Candy Dishes

My parents live about an hour and fifteens minutes from me. They still live in the big old two story house that we grew up in. The house sits on about four acres, and although it is located within the city limits, my parents don't have close neighbors.

There is an old granary on my parent’s property. My daddy bought it many years ago and moved it to town. The granary is a round, tin building with a cement floor. It is a perfect storage building. I have on several occasions during my adult life needed a place to store some of my “treasures”.

One of those occasions was a few years ago. I sold the home in which I lived and moved in with my brother and his family while my new house was being built. I packed up a bunch of stuff in plastic storage bins and took them to the “granary”. When my new house was completed, I retrieved what I needed immediately; with the best of intentions to retrieve the rest of it as soon as I got everything else put away. Over the course of the next seven years, yes, I said SEVEN YEARS, my dad would mention now and then that I still had some plastic boxes in the granary. I mostly ignored his comments, because you know he wasn’t charging me rent, he didn’t threaten to throw my stuff away and quite frankly I didn’t have a place for all that stuff.

Last summer I decided I would have a garage sale. I drove to my parents to go though my "storage building". We brought all the boxes out of the granary and I began to sort through my stuff. One person’s junk is another person’s treasure, right?

I thought I had a good idea of what was stored in each container. However, in one of the boxes, I found this candy dish. I can't for the life of me remember where it came from or why I left it in storage for so long. I LOVE it.


I have always, always had a love for old glassware. I would much rather have an old glass candy dish; than a new crystal one. I also love browsing through antique stores. Not the fancy, smancy overpriced ones, but the ones that are a little on the junky side. Saturday afternoon I was out and about and decided to stop at a couple of antique stores in town. In the second store I found this candy dish. The guy told me it was from the 40’s or 50’s. He stated you could buy the dish back then in the dime store. It cost more than a dime; but it had my name on it. Happy Valentine’s Day to me!






I was drawn to another dish in this same store. It didn’t have a lid and it cost $40. Dorky me; I thought the tag said Hershey Compote. I liked it...a lot, but I wasn't going to pay $40 for a Hershey Compote. I don't even know what a compote is. When I asked the guy about it, he stated it was a Heisey Compote. He stated that Heisey went out of business in 1957 and that was the reason for the $40 price tag. He stated a compote would not have a lid. Hmmm. I told him I would put it on my wish list. Needless to say, when I got home I did a little research on Heisey glassware.

I hope you had a beautiful day. I soaked in the sunshine.

Blessings,

Life as I know It

Wow! It has been a couple of months since I actually wrote a blog post. I have every intention of posting something a couple of times per week; but life happens.

Where to start?

I worked in El Paso from October 26 through November 20. I taught a MEPD (Medicaid for the Elderly and People with Disabilities) Part One BST (Basic Skills Training) class. This class is for newly hired MEPD specialists. I teach them about the Medicaid programs that are available for the elderly and people with disabilities who live in the community. I also teach the basic policy guidelines and how to actually work a case to certify or deny an individual for Medicaid.

I love being in the classroom.

Thanksgiving Day and the day after are paid holidays for me. I took vacation days the three days before Thanksgiving, which gave me the whole week off from work. I planned to rest, clean my house and get ready to put my Christmas tree up the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

I picked Sophie (my sweet dog) up from mom and dad’s house on Saturday. When I travel, she lives with them. I guess you could say we share custody of her.

I was sick the following three days. I was finally able to do a few things on Wednesday.

Thanksgiving Day Sophie and I travelled back to mom and dads for the day. We had a good day. It was nice to spend time with my family.

Caley, Gloria, Clara and I were up early on Black Friday. Caley and I were at Old Navy at 2 a.m. only to discover that they actually opened at midnight. Our next stop was Kohl’s; then on to super Target.

I told Caley that we were making memories.

I finally had to have a nap. No nap for Caley. She played with the Lincoln Logs, watched some television and played on my phone…to be young again and full of energy.

I didn’t get my Christmas tree put up on Saturday…or Sunday.

Monday came. I was busy, busy at work.

I flew to Houston on Tuesday. I flew home on Wednesday.

Dad had surgery. What we thought would be a simple procedure and short hospital stay turned out to be a not so simple procedure. He is out of ICU; but still in the hospital.

I worry about mom. She stays by her man. 48 years of marriage.

I still haven’t put up my Christmas tree. I still have pumpkins on my mailbox and a scarecrow on the front door. At this point I don’t want to drag out the tree and all the decorations for only 12 days.

I have most of my shopping done. I’ve tried to get a couple of things each day after work. I want to avoid the weekend crowds as much as possible.

My house is still dirty and scattered. I have so much to do that I don’t know where to start.

I am thankful for my family, for the memories we make. I am thankful that I have my health, my dirty, scattered house, heat and hot water and more food than I need to eat.

I am thankful that life happens.

Holiday Blessings,

Cowboy Symposium

Last Saturday, I received a telephone call from a friend that I haven’t seen in a couple of years. She and her husband were in town for the Cowboy Symposium. She stated she would like to see me and asked if I would meet them.

I really did not have a desire to attend the Cowboy Symposium. It is a neat event. I have attended in the past. It is not really my cup of tea. I did want to see my friend; so I headed out to the civic center.

We walked through the inside exhibits, looking at items of interest and catching up. We ended up outside walking among the chuck wagons. She stated that her husband had purchased a wagon and was in the process of rebuilding it.

Some of the wagons were really neat.

There had been a contest earlier in the day regarding which wagon cooked the best food. The cooks on each wagon had been given the same ingredients and told to prepare a meal. Then they were judged individually on the meat, potatoes, bread and dessert.

One of the wagons belonged to two sisters. Both of the sisters were in their 70’s. Each of them wore an apron from Imperial Sugar. I wasn’t there for lunch, so I can’t say how good the food was. I know they took home several awards. The aprons ROCKED! I want one!

Hope you are having a peaceful Sunday afternoon!

Family

I download a free desktop background from The Shabby Shoppe each month. It is so simple to drop your photo(s) into the background.

I took some pictures of dad to go on the August desktop. This is one of my favorites. He is in his element. He is happy.

Dad's birthday was August 27th. He is 78 years young. It was not possible for all of us to be together on his actual birthday; so we chose to celebrate during the Labor Day weekend. Mom prepared a great lunch, we had cake and home made ice cream. We had a great time together. Of course I had to take some pictures. It is so hard to get everyone to smile at the same time.

Look at Shawyn. He did not want any part of the photo shoot.

I love this picture of Dad and Caley.

Enjoy your Saturday!

Sunflowers

One of the neat things about living in rural america, is the agriculture.

I traveled to Abilene a couple of weeks ago. Just outside of Lubbock, I noticed a blanket of yellow sunflowers. It was beautiful. I knew it would be a great background for a picture.

I noticed the sunflowers again on the trip back from Abilene. I could not wait to take some pictures.

A couple of days later, I called my niece and nephew to see if they were up for a photo shoot.

My niece is always willing.



My nephew, not so much!

I wanted to take a few more pictures.

When we stopped, Shawyn would not get out of the car. I made the mistake of leaving the keys in the ignition. He locked all the doors!

I did manage to get some pictures of Caley. I love this picture; I just wish I knew enough about photoshop elements to get rid of the shadows. I need to work on lighting.

All in all it was a fun couple of hours…for me anyway. I did buy ice cream to pay for their services.

Enjoy your evening!

New Camera

I have always loved pictures. I can remember as a young girl, looking though old pictures in my Maw Maw’s picture box. There were pictures of my aunts and uncles. There were pictures of my daddy when he was a boy; then when he was a young man. There were also pictures of relatives that I had heard stories about, but never met.

My mom likes pictures, too. She has many, many pictures. I can remember mom having several different cameras. I especially remember the one that when she snapped the picture, she pulled it out and we watched it develop. We would all gather around to see what the picture looked like.

Memories.

A couple of months ago, I bought a new camera. I am excited and at the same time, a little over whelmed.

I haven’t figured it out yet. I’m still learning. It is fun.

I have a dilemma. Sophie, my sweet little dog, is very camera shy. She hides when she sees the camera in my hands. I don’t have kids of my own running around to snap pictures whenever I want to practice.

I do, however, have some nephews and a niece.

So I begged them to let me take some pictures.

They reluctantly agreed.

Brady modeled first. He is the oldest of the three and very handsome.


Then we took some group shots. Everything is going great. They are looking good.

Caley and Brady had their eyes closed in the picture below. Shawyn looked perfect. So I cropped the other two out.

By this time, Shawyn thought he had agreed to only one picture.

When he is done, he is done. Nothing will change his mind...not bribes of ice cream or money...nothing. He seems to have a bit of a stubborn streak. Personally, I think he gets it from his dad. Just my opinion...

Beautiful kids. Great models. Lots to learn.

Blessings,

Yard Work

I moved into my house six and a half years ago. The summer after I moved in, I had a lot of help to install Tex Turf 10 sod in my front and back yards.

My neighbor at the time, T, planted fescue in his front yard. T was very concerned that I installed Bermuda grass. He stated my yard would grow over into his fescue. He tried to convince me to plant fescue. His efforts were fruitless, however, because I loved my Bermuda grass.

T re-seeded his yard each year to fill in the bare spaces. Each year, to my dismay, I had sprigs of fescue in my yard. It was so aggravating. I would spend hours pulling that fescue out of my grass. I finally gave up on the strip that ran along the property line.

T passed away last year. His children sold his home.

I have new neighbors.

This past spring, new neighbor dug all of the fescue out of his yard. Well, all but the strip that runs along my property line. I have tried to pull this strip of fescue up. I think new neighbor thought I would never do anything, so he has dug some of it up, too. It is a slow process.

New neighbor installed Bermuda sod.

His yard is beautiful. Just beautiful.

Another thing you should know is that three years ago I started travelling with my job. I am away from home a lot.

I have a sprinkler system and Perm-a-green comes about every six weeks. However, it is all I can do to mow the yard and keep up with the inside chores.

New neighbor has a beautiful yard.

Because new neighbor has a beautiful yard, I have been trying harder with my yard this year. I don’t want to be known as the woman who let her yard go, with sprigs of fescue sticking up every where, seeding and ultimately ruining new neighbor’s beautiful yard. I have my pride you know.

This past weekend I worked in my yard. I mowed. I researched the internet on how to go about leveling said yard; as it contains low spots. I made a mental note to buy some topsoil to fill in the low places. This top soil process needs to be completed during the growing season.

I worked in the flower bed in the back yard, too. Here is a picture of the flower bed that was taken about five years ago.

Notice the purple grass along the fence. I thought that purple grass was so beautiful. I was so proud of that grass. However, I did not plant it again after that summer because it would not come back every year.

Or so I thought.

I didn’t take a before picture of the flower bed; because frankly, I was embarrassed. It was horrible. It was over run with weeds and grass. It was just horrible.

Here is an after picture of the flower bed. Notice the two Gerber daisies on each side. I purchased these daisies at Ivy Gardens at least four years ago. I am amazed that they come back out each year. They haven’t received much TLC. The delicate yellow flowers in the center came from Ivy Gardens, too. These have come back for at least two years.

Do you see the little sprigs of grass?

They are there. Believe me.

I pulled grass out of the flower bed for what seemed like forever. The grass just sprouts back out. It reminds me of gray hair, you pull one out and two replace it. And while I loved the purple grass a couple of years ago, I am no longer feeling the love.

I bought some chemical at Little Red Riding Hood nursery last year. It cost $30 for a small bottle. It is supposed to kill the grass without harming your other plants. As far as I can tell it hasn’t killed anything.

If you are reading this post and know of some sure fire way to get rid of that grass, without killing my hardy Gerber daisies, please, please, please let me know what it is.

I am also open to suggestions as what plants I should add to my grassy flower bed.

Blessings,