God watches out over fools and idiots

Found myself doing the silliest thing the other day.

I know, hard to believe I would do something silly. Totally out of character for me.

 Look at the pic below and see if you can figure out where this is going.

 

This is a three foot section of our Laundry/Pantry/Storage Place to put any other junk we don't know what to do with but we better save it just in case we might need it one day room.

 (Nothing to do with the post but I do like the way Hubba Hubba's brown shoes

 look like they are floating in this pic.)

 The item I'm going to discuss is the pair of  white Reeboks on the right under the high chair.

(Nothing to do with the post but  I think I have finally figured out the "keep it cause I might need it one day" purpose of this chair. I'm thinking about painting it and making it a time-out chair. We'll see where my good intentions take me.) And just in time because the chair is 28 years old.

 I do hope it's the oldest item in this room.

 The Reeboks are my fishing shoes. I always, always, always

 (because of my enormous fear of arachnids)

 pick them up, run my hands all the way in to check for spiders

 (cause the shoes stay out here for days without being used

 and would make a wonderful nesting sight for black widows),

 and then yank them onto my feet without untying the laces.

 Off we go fishing!

 

 I have done this for years. (not with the same pair of shoes; I do occasionally

 replace the old pair with a new pair of old shoes.

 I like that statement-replace the old pair with a new pair of old. Ha!).

 

 It dawned on me a couple of weeks ago that I was being so foolish.

  I bet you have already figured it out.

 It's only by God's good grace that a spider hasn't already bitten me on my finger

. Why would I try to protect my toes from a spider bite by offering the spider my fingertips?

Surely the venom from a bite would reach my heart and lungs

 faster from my fingertips than from my toes.  

 

It must be true that God looks out over fools and idiots.

 

I wonder what other actions I take to protect myself that are actually placing me in more danger?

Newest addition

Our newest addition  (even though you can hardly see her).

Having grandchildren never gets old.  Knowing this will be the last grandchild is bittersweet, but we have been blessed with the 6 sweetest and most beautiful grands in the world. And it's true that grandchildren keep you young. You take walks and look at butterflies and bugs and ants. You stretch up to see airplanes and birds. You run to be the first one to the potty. (you never win at this). You sing songs and act crazy and do funny faces and voices. You laugh with your teenage grands, take great joy in their accomplishments and pray, pray, pray for them.  Through the years we have constructed thousands of lego and tinkertoy thing-a-ma-jigs; only they know what they are building. And I've learned how to get down in the floor and play.

 (more amazing is the fact that I have learned how to get up off of the floor unaided).

 

Just like life being OK without kids; life is OK without grandchildren. But having grandchildren is like having kids; you can't imagine how you got along without them or what you did with all that love that is now theirs forever.

BURYING MY KILLER INSTINCT

A few weeks back my sweet Hunka Hunka and I went to Luverne

 (that's pronounced loo verne, not la verne) to have lunch with my sister. 

 

On an  aside: We can count this lunch as community service or a good Christian deed since she had spent several days in the hospital with her mother-in-law. (just in case God needs reminding of our good deeds and will reward us when we reach a certain level of points.)

 Yes, I know that joke might be offensive to some of you, but it was still a little bit funny.

 

Back to the story. My lovely sister picked Subway for lunch. Great choice; close by and you could have a sandwich or a salad.  We're chattering on and on and occasionally even letting Hunka Hunka have a say as we work down the line, choose our bread, choose our cheese, hot or cold? Then we notice the super slender, young, nose-earringed and in a tank top with tattoos in various places guy in front of us. He's ordered a footlong sandwich and is piling on everything in the display. That sandwich looked thicker than one out of a commercial. Seriously!  It was so thick the man fixing the sandwich could hardly close the top over. He could have definitely used some of those thick, thick rubberbands  to hold it together. Lovely sister starts a conversation with him. He must be hungry, going to eat lunch and dinner (cause they don't eat supper where she comes from)

 from one sandwich, etc. Da, De, Da, De, Da

 

On an side: I'm thinking he must be feeding a family of four somewhere and that's tells you how big the sandwich was because ya'll know I can eat humongous amounts of food at one sitting.

 

Back to the story: The nice young man replies back (and this is where I have to look way, deep down inside myself and find the strength to bury my killer instincts). He says it's all for him. He will eat the whole, entire sandwich himself at one sitting and be hungry again in less than TWO, yes, I said TWO hours. He will then eat again every two hours and probably wake up during the night hungry. He eats 5,000 calories a day, at least. He has a very high metabolism, he never gains any weight,

he wishes he could gain weight.

AAARRRRGGGGGHHHHH!

 

On an aside: Now do you think it would have been wrong of me to kill him on the spot? Just swat him like a fly and grind him underfoot? I didn't know there were people with this problem out there and I sure as heck didn't know they considered it a problem!

 

Back to the story: We managed smiles (this was not hard for lovely sister as she is a much nicer person than the writer) as he left with his 7 lb. sandwich.  But I thought of this young man last night as I read this quote on Pinterest (and if you don't know what Pinterest is you have my sincere congratulations on being a person that actually does things instead of collecting pictures of what everyone else is doing. I have quite a collection of what everyone else out there is doing).

 

THE QUOTE: MEN THINK THAT ALL WOMEN WANT A GOOD-LOOKING SUPER RICH MAN TO MARRY. WHAT WE REALLY WANT IS TO EAT ALL WE WANT WITHOUT GAINING WEIGHT.

 

Can I get an Amen, sisters?



National Holiday

I haven't been on here in so long I am surprised it recognized me when I logged in. Even more surprising is the fact that I remembered my password.

Here's an idea I want to get the government and everyone else to push for:

NATIONAL DRAMA-FREE DAY!

Don't you think that would be great? Heck, let's  make it:

NATIONAL DRAMA-FREE WEEK!

My brain is in overdrive. I better take a break.

I have taken three "sister trips" with my 5 sisters and my sister-in-law. It's always a fun time.  Our husbands think we spend the time talking about them (either how stupendous they are or how inept they are). 

The truth is that we never talk about them, except to discuss their health. I just realized this the other day when we came back from Mentone, Alabama.

These are the topics we generally cover:

1. Who is constipated and who has the fastest moving bowels.

2. When and where to eat. (first night has to be a super tasty, out of the ordinary meal)

3. How much weight we have lost. How terrible it is that when we find our lost weight it 

    has made friends with extra pounds that it insists on bringing with it. 

This topic is covered during our "vacation meals."

These are super calorie meals that we claim we do not eat at home.

4. Who has the most things wrong with them. (other than our poop situation). 

5. When and where to eat. (Do we get cereal and eat breakfast in or do we go out again?)

6. What medicines we take for what is wrong with us.

7. Sleeping arrangements. This usually takes only an hour.

 (unless you stick the sister-in-law under an alcove on the smallest bed).

8.Who snores the loudest. (I am always a top contender)

9.When and where to eat.  (eat a big lunch and have sandwiches for supper or vice-versa). 

10. Whose turn it is to say grace.

11. How beautiful God made everything. 

(except for the Mobile trip; rain is only beautiful for one day)

12. The name of every flower or pretty plant we see.

13. Relative and classmates that have died, who is in trouble with the law,

      what's happening with our kids, our churches, the weather, blah, blah, blah,

(but it's fun, people)     

14. When and where we will eat. 

(Are we in a hurry to get home and want to skip a meal, do we

      really want to eat after the big snack we had,

do we go back to the place we really like or try something new..........)

It's a girl thang!

I sometimes wonder what our decendents in a couple hundred years will think when they look back on photos of our newest generation. They stand with their head tilted slightly to the side and their hand on their hip. It's kinda like the "Little Teapot" song without the spout.  It makes you wonder if  three friends have their pic made together if the middle person is secretly bummed out because she knows she will look older, plumper, dumber, or shorter. 

 It's also funny that it never crosses a guy's mind to pose to look better. He either has a fish hanging from his hands, or he's hanging out of a vehicle covered with mud, or he's on the beach sunburned with oily hair, or he's holding a canned drink raised to the sky, or he's standing straight up tall beside the girl posing with her hand on her hip.

I guess it's a girl thang.

Pants on the Ground

Pants on the Ground

Pants on the Ground

Call yourself a cool cat

With your pants on the Ground

My Grandbabe

Lessons Written Down

I was looking at one of my older Bibles today and found some good stuff jotted down in the back.

I am sure they all came from sermons I have heard.

I will share some of them and hope you like them, too.

     Christians are called to lead a supernatural life with Jesus.

Anybody can lead a regular life without Him.

    God is the great "I AM" -- not the great "I Was" or the great "I Will Be".

    We don't question our blessings - should we question our trials?

    God is shaping us here on earth with different, sometimes difficult circumstances

 to make us what He wants us to be when we're with Him in heaven.

    Let prayer be your first choice, not your last.

    Pray retail, not wholesale.

    God won't tell you what to do until you do what He has already told you to do.

   Do I "have to", or do I "get to", do it for Jesus?

   Who am I keeping from Jesus by my life?

Character is who we are when no one is looking.

The part of the Bible you believe is the part you do.

We can endure anything if we have something (heaven, in the believer's case) to look forward to.

Live your life so much like Jesus that your pastor won't have to lie at your funeral.

I should believe God more than the doubts and fears that Satan tells me. God said He will NEVER leave me or forsake me; He WILL supply ALL my needs according to His riches in Christ.

Grace is God not giving me what I deserve. Mercy is God withholding judgement on me.

Sometime healing comes slow, sometimes healing comes fast, sometimes it comes when we reach heaven. But to all who believe, it comes.

This world is not my home. My home's been made at heaven's throne.

This life is not my own. I am His and His alone.

Come now and walk with me; together we our Lord shall meet.

Nothing, absolutely nothing can separate me from God.

Let the waves roll; let the winds blow; let the lightning flash;

 cause Jesus is carrying us to the other side.

If Jesus was as picky and choosy about who He showed love and compassion to

as I am, where would I be?

Worth the effort?

It's Sunday and it's kinda been a busy day. I messed around too much this week and didn't get my Sunday School lesson prepared until last night. This is no small task; you better study your background material cause you will be asked questions that only  3rd or 4th grade child could think of. I also had to make a sample cross for the craft we were going to do, also.

Needless to stay, I worked through my sleepy time and it was after 3 am before I fell asleep.

Good news for me - only had to get up one time to go potty and only woke one time having to fling the sheets off of my hot body. (and I mean temperature hot, not bodacious hot).

Bad news for me - I finished my book and now have to find something new to read tonight.

So........that means my alarm was set for 8:15 so that I could get every last minute of sleep possible. Church starts at 9:30 so that gave me plenty of time to shower, makeup and dress and to get in one or two snippy remarks to Hunka Hunka.(a regular Sunday Morn ritual).  He leaves to pick up our Granddaughter because Grandson is sick and their Daddy will stay with him. He also has to stop and get gas because the low fuel light always decides to light up on Saturday night.

But I digress; back to my main subject.

I manage to get to church only 5 minutes late. We have a great Sunday School class - neighboring class brings us plates of birthday cake and chips and Sunny D.(and that is why the kids never want to move up to my class).  Much better breakfast than the little bowl of shredded wheat (who could eat a big bowl?) I consumed while putting on makeup. We have time to complete the lesson (fourth grade boys can usually interrupt numerous times - this week they had all been to the Rattlesnake Rodeo here in town, so you do the math on the interruptions we had today.) It's amazing how they can answer the review questions at the end of the lesson correctly every Sunday.

I digress once more; back to the subject.

We have a super wonderful worship service with testimonies and singing and just so great you hate to see it end. We get out around 12:30 and head over to the fellowship building for the children's Easter Egg hunt. (although we adults enjoy it, too).  Mrs. Carolyn always does a great job with the egg hunt.

This year each child found 6 eggs with letters on them that spelled E-a-s-t-e-r. They had to wait to open the eggs when they came back inside. They opened them one at a time and she explained the contents; all about the Resurrection. 

Here's a pic of a few of the precious kids waiting for the hunt to begin.

But I digress again - back to the subject.

I arrived home about 2pm. We have to be back at church at 4pm. Not much time - if I nap to make up for lost sleep I will not be able to sleep tonight. Besides, less than 2 hours is not enough time to start anything.

THE BIG QUESTION - with less than two hours before heading back out is it worth the effort to take off my shoes and bra and relax in style and comfort? 

Ladies, this is what we in the South call a no brainer. Yeck, yeah!  Oooh, Aaaah!

Putting on mascara

I think life is full of humor. I like it the most when it is someone else, but in this case it is me. I really should get someone to take a pic and post it of me putting on my mascara.

I have poor vision. OK, very poor vision.

An aside: I was hoping Emma would specialize in lasik surgery and help me out with this, but noooooo, she won't do it. Come on, Emma, what would it take; another 2 or 3 years of school?  It would work out great for me. I would probably be old enough for medicare to cover part of it by the time you completed your specialization. (Is that even a word?)

Back to the subject. I used to be able to put my makeup on without wearing my glasses or contacts. 
The vision became more impaired. I could see to apply my foundation and blush, but not my mascara. So I had to improvise. I perfected the technique of putting on my mascara with my glasses pushed a little ways down my nose. This gave me enough room for the mascara wand to do its job of making my whitey wisps into gloriously lush black fronds.

The vision became more impaired. I began to notice my foundation was on a little too heavy and the blush a little too bright when I would put my glasses on.  Hence, the contacts would go in and I would
put all my make-up on.  I discovered I needed to stop with the black fronds and try a more natural brownish color. (if brown can be considered natural on white eyelashes. I think it can because my hair is turning darker on the underside in the back and everyone thinks I just dye the top layer of my hair, so brown could be my natural color, right?)

The vision became more impaired. So I improvised. I bought a mirror that magnifies about 20,000 times.  I put on my glasses, find my contact case, take out the first contact, get it on the end of the right finger, take off my glasses, get the magnifying mirror and put in my contact. I can then see the case and can get the other contact in. Whew!

An aside: I can't tell you the number of times I have taken out my contacts, put my glasses on and found out I completely missed the contact case. I used to put the contacts in and screw the lid shut before I put on my glasses. This resulted in a contact being caught in the threads and being rendered unusable. A missed contact case is much better than a shredded contact.

Back to my subject.
 Next I put on my foundation and blush, pick up the mirror again and check for caked foundation and blushy bright spots. After this is corrected, I put on my mascara. This is where it gets tricky. You have to hold the wand in the right hand and the mirror in the left, with the mascara tube facing outward between a victory sign you make with the left hand. (this is to make sure you don't cover the hair beside your cheekbone and left eye with brown mascara. And you will hit your white hair every time with this glop if you hold it between your thumb and pointing finger. Trust me on this.)  Then you take a Qtip and get all the mascara you have smeared right above your lid line. (Something else I found out I was doing when I started implemented the magnifying mirror technique).
I am a bit worried. If my vision becomes more impaired I only have a few options.

1. Go without any makeup and risk scaring everyone I meet.
2. Hire a live-in makeup artist to put on my makeup. 
3. Growing my hair over my face.
4. Going with no makeup, no glasses, no contacts and having Bob lead me around everywhere.

Number one would not be conducive to a good self image.

Number two would be somewhat expensive.

Number three I am working on.  My hair, when combed to the front will hang to my chin. It is hot under there and I shed like a shetland pony.

Number four - Hunka Hunka would probably tell me I needed a service animal and would supply me with a wolverine or something else that I would think was a dog, but in reality was an animal that seeks out the weakest (in this case the blindest)  in a group to kill and destroy.

I think I better started taking Ocuvite and eating a lot of carrots.

Family Pics

 FAMILY

May God bless this family

and the love and laughter we share.

Family is my only treasure on this earth.

Our first son, Michael, and his wife Sherry



Our first grandchild, beautiful Brooklyn

           

Our second grandchild, handsome Brady



Our fourth grandchild, Pretty Layne



Our third grandchild, cutie pie Andrew



Our second son, Matthew



Our fifth grandchild, sweet Adelyn



Our first daughter and third child, Jessica, and her husband Jarrod
(and baby #2 hidden inside)

To God Be the Glory

For His Wonderful Goodness

to Me and Bob.







Miracles Still Happen

I have been married 33.5 years. Some people think that is an amazing accomplishment and I guess it really is considering who I am married to.  Ha! Ha! Ha!   People who know me well also know that Hunka Hunka of  Burning Love is the one who gets the credit for the longevity of our marriage. Although I can remember asking him when he popped the question if he was sure and I told him I was a b*#*h and very selfish; selfish with his time, not with money and possessions. So he was forewarned.  And I did  tell him it was forever because it was a vow with God unless he cheated on me; and I explained the repercussions to particular body parts of his if this occurred. In my family we know that 33.5 years is child's play. My parents and sisters have far exceeded this total.  That said,  marriage itself is fairly easy if  you love, love, love your Hunka Hunk like I do mine. Love forgives much.

But all that is way off the subject I want to talk about tonight.  My husband has told everyone how I think he is a god because when we first met I kept putting burnt offerings in front of him.  I have repeatedly over the years tried to make biscuits. This is something I could do very well as a teenager - I don't know what happened when I moved from home.  Sweet Hunka Hunka has literally thrown my knots of bread (an attempt at biscuits that went really bad) against the wall and they didn't crumble or break. He threw them outside to the dog and the dog sniffed and walked away!  At times I have gone years in between attempts. 

Tonight I tried again, and while they were not pretty by any means, Hunka Hunka deemed them delicious. I warily tried one and when I broke it open it smelled like my Mama's biscuits!  So I put a bite in my mouth and this time I was able to eat the entire biscuit; with only butter. (and this time the butter was used to enhance the flavor, not disguise it).

So here is a picture of a miracle that is over 30 years in the making.

Whoop! Whoop!