God’s Country

Here are some shots of the views from my grandmother’s home. 

The ole smokehouse

The ole chicken coop

The ole barn… loved playing in the barn and watching Papa milk cows. 

Seriously?

My 8 X 10 of the rainbow I took last week showed up today.  

In spite of the fact that we have an oversize mailbox and the photo was in a cardboard photo mailer with “This package contains photographs.  Please do not bend.”, it was bent in half around our regular size mail and put in our oversize mailbox the wrong way.  He did this just before he delivered a box to our front step since it was too big for the mailbox.   I’m surprised he didn’t try to squish the box in there too.   Of all days for us to have a substitute carrier. 

I do not order prints in the mail often but I had a free credit for the 8 X 10 and I like to use coupons to enlarge prints I might like to enter in our local fair.  I filed a complaint with the USPS via email about the damaged photo.  It’s not so much about the money (about four bucks) but the just the idea of “How in the world did this happen and why?”.  I mean, it didn’t occur to him why it was in a cardboard envelope?  Or that our mailbox is oversize and the envelope would have fit just fine if he’d turned it horizontal.   And, can’t he read?  

God’s Promise

I took this the other day after a dark cloud came by.   Happy Mother’s Day. 

 

Gourds Galore

I just love gourds.  I think it goes back to my great-grandfather growing them (or someone?) and then seeing dried gourds at my grandma’s house.  I want to clean them and do pyrography art on them. 

The guy who was running the booth gave me a website to check out which has a lot of information about growing gourds and also sells seeds.  Indiana Gourd Society

 

 

Field Trip

On Friday we went to school day to the Lore of the Laughery in Friendship.  It was hosted by the NMLRA.    It was a good educational experience and fun too. 

Butter Churning. 

Flag from the war of 1812.  15 stars and 15 stripes. 

Leather crafter.

Notice what the guy dressed like Ben Franklin is holding in his hand.  I am pretty sure it is an iPhone.  Yes, I am easily amused. 

He was explaining how they would use gourds to hold the food that they were gathering. 

This was my favorite booth.  I will do another post just on the gourds.

I would love to grow and decorate gourds.

Sean was in heaven. 

Candle dipping.

 

After Friendship, we stopped at the Muscatatuck National Wildlife Refuge where they have a restored home and barn from the late 1800s.  That refuge has lots of wetlands and habitats especially for birds.  They had an observation deck with high-powered binoculars where we could see a really cool large bird that we think was a great blue heron.  

A New Season

Sean is trying out a new sport.  His first game was 2 hours and 15 minutes.   I am hoping this isn’t the norm, but it was fun to watch.   It’s just that some games are at 8:00 p.m. during the week including some school nights.

They lost 10-9 but made a great comeback after being down several runs.

Got Hail?

We had some hail yesterday.  Most was marble-sized but we had a few big chunks also.   It is so warm already that I know we will end up with the air conditioner turned on.  I do not do hot and humid very well.

24 Years

24 years ago today, when I was 12, um, I mean 21……….

Sean and Piano

Sean is just completing his second year of piano or his 4th semester.  He has learned a lot in a short time in the Musik Garten program.   

Last week was a 4H contest which was like a talent contest.  One category was musical – vocal or instrumental – so he signed up and went to play.  It said in the information the time limit was 3-5 minutes.  They wanted a minimum of 3 minutes.  The problem is most of his songs are more like 15 or 20 seconds.  So, he played a couple of songs twice to end up with about a minute.  Points are taken off for being under.    There were only seven acts total of all three categories and they can send six acts to the area contest.  He was selected to go to area.  They all were since one girl in the musical category also participated in a skit in another category. 

So, our dilemma is this.  How does he play for three minutes?   His piano teacher has offered to help him put together a medley of a handful of songs.   Thankfully.

The area contest is less than 2 weeks away so he has a lot of practicing to do and we do not have the medley ready yet.   I need to find him a pair of shoes since he outgrew his other ones.  We learned that “costumes” are also judged.  Here’s a picture from last year’s recital.  We missed the January recital due to a scouting event. 

Driving a Beater

 

New Neighbors, New Friends?

The house diagonal from ours has new occupants although they are not sleeping there yet.  The big trucks came yesterday and moved in their stuff.  The kids are very excited because they have kids.  We had heard three but it appears possibly four including a school-aged girl.   Sierra is beside herself.   There have been rare sightings of the older kids who were probably in school while the parents have been cleaning and whatever else you do before moving into a home, but the younger two are a newborn and a toddler.  We look forward to meeting all of them soon. 

I am easily entertained these days and spent the day wondering how the semi was going to get back off of our street.  I learned that they can sort of maneuver on a cul-de-sac but you better hope it is not muddy.  A lot of backing up and pulling forward until they got past our mailboxes.  Here is how it ended up and they parked there until they were read to leave with the smaller truck.

Fainting Spells

After Callie’s last episode of fainting which resulted in an ambulance ride, I decided we were going to go talk to the doctor.   Although the paramedics said it is not uncommon for someone to pass out after having a procedure, I didn’t go into the other times she has passed out.

I told the doctor that this seems to be increasing in frequency and we’d like to know what causes it and if there’s anything we can do to prevent it. 

Most, if not all, of her fainting spells appear to be connected to some event or pain.   For example, the first time I remember her passing out was at the health department a few minutes after she got the flu shot.  This was before we learned she has an allergy to egg and, at the time, the nurses thought it was due to anxiety.    She said she didn’t feel well so they sat her in a chair, and did everything you’d expect them to do to try to prevent her from fainting but she went out anyway.  Another time, she passed out while ice skating with a migraine headache caused from drinking a diet soda.  (This was our first clue that she is sensitive to aspartame).   During this past winter, in the span of about three months, she passed out three different times after hitting the funny bone on her elbow.   She can feel it coming on and thankfully has been at least sitting down when it occurs.  She loses consciousness.  She has also had close calls at church after being overcome by someone’s strong perfume, but this hasn’t happened in a long time.

Needless to say, it would not be good to have her passing out when she’s, say, at the library, or at church, or on a walk around the neighborhood.  She could get hurt pretty easily from a fall. 

The doctor suspects it is what is called vasovagal syncope, even though most people will not faint from hitting the funny bone.  She is going to order some tests.   One will be a tilt table test which will monitor her heart and blood pressure when they tilt her at different angles.  The other test will be to wear an event recorder for several days. 

When the paramedics turned her over to the emergency department staff at the hospital, he mentioned that she had a heart arrhythmia when they hooked her up in the ambulance.  I mentioned this to the doctor.   I think this monitoring is to check her heart when she has dizziness or chest pains that she sometimes complains of.  

Anyway, I hope we can find some answers and some solutions. 

Sick Day

My husband has been working so much that the kids were excited to find him home yesterday morning.  He was sick so he called in. 

Last night at bed time, Sean told him that it was nice to spend time with him during the day and then he asked, “Can you call in sick tomorrow?” 

I thought how sweet that was but on the other hand, it’s pretty pathetic that you have to be sick to see your kids.  Turns out, he feels worse today than he expected and has called in again.   Normally, he will tough it out at work if he’s sick but I’m sure it’s hard to go in to work sick knowing you are looking at probably at least a 12 hour day. 

The kids are not awake yet so they don’t know.  It reminds me to look for good even in the bad and to give thanks in all things.