You ain't gonna' believe this !

An update on my crafty projects - Picture frame - It's coming along good.. I've got the doorknob and had a piece of wood added to my existing 4 pane window. I sanded, painted and applied crackle to it. Today I dropped it off at the glass shop to get the panes put back in. When my vinyl lettering get here, I will be almost done. (BTW, Lana, I ordered a cricut !! ) All I need to do now is find a really cool abandoned home to take a picture of for all four seasons. Yarn thingy - As you know I packed it up and sent it to mom. It was making me say bad words - really bad words. I should have just spent the money and bought one ! But noooooo, I had to save for vacation to Tennessee !! So mom emailed me some pictures of the finished product - here it is. Not too bad, huh?

Rick and I have had a busy week and weekend. It's been raining so much here that it's made it easy to pull the weeds and of course rain makes the grass grow !! So I get to mow the yard. Rick got me all ready with the mower washed it, changed the oil and sharpened the blades so to the yard I go ! I don't like it when he mows, he seems to chop off flowers AND blow grass on the ones he don't chop ! Men !! ☺(giggles) So I'm mowing along and thought I saw a worm wiggling on the grass, nope, it was a darn snake. I HATE SNAKES ! But I had managed to almost cut him in half without even noticing. So what did I do you ask, I backed up and proceeded forward slowly , until the tire was right on top of it. Then I turned the wheel about 20 times. He's a goner, almost. I hurried up to go to the shop , on the mower might I add, and get Rick. I asked him to pick it up and lay it in the shop on the floor. WHAT ?! He thought I was nuts, OK he knows I'm nuts. I told him it was perfect for my 365 for the day ! I took it ( mom don't look) she hates snakes ! I already got yelled at by her 'cause she seen it on my flickr. Did I mention I HATE SNAKES !! I know it's small but it doesn't matter, it's wiggly !

A few days later I went stalking my bluebirds. They found their house and have set up a life there. I had seen them flying in and out and I wanted to get closer. Peep, I was being watched. I better leave them alone for a while and wait on the babies to come crawling out. I'm a bird watcher, I'm a bird watcher, watching birds fly by...oh yeah ! My lyrics to "I'm a girl watcher" (giggles) Now for my favorite birdies of all - the hummingbirds, they're back !! I took this through the screen so it's not a great shot but I didn't want to spook him away just yet. He has to get used to me ya know.

I want to be able to have the hummers sit on my hands and eat. I have seen it in magazines so I'm going to sit out in front of my house with the tripod set up waiting. I will wear a red shirt to draw them close. I'll post for sure if they come to me.

Enough already on the birds right, let's go to Missouri. On Saturday we went to an auction in Farmington, Iowa. A friend of ours and his dad run Fett Auction and they are always filling Rick in on some of the items. This particular one was a canoe. Rick told me about it but he did say it had a hole in it. Now why would anyone want to buy a canoe with a hole in it. Were they gonna sell a bucket with it to? Well Rick the fixer-upper said he could patch it and probably get it cheap. WRONG - the holey bottom canoe ended up selling for $180.00 !!! Geez people come on, let us get something cheap in this world. We only spent 6 bucks at the sell, Rick got a cooler and I got a book. Bummer ! I bet I said a hundred times, "look at all this junk ! " We decided to head to Missouri now and get some smokes. With camera in hand scouting out the ride I was able to get a shot of a fly passing us by. Just kidding ! Rick said we would stop at a couple places on the way back through. I think he said this because I was going ohhh look at that old house,

can we stop ?

Ohh look at the neat barn,

can we stop ? Then we get to the store and he said ohhh, get your camera you ain't gonna' believe this ! I turned around behind us was a car was. OK I thought, then I saw it, a buggy and an Amish lady !! Oh yeah, I was in business, Amish people at the car wash !! I figured they would hand wash their buggies ? The horse was tied up out back so I didn't get a shot of that.

This was worth the trip. I need to get out more huh ? Something about the Amish interests me. I wish I could spend a day with one of the families and learn about them. It would be even more great if they would let me take some pictures !

Well' enough blabbing today. I have to get off here and gather up yard sale stuff. Next weekend is going to be another busy one. I'm going out to supper and the casino for my birthday on Friday, yard sale on Saturday and my nieces baby shower on Sunday. That should make an interesting post. BUT before the shower I'm going to get some baby bump shots ! I can't wait.

More shots and interesting stories soon !!!! Be sure to comment and let me know what you want to hear about.

Hunting, Fishing & Crafting

I know you are thinking wow, 2 posts in one day. I'm playing the catch up game so here it is. I have a lot to cover in this one. Did the title get your attention ?

Rick was going turkey hunting and asked did I want to go along to see if I could get a tom all fanned out, with a camera that is. He took the bow ☺. First off let me say that the 2 man blinds are exactly that. No room for a chair, bow or any other thing you may want to take along. Rick and I were crammed in that thing, sitting on these little 3 legged stools, that he uses for fishing. It was like riding a banana seat bicycle all over again. Needless to say I was getting a little numb in the bum! Now we finally get all situated, the sun is just starting to come up and Rick start calling in the turkeys. Annoying sounds were coming from our blind but then in the near distance I hear gobble,gobble gobble. Well, they don;t really sound like that but you get the picture. It was like turkey Heaven ! Sounds coming from all around, tons of turkeys both toms & hens. Now we wait, uh here comes one, Rick is getting a little nervous cause he is about to kill something. The tom comes to within 30 yards of us but Rick doesn't have a good shot cause the smart tom is standing behind trees. I can see he is all fanned out but I can't move ! What !!! I came along to take a picture and now I can't move !! Rick said that turkeys have really good eye sight and the least move will scare him away. Oh well, I watch and that I mean watch the tom walk away. After he was out of sight Rick and I discussed that if he did have a shot, he had no room to pull back the bow ! So I think we need to get a blind each and he will have plenty of room for the shot and I can have room for a comfy chair, coffee, and my camera bag !

Hunting's over now we decide to go fishing. It's cloudy and the rain isn't far away, perfect time for the scaly things to be bitin' !

It was like the turkey scenario - but with fish. It was fish Heaven !! My arm was getting tired from reeling. We caught bass, bluegill and crappie !! Dad & Uncle Allen , tell the Tennessee trout to look out we are coming soon ! Supper tomorrow will be.....FISH !

Crafting - well many of you know I'm some what of a crafter, or at least I think so. I saw these Fringies for sell on Etsy and thought I could just make one myself and save the money. (Thanks for the economy situation Obama) So I got on EBay and found some yarn that will work. I bought it, it came and I got started. Now I failed to mention that I have no pattern to go by, only a picture. So I began cutting yarn, drug out the sewing machine and proceeded to sew the yarn to a pillowcase. I'm not that good at sewing, in fact Rick got me the sewing machine for Christmas ( cause I wanted one ) and I don't have the patience for the friggin' thing. My bobbin ran out and I fought with the darn sewing machine for almost an hour before packing everything up in a basket and sending it off to mom. Gotta love moms, they can do anything !! Thanks mom !!!! If mom can't make it look good - I will spend the money and get one.

Now for a shot not related to this post. The Magnolias are blooming everywhere. I took this shot in Crapo Park in Burlington,Iowa. Ah, the fragrance and beauty of Spring. Have a great day !

Easter ( late post but I did it )

I have been super busy with my yard, work and of course the dreaded housework lately! Finally I have a minute of down time and am going to get caught up on my posts. Here are a few shots and a short post from Easter at mom's.

A little quiet time while the kids are out enjoying the sunshine and hiding Easter eggs.

Gina made these beautiful cupcakes all by herself. Kim's daughter loved the cupcakes that Gina made. The icing did come off but a little bit of purple stain didn't.
The hunt ! Maggie ( in red) won with the most found. She was like a fart in a whirlwind ( Granny's saying) I think next year she will graduate to the bigger kids hunt. Mom always splits the kids up by age to make it more fun. It was a hoot to watch them run out the door.


Hunter was telling me here that he wanted to eat the candy inside the egg. He didn't care how many he had found. I convinced him to wait and get busy looking for more then he would have all kinds of candy ! He agreed and started looking again.

Busy weekend

What a weekend this was.

Gina & Louie and Rick & I went to Madison, Wisconsin for a deer/turkey expo at the Alliant Energy Center. This is the guys trip so they made all the arrangements, well except for reserving the rooms !

We took off Thursday evening after work with a "go with the flow" plan for Thursday night since we only made reservations for Saturday & Sunday. We got to Dubuque and decided to eat. So we grab the GPS'S yes that's correct we had ours and Gina brought theirs ( to see which one was more accurate ) really now, they are going to be the same or at least pretty darn close. So back to the journey, we typed in restaurants, wanting steak we typed in steak. Now we are riding around the not so safe streets of Dubuque looking for all we found on the GPS. We were going further & further away from town and it was looking a little creepy, were their drug runners there, a street of convicts, who know, let's get the heck back on the road. We drove on to Platteville before finally pulling over. Now we have sat in the car for a little over 3 hours and I have to stretch and am really getting hungry. By this time it is about 9, time to look for a room and get some rest. Yeah , right rest with the guys ! Are you nuts !! We ate supper, got a room to split for the night ( save more, spend more shopping ) and I was out. By the way this is the first night since surgery that I slept in a bed ! Oh my did I do a lot of tossing & turning.

Got up Friday morning, with the phone ringing, it was Trent, Gina & Louie future son-in-law. Calling to see where to put the key, OMG he was coming up later tonight why not wait. This phone call already had Louie & Rick planning how to get him back for this. He's in trouble !

Back to the story- we were leaving the hotel when we noticed a swan nesting so here I go, out with the camera to get some pictures. I looked back , the guys were saying go closer ( while they were laughing and holding Gina's camera) so I thought I was close enough. I snapped a few shots and turned around before I got attacked by a hiding male swan ! On to breakfast ( which I chose healthy ) then hit the road. It is Madison or bust. We got there, went to the room, then headed out to get some snacks and beer. We went to Sam's Club and that is when the Weight Watchers thing slipped right out of my mind. Have you ever been to a Sam's ? They are cooking up something in every corner and they had the BEST cheesecake ever ! Seriously now it was tasty ! We went back to the room, put away groceries then headed down to the show. They guys were in awe, this was a lot bigger than the Des Moines show that we always go to. We walked around for about 4 hours looking at everything and I mean everything. Oh yeah I forgot to mention they have snacks there to. Another strike on the weight watchers plan. Have you ever seen the commercial about WW - the little orange monster looking thing, well I think that creature was with me all weekend. Ok, back on track, are you bored yet ? Well it gets better so stick around. Take a bathroom break and hurry back……..ok here we go. We go back to the hotel for happy hour. Yep, from 5:30-7 it's free beer, wine and snacks. MORE things I shouldn't have !! Oh well, this is a special occasion right ? After that the guys took off to go back to the show and Gina and I made a beeline for the room. We are staying across from each other so it was pretty neat to just cross the hall for a visit. I made about 5 trips over to her room as we were trying to figure out what we were doing for supper. Remember we had snacked all day and bought lunch meat but that didn't even sound good so we ordered pizza ! Man am I going to pay on Thursday when I have to weigh in ! The guys came back we ate then we went across the hall to play LCR

I bought it on Ebay for 6 bucks. ( had to throw in the word bucks, since we are at a deer show for this ) Needless to say I lost several bucks ! And so did Rick as he was using my bucks too !! Bedtime - nite see ya in the morning!

Saturday - time to get up and go down for breakfast. Trent & Megan had got there around 11 or 12 so they were still a little pooped, not to mention that they were woke up by the alarm going off at 4:30 AM. Remember me telling you that Trent had called our room at 6:30, this was his payback. Rick & Louie set the alarm !! We ate, they the guys went to the show and us gals went shopping. But first I wanted to go to the zoo although Gina wasn't that interested in going there, she ended up having a pretty good time. I think that she snapped as many (if not more) pictures than I did ! We hit the mall and was wore out by the time we got back to the room. ( yes I'm getting tired of typing so here's were it gets shorter ) Got back, got ready for happy hour, met up with my Aunt Sue & cousins with their girlfriends and drank some more. We all went to eat supper, minus Aunt Sue she was not feeling well so she headed home. We took 2 cars to meet up at the Avenue Bar & Grill for supper. We are finally going to get that steak that we wanted in Dubuque. Supper was great but the service, not so much ! I think the waitress felt the tension :) she apologized about 4 times for the confusion. Oh well , we won't be back anyway. Trent was chased down in the parking lot for leaving the wrong end of the receipt on the table, he accidently picked up the signed copy. Now back to the hotel for some more LCR playing. I want to try to win back my bucks ! On the way back we drove around Madison with our tour guide Tina ( Jeff's GF) we were actually looking for somewhere to buy beer. In Madison they don't sell it after (:00 and it was almost 10. We found a place and was back on track. Got back to the hotel played LCR and yes I won some of my bucks back ! Whew, I'm really tired. Nite, it's off to bed.

Got up Sunday, ate breakfast, drove towards home, stopped at Dick's Sporting Good and Harbor Freight ( it was the guys weekend ya know ) then off to moms to drop off Gina & Louie. I'm exhausted and had to get home to do laundry and get my pictures uploaded to Flickr.

That was a good weekend and a nice trip out of town. Next weekend it's a family thing with Easter, egg hunt and more eating. This time I will do much better !!



I bet I walked 50 miles.



My Ebay purchase came so I will get that picture frame done soon and post a picture if it. I will leave you with a nice little quote that hits home since I did just eat all weekend.

Focus - Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goals.

Happy Monday everyone !!