Today was better

I went for my walk yesterday as usual but the rest of the day I was kind of blah. Couldn't seem to get anything done. I'm glad days like that are rare for me, but I guess we all have them. Ken was late getting home from work again and I didn't feel like cooking so he took me out for pizza. That helped to brightened things up a bit. A nice warm walk this morning. It was nice to leave a few layers of clothing off and I managed to get enough of my hair together to have a little pony tail so I could wear my ball cap. :-) After walking around the lake and on the path going back home I took a little path off the main trail which went under a bridge and along a little stream. It wasn't much of a path and it dwindled down to this little thing. I climbed up a bit of a hill and ended up on the road pretty far from where I started. I guess I won't be taking that path again! I stayed home but got a lot done around the house. Nothing exciting but it always feels good to have a nice clean house. A picture of my clothes blowing in the breeze, just because I like it. :-) My son David and I sent a few text messages back and forth (I'm finally getting pretty good at this texting thing) and then he called me. It's nice to text but better to hear his voice. :-) I did a little needlepoint late afternoon. Surprise - Kenny was home a little early today from work, :-) that hasn't happened for quite a while. I had another phone call today - my friend Bernice who had a birthday a few days ago. :-) We had a nice long chat and caught up. I wish we lived closer to each other. The rest of the evening will be a typical one. A little ice cream, a Netflix (The House of Eliott) and knitting. Then some reading. This week seemed to fly by once again and now we have a weekend before us. Make it a good one. :-)

A deer, food and rolling pins

It was quite cold this morning - only 16, but thankfully no wind when I headed out the door. Walked around the lake and like every morning I saw deer which I never get tired of seeing. Most times I can't get my camera out fast enough for a picture, but once in a while like today one will stop and pose for the camera. By the time I got back home it had warmed up to near 30 and I had my two top layers unzipped. It warmed up some more and I got to hang a load of clothes out to dry. No complaints yet from the neighbors so I think it will be okay. I made some cream of wheat for my breakfast this morning. My mom used to make me that a lot when I was a kid, she made it with milk and I added some sugar but it was watery like soup. I still make it with milk but I like it thick and today I've added some raisins, dried cherries and topped it all off with some maple syrup. Oh that is good after a good brisk winter walk. I took a drive back to the old house to pick up the last couple days worth of mail. Not much there, just a bunch of junk but it was nice to get out and take a drive in my car. When Kenny does something he does a good job of it and when he hung these rolling pins up in the old house he hung them up so they wouldn't come undone easily. He used fine wire and hooked them all together and they stayed hanging up fine for years. BUT now I have to take them apart and that's what I did this afternoon.

Here they are, all tied together.

After an hour or so of untangling and cutting here they are all separated.Now I just have to come up with a clever new way to display them in the kitchen.

I tried a new kind of bread in my bread machine. Last week I was going to make oatmeal bread and didn't have any molasses. This week I have the molasses so I made the oatmeal bread.

I cut the top of the bread off when it was still warm and ate a half of it. It was so good - I wanted to eat the other half but I saved it for Kenny. He was only a little bit late tonight but still not in time to have his piece of bread warm.

Even though I'm in the middle of a book I started reading one of the books I picked up from the library yesterday - Cross Country by James Patterson. I haven't been reading much lately. It is indeed going to be a challenge to read 75 books this year if I don't start reading more. Stopped to get some chocolate chip ice cream and I'm looking forward to having that for my snack a little bit later while we watch another episode of The House of Eliott. Then I'm planning on reading. I hope you enjoyed your Wednesday and you someone made you smile. :-)

Happy Birthday

Bernice is my life long friend and today is her birthday. I am an only child and she is the sister I never had. The year we turned 50 (a few years ago now) I wrote this letter to her. I thought I would post it here today on her birthday. You can get an idea of what she means to me. Happy Birthday to my dearest friend Bernice Today you are 50 years old. When I look at you I don't see a 50 year old woman. I see a little girl who I've grown up with and have known my whole life. We first knew each other in church when we were only babies. Third grade I moved to Waldwick and we ended up in the same class. I walked into the room and you shot up your hand and said "That's Karen, she's in my Sunday school class." In those young years we knew each other from church, then as teenagers at the age of 15 we became very dear friends. Where one was the other one was. We called each others parents mom and dad, spent many nights over each other's houses, roller skated every Saturday night (some great times we had there) and many times liked the same boys. We've done so much together that it would take a book to write it all down. And through it all we told each other everything. No secrets between us and we grew up knowing we would always be there for each other no matter what. Going through the teenage years is sometimes hard and whatever happened I knew you would always be there for me to help me through it. I don't think I would have made it through with out you. We had so many good times together and have spent many hours laughing and have shed a few tears too. We got older, married, moved away from each other, had babies but have always kept in touch. Sometimes years went by without seeing each other, but once together again no time had seemed to pass. We were kids once again. I treasure our friendship and I know I am so lucky to have you for my friend then, now, and forever. So when I see you now on your 50th birthday I don't see a 50 year old woman, I see that same little girl, that same teenager, that same grown woman who is my dearest friend. I love you Bernice. Love your forever friend, Karen :-) And so today on my friend Bernice's birthday, I want to wish her a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY! She is one in a million!! :-) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Today it's cold and windy but the sun is shinning so I decided to get in my car and go out and pick up a few things for the downstairs bathroom. Made a stop at Michael's and got pink and white paint and some pink silk flowers. Then to Target for towels, but not a pink one to be found. So my next stop was at Kohl's where I got two pink hand towels on sale for the bath downstairs. I also stopped at the library to pick up a couple of books that I had put on hold.

I made this little blue shelf some years back. This afternoon I painted it pink, hung it up in the bathroom and put some old bottles on it.

The pink flowers I put in this green bottle

and hung up the pink towels.

A few other pictures taken of the half bathroom downstairs. It's kind of hard to take pictures in such a small room.

A little chest of drawers

This picture of the curtains is a bit dark and I couldn't back up far enough to get all of the window in.

This is the color green I've chosen for the walls.

The whole bathroom has a pink glow when from the curtains. It's another late working day for Kenny. Just having some left over Potato Soup and dill bread for supper which will keep so I'll wait and eat with him when gets home. In the meantime I still have to do my exercise tape and then I'll do some needlepoint or maybe read. Hope your Tuesday so far was a good one. Enjoy the rest of the day.

Pink and green

We spent yesterday coming and going all day and got lots of errands done. Kenny makes detail parts for model train layouts which he sells and decided to use one of the other bedrooms as a work room. We bought a couple of kitchen cabinets and will soon buy the counter top to put on top for his work surface. Once it's done I'll post some pictures of the room. This will be a good place for him to work on his glass hobby too. I had a nice surprise today on my walk around the lake - I saw THREE great blue herons all together. I saw one near the shore line and tried to get close to take a picture, when it and two others flew away. I might not have gotten a picture but what a sight to see three of them take off together!! Beautiful!! I got a new person on my Meals on Wheels route today which gives me 9 people now - a good amount. I haven't had to sub for a while so have just been doing my regular scheduled every other Monday. I would like to deliver EVERY week. Once summer comes along I should be subbing more because people go away on vacations. The road work continues on the road where Mrs W lives so again I took the FJ. All my people were fine today and I am happy to say I had no trouble finding my new lady. I'm always a bit nervous when I have a new person because the directions they give us to follow are pretty poor. Last night we went out for pizza and when I got home from Meals on Wheels I was all set to heat up a leftover slice for my lunch. Opened up the refrigerator and no pizza - it was then that I realized we left it on the table in the restaurant! :-( I've finally decided on the colors for the half bathroom downstairs - pink and green. I got some pink checked curtains which were too long so today I hemmed, ironed and hung them up. I found the curtains of all places yesterday at Lowe's!! I would never have thought to look for curtains there and just happened to see them as I walked down one of the aisles. I got a pink rug and have to buy some pink towels and will paint the walls green. The little bathroom upstairs is to be blue and yellow. No ice cream for me tonight. I've been eating a little too many extra calories and the ice cream is a good place to cut back for a few days. My snack tonight will be Welsh Cookies - I'll have 4 and each is only 40 calories. We have a movie to watch tonight with our snack. I'll also do some knitting. And that ends my Monday. It was a good one and I hope yours was too. :-)

Love

I have an old little book that is only 45 pages long. It was written by Henry Drummond (1857-1897) called The Greatest Thing In The World. I love this little book and read it every so often. Here is just one little part of it.

Kindness. Love active. Have you ever noticed how much of Christ's life was spent in doing kind things - in merely doing kind things? Run over it with that in view, and you will find that He spent a great proportion of His time simply in making people happy, in doing good turns to people. There is only one thing greater than happiness in the world, and that is holiness; and it is not in our keeping; but what God has put in our power is the happiness of those about us, and that is largely to be secured by our being kind to them. "The greatest thing," says some one, "a man can do for his Heavenly Father is to be kind to some of His other children." I wonder why it is that we are not all kinder than we are? How much the world needs it. How easily it is done. How instantaneously it acts. How infallibly it is remembered. How superabundantly it pays itself back - for there is no debtor in the world so honorable, so superbly honorable, as Love.

1 Corinthians 13:13 Now abide faith, hope, love, these three; but the greatest of these is love. Have a blessed Sunday and be kind to someone today.

RV show

A cold windy morning on Friday and for 10 minutes or so it snowed! I saw 8 deer down the first path I walked and a fox with 4 crows chasing and dive bombing him. Today was another cold one but what a difference no wind makes! Walked around the lake and there were LOTS of runners. A runners club was out and running early this morning. I counted 50 before I quite counting - Way too many people out around my path. :-) While I walked yesterday Kenny went to work for a couple of hours and then he took the rest of the day off so we could go to the RV show at the Timonium Fairgrounds. We thought there would be a lot less people there on Friday than on the weekend and we were right. We practically had the place to ourselves. Kenny just switched working days around. He is working all day Saturday. We have no intentions of buying any RV, but it is always fun to go and look at them all. They range from tiny little things to huge buses and everything else in between.

A few of pictures.

I sat in a chair in one of the RV's and took this picture. Didn't realize I had taken a picture of my feet as well.

There were also lots of people there representing camp grounds for you to visit after you purchase your new RV. There is a campground in Delaware set in the woods with LOTS of walking trails and you can rent little log cabins. I would love to go there and spend a few days in the spring just walking the trails. I have a birthday in May, maybe that is just the time for us to go. :-) Late Friday afternoon Cheryl popped in to take a look at the house. Always nice to see my friend. :-) So here it is Saturday and if feels like Monday with Kenny at work all day. Though I suppose it should seem like Friday because he is off tomorrow. I've been busy in the house doing this and that. A little cleaning, a little computer time, exercising and baking. I made some of those tasty Welsh Cookies this afternoon. I put in some dried cherries as well as raisins. I'm off now do wash the baking dishes and then do some needlepoint. If Kenny doesn't work too late I'm hoping to go out to our favorite Mexican restaurant near the airport for dinner. I hope your Saturday is as good as you thought it would be and possibly even better. :-)

Not much gets done today!

Today I walked the route around the lake. The lake is 2 1/2 miles and I live only 1 mile away so I have to walk an extra mile and a half to make a 6 mile walk. I do that by walking up the main road by my house to the cross walk, where I cross and then walk home. About half way through my walk today it started to drizzle so I was slightly damp by the time I made it back home. The sun did eventually come out and boy did it get WINDY again. This time my wind chimes are here on the deck and they got a real work out. :-) If you want to get anything done around the house, do not start doing needlepoint in the morning. That is what I did and I didn't get much of anything else done today. But I did enjoy my day! :-) We checked out another store for ice cream but didn't care for the store so we left. It was a dark and dingy store. Then we went back to Mars and got a flavor called Amaretto Cherry Chocolate to try. It has maraschino cherries, dark chocolate chips in Amaretto ice cream swirled with chocolate fudge sauce. Though nothing can replace my Weis Chocolate Chip this was a very good flavor too. Kenny didn't like it as much as I did and preferred his usual chocolate. The Mars store is the brightest store I've ever been in, which is super for a food store I think. You almost have to wear sun glasses! :-) We started another series on Netflix called The House of Eliott. Two sisters start a dress making business in London in the 1920's after their father dies and leaves them penniless. It's pretty good so far. That's about it for this Thursday. A Happy Day to you all!!

My Dad's old tool box

I've been walking around each morning exploring and walking on new paths that I find. I've been trying to map out some basic routes to walk. I have connected up a bunch of paths today and mapped out a route that is 6.5 miles. Lots of variety on this route. I walk some on the roads, then walk down one path behind houses on one side and meadow type land on the other, then woods and a stream. I come out of the path and walk on the road a bit and then take another path which leads to a school, walk to the other side and take another path to a road. Walk the roads a while and then take another path through the woods and along the river. Back out to the road and walk to the pool and walk along part of the first path again and home. I came across this round-a-bout today in a playground by the pool. I haven't seen one of these in years. I remember having lots of fun playing on these things when I was a kid. Running around and around holding on and then jumping on it. I have my father's old tool box from when he was a machinist. I was going to clean it up and paint it but decided just to keep it old looking and I put it on the floor in the pantry to use as a kind of junk drawer. I keep some basic tools, like a hammer, screwdriver and wrench in it. Also some nails, shoe laces, old keys, tacks and other stuff like that. I think that I found a good use for it. Another stay at home day for me. It started snowing as I was getting home this morning, but I'm happy to say it warmed up and turned to rain. Couldn't hang any clothes out side today! I had to make due with my inside lines. The other day I bought a couple more stamps for making cards and today I made a birthday card for my friend Bernice. I worked on my needlepoint and though it's slow going I'm just about done with the sky - two colors of blue and the white clouds. I ate up the last 4 chocolate chip cookies this evening while watching Faulty Towers. That's about it for another day. Hope your Wednesday was a Happy One. :-)

Outside clothes line

I can now hang my clothes outside on the line and get those fresh smelling clothes once again. Kenny made me portable lines to hang on the deck. He put some hooks on blocks of wood and attached clothesline to it. I just have to hang the hooks over the top of the privacy fence tops and wallah there's my clothes line.

Today was the first day I put the lines to the test and hung up sheets.

Now we just have to wait to see if there is some kind a rule against it and someone complains. I don't much care though because I'm going to hang them up there anyway! :-)

We have been missing our Netflix viewing old chairs because they are recliners and our new chairs aren't. So back to the old house we went to get those old green chairs. Now once again we can kick our feet up and watch in comfort.
We just put the two new chairs over by the other two new chairs by the window and made a nice foursome conversation corner. That corner is a great place to sit in the morning because it is so bright and sunny. One thing I like about this whole house is how bright it is.
Just hanging around home today getting stuff done around the house.
Hope your Tuesday was a Happy One. :-)

Happy to hear the wind chimes again!

Started my day off as usual with a morning walk. This is the start of the path which leads to the lake I walk around on one of my routes.It is only a couple of blocks from my house and the lake starts about 1.2 miles from here. There were lots of people out walking around around the lake. It was just about 30 degrees but sunny and hardly any wind. There was some wild life about too. I saw lots of cardinals, a heron, a fox and a few deer. Kenny was off today so I made us pancakes for breakfast. :-) I didn't make pancakes this weekend but made French toast instead. I have been making all our bread in the bread machine since I said I was going to. I'm probably eating too much bread but it is so good.

This is our gas fireplace in the corner of the living room.

We would like to put stone up on the wall above it. We went out today looking for some and found just the stuff we were thinking we wanted. We had it priced out and it would cost about $700!! We thought that sounded a bit much - it's not all that big a space. So Kenny decided that he would make a couple of molds of stone and then make his own castings. He did this for his train layout and they looked fantastic so this will just be on a much larger scale! When he gets around to making them I'll post pictures of the process. Kenny did a couple little jobs around the house in between us coming and going one of which was to hang up my wind chimes. I've been missing them and it's so nice to hear them again. I guess all the neighbors can hear them too. I hope no one complains! I think I'll move the bird bath to the other side - don't want to scare them off. :-) I got a 3000 piece jigsaw puzzle for Christmas and started it today on the kitchen table. I'm still going through the pieces looking for all the edges. I always like to get all the edge done first. This puzzle is huge and should take quite a while to finish. I also got the felt to do it on which is supposed to roll up neatly so you can put it away. I haven't tried that yet though. We walked up the street and had dinner at our local restaurant. They make the best Cream of Crab soup. We each had a bowl and shared some of their famous potato chips that they make. Yet to come this evening is watching another episode of Bramwell and having some ice cream. (Kathy - we did find the Weis in Waverly.) I'm going back to chocolate chip after a few days of the Sticky Bun flavor. I skipped ice cream altogether yesterday and had some cookies. I'll also do a little knitting and probably read some too. I hope this Monday was a Happy One for you too. :-)

Church signs

I have a day calendar of church sign sayings. Here are a few that hit my fancy. All God's angels come to us disguised. An unused Bible is worthless. A well-worn Bible is priceless. Man sees what we do. God sees why. Love someone not because he is a Christian, but because you are. Jesus lives in the community - He only visits the church. If you want to hear God laugh, tell him your plans. Have a blessed day one and all!

A day out doing errands

One of the paths I walk along.

I not only like walking down the paths I also like pictures of them. They always make me want to take a walk.

This sign was out in front of a house.
Never saw one like this before.
Does this mean that it will soon be for sale?

On the way to the commissary yesterday I stopped by the old house to pick up the mail and a couple more things that I left at the house. Some of the things I thought I didn't want anymore, I realized that I do want them after all.
I was in and out of the commissary pretty fast. Only needed to pick up a few things and there were no lines. When I got back to the car there were a couple of sea gulls waiting for me so I took their picture.
We went to another grocery store called Mars a few miles away from the house last night to try out their ice cream. The chocolate is VERY good - nice and creamy and just as good as the ice cream at Weis. They didn't have any chocolate chip for me to try but I got a flavor called Sticky Bun to try. Cinnamon caramel ice cream with pieces of sticky bun and cinnamon swirls. It was very good but I still like my Weis chocolate chip better. I'm hoping next time that they will have my flavor to try.

When I came downstairs this morning there was a card and a chocolate rose waiting for me for Valentine's Day. I'm glad Kenny still wants me to be his Valentine after all these years! :-)
Kenny did have to go to work for a few hours this morning, but he went while I was walking. I met a lady this morning on my walk who is an inspiration to me. She was walking at a pretty good pace but I caught up to her and as I passed said the usual good morning. We started talking and I slowed down and walked about 1/2 mile with her. Her name is Gertie and she was telling me how much she enjoys walking - she wakes up each morning, throws on her walking clothes and heads out the door. Sounds a bit like me! :-) I said to her, "Do you mind me asking your age?" She said, "Not at all. I'm proud of my age. I'm 86." I couldn't believe that was her age. She is a role model for me and I hope to be still out there walking when I'm 86! Her family keeps telling her that she is too old to be walking outside every day but she refuses to listen to them and I say good for her!! She said she tried walking in the mall but it was just too boring for her. I think I've met a fellow Happyone today. :-)

Once Kenny got home and we had some breakfast we were on the go all day long. Went by the old house 2 more times, went to the library and stopped in where Cheryl works so Kenny could make an appointment with her to get his hair cut - he goes next Tuesday!
We also took my NEW Orek vacuum cleaner in to have it looked at because it was making a weird noise and smelled like it was burning. The kid working there took a look at it and asked if we had new carpeting. Yes - a whole house full. Since the carpeting is new and is shedding a lot and the vacuum just cleans too good and was picking up too much of the new rug fibers which clogged things up. Even though there is a $25 charge for cleaning things out, he didn't charge us anything this time. He told me for the next month or so when vacuuming just to lean the vacuum to the side a bit every so often to let some air under to break the suction and it will be fine. So we left there happy with a working vacuum.
While we were out we discovered another library not too far from the house so we had to stop in to check it out. We are lucky to have 3 libraries so close to where we live!!

My parents are coming by tomorrow for a visit so today I baked a lemon cake for dessert - a favorite of my step-dads!

Well here it is 8:45 - time to watch a Bramwell episode, have some of the Sticky Bun ice cream and relax.

I leave you with this:
Two bricklayers were asked what they were doing. The first replied, "I'm laying brick." The second replied, "I'm building a great cathedral."
Same task, same bricks, two thoroughly different perspectives!
Just something to think about!

Happy Valentine's Day! :-)

The New Bird Bath

The word on weather around here today was wind!!!! My wind chimes are still at the old house and I bet they are chiming away today. This is the bird bath we bought last night at the hardware store. It rained last night so there is a little water in it. I guess I spoke too soon the other day because I ran into another friendly person this morning. I was walking around the lake and caught up to a woman. We said a good morning to each other and I asked if she wanted company for a little while. I perfer to walk alone but sometimes like a little company for part of a walk. She felt the same way so we walked half way around the lake together talking and then I took off again. Her name is Jeannie and I'm sure I'll see her many more times. :-) I spent most of the day on line today at LibraryThing. I left a lot of my books back at the old house which I'm not going to bring here. I'm only keeping the books that I really like and would like to read some day again. So I've been deleting the books I don't have any more out of the library list on LibraryThing. Then also had to add some new ones that I have read recently. I can't believe how much time I spent doing this and the hours just raced by. Kenny didn't make it home for supper because of another late day at work, but he did make it home in time for ice cream. I'll do a little reading and knitting the rest of the evening until it's once again time for bed. Pleasant dreams!

The friendly crossing guard

I found a friendly school crossing guard this morning on my walk. :-) She was standing by her car waiting for some kids to come along and as I walked by I said my usual good morning. She said good morning back and had a smile to go along with it. I stopped to chat for a bit. It was a very mild morning and we commented that how nice it was that we didn't have to wear a lot of layers today. She said every spring people ask her if she has lost weight! All our layers make us look a bit roly-poly! I got some house cleaning done today. That nice big tiled double shower sure is nice but not so much fun when you have to clean it. Not really complaining though, because it is really nice to have all that room in there. I started reading the fourth and last novel in the 4 in 1 book by Robert Louis Stevenson called The Master of Ballantrae but I just couldn't get into it so I've decided not to read it. There was a time when I would have read it anyway, but there are just too many books that I want to read to be reading books that I don't like. Kenny was only a little late getting home from work but not too late for supper. After supper we went to check out the Ace Hardware store a few miles away. It may not sound like a fun thing to do but we enjoyed our walk around the store. It is a great hardware store and has things to buy that you don't even know you need. We went to get hooks and clothesline rope so Kenny can put up my clothesline on the deck. I will be able to just hook it on the two privacy sections of fence when I need to hang my clothes up and it will come down easily when not in use. I shouldn't be upsetting any one because of any covenants that way. By the way this morning on the radio they were talking about how people should go back to hanging clothes outside as a great way to save energy and suggested going here to check it out. While at the hardware store we also bought our first thing for spring - a bird bath (which was on sale) to put out on the deck. I was going to take a picture of it but since it was dark out I'll take one tomorrow and post it. I am looking forward to starting a container garden this year out on the deck now that I don't have a yard. I'm sure I'll be spending a lot of time out there. I wish these spring like days that we are having were here to stay but it's only February and I'm sure we have lots more of winter weather coming ahead. We watched a Netflex, had some ice cream, I knitted a little and now I'm off to read some more of another book I started today. Wednesday is just about over and I hope yours was a Happy One. :-)

A mother/daughter afternoon

Another great morning for walking and this time I walked around the lake. Cheryl asked if I miss my old walking paths. I do miss the one that ran along the river through the woods, but I sure can't complain because there are so many great walking places here and overall I like walking around here better. I also miss some of the people I met walking back at the old place. I find as a rule the people here are not as friendly. They are mostly runners and they all seem to be very intent on exercising. I like walking for exercising but get so much more out of it than that. I stop to look at the animals and nature, take pictures, and like to have a few words with the people around me. I was stopped this morning looking at 5 deer in the woods and as woman went by I said "Look there are 5 deer over there." She just said, "Oh, they're always there." and just kept on running. Then again maybe they all have to hurry and get back home so they can go to work. Not every one has the luxury of having the time to stop and enjoy their morning outside. I did my usual morning chores around the house. I had a very nice afternoon with my daughter, Debbi. She came over and we spent the whole afternoon together - just the two of us. We didn't do anything special, but just hung out together. Those are the best times! Thanks Deb for being such a great daughter!!! :-) Another late day for Kenny at work and when he came home we went out for bite to eat at Pasta Blitz. No pizza tonight - we had pizza steak subs! We will have the usual evening. A Netflix show, a little ice cream, a little computer time and hopefully a little time for reading. As Tuesday comes to an end, I hope you can look back on the day and find it was Happy One. :-)

Cabinets get pulls

Here it is Monday already - the weekend passed much too fast. And what a beautiful weekend it was with temperatures in the 60's!! Just nature giving us a glimpse of spring and something to look forward to. I got a new mouse pad. Aren't these puppies adorable!? I want one! I'd take the third from the left. One job we got done with this weekend was putting on the door and drawer pulls on all the kitchen cabinets - 22 doors and 12 drawers. Wouldn't you think the cabinets would already come with pulls on them? We picked them out at the Expo Design Center and got them for 30% off because they are going out of business. We did have to buy different screws though. The ones that came with the pulls were too long for the cabinet doors and too short for the drawers. We finished watching The Lost Room. It was good but I didn't really like the ending. It left way too many unanswered questions for me. It's been so nice walking the last few days with no ice to speak of. I'm glad to have the lake to walk around and I thought that would be my main walking route but I find I like walking through the neighborhoods and finding paths better. There are just so many paths around here, some along streams, through woods, fields, and along peoples back yards. It's just a joy to be able to walk here each day! :-) Today was a Meals on Wheels day for me. All my people fine and happy. They all mentioned the nice weather we've been having. Mrs J who is in her 80's was going to go outside and rake some leaves later on in the afternoon. :-) Mrs P was in a real chatty mood so I stayed by her a little longer than usual. She has such interesting stories to tell me. I took the FJ and I think I will for a while until they finish all the road work down the road where Mrs W lives. They are digging on both sides of the road and the whole road is a mess. I don't want to drive my car down there. It was such a beautiful sunny day though and I missed driving my car. I have a few hours of afternoon left. Some time for a little quick cleaning, then needlepoint and maybe a little reading. I'm making baked ziti for dinner, but before I do all that it's exercise tape time. Better go and get started. Make this Monday a Happy One! :-)

A Time for Everything

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 There is an appointed time for everything. And there is a time for every event under heaven. A time to give birth, and a time to die. A time to plant, and a time to uproot what is planted. A time to kill, and a time to heal; A time to tear down, and a time to build up. A time to weep, and a time to laugh; A time to mourn, and a time to dance. A time to throw stones, and a time to gather stones; A time to embrace, and a time to shun from embracing. A time to search, and a time to give up as lost; A time to keep, and a time to throw away. A time to tear apart, and a time to sew together, A time to be silent, and a time to speak. A time to love, and a time to hate; A time for war, and a time for PEACE.

Take some time today to thank God for all your blessings and then take some time to enjoy them. May you all have a blessed Sunday.

A new path along the way

I had a great walk this morning. I waited until the sun was up and headed out the door when the temperature was 20 degrees. By the time I got home it was up 10 degrees to 30. I gave any ice I saw a very wide berth. :-) I didn't go around the lake today but stayed on sidewalks and walked around neighborhoods. Well, I did go off the sidewalk and when I came across this path. It called to me, so I followed it a short ways and came across this old fallen down stone building. It was so nice walking with the sun shining that I ended up walking 7.2 miles - I have to make up for the days I haven't been able to walk! I crossed streets in three different crosswalks and even though there are these big signs around not one person stopped. Only once in a great while does anyone stop. My plan was to clean bathrooms today but I ended up not doing that. Instead I did some shredding. I only got through half of it and even though I like to shred you can just do so much shredding at one sitting. Next I did my exercise tape and then I went up to my loft and read and did some more needlepoint. The time just zooms by when I do needlepoint. It was just about time for Kenny to come home from work when he called and said he was going out with his coworkers and wouldn't be home for supper. I did a little more needlepoint and then I made myself French toast for supper with the homemade bread that I made the other day and it was delicious. I've decided not to buy bread anymore and will just make all I need. It's so easy and fast to make with the machine and tastes so much better. When I get finished being on the computer in a little while, I'm going to sit by the fire and read. Happy Friday to you all and have a great weekend. :-)

No walk today

Thanks for all you comments and concerns about my fall yesterday. Another one of those freezing cold mornings and I just didn't make it outside this morning for my walk. After yesterday's fall I just was afraid of finding another one of those icy spots. Today the two big muscles on the side of my neck are really sore. I thought maybe today my body would be sore but it's only my neck. I took my shopping list in hand and headed out to the commissary. This time I remembered to bring along the green bags. :-) I live farther from the commissary now that we've moved and have to go 17 miles instead of only 6. Almost every time I drive through the gate the guard has something to say about my car - today it was, "We are confiscating all red Corvettes today." I ran into Linda at the commissary who I know from my old walking path along the river and we stopped to talk for a while. I have finished reading Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson which makes book number 7 for my reading goal this year. A good adventure book about David who gets kidnapped, put aboard a ship bound for the states, fights for his life aboard the ship, gets shipped wrecked, and finds his way back home. I thought it was great. There is one more novel left to read in the 4 in 1 book I bought by Stevenson and I've already started reading it. I love the loft in our house off the bedroom and I sat up there today doing some needlepoint. I also have my knitting up there as well as my stamping stuff, a bookcase, and my keyboard. I haven't decided yet what color to paint the walls. Maybe a shade of red. We went to the mall and had supper there and then went back to the old house to pick up the mail from the last couple of days. No ice cream for me tonight, I had some of my chocolate chip cookies for my snack instead. We are watching another series called Bramwell that we picked up at the library. Its set in 1895 in England about a woman doctor and the hospital she sets up after getting booted out of the all male doctor hospital. It's pretty good. Well that's my day. It was sunny but cold. I hope to be able to go for my usual walk tomorrow. Hope your Thursday was a Happy One.

A bump on the head!!!

This morning we awoke to cold weather again and another dusting of snow. It was supposed to warm up later in the day so I decided to walk later in the day. By 10:00 it had warmed up to just above freezing so I layered up and headed out the door. I walked about 1/2 mile and hit some ice under snow and up in the air I went and down I came landing flat on my back and heard my head crack against the sidewalk. OUCH!! I was a bit dazed and just stayed down for a while making sure I was okay. I was a bit shaken up and walked slowly back home, called Kenny at work and he came home. I have a big bump on the back of my head which is a bit sore, but other than that I am fine. No broken bones and I don't even have a headache. Kenny really didn't have to come home but I'm glad he did. :-) He took me out for lunch and then went back to work.

I love to listen to the Italian love songs they sometimes play in Italian restaurants and the other week when we were out in an antique shop, the woman working there was listening to music that I thought was Italian singing. I told her how much I liked the music and she told me it was a Spanish singer called Mario de Mi Alma. Kenny downloaded one of his albums for me from iTunes and I've been listening to it all day. I have no idea what the words are he is singing but I love to listen to it. :-) It is so beautiful!!!

This afternoon I spent going through our filing cabinet and organizing everything. I even made new folders and got everything nice and neat. Now I have LOTS of shredding to do but have saved that job for another day.

I have some bread baking in the bread machine and it's starting to smell really good. Since Kenny will be working late tonight I'm going to eat bread with butter and jelly for supper.

Last night we started a new series from Netflix that my daughter Debbi recommended. It's called The Lost Room and is on the SciFi channel. There is a key that opens any door and it takes you to a certain hotel room. There are also simple every day objects that do strange things and there are people out there who know about these objects and are trying to collect them all. We both like this strange new show. (new for us anyway) Thanks Deb!!

It's time now for a little needlepoint which I'll do until supper time and then I'll read until Kenny comes home.

Hope all is well in your part of the world and that your Wednesday is a Happy One. :-)

Two parked cars!!!!

Some light snow out there this morning when I walked, but the temperatures were above freezing so it wasn't slippery. The flakes were huge and I enjoyed walking in the falling snow.I've posted some more snow pictures from my walk this morning on my PictureBlog. To answer a couple of questions about my kitchen table. I don't know what the material is on the seats but they are comfortable. The table is counter top height and it does have a leaf in it. The picture from yesterday has the leaf in it already.

The nice thing about it is that the leaf folds up right in side the table when not in use.

Here is the table with the leaf folded up inside it.

There are two people who live in another row of townhouses less than two blocks away and drive their cars and park in front of my house every day at 3:55 to wait for a school bus so they can drive their kids home from the bus stop. Though I think it's crazy that these kids can't walk home (no wonder why there are so many overweight kids) that is not what I find annoying about this daily routine of theirs. They don't even pull over to the side of the road, but just stop smack in the middle of the road. I had to take a picture of this to show you. I took this from my front window the other day.Other cars pull up behind them and beep their horn and they both just stay parked there. It is most annoying to other drivers and I just wait for some incident to happen some day. We finished watching Jekyll last night. It wasn't a very long series, but it sure was a good one. Lots of surprises right up till the very end and it really was a different take on an old story. While watching we each had our favorite ice cream. :-) I did some knitting too on Nola's afghan which I need to get finished - I'm taking such a long time knitting that. I've had a nice day puttering around the house. Did a little cleaning and I'm still moving things around a bit - nothing major but just little changes here and there. I still have some pictures to hang up and I'm deciding if I still want them or not. I am in the pizza mood for supper tonight. I will suggest when Kenny gets home that we go to Pasta Blitz for some pizza and a Greek salad. My mouth is watering already. A very Happy Tuesday to you all.

Warmer weather and more house pictures

I don't usually watch football games but I did watch the super bowl last night with Kenny. I really didn't care which team won but it was an exciting close game and I must say I did enjoy it. Yesterday afternoon the weather warmed up nicely and we had temperatures in the 50's. We went to the historic part of town here in Ellicott City and walked around town and in and out of the shops. Found a couple more glass banks to put the coins I find on my walks in. The temperature today is once again in the 50's though things did freeze last night and there were some icy spots on the path around the lake this morning. I walked a little over 6 miles today and yesterday. It was 28 degrees both days and it felt almost balmy after the very cold mornings we've been having.

The shiny parts in these two pictures are ice.

We ordered the kitchen chairs and went to pick them up at the warehouse a couple of weeks ago. We got six of them.

Here are a few more pictures around the house.

I put an area rug on top of the rug which I thought made the little sitting area more cozy looking.I've spent a lot of time sitting there reading.

Isn't this shower fantastic!!?

Here are a few quilts that I have hanging over the railing

of the loft overlooking our bedroom.

We have lots of painting to do and have put those little card color samples all over the house. We will probably paint the living room first. When we do, I'll be sure to post pictures. We are really enjoying our new house and living in a different area. I have seen some of our new neighbors to say hello to, but haven't really met anyone. Most people go off to work and I don't see many people except for all the workers building the next couple rows of townhouses. I did bake some chocolate chip cookies and took them to the building trailer for the guys to eat. I don't think the cookies lasted very long. :-) Kenny put up some clothes lines for me downstairs on the lower level which we are using as a utility room. He hasn't gotten around to putting some up outside on the deck yet, but he will one day soon. I did use the dryer a couple of times and I just don't like how my clothes come out in a dryer. I have yet to use the dish washer and probably never will. Kenny says I am a throw back from an earlier time. :-) The grocery store just across the street is a Giant and we have tried their ice cream, but it just doesn't measure up to Weis's ice cream. Weis has the BEST chocolate chip ice cream of all time. At this Giant there isn't a very good selection and most days Kenny can't even get his favorite which is plan old chocolate. Who ever heard of a place not having chocolate!!!!! We stopped in at our old Weis and stocked up on our favorites. Just got a call from Kenny saying he will be late getting home from work. That will give me some time later to read and maybe do a little more on my needlepoint. Happy Monday to you all.

Praise

Early this morning walking around the lake.

Psalm 33:1 Let all the joys of the godly well up in praise to the Lord, for it is right to praise him. Psalm 34:1-3 I will praise the Lord no matter what happens. I will constantly speak of his glories and grace. I will boast of all his kindness to me. Let all who are discouraged take heart. Let us praise the Lord together and exalt his name. May each of you have a blessed day. Remember God loves you! :-)