Ahhhh It Feels Like a New House!

Well almost all the carpet is in. Just one more room-familyroom needs to be done.
My brother is hard at work putting in the partition for the little wall so he can make my closet in the guestroom.

The guestroom has this little alcove thing...not sure what it's for but it's awlward to put furniture in so I'm having him make it into another closet. Now the whole wall will be closets and this gives me a 4 ft closet that I'm putting in 4 shelves to store my ebay and etsy art, jewelry, china, etc. whooo hoooooooooooooo

It's Hell Getting Old

What a horrible couple of months. My thyroid condition is worse---higher dose of meds. My blood pressure was up even with medication....a second medication. My bone density test sucked---osteoporosis---more meds. NOW vitamin D deficiency....more meds and sit in the sun..............ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

I made It Through...

...through 13 hours with 11 teens in Ocean City. Actually they are a nice bunch of teens. No problems with them. Me and the other 2 adults (actually those adults are only 24 & 27--young adults) commented that it was funny, it seemed like they wanted to be where we were. So we didn't have a hard time finding them for check in.

Our church youth group has anywhere from 25-40 high schoolers come to youth group every week. I was surprised more of them didn't want to do the beach. Of course this old lady, had lots of sunscreen and spent most of the time under an umbrella.

What I want to know is why my umbrella was the only one on the beach with the "Mary Poppins Syndrome"? Every 5 minutes I was chasing it down the beach or clunking a kid in the head as it rolled over them while they were basking in the sun! It got to be a running joke.

What am I in for?

Why do I do these things to myself. Every week I volunteer with the high school youth group at church. I dont' have any kids in there but been helping out for years. Some say I'm nuts, maybe I am. So Melissa the youth minister, needed chaperones for the Ocean City trip today. Would the parents of the kids volunteer, heck no. So here I go with her and 12 kids off to the beach. Pray for good weather and patience and a sense of humor for me!

Father's Day Reflection

Yesterday I spent the day at my parents. My Dad is 81 years old. Sometimes I look at him and think he looks so old. Yesterday he was working away helping me get ready for our little get together, cleaning up the screened porch. He looked old to me but then again when I watched him talk later, he reminded me of Dad as I've always known him.

I have such mixed emotions about him getting old. It's like I don't feel older but I watch my parents and I think I must be older, they are getting older...why don't I feel old????

Anyway, as Dad and I sat on the pier alone fishing, I thought I am lucky to have had such a wonderful father. He's not much of a fisherman but he's such a wonderful father. When I was little he would get me up at the crack of dawn, "gotta wake up before the fish, they get up early". We never got many fish but it was always a wonderful bonding experience. Mom didn't like to fish so it was me and Dad and my brother Joe.....it was our time. We might not have liked getting up early but it was fun to be out on the water.

The boat is long gone now but we still have those moments on the pier and I'm thankful for it. (and thankful I didn't catch a fish so I didn't have to clean it!)

Ning.....I'm all about Ning.....

....so first there was Indiepublic.com (which is ning) that I joined.
Then there was DesigningArtists.ning.com --- my painting pals from EBAY that I joined, and then there was Etsylove.ning.com.....and guess what I did -- yes I joined and now there is Redhatladies.ning.com....and OF COURSE I JOINED..........

between Etsy forums, my blogs, all my ning social networking and facebook. Its a wonder I have time to paint!!!!!!

"Crazy but that's how it goes".....I'm listening to Ozzie Osburn....and he's right!

Another Cruise in My Future

So I decided to book another cruise. This one is to Bermuda. It's for October 2009. The last time we went to Bermuda we took my daughter so it's my son's turn.

Also booked the tickets for October 08's red hat trip to Savannah and January 09's trip to the Keys..............God I LOVE RETIREMENT

Around the House...

....so no trips in the very near future. The next one is October to Savannah Georgia for a Red Hat Hoots, Haunts & Hats convention. And then the next in February to the Keys in Florida.

But for now, it's work around the house. New carpet is forthcoming upstairs...we did the first floor last year. I hate replacing carpet. It's like moving, packing up and moving stuff and then putting it all back.

And that raised brick fishpond has got to go. I'm so tired of the expense and work to keep it up. I've had it for gosh maybe 10 or 15 years. Now it's going to be a raised planter. It's so big to fill up so I've been raking up yard debris, using my compost from the pile, whatever and then I'll put good soil in it. Although the compost is probably good soil.....anyway...more work but the rains have been hampering it. Today we had a Jim Dandy of a STORM! I was napping (it's great to be retired)...when it came through, loud, strong winds, scared the crap out of me. All the windows were opened so the rain just poured in.

Well here comes another storm so maybe I'd better put this laptop away!