Category Archives: family

Jun14

Maybe 3 is the charm

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Repairman #3 is here to try and fix our leaky air conditioner. It’s 11 and he’s been here for two hours and all he will say ‘is it has a leak’. I think he was prompted not to give out any info or comment on the previous two men who were here like #2 was saying #1 didn’t fix the problem. #2 then denied saying that. What a pain.

I got to the dentist by 9:45 and have my new crown now. The temp was starting to bother me, and the assistant said there was a gap between it and my gum.

I am going to a podiatrist on Monday as my foot hurts even to press down on the gas pedal. I want to make sure it’s checked out before our NYC adventure.

It’s really cool outside today. When I left for the dentist it was about 60. In a few days it will be 90 just in time for my two nephew’s graduation party.

My poor little niece Tori has been really sick with a strep throat. I need to call and check on her today. My Uncle wasn’t mad at my mom (she always thinks everyone is!), but he’s still not happy about his situation.

When my friend Angela was here last Saturday, I was going through the Longwood Gardens photos  here on the computer and we stopped and raved again about the Painted Tongue flower. I looked it up today and it’s an annual. One site said that the Victorians loved them. They also grow best in areas like Oregon.

Painted Tongue

Jun12

Happy 84th Uncle Don

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 Unfortunately my Uncle Don is in a state of turmoil right now. He was all set to go home and asked my brother Ken to get him. His stepdaughter said if Ken did that, it was going against the recommendations of the doctors and that he would be held responsible, so Ken didn’t go get him. He felt terrible and when he told my Uncle that he wouldn’t be getting him. Ken told UD that he wants him to be happy and that they would find a place that would work for him. There are retirement places around here that are fairly new. My mom sent for a booklet to check out the prices. You have to give them a $160K refundable deposit and it’s like 1k a month, but everything is done for you-no food shopping, cooking, mortages, bills, etc. My mom can’t really afford it, but my uncle could. He isn’t calling mom as he’s so disappointed about not going home. He would be so dependent on friends, family and neighbors for everything-food shopping, taking the trash out, getting the mail, that they would get sick of it. I wish him the best too.

Last night I planted a bunch of different sunflowers in the inner circle I have around the Zinnias, Mexican sunflowers and Cosmos. I don’t have high hopes for them as the deer or ground hogs will probably come along and eat them. I also tossed a row of basil in near the lilies. The basil I bought at the nursery is gorgeous right now.

So it’s the 12th of June and I haven’t planted any green beans or zucchinis. The only green beans seeds I have are from last year. This is the last thing I plan to get in. The weather is really iffy today with storms expected, so mom and I canceled Longwood Gardens. I have a sore foot anyway. I do have to go to the food store shortly and cash the check we got for Sean’s car being towed on Memorial Day. Bri had to have his car towed last year and forgot completely about getting insurance money back.

Have a great day!

Jun11

Not much new…

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…but the next few weeks will be hectic. Bri and Sean need to pick out their clothes for Karin and Michael’s wedding in NYC on the 23rd. I still can’t believe we’re going! The Tony Awards were on last night and made me hope to see the Broadway district even saying ‘I’m going to wet my pants’ when I see it-I hope not though!

I did some weeding yesterday, even in the veggie patch. Bri doesn’t know how lucky he is. We are using mulch and the hoe just got the ones sprouting up in a pinch. I think the particular weeds we get like harder soil and the dirt now is soft. The plants seem to like it. I’m big on mounding dirt around plants to give them root support too. I also need to plant a few more seeds. I hope I can get around to this sometime during this week between my hair appt, clothes shopping, the dentist, etc.

I’m waiting on the air conditioner repairman-again. Bri said there was a big pool of water under the unit there in the basement last night, big enough for the wet vac. I hope he shows up soon as because of this second visit, I have to postpone seeing mom.

Sean rented an interesting movie called ‘Fast Food Nation’. Don’t think I’ll be eating a hamburger anytime soon. There were some graphic scenes in the slaughterhouse. I know, the hamburger doesn’t appear magically on the sesame seed bun! But, it makes you think. I seem to need protein like red meat. Just warning you, some scenes I couldn’t look at.

So if you don’t see me here, I’m busy. I may even stitch a little graduation design for my nephew Patrick-getting the colors out for that. I wanted to do it for all the kids and he’s #3 out of 5.

Jun7

Sean’s unwired but wired

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Yeah! He’s got his laptop connected now so this baby is all mine during the day.☺A guy not much older than Sean hooked up the router and now we can have up to 5 connections to the web if we wanted to.

Sean was also offered a $1,500 scholarship from Barnes & Noble-to divide over the next two semesters. Every little bit helps. He needs to write a thank you note to someone at PSU for that.

My thrill today is a new garden cart that Sean picked up for me at Big Lots last night. My old one has a big crack in it. He gets a 20% off discount so that is nice. It’s lightweight and holds more too. I think we’ll get one for my mom too. If anything, she could put groceries in it and wheel them up to the front door.

It’s getting warm and sticky here. I’m still trying to clean-so hard. My lower back is bothering me today from the weedwhacking I did yesterday. Today I spray painted my wrought iron boot scraper/welcome ‘mat’ that is for the front door as the paint was all chipping off of it.

My Uncle Don wants to come home from the nursing home and my brother was going to go get him on Sunday. My uncle’s oldest stepdaughter said that he is going against the doctor’s wishes and that he can’t handle making him bed every day (his bladder is useless now) and taking his meds. If Ken brings him home, he’ll be held responsible if my uncle hurts himself. Of course my stubborn uncle said he would call a cab to bring him home. He’s so much like his mother! He’ll be turning 84 on the 12th. I hope he thinks about all the people that would like to help him but can’t really get to his house too often. My mom really can’t be going out there all the time and his stepdaughter’s husband is not well either. So hard.

Jun5

Happy 25th Anniversary

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To my brother Dave and sister-in-law MaryAnne!!

MaryAnne, Patrick and Dave
Their house with younger son Patrick before his junior prom last year. Patrick is about to graduate from high school and his older brother David is about to graduate from the Art Institute of Phila. with his degree in interior design. He did the family room at his parent’s house.

I also met Brian exactly 25 years ago today at their wedding. He’s MaryAnne’s first cousin.

For those of you married 4-5 years, it doesn’t take long to reach milestones like this.

I’m feeling somewhat better. My back is still a bit achy. I remember after I moved books and painted in the family room back in 2004, I suffered with arm and foot pain for at least a month. I tend to overdo things. I told Sean not to let me pull one weed in the week leading up to our trip to NYC as I want to feel great for Karin and Michael’s wedding. Poor Michael is having back pain himself and is on painkillers.

Off to the grocery store soon to fill up some bare cabinets.

May28

Whenever I see your smiling face…

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Tomboy Tori
I have to smile myself, ’cause I love you!
My high school pal just sent me this in the mail. Seems her granddaughter and my niece are on the same softball team called ‘The Pixie Chicks’ in our hometown. What a nice surprise.
We had a hectic early afternoon here. Sean’s car has been acting funny, meaning when he tried to start it. It finally died up at the high school where he was parked after watching the local Memorial Day parade. Luckily I found a tow place a few blocks away, but the price was high and Bri had it towed to a place that ripped him off last year. Why? We’re thinking it’s the starter or alternator. This is the intended vehicle we plan to take to NYC in a few weeks. If it had to happen, glad it did locally.
Off to mix up some potato salad.
Hope you’re having a nice day. ☺

May19

Gloom and chill

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The funeral for Bri’s Aunt Rose was today. He attended the viewing last night and left before we did this morning to go to the funeral home first. Sean and I picked up my mom and went right to the church. I just didn’t want to remember his aunt ‘that way’, you know? I showed my respect for her and my husband’s family which is really decreasing rapidly. I think with the one son’s wife’s family, there was only 40 people there. The kids (Sean’s age and a bit younger) are getting so big which makes us feel old. Soon we’ll be the oldest generation. Ugh. I got up to go to the restroom (at the restaurant), the mom of Aunt Rose’s daughter-in-law said loudly (so I could hear her) ‘Oh those are the people who didn’t go to the wedding’. I acted like I didn’t hear her. If Brian’s dad had gone last year to his nephew’s wedding (and the nephew begged him), then we would have gone too.

The church was the one we use to go to 20+ years ago when we lived in the area (we lived in the same apartment complex as Aunt Rose and Uncle John (also residents in the late 50s-early 60s were Dick Clark and Ed McMahon).

After the luncheon (at an Irish pub style restaurant-one of the dishes Shepherd’s Pie), we went to a Dollar Tree store across from the restaurant (ha) and then remembered that a great plant/product place was about 10 minutes away. I got 3 nice hanging baskets for $7.50 each (two toned pink petunia, multi-colored vinca and burgundy impatiens) , a gorgeous Christmas cactus and a clematis vine for $5.00. Good prices!

I came home and planted a few tomatoes (roma), green pepper and an eggplant before the early evening chill sent me in.

May16

Working hard part 2

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Today Sean and I went to my mom’s to wish her a belated Happy Mother’s Day and to plant some flowers for her. I need to go back to the nursery in Delaware as the garden centers around here aren’t that great-even Walmart! We stopped there and I couldn’t believe they wanted $10.88 for one hanging baskets. Guess I’ll be making my own. I did get a couple of waterlilies and a couple of perennials like asters.

So we get to my mom’s and I have never seen the yard around her house look so weedy and terrible. I had to fix her weed wacker and then I went to town with it! Most of her front yard isn’t fit for a mower, so you have to use a weed wacker. The leaves (mostly from Japanese maples) were never cleaned up from the fall so I did some of that. I would say that we made a nice dent in the yard and the flowers that I planted last year (white astible, white bleeding heart, hosta, lilies and barrenwort) were all coming up nicely. It was warm though breezy today. What my brother did to the back yard is really neat. Imagine a thicket of evergreens with the bottoms trimmed up and a new layer of green, green grass growing under them. It never looked like that when we were kids. (I’ll bring my camera next time).

Mom treated us to dinner at Carabbas which was nice. Glad it was dark in there as I had some grass still stuck to my legs! I had chicken, spinach and ricotta stuffed raviolis. We hit Macy’s and I bought some necklaces, a dress and a few tops.

We just found out that Brian lost his Aunt Rosemarie (she looked like Lucille Ball) on Sunday. She is also Brian’s godmother. She has two sons around my age and 3 grandchildren a bit younger than Sean. This is the auntie who was in a nursing home in Delaware, very close, yet Bri’s dad or Bri never went to see her. That is the last of my father-in-law’s six siblings. I am either going to the viewing on Thursday or the funeral on Friday as we have a 70 mile round trip from here.

Snowball bush beginning to bloom

Snowball bush beginning to bloom
My windowbox 2007
Windowbox 2007

May14

Mother’s Day rap up

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I didn’t get to spend the day with my own mom, but I promised her Sean and I would come down on Tuesday to plant a few annuals in the garden I fixed up for her last year.

I have terrible dry (and a bit itchy) allergy eyes. I thought it was from handling dusty Space Bags of my summer clothes, but I’m now thinking something is pollening that is bothering me. I am using both tears and allergy formula and it helps a bit, but looking at this screen is not easy. I’ll call the eye doctor if they aren’t better in a few days. I just have some circles under my eyes (what else is new).

I got two lovely cards today and one from my friend Terri in Alabama the other day-hers was a total surprise and so sweet. Sean’s was oversized and pink and flowery with sweet reflections of motherhood. Bri gave me a musical card that played ‘How Sweet it is’ by Marvin Gaye. (James Taylor also recorded it later on).

I asked Sean to drive to a garden center at a store in Delaware, but they didn’t have one this year. We ended up at Loew’s and their stuff was just ok. I got some tomatoes and a few flowers and bags of red mulch.

We grabbed a burger at Friendly’s and headed home.

I just watched the 3-hour long ‘Survivor’ finale and reunion while trying to finish up a redwork cross stitched piece. I was cheering for a 54-yr old man to win named Yau-man, but he got back stabbed as the remaining players knew he’d win if he was left in the ‘final three’. I miss talking about ‘Survivor’ with my estranged brother who enjoys it too.

So to end this nice weekend, here are some things I admire about my mom-her beautiful, trained soprano voice, her ability to pick up a pen, pencil or marker and sketch a portrait that resembles the person she is trying to capture (and from memory sometimes) and her love of giving, though that gets her in trouble sometimes. I told her once that Penelope Cruz could be her daughter more than me as she looks like mom a little. The next thing you know someone asks if we are mother and daughter and they say ‘I can tell’. What a nice compliment.

Mom on her 75th 9-23-05

Mom on her 75th birthday-9-23-05

and-Mom as a young mom with my grandmom and older brother Dave. (See how she looks like Penelope Cruz here? It’s clickable)
Mom as a young mom about 1955-56

I tried the edger tool that Brian just gave me (so long electric edger) and it works pretty good, but I can see me only using it after a rainstorm like we had last night.

May12

Photo hunt-Five

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Five of my favorite young people on this earth…

PSHunt
Grab the Scavenger Hunt code.Photo Theme. Join the blogroll. Visit participants.

5 of my most favorite people
My son, nephews and solo niece!

I am sorting winter and summer clothes. Not fun when it’s so gorgeous outside. I may stop once I get the clothes off the bed-I still have to swap out my footwear. I try to get rid of at least a kitchen trash can size bag of clothes every time I do the switch over.

Hey, I’m wondering what my readers do with their seasonal clothes? Are you lucky enough to have a huge walk-in closet? Aren’t you a person that saves that many clothes each year? I know I don’t wear them all, but some years I’m more of a sweater person than the next year.

I’d rather be gardening…