. They had a cancellation and did I want to come in today instead. (Well, NO - I don't want to come at ALL!!!) But I said "sure!!!" and off I went - arriving at their office about 10 minutes later. Got my tooth fixed and a new filling in another. They said it was loose or cracked ... so we did it all while I was there. Dr. Lawhead is so good and his assistant Brigette is great too. I so HATE dental work.
So ... Sharon? You said there hadn't been a Ludke-ville in awhile. Have I rambled on and on (and on) long enough yet? Hope you are enjoying all the activity and hard work of cooking for all those people at camp. I'm sure they are blessed by having some great meals! Did I mention I'm really hungry ... ???
She's cooking for groups of up to 200 people at a time at a camp over in Illinois!
Joy ... don't go. (That was just in case you said to yourself ... 'if one more person says don't go - I'll take it as a sign to stay here!' I don't want you to leave. :(
Howdeez to everyone else ... been thinking of Lisa, Paul, Dava, Josh, Glo and boys!!!! We need to get together in Iowa City sometime!
Josie darling -- I hope you can stay infection free until they can get your tubes in your ears. You poor little dolly. (This is Randy's sister's little girl ... she's had such a bad time with sore ears.)
LATER ALL!!!
PS I love my new phone. It's so cool. I have so much yet to learn about it but WOW it's neat. And now that I have the red cover ... it's just as darling as my sweet little berry phone. (Thank you RL for putting the cover on it!! I still miss my berry phone - but since it's screen was 1/3 broken I had to say SO LONG little berry!
Time for bed or at least getting READY for bed!
1 house (over) full with stuff (some good, some junque ... but thankfully big!)
1 other house full with stuff (its all newer stuff - so not so much junque as 1st house)
4 dogs
3 men
2 women
1 adorably sweet little girl
Mix it all together with rain water, dirt, backaches, headaches, and tired muscles.
Sometimes short tempers - (Add a little more rain water to it just for good measure.)
Stir and mix - pushing and pulling until everything fits into one container (aka house).
Sprinkle with even yet more rain.
Here you have a a wonderful mix of everything and the beginning of an adventure!
No, the process hasn't been easy. I know that especially the marrieds are sick to death of the shuffle and not knowing where their things are. But each day it shows progress. Rhiannon has worked herself silly cleaning and making a little bit of a nest for themselves. I don't hate any part of it - except for maybe the dog hair everywhere. But with two housefuls of vacuum cleaners there, we should be able to keep it at bay.
Like I said, Rhiannon has been working so hard. She pulled apart her entire bedroom and did walls, and surfaces and shampooed the carpet. She did the same with our family room. It was SOOOOooo bad. I knew it was, I just hadn't faced the HOW BAD part square on. I think having the windows open during the summer and the corn burning heat - has dirtied things up a lot. (Plus not having attentive house owners hasn't helped!)
My husband is going to be in BIG trouble though. If not by me, then by his daughter. He loves to buy those nasty marrow bones from the grocery store butcher department and give them to the dogs. The DOGS love them. MmmmmMMMmmMMMM! But then you have these awful things in the house. It's always been bad - but now that the carpets have been shampooed I was REALLY mad (yes, MAD) when I saw some on the floor last night. If I wanted a dead cow on the floor of my house, I'd butcher one myself. RANDY!!!
Speaking of dead. One of Mickey and Minnie's country cousins came to visit us. I knew because on my ever-so-cluttered craft table there was EVIDENCE (ewww!) that he had been there. I got FOUR mousetraps and TWO containers of DeCon (don't mess with me!!!) and put the mousetraps out around the floor of the basement and sat the DeCon high out of the other furry beasts' reach.
It was not long before all of the traps had been snapped. WOW! We must have more than ONE country cousin there. Randy reset them and very soon we had one fat mouse snagged and dead. YEAHHHHHH!!!!! Found out also that when Ryan vacuuming in the basement he snapped off the traps. Soooo anyway now I'm just hoping that one fat mouse and one dorky son-in-law (I love you anyway Ryan!!!!) is all that is visiting.
The fun part is that we get to see our sweet Jaimee every single day. She has been a wonderful little trouper through it all. As long as she has Mommy and Daddy (aka RYAN ... which she says 'oh-so-clearly' ... RYAN!!!) she seems to be happy. She's not bothered by the ifs/whens/whys/ and wherefors of her little life as long as she has them ... and food.
I love my kitchen sink! It is the perfect size to fill up with water and plop her tiny little booty in and let her play and get cleaned off. Nothing cuter than a little soft skinned naked baby bottom!
We were happy to see Aunt Nita - though with our wild schedules we didn't plan anything at our house for when she was here. We picked her up at the airport and made a stop at a Maid-Rite for lunch. Aunt Nita says there are two things she has to do when she comes to Iowa - one being Maid-Rite and the other being to eat a pork tenderloin. Mom had us down to her house for one of her magnificent meals. I can't even tell you all the yummy stuff that she had. I'm really hungry right now - so everything sounds excellent. She made a 'maid-rite' type burger from vegetarian burger and it was scrumdillyishus!! And mom ... I want your shortcake recipe. Nick ate the shortcakes plain that I brought home because they were so good. Anyway - Aunt Nita's visit is over and she has returned to California with a trip to see Kathy's new house and to go camping with Marjie and Kelly. I'm sure there will be a stop to see her grandbabies too.
I do have to ask ... Aunt Nita? You sent a note today that said, "Had a great visit with almost all the family in Iowa..." Just wondering which ones you didn't have a great visit with!!! *smile* (I make myself chuckle!)
Got a phone call today from the dentist. I lost a humongous filling in a back tooth on Friday I think it was. Didn't hurt - but needed to get myself in and get it fixed. The appt. was set for Thursday. So anyway the phone rang and it was the dentist's office. They had a cancellation and did I want to come in today instead. (Well, NO - I don't want to come at ALL!!!) But I said "sure!!!" and off I went - arriving at their office about 10 minutes later. Got my tooth fixed and a new filling in another. They said it was loose or cracked ... so we did it all while I was there. Dr. Lawhead is so good and his assistant Brigette is great too. I so HATE dental work.
So ... Sharon? You said there hadn't been a Ludke-ville in awhile. Have I rambled on and on (and on) long enough yet? Hope you are enjoying all the activity and hard work of cooking for all those people at camp. I'm sure they are blessed by having some great meals! Did I mention I'm really hungry ... ???
She's cooking for groups of up to 200 people at a time at a camp over in Illinois!
Joy ... don't go. (That was just in case you said to yourself ... 'if one more person says don't go - I'll take it as a sign to stay here!' I don't want you to leave. :(
Howdeez to everyone else ... been thinking of Lisa, Paul, Dava, Josh, Glo and boys!!!! We need to get together in Iowa City sometime!
Josie darling -- I hope you can stay infection free until they can get your tubes in your ears. You poor little dolly. (This is Randy's sister's little girl ... she's had such a bad time with sore ears.)
LATER ALL!!!
PS I love my new phone. It's so cool. I have so much yet to learn about it but WOW it's neat. And now that I have the red cover ... it's just as darling as my sweet little berry phone. (Thank you RL for putting the cover on it!! I still miss my berry phone - but since it's screen was 1/3 broken I had to say SO LONG little berry!
Time for bed or at least getting READY for bed!
Friday, May 21
GRANDBABIES
Randy and I were wishing our marrieds were closer tonight. We said that we would get in our car, drive there and take that baby and bring her to our house for the night.
But they aren't closer. In fact they are FARTHER. They are spending the week down in Arkansas visiting with Ryan's family.
I hope she doesn't use up all her cute and sweet while she is down there!
But they aren't closer. In fact they are FARTHER. They are spending the week down in Arkansas visiting with Ryan's family.
I hope she doesn't use up all her cute and sweet while she is down there!
HONEY & OAT BLENDERS
Okay - okay ... this blog thing has a space for a TITLE. I'm munching on a cup of Honey & Oat Blenders (with almonds!) so ... there you go. (BTW - this is pretty good cereal. And I'm not much of a cereal eater! Of course I didn't add milk, that disgusting white liquid ... eww!) This cereal comes in the bags of 'knock-off' cereals in WalMart's cereal aisle!
I took the day off from work today so I could be at the hospital with mom. However, since they sent dad home until Monday - that foiled my plan! And I don't have the phone number of the other gal, so was unable to contact her to say I could come in afterall ... so I had a day here!
I planted the rest of my flowers. I went with mostly red geraniums this year. They seem to be heat and draught tolerant about as much as any flower ... and since I'm often not the best plant mom ... it's a good choice (I hope!). I have a few petunias and marigolds in one big planter. I also planted some kinda purply perennials. Oops -- you know I think I threw away the little stick that told me what they were. Oh no.
I made a card. I'm the world's slowest card maker. Of course my efforts are a bit hindered because my craft area is a monster mess. There is a ping-pong table for a work table. I'm telling you this because if you went down there and looked ... you wouldn't know what kind of table was there. It's so piled high with 'stuff'. It takes about 4x longer to do anything when you can't find anything to do something with!
Then I finally made good on my promise to make signage for the Adventist Community Center. Randy helped me and together we made a good team and it probably only took about 3 -4 hours start to finish to get it set up in the computer, cut on the cutter, weeded, masked and put in place! Drive by the ACS and take a look! There signage on the windows in the back too.
It feels GOOD to have that done. And I have signs sitting out front of the ACS telling about our Sandwiches and Praise Singing thing tomorrow too! Hopefully we'll have a few folks show up and enjoy a grilled cheese sandwich and some songs tomorrow. It's open to the public at 1103 East 9th Street from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. on the 4th Saturday (tomorrow) of the month.
So now it is bedtime. But first (I hope you don't mind mom) I want to include a portion of the email mom sent to some of us to update us on dad's condition. Please continue to pray for a miracle of healing for dad. This diabetis is a nasty demon! (She wrote this on Thursday evening.)
Good Evening,
Yes, we are back home.
We met with the surgeon this morning and when we were finished talking with him it was pretty much decided that the best way to go was to have the amputation just below the knee. He showed me that there were two dams or blockages in the artery to the foot one is in the upper part of the leg and the other is down in the lower part. He couldn't be sure that the blood would get to the foot to heal if they only took off the toes, but was certain it would heal if they took off just below the knee and then at sometime would do a by pass on the upper leg. I even thought he said maybe do the bypass before the amputation. The date was set for tomorrow. They wanted us to go down to vascular Lab and have an ultrasound of the vessels again before they decided for sure. So we went and had that done and then it was time for lunch and they had every room full of patients when we came back so they thought we should go eat so we went to the cafeteria and went right back. We waited and waited and waited. Finally a couple of Doctors came in and said they had a new plan. They were going to postpone the surgery till Monday the 24th of May. Also, had come to the decison that they should should try to save the leg. So they were going to do a balloon and push open the artery to allow more blood flood to go down to the foot and possibly put a stint in and then they are going to amputate the toe end of the foot. It doesn't really make much sense to me but they were happy with their new plan. The surgeon didn't come back in with them but they said he went along with this new plan. It was 4:30pm by the time we finished with them and then we had to do all the pre-opt stuff because we would be the first operation in the morning so we had to be there at 5 :00 am on Monday morning. It was After 6:00 when we got out of the VA. I hadn't gotten groceries for sometime so thought I'd better get some so I didn't have to go in tomorrow and do that. So glad to have that done too. Well, it was after 8:00 by the time we got home. I don't know why things are working out the way they are, but I only hope and pray it is the way the Good Lord wants it to be.
We thank all of you for your earnest prayers and ask that you contiue to pray for his fast recovery. Of course we'd like a miracle healing but most of all God's Will be done.
To God Be the Glory, Great Things He Hath Done!
Shirley
NOW I'm headed to bed! HAPPY SABBATH!
I took the day off from work today so I could be at the hospital with mom. However, since they sent dad home until Monday - that foiled my plan! And I don't have the phone number of the other gal, so was unable to contact her to say I could come in afterall ... so I had a day here!
I planted the rest of my flowers. I went with mostly red geraniums this year. They seem to be heat and draught tolerant about as much as any flower ... and since I'm often not the best plant mom ... it's a good choice (I hope!). I have a few petunias and marigolds in one big planter. I also planted some kinda purply perennials. Oops -- you know I think I threw away the little stick that told me what they were. Oh no.
I made a card. I'm the world's slowest card maker. Of course my efforts are a bit hindered because my craft area is a monster mess. There is a ping-pong table for a work table. I'm telling you this because if you went down there and looked ... you wouldn't know what kind of table was there. It's so piled high with 'stuff'. It takes about 4x longer to do anything when you can't find anything to do something with!
Then I finally made good on my promise to make signage for the Adventist Community Center. Randy helped me and together we made a good team and it probably only took about 3 -4 hours start to finish to get it set up in the computer, cut on the cutter, weeded, masked and put in place! Drive by the ACS and take a look! There signage on the windows in the back too.
It feels GOOD to have that done. And I have signs sitting out front of the ACS telling about our Sandwiches and Praise Singing thing tomorrow too! Hopefully we'll have a few folks show up and enjoy a grilled cheese sandwich and some songs tomorrow. It's open to the public at 1103 East 9th Street from 4:30 to 5:30 p.m. on the 4th Saturday (tomorrow) of the month.
So now it is bedtime. But first (I hope you don't mind mom) I want to include a portion of the email mom sent to some of us to update us on dad's condition. Please continue to pray for a miracle of healing for dad. This diabetis is a nasty demon! (She wrote this on Thursday evening.)
Good Evening,
Yes, we are back home.
We met with the surgeon this morning and when we were finished talking with him it was pretty much decided that the best way to go was to have the amputation just below the knee. He showed me that there were two dams or blockages in the artery to the foot one is in the upper part of the leg and the other is down in the lower part. He couldn't be sure that the blood would get to the foot to heal if they only took off the toes, but was certain it would heal if they took off just below the knee and then at sometime would do a by pass on the upper leg. I even thought he said maybe do the bypass before the amputation. The date was set for tomorrow. They wanted us to go down to vascular Lab and have an ultrasound of the vessels again before they decided for sure. So we went and had that done and then it was time for lunch and they had every room full of patients when we came back so they thought we should go eat so we went to the cafeteria and went right back. We waited and waited and waited. Finally a couple of Doctors came in and said they had a new plan. They were going to postpone the surgery till Monday the 24th of May. Also, had come to the decison that they should should try to save the leg. So they were going to do a balloon and push open the artery to allow more blood flood to go down to the foot and possibly put a stint in and then they are going to amputate the toe end of the foot. It doesn't really make much sense to me but they were happy with their new plan. The surgeon didn't come back in with them but they said he went along with this new plan. It was 4:30pm by the time we finished with them and then we had to do all the pre-opt stuff because we would be the first operation in the morning so we had to be there at 5 :00 am on Monday morning. It was After 6:00 when we got out of the VA. I hadn't gotten groceries for sometime so thought I'd better get some so I didn't have to go in tomorrow and do that. So glad to have that done too. Well, it was after 8:00 by the time we got home. I don't know why things are working out the way they are, but I only hope and pray it is the way the Good Lord wants it to be.
We thank all of you for your earnest prayers and ask that you contiue to pray for his fast recovery. Of course we'd like a miracle healing but most of all God's Will be done.
To God Be the Glory, Great Things He Hath Done!
Shirley
Congratulations to Alana on your college graduation this year!
Congratulations to Scarlett on your pre-K graduation! (and for learning to do a somersault this week!)NOW I'm headed to bed! HAPPY SABBATH!
Tuesday, May 4
A GREAT WEEKEND for 'Pa and ME!
HOVER YOUR CURSOR OVER THE PICTURES!
It's late and I have been thinking about bed for about 6 1/2 hours! So not going to stay up too much longer!
Rhiannon and Jaimee came to visit us this weekend. Ryan stayed behind to study - finals are this week and he wants to ace them! Study-study-study!
Sabbath we went to church and then potluck. In the afternoon we had small group. We went to Lynn Tavener's house. She had knee surgery earlier in the week and we knew she wouldn't be up to getting out. She graciously allowed us to be there. I could tell by the end of the time that she was getting very uncomfortable. Our small group was the LONGEST we've had I think! We're reading DESIRE OF AGES and this chapter was very long! We only read part of the accompanying verses - we'll do the rest next week.
Saturday night we had family in for pancakes and to watch the video of mom's birthday party. (Aunt Lois, I have a copy for you! I'll get it to you soon.) It was a noisy ordeal with a ton of people in the room here - plus the video had a lot of noise in the background too. But it turned out REALLY well and I know we all enjoyed it. THANKS Rhiannon for your work on this!
After several of the people left - some of us watched THE BLIND SIDE. We enjoyed it. JoDe, Josh, Reese and Tearney left before it was totally over. I know JoDe and Josh had seen it before, not sure about Tearney. So she might not know how it ends! Refreshing to see a movie that didn't depend on vulgarity or nudity and sex to make a film.
Got a call in the night Saturday night - Nick had some car problems and needed some help pushing/lifting his car from being stuck. Randy woke me up. I had taken Ambien to sleep and I knew I was going somewhere but not sure where! When we got there they put ME in the car to drive it while the guys lifted/pushed. One of Nick's friends had responded to his plea for help - so it was the three guys doing the muscle. Didn't seem like it took too long to remedy the problem. Came home and went back to sleep! *LOL*
Now speaking of sleep -- better get going. Need my beauty rest you know!
Sunday, April 25
FULL WEEKEND!
Weekends just fly by. And this one has been no exception. It was a nice full weekend.
Yesterday - Sabbath - before we went to church I put some patties in the oven with some mushroom soup over the top. Turned the oven on low, so we had patties, corn and mashed taters (instant)for lunch. This was a recipe for patties that I made from scratch (and did the recipe wrong - duh!) But they tasted fine! Here is the recipe I started with:
CHICKEN FRIED STEAKS
1 1/2 c. gluten flour 1/2 c. rice flour
2 c. water 6 Tbsp. Braggs liquid aminos
1 - 2 Tbsp. granulated garlic 2 Tbsp. powdered onion
2 Tbsp. beefless base 2 c. bread crumbs
1 tsp. sea salt 2 c. flour
1 pkg. tofu, any kind 1 c. soy milk
1. Combine water, soy sauce and beefless base. In a separate bowl, combine gluten flour, rice flour, onion and garlic. Mix soy sauce mixture into the dry ingredients, adding more gluten flour or water as needed to make a soft dough.
2. Form into patties and place on parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 6 - 7 minutes on each side.
3. Blend soy milk and tofu until smooth. Drop prepared patties into water seasoned with a little beefless or chicken-style base. Remove patties from water one at a time and coat patties with flour on both sides, then dip into soy milk and tofu mixture. Dip into bread crumbs on both sides, then fry in a little oil until golden brown. Serve with vegetables, potatoes and gravy.
Mark Anthony
What I did wrong was put the bread crumbs into the dry ingredients in step one. So they were drier than they probably should have been. AND NOW I have a left over thing of tofu. I'm not a big tofu user, but maybe I need to find some kind of good recipe for a block of firm tofu.
After church we ate. I read a little bit and then tried to nap a short while. Not real successful between Randy, the phone and the dogs - but I tried!
We had Grilled Cheese Ministry Sabbath afternoon at our Community Service Center. That is a nice program of singing and serving a grilled cheese sandwich to visitors. We had 7 people the first time, 0 the second and 1 yesterday. (When I say those numbers I refer to people that weren't part of the regular group.) We are thrilled to have guests because we just want to spread the good news of Jesus with people.
Following the GCM (above) we went to the SDA Davenport church. They had a group there called FOLK MOUNTAIN GOSPEL. Dean Wooten and his sister Sharon rode along with us. (It was raining cats and dogs!) We got there in plenty of time and SURPRISE ... we learned that FOLK MOUNTAIN GOSPEL is 1/2 of of the group SIMPLY HIS who we have listened to their concerts 1/2 dozen times.
The daughter of the other couple had a serious brain bleed last summer and requires lots of care and help, so they don't travel as much right now as they used to.
I don't think we would have gone all that way in the rain had we known we'd seen them before. Actually I don't think the rain would have been a factor -- we wouldn't have gone. They are good, don't get me wrong - just that we've seen them! They play some interesting instruments like the zither, hammered dulcimer, psaltry and seems like something else.
Today Randy played tennis early. I HATE when he plays tennis on Sunday morning. Sunday is the ONLY day of the week that I don't have a place to go and time I have to be there. I generally don't sleep in terribly late, but it's nice to get up at 7:30 or 8:30 and not have been disturbed. Oh well. It doesn't really matter in the big scheme of things.
When I got up today I decided to wash our bedding. As I removed the sheets and was moving around the bedroom it occurred to me that our blinds were WAY gross dirty. So I took them down and put them into the tub to soak a bit. I took the laundry down to the machine and realized that the laundry room blinds were also WAY gross dirty. So I brought them up to the tub and they also got cleaned. Of course I had to do the ones off the window in the bedroom bathroom so they matched! (I have purposely NOT looked at any other blinds!)
I also took apart the fan we use in our bedroom window all summer. I think we've had it 2 or 3 summers and it runs a LOT. While noticing all the WAY gross dirty stuff - that fan also waved its red flag in my direction! That took WAY more time than the silly old fan is worth. It will probably fritz out now at the beginning of summer! It at least looks better for the time being. (I couldn't get the side pieces back on it - we don't use them anyway - PLUS I had an extra screw!)
Took a break mid-afternoon and went to the Muscatine Art Center. In the music room, the Pearl City Players were doing their REMINISCE WITH RADIO show. Since one of my co-workers got me involved (by basically volunteering me to do their promotional materials) I thought it would be fun to at least go see what it was all about. We bought our tickets and enjoyed a 2 hour show. Our bottoms were happy to have it over because they have very small HARD chairs to sit on. And seating was cheek to cheek if ya know what I mean! *wink*
Cousin Kathy - Congrats on the purchase of a new (to you) home! It looks really REALLY nice. I'm happy for you and wish you many years of happiness. She said there is evidence of God's leading from start to finish, so hope to hear that story!
Lisa in CB ... Hi!!!
Rick - glad you are home and hope the healing continues. Rhiannon and I are very intrigued by the vegan thing. Keep us posted!
Gonna run - not sure if I'll get any scrapbooking done tonight or not. Creativity is best used before you've cleaned lots of stuff and worn yourself out!
Have a good week!
Yesterday - Sabbath - before we went to church I put some patties in the oven with some mushroom soup over the top. Turned the oven on low, so we had patties, corn and mashed taters (instant)for lunch. This was a recipe for patties that I made from scratch (and did the recipe wrong - duh!) But they tasted fine! Here is the recipe I started with:
CHICKEN FRIED STEAKS
1 1/2 c. gluten flour 1/2 c. rice flour
2 c. water 6 Tbsp. Braggs liquid aminos
1 - 2 Tbsp. granulated garlic 2 Tbsp. powdered onion
2 Tbsp. beefless base 2 c. bread crumbs
1 tsp. sea salt 2 c. flour
1 pkg. tofu, any kind 1 c. soy milk
1. Combine water, soy sauce and beefless base. In a separate bowl, combine gluten flour, rice flour, onion and garlic. Mix soy sauce mixture into the dry ingredients, adding more gluten flour or water as needed to make a soft dough.
2. Form into patties and place on parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake at 350 degrees for 6 - 7 minutes on each side.
3. Blend soy milk and tofu until smooth. Drop prepared patties into water seasoned with a little beefless or chicken-style base. Remove patties from water one at a time and coat patties with flour on both sides, then dip into soy milk and tofu mixture. Dip into bread crumbs on both sides, then fry in a little oil until golden brown. Serve with vegetables, potatoes and gravy.
Mark Anthony
What I did wrong was put the bread crumbs into the dry ingredients in step one. So they were drier than they probably should have been. AND NOW I have a left over thing of tofu. I'm not a big tofu user, but maybe I need to find some kind of good recipe for a block of firm tofu.
After church we ate. I read a little bit and then tried to nap a short while. Not real successful between Randy, the phone and the dogs - but I tried!
We had Grilled Cheese Ministry Sabbath afternoon at our Community Service Center. That is a nice program of singing and serving a grilled cheese sandwich to visitors. We had 7 people the first time, 0 the second and 1 yesterday. (When I say those numbers I refer to people that weren't part of the regular group.) We are thrilled to have guests because we just want to spread the good news of Jesus with people.
Following the GCM (above) we went to the SDA Davenport church. They had a group there called FOLK MOUNTAIN GOSPEL. Dean Wooten and his sister Sharon rode along with us. (It was raining cats and dogs!) We got there in plenty of time and SURPRISE ... we learned that FOLK MOUNTAIN GOSPEL is 1/2 of of the group SIMPLY HIS who we have listened to their concerts 1/2 dozen times.
The daughter of the other couple had a serious brain bleed last summer and requires lots of care and help, so they don't travel as much right now as they used to.
I don't think we would have gone all that way in the rain had we known we'd seen them before. Actually I don't think the rain would have been a factor -- we wouldn't have gone. They are good, don't get me wrong - just that we've seen them! They play some interesting instruments like the zither, hammered dulcimer, psaltry and seems like something else.
Today Randy played tennis early. I HATE when he plays tennis on Sunday morning. Sunday is the ONLY day of the week that I don't have a place to go and time I have to be there. I generally don't sleep in terribly late, but it's nice to get up at 7:30 or 8:30 and not have been disturbed. Oh well. It doesn't really matter in the big scheme of things.
When I got up today I decided to wash our bedding. As I removed the sheets and was moving around the bedroom it occurred to me that our blinds were WAY gross dirty. So I took them down and put them into the tub to soak a bit. I took the laundry down to the machine and realized that the laundry room blinds were also WAY gross dirty. So I brought them up to the tub and they also got cleaned. Of course I had to do the ones off the window in the bedroom bathroom so they matched! (I have purposely NOT looked at any other blinds!)
I also took apart the fan we use in our bedroom window all summer. I think we've had it 2 or 3 summers and it runs a LOT. While noticing all the WAY gross dirty stuff - that fan also waved its red flag in my direction! That took WAY more time than the silly old fan is worth. It will probably fritz out now at the beginning of summer! It at least looks better for the time being. (I couldn't get the side pieces back on it - we don't use them anyway - PLUS I had an extra screw!)
Took a break mid-afternoon and went to the Muscatine Art Center. In the music room, the Pearl City Players were doing their REMINISCE WITH RADIO show. Since one of my co-workers got me involved (by basically volunteering me to do their promotional materials) I thought it would be fun to at least go see what it was all about. We bought our tickets and enjoyed a 2 hour show. Our bottoms were happy to have it over because they have very small HARD chairs to sit on. And seating was cheek to cheek if ya know what I mean! *wink*
Cousin Kathy - Congrats on the purchase of a new (to you) home! It looks really REALLY nice. I'm happy for you and wish you many years of happiness. She said there is evidence of God's leading from start to finish, so hope to hear that story!
Lisa in CB ... Hi!!!
Rick - glad you are home and hope the healing continues. Rhiannon and I are very intrigued by the vegan thing. Keep us posted!
Gonna run - not sure if I'll get any scrapbooking done tonight or not. Creativity is best used before you've cleaned lots of stuff and worn yourself out!
Have a good week!
Friday, April 23
DRIP-DROPPIN' AWAY
(Kinda hum that title to the tune of "Slip-Sliding Away" - cool huh?)
It's a dreary day here in Ludke-ville, but I love it. I'm not one to disparage a good rainy day here and there in life. Now when it starts working on a good rainy WEEK or a good rainy MONTH, then I may just start whining!
I will say that it felt like my parking spot was double the distance from City Hall's front door today though. My umbrella being kept safely dry in the closet here at home, I raced (??) across the parking lot dodging raindrops and losing. By the time I climbed into the van I looked like a participant in a wet T-shirt contest.
At that point I ended up on the phone with a friend and told her about my contest entry. She informed me, "women our age don't look good in wet T-shirts anymore, we just look like we have a second set of kneecaps". So for at least the near future, I'm going to stay to myself and dry out a bit. I think I'm doing everyone a favor by that decision.
Last night I had a board meeting (I'm not ON this board, but am required to attend since they are the 'owner' of the properties I work for.). My boss from Des Moines was here to explain some things to the board (owner) and afterward I visited for a short time with him. All in all it was an interesting meeting and nice visit.
I told a very stressed friend I would help with a few pages of her daughter's graduation scrapbook. She's trying to scrapbook all of this child's life within the few weeks ahead of graduation! I started working on a ZOO set of pages. I promised myself I was NOT going to buy anything extra - only use my stuff that I've collected in the basement. But then I got to thinking ... wouldn't a tiger stripe paper be cute, or leopard, or giraffe?
So off to WalMart I went - well THANK YOU SAM WALTON!!! - they are remodelling our store. So not only was it hard to find where they put everything, I found they eliminated (or at least it isn't out on the floor right now) most of the scrapbook stuff. I did find a cheap spool of leopard (or some animal) print ribbon. Now I'm left to my own devices and looking for something wild and natury to use. The dead ladybug-wannabees on the floor in the basement might be cute little toppers for brads, whatcha think?
I just remembered I didn't do the bulletin for church last night (Thursday nights are my night to do this ... I was scrapbooking!!!) And I was going to do it during my lunch time today. Ooops! Here I am hanging out with you guys instead!
Gotta fly! Until next time!
It's a dreary day here in Ludke-ville, but I love it. I'm not one to disparage a good rainy day here and there in life. Now when it starts working on a good rainy WEEK or a good rainy MONTH, then I may just start whining!
I will say that it felt like my parking spot was double the distance from City Hall's front door today though. My umbrella being kept safely dry in the closet here at home, I raced (??) across the parking lot dodging raindrops and losing. By the time I climbed into the van I looked like a participant in a wet T-shirt contest.
At that point I ended up on the phone with a friend and told her about my contest entry. She informed me, "women our age don't look good in wet T-shirts anymore, we just look like we have a second set of kneecaps". So for at least the near future, I'm going to stay to myself and dry out a bit. I think I'm doing everyone a favor by that decision.
Last night I had a board meeting (I'm not ON this board, but am required to attend since they are the 'owner' of the properties I work for.). My boss from Des Moines was here to explain some things to the board (owner) and afterward I visited for a short time with him. All in all it was an interesting meeting and nice visit.
I told a very stressed friend I would help with a few pages of her daughter's graduation scrapbook. She's trying to scrapbook all of this child's life within the few weeks ahead of graduation! I started working on a ZOO set of pages. I promised myself I was NOT going to buy anything extra - only use my stuff that I've collected in the basement. But then I got to thinking ... wouldn't a tiger stripe paper be cute, or leopard, or giraffe?
So off to WalMart I went - well THANK YOU SAM WALTON!!! - they are remodelling our store. So not only was it hard to find where they put everything, I found they eliminated (or at least it isn't out on the floor right now) most of the scrapbook stuff. I did find a cheap spool of leopard (or some animal) print ribbon. Now I'm left to my own devices and looking for something wild and natury to use. The dead ladybug-wannabees on the floor in the basement might be cute little toppers for brads, whatcha think?
I just remembered I didn't do the bulletin for church last night (Thursday nights are my night to do this ... I was scrapbooking!!!) And I was going to do it during my lunch time today. Ooops! Here I am hanging out with you guys instead!
Gotta fly! Until next time!
Friday, April 16
BURIED UNCLE HIB TODAY
Uncle Hib died Tuesday of this week (4/13/2010). Last night was the visitation and today was the funeral. As far as days go, outside of being windy, it was a gorgeous day. There was talk of farming among the people standing around last night and today.
Last night on the way to the visitation we got re-routed by what turned out to be a bad accident. When we were re-routed, it had been about 2 hours since the accident occurred. When we finished we were able to travel back on that road. It was then probably 4 1/2 hours since the accident and we followed the semi back into town. Here is a link if you are curious:
http://www.muscatinejournal.com/news/local/article_cda56ba0-48ca-11df-b6c0-001cc4c03286.html
Today when we came back from the funeral Randy and I could see a plume of smoke in the distance. Ever the 'ambulance chaser' (or firetruck in this case) I asked if we could PLEASE drive that way - and surprisingly Randy said "YES!". (If I had been driving ... there would have been no doubt in my mind - we would have gone!)
So when we drove up we could see a barn ablaze. We parked and watched for a few minutes before we realized that the fire department hadn't yet arrived. After taking a few pictures and going around the corner to the other side of the farmstead is when it actually sank in. NO FIRE DEPARTMENT? We could see that another structure had flames on it by that time.
We turned around, still gawking and staring, and a tractor pulling a piece of farm equipment was near us. Randy asked the farmer if he knew if the fire department had been called (I was attempting to dial 911 by that time myself). The farmer said that YES, he personally called the fire department over 20 minutes before that.
The wind was strong and steady and pieces of roofing and other debris were blowing off the fire into the field across the road and there were several good sized ground fires there that were picking up some momentum. It looked as if it was a good possibility that given enough time and continued wind that most if not all of the buildings there could go.
Finally a sheriff showed up and then a couple of firetrucks from Wilton. They had to, of course, haul their own water and it wasn't long before one of them scooted off down the road back toward Wilton, presumably to refill at which point the second truck pulled into that truck's vacated position and started hosing the fire. Eventually Fruitland came too.
It was very exciting to watch, though I'm sure when the farmer and family arrived it was less exciting by a long shot. There were some animals either in a building or lot near the buildings that someone apparently let out, we hadn't been able to see them until they went racing wildly across the field. Probably 20 or so cows and horses. They ran and ran all the way across the field and around and back sort of near the farmstead. I think they were terrified judging from the running they did.
We got quite a few shots of the fire. The sad thing is that this farm, a Dickey farm, is the same place where not that many years ago an explosion occurred in the house and took the lives of I think 2 people who were in the house. Something makes me think that the explosion took place in a modular home that had replaced a home that had burned out before that. (I might be making that part up in my head -- but I am sure about the explosion.) That's a lot for one farmstead.
Anyway - that was my day today.
Last night on the way to the visitation we got re-routed by what turned out to be a bad accident. When we were re-routed, it had been about 2 hours since the accident occurred. When we finished we were able to travel back on that road. It was then probably 4 1/2 hours since the accident and we followed the semi back into town. Here is a link if you are curious:
http://www.muscatinejournal.com/news/local/article_cda56ba0-48ca-11df-b6c0-001cc4c03286.html
Today when we came back from the funeral Randy and I could see a plume of smoke in the distance. Ever the 'ambulance chaser' (or firetruck in this case) I asked if we could PLEASE drive that way - and surprisingly Randy said "YES!". (If I had been driving ... there would have been no doubt in my mind - we would have gone!)
So when we drove up we could see a barn ablaze. We parked and watched for a few minutes before we realized that the fire department hadn't yet arrived. After taking a few pictures and going around the corner to the other side of the farmstead is when it actually sank in. NO FIRE DEPARTMENT? We could see that another structure had flames on it by that time.
We turned around, still gawking and staring, and a tractor pulling a piece of farm equipment was near us. Randy asked the farmer if he knew if the fire department had been called (I was attempting to dial 911 by that time myself). The farmer said that YES, he personally called the fire department over 20 minutes before that.
The wind was strong and steady and pieces of roofing and other debris were blowing off the fire into the field across the road and there were several good sized ground fires there that were picking up some momentum. It looked as if it was a good possibility that given enough time and continued wind that most if not all of the buildings there could go.
Finally a sheriff showed up and then a couple of firetrucks from Wilton. They had to, of course, haul their own water and it wasn't long before one of them scooted off down the road back toward Wilton, presumably to refill at which point the second truck pulled into that truck's vacated position and started hosing the fire. Eventually Fruitland came too.
It was very exciting to watch, though I'm sure when the farmer and family arrived it was less exciting by a long shot. There were some animals either in a building or lot near the buildings that someone apparently let out, we hadn't been able to see them until they went racing wildly across the field. Probably 20 or so cows and horses. They ran and ran all the way across the field and around and back sort of near the farmstead. I think they were terrified judging from the running they did.
We got quite a few shots of the fire. The sad thing is that this farm, a Dickey farm, is the same place where not that many years ago an explosion occurred in the house and took the lives of I think 2 people who were in the house. Something makes me think that the explosion took place in a modular home that had replaced a home that had burned out before that. (I might be making that part up in my head -- but I am sure about the explosion.) That's a lot for one farmstead.
Anyway - that was my day today.
Sunday, April 11
ELEVEN DAYS
I don't know what I've been doing for 11 days (since my last blog-post). My life hasn't been all that exciting. I suppose that is good in a way, but makes for sorta boring blogging!
I was supposed to have some training (for the afternoon job) in Des Moines and it got postponed. I'd already scheduled 2 days of vacation time from the a.m. job - so I put in a few hours at the afternoon job, but mostly had two days off.
During that time I cleaned out a couple of cupboards and drawers - but that was the BIG extent of my productive time. I think I also made the cards for our monthly 2nd Thursday night stamping night. Whether or not you see that as 'productive time' I suppose is debatible. For me, it is productive time. The little bits of creative time I put in - keeps me sane.
OHHHH! Speaking of creative - there is something sort of cool. I'm "published"!!! Well, not in the way like Debbie (Randy's sister) is - in that she actually had an article published in a teaching magazine. My 'published' is that I was asked to do a promotional piece for a small local theatre group called "The Pearl City Players". They are doing posters, table tents (for local coffee shops and restaurants), and supposedly the Art Center is mailing postcards to their patron mailing list. Not a huge deal, but in my boring little world - it is fun! Just in case you wonder -- I'm not a paid professional! It's volunteer work.
I also scrapbooked a page (I want to do another page - so it is a 2 page layout) of Jaimee's birthday.
We were trying to get a cooperative picture of her in her little plaid dress as Ryan's dad and his family gave it to her for her birthday. Finally had mommy sit and hold her down for a pic! Remember Horton Hears a Who? She has Cindy Lou Who hair!
The old uncle - after such a seriously bad day on Friday, rallied yesterday. Went to see him in the a.m. and he was propped up in his bed looking around. I tried to give him moisture (those sponges on a stick) and he tried to say something to me. I put his fan on him because he always liked it on him.
I was supposed to have some training (for the afternoon job) in Des Moines and it got postponed. I'd already scheduled 2 days of vacation time from the a.m. job - so I put in a few hours at the afternoon job, but mostly had two days off.
During that time I cleaned out a couple of cupboards and drawers - but that was the BIG extent of my productive time. I think I also made the cards for our monthly 2nd Thursday night stamping night. Whether or not you see that as 'productive time' I suppose is debatible. For me, it is productive time. The little bits of creative time I put in - keeps me sane.
OHHHH! Speaking of creative - there is something sort of cool. I'm "published"!!! Well, not in the way like Debbie (Randy's sister) is - in that she actually had an article published in a teaching magazine. My 'published' is that I was asked to do a promotional piece for a small local theatre group called "The Pearl City Players". They are doing posters, table tents (for local coffee shops and restaurants), and supposedly the Art Center is mailing postcards to their patron mailing list. Not a huge deal, but in my boring little world - it is fun! Just in case you wonder -- I'm not a paid professional! It's volunteer work.
I also scrapbooked a page (I want to do another page - so it is a 2 page layout) of Jaimee's birthday.
We've been having a great weekend with our daughter and the baby here. The baby decided last Wednesday that she could and would walk everywhere she went. Or most everywhere! It's sort of cute, as she has to hold her arms up to do it.
We were trying to get a cooperative picture of her in her little plaid dress as Ryan's dad and his family gave it to her for her birthday. Finally had mommy sit and hold her down for a pic! Remember Horton Hears a Who? She has Cindy Lou Who hair!
After a long day of having Cindy Lou Who hair - you end up with Jaimee Rae Who hair at the end of the day!
The old uncle - after such a seriously bad day on Friday, rallied yesterday. Went to see him in the a.m. and he was propped up in his bed looking around. I tried to give him moisture (those sponges on a stick) and he tried to say something to me. I put his fan on him because he always liked it on him.
Last night some of the family was in to play games and some of them had been up to see him in the afternoon. He had taken some ice cream and diet coke (his FAVORITE beverage). He was cranky to my mom demanding his fan be put back on him.
He truly was NON-RESPONSIVE on Friday. I would imagine it is a temporary reprieve, but we were all surprised he made it through Friday a.m. he was so bad. Amazing isn't it?
Tuesday, March 30
CHEESEY GRIN
Satan must be sitting with a huge cheesey grin on his face all the time anymore. I mean really. Look around. There is so much sadness and sorrow.
I think just now of a little girl laying in a hospital bed who has fought for years for her life. Now she lays precariously perched again - still fighting.
http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/meaghanrath/mystory
And I think of the person I deal with at my afternoon job who is struggling so hard with the mental illness. Its escalating and the person is powerless to understand what is happening. I pray that they can get medical relief soon.
And we can all add 1/2 dozen other things to the list by thinking of folks in our own circle -- our Pastor's mom died today for instance.
Big cheesey grin. How evil. Thank goodness God reminds us in little ways - a seed wafting through the air being carried along by the silky sail that God attached for just this purpose (flying to a new home!). Or a little child laughing shyly because you said hello to them and it made them (nervously) happy.
God hold us tight - we KNOW the road is going to get bumpier before it gets better. Maybe we won't get better shock absorbers for the ride, but at least don't let us fall out (of your favor!).
I think just now of a little girl laying in a hospital bed who has fought for years for her life. Now she lays precariously perched again - still fighting.
http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/meaghanrath/mystory
And I think of the person I deal with at my afternoon job who is struggling so hard with the mental illness. Its escalating and the person is powerless to understand what is happening. I pray that they can get medical relief soon.
And we can all add 1/2 dozen other things to the list by thinking of folks in our own circle -- our Pastor's mom died today for instance.
Big cheesey grin. How evil. Thank goodness God reminds us in little ways - a seed wafting through the air being carried along by the silky sail that God attached for just this purpose (flying to a new home!). Or a little child laughing shyly because you said hello to them and it made them (nervously) happy.
God hold us tight - we KNOW the road is going to get bumpier before it gets better. Maybe we won't get better shock absorbers for the ride, but at least don't let us fall out (of your favor!).
Monday, March 29
SORRY - no big DIEHL
DR. HANS DIEHL
Ahh yes, the well known doctor was coming to our church to lecture on the afternoon of Sunday, March 28. Two-thirty p.m. to be exact. My sister, Gail, asked mom to go with her because she wanted to hear him. Mom was, to quote my niece 'stoked' to go see him!
And so the ruse began! Actually it began about 3 weeks before that with a phone call from Aunt Lois suggesting a surprise party for mom (aka Shirley).
We helped mom find a seat (in a planned location - clear at the back of the group).
The lights went low. At the front of the room you could see three shadowy forms scrambling into the antique bed on the stage. An alarm clock sounded. One bank of lights came up as the beings in the bed started to stir.
One by one they awoke - some perky and some a little more reluctant. Their rag-tied heads emerged, stretching ensued, and the blanket was thrown off. Perky (Aunt JoAnn) informed the drowsy ones (Aunt Mary Ellen and Aunt Lois) that it was SHIRLEY'S BIRTHDAY! They had to plan a party! One with all Shirley's friends!
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Soon, with a Yip Ga Molly Come Sockee YOO HOO (or some such thing) they called out. After a couple more tries and they heard a Yip Ga Molly Come Sockee YOO HOO (or some such thing) returned from the back of the room. Mom had heard their familiar childhood call, and called back. The red long-john clad sisters searched her out of the crowd and brought her to the stage where the party began.
We nestled her into the 'bed of memories' with my sister Gail at her side. The program began.
A program of people from the past - an older sister (Aunt Elda Mae), grandma and grandpa Goddard (portrayed by my cousins Nick Goddard and Tammy Goodale), school chums, a music teacher, cousins from Wisconsin, a friend from Indiana, a bowling chum and church friends/comrades from through the years. Twelve in all - many of them she hadn't seen in a long-long time! Dad even said a few (recorded) words. And you know what? He was pretty sentimental. It was nice.
Each stood behind a curtain at a microphone - a circle of light was behind them revealing on a shadow as they spoke into the microphone. Each spoke a few words to help mom guess who they were. When she guessed, they came out and gave her a long stemmed rose. My sister Gail who sat by her - well, she can be pretty funny when she wants to be, she wasn't feeling so hot yesterday (which may have been good! *wink*) but she still interjected some fun quips like - "wow mom, you're old - this could take a LONG time!"
When all was said and done we let mom come off the stage and mingle with her guests. I think the only downside of the day was that there just was not enough time to visit with each guest as much as we all would have liked.
Wynter and JoDe (my nieces) made the cake - fondant makes such cool looking cakes. Combine JoDe's expertise with that and Wynter's artistic flair - and we got a bed of memories cake - to keep in the theme of the day (the bed).
TONS OF FOOD -- oh my I don't know how the Goddard family does it -- it was the talk of everyone about how much food there was. And it was GOOD food. My son was chowing down a huge plate of the delicious mexican fare and saying how delicous it was. He always says that my mom is the best ever cook -- and now he truly knows that it runs in the family. Unfortunately for him, some things must skip generations and his momma is the 'skip generation' for him! Sorry kid!
I felt guilty that all the food prep was for someone else - but I truly do not enjoy that type of thing, therefore I am not good at it. But believe me - it was in good hands!
I felt guilty that all the food prep was for someone else - but I truly do not enjoy that type of thing, therefore I am not good at it. But believe me - it was in good hands!
The table decorations turned out pretty good. Nothing very fancy, but festive enough to get the idea of HAPPY BIRTHDAY across. Everyone pulled together as far as setting things up and getting all of the preparation done. I would have never have been able to come up with anything like what they did.
I don't know how the party ended for mom. You see, the aunts spirited her away to a bed and breakfast owned by my cousin Valerie. I think it is in south-central Iowa (Bloomfield?). They were going to spend the night and come back sometime today. Joy and her little clan stayed at dad's house to keep him company last night and today.
How do I THINK the day ended? I think when all was said and done - that mom had a huge surprise and enjoyed it. I think she is probably very tired and will be glad to get home -- you see she left to listen to Hans Diehl talk and didn't return home for more than 24 hours! SURPRISE!! It really WAS a big Diehl now afterall, wasn't it!
LOVE YOU MOM!!! 4-ever and always!
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| Marion Kelch, Sharon Wooten, Dean Wooten, Edyth Wooten |
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| Tita Bellie and Jaimee (you KNEW there would be a picture of her, didn't you?) |
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| Rhonda and Doug Dusenberry (our cousins), my brother Mark and sister-in-law Bellie |
I have to confess something -- I 'plagarized' the pictures from my sister in law Bellie. I got about 3 pictures total. Bah humbug for me! Thanks Bellie (though I didn't really ask ... *smile*) -- if anyone has any pictures they took of the day - please email them to me (as high quality as possible -- in other words, don't try to shrink them for email) ... thank you!
AND THANK YOU TO EVERYONE who did anything. You are all awesome. Especially thanks to the aunts!
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