Part of the dinosaur exhibit
Gorgeous garden wedding with the tables in the middle of a pond!
Water sphere
Yellow themed garden
Waiting at the station-silly people!
Mar11
Category Archives: Me stuff
Mar11
Philly Flower Show-127 photos later
We had a nice time at the flower show today. We got to eat at the Reading Terminal Market and utilize the new camera to it’s fullest capacity. I won’t show you all 120+ photos, but here are a few of my favorites:
Brian and me at the entrance to ‘The Legends of Ireland’ Flower show. Mom and Sean were with us and he took this photo. (Um, Di pull your top down in the front there!)
A gorgeous arrangement and silver-what a combo!
Where we ate lunch as viewed from the Convention Center.
Mar6
16 children
On TLC last night the Duggar family special was on about them building their own dream house on 20 acres. 20 acres-so each of the 16 children could have an acre and build a home for themself someday. The dad and the bigger kids did a lot of the work themselves until it got too much and they called in a contractor. But what they did was amazing. Michelle the mom and the only non-J named family member was about to have baby number 16, so they wanted to get it finished.
(The names and ages of the Duggar’s children, and you’ll notice a pattern with their names, are: Joshua, 17; John David, 15; Janna, 15; Jill, 14; Jessa, 12; Jinger, 11; Joseph, 10; Josiah, 9; Joy-Anna, 8; Jeremiah, 6; Jedidiah, 6; Jason, 5; James, 4; Justin, 2; Jackson Levi, 1;Johannah, newborn.)
I think TLC came in and got a designer for them, sponsors, etc. Jim Bob is the dad (why do I think of The Waltons when I hear that name?) and is a real estate person. He must do extremely well. Michelle is the sweetest person. Talk about building a village! They remind me of Mennonites or Mormons, but are Southern Baptists who believe that God opens the womb. The girls wear long dresses and have long hair (mom too). What got me was the family closet. They all store their clothing in one room-bins for ‘dark socks’, etc. Mom has used heavy duty kitchen equipment that is worth $100k that they got for $11k. Mom is also the teacher. I must say all the children are extremely polite. The oldest son narrated the special and did an excellent job.
What have I been doing? Cleaning! I took down my winter snow scene yesterday and replaced it with my glass egg collection. I am having trouble finding Easter stuff. What else is new?
I have a pot of beef stew all set and I have to go mail auction items as tomorrow will be a snowy day-maybe. They say the roads may not get bad. Crossing fingers.
Mar4
Yucky and yummy
So what’s the worst thing that could happen to you that is house related? Not as bad as a fire, something you can clean up. What happened-Sean used too much toilet paper and I went in to use the facility. The water looked low, but I was in a hurry. I went to flush and you guessed it-geyser time! I was in my bare feet at least, but in my good dress slacks. I started yelling-get the plunger. Brian happened to have stepped outside. So Sean went running for the plunger just when the toidy let out a big gurgle and down ‘it’ went! We had water going through the floor into the basement. I had to first clean up the water with paper towels and then went over everything with antibacterial wipes-my poor back! We don’t have a huge bathroom, thank goodness. I have the little rugs to wash-tomorrow.
Bri went to the grocery store with me. He decided to go to the ‘cheaper’ store, which was really crowded. It was late, like 3:30 by that time. I decided to do a pasta salad with cut up turkey ham in it. Bri saw stewed tomatoes and wanted some. When I got home I cooked up the penne and the guys decided they wanted the stewed tomatoes and cut up ham on top of that (Sean doesn’t like mayo much). They loved it! I had what I originally envisioned-penne, ham, with mayo, dill, cheddar cheese and a bit of onion-plus a croissant. Not bad.
Tonight I enjoyed reading the People magazine about the Oscars with Patrick Dempsey and his new twin boys on the cover. So cute.
Tomorrow the snowbaby display in the big living room window is finally coming down and getting replaced with a spring display! I like the idea of switching it out every few months.
Mar3
Mom stuff
Did you feel the earth move today? I hopped in the van about 11:30 and went down to my mom’s to do a few things for her. Things that I feel bad that she couldn’t do for herself. One was putting the handle on her new vacuum cleaner. It took me a few minutes (remember I don’t read directions), but I got it. She got one of those bagless ones which is not good for someone like me with allergies. I donned a dust mask and went to town-after spraying all over with Lysol and Febreze. I had to empty it about 6 times as it had been a while since the place was vacuumed. She also wanted me to hang up a new phone, but a connector piece was missing. Both the wall plate and the phone only had spaces for those little snap in pieces. I put a slipcover on a chair and then had to leave. I had brought her half of a lobster salad sandwich. I had gotten baby lobster tails for Christmastime and never cooked them until yesterday. It was good! I think she enjoyed it. I also brought her a 8 oz can of coke which seemed to brighten her up a bit-sugar overload. I got to talk to my Uncle Don too which made me feel better. He sounds okay, a little tired but more like I expect him to sound. And mom really liked my Art Trading cards, especially the one I made for her. She said she can see why I like doing them. She showed me all the little watercolors she’s been doing from her watercolor a day calendar. I can see her getting better each day. I was glad to see her being creative.
I dropped by my brother’s on the way home with Roald Dahl books for Tori and a few other things I found in the room I am trying to turn into a craft area. I told them mom didn’t look good and her appetite was terrible. My nephew Kenny who is almost 11 is as tall as me now! Tori was cute and gave me several hugs.
When I got home, we went to church, picked up disgustingly big burgers (am feeling that!) and settled in for the night.
I talked to mom and she said she had cleaned off her end tables in the living room after her shower. I sure hope she gets her strength up so she can go to the Philly Flower Show sometime this week. That’s a lot of walking! Brian’s dad isn’t well either. So much to worry about.
No photo for ‘salty’ as call I could think of was pretzels and my jar of sea salt. Sorry!
Mar1
Bri and me
Sean took this with his cellphone camera. We went up to the restaurant in the next town and had dinner this past Saturday night to make up for not going out on Valentine’s Day. I have kinda puffy eyes. My sweater has some bugle beads on the bodice part and it’s 3/4 length-not bad for $7 from Walmart! ; ) Oh-here’s the photo from last year! As you’ll see the new curling iron I got this past Christmas did wonders for my hair!
Mar1
In a quandary
I really need to see my mom one of these days. She has been sick for over 3 weeks and I haven’t been down to her house to do anything (the weather hasn’t helped). Thinking about going makes me a bit tease. My sinuses and throat are really bothering me this week. The problem is mom hasn’t really done any cleaning for that length of time. I did gather up some dust masks because I really want to go! I guess I’ll resort to taking allergy medicine which I hate to do. This always happens to me at this time of year from the forced air heat and not getting out in the fresh air.
Sean and I were out yesterday on a whim. I had stuff to drop off at the Goodwill and I wanted to go to Michael’s crafts while Sean was in Old Navy. As soon as I hit Michael’s I got the ‘drip’ ‘drip’ and then the flow in my throat. Not fun. It was like a hurry up and look around and that’s not what I wanted to do at all. I should always have water on me. So I got some neat paper, stickers (that look like old postage stamps and some with wording on them); some varnish and ModPodge and glitter. Actually when I left the store and we went to Trade Joe’s, TJ Maxx and then The Olive Garden, I felt better. Probably they were using glue or something that bothered me in Michael’s.
So I’m up in the air. I miss mom so much and she’s sounded so sad. She never asks my brother to help and he’s within walking distance of her house. I feel this is so unfair. My other two brothers never call and she hasn’t heard from the one in Florida since November. He’s mad at me, why take it out on mom?
So I hope this ‘cottonball’ effect lets up. I really feel like my sinuses are stuffed with cottonballs. That was a good choice for my Photo Hunt picture this past Saturday-like I had a premonition!
I hope you all are feeling chipper.
~Update~Mom doesn’t want me to come down as her 750 mg a day antibiotic is making her feel terrible and she wants to rest. If she’d eat more, that may help. I told her to drink an entire bottle of water when she takes it at dinnertime. I was looking at last year’s late February entries and the same thing was going on- I hadn’t seen my mom for a few weeks and my sinuses were bothering me. I just used the miracle spray-BioAllers Homeopathic nasal spray and it helped a lot.
Feb27
That warm fuzzy feeling
After Heroes was over last night, a new show came on called the Black Donnelly’s. I tried to watch it for about 20 minutes and couldn’t get into it, so I switched over to find the Oprah Winfrey special about the all girl school she opened in South Africa. I was totally mesmerized by those sweet girls and how happy they were to be able to go to the wonderful facility that Oprah built after 5 yrs in the planning. The last photo that was shown, was Oprah in the middle and surrounded by a sea of smiles (every single girl!) teared me up big time. Oprah said that ‘all the girls are like her daughters’. This touched one girl whose mother left her when she was 4. I can see many lives changing now.
This special will be rebroadcast on Saturday, March 3rd so check your local listings.
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I’m doing a little ‘me’ pampering tonight-I couldn’t get a hair appt until 6 tonight and I called a week ago! Cruella DeVille and I could be sisters! I guess my stylist is getting too popular. I plan to shop at a local office supply place for some art card supplies (I’ve made 32 ATC now) and then go to Subway to pickup dinner so I don’t have to cook and run out the door.
My mom is still unwell. She said she was wheezing a lot last night. She has a doctor’s appt at 3. Wish her well as this is about her 3rd week of this illness.
I went and started a new cross stitch project when I have two looming deadlines. Not to worry, the house round robin is nearing completion as I need to finish the garden area in front of the house. The bee and flower for Love Quilts is fine-the poor bee needs it’s wings! I’ll put an updated photo above soon. What I started was a heart shaped design filled with butterflies. My mom gave me the two packages of DMC linen floss for Christmas and they both came with free designs. The fabric I am using is from Sugar Maple-a blend of pinks, greens and a little yellow and blue. It’s a cashel and very nice to work on.
It’s in the 40s today, so down right tropical. Go away snow and ice! Bri almost fell in the driveway this morning as it must have done something during the night.
Feb23
Just for fun
Good way to keep awake tonight!
Feb23
Lake Stitcher and I are on parallel planes
Lee over at Lake Stitcher also grew up in Pennsylvania, but further northeast from me. Every place I mentioned this week, she had been there and could relate. I thought that was pretty neat. She even went to the Villas in NJ and my sister-in-law’s mom also has a house down there. When Lee mentioned that she knows the person who owned Poor Richard’s Inn down in Cape May, I thought that was more that coincidence. I mean of all the places down there! I’ll mention a few places and let’s see if she’s been to: King of Prussia mall and Valley Forge National Park. I bet she has!
Have a great weekend!
Collages & Creative Goodness 
