Coming to terms

I sit here thinking…just random thoughts firing off in my brain.



We’ve finally gotten to the acceptance place of not ever having kids & becoming a family once again. Time & time again we allowed ourselves to get our hopes up & time & time again for whatever reason it just never works out. To let ourselves continue on the emotional rollercoaster is mentally & physically draining.





I’ve always envisioned my life with 5 kids. Three girls and 2 boys. Heck I’ve had favorite names for as long as I can remember. We tried the old fashioned way but the entopic pregnancies in 95 & 97 left me a “unplumbed” woman. I knew at age 22 we would not have children of our own. Well unless we did invitro & that’s just not something I myself believe in for myself. To other couples it is an option & that is totally swell. But not for us. I can’t see injecting 5 to 7 embryos into my womb in hopes that 1 would “take”. Now, go figure. If only 1 takes the remaining are lost babies. Emotionally that is not an option. We lost two & that was hard enough. Then we have the adoption nightmares. To come so close only to have everything crumble from under us was beyond gut retching.








But yeah…things are so different for Ken & I. We love our life, love the spur of the moment events and not having the responsibility of caring for a kiddo. Right now most of our friends are raising their kiddos & are unable to do those spur of the moment events like we can. We have some close friends who have remained close even though they have kiddos & then there are some for whatever reason just can’t find time to keep in touch with us. No, I can’t put my two cents in on potty training a kiddo, or those 1st steps & what not. I however do absolutely enjoy hearing of their kiddos milestones.








I love having lil nieces & nephews. I know I say that all the time but I really do!! I don’t see them often enough & they grow up way too fast. But I hope that I am a good example for them. I enjoy their company & it gives me that inner peace about not being able to have kiddos of our own. I can hopefully instill some values in them & share in their life experiences & be their friend at the same time. I’m so very thankful for those little people in my life. I imagine the next best thing to being a parent is being an aunty & a friend to my friend’s kiddos as well. And I am A OK with that!! =)

Ponderisms of my personality test

I had all weekend to reflect on my personality type results. We went on a camp out at Ken's family's camp this weekend. Anyways, back to this test...It boggles my mind at how close the results are to my actual personality!!

I do tackle life with integrity, as in honesty. There are no room for lies. In fact one of my biggest pet peeves in life are lies. Big & Small. I also do have strong moral principles.

I totally agree with the originality, vision & creativity. In fact, there will be numerous "things" I will see & will think, "hmmm that would make a neato such & such." I am truly happy when I am using resources around me & making useful items.

I am very independent & very stubborn. I will not argue with that at all. I'd like to think I am a good listener. I take great care in my friendships & enjoy listening to people & hearing their life experiences.

I do have deep feelings & I agree, I take great care in explaining them. Although I rarely share deep feelings with very many. I tend to keep those private or share them with only a couple very close friends.

I always believe relationships need to continue to grow. It's what keeps love alive. Whether it be with a spouse, friends or family. Things such as relationships need to be nurtured. And when they are nurtured they grow & evolve into even more beautiful relationships. Well that's my thought anyway. Stagnation is like a routine...BORING!!!!

I do try to remain happy & positive about work & what I do. I do what I believe in & that is what keeps me motivated. I can't imagine doing a job where there is no goal ahead to reach. Plus remaining happy & positive reflects onto others.

I also agree with the career choices as well. I just LOVE taking photos & with having Meniere's I am always researching alternative medicines & such. Perhaps that is the Guru in me. LOL Oh, and when I set out in College my hope was to become a special education teacher! Pretty kwinkidinklish eh!!!

MY Personality Type

You Are An INFJ

The Protector You live your life with integrity, originality, vision, and creativity. Independent and stubborn, you rarely stray from your vision - no matter what it is. You are an excellent listener, with almost infinite patience. You have complex, deep feelings, and you take great care to express them. In love, you truly see relationships as an opportunity to connect and grow. You enjoy relationships as long as they are improving and changing. You can't stand stagnation. At work, you stay motivated and happy... as long as you are working toward a dream you support. You would make a great photographer, alternative medicine guru, or teacher. How you see yourself: Hardworking, ethical, and helpful When other people don't get you, they see you as: Manipulative, weak, and unstable

What's Your Personality Type?

A look into anal retentiveness!!

I am the most anal retentive person I know about certain things. Not everything...just certain things.








Such as: My cabinets in the bathroom must be highly organized. Well holy sheepskin Batman! They were beyond disarray. The thing I am most anal about is my towels & wash cloths...see, they MUST & I mean MUST be folded a certain way. No tags can be seen, corners have to match, and the design at the bottom has to be showing on the outside. Oh and another thing...they have to face a certain way in the closet. Well lately I have not kept up with my organizationalizing because we have either been busy or I have felt like padooples...so it took the better part of this afternoon to get it tidied up. I have to wonder...are there other wackadoodles out there or is it just me all by my lonesome wasting time on such nonsense?














Another thing I am especially anal about is how sheets & blankets are folded. Once again...corners have to line up precisely. Sheets need to be crisp but not cardboard-ish. Designs on blankets have to be on the "right" side facing up. When such items in my home are not in such fashion I literally get cranky & pull everything off the shelf & re-fold it all. Now isn't that just nuts!!









I used to even alphabetize my spices & my canned goods too. I have somehow let that one go for the time being. I do however have to have everything facing one direction & like items are grouped together. You won't find french cut green beans & sliced green beans mixed amongst each other.












BUT...these days even my kitchen cabinets are in a state of complete chaos! With all the baking & cooking I've been doing items are just getting put up in the cabinets wherever they will fit. I am determined to find some sort of solution. Not only for my mess but also to not be so insanely anal. Each day I will tackle a specific chaotic explosion & find homes for everything.










I even used to organize my clothes closet by color of clothing & different color hangers for certain things. Not to go all "Mommy Dearest" but there are NO wire hangers in my closet! Sadly my closet is bulimic these past few months. I keep feeding her clothes & she just purges them out her doors. I'm thinking we need some sort of treatment for that too. I will never have an anorexic closet slim with clothes. There may be an underlying addiction here.








Why is it bizarre for one to fold undies & socks & over the shoulder boulder holders? I know sooo many people who just toss everything into their drawer. I dunno how people could stand a big ole wrinkle wedged in their heine from not folding their undies. Especially full fledged bloomer undie wearing folks. You know, the undies that support ones bust.







Another thing...grammar. I'm a junkie for grammar & if I read something with errors I have to re-read it several times & in my head I fix the errors. It took me like a month to edit my friend Laurens book last summer! You have no clue how much it bugs me that this blogger thing won't post my entries with paragraphs! Oh my Smurfs! Does that ever urk my inner being!!!








Anyways, I think I think too much. Tonight just happens to be one of those nights of deep reflections on completely nonsesical things!! =) Is there anybody at all out there who is even a smidgen in the anal state of mind such as I???

Raspberries Galore!!!

My lil brother JJ called this afternoon asking if I was up to anything tonight. He was wanting to spend the night at his big sis' house. Of course I said yes. I have missed the lil goober head!

I asked him if he'd want to go raspberry picking tonight & he was like "sure" So I stopped by my in laws & picked up my niece Brittany & away we went. This time I took the camera though!!!



Me & Brittany





Haha! JJ posing with his lil not so manly berry picking apron!!! He was not too snitz on this contraption at all & I do believe he felt his guyhood was violated with the prettyness!! LOL



JJ & Brittany being goofy heads!!

What a funtastical outing it was to hang with my lil bro & adorable niece!! Now hopefully they will help with the preserving part!! LOL

The new lil gadget

Yesterday was my Mom's birthday. She would be 88 if she was still living... Ken & I were outside finishing up the cleaning up of the debris from the tree. The phone rang & Ken handed me the phone. He said it was my brother Mike on the phone. Mike went on to say "I got a question for ya" I was like "ok..." He went on to ask if I ever can like as in preserving, asked if I like applesauce...which was a yes. Then asked if I have ever made applesauce. I told him I did just last week. I was wondering where in the farts he was going with this. He then asked me if I'd be interested in having Mom's old applesauce puree-er. Which I was like heck yeah!!!! He then told me of a scrap of fabric he found. I'll address the fabric in a later post. This is all about applesauce =)





Apparently Mike had visited an antique store & saw one of these applesauce makers & reminded him that Mom had one in the fruit cellar. Well there is nobody else in my family that I know of who is such a robo dork about canning & preserving stuff as I am. We stopped at my family's house to pick this wunnaful gadget up before we headed out to the rasperry patch. Soooo many batches of applesauce were made with this lil gadget. Mike went on to tell me that he believes it was my Mom's Mom's!! How stinkan cool is that!!


After picking a flat of rasperries at the patch we went to the cemetary to "visit" Mom & Dad. Usually on Mom's birthday I am a lil frumpy froggish. But this was a wunnaful day with fabulous memories of Mom...I just hope to skittles my applesauce turns out as yumalishious as hers was!!

The man upstairs was DEFINATELY involved!

Our downed maple tree is finally all cleaned up & disposed of. We have ourselves a nice stash of firewood for the firepit next year & camp also has gobs of wood as well for future bonfires.


Thursday night was one late night of cleaning up as much as possible. Ken had to leave at 4am on a run for work & returned home Friday late afternoon. He & I began tackling the tree mess again. I however didn't last long. It was one heck of a night spent in the bathroom. My Meniere's was totally kicking my arse something fierce! Thank God Ken was home because I needed him this time. My brain was ready to explode, my head was non stop spinning & I was just a pukey mess & I had horrible cramps. (Excuse the bluntness here) So, what to do? Do I take my anti vertigo meds, ibuprofin for the cramps? Meds for the migrane? Or perhaps put my head in a vice to stop it from spinning? Well in the state of mind I was in I decided to take ibuprofin. In hopes that the headache would go away. I always take 4 ibuprofin for headaches. Nothing less that that will even touch them. Anyways, so I pop what I think is ibuprofin. Then I realized they were freakin Aleve!!! YIKES!!! I was still a pukey spinny mess but managed to holler to Ken to come in the house. He had been outside talkign to his folks. Anyways, I didn't die from taking the Aleve & they are now put far away from where we put the ibnuprofin & my other meds.

After that ordeal Ken wanted me to go to bed but I wouldn't dare. I was still scared of my dosage & Ken was outside working on cutting down the tree. Someone had to be out there!! So I watched & then helped a lil after he had the branches down.

Saturday Kens Dad came over & they went at it with the tree again. I made the Nelson's (our neighbors)one of those Blueberries & Cream Pies & made a double batch of stewed tomatoes & canned those up. They had a few smaller limbs to cut off yet before they tackled the honkan big ones. Everything was going smoothly. The branches were falling as planned. Well one of them decided to go awol & crashed into the ladder which Bill (my father in law) was on. Ken was holding the rope. Anyways, Bill managed to grab onto the left side of the Y branch on the tree & then he lost his grip & fell about 6 or 8 feet. Luckily the chain saw stayed in the tree!! We all kept asking if Bill was alright & he assured us he was fine. He had a few scrapes on his forearms & that's it....pretty darn tootan lucky if you ask me!!! It was not too bad of a fall but it was bad enough that his hearing aides popped out of his ears when he fell. The big man upstairs was DEFINATELY looking out for Bill that day!! It could have been a real bad scene.

SNAP!

Ken got home just in time last night...about 15 minutes after he arrived we got a hugemungus storm that passed through. The rain was pounding in our screen room so I had to get the cat tower & doggie bed out from there. I was a bit late though as they were already drenched & by that time, so was I! So what the heck, we decided to sit back there & watch the storm. The wind was INSANE & rain was coming down horizontally right into our faces. Our glasses could have used some wipers! It was insanely loud so there we are, sitting in our screen porch, hollering at each other in order to talk & the trees were just dancing away & we kept hollering, "holy wha, look at that one. Then I screamed "HOLY SH! Look at OUR maple tree....It was practically bent in half! The SNAP!! Right in front of our eyes! How freakin cool was that!!! Well the cool amazement feeling lasted for just a lil while. Because we knew we were going to be in for one long night of removing the tree. It split right in half. One half landed on our neighbors garage & the other half is still standing, but very droopy. We managed to clean up all of the tree that was in the Nelson's yard & on the garage before it got dark. This weekend we still have half of that honkan maple to cut down & clean up & bring to the compost site. All this lifting is gonna help oodles with getting my arms in shape. In a couple of weeks we are going on a canoe trip. Here are some pics of our crazy mess!!












You can see in one of the pictures where our back screen room is...lucky the darn tree didn't come clunk on our heads with us being that close!!!

YUM!

Today Ken & I drove out to our local greenhouse to pick rasberries. Well that was our hope anyways. The darn place was closed!! Apparently they are only open on the weekends. So back into town we went but, before headign home we stopped at a Farm Stand near the Fairgrounds. They set up there every year & sell their yummy goods. We picked up some baby red potatoes, 24 HUGE tomatoes to make stewed tomatoes with, and 6 juicy peaches.


After that we decided to tackle putting up a gate between our house & the neighbors. We have way to many wackadoodles who decide to cut through our houses as a short cut. Well that & the kids take jumps on our driveway. There's a jump from the sidewalk onto our driveway...NOT good. It seems that the kids in the neighborhood don't have ears because after we ask them to not do that they are back at it in no time. Hopefully this gate will be a solution to ours & the neighbors problem.





Once that project & the weeding of the flower beds were done we headed to the Farmer's Market downtown. I know, every single week I post on they yummy things we get there. This week was super fantastical as well!





They had blueberries this time & that sooo rocks our world. We also picked up some carrots, rhubarb, sugar snap peas, snow peas, and this twirly garlic. When the guy selling it was telling Ken what it was he said it's basically the top of the plant, sorta like a chive...but garlic.

We decided we'd use our veggies & make a home made stir fry for dinner tonight & I'd make a peach pie for desert. The stir fry turned out so delish. Ken was in charge of the stir fry sauce & he did one heck of a job creating a yummalish dish!! Oh my Smurfan heck! That blueberries & Cream pie can be substituded with peaches so I did that & holy fartan heck!!! Totally yummalicious!!!




It only took two of the peaches to fill this pie. I foresee 2 more of these peaches & cream pies with our remaining peaches ...We'll have to invite some friends over for din din this weekend. =)

Chloe is Home!!

YAY!!! After we devoured our din din Sunday night we hopped in the truck & went to my friend Kellie's house to pick up my Chloe Michelle!!! Chloe is my African Hingeback Tortoise. My dear friend has had her for the past handful of months because ken & I were on the road trucking. Kellie did an outstanding job taking care of her while we worked. Well now that Ken is back with Niagara & home like every other night I have been staying home...soooo, that means Chloe could come home too!! OH the excitement! Once we got to Kel's house I held Chloe & she nuzzled into my neck like she used to. I wasn't sure if she'd remember me or do that because of my hair cut. But low & behold she nuzzled right in & then dropped a big ole turtley turd on me! Luckily I was holding her in a towel so no turlte turds invaded my clothing. I gave her her bath "soak" when we got home & Ken set up her tank & everything. Then it was time for her & Mama time! She soo rocks my world!!

Blueberries 'n' Cream Pie OH MY!!!

On our way home from the Zoo we passed by a farm stand. Can't be passing up fresh produce now can we!!! Ken turned the truck around & we bought some fresh onions & 2 quarts of fresh blueberries. We got down the road a lil ways & passed by another road-side stand selling fresh corn on the cob & watermellons. So we turned around again & purchased a dozen ears of corn. We munched on the blueberries on the way home.

Once we got home after dropping the kiddos off we began making our dinner. We cooked up all the corn, made some baby red potatoes & added some of our fresh onion & had our free range chicken breasts. I will be canning the remaining corn. I paged through a recipe book I have & found a blueberries and cream pie & decided to give it a whirl. MAN! It was delish & super easy to make...so I totally have to share the recipe!!


I forgot to take a picture of the pie before digging in...



It's taken from the Taste Of Home's Contest Winning Annual Recipe book from 2007.

Blueberries 'n' Cream Pie
1/2 cup plus 1tbsp fat free milk, divided
3tbsb butter, melted
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 package (.8ozs) sugar-free cook-and-serve vanilla pudding mix
1tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries, thawed
1 package (8ozs) reduced-fat cream cheese
1/2 cup sugar

TOPPING:
2tsps sugar
1/8 tsp ground cinnamin

1. In a large mixing bowl, beat 1/2 cup milk, butter & egg. Combine the fluor, pudding mix, baking powder and salt: stir into egg mixtue just until moistened. Pour into a 9 inch pie plate coated with non sitick cooking spray. Arrange blueberries over batter to within 1/2 inch of edge of plate


2. In a large mixing bowl, beat cream cheese, sugar, and remaining milk until smooth. Spread over blueberries to within 1 inch of berry edge. For topping, combine sugar & cinnamin: sprinkle over the cream cheese mixture. Bake at 350 degrees for 30-35 minutes or until set. Serve warm. Refrigerate leftovers (if you have any LOL) Yield: 8 servings

Nutritional facts: 1 piece equals 249 calories, 12 grams fat (7g saturated fat), 60 mg cholesterol, 302 mg sodium, 31g carbohydrate, 1g fiber, 6g protein.

Diabetic Exchanges: 2 fat, 1-1 1/2 starch, 1/2 fruit

A Day at the Deyoung Zoo

Ken didn't get home till Saturday afternoon. So it pretty much put a damper on our camping plans. Plus the forecast didn't look all too snitzy.

We started to work on painting the kitchen cabinets & settled into bed early.

Now, on Sunday we had somewhat of a dliema. We had hoped to go to the DeYoung Zoo in Wallace, MI on Saturday but with Ken's late arrival we had to postpone it till Sunday. Now here was the delima...Kyle Petty, the race car driver was going to be in Gladstone for a charity bike rally for his Camp in honor of his fallen son, Adam. Victory Junction Gang Camp is a camp for kids with terminal illnesses. Well I have always liked Kyle & he has wunnaful ethics & does so much for others...a true inspiration.



What to do, what to do? We decided to go to the Zoo & miss seeing Kyle. One of my dreams before I die has always been to hold a tiger. Well by golly! I not only held a few tortoises, a billy goat, a baby wolf, a lil monkey, a baby couger, a raccoon but I held the cutest lil cat! A 2 week old siberian tiger. Talk about royal cuteness!! Here are some pics!!! =)



Now this next lil guy was soo funny! He kept looking at me & sticking out his tongue. Then he'd nuzzle in my chest.










One of the cutest things was seeing this black poodle & baby siberian tiger nuzzled in to each other. Both pup & tiger were born the same time & became Pals. Bud, the owner of the zoo seperated them & neither the cat nor dog coped well at all. Hense why they are nuzzled together. I'm sure once the tiger gets bigger they will have no choice but to seperate them.



This next lil baby was soo fun to watch. He'd stare at his Big Bird toy & then play with it. Then look around again.


These next two lions were in the same fensed in area. The zoo owners said this was Nala's 3rd husband. LOL! Guess now a days even the lions can't remain monogamas!





Bud, the owner & his fiance handle each & every animal every day. Here's Bud in one of the tiger fenced in areas. He's got some guts to do that!!


This next critter scared the zoinkels right out of Ken. He is absolutely terrified of snakes & will scream like a lil girl if he sees one. Well when they took this gynormous Burmese Pyton out Ken was sure to stay as far back as possible.


We ended the day at the zoo just as they were going to start the reptile feeding. The kids were a bit edgy & tired. What a fantastical day though!!

The new "do"

I finally did it!!! Got my hair cut that is!! At least 10 inches was chopped from my head on Friday. I hadn't had a real haircut in 2yrs & haven't had short hair in eons...like 12yrs! I was letting the mess on my head grow so I could donate it to Locks Of Love. Well, once I decided it was time to get rid of it I be bopped over to the salon all eager to give them a good portion of my crazy, naturally curly/wavy hair in exchange for a new more manageable style. I did question if I was a candidate for donation & the young gal really didn't know & then said no, that she didn't think so...total bummer! But...I've already noticed I have less headaches & by golly, I like the new "do" and so does the Kenster =)

Everything Reminds Me of Her...

My 1st Communion with my Mom & Dad







Lately it seems like everything reminds me of my Mom. I do canning & Mom comes into my memory, I go on a crocheting frenzy, again, Mom pops in my head. The other night while going through some old books on the bookshelf upstairs I ran across my Mom's Needlepoint book. I decided to take it to bed with me & did some reading up on different techniques & whatnot. In the front inside cover my Mom had written her name in cursive & as I thumbed through the patterns & designs I came across a piece of paper that had a pattern for crocheted snowmen. I remember Mom making those lil guys for the Church Bizarres!!!




Yesterday Ken was home & we were both on each others last nerve. At one point I got sooo irritated with him I told him I didn't like him right now but I still love him. I guess we were both in a mood so to speak. It doesn't happen often but I guess even the biggest love birds need a break from each other.



I pretty much chalk my moods to my Mom's upcoming birthday, July 20th. For some reason I always get frumy froggish near & on her birthday. It's rather silly. She has been dead for 22yrs. I only knew her for 10 short years. Even now, sometimes my memory of her fades but it always comes back to me during times like these.



I'll tell ya what happened today. I was making some stewed tomatoes to be canned and my neighbor lady friend called me to tell me Pat across the alley was having a rummage sale today & if we wanted we could walk over there & check it out. I was total game!! Heck yeah!! I grabbed a bit of moolah & away I went!! I found an adorable Christmas tablecloth, some wooden bowls for salad, a quilted pillow, an 8 track of James Taylor & a set of old encyclopedias.

The James Taylor 8 track has a childhood favorite song on it..."You've Got A Friend" I just had to have it!!



Now one may wonder what in tarnation I would want an old set of encyclopedias for. Cuz I like reading em for funs sake!! Much to my surprise Pat told me she had a box in the corner for them. I went to grab the box & memories of my parents engulfed me. It was a Red Owl box!!! I remember on Saturday mornings going to our local Red Owl grocery store with Mom & Dad. It was located where our JC Penneys is currently.


I looked around more & what did I see but crocheted snowmen!!! I almost started to cry. I had just 2 nights prior found my Mom's pattern for such things & there were two similar ones in front of my face. I didn't buy them though...I plan on making a handful with Mom's pattern in time for Christmas.



After I returned with my fun rummage sale finds I cooked & canned 9 jars of the stewed tomatoes & began making applesauce & rhubarb jam. I ended up with a quadruple plus one batch of jam. What is 5 batches of jam called anyways? A pentagonal batch or perhaps a Cinco batch? Heckles if I know. I just call it a quad plus one.





These are a couple other things that remind me daily of my Mom...

Below is a picture of the afghan my Mom made that I sleep with every night. Yup, I'm a 32yr old kid who still needs a blankie. Actually I was in my 20's when my siblings gave me Mom's afghan. I had that "needing to sleep with a blankie" thing conquered before I was given this ultra fabulous blanket!!






Also, I inherited Mom's wedding dress. It was always a dream of mine to get married on her birthday & wear her wedding dress. When some people are shown our room they get the heebbie jeebies & think that Mom's wedding dress on the wall above our bed is eerie. I absolutly LOVE it & have a feeling of safety with it above me.




These "things" I speak of are just that..."things" I don't have too many memories of Mom, actually we didn't have the time in life to make oodles of fun, lasting Mom/daughter memories. I was 10 when both my parents died. But the memories I do have I hold tight & cherish & never allow myself to forget. It's all I have...things... to evoke memories. I wonder if memories of Mom will dance in my head as I sleep tonight.

How this gal gets her thrills!!

Our Farmer's Market is now starting to bloom with awesome produce & crafts & other baked & canned goodies.

Ken was home this afternoon so we both got to go. First we picked up more rhubarb, like 5 bunches of it. Ken just loves rhubarb & he has almost consumed all the jam I made!! With what I just bought we should be golden for quite awhile!! =)

I picked up some honkan HUGE radishes! Like for serious, they are the size of large carrots. The woman selling them used to belong to the Laide's Guild at Church with my Mom years ago. I recognized her but she had no clue who I was. We also picked up some romaine lettuce for us & some spinach for my tortoise =)

Speaking of my tortoise...her name is Chloe. Chloe Michelle to be exact. Ken really wanted to name her "Shelly" because of her shell skeleton. Total originality there! Anyways, my friend has been a foster Mom to Chloe for the past few months because we were on the road. Well, now with Ken back at Niagara & with me staying home more it's time for Chloe to come home!!! =)

There was a woman from a Farm in Iron Mountain selling fresh Free Range Chicken. The thought of the chickens not being penned up & not having anything injected into them totally appealed to us so we bought some breasts to try out.

Tomorrow I will be jammin 5 batches of rhubarb jam & making a big batch stewed tomatoes to can for future Ken's sketti meals. Did I ever mention what a fabulous cook Ken is? He's oober messy & doesn't clean up after himself but the dishes he makes have always been scrumptious!!

Why is it that most of the people who go to the Farmer's Market are 20 years or more older than me? Am I like one of the only people my age that get their thrills out of canning & preserving?

My bones hurt!!!

What a crazy busy day!! Started out running errands & finally sent a gift package out to Shash!! I stopped at our local Family Dollar to pick up some odds & ends for the camper & ended up with a cart full of goodies!! One such goodie was this adorable birdfeeder. I put it together when I got home & put it in the front flower garden.





After I did that I took several pictures of the flowers in bloom in my gardens =)













I also bought some stick on floor tiles. I planned on testing it out on our bathroom floor. We desperately need to remodel our retro bathroom with the olive green tub, toilet & sink but when we do that we have to gut it & do all the plumbing & electric which ties into the kitchen. So we want to re-do the whole back of our house & right now that is not affordable. But these tiles are a perfect bandaid for the totally UGLY floor that has been in there since we moved to this house. This is our 3rd summer here & I've despised the bathroom & kitchen floor for as long as I laid eyes on it. Sooo, this is what I was up to today...
The Before:




And After:



Once I finished that & was pleased with the results I hopped in the truck & bought 2 more boxes & set out to do the kitchen floor I so badly despised! When we put the new stove in we had to move our bar & when we did that this orange tile was exposed! GROSS!!! I just finished that task & am pleased with that project as well. My bones ache & I am flippen dizzy but it's done & looks swellacious!! =)


The Before:








The After:





Tomorrow I need to situate the rest of my house. Ken will be home sometime tomorrow & I can't WAIT for him to see what I did. He knows I did it... only because after I was finished I sent him a pic on his cell phone of the finished product. I'm so incredibly lucky & fortunate to have a husband that puts up with my spur of the moment projects!!!