Vivid Colors!

May I present Ellie in VIVID COLOR!

Remember back when I was talking about some color in MY life? Well, here's the gorgeous hat and scarf set my friend, Sharron, crocheted for me for my birthday.

While the kids were visiting, I decided to let Ellie model the set. When I tried it on, Jonathan said I looked like a bag lady. I believe that Ellie, however, carries off those bright colors with a certain panache. I mean, just look at this face!

Cute kid with a "distinctive and stylish elegance" - even in such VIVID COLORS!

Okay, even if you don't believe it's elegant, you must agree the model is fabulous, and the hat and scarf set is fun and... well, BRIGHT!

Thanksgiving in Florida

I'm sitting in a motel room in Bryon, Georgia, watching the BAMA/Auburn game (sort of) and working on my computer. Jess, of course, is avidly keeping track of the action.

My laptop is being obstreperous. I made the mistake of telling Debra what a good computer it's been, except for needing a new lamp for the LCD screen display, and now I have two problems. First off, it doesn't want to stay on electric power and flips back over to battery power, which means the screen dims, and of course, the battery is losing power.

Secondly, the "n" key isn't working right now. Most of the time it doesn't work at all and I have to go back and hit the key HARD to put the "n" in a word. Or if it does put the "n" in the words, it sometimes puts in TWO of them. ARGH!

But about our Thanksgiving visiting - it's really too bad we have to spend more time on the road than we can spend visiting. We started for Florida on Tuesday, and got there on Wednesday afternoon, so we did have some time to visit that day.

Thursday, of course, was Thanksgiving. Dave and Debra had a house full of people with their six, Dave's mother (Lucille), sister and brother-in-law (Becky & Dave), plus Jess, Randy and myself. Emily's boyfriend (Ryan) was also there for a while, and also Lee's girlfriend (Cheyenne). Like I said, a full house!

We had a good time with lots of good food. We also played a couple of games. Dave emceed a Thanksgiving Trivia Game. It had a lot of interesting facts. Some I knew, some were a complete surprise. Becky and Dave B. tied to win that one.

Then we played another game Debra worked on. She had trouble getting us all to do the prep work and get our facts in ahead of time to her... we were supposed to come up with a fact we thought most people wouldn't know about us. She finally got a fact from everyone, read them, and we had to guess who we thought did that particular thing.

That was pretty interesting! My fact was that I had spent a summer working in an insane asylum (not a patient mind you, a worker)! Jess's fact was that when he was in high school he was selected as a page for the state legislature. Cool, huh?

Most of us were lost, and only figured out 3 or 4 facts for the 12 people playing. Ryan was on a roll and got 6 right, so he won that game!

It was an all-around very nice day. Dave has a great family, and of course, so does Debra, ha!

Friday was a super neat day. Dave and Debra borrowed a pontoon boat from friends, and the adults - Dave, Debra, Randy, Jess and me - spent a big part of the day on the river.

I have pictures of scenery, birds, turtles AND some alligators! I'll get those ready once we get home and put them up on the Rural Ramblings site. I think everyone had a good time tooling around on the water and seeing the sights. I know Jess and I really enjoyed it! I'm paying for it today, and the pain in my side has been giving me fits, but it was worth it.

Jess also got to go to one of Ryan's football games last night, a regional play-off, and they WON! GOOOOO RYAN!!!! I wish I could have gone, but Jess discouraged me from trying it. He didn't think I'd fare too well, and he's probably right. I hated to miss it though. I'm not a sports fan, but I'm a fan of our super-duper grandkids and would have liked to be able to cheer him on!

We went over to Sanfords this morning before we left to say good-bye, as did Randy. It was so nice to see Sanfords and Randy this week, but unfortunately, it was time to get started home. Jess has some work to do this coming week, and then the next week he'll be having surgery.

There never seems to be enough time for the fun stuff!

Happy Birthday Jesse!

Happy Birthday Jesse B. King!

Today is Jesse’s birthday. We celebrated by going out and finding him a chair he can get in and out of after he has knee surgery. Somehow, that doesn't sound like much of a party, does it?

We found a pub stool with arms, and of a height to fit the criteria for ease of sitting and standing up from it. I’m just not so sure how comfortable it’s going to be. Anyway, we bought it, and Jess put it together this afternoon. (We're not talking high class furniture here.)

We also looked at pecan trees. Jess has wanted another for some time so I thought that would be a good birthday present. We went on down to Bennett’s Nursery while we were out and checked out their supply. They don’t have a lot of pecan trees, but they have 3 or 4 varieties. The only problem is figuring out which one to buy that will pollinate the one we already have.

Jess was shocked at the prices. I wasn’t. I had a pretty good idea what a bigger tree would cost. We didn’t buy one today, but only because we wanted to double check what kind the survivor of the two we had is.

Otherwise, it’s been a pretty quiet birthday for Jess. He got a lot of phone calls from people wishing him happy birthday, but the real fun will come later when we visit in Florida over Thanksgiving.

Now, to reminisce about Jess’s childhood, and just to prove there is at least a slight possibility he really did walk uphill in the snow, both ways to school, and in his bare feet, here’s a picture of him and his younger brother, Kenneth.

And since that doesn’t show their faces very well, here’s another picture of two cute little boys:

Both are now capable of senior moments. My, how time flies.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JESS!

Latest Update

Latest Update on Family Happenings . . .

It’s been a while since I posted an update on family happenings, so here we go!

First off, Jess and I had a great trip to West Virginia. The train trip wasn’t as good as the first one we took, mostly due to the mix-up in NOT getting a domed car, but we still enjoyed it. I didn’t get many pictures, but there’s a few on the Rural Ramblings site.

We traveled on up north to Maria, Scott & Caleb’s house the following Sunday and visited. Dad came down after church, so we were all there and as the small-town columnists would say, “A good time was had by all.” We went out to supper at a new steakhouse in the Parkersburg area, then Jess and I followed Dad up to his house and spent the night.

The next day the three of us headed over to Buckhannon, WV. Dad had expressed an interest in seeing the West Virginia State Wildlife Center, and that sounded like fun to us too, so off we went. It was a pretty neat place, and since it was a weekday in October, we were the ONLY visitors. Cool!

Yeah, it was cool both literally, and figuratively, ha! I got an extra pair of pants out of the suitcase in the trunk while we in the parking lot, and pulled them on right there, before we started out on the trail. If you want to read more about the Wildlife Center, I posted about it over on Rural Ramblings.

We stayed overnight in Buckhannon, and imagine our surprise when the next morning it was snowing! We so rarely see snow anymore, we just hadn't thought about seeing any in October.

Since the weather was cold and blustery, we ditched our idea of going to Jackson Mills, and opted to visit a glass blowing place nearby instead, Hinkle Glass.

They have a big gallery full of their work, and Hinkle and two fellow workers, do an amazing job blowing glass. Once again, we were the only people there. We enjoyed watching the guys at work for quite some time, and chatting with them. They were making Christmas ornaments while we were there. I bought one as a souvenir, plus a little glass mushroom that caught my fancy.

We drove home in more snow than we’ll likely see down here in way southern Tennessee for the rest of the year.

Dad treated us to supper at The Fireside in St. Marys. They have some really good eats there!

We headed home the next day. It was tough leaving Dad behind. I wish we lived closer. I’m not much use to him when he needs help since I’m so far away. Having our families flung all over in two countries is a real bummer sometimes. It's hard to get around to seeing everyone when they're in different directions, like Canada, West Virginia, Oklahoma, Tennessee and Florida, and also try to squeeze in a little "just us" vacation time.

Since we’ve been home it’s back to the routine, plus getting ready for company. Richard, Chrystie and Ellie will be flying into Huntsville late Tuesday evening and staying for a few days. I’ve been making sure sleeping places are cleared out, and Jonathan and I are going grocery shopping later this afternoon. The kitchen has a case of 'Mother Hubbard’s cupboards' at the moment!

Now for more people specifics….

Jess: He has been super busy at work. A couple of people called him while we were still in West Virginia, so he was busy the minute he went back to the office, and is still swamped. He’s trying to get as much done as he can before he has knee surgery December 8th.

He got the permanent crown for his lower tooth, but wouldn’t you know, even with a mold the lab didn’t get it right and even with lots of grinding and finagling, the dentist could NOT get Jess’s lower partial to fit back with the new crown in place. So they’re making a new lower partial plate, and he won’t have it until Wednesday morning. In the meantime, he’s eating lots of SOFT food since he doesn’t have any bottom molars!

Me: I’ve been working on the house and calendars. That about sums it up, ha! I plan on getting back to “work” work after the Canadian contingent’s visit.

I have, however, spent a fair amount of time working on computers. I tried and tried again to get the sound back on the desktop, but only got as far as an occasional system sound (beep). Jonathan has looked too, and at one point we tried installing new drivers, but nothing we’ve done has got it working again. It’s about time to call in professional help I guess.

For a while I was without sound on either computer. My laptop got goobered up while we were traveling and wouldn’t connect to the internet. No YouTube! No tutorials! I spent several hours working on that, and finally found a discussion on a tech forum that gave me the right info on how to fix that particular error. It took hours and hours of frustrating searching before I found out how to fix it, and maybe five minutes to actually correct the problem once I knew how. I am not a good tech person!

Jonathan: He’s getting ready to go on night shift this week. During the Christmas shopping season, Toys R Us gets in a lot of trucks full of goodies. It’s too busy during the day to try to have someone stocking shelves, but the regular night guys don’t have the necessary security clearance to go in the “R Zone” where the electronics and games are. That means they have to put someone on nights for a while to keep up with the new stock coming in, and Jonathan always volunteers because it’s better pay and less hassle.

And there you have it, the latest happenings from our part of the world!

My New Look

Several people have asked for a picture of me since I got my hair cut. I don't know, maybe they have an invasion of mice and need something to print out to scare them away or something. For whatever reason, here's the only picture I've had taken since I got my hair whacked off.


Jess took this picture of Dad and me right before we left to head back home. That's Dad's living room in the background. You can see the Ohio River through the patio door behind Dad.

At any rate, for those of you curious about my new look, ta da! There ya go.

Of stain, a baby & fireworks!

Jonathan and I actually got with the program Sunday afternoon and stained the door and trim for the bathroom. It was a major project, not because it took so long to stain everything – it didn’t – but because we had an awful time trying to get the stain to match the existing woodwork. It’s got a “Honey Spice” stain, which has just a hint of red in it, so no matter how much we darkened the natural stain with the “Golden Oak”, it wasn’t going to look just quite the same.

Finally I remembered I’d used a cherry colored stain for the aviary in our living room, and ferreted out a can of it in the basement. After several tries of mixing the three shades, we finally got something that looked close to the same color as the cupboards.

While we were working on that, Jess went down to Huntsville to see Jason and the new baby, before heading to church.

Meet Sara Beth King, born May 28th, 2008.

He visited with the three of them for a while, and snapped a bunch of pictures.

Jason and Katie Sharp

Then he headed back up to FRBC for the big 4th of July celebration. They had all kinds of food and games and a HUGE fireworks display.

It was pretty late by the time Jess made it home from all his frivolities.

We all had a full day of activities!

We're on a roll taking pictures!

Yesterday we did pictures of Ellie with a "Little Red Riding Hood" costume, and Winnie the Pooh Bear. Today we've already got pictures of Ellie as a scarecrow and as a 70's hippie chick.
I'm planning on this one being in a Woodstock kind of photo.

We've got plans for a couple more pictures later today, so like I said, we're on a roll!

Picture This!

Yesterday I got an email from a friend of mine who is a missionary in Africa. She wanted a picture of me to show to a mutual new friend living there. I started searching through past blog entries to find a good one (that’s really an oxymoron), and noticed I never finished making on-line slideshows of pictures I took while Dad and I were in Alaska.

That got me rather sidetracked, as I finished going through pictures from our time visiting Glacier Bay, Saxman Native Village, Ketchikan and Victoria. I discovered I hadn’t even discarded the obvious flawed pictures (blurred, bad lighting, etc.), so those got deleted as I picked through to find ones I wanted to re-size and put on-line.

By the time I finished that, I was tired of working on the computer, so I never did got around to finding pictures of myself, aside from a couple taken while I was in Alaska.

After doing morning chores outside and inside this morning, I needed to get some snail mail done, so once again I got sidetracked. FINALLY though, I got the letters out in the mail and sat down at my desktop computer to look for pictures.

Easier said than done.

For one thing, my hard drive was getting so full I decided I needed more room to store pictures. I have an external hard drive for back-up, but I like my pictures saved to at least TWO places, so if one fails, I don’t lose everything. When Richard was visiting back in November, he installed a new, second internal hard drive for me, and now that’s where I store one set of my pictures.

I said all that to explain one of the reasons it’s so difficult to find pictures. I moved most off the original hard drive (“C”) to the new hard drive (“F”), and I also have older ones backed up on the external hard drive (“G”). As usual I was short on time, and didn’t sort and organize the pictures as I should have. So it’s a hodgepodge of files that needs a good sorting… sometime.

For another thing, finding pictures of me is hard, well, because there aren’t that many. I’m usually the one BEHIND the camera, so I have lots and lots of pictures of Jess and family and friends and pets and farm animals, but me? Not so much.

Here's a picture Sharron took of me with my camera on one of her visits to the farm. (I shudder to think what might happen now that she has her own nifty digital camera!) She's not afraid to get out there and get dirty, so there's no telling what we might get into when she visits. This time, we happened to have a new goat kid.
I finally came up with 7 pictures for a photo page: 1 that Richard took, 1 that Sharron took, 1 that I set the timer and took myself, and 4 that a photographer took. I'm including a link to my page of pictures, just in case you want some photos capable of killing any vermin in your home.

So here ya are... just picture this.

Going Green for Christmas

Richard called yesterday to wish us all a Merry Christmas, and one of the things we talked about was decorating for Christmas. Or to be more precise, my LACK of decorating for Christmas.

A few years ago I bought an artificial tree on sale at Lowe's after Christmas. It's about 4' tall, with fiberoptic strands that turn different colors, and a string of miniature lights. It costs all of $20 if I remember correctly.

This year, I put a Christmasy tablecloth over a teacart (family heirloom - not something I'd go out and buy!) and had Jonathan carry this little tree up from the basement and plop it down on the cart. Jess found an extension cord for it, and Viola! I was finished decorating for Christmas.

Okay, so the tree isn't exactly 'going green' for Christmas, but I've had it for years, so I used it. But take a look at the packages. You won't see any fancy Christmas wrapping paper there!
No, instead I used the paper bags that you put frozen groceries in to keep them from thawing out while you finishing shopping and an old roll of priority mail tape. Not to mention reusing some plastic bags from stores, and a pillowcase or two.

No fancy paper, no bows, no lights or other decorations all over the house. We didn't use up a lot of throw-away wrapping paper or electricity. Instead we recycled paper bags, and used very few lights. We conserved trees and energy. We 'went green' for Christmas.

It has nothing to do with the fact I just didn't feel like decorating. Or that I was maybe a bit of a Scrooge. Nope, we were doing our bit to 'go green' and help the environment.

That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

A note about the pictures in this blog...

Regarding the previous post, with the photo of the moon and poem -- Jess informed me I should make note that I took the picture and wrote the poem.

Okay, here's my note: Everything on my blogs - all the writing, all the pictures - are my own, unless I say otherwise. I believe in giving credit where credit is due, so if I use a photo or anything from another place, I say where I got it.

So now you know!

Merry Christmas!!!

Our Calendar Girl

I finally got the copy I ordered of Ellie’s 2008 calendar earlier this week. This calendar is HUMONGOUS! It doesn’t fold in the middle like last year’s calendars, so it comes in a really big cardboard sleeve. I guess that might be part of the reason it took a week to arrive, instead of the 2-3 days it’s supposed to take for priority mail.

The pictures came out GREAT!!! (Okay, I see little bits here and there I might change – I never think a picture is perfect, but I think they’ll look pretty good to anyone else.)

I spent some time going over the calendar and “proofing” it. I got out a commercially produced calendar and double-checked the dates. Richard and I checked and re-checked them… and yet, there it was, the dates were wrong for the start of spring and fall. HOW DID THAT HAPPEN???

Our nerdiness came back to bite us in the butt. When we were checking dates for the calendar, there we were sitting at our computers, so how did we check them? Why, we looked on the web, of course!

When I went back and checked again on the web, trying to see how we managed to mess up those dates, I figured out where we went wrong. On the web, the dates were listed for UT time. Uh-oh. Universal Time is the time along the prime meridian (0 longitude) that runs through the Greenwich Observatory outside of London, UK.

That’s not where we’re located, now is it? So on a couple of the dates, the time was just enough different that in one case the season started a day earlier here, and in the other, a day later.

Back to the publishing site, fix the dates, let it re-convert the files, and end up with a NEW and IMPROVED version of the calendar.
Richard did this picture. Isn't it cute?!!!

After I got it all fixed up, I input all the orders we’ve received so far, plus ones I wanted.

It’s a great looking calendar. If you’d like a calendar of one very cute little girl, don’t miss out!

We sold our first calendar!

We've already got our first order (thank you Linda)!!! We're hoping for great things this year, so it's nice to have already made a sale, even though we haven't got our first copy to proof it.


I took this picture of Starbucks when I was in Seattle, Washington. And yes, the dog was there, and I don't know what he was looking at - maybe hoping for his master's return? At any rate, it worked well, and makes it look like he's looking at Ellie, who of course is "Photoshopped" into the picture.

The first Starbucks opened in Seattle in April of 1971, so I thought this was just the picture for the April page of the calendar!

Give me a frappuccino please!

Calendars for Christmas

The calendar is finished, and I finally finished the sales page. You know what the hardest part is? Deciding on the price. We aren't a big charity organization that can place large orders and cut costs. So this calendar costs more than one that can be purchased at Walmart or some other stores. But it's also bigger and has thicker paper. It's a quality calendar.

Then there's the fact this is a FUND RAISER. When someone purchases a calendar, they not only get a calendar, but contribute to "Ellie's Medical Expenses Fund."

So after much debating, I finally settled on a price and finished the sales page.

Don't clown around - get a calendar!!!

I'll be interested in seeing which size calendar most people prefer, last year's smaller size with the flimsier paper, or this year's bigger calendar with heavier paper.

I know I have to buy a few extra calendars for Christmas gifts! Oh wow! That's the next project - December and Christmas is coming up fast!

As usual, I've got more to do than time and energy to do it!!!

Every month is finally finished...

Did we just get home Sunday? Yeah… well… it’s been a frenetic couple of days! I’ve jumped back in to the usual farm chores, been to the grocery store, and been pushing, pushing to finish up Ellie’s 2008 calendar.

And hooray! It’s finally done! Jonathan helped me put the finishing touches on February’s page this morning. Richard did the cover and the December calendar page, plus took the picture that became the June calendar page. He helped putting the holidays/events on the calendar. We emailed back and forth the biggest part of the day, fine-tuning pictures, captions and holidays.

We finally declared it finished, and I’ve got one ordered to hold in hand and double check it, though it should look like the PDF “ready to publish” file.

"Dah-ling, I can't wait to get my Oscar for Cutest Actress!"

I’ve been working on a sales page and should have that ready soon.

Now, to get to work on the neglected house, cooking better meals, Christmas stuff, health routines, snail mail… gee, I may have a hard time finding anything to do now….

NOT!

Happy Thanksgiving & Happy Birthday!

Happy Thanksgiving to all our family and friends!

Happy Birthday to Jesse B. King!!!

Here's he is in a picture I took yesterday, playing pool with son Randy, and son-in-law, Dave.

And then enjoying some time singing along with Emily as she plays the piano!
Today we go visiting some more, eat some more, and otherwise have a great day!

You all do the same! HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

There's a bird in my dishwasher...

Okay, so there's not one there NOW, but there was:

I was busy in another room packing stuff, when I heard our parrot going "Hello, hello" from the kitchen. When I went to investigate, there she was, perched on the dishwasher door I had opened to allow the dishes to dry, investigating what she could "get into."

Our conversation went like this:
Me: What are you doing?
Bird: What are YOU doing?
Me: You know you're not supposed to be there.
Bird: "Soooo????"

Now to truly appreciate that, you'd have to hear her say it. She's imitating MY voice, and the exact tone I use when the guys have aggravated me about something and I say, "Soooo???"

She says it with an ATTITUDE, and she knows what she's saying.

Never a dull moment!

All Keyed Up

The scent of Hawaiian Banana Pineapple bread is drifting through the house. I had a bunch of over ripe bananas, having obviously bought way too many for little Miss Ellie to eat up while she was here. I also had some leftover pineapple, so decided to try out a new recipe. After Thanksgiving I have to totally eliminate sugar from my diet for 3 months, so I won’t be doing any baking of sweets. So for now, I’m keyed up, ready to try something new from the oven.

I’ve been working on Ellie’s 2008 calendar today. I got 3 new pictures done, or thought I did. When I tried to upload one of them, it turned out the file was corrupted, and I’m going to have to rework it. Bummer!!!

Fortunately, I had some good advice earlier today (thanks Jonathan!) about saving the file while it was still in layers, then make a new file for the flattened image. I’ll still have some work to do, but not nearly as much as if I’d had to start all over!!!

I’m all keyed up about the calendar though. I think it’s going to be not only bigger, but even better, than last year’s calendar. I think the picture I finished today for March is going to be one of my favorites.
What's left? I’ve got to rework the one that got messed up somehow, then I have three more to work up. Finding or creating backgrounds for some of these takes a LOT of time, sometimes as much time as working up the picture itself.

Also today, Jess took our car to the dealer for some work, and while he was there, he had them make another key. Mind you, it costs $75 for a new key, and that does NOT include the remote. Nope, just an ignition key.

But now I have a key for the car again, so I’m all keyed up!

Bloopers!

I took lots and lots of pictures for Ellie's 2008 calendar. Considering you only need 12 for a calendar year, after saving back the ones I think I'll use, there are still a lot left over.

To see a slideshow of some of our "better bloopers", click on the picture below.

The good, the bad, and the funny -- we had a good time taking ALL the pictures!

Trick or Treat!

We have company, hooray, hoorah!

Last night we dressed Ellie up in a Care Bear outfit, and took her around for her first Trick or Treat experience.

Finally, having that subdivision close by was a bonus!Of course, everyone commented on what a cute little girl Ellie is! How perceptive of them!!!

Look what I got!

And the Triumphant Trick or Treater returns home, after bagging a bunch of goodies!