The Most Wonderful Mother In Law

in the world is not married to my Father in Law. His current wife is beyond beyotchy but that's a story for another blog day.

My wonderful Mother in Law showed up at my Mom's house about 8:30 p.m. Saturday evening. She and her best friend Janet made a road trip from Marshall all the way to Waco. It's about a 3 1/2 trip one way so she went way above and beyond being the most wonderful Mother in Law in the world. If you follow my blog you know my Dad is in the VA because of Dementia and not being able to walk. My Mom lives with 2 of my siblings and my sister Cheryl is mostly responsible for all the financial stuff. My Mom's and Dad's social security barely covers their mortgage, bills and medications and sometimes like now my Mom's meds fall into the gap range and she/Cheryl has to pay full amount for them. She's gone a few days here and there without insulin because of it. Anyway, my most wonderful Mother in Law brought down a Christmas basket that her church gave out to the needy. It was supposed to be a Christmas basket but Mother in Law added to it. Family takes care of family is her motto and in my family the words married into/step/half or whatever the relationship is doesn't exist. Family is family. (Father in Law and his current wife do not believe in this motto. Their motto is money is better than blood...again a blog entry for another time. Maybe a scary story for Halloween next year) Anyway, she and her friend Janet brought down a carload of a Christmas basket. 12 rolls of paper towels (I thought of you Lori), multi packs of kleenex, 36 rolls of toilet paper, the big bottle of Tide detergent and Gain too, multiple can goods, 10 pounds of beans, a huge box of rice, bunches of hamburger meat, a Ham and a ton of other stuff too. I can't even list it all. This lady is definitely on Santa's nice list. I can't wait to see her on Friday and give her the biggest hug. Her explanation of why they brought it down early? It just didn't make any sense to unload it from my Brother in Law's truck, put it in her house and freezer and then load it all up again on Thursday back into his truck so he could bring it down on Christmas eve and she felt up to a road trip anyway. What did it matter that she didn't get home until after 1 a.m. that night and had Christmas services at church the next morning? To her it didn't matter and that brings to mind the old saying from Dr. Seuss.........Those who mind don't matter and those who matter don't mind. (paraphrased) I'm glad my Mother in Law is a person that MATTERS.

So.....

what's the most bizarre Christmas gift you've ever wanted? Chris wants to get me a gift that costs about $100. It's something that has to do with a computer or printing pictures I'm pretty sure since he went into Office Depot and looked at it. He wanted me to go in the store too but I know he'd have shown me what it was that he's wanting to get me and I don't want to know ahead of time. I told him to just get me a little something since payday falls the week after Christmas this year and then get me the big gift that weekend. He couldn't think of a thing to get me so I finally told him what I really, really, really have been wanting. An ironing board. Yep, straight up and simple. So today I was at Target and found one for a little under $13. I told him about it and he told me to go ahead and get it. Now I can prettify all of our clothes and hang them up instead of pulling things out of hampers or folding things and trying to stuff them into drawers. Yeah! Now to get him to actually buy me some perfume for an actual Christmas morning gift. ;) LOL.

Smile.........

My Daddy today (12/5/09). I'm taking the kids to see him tomorrow. He looks so very old and tiny to me in this picture that my sister took today. So much like his Daddy looked when he wasn't well toward the end of his life. Jessie nearly cried when she looked at the pictures and that almost made me cry too. I've got this song in my head because my Dad always did these goofy smiles. (Ironically, my Dad was born in 1938, 2 years after the song was written.)

Smile though your heart is aching;

Smile even though it's breaking.

When there are clouds in the sky, you'll get by.

If you smile through your fear and sorrow,

Smile and maybe tomorrow,

You'll see the sun come shining through for you.

Light up your face with gladness,

Hide every trace of sadness.

Although a tear may be ever so near,

That's the time you must keep on trying,

Smile, what's the use of crying?

You'll find that life is still worthwhile,

If you just smile.

That's the time you must keep on trying,

Smile, what's the use of crying?

You'll find that life is still worthwhile

If you just smile.

Lyrics by John Turner and Geoffrey Parsons.

Music written by Charlie Chaplin, 1936.

Thank God for Answered Prayers

We got a completely different diagnosis on my Dad today. Thank God. He'll need longterm or comfort care as the VA calls it. Apparantly the Temple VA doesn't handle dementia patients well and the doctor there thinks its easier to scare the crap out of families by saying they only have a week to live and suggesting hospice care for them. Oh I so want to tell that doctor off. At least he isn't his doctor anymore. Everything will be handled at the Waco VA for my Dad from his labs to his daily oral medications. He shouldn't be going back to the Temple VA for anything. Icing on the cake is my Dad asked for a shave and a haircut today. I can't wait to see him. I hope someone emails me a picture of him. I'm sure he'll look a 100% better with that scruffy beard and long hair gone. He's still got the cellulitis infection in his legs and has problems with his right side but he's going to be with us for a little longer than we were told at least. Thank you God for answered prayers!

Just Waiting.........

for my Dad to go on his way. We've been told to make him comfortable and he was returned to our local VA yesterday evening to just wait it out. He might have a week if he doesn't eat or drink anything or it might be longer. I wish we had a time frame but of course there's no way to know for sure when he will finally give it all up to God. My baby sister has checked funeral prices and was quoted anywhere from $1200 to $1600 for the funeral. The cremation and internment will be free if my Mom can find my Dad's discharge papers. I know she had them at one time but I'm not sure if she remembers where they were. I just don't know where we're going to get that kind of money. This sucks. My Dad might have to go to a paupers grave because he never planned ahead and took early retirement and was living off of just social security and a tiny, tiny pension. I shudder to think of what will happen to my Mom now without my Dad. I'm pretty sure her house will have to be sold unless they have the insurance that pays it off if one of them do pass away. I hope they have that insurance. We'll see........we've got a lot of plans to make even though my Dad hasn't passed yet. My husband and I will be making these plans in January and starting a burial plan too. I will not leave my children up in the air over what we want and having to figure out where to get money from for our burials. There's too much grief to be thinking straight when a loved one dies to be making these decisions last minute like we're having to do now.

Ft. Hood Update

I heard on the news this morning that there are 5 wounded still in the hospital from the shooting. 1 is in fair condition and the rest are stable. Major Nidal Malik Hasan is still on base in San Antonio and is reported to be paralyzed from the chest down. It has been said that he will be pleading not guilty to all charges. I just don't get it.........

This Is My Daddy

This is my Daddy. Robert is his name but he's always been called Bob by everybody he knows and meets. Well, except for his Mom. To her he was always Bobby even when he got to be in his 50's he was still Bobby. My Dad hasn't passed away but we have lost him to dementia. It's an ugly disease of the mind. I don't wish any family to go through this. It breaks your heart and then your spirit to watch your family member go through it. We're just going through the early stages of it with my Daddy but he had to be admitted to the local VA unit for extended care because of it. He more than likely will never come home. I'm handling it pretty well but my middle sister isn't. She's the one that lives with my parents so its been a really heart rending and terrible experience for her especially. I miss my Daddy even though he's not really gone. As one friend put it you miss the man he was. I do. I really do.

Ginny Humbert | A Dog Named Christmas

Ginny Humbert | A Dog Named Christmas

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Thank you Angel.....

and not the Christmas variety. An angel I know is paying my parents electric bill of $675.97. My sister Cheryl had made payment arrangements and had my parents listed as critical care so she would only have to pay about $200 or $300 a month instead of that huge amount but all of the sudden TXU said she had to come up with the huge amount and that my parents weren't listed under critical care. I know who the angel is. I won't ever tell my sister Cheryl who it is. If the person involved wants her to know they can tell her. All she's getting out of me is that I'm the go between. I just hope she can keep up now with it all. Its too much for her to have all the financial responsibility on her shoulders but there's no way I have that much extra. I'm lucky to not have any overdrafts each month. Thank you again Angel.

Ft. Hood Tragedy

My heart goes out to all involved in the Ft. Hood shooting. Prayers being said for everyone involved. It's hard to believe a fellow soldier, fellow American did this to our own. Now finding out that he's still alive we can only hope that there will be answers as to why this happened.

Finally....

she showed up this morning with book in hand at 7:52 a.m. We heard a knock on the door and Chris answered. She gave him the book and said "Gotta go" and left. I think she was surprised we were at home and I wasn't taking Chris to work. Maybe if she would have called she would have known huh? Now no more seeing her or her brothers anymore. We tried but still reminding myself that they aren't our children and they are adults. They are all over 21 now and responsible for their ownselves. Its up to them to get themselves a good life now.

It's Done *Edit

I finally got in touch with Amanda. Said my peace and told her I loved her, I don't hate her but she could call and double check things when she knows she's not going to show up at my house like I expect her too. She started to stumble through her go to sentence of being out of minutes and I told her to woman up and buy a phone card. Anyway, I'll be getting my library book back tomorrow at least. I doubt she'll ever have anything to do with me again. She's working 6:30 p.m. to 12:30 p.m. I have no idea how she's getting back and forth to work but I hope she's not driving herself. She doesn't have glasses and can't see worth a darn without them and also she doesn't have a drivers license either. She's on her own if she gets a ticket for driving without a license. Hopefully she'll prove me wrong and have a great life. I hope.

No library book. She *forgot it. Yeah, I doubt it. All she could say to me is I'm at work you shouldn't be talking to me here. Yeah, she's blowing me off. We helped her for over two months and she just up and decides we're not good enough anymore. Oh well, neither is she. Hopefully I'll have the library book by Monday. If not I don't know what I'll do. :( I never thought that she'd treat me so badly. I'm done and hurt to my core over her. She's my only blood niece. Turns out she's more like her brothers than I thought she was.

Doesn't make sense does it?

Well its been a heck of a week. First some strange lady named J******* G******* decided she wanted to be a member of www.your****book.com (imagine the f word for the astericks) and used her credit card to sign up for it but........she used my email address to sign up with. Doesn't make any sense for someone to sign up and pay $39.95 a month and then use the wrong email addy does it? Not to me either. I tried to use the info in the emails to cancel the account so I wouldn't get the porn emails that were being sent to me but without her credit card number I couldn't. These were awful emails and had porn in them. I only opened the first one because it said order confirmation and was seeing what I had ordered that I had forgotten about. I've ordered stuff before and forgotten so it made sense to me at the time. So I called the 800 number to tell them they needed to cancel the emails and the account since I wasn't the correct receiver but they wanted my name. It was bad enough they had my email address I sure didn't want them to have my name. The lady (she had an asian accent so I'm pretty sure I wasn't calling someone in the USA) told me that privacy required them to have my full name. I told her that's crazy cause I wasn't going to give my name to just anybody who answered the phone first. I asked for the manager, she put me on hold for a couple of minutes and came back and said she couldn't do a thing without my name. I said okay you can have my first name. It's Karen. Still she would not even put a note on the account that the wrong email address was being used because she didn't have my full name. @@ I did a lot of eye rolling at that one. Finally she told me to contact the company at an email address that I finally found in one of the emails. It's surrounded by so much junk it was hard to find. I sent them an email explaining the situation, threatening to take them to court to sue their asses for sending me unsolicited porn and telling them they better not send me another email unless it was saying this mistake was all cleared up. I just went off on them. Anyway, at midnight my time I got two emails from the company. One stating the account was cancelled and another stating again that the account was cancelled but that the free trial was still ongoing until it ran out. Funny how within an hour of my phone call and sending that email they cancelled the account. I could have posted all kinds of crap on that ladies profile for that site and caused her all kinds of problems with it too but my Mom didn't raise me that way. Like I told my husband I don't care what people do online but when they drag me into it its a whole different story.

Then yesterday I decided that since I had to drive my kids to the bus stop because of it raining I would just drive over to my niece Amanda's apartment and go ahead and pick her up and save her boyfriend a trip to my house since it was raining so hard. I get to her place and knock on the door and two strangers answer. I say where's Amanda? They have no idea who I'm talking about. They say they moved into the apartment on Saturday. Yesterday was Thursday. Manda was off on Monday but had been at my house on Tuesday and Wednesday and never said a word about moving. I head back home but decide to make a stop at Starbucks for a latte but their electricity was knocked out from the storm. I get home finally and Amanda gets here finally about 8:30. I ask her straight off when did they move and she lies to me and says they moved on Tuesday. Yeah right. Tuesday she worked until 12:30 a.m. and was at my house all day from 8:15. I told her the people said they moved in on Saturday and she said they didn't. Those people don't know me and have no reason to lie to me but Manda does. Come to find out they couldn't pay the rent there because boyfriend needed her paycheck to pay on the car he just got from his cousin. She has nothing to show from working 2 jobs but says that car is half hers. Why in the hell would she want half of a junk car? They're living with his Aunt. Manda is ashamed of it and didn't want to tell me. Why not tell me? Because I told her exactly what kind of guy her boyfriend is. If he wants a car so bad why not work 2 jobs. She's working 2 jobs but yet he can't? Doesn't make sense does it?

Then today, Friday, I put off picking up Chris when he first comes in because I'm waiting for Manda to get here so she won't have to sit out in the cold waiting on me to get back. 8:30 comes and no Manda. I go and get Chris and we get back and there's no Manda waiting on the front steps for us. I have no way to reach her even though I bought a prepaid phone so I could reach her but she won't keep minutes on it so I call her boyfriend at work. I say where's Manda? He says she's at home. I tell him a phone call would have been nice. He says she's got a ride. I say still a phone call would have been nice and hang up on him. She's supposed to go to work today at 5 so I'm going to call her at work which I don't like to do and never would do but I have to tell her since she had a ride today she can use the same person from now on. I'm done giving her a ride to work. She's not a baby. She's 24 years old and if she can't and her boyfriend won't at least have the decency to call me and let me know she's okay (I didn't care about the ride) she can just use the same person to get a ride from now on to work. As long as this boy is in the picture (boy because a man doesn't use people like he does) I can't help her out any more. Until she decides she's worth more to herself than just having a man in her life I just can't do it any more. I don't like the mentality she has about if she doesn't have a man its not a good life. @@ Doesn't make sense does it?

Then for lunch today (still Friday), we ordered take out from a mexican restaurant. I ordered the sour cream chicken stacked enchiladas with rice and refried beans. Caught that the beans were charro beans at the restaurant but got all the way home and found that they didn't give either of us rice. Doesn't make sense does it? Rice is the side dish for nearly every entree on the menu. @@ On a good note I called and the manager apologized and is going to send us a couple of coupons for a free dinner. Now hopefully we'll actually get the coupons. That's the last few days in my week. Hope this all made sense.

Yeah!

I finagled a bill or two and came up with gas money for tomorrow. We'll take the kids to my Mom's and trade them in for her for the day. They'll help Aunt Kelly and Uncle Anthony move into their new house and Chris, my Mom and I are going on a day trip to see her brother and his wife. She was beside herself with worry about him while he was in the hospital in Michigan and not being able to go to them when they've always come to us when someone is hospitalized just about killed all our souls. So anyway, we're going on a day trip to see how they're doing. My brother called this afternoon and said Mom can't wait for tomorrow to get here.

New Tags.......

for Autumn can be found at Grab It Graphics. Click on my button to the right to go there. I hope that works anyway. LOL.

Everything's going pretty good. Nothing to really write about. We're all healthy and happy. My niece Amanda is doing well in her job. My Uncle was diagnosed with dementia. I need to plan a weekend to take my Mom to see him. This weekend would be perfect if we had gas money but it was a payday of too many bills and not enough paycheck so hopefully we can go maybe the next payday. We'll see.

Junior National Beta Club

Nicky was invited to join the Junior National Beta Club through the middle school today. He had told me about it last week but just said Beta club so I thought it was just something to do with the school. It sounds very similar to the National Honor Society though from the literature I got in the mail today. If nothing else it'll help build his self esteem and leadership qualities and when he's a Senior if he's still a member he can apply for scholarships through them. I'm very proud of him!

It's a Boy!!

We've got a new nephew! Eric Jeffery was born at 2:57 p.m. today. He weighed in at 7 lbs 0.2 ozs and is 19 1/2 inches long with reddish blonde hair. I forgot to ask the eye color though. I can't wait to see him!

Dang!

Amanda didn't get that job we were all wanting for her. They've filled both the permanant and substitute positions and yet still have them as vacancies on the website. Doesn't make a lick of
sense does it? Plus, why did they take her application on Friday if they were already filled? Nope not a lot of sense there either. Oh well, something better will come along and if not there's something else out there until it does. She's just going to help me some more this week and go after labor day and start applying. It'd be her luck to get a job that'd want her to work on Sunday and we don't want that since we're planning a birthday party for her. Oh, I almost forgot to say I got a new desktop computer. It's not much different than my other one but I decided to get a new one so that the kids would have a separate one to use for school and to play
games on. Theirs won't be online unless its to do school work or Amanda wants to check her email and stuff. That's about all the exciting news going on here.

Well,

we got Amanda's warrant paid on. She applied for a job with the local school district. It's to be
a food service handler which is the tecnical words for lunch lady. LOL. It'll be a perfect opportunity for her right now with her not having a car. She's got to have something close
to me since she's living here and I have to take her back and forth. Plus, she needs the hours
that work with the kids school hours too. She really likes the idea of getting off of work in the
early afternoon, being off on weekends, school holidays and then 3 months of summer too. She'd be able to go to school full time in the summer so I'm really hoping she'll get this job. She needs
to call the lady in charge on Monday morning to find out about being interviewed for it. They've
been advertising for someone for this job for about 6 months now so hopefully.........Anyway, I'm keeping my fingers crossed for her.

And Again........

we've let another family member move in with us. It's our niece this time. She's nothing like her brother John. Thank God for that. We're going to try to help her get on her feet. She got a ticket and lost her job before she could pay it so it turned into a warrant. It's a misdemeanor. She's been helping me a lot this past few weeks so I told her we'll just let her work off the money and once she does that we'll pay the initial payment on the warrant and then she'll be able to get a job and finish the payments herself. She'll be trying to save money for a car also so she'll be here quite a while. Its nothing like the situation with her brother though. She's a hard worker. Plus she won't be here on weekends cause she goes to her boyfriends apartment. We will still have our family time and I get adult company when Chris is gone. Her Mom hasn't been in her life since she was about 10 when her Dad got full custody of her and their other brother. Her Dad always had custody of John. I told her the other day that I always considered her mine anyway. She lived with us her Senior year of high school. I pushed her to go back and live with her Dad as soon as she graduated. I wish now I would have just let her stay with us. Maybe she would have gone to college or tech school. Her plan now is to try to get on with the local school district as a cafeteria worker. It'd be great hours so she could go to school in the evening eventually, plus, she'd have off weekends, school holidays and every summer. She could do school full time then for sure. If she can get that job it wouldn't be hard for me to get her back and forth from there until she can save enough money to get her own vehicle and insurance. Oh and another big thing is that she already has the respect for Chris and I and that makes it easy for us to respect her back.

Turn out the lights........

the party's over. This weekend just flew by too fast for me. We went and saw Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince on Friday. It was just okay for me. Chris and the kids really enjoyed it but I almost fell asleep towards the end of the movie. They're setting up the story line for the next couple of movies so it was a lot more explaining of things than of doing things in the movie. We watched Eureka and Warehouse 13 on Friday night. Its nice having something good on Sci Fi again. I miss the old SG1 and Stargate Atlantis though. We also watched Wizards of Waverly Place with the kids. I think Chris and I really like some of these Disney shows more than the kids do. It reminds me of when I was little and we watched Wonderful World of Disney on TV with Mom and Dad on Sunday nights. I loved Fess Parker as Davy Crockett. Saturday I got up and went to the grocery store and we just hung around the house the rest of the day. Nothing like a nice quiet day. Today we watched Knowing with Nicolas Cage. It was totally not what I expected. It was a really good movie. It kept me on edge the whole time. It got to the ending and I realized it was very familiar to a scifi story I read years ago. I'm going to have to research and see if it was based on the story I read or not. Then we watched Hannah Montana with the kids. Again, another Disney show that sucks you in. LOL. Chris goes back on the road tomorrow and will be back in on Friday. Next weekend we're going to start back to school shopping. School starts the 24th here and the kids just want summer to last all year I think. LOL.

Just Another Week......

Just another week gone by in life. Nothing major happened. That's a good thing. I like the nice quiet days. School will start in about 3 weeks. The kids can wait. They want summer to last forever. We don't need to get much in the way of clothes for them. Just underwear and socks mostly. New shoes of course. I already have Nicky's. Jessie's we'll get right before school starts when we go to buy school supplies and backpacks. Our tax free weekend is Aug. 21st through the 23rd so we'll be able to save a little money at least. It helps that its still hot down here so they can wear their summer clothes to school to start. I'll probably get them some new shirts is all. We'll see how the sales are and how much money we have too. My Uncle is getting better slowly but surely. My Aunt said he might get out of the hospital on Aug. 20th but doesn't know if he'll go to rehab of some kind up there or if he has to have rehab if they'll send him home to get it or not. I really hope they can send him home. She needs a break too. I'm pretty sure she's not taking very good care of herself either. Their son did make it up for the weekend so she got a little break with him there and their daughter will be up this weekend so hopefully another break will be in store for her again. I've really enjoyed having broadband connection too. It's so much better than dial up. I hope I never have to go back to dial up again!

Woohoo!

Took Chris to get the usb drive to connect to broadband and found out that's all I needed for my pc at home too. Everything's is so much faster! I'm going to really enjoy the internet now. AOL is screwy on it but I can use it for email just now browsing so I gotta get used to internet explorer. I don't want to use www.aol.com because then I can't have my pretties in my email signatures and ya'll know how I am about my pretties. LOL.

New Blog Background

I found a tutorial at http://gardengnomeathome.blogspot.com/2008/11/how-to-make-your-own-scrolling-blog.html that helps you make your own blog background. Thank you so much. I sort of did my own thing on parts of it. It's not bad for a first try. I can't wait to play more and to use some digital scrapbook stuff I have too. Woohoo!!

Grab It Graphics

I've decided to move the graphics I make to their own blog. You can find them at



There's nothing posted there yet but it should have something new this week. I did this so that my regular blog wouldn't be so loaded down and take forever to load. Oh the joys of dial up. LOL.

Reading is Art is Reading

I know there are a lot of bookaholics, readers or whatever word we like to call ourselves on Blogger so please take whichever icons you like and share with your friends. Individual icons are below this one.

Grab It Graphics - Emotions

Take it if you want it. Just don't claim to have made it. If you want a name on it just leave me a comment saying which one and what name. I'll post it in another blog to pick up.

Thanks Kathy. :)

You can find Kathy at http://bagsbooksandbonjovi.blogspot.com/.

FIRST LINE FRIDAY...First lines have always intrigued me since I heard an author say that writing the first sentence is, by far, the most difficult part of writing a novel. The reasoning was that a first sentence can make the reader continue reading or cause the book to be tossed aside.So, go to your To Be Read Pile, choose as many books as you want and share the first line. Be sure to include the title and author so that if your reader also finds it intriguing, they can find the book.Also, share your thoughts about the first line. Does it draw you in? Is it...exciting...thought provoking...scary...funny?

I love finding books at Dollar Tree. They're usually unusual books. Things you really don't expect to find. I call them my dollar treasures. I found one yesterday that is about the Mexican-American war of 1846. It's told by two soldiers each from opposing sides. I love reading fictionalized history where the characters are involved in the actual historic events but were never part of the real history. Does that last sentence make sense? LOL. Anyway this book is called Saint Patrick's Battalion by James Alexander Thom. Here's the first line.

New Mexico City - April 1861

On a sun-heated road to the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe, a freckled young man with red hair and long legs hurries up a hill, carrying a wooden writing portfolio under his left arm and a knapsack slung over his right shoulder, squinting ahead, stepping around the black-clad pentitentes who are crawling toward the cathedral on their knees.

I'm wondering why the guy is in such a hurry and why he's carrying so much with him. Who's he off to meet?

Family Trees

I have my extended family tree online at Ancestry.com. Well a distant cousin sent a question about who was who in a picture of my paternal great grandmother with my Dad as a little boy with his sister. I sent back the reply about who was who and she mentioned that my paternal great grandfather was the son of his grandparents. Boy, you'd think family would have the right info. I guess it was hidden from the children that Grandpa was actually a nephew and not a brother like they thought huh? I told the distant cousin that he should have been a H*****s instead of a M****y and she told me that she thought we had his Mom wrong. Well, I just spent a few hours going through census and voter registrations from the 1800's and finally figured out his Mom was Sarah and not Elizabeth like we thought. That makes me feel so much better because Elizabeth would have been maybe 12 years old when she had him whereas Sarah was almost 16. My Mom will be glad to know that I figured out who his Mom was too. I have my Mom's handwritten notes and his half siblings are what she had listed and match with Sarah as their Mother instead of Elizabeth. When my Mom first started looking into the genealogy of my Granny's side of the family my Granny was so ashamed that her Dad was born on the wrong side of the blanket. She finally told my Mom though because her Dad is listed as living with his maternal Grandparents as a grandson on all the Census records and it would have come out when she wouldn't have been able to find his Dad anywhere. My Great Grandfather was never raised with his half siblings and always lived with the Grandparents. In fact, his Grandmother was listed on the Census records as living with him and his family during her last year of life. I find all this family genealogy fascinating. You never know who you'll be related to also. So far I've found one 2nd cousin, 1 3rd cousin and I don't know how many times removed this cousin that just contacted me would be but like she said she doesn't like using the word removed because then it sounds like you've been disowned for one reason or another. LOL. She sounds like my kind of cousin.

First Line Friday

Thanks Kathy. :) You can find Kathy at http://bagsbooksandbonjovi.blogspot.com/.
FIRST LINE FRIDAY...First lines have always intrigued me since I heard an author say that writing the first sentence is, by far, the most difficult part of writing a novel. The reasoning was that a first sentence can make the reader continue reading or cause the book to be tossed aside.So, go to your To Be Read Pile, choose as many books as you want and share the first line. Be sure to include the title and author so that if your reader also finds it intriguing, they can find the book.Also, share your thoughts about the first line. Does it draw you in? Is it...exciting...thought provoking...scary...funny?

I finally, finally made it to the library to pick up the sequel to the Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs. It seems like I was on the list for it for 3 months. It probably wasn't that long but it seems it. LOL. This one is called Knit Two and I can't wait to start reading it tonight.

Here's the first line.

It was after hours at Walker and Daughter: Knitters, and Dakota stood in the cente of the Manhattan yarn shop and wrestled with the cellophane tape.

It was hard to stop after the first sentence. I can't wait to find out what Dakota and the ladies of the club are up to now.

Keepsakes

I got my first blog award from my friend Cyndy. She can be found at http://luvmydoxies.blogspot.com/. Thanks Cyndy!

I tried to think of something I really, really treasure and I finally realized pictures are my heart treasures. I'm especially fond of the old sepia tone pics from the 20's and 30's that I loved looking at in my grandparents photo albums. PIctures of my kids at Christmas with crazy t-shirts or antlers on their heads are another on going theme in my own albums. I also take pics of my kids in the wildflowers every year, especially the bluebonnets. But my all time favorite photos will always be pics of my kids, family members and just people in general from the backside. I always joke that I'm going to come out with a coffee table photo book called the Backside of Life and have nothing but backs of people for people to look at. I think it puts a different perspective on the more normal angle of pictures that we usually take. Anyway here are some of my favorite pictures that I treasure as keepsakes. Short explanations follow each group of pictures. Enjoy!

This is my all time favorite picture of my kids.
It was taken at the cemetery where my paternal
grandparents are buried in Dallas, TX.



This is a pic of the kids on Halloween 2001. They were
almost 3 and 5. They're dressed as Mimi and Drew Carey
and they won 2nd place at the local mall for the costume
contest.


This was taken after my maternal

grandmothers funeral in March 2006.

My favorite pics combined. Backside and

bluebonnets. Taken last year in 2008.

We missed this years crop.

Easter 2007 we had snow after the bluebonnets

bloomed. Gorgeous in the snow!

I love doing crazy Christmas shots with

my kids. These were each used for

Christmas cards during different years.

My husband Chris with his Grandfather and his

brother Alan. Papaw was almost 100 when this

picture was taken by me.

Papaw passed a few years ago at the age

of 101. I got this shot of my BIL Alan, Nicky

and Chris just by chance. It just seems to

be leading from the pic above into the

next generation.

This is my maternal Grandfather

Ivy and his BIL Shorty at a

Louisiana carnival in the 30's.

My maternal grandparents

Ivy and Ruby. Circa 1937.

My maternal grandfathers

Grandfather.

and my all time favorite

picture of my Dad with his

sister Shirley. Definitely taken

during World War 2. He's in an

army uniform and she's in a red cross

uniform that were both made by

my Grandmother.

Dena!

Hi Dena. I made you a button for your blog. It's just a simple one and I tried to match the colors to your background. Easier said than done sometimes. Hopefully you can figure out how to use it eventually and if not its no biggie that you don't use it. I just enjoy playing around with graphics. Thanks for asking about one the other day. This just popped into my mind earlier today.

We're Home!

We got back last night about 6ish. We were all so tired that we slept well past 9 this morning. It was a nice trip and fun to see everyone but we're so glad to be home. There's just something about sleeping in your own bed. KWIM?

First Line Friday

Thanks Kathy. :) You can find Kathy at http://bagsbooksandbonjovi.blogspot.com/.

FIRST LINE FRIDAY...First lines have always intrigued me since I heard an author say that writing the first sentence is, by far, the most difficult part of writing a novel. The reasoning was that a first sentence can make the reader continue reading or cause the book to be tossed aside.So, go to your To Be Read Pile, choose as many books as you want and share the first line. Be sure to include the title and author so that if your reader also finds it intriguing, they can find the book.Also, share your thoughts about the first line. Does it draw you in? Is it...exciting...thought provoking...scary...funny?

My First Line Friday is from the book Skipping Christmas by John Grisham. Yes, John Grisham apparently wrote a book that doesn't involve a courtroom. LOL. This book is the basis for the movie Christmas with the Kranks. I've seen the movie and loved it so I'm sure the book will be even better. It's a pretty thin book so it should be a quick read. Anyway, here's the first line.

The gate was packed with weary travelers, most of them standing and huddled along the walls because the meager allotment of plastic chairs had long since been taken.

Sounds like somebody is going somewhere from an airport to me. Like I said having the foreknowledge of the movie in my head makes it easy to want to continue reading this book. I'm curious to see what they left out of the movie that was in the book.

Vacation Time!

We'll be going to see MIL, BIL and SIL this weekend. We'll be back on the 7th. Hope everybody has a wonderful and safe 4th of July!!! God bless all our men and women in uniform or retired. Without them where would we be?

Bumping............

this comment up and into a post. I hope you have a great raffle!!!


Wonderful World of Weiners said...
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June 16, 2009 5:08 AM

Grab It Graphics

Been working off some worry energy again. If you want one, take it. If you need it personalized just let me know by leaving a comment. All I ask is that you please don't claim to have made them.