Getting Ready for Christmas

Raymond always helps with wrapping...

I always try my hand at candy making...

Here's my favorite room at my house...

Take 2 - Since I didn't like Take 1 so much...

Susan took the free ColorQuiz.com personality test! "Very active imagination and may be prone to fantas..." Click here to read the rest of the results.

Color Quiz - Creepy Accurate

STW took the free ColorQuiz.com personality test! ""If motivated, she will easily and quickly learn n..." Click here to read the rest of the results.

Kenny's Latest Project

Mom and Dad in front of a beautiful 1946 Mercury recently restored by Kenny Coggin (in the sepia photo below)! What a beauty! Remember that Mom and Dad were married in '46!

Parsley Snipping Time

I went out to snip some parsley for my salad and LOOK who got there first! Oh, my! Hope he will be a beautiful butterfly one day!

Otis

Saturday I adopted a beautiful little boy. His name is Otis. I'm in love!

Happy 63rd!

Mom and Dad celebrated 63 years of marriage today at a luncheon at my house. I love them so much and am very proud of them!

Happy Birthday, Mom!

My sweet Mom turned 81 today! For her birthday lunch, she requested meatloaf, macaroni and cheese, and turnip greens. She got it! And I surprised her with a fig birthday cake. She had a great day. I love you, Mom!

Matthew 18:20 Does This Count?

For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. Matthew 18:20

Girlfriends!

Martha, Tammy and me in Orlando. OK, so it was 25 years ago!

Where It All Began

Sixty-Three Years Later

Mom and Dad outside the pastorium where they were married. After 63 years, they still love each other! Amazing!

Another Window

The Entire Window

Great Grandparents

I took this photo at Chatahoochee First Baptist where my grandparents generation gave a stained glass window in honor of their parents. Pretty cool! This is the church where Mom and Dad were married.

Another

Birthday Cake

I'm experimenting with baking and uploading photos in Picasa. Here's Louise's birthday cake I made her and it was quite a hit!

Love These Guys!

Before the Party

Happy Fourth, America!

Happy Father's Day, Dad!

You don't get to pick your parents but I couldn't have done better if I had tried. I needlepointed Dad a piece once that says, " A father is someone you look up to no matter how tall you grow". Thankfully that is very true in my family!

We had a nice lunch today at my house and, as you see, dessert stole the show. Wish you'd been here to join us!

I'm Trying to Buy American!

Today I went in several gift shops and noticed that everything was made in China. I know things are still made in America and I think they're worth saving. Here's a website that will help me and those like me to find what we want. I hope you will work on this with me!

Chattahoochee First Baptist

Today was the anniversary of Dad's cousin and his wife - celebrated at Chattahoochee First Baptist in Atlanta. I enjoyed wandering the grounds and through the church while Mom and Dad visited with family they seldom see. The church is Dad's home church where he and Mom were married (in the white building, the Pastorium, beside the church) and where both Mom and Dad were baptised. It's a beautiful church and we all had a great day. At the end of the video you see Dad's elementary school and the house he grew up in. Pretty cool, huh?

A couple of my favorite shots are the mossy brick path to the church and the cornerstone on the front right of the sanctuary building. And, of course, the stained glass is remarkable!

In My Rainy Morning Garden

The Glory of the Garden

Our England is a garden that is full of stately views,
Of borders, beds and shrubberies and lawns and avenues,
With statues on the terraces and peacocks strutting by;
But the Glory of the Garden lies in more than meets the eye.

For where the old thick laurels grow, along the thin red wall,
You will find the tool- and potting-sheds which are the heart of all ;
The cold-frames and the hot-houses, the dungpits and the tanks:
The rollers, carts and drain-pipes, with the barrows and the planks.

And there you'll see the gardeners, the men and 'prentice boys
Told off to do as they are bid and do it without noise;
For, except when seeds are planted and we shout to scare the birds,
The Glory of the Garden it abideth not in words.

And some can pot begonias and some can bud a rose,
And some are hardly fit to trust with anything that grows;
But they can roll and trim the lawns and sift the sand and loam,
For the Glory of the Garden occupieth all who come.

Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made
By singing:--"Oh, how beautiful!" and sitting in the shade,
While better men than we go out and start their working lives
At grubbing weeds from gravel-paths with broken dinner-knives

There's not a pair of legs so thin, there's not a head so thick,
There's not a hand so weak and white, nor yet a heart so sick.
But it can find some needful job that's crying to be done,
For the Glory of the Garden glorifieth every one.

Then seek your job with thankfulness and work till further orders,
If it's only netting strawberries or killing slugs on borders;
And when your back stops aching and your hands begin to harden,
You will find yourself a partner in the Glory of the Garden.

Oh, Adam was a gardener, and God who made him sees
That half a proper gardener's work is done upon his knees,
So when your work is finished, you can wash your hand and pray
For the Glory of the Garden, that it may not pass away!
And the Glory of the Garden it shall never pass away!

Rudyard Kipling.....

Sibling Unit Scores BIG!

My sister played a perfect Wii bowling game today.  Holy smoke!  I've never done that!  Guess I have to now...

Great Movie

I saw Star Trek today and everybody is right!  It's terrific!  One to buy and watch over and over.  And I'm not even a trekkie!  (Well, maybe I am now!)

Fabulous Book - Very Valentine

Have you ever read a book that was so good that you didn't want to read the last forty pages because then the book would be over?  Well that's where I am and that's what's happening.  I'm heading to the sun room to read the last forty pages and I fear that Trigiani isn't writing fast enough for me to get the next installment in this series when I finish.

This book is beautiful!  The characters are people you know and the problems belong to all of us.  I know the next forty pages will only leave me hanging and waiting with baited breath for the next one.  Adriana Trigiani, I love you!  Wow!

Christian, the Lion

Look What I Have to Look at From My Sunroom ...

This red-headed woodpecker is almost having to tie himself in a knot to eat from this tiny feeder.  But he's not complaining.  Isn't he a remarkable gift!

The Tasty Elephant Debuts

I have created a new blog to document my journey of losing 50 pounds.  It certainly can't hurt and it could be down-right fun.  If you want to visit and encourage, here's the link to The Tasty Elephant.

Still Feathering the Nest

For the last few days I haven't seen any signs of the chickadees at the house they had worked so hard on.  I was thinking they had abandoned the project or something tragic had happened to the eggs or babies.  Well, today I finally see them adding a bit more dog fur to the nest.  Interesting!  I was expecting baby chickadees by now!

Gift for the Hard to Shop For.....

I know many of you have been wracking your brains for the perfect gift for me. Well, to help you out, I have found a perfect bird feeder - you know how I love those - that I really want. It is from http://www.douglasfeypottery.com and is an original work of art - stunning, I say! So if 600 of my closest friends go in together, it will only cost a dollar a piece. Sound good? (I wish I had tons of money - I'd sure have me one of these!)

Amazing how God provides...

Just at the same time that my chickadees need a fur-lined bed for their babies, the dog next door is shedding.  Ain't it wonderful!

Moving In Day

Today is the official moving in day for the precious chickadees who chose my new bird house to have their babies in this Spring.  You will probably see many shots of these guys as the house is right outside my sun room.  Stay tuned!

Hard to believe.....

...that this shot was taken less than one month ago!  What a difference a couple of weeks make!  Happy Spring!  PS - This is Albert in his beloved platform feeder that is now in the garage.

Never, Never, Never Give Up

I'm back in the game.  Stay tuned!

Rodent Wins - I Give Up

Yes, Albert can now jump off of the witches hat baffle and stick a landing on the feeder underneath, thus spilling the goddies all over the ground.  Of course, there are way to many for him and his family to eat, so they bury the rest of the !@#$%^&* seeds and nuts!  I give up...

The Next Battle

In the never-ending war between PhD and Rodent, I must confess that rodent is winning. However, I have just come up with a new feeder/baffle arrangement that has kept the wee geniuses at bay for three days now.  Do I enjoy this too much?

I MUST get the nuts and seeds!

I must!  I really must!

I meant to do this!

How is that bird doing that?

Mr. Rupert Bluebird looks on in disgust!