Guess Who Came to Lunch!

Melany, Wade, and Erin paid us a visit today. Melany is off this week for Spring Break at Rutherford County Schools (Murfreesboro,TN)so she had a little extra time. Wade also took off this week so he came along. And, they brought along Erin, our oldest grandchild (23). We had a nice visit. We were celebrating two birthdays...mine from a couple of weeks ago...and Melany's which is next week. Guess you could say that we also celebrated Wade's too as his is the same day as mine...but we had already given him his present. Melany and I were the ones who got present today. They brought things for the yard for me...new bird houses, bird feeder, and a pretty spinner for the garden. We had a traditional New England Boiled Dinner (can you tell that we like corned beef, cabbage and the rest of the fixings?). Melany and Wade brought dessert...cheese cake and cookies. The neighbors (Nathan, Kathy and family)filed through and got some dessert too. We had had it around St. Patrick's Day and so had Melany, Wade and Erin. Woody had found some really good corned beef briskets on sale and we couldn't resist indulging again! We sat around and talked and walked around in the yard. I forgot to snap a picture at lunch, but remembered after lunch when we were sitting in the family room...it ended up being at a rather odd angle since I was trying to get everyone in and we were spread all over the room. Isaac spent some time over here since he didn't have school. He enjoys his cousin Erin as she helps him play some of the games on his handheld game system. The rest of his family had lessons plus their music lessons (violin (Kathy & Esther) and piano (Abigail & Joy). So we didn't get to all visit the way we sometimes do. Even though Melany has Spring Break she still has to teach the college classes that she teaches and she teaches one on Saturday. They will be able to come back on a Saturday in a month when her Motlow classes are over. I keep thinking that today is Saturday since they usually come on Saturday! I took a break from what I was doing to come up to blog. What I was doing was deboning chicken thighs (oh, boy). Not my favorite job! BUT...I got some items in the mail today which included a new boning knife and does it ever make a difference to have a nice sharp knife meant for the job...much easier. Melany, Wade, and Erin left late afternoon to head on to Cookeville to see our oldest grandson, Alex (19)and take him out to supper. So they have made the rounds for meals today...breakfast=Murfreesboro, lunch=Tullahoma, supper=Cookeville. They took Alex some of the cheesecake and cookies too. I know that he will be happy! I will end with the story about the stuffed tiger that is on the back of the couch in the pictures. Erin found him before Christmas and decided to buy him and add him to the "pickle present" that Woody and I do each year. The tiger was well received and much loved by especially the youngest, Joseph. He even marched off with it to take home when our family Christmas celebration was over.(Usually the pickle presents stay at our house.) Tiger lived happily next door, until suddenly his little owner, Joseph, started being afraid of him. So tiger took up residence back at Grammy and Goosey's. I had even hidden him so Joseph wouldn't find him. Today Erin found him and I suggested that she take tiger home with her for a while and tame him so he won't frighten Joseph! She happily took him home with her as she had had a bit of trouble giving him up at Christmas as she had rather taken a fancy to him. So the tiger roams tonight! And, now I bid good bye to March. See you in April...unless I'm fooled!

Thursday Doings

Thursday started out pretty much as usual. I had school time with Isaac and Joseph. Then it was reading time with Elijah, Esther, and Joy. It was Esther's long time today and she forgot for a while...but got over in time to do some more on her cross stitch picture and then worked a bit with Osmo and tangrams. While I was waiting for Esther to come over I got started on tomorrow's lunch. If things go as planned, we will have company for lunch tomorrow...more about that tomorrow! Woody spent a good part of the morning outside. He continues to work on both our yards (ours and Nathan and Kathy's). After lunch, I started doing a few things to get ready for tomorrow...a little dusting, a little vacuuming, a little mopping...in other words I'm not doing a lot of anything...as little as possible to get ready! These days that is about all the energy that I have to get ready for something (minimal energy!). Woody went for a four-mile walk this afternoon. I think that I napped for part of that walk! I left the vacuuming of the family room for Woody...and I just heard something that I couldn't figure out what the sound was...I have decided that perhaps it is the vacuum running below me! I have a couple more things to do this evening and then I will pretty much leave the rest to do in the morning. I can't believe how little of March is left! Once again I am reminded that time flies when we're having fun...and even if we're not!

Barn Tour Continues

I am still going through the pictures I took when Marie and I went on our "barn excursion" on the 17th. Now that the computer is fixed it is ever so much easier to get them up on the laptop screen and do a tweek here and there...crop, lighting, color, straighten, etc. and sometimes I use some crazy filter to make them more artwork than photo.

Some are tumble down and might just be a pile of wood the next time that we make a pass by...some will be hidden by vines and other growth and won't be able to be seen from the road. Almost all the pictures that we took this time were taken from the car either looking out the windshield or out an open side window...sometimes taken while the car was moving. Often the color isn't the greatest due to glare, etc. and that is where photo software comes in to remove the glare and improve the color. Most that I post I do some sort of "fix." Every camera is different and some make things more blue than they should be...some more green, etc. There is a place in my software that you can click on something that is black, gray or white and it will correct to proper color tones...and it works most of the time...makes photos look more natural. The top picture tonight had a large wire running through part of the sky...I just cropped the wire out...there is a way that you can color over the wire and it won't show...takes less time to crop it out! The other thing that I can do is straighten a picture that seems to be on a slope...sometimes the slope is really there and other times it is the way I hold the camera...one of my shoulders is lower than the other so I often don't hold the camera level...my cameras do have either levels or lines that let me line things up straight..but often especially when just snapping from a car quickly I don't get it level...so I can make them level with the software. Lots of tricks behind each of the photos that I post! Today Woody worked quite a bit in the yards again...he continued to work on Nathan and Kathy's yard. I had school this morning. Abigail and I worked on making instructions with photographs that we snapped with the iPad. This is an iPad project and sometimes the app we are using was cooperative and sometimes not. In the end we got four pages to print and they look pretty good. Then we got hung on a couple of the last pages...hopefully we can complete this project when we meet next (if iPad cooperates). Technology and I seem to be butting heads lately! Woody went to Aldis and Krogers this morning and stopped at WalMart to buy some seeds to plant parsley and lettuce. I ate lunch and put away groceries at the same time...sometimes one needs to multitask! After lunch I headed off to work in the church library for a couple of hours. Donna and I got quite a bit done, but did run into a snafu with one of the computers in the library and the printer...we left that to solve for another day. I had had enough of messing with technology for the day. Woody's exercise for the day was working in the yard. Some of the neighbor grandchildren came over late this afternoon and played school in the school room. They had fun, but they had quite a bit to pick up in order for us to be able to have school in the room in the morning. It took a while, but they did a good pick up job. The front porch rockers got used by quite a few on this quite warm day. If any of you are out and about..."come set a while!" This is perfect porch sitting weather...Elijah, Esther and Joy and I chose to read sitting on the porch glider this morning. Nice!

Besides Barns...

Besides barns on our photography trip, Marie and I saw some interesting livestock. Tonight's photo is an example...what a face...not the cleanest of the cows we saw! Today has been a pretty ordinary Tuesday. Tullahoma City Schools are back in session so Isaac spent the morning with me while his mommy went to her Bible study and Nathan and the rest had juggling practice. Isaac had a great morning in the school room and then we did some other things, but today he mainly wanted to work with the school equipment that we have. He did his weekly paid chore for me: vacuumed the stairs with my little Dirt Devil handheld vac. He started this job for me last week. He wanted to earn some money so I decided that this was a job that would help me out. Woody walked to the pharmacy to pick up a prescription for each of us. I think that he made that walk into a four-mile walk also, but not sure. He doesn't usually take a four-mile walk on Tuesdays because he walks to and from the prayer room at church on Tuesday evenings. That's where he is now (and thus I can't ask about a four-mile walk earlier in the day). He worked out in the yard a lot today. He continues to plant grass seed in the neighbor's yard (Nathan and Kathy's). I think that perhaps he is trying to prove the theory that the grass is really greener on the other side of the fence! I know that our other neighbor's yard is greener than ours. At this rate he will make ours look even worse than it already does. Our yard grows moss very well and at a point it will grow clover...but grass is hard to come by...though, he has been planting some of that grass seed in our yard. He is attempting to get grass to grow around the stepping stones that connect our house with Nathan, Kathy and the grandkids' house. I decided that I was going to do some sewing this afternoon. I got bogged down when one of my software programs for sewing wouldn't work due to the recent trip to the tech. I did manage to get it back to running...but was a bit stressed out when it was a bit stubborn and it looked like it was going to install a lower version than I had. But after wiping out any evidence that I had ever had it and redownloading it onto the laptop...in the end there it was again...correct version and all. I have another sewing software that I am sure had the same thing happen to it, but just couldn't face attempting to fix it today...as Woody says...don't do it till I need to use it. At least today's problem ended up as "all's well that ends well!" And, I did get one design stitched out for the project that I am planning. Oh, and no hail last night...just a lot of rain and lightning and thunder.

More Storms Predicted

We have already had a storm roll through and they say that we aren't out of the woods yet that there are probably more to come before the evening is over. Some of these storms have been producing large hail. I heard it reported that one place in Tennessee had tennis ball hail. I can very easily have hail left out of storms! We had a lot of damage a few years back due to a hail storm...had to replace some of the new siding that we had just had done and also ended up with a new roof due to that storm. So the thoughts of large hail sort of makes me shudder! Woody worked in the yard early in the day and a little more in the afternoon. He got his four-mile walk in this morning trying to avoid the rain that was coming. He went to Life Care and had Bible study with Jeff this morning also. I had school with six this morning...Isaac and Joseph had their preschool time together again (the new norm), then Elijah, Esther, and Abigail read with me, and then Joy came over for her long time. She completed her skirt. Elijah came over after lunch for his long time. He played the Pizza Co. Osmo game and also did coding with Osmo, and then we read another chapter in the book we are reading together. Joy came back over after she finished with her school work next door and tried the skirt on with the blouse that I had made her to go with it. She did a great job with her skirt and now between the two of us she has a new outfit! I think that she was pretty pleased when she wore it back home to show everyone. I decided that today was the day to stew a chicken so did that, deboned it, and made chicken stock. While things cooking I "degermed" the kitchen sink a job of necessity when I do a chicken like this. That was about all the energy that I could muster for today! We are now settling in for the evening...pretty much the same ol', same ol'! Now if we can just avoid bad storms! Here's a zoomed in photo of the above barn:

Sunday Blessings

Once Red

This morning I worked for a while on the pictures that I took last week on my friend and my "barn excursion." Tonight's photo stood out to me because you can tell that it was once a red barn and is now pretty much weathered gray. Woody started out the day working out in either our yard or Nathan and Kathy's. He ran his usual Saturday morning errands--library, Aldis, and WalMart. Isaac came over while I was working on pictures and stayed till lunch time. After lunch, I got busy putting the final touches on tomorrow's Sunday School lesson. I am teaching my ladies' Sunday School class in the morning. Woody went for a four-mile walk this afternoon. He got back just in the nick of time as the bottom fell out not long after he got home. It rained hard for a little while. Now it is just a gentle rain that I am hearing on the roof. Woody is settled in for the evening with March Madness and a book or two. I am ready to settle in too once I get everything packed up for tomorrow's lesson. Tomorrow's lesson should bring back memories of childhood...in several ways...and perhaps they will learn a new biblical fact or two that wasn't brought out to them all those years ago.