WHAT A WEEK!

It finally happened.  My dryer died.  My washer is making weird noises.  I don’t know how old they are because I took Uncle Clarence’s when he died.  So, I went to Lowe’s and bought new.  They will be delivered while I am at the District Assembly for which I am a delegate for Landmark Church.  Renea will be taking care of Penny while I am gone and she will be here for the washer and dryer.
 

Before I left on Tuesday (I will be gone Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday) I cut back the Lantanas and weeded them.  I also cut back the Hummingbird bush and weeded it along with the snowball bush.  They are all looking really nice now – except for the Lantanas because they have not started getting leaves.  Still have a lot of weeding to do and, of course, grass to cut.  That will have to wait  until I return.

 

After finishing I took a shower and headed for the church.  We are meeting in the church parking lot and Andy (the pastor) will be driving us to the District Assembly.  There are five of us going in addition to Andy; Tom, Evelyn, Gayle, Sandy and me.  The church pays for our room and our food.  I will be rooming with Evelyn; Gayle and Sandy will be together; and Tom and Andy will each have separate rooms. The District Assembly was held in Prattville which is about ten miles north of Montgomery.  Everything was really nice. 

 

This was a new experience for me while everyone else had already attended at least three.  In fact, Evelyn has been to 58 of them.  (She is 86)  Evelyn and Gayle seemed to know most everyone.  The first two sessions had to do with missions since we are a mission church.  I learned a lot about what the church and their volunteers do and where they go.  There were several interesting speakers.

 

The next five sessions were about the church, business meetings and reports from the various churches.  The group consisted of pastors and delegates from all the Nazarene Churches in Southern Alabama. I found it very interesting.  Again there were several interesting speakers.  My favorite was Dr. Crocker.  The singers were Jennifer and Robert Wilkerson.  They were awesome; especially Jennifer.  She had an absolutely beautiful voice.  They were at all five sessions.  The led the pastors and delegates in singing and then Jennifer sang a few hymns herself.  I should mention that she is pregnant with twin girls. 

 

We broke for lunch and supper between the sessions.  All of our group knew the area except me.  We went to several nice restaurants and had some really good food.  We arrived back at the church parking lot about 4:30 in the afternoon.  I then headed for home.

 

Wouldn’t you know it – my washer and dryer (which was supposed to be delivered in the morning) had not yet arrived.  Renea had not received a phone call telling her they were “running late” so I got on the phone to find out just was what going on.  Long story short, they were on their way.  However, they didn’t arrived until about six o’clock.  They took my old washer and dryer and installed the new ones.  Their excuse for being late was they got tied up in Columbus. I was not happy, but what can you do.  Anyway, I now have my new washer and dryer.

 

I spent all day yesterday cutting grass; and, yes, it was butt high in places.  I cut my front yard and part of my back yard while Renea cut the rest of the back yard.  It was an all day project.  Today is raining, we may have some severe storms.  So, I am doing inside work.  In fact, I am using my new washer and dryer.  The washer makes some strange noises.  Penny isn’t too sure about the washer. She keeps checking on it.  The dryer is much more quiet. 

 

Penny was glad to see me when I arrived home.  In fact she slept with me that night and didn’t get me up until 5:30 a.m.  That is late for her.  This morning she was back to normal.

That Darn Mocking Bird!

This is last week’s blog.  Didn’t have a chance to post it before I left for the District Assembly Meeting as a delegate for Landmark Church. 
 

When we lived on Boomer Road there was a mocking bird that used to dive bomb Rodney as soon as she would come outside.  Now we have one here.  It doesn’t dive bomb Penny because she doesn’t go outside, but it drives both of us crazy because it doesn’t shut up.  Darn thing wakes us in the morning and yammers most of the day.  It hangs around outside the kitchen window.  I think it has a nest in one of the Bradford Pear trees.  Not sure how to get rid of it.

 

My purple martin house seems to have bluebirds nesting in it.  Haven’t seen a purple martin house.  I don’t have the heart to get rid of the bluebirds, so I guess I will have to get another purple martin house.

 

This has been such an exciting week.  It has rained every day.  Penny and I have spent the time not doing much of anything.  I am working on a couple of plastic canvas projects and a couple of crocheting projects.  One of the items I am crocheting is a table runner, at least I am trying to make one.  I have taken it apart once so far and started over.  For some reason I have a tendency to start wide, then it gets narrow, then it gets wide again.  I am trying a completely different pattern this time.  Hopefully, it will stay the same size.  Stay tuned.

 

In my bedroom I have a two shelf bookcase.  Last night I decided to go to bed early and do some reading.  Miss Penny decided to join me by running around and jumping on and off the bed.  All of a sudden she stopped and looked at the bookcase.  On the top shelf I have stacked my sweatshirts on one side and my Capri pants on the other side.  She jumped onto that shelf right between the two.  Penny then decided to go behind the sweatshirts, and when she did this the sweatshirts fell off the shelf onto the floor.  The look on her face was priceless. I decided I better pick them up and put them someplace else.  If I put them back on the shelf she would think it was a game.  I then turned out the light and went to bed.  Don’t know how long she stayed on the shelf.

 

If you remember I told you the grass would be butt high by the time it stops raining and we get to mow, well, I was wrong – it will be waist high!

Mostly About Penny

Today is Friday and I am starting to feel a little better.  Seems I had a really bad case of food poisoning so you can imagine where I spent yesterday from about two o’clock in the morning.  Penny was a “good girl” yesterday.  However, she is making up for it today.  She has been into and onto everything!
 

I just walked up to get my mail before the rain hits.  We are supposed to have some really bad storms today.  Of course, that means my fibromyalgia is really bad today.  I think I am going back to bed and just stay there!

 

We never had any really bad storms.  They all went north, south and east of us.  We did have one storm with a little bit of lightning and some thunder.  This fascinated Miss Penny.  She sat on the shelf of her tower and kept watching the sky trying to figure out what was going on.  At least it kept her entertained.

 

I FINALLY DID IT!  She has gotten into the habit of bringing me her toys and waking me up between 2 and 2:30 in the morning wanting to play.  This morning (Saturday) I got up, chased her out of the bedroom and shut the door.  I went right back to sleep.  Didn’t hear her the rest of the night.  Yea!

 

I am more convinced than ever that she is Jim reincarnated.  This morning she was all wound up and I was going to shut the door again but I needed to know where she was before I did so.  I turned on the bedroom light and found her with her paws and head on top of Jim’s container.  She just laid there and looked at me.  It was four in the morning. 

 

This has really been a non-productive week.  I have been sick with a stomach virus (I don’t think it was food poisoning) plus it has rained every day.  I am feeling better now, but it is supposed to rain until Sunday.  By the time we get to mow grass it will be butt high.  It’s almost there now.

 

This blog seems to be about Penny and I have another comment about her.  Yesterday I had left my computer on and wasn’t paying any attention to her.  I was busy doing “other stuff.”  I turned around and there she is walking across the keyboard.  Whatever she walked on caused my desktop to turn sideways.  For me this was a first.  I wasn’t sure what to do so I call Brian, my computer go to guy, he gave me two ways to correct this and the computer is fine now.  It was really weird working on the computer when everything was sideways.  At least she keeps things interesting.

 

Penny is not afraid of storms.  As I said before she watches the sky when we have thunder and lightning trying to figure out where it comes from.  This morning, however, we had rain that came down so hard she got in bed with me and snuggled.  It was so hard and loud there may have been some hail, but I didn’t get up to check.  Now the sun is shinning.

Easter Sunday

Saturday – finished cutting the small patch of back grass.  Filled all the bird feeders.  I have a lot of finches now – both yellow and red.  Not sure if the yellow are canaries or yellow finches.  I understand that the red are actually purple finches.  I also have a lot of cardinals and starting to get mourning doves.  I have robins all year.  Also cleaned the dead leaves out of the other hydrangea bush and corners of the north rock garden.  Watered the new trees.
 

After church on Easter Sunday I spent the afternoon and evening at Ricky and LaNora’s.  LaNora’s son, Phil, and her sister, Vicky, were also there.  Kevin, Renea, Stephanie and Ryan were also in attendance.  Stephanie’s friend, Al, joined us after supper.  Meal was great.  More than enough food to feed everyone so LaNora insisted everyone fix a plate and take it home.

 

Everyone except Vicky and me played cornhole.  Good competition!

 

I had a really nice chat with Ryan.  Something I don’t believe I have ever done.  We talked a lot while at Ricky and LaNora’s then he stopped here on his way back home and visited for a while. This was the first time he met Miss Penny.  She made up to him right away.

 

LaNora has two cats.  One is all white with blue eyes and totally deaf.  His name is Cotton and he is very friendly.  I had on black slacks that were white by the time I got home.  Her other cat is named Callie.  He is almost one year old and very shy.  She is a calico.  She wants to be with everyone, but she doesn’t want you to touch her.  She is a very pretty cat.  Even though she is a calico her markings are totally different than Penny’s.

 

LAUNDRY IS FINISHED!  YEA!!!!

 

Today is Wednesday.  I took Renea to get her shot this morning.  Now I am watering my new trees.  They are looking good. 

 

Penny the Attack Cat struck again!  Had my air conditioner looked at today.  Scott is a very nice young man.  He knocked on the door, Penny ran to the door, I opened the door and let him in.  At that point Penny ran away and hid until he left.  Then I had to bribe her with a treat to get her to come out of hiding.   He cleaned the furnace and compressor and replaced a part that was going bad.  Hopefully, I am good for the summer.

 

Time to cut the grass again.  No plans to do so until this weekend.

This and That

What a day!  I had my last crocheting class today.  They decided my cowl looked like a little girl’s dress.  Then, we were taught how to do granny squares today and because of a miscount on my part mine turned out differently than it was supposed to.  However, we all decided it would make a good granny square for a Christmas tree skirt which I plan to make at some point down the road.  Maybe I should be a designer instead of a crocheter (not sure that is a word but it sounds good).  Anyway, Wanda invited us to a class next week to learn something new.  She is also going to have the Next Step class on a Saturday when she returns from her cruise.  I am definitely going.

 

This is the piece that we decided looked like a dress.

This is one of my so called granny squares.  As you can see it isn't very square.

 

After class I stopped and got a haircut.  Had lunch and then decided to do a little weeding.  I figure it will probably take me most of the summer to get caught up.  I told Kevin I was going to start in April, but I got a day’s head start.  I weeded a couple of items that I have to “feed.”

 

I then decided it was time to start mowing the grass with my new mower.  I estimate that I mowed about 2/3 of the area that I mow.  I like my new mower.

 

Miss Penny is not happy with me because I have not spent any time with her today.  I guess I will do that now.  As you can probably tell from my postings that I am not nearly as strict with Penny as we were with Rodney.  J

 

It is Wednesday morning now and I have just finished mowing the rest of the front yard and the side yard.  I will do the back portion that I normally do tomorrow.  I plan on pulling a few weeds after lunch.

 

I also crocheted another granny square like the one I did in class yesterday.  That one was red and white.  This one is green and white.  (see picture above)  I plan to try and do one every day.  Of course, we know that isn’t going to happen, but I will try.  I am sure I need a zillion of them for my tree skirt.

 

Last night we had a severe thunderstorm watch.  Everything stayed north of us.  About five o’clock this morning we had some thunder and two drops of rain. 

 

Saw my first hummingbird today while weeding the garden.  Need to get the feeders out!  Feeders are out and the hummingbird was around while I was weeding the garden.  Actually there are two hummingbirds.  One is the “bully” and he watches the feeder from a branch on one of my plants.

 

I have finished weeding the north rock garden.  Now it’s time to spray roundup along the edge and clean up the dead leaves that accumulated over the winter.

 

Today is Friday and I didn’t get anything accomplished on my TO DO LIST.  However, I went shopping with Kevin and Renea.  They wanted to by some apple trees.  Guess what!  They didn’t buy any apple trees, or any trees for that matter.  But, I bought three tulip poplar trees.  Kevin planted them for me when we arrived home.  I helped, of course.  I told him where to plant them. J  And I have been watering them (after Kevin hooked up the hoses and drug them out to where the trees are).

 

This is a picture of one of the tulip poplar trees.  There really is some leaves starting to come out on the tree.  Once the leaves come out I will post another picture so it doesn't look like we planted sticks.