Fall Sunday

I didn't do much today.  My cold/cough has just about gotten me down.  I did go to church this morning.  At that time my voice was still with me, so I thoroughly enjoyed singing "Soon and Very Soon".  The congregation loved it, too.  We actually got an ovation!!  That doesn't happen much at our church!  At church today, one of our members challenged us to do a "random act of kindness."  After church Dave and I went to 2nd Street Cafe for lunch and while there, we asked the waitress to get the check for this little old lady who was sitting by herself in a booth.  When we left, we paid for her lunch.  The waitress said the lady was a regular who used to live in the Hotel Ottumwa but was now in a nursing home.  I hope she enjoyed it - we enjoyed picking up her check anonymously!!

I came home and went to bed.  I slept for 2 hours and feel like I should sleep a bunch more!!  I watched the end of the race and then this evening we went back to church for our evening service.  We talked about Isaiah 52-53...very much like BRT.  We just read it and discussed it.  A great prophecy some 400 years prior to Christ's birth...hmmmm.  Amazing!

This week is a very, very busy one for me!!  Two things tomorrow, then DWTS tomorrow night...4 things Tuesday, 2 things Wednesday, 3 things Thursday, 2 things Friday and 2 things Saturday.  Sunday will truly be a day of rest!!

More later...

Saturday!

I was so excited about today.  I really didn't have anything I had to do except empty the dishwasher and start the ribs cooking.  I had no problem with the dishwasher, but I did have a problem with the ribs!  As I was getting the slow cooker out of the cupboard, the glass lid slipped and fell on the tile floor.  I had on sandals and when I looked down at the mess, I had little spots of blood here and there on my feet.  I just stood there for several seconds trying to figure out what I could do without getting more cuts.  The broom was behind me about 5 feet and behind a door.  I knew wherever I stepped, I was going to step on glass - this thing shattered into a gazillion pieces!!  When I finally moved, I found a piece of glass between my toes...not good, but I got rid of it right away.  When I got to the chair to shake out my shoes, there was even glass ON the chair and glass clear over by the main door to our family room - that's like 12 feet away!  It was everywhere!  I swept all of the big pieces into a pile, then called Dave.  He came home from Habitat and decided to pick up all the glass with the broom and dustpan and then just use the regular vacuum.  I figured he'd want us to use the garage vac, but the Electrolux has far more suction.  So we moved furniture and swept the floor.  Now tile is really bad when you drop something glass on it.  Our tile is especially bad because it has rather large indented grout lines - a good place for little slivers of glass to live forever!  We'll probably be finding glass for months!

The worst part of all of this is that I love that slow cooker and they don't make them quite like that any more.  Of course, it's old enough that I can't order just a replacement lid - the new lids don't fit it.  So I'm going to check out some of the second-hand shops to see if there happens to be one for sale somewhere.  If not, I'm putting a new slow cooker on my Christmas list!  I did get my ribs cooked - I got my crock pot out and cooked them in it.

Now I'm listening to my Cyclones - they are not playing well at all.  I've said all along that I'm not sure Steele Jantz is good enough to get us through the season...and tonight he's proving me right.  We're down by 8 at this point.  Yuck!

More later...

Beautiful Friday!

When I was still working at Indian Hills, every Friday was beautiful because it was a day off!  Today it was beautiful because it was a picture perfect day!  We had a good card class this morning.  There were only 4 of us there, but everyone liked my card!  Because we were short in numbers, we got done early.  I had picked up Ruth (a lady who is 90 and is giving up her car tomorrow) so I asked her if she'd like to take a drive to Agency just to see the beautiful fall foliage.  She said she wouldn't get to see it otherwise, so we took off.  The trees were so pretty - she just loved it!  I'm so glad I suggested it!!

After I got home, Dave washed and waxed my car.  He had done his truck the last couple of days, too.  So, they're both ready for winter!  He even vacuumed the inside of my car, put leather conditioner on the seats, Armorall'd the dash and door panels - it looks brand new!!  Now, I'm not going to want to drive it...I just want to leave it in the garage!

I have to tell you another thing that thrilled me to death today.  The view out of my office window was wonderful.  I'll show you why!  First I've seen this guy the last couple of days.  From what I can tell he's a red-bellied woodpecker.  I know his belly isn't red at all, but that's what he's called.  He's quite noisy, and very thirsty!!

Then just a few minutes later, I heard the sweet sounds of an Eastern Bluebird.  He was evidently very dirty!  

He sat on the side of the birdbath and groomed first one wing and then the other before he stepped into the water.  Once he got in, though, he just had a blast bathing!!

He splashed and splashed!

 Here he is after his bath - he's just all fluffy now!!

Then it was mama bluebird's turn.  She's not nearly as blue, but she was just as fluffy after her bath.  I had so much fun watching them!  And I was so excited to get some decent pix!  I really needed to take these pix in sports mode, though.  The water was just flying!!

Aren't they cute??

More later...

What a day!!

It was a busy, busy day today - and a beautiful one, too!  Another one of those almost perfect fall days!!  Thank you, Lord!!

I hosted a card class at 1:00 this afternoon.  Juliene and I demonstrated 3 cards to 6 ladies!  A fun time was had by all!  I'll try to get the cards on sometime tomorrow so you can see them!  They were beautiful if I do say so myself!!  I think all of the ladies would agree, too!

This evening, Dave and I went out for supper before the Jason Crabb concert at Bridge View.  We were going to go to the Canteen and have a loose meat sandwich, but when we got downtown, most of the streets were blocked off for the Ottumwa HS homecoming parade...so no Canteen!  Instead we went to Appanoose Rapids.  Dave had a Cuban sandwich and I had a tenderloin.  Both were good, but Dave said his was a long ways from the Cuban sandwiches we have in Florida!  I think that meant he didn't like it as well!

The concert was fabulous!  Don't go to a Jason Crabb concert if you don't want to be preached to, cause he can preach!!  He can sing, too, obviously!  His message was to love one another!  His love for his audience really came through in his singing.  The concert started at 7:30 and we got out at 10:05!  Fun evening!!

More later...

Productive Day!

Dave and I both had a very productive day today!  He got several things crossed off on his lists, including washing my car!!  Yay!  It sat outside while we got ready for the garage sale, and several birds "found" it (if you know what I mean!)  He also cut down a tree at Nan's and together we delivered our leftover garage sale "stuff" to IHCC's north campus.

I got my card papers cut out for tomorrow and Friday morning.  I got the PEO newsletter typed and sent out, along with an addendum because I forgot something important!  I picked up around the house in preparation for a card class tomorrow, and even got to play a little bit AND take a short nap.  Hopefully I'll still sleep tonight!

Choir practice tonight was great!  I can't wait to sing on Sunday.  I love the song we're singing - "Soon and Very Soon"!  It's a fun one!!

More later...

Tuesday

It was another almost perfect fall day today.  You've just got to love this weather!!  At one time it was 81 degrees here, 81 in Clearwater and 81 in Ft Lauderdale!  Pretty nice, I'd say!

Dave and I sold another thing from our garage sale.  A lady came to the door around supper time and wondered if we'd sold the large quilt rack that Dave had made.  Since we hadn't she wanted it!  On Friday when she was here originally she didn't know if she had room for it in her house.  She must have measured and came back for it!  We have everything boxed up ready to go to the IHCC auction and we're delivering everything to Indian Hills tomorrow in fact!  She almost missed out!!

Dave is working on his list - getting things winterized.  Plus he's making a list of what all he wants to take to Florida with us!  I've been working on cards today.  I also did some typing on the PEO newsletter and hopefully will finish it tomorrow!  I had to deliver some SU orders and pick up some paper from Juliene.  We also did laundry and changed the sheets on the bed.

Speaking of bed, Dave's already there and I'm headed that direction.  More later...

Beautiful Day!

Today was another absolutely beautiful fall day!  Our house was cold inside, so I opened it up and let some of God's air in.  It was so pretty outside, but I had a terrible time getting that beauty inside this big, old house!  I love fall days like this!  Low humidity, lots of sunshine, and warm temps!!

I had Bible Reading Time this morning.  We actually got through 20 verses today.  We're ready for Chapter 4 of John!  We learn so much each time!

I got my SU order today so now I've got some new things to play with - hopefully tomorrow!!  I got called out to a meeting this evening.  It's PEO reciprocity time so we had a planning meeting this evening.  For some reason I didn't get an email about it, but they called me and I dropped everything and went.  Dave had a Habitat meeting, so it wasn't a big deal.  I got home with about 10 minutes to spare before DWTS came on. Oh my, this is going to be a fun season!!  So many wonderful dancers!!

More later...

Beautiful Day

Now THIS was a beautiful day.  It even smelled like fall, which could be why I was sneezing and miserable until my allergy pill kicked in!  Poor Dave still is miserable.  This will be the 4th night he's slept in his chair!  We were going to get flu shots tomorrow, but not now.  Don't need a cold AND a flu shot at the same time!

I felt so bad and sneezed so much that I didn't go to church this morning.  When Dave got home and we'd eaten our lunch, we went outside to work on the garage.  We got everything ready to go to the IHCC auction.  We brought very little back into the house.  Tomorrow I've got to call IHCC and find out when someone can come pick up our leftovers!  Dave is taking his leftover car parts down to Goldy.  Some of the tables have been returned and the others should be able to be returned tomorrow.

Tomorrow night is the All Star version of Dancing with the Stars.  I can hardly wait!  I think it'll be really, really good!  I'm excited to see Shawn Johnson dance with Derek Hough...should be a great couple!  Very athletic and young!

More later...

It's Over!!

I know you've heard this before, but I hate garage sales!!  I'm so glad that's over!  Actually, I enjoyed myself most of the time...it was good to have Juliene here most of the day.  Had she not been here, I'd have gone crazy!  We sold quite a bit again today, but we did reduce prices on lots of things!  One of the things I dislike about garage sales is that you mark something waaaaayyyy down so that it'll sell and then people ask if you'll take half of that!  It's like they just want a hand-out!  Come on, people, it's a garage SALE, not a GIVEAWAY!!  I'm much more inclined to give a person a discount if they don't ask for one!!

I must say, it was pretty chilly outside today.  I had to wear jeans and that's unheard of in September!  I had my Under Armor ISU jacket on and that protected me from the chill.  But when I finally came inside, I realized that I was pretty much chilled all the way through.  I've finally gotten warm after eating supper right by our Eden Pure heater!

Dave is still sickly.  He's having a really hard time breathing through his nose.  I am trying to stay away from him and his germs!  He went to Habitat today and then came home and took a nap.  Tomorrow's church and then packing up what's left from our garage sale...another part I really, really like - NOT!!

More later...

One day down...

and a half a day to go!  Then our garage sale will be history!  We had a pretty good day today.  We sold a bunch of stuff.  Unfortunately, there's still a bunch left!  Dave got rid of a lot of his garage stuff.  It's really strange what people buy.  I'll be glad when it's over.  We only go until noon tomorrow!

I had PEO this morning.  It was a really good meeting.  Unfortunately I volunteered to help with our fund-raising efforts and since I'm going to be gone soon, that means I've got to get busy right after our garage sale is over!  I've also got to write a newsletter and get it out, plus get ready for two more card classes and a trip to Wisconsin!  I'm going to have to go to Florida just to rest!!

I thought I'd share a couple more cards tonight.  \

This first one is using Lovely as a Tree stamps.  I used a cut out image of one of our label dies as a mask.  Sponged marina mist in the cutout, then stamped the background trees in Basic Gray.  Then I removed the mast and stamped the lone tree in both Always Artichoke and Old Olive.  I also used the Soft Suede marker to color in the tree trunk itself.  The sentiment is from Teeny Tiny Wishes.

The next card is kind of hard to see and I apologize.  It's a spring version of the fall card I showed last night. This time I used Summer Starfruit, Garden Green, Pink Pirouette, and a little Sky Blue to give the feeling of spring in the air.  Plus I scored some lines just for interest!  The sentiment is from Petite Pairs.

Another rendition of my fall card...this one is my winter version.  Here I sponged Marina Mist, Night of Navy, and Elegant Eggplant to cause a winter feel.  I also did a summer version using Garden Green with a touch of Daffodil Delight...but I gave that one to Juliene for her sample.

More later...

GS Eve!

Tomorrow is the start of our big garage sale, so tonight is GS Eve!  I've got PEO in the morning, so that's why our sale isn't starting until 1:00.  I will be glad when it's history and all of the "stuff" is gone!

Today I had my big test - a pulmonary function test.  It took an hour and it was very interesting.  I had to breathe normally and then on command bring in a huge breath and expel it all the way...did that several times...also had to pant - all just to see how my lungs compared to "normal" ones for my age, height, weight, and the fact that I am an ex-smoker.  I don't know for sure, but I think overall my lungs are pretty good.  The young man administering the test said he'd trade his lungs for mine any day!  All of the markers were to be in the 80-100 range and all but one of mine were.  The very bottom of my lungs weren't so good - they only got an average of 72.  Hopefully, though, there is nothing there to indicate either cancer or emphysema. My doctor won't get the report until about Tuesday, so now I wait!

Since I had some time to get these uploaded, I thought I'd share pictures of the cards we did at our last class.  Again everything is Stampin' Up.  This card is made with Garden Green cardstock, the Evergreen stamp set, and pewter embossing powder.  The sentiment is from Come to Bethlehem and we used one of the new embossing folders on the side, cut the scallop with the large scallop edgelit, and highlighted the embossed parts with Shimmer Frost paint.  I love this card!

I demo'd the next two cards.  This one is a masking technique using Soft Suede, Pumpkin Pie and Summer Starfruit inks.  The trees are from Lovely as a Tree and the sentiment is from Petite Pairs.  The trees are stamped with Versamark and then embossed with clear embossing powder.  

This card may be one of my very favorites.  First of all I love this stamp set.  It's called Just Believe.  The technique is watercolor.  We used Night of Navy and Old Olive markers to color the stamp, spritzed it with water, and stamped on Very Vanilla cardstock.  The other cardstock is Lucky Limeade (because I was out of Old Olive!) and Night of Navy.  Again the sentiment is from Petite Pairs.  I added two of our 3/8" brads in the bottom right, just for some bling and the sentiment is at the bottom because I have a goof I'm covering up!!

Hope you enjoyed looking at my cards!  

More later...

Wednesday

We are ready for our garage sale!  The ad is at the Courier, everything is priced, and everything is in the garage...so come on Friday, let's get this over with!  We even got the change today - we really are ready!

Tonight at choir practice, we just zipped through our songs!  I was home before 9:00 and that's really, really unusual!  We had 4 altos, 4 sopranos, 4 basses, and 3 tenors tonight!  Good job, choir!

Tomorrow I go have my pulmonary function test.  I'm feeling kind of wheezy tonight, so I hope I have enough air to pass this test tomorrow.  I'm ready to have it done, too!  I don't like waiting for things, can you tell?  Maybe I'd better go back and read Habakkuk again, since it talks about everything in God's time...not ours!

More later...

Busy, Busy

We had lots going on today.  The furnace man came today...and not any too early!  It was chilly today - and yes, I still had shorts on!  The furnace got cleaned out and they kicked it on - it worked!  Then it got turned off again.  I refuse to have the furnace on yet.  In fact, I'm hoping not to have the furnace running until we leave for Florida (since we're going early)!!

Dave and I worked in the basement bringing stuff up for our garage sale this week.  I also cleaned out some purses and some kitchen items that we no longer use.  Then I cleaned out some drawers and found some books to sell, too.  Dave carried everything out to the garage and priced lots of the stuff.  I'll go out tomorrow and help him finish up.

I also was able to get my desk cleaned up and I'm getting organized for our next card class!  Tonight Dave had a church meeting and I had sorority.  It was a very busy day!!

More later...

Rainy day

This morning started out lovely, but around noon the west sky turned very dark and it started raining and blowing.  It was a welcome sight, though, as we're in severe drought conditions.  Dave worked out in the garage, even during the rain.  He's working on getting stuff put together for his part of the garage sale this weekend.  Did I tell you how much I hate garage sales?  Ha!!  I can tell you we're not having another one!!

This morning I went to Bible Reading Time.  We're in John 3.  We only got through 6 verses today.  Our last verse was John 3:16 - probably the most recognized and quoted verse in the Bible.  We had lots of conversation about that verse.  I love this time and wish we could have BRT more than once a week!  It's so enlightening.

More later...

Sunday evening thoughts!

For one thing, I guess I forgot to blog last night.  I could have sworn I wrote something, but I don't see it so I guess I didn't!  Saturday was one of those busy days and when it was over I just crashed!  I worked Nan's garage sale Saturday morning and then I came home and worked on putting away all of my Stampin' Up stuff from Thursday night.  By Saturday evening I was so tired, I closed myself in my office, turned on the Cyclone football game and just chilled while I was listening to it.  It was a fun game - I love when it's a blow-out, which doesn't happen much.  A friend of mine calls the Cyclones the "heart-attack kids" because usually our games are close ones.  This one was a very pleasant diversion!

Since it was a night game I couldn't go to sleep until it was over or I wouldn't have slept wondering if Western Illinois came back in the end...so I just stayed up until it was over!  It would have been a wonderful evening sitting out at a football game!

Today we had church and Pastor David was back from vacation.  He preached on passages from Habakkuk about chronos and kyros...man's time vs God's time.  Very interesting.  Choir sang a beautiful song called, "The Narrow Way".  We came home after church, had lunch, and then watched the Nascar race.  I was so bummed.  Jeff Gordon was doing so well, then his throttle stuck and he hit the wall hard.  Bummer!  I think he can just chalk this season up as "what in the heck happened?"!!  This evening after supper, we went to church again.  When we got home, I put three Stampin' Up orders on the system and now I'm about ready for bed!

More later...

Fun Day!

We had a girls' day out today and we had a lot of fun!  Five of us (Girls of '66) went to Williamsburg to shop today.  I had to be at Nan's at 7:00 AM to help set up my portion of her sale.  Then at 8:00 I left to meet the girls to go to Williamsburg.  Now, I must tell you that I'm not used to getting up so early, so tonight I'm really tired!  Poor Dave worked with Nan at her garage sale and he's pooped too!  I'm afraid we'll both be asleep in our chairs shortly!

Tomorrow morning I'll help Nan and Dave is going to work Habitat.  Thank goodness that we have nothing else all weekend except church!

More later...

Oh my!

There's just no rest for the wicked!!  I'm tired tonight.  We had a stamp class.  There were only 10 stampers, but we had 2 complicated cards.  We actually introduced them to watercolor and to embossing.  Some of them felt it was a little challenging, but their cards turned out lovely!

I didn't get home until about 9:00 and tomorrow's another busy day.  I have to be at Nan's at 7:00 AM to help...then off to meet my high school friends at 9:30 in S English.  We're doing a day in Williamsburg!  It rained/drizzled most of the day today, but tomorrow's supposed to be lovely!!  Yay!!

More later...

Not sure...

I'm not sure what I think about today.  I had a doctor's appointment this morning in Fairfield and I always make a list of what I need to discuss.  Today was no different.  So, we covered black currant, omega 3, and the thing on my hand.  The last thing on my list was this persistent cough.  I really don't think it's anything, but Dr. H wants to make sure.  So I went to the JCRMC for a chest xray and he tried to get me in for a pulmonary function test, but there was no time available.  So, now I have to wait to hear from the lab for when they can get me in.  Dr. H said he wasn't worried about it since I wasn't a smoker.  He didn't know that I smoked a long time ago until I told him that I was an ex-smoker.  That's why all the caution.  Seems that even though I quit smoking almost 30 years ago, I still could get emphysema or have lunch cancer...I pray that all the tests come back negative!

After that I came home and waited for the hospital to call to set up an appointment.  Of course, they didn't call!  So, I'm still waiting!!

Dave worked at Nan's all day today helping her get ready for this garage sale.  She has more "stuff" than Target!!  She's got furniture, clothes, tools, knick-knacks, etc., etc., etc.  Wow!!

More later...

Tuesday!

Dave worked this morning and I went over to get my glasses adjusted.  I'm thinking we've done pretty well getting them to fit right, although I think the ladies at Heartland actually adjust better!  Do you suppose they'd know that these glasses didn't come from there?  Hmmmm...

About noon, Dave had had enough of work so he came home.  We sat down to rest, but decided instead to price items for the garage sale this weekend at Nan's.  There were only 2-3 boxes of "stuff" that we needed to price, but it took us about 3 hours with both of us working non-stop!  So we decided that we would take some stuff to Nan's but that we had enough to have our own garage sale.  We'll see how things sell this weekend and then we'll pick a date for ours.  At least everything so far is tagged and priced!

Tomorrow I've got a doctor's appointment at 9:45 in Fairfield.  When I get home, Dave wants me to go through some more stuff to see if we can sell anything else.  Yuck!  Have I mentioned how much I hate garage sales?  lol

I've also got to request an absentee ballot for the general election and type up some minutes from tonight's Personnel meeting.  I've got a couple of bills to pay and an account to reconcile.  Oh, I've also got about 3 months worth of filing to do.  That's another yuck!

More later...

Busy day!

I had a wonderful day today, albeit it a busy one!  First of all, the weather was just about as perfect as perfect can get!  I opened windows and doors and let God's air fill our house with freshness!

Dave went to work today which gave me basically all day to be productive.  I even put meat on in the slow cooker and had supper ready for him when he got home!

I was able to get all of my cardstock cut out for the cards I'm demo-ing on Thursday night...I have 2 again this time.  I got everything loaded into my 31 bags - I still have to load my Big Shot and some rags.  I even finished up a couple more cards and tried to clean up my work space a bit!

This afternoon I edited the church website and added lots of information which I had already typed.  I'm pretty excited about doing this.  We're doing the new website in Wordpress, which is soooo much simpler than HTML!  I've still got some information to gather before I can consider myself done with my part!  Tomorrow night I have a church meeting, but other than that I'm probably going to price garage sale items tomorrow - yuck!  Have I ever told you that I HATE GARAGE SALES!  I'm sure I have.  I'm not having this one - Nan is and I'm just putting together some Stampin' Up stuff (and other stamping stuff) to go in it!  I will have to work it, but at least it's not in our garage!

More later...

Finally!

Finally, Dave is home from Florida - yay!!!

Finally, I'm home for the evening!!  I left at 8:30 AM and I'm basically just getting home and it's almost 8:00 PM!  I was home for a little bit between church and a church meeting.  I was home long enough to eat my lunch and say hi to Dave!  Then between my church meeting and our car club meeting, I was home for about 25 minutes!!  I'm going to go put my jammies on and just put my feet up!  It's been a beautiful, but long, day!

More later...

cyclONEstate!

It's a Cyclone state again!  Woohoo!  I was almost sick by the time that game was over!  Someone on Facebook said the Cyclones won despite their generosity!  I really thought Iowa would capitalize on the mistakes we made, but it seemed they just made a mistake right back!  So, all is well in Cyclone land!

Now I'm watching the Nascar race!  This has been a great day!  A Cyclone victory, an Auburn loss, and Nascar - all in one day!

Dave comes home tomorrow morning bright and early and I'll sure be glad!  I've had a terrible time sleeping - did you know that old houses creak and groan!!  I hear it all!  Hopefully I'll sleep tonight.  We sing in church tomorrow, so I have to be there earlier than I've been all summer!

More later...

A few sprinkles!

We actually got a few sprinkles today - enough to make the driveway wet!  It was enough that I didn't have to go out and water my plants - they perked up quite a bit!  My hummingbirds are busy fattening up.  I've attached a picture of one that sat and watched me for a long time today.

As you can see, she's getting ready to heat south.  She's getting fat!  They actually double their weight for the big trip to Central America and points south.  They fly over about 500 miles of water before they reach land again so they have to store up body fat!  This little one is pretty fluffy!!  Of course, part of it was the fact that it was only 65 degrees out when I took these...I closed the window after she left!

I talked to Dave several times today.  He told me he'd decided not to pursue that trailer he was looking at.  He just thought we'd get claustrophobic - it's on a small lot with trailers on both sides.  Where we are now, we only have neighbors on one side.  It's really nice according to the pix he sent!  It'll make someone a nice home!

He's with Jami and the family tonight.  He called me after he'd picked up the girls from school, so I got to talk to both of them.  Danny wasn't home yet.

I got my new glasses today and ran some errands.  Other than that - I didn't do much!  I did finish a book.  It was a good day to stay in.  I need to go back to the eye doctor tomorrow, because my glasses aren't quite fitting correctly.  The nose pieces are killing me and one side is tighter than the other.  Other than that, I really like them!  I actually don't have my head back trying to see out of my bifocal - I can see the computer with the trifocal like I'm supposed to!!  Yay!!

Tomorrow's a big day!  Go Cyclones!!  More later...

Oops!

I almost forgot to blog!!  I was watching the DNC and when the President finished speaking, I started upstairs.  Then I remembered that I hadn't blogged yet!  I thought both VP Biden and Pres. Obama gave good speeches.  I thought a lot was left unsaid, like how jobs would be created, for instance.  But overall, I thought they did a good job.

I had a good day today.  Juliene and I got together and planned out 6 cards!  Plus, this afternoon, I worked at the First Presbyterian Church's Food Pantry.  It was really a tiring and sweaty time, but I sure feel good when I get done there.  Everyone was so gracious and appreciative of the food they got.  We had a record number of families served again today, I believe.  I'm guessing around 97 families before I came home!

That's it for tonight.  More later...

Good Night, Gracie!

Gracie is me!  I'm going to bed shortly!  Last night was one of those nights when my brain wouldn't shut down.  I was still awake at 3:45 AM!!!  Today I DIDN'T take a nap, so I should be able to sleep tonight!  If not, I'm taking a tranquilizer!!

I had a massage today and actually fell asleep on the table!  Then at 5:15 we had a meeting a Bridge View with our financial adviser.  It was a dinner meeting and at 7:20, Dave asked me if I was going to choir practice.  Since I didn't realize how late it was, we took off and made it to church just a bit late.  Choir lasted until 9:00 and now I'm pooped!!

More later...

Oh wow!

This evening was sure eventful!!  Dave is going to fly to Florida to look at a couple of manufactured homes in our park...we've got a couple of possibilities for double wides.  It'll be a quick trip, but I think it'll be worth it for him to see what we're really considering.  He can stay at our home and he'll go visit Jami while he's there!
How do we get ourselves into these predicaments????

Today itself was rather mundane.  Dave had an eye doctor appointment and I had Bible Reading Time.  This afternoon I was so cold, I just couldn't get warm.  I hope I'm not coming down with something!  I took about a 3 hour nap!!!!  My massage got changed to tomorrow and I decided to stay home tonight because of my chills.  So now tomorrow is a busy day!!  I start out at 9:30 with a massage and end after choir at about 9:00 tomorrow night!

More later...

Laborless Day!

Happy Laborless Day!  I've always thought that since you get this day off (when you're working), it should be called Laborless Day instead of Labor Day.  Dave and I enjoyed being home today.  We neither one got up very early and I lounged around in my jammies until about 10:30.  He did go outside and work on the "hole" again.  He's taken lots of roots out of the "hole", and he even got a big chunk of concrete out of it where previous owners had tried to shore up the tree evidently.  I think he's about to a point where he's ready to go rent a root-chewer-up-thingie and then put in some black dirt and grass seed.  I can't believe that the tree company hasn't called us back.  We've been trying to get someone here since the tree fell down on July 16th or so.

The rest of today we spent looking at pictures of mobile homes at the Ranch.  There are a couple of interesting ones for sale right now.  One looks really nice in the pictures, but we'd like to see it in person before we make any decisions.

Tomorrow is a busy day for both of us.  Dave has his eyes checked to see if any more of his retina has torn and I have 3 appointments tomorrow!  Plus I need to get some cards ready for the 13th (our next stamp class).

More later...

Back home again!

We left Friday morning for Indiana.  Dave's family always gets together for Labor Day, so we went out to be with them this year.  We had a really good time.  The party was at his sister's and all of the family was there except for Jami, Julie and Jessie and their families.  I think there were 30 there.  It was pouring down rain, so we were all inside.  Ages ranged from 88 to 17 months!  Good food, good conversation, and wonderful family!  I was really excited because I got to watch the Cyclone football game at the party.  They have a large flatscreen on the wall, so they did a PIP and had both the Purdue game and the Cyclone game on!  I loved it!!  Great to watch two college football games at one time on opening day!

We went to church with Don & Bev this morning.  We had planned to go out to lunch and then come home, but we ate too much this morning and didn't feel like eating again so soon, so we took off about 10:45 their time (which is an hour ahead of us).  We stopped at a DQ in Illinois for a shake and that held us over until we got home.  It rained on us about half of the trip home...everything in Indiana and Illinois really greened-up after the rains.  Not so in Iowa.  You can really tell a difference.  Our grass is very brown compared to theirs.

I'm glad to be home.  I'm looking forward to sleeping in my own bed!  Right now I'm watching the race - it's starting to get fun now.  It's actually been a boring race, but now with 38 laps to go, the drivers are going harder!

More later...