etcetera

a little of everything

Did I Say I Would Be Done When?

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So tomorrow night (to post pics and get ‘er done) has come and gone.  But… I have found a brand new blog!!  Well, new to me.  At least I don’t remember going there before.  Oh, dear.  Now I’m wondering if I had already subscribed and then subscribed again.

Anyway, it’s note*to*self.  Isn’t that the neatest name?  And I know the author of it.  If and when n*t*s really begins writing, I will put it on my blog roll so you all can check it out.  n*t*s has a great writer!

My grandgirls went to the carnival without me tonight.  boohoohoo  I am taking them tomorrow night.  Unless the pool paint comes in.  In the case of the finally-arrived-pool-paint, I shall have an evening BYOB-and-tell-me-where-I-missed-a-spot party.  Bring your own chair.  I will be the one in the boots in the bottom of the pool with Bikini Blue all over me.

Gettin’ ‘Er done

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This weekend has been the clean the pool house and get the pool repaired and opened weekend.  My good friend, Cheryl, came by Saturday in the midst of her very, very busy day to give me a boost by helping with the pool house.  Okay.  So she practically cleaned it all herself.  Emily, her daughter, and I just sort of looked busy.

I was supposed to have it finished Saturday night, but a good friend’s anniversary/retirement celebration took precedence.  Today I didn’t get it completed either.

So… tomorrow you get the pics of the completed job.

Back when I was young…

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Tonight at book club the old farts, well, older farts, got to recollecting about way back when.  Our book for the month was “The Help” by Kathryn Stockett (although a member of the club did call her Kathryn Stunkett).  And that member should take note that I did not burst out laughing even though I wanted to really badly.  Just smiled great big.  Everybody probably thought I was immensely enjoying the discussion… which I was.  Ms. Stunkett wrote about the plight of the black maids in Mississippi during the 1950’s and 1960’s.  Actually, it was more about the interactions between the women, black and white, during that time as well as the fight for and against segregation.

But, as in all books, there are a lot of other little tidbits that one can glean knowledge about or that brings back a memory.  In our case tonight, we were remembering when the zip codes first began to be used on letters, how we could just write the name and the town and the addressee would receive the mail, and the fact that people didn’t want to have to use the zip codes.  Now, of course, it’s second nature to slap it on there.

Then there were the telephone party lines.  That brought back some memories and stories!  Here’s a link to walk you down that memory road as well:  telephone party line

Some of us remembered when Medgar Evers was shot and killed for trying to make things better for African Americans in Mississippi, and we remembered Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. as he did the same, and was killed for it as well.  And today we have a President, whether you  agree with his politics or not, that brings justice to those senseless deaths.

How the world changes!!!  I’m just trying to hang on by a string!

Blog Baby

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One of my favorite blogs (which is now defunct due to some apparent nasty comments or emails to the blog author that upset her to the point of forfeiting her blog writing) (such a shame because she was really good, too) had a blog one day that put her on the Freshly Pressed page.  I will never make that page.  Not just because I don’t write well enough or am not quite interesting enough but because when they sent me the little popup question “Would you recommend Word Press?” I inadvertently put never instead of yes, of course.  Which I would by the way.  It’s very easy to maneuver around on; they give great tutorials, and have a great help page.  But in my haste, only reading a smidgeon of the question, which I am want to do quite frequently, I checked the wrong box.

So I know that is why I will never be Freshly Pressed.  It has absolutely nothing to do with my boring blog or my lack of good taste or my rambling, unfocused content.

Back to my original thought before that stinking rabbit came along that I had to chase.  Another thing I do quite often:  chase stinking rabbits.  That is why I can’t get anything accomplished in a timely manner, finished completely.  I go to another room… and there is a stinking rabbit!!  My life is exhausting.  Those stinking rabbits run in circles, you know, so I must run in circles as well.

On to the blog of one of my favorite bloggers:  she wrote about the fact that her blog is her baby.  I could so relate!  Although I am better now, I still come in and check to see if there are any comments, how many hits I’ve had that day, if I can change my blog’s little clothes (heading photo), or just talk to the little darling via a post.  It’s kind of neat having a blog baby (her title).

Mine will probably never grow up because I try to keep it short and sweet, although occasionally it throws a tantrum by way of Brenda the Blogger.   It’s just a little dose of a little something to give you a break in the day.  No big thinking here; just interacting… that is, if you comment.

So enjoy your evening or your day and give my little baby blog a bottle (comment).  Or not.

Locusts!

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What is going on around here?  First we have a major flood, and now we have this army of locusts invading our land.  They are eating everything in sight!

my once beautiful rose bushes

I have been on the internet to find out how to kill them, but the only apparent safe way is to stomp them or hit them with a board, which is my plan of action, both things.

making their way to my rose bushes and other flowers

Insecticides aren’t an option because the birds are having a heyday with them as are the squirrels and even spiders.  The locusts must be delicious.  I had been noticing the squirrels digging in the ground and eating away where nothing to eat should be, couldn’t figure out what was going on with them.  Then the birds have been eating something as big as their heads.  Today I see what it is.

What kind of spider is this?

Today… I am so very mad at Adam and Eve for screwing up Paradise and opening up Pandora’s Box of sin with all the consequences that go with that sin… from now until the end of time.

The nasty, red-eyed, evil looking things are EVERYWHERE!

Mission Statement

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an apron gift from my good friend Dolores

The apronsandappetites Mission Statement:

1.  Write about what interests me or catches my attention or someone suggests or what I cook from my magazine recipes (I have to laugh at this one… but I really am going to do that on a regular basis soon… still laughing) or an old story or friends or…

2.  Bring a smile to someone’s face or provoke a deep thought or nudge a lighthearted one or renew memories or change a point of view or create empathy/sympathy or…

3.  Never think that because I write a blog that I am a real writer.  Perchance some real words worth reading on occasion may make their way into this little blog, but may I never perceive that as the true gift of being able to write.

4.  Enjoy myself and perhaps bring joy to others; bare my soul and perhaps bring the encouragement for others to do the same; leave a piece of me in cyberspace and bring those who comment along with me.

5.  Write on a semi-regular basis with the hope that people read on a semi-regular basis and maybe even comment on a lesser semi-regular basis (only because I know you won’t all the time, my goal).

When It Starts Coming Together…

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the tongue helps... really, it does

Giving piano lessons is one of the neatest things about getting the baby grand.  Of course, I wanted the grand for me, but I also didn’t want to give piano lessons on the little spinet I had.  (won’t give a brand name of the little spinet, but it’s just not a good piano)  And I did want to give lessons.  We need some new piano blood in our church.  Vickie and I aren’t getting any younger.

totally focused

Emily is eight, and I am priming her for the church pianist.  She just started a couple of months ago, serious lessons, and she’s doing great.  I love to watch her throw her hands out to the sides to calm herself down for the new pieces.  And I love to watch her when she’s really practiced hard and knows her lesson well.

now she's getting it

Today’s lesson, the new lesson, was the theme from the Mickey Mouse Club.  It looks hard at first until she plays through it a couple of times.  Then she sees that really can get it.

oh, yeah!!

And she really  likes it when we play the piece together.  We played a duet of Old McDonald today.  She was fantastic and very happy as she played it with me.

It’s just such fun when it all starts coming together.

Plant Lessons for Life

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If you read my blog, then you remember the post about the death of my beautiful plants. (boohooing at this point)  Today I finally took the dead things out off the porch into the backyard for burial.  It was actually going to be a cremation after I had salvaged all the dirt from the pots, and then pulled the useless, lifeless roots out and shook the remaining dirt over the yard.  (my Mom taught me to be frugal)

In memory of their once vibrant lives that brought such pleasure to me and other visitors to my backyard paradise, I took pics of them.

my once green, full-leaved rubber plant

They used to have full green leaves until I left them out to freeze to death while I sunned on the Florida beaches.  I’m still somewhat ashamed, perhaps, a little.  That sun just felt so good; those waves were so wonderful.  Those plants were so far from my mind… until I got home and saw the little darlings.  I cut them back, ready for the dirt dumping.

I could wire a fake plant to these branches

As I was digging out the dirt, I noticed in the big pot that had held the rubber plant a small green thing.  What in the world?  A bug?

I couldn’t believe my eyes!  It was sprouting a new little leaf, way down at the base of the plant.  WOW.  So I checked the other corpse also waiting for cremation, and there it was:  LIFE.

the rubber plant putting out a sprout

As I stood there amazed at these little plants I had given up for dead, deemed useless to me and the world, was about to throw them out like the trash I had decided they were, God’s gentle, loving presence infused me with the knowledge that we are those dead plants.  Our lives can be destroyed to the point of death, and we still fight to live, beginning anew with the smallest step.  We decide who is useless to the world, who has had enough chances, who is too irritating, ugly, mean-spirited, drunk, drugged, or needy… and throw them out like trash.

But… (I always love this “but” part in the Bible) God is the giver of life, and though we see something dead or useless, God sees a sprig of beauty and new growth deep within the marrow of the soul.

Let us not throw away something precious until we look as closely as God looks.

the new beginning

It’s Apron Time!

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This is so us... especially the loud part

Taxes are done.  Test for work (that I bombed by the way) is out of the way.  The flower beds are beginning to take on a little shape.  And this week I’m going to tackle the tremendous amount of tantalizing and tasty-looking recipes staring at me from the box in my office.  I have occasionally taken one or two out with a big whim of getting started with my Julie/Julia-Mommas/Magazines endeavor only to put them back after letting them lie around on the desk for a couple of days.

But tomorrow…  I cook.  Bake and cook to be more specific.  I’ve got the camera out and ready to shoot.  I am going to make Easter cookies that were inspired by Pink Martinis and Pearls.  I’m so excited!   I’m quite sure mine will not be as beautiful as hers.

With which apron should I start off?

I love these fun aprons!

The red and orange is a half apron.  The other two are full body.  I also have two new ones; one from Dolores and one from Darla.  They are so cool and fun.  Pics of them tomorrow too.

I’ll have to put on some make-up.

Piano Lessons

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Since I was out in the backyard digging in the flower bed (digging up sunflower seedlings), I almost missed my piano student.  I thought it was five… it was six.  This daylight savings time makes me lose track of the time.

Right now I am up to four students!!  Yippee!  I love it.

piano student

It’s so much fun to watch it come together as they learn to play.  And the books now are great; gets them moving on the piano with both hands right away.

My mom started me taking piano lessons when I was seven or eight.  Mrs. Jennings from Junction gave me lessons every Saturday.  When Darla started taking lessons — (Dar, tell that story) —

weird Japanese stuff

I would get to watch TV during her lesson.  There was always one of those weird Saturday movies on, a Japanese movie with dubbed in English, black and white, something like that.  They were great!

Mom made me practice maybe not every day, but often.  She wanted me to play piano at church, and when I was around 12, she got her wish.  It may have been with one finger a lot of times, but I began playing around then.  And so did Vickie Jerrells (now Vickery).  Vickie plays the organ (the best I’ve ever heard) and I play the piano.  We have played together at church for many, many years now with some intermittent times of playing with other people.

wish we had one of these at church

ours isn't quite this big

I can see us still playing when we are very old, our hands all gnarled with arthritis, pounding away because we can’t hear, with sour looks on our faces because… well, we’re all old and gnarly.  That’s enough reason to look sour!