Even after two days of slaving away at the church food pantry, I am still “basking in the glow” from Mother’s Day. We had a wonderful meal shared with the family, cooked by Daughter’s fiance’. Daughter’s awesome chocolate chip cookies, still warm from the oven, topped off one of the best grilled steak & veggie dinners I have ever enjoyed in my life! Seldom-seen Son was able to attend, Donkey’s Mom & brother were also there to share it, too. The baseball & basketball teams we were rooting for even won that day. How can you top that?

Well, here’s one way:
Sunday evening after we return home, I decide to check my email. I get this message from my younger sister:
Hi Everyone wanted to wish you all happy mother’s day, and to let you know that I got a 6 lb 13 oz, 19 1/2 inch baby girl (baby’s name here) for my mother’s day present. That (son’s name here), he knows how to mother’s day shop huh? Enjoy your day I am! Love to you all.

Isn’t she a cutie????

My typical day starts with opening my email. I usually zap all the junk, file all of the “later” stuff, then go back to peruse the remainder. Yesterday’s (thanks again for the giggles, Sis!) started with this:

THE MIRACLE OF TOILET PAPER

Fresh from my shower, I stand in front of the mirror complaining to my husband that my breasts are too small. Instead of characteristically telling me it’s not so, he uncharacteristically comes up with a suggestion. “If you want your breasts to grow, then every day take a piece of toilet paper and rub it between them for a few seconds.”

Willing to try anything, I fetch a piece of toilet paper and stand in front of the mirror, rubbing it between my breasts. “How long will this take?” I asked.
“They will grow larger over a period of years,” my husband replies.
I stopped. “Do you really think rubbing a piece of toilet paper between my breasts every day will make my breasts larger over the years?”
Without missing a beat he says, “Worked for your butt, didn’t it?”

He’s still alive, and with a great deal of therapy, he may even walk again, although he will probably continue to take his meals through a straw.

Stupid, stupid man!

Then, my e-devotional, which kinda seemed like a good one to share with all of you in XangaLand since it is so well populated with such talented souls:

God’s Masterpiece

Suggested Bible Reading

        The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night declares knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard; yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In the heavens he has set a tent for the sun . . .

    -Psalm 19:1-4 (NRSV)

      IT is usually dark each morning when I drive to work. But the proprietor of an art and frame shop I pass leaves on lights in the gallery. The dozen or so paintings visible through the display window combine into a mosaic of colors that brightens my day.

    However, my uplifted spirit comes from more than a splash of pretty colors before dawn. In each of those paintings, I see the work of an artist who has found special meaning in some glimpse of God’s creation and has employed talent and training to express this meaning on canvas. Whether or not the artists intend it, I consider their work a message from God to me.

    We can’t see God. Yet we live in and are special parts of a masterpiece God is painting. And what an awesome work it is! The best part about it is the infinite number of ways God gives us to participate in a creation that never ends, to share the meanings we find in it with one another, and to see our Creator’s handiwork wherever we look.

    Bob Tippee (Texas, U.S.A.)

    Prayer
    Thank you, Generous Provider, for the gift of your creation and of our lives within it. Help us to make creative use of everything we have received from you. Amen.

    Thought for the Day

    Each one of us is part of the masterwork of God.

    Prayer Focus

    Artists

That psalm was one of the favorites of a lady Donkey & I used to take to church after she was not able to drive any more. I really need to go visit her again soon…
Finally, there was this Mother’s Day message from the “too good to toss” file:

OUT OF THE MOUTHS OF BABES!
The following are different answers given by school-age children to the given question:

Why did God make mothers?
1.-She’s the only one who knows where the scotch tape is.
2.-Think about it, it was the best way to get more people.
3.-Mostly to clean the house.
4.-To help us out of there when we were getting born.

How did God make mothers?
1.-He used dirt, just like for the rest of us.
2.- Magic plus super powers and a lot of stirring.
3.- God made my mom just the same like he made me. He just used bigger parts.

Why did God give you your mother and not some other mom?
1.- We’re related.
2.- God knew she likes me a lot more than other people’s moms like me.

What ingredients are mothers made of?
1- God makes mothers out of clouds and angel hair and everything nice in the world and one dab of mean.
2.-They had to get their start from men’s bones. Then they mostly use string…  I think.

What kind of little girl was your mom?
1.- My mom has always been my mom and none of that other stuff.
2.- I don’t know because I wasn’t there, but my guess would be pretty bossy.
3.- They say she used to be nice.

How did your mom meet your dad?
1.- Mom was working in a store and dad was shoplifting.

What did mom need to know about dad before she married him?
1.- His last name.
2.- She had to know his background.  Like is he a crook?  Does he  get drunk on beer?  Does he make at least $800 a year?  Did he say NO to drugs and YES to chores.

Why did your mom marry your dad?
1.- My dad makes the best spaghetti in the world. And my mom eats a lot.
2.- She got too old to do anything else with him.
3.- My grandma says that mom didn’t have her thinking cap on.

What makes a real woman?
1.- It means you have to be really bossy without looking bossy.

Who’s the boss at your house?
1.- Mom doesn’t want to be boss but she has to because dad’s such a goofball.
2.-Mom. You can tell by room inspection.  She sees the stuff under the bed.
3.- I guess Mom is but only because she has a lot more to do than dad.

What’s the difference between moms and dads?
1.- Moms work at work and work at home and dads just got to work at work.
2.- Moms know how to talk to teachers without scaring them.
3.-Dads are taller and stronger but moms have all the real power ’cause that’s who you gotta ask if you want to sleep over at your friend’s.

What does your mom do in her spare time?
1.- Mothers don’t do spare time.
2.-To hear her tell it, she pays bills all day long.

What’s the difference between moms and grandmas?
1.- About 30 years.
2.- You can always count on grandmothers for candy. Sometimes moms don’t even have bread on them!

Describe the world’s greatest mom?
1.- She would make broccoli taste like ice cream!
2.- The greatest mom in the world wouldn’t make me kiss my fat aunts!
3.- She’d always be smiling and keep her opinions to herself.

Is anything about your mom perfect?
1.- Her teeth are perfect but she bought them from the dentist.
2.- Her casserole recipes.  But we hate them.
3.- Just her children

What would it take to make your mom perfect?
1.- On the inside she’s already perfect.  Outside, I think some kind of plastic surgery.
2.- Diet.  You know, her hair.  I’d dye it, maybe blue.

If you could change one thing about your mom, what would it be?
1.- She has this weird thing about me keeping my room clean.  I’d  get rid of that.
2.- I’d make my mom smarter.  Then she would know it was my sister who did it and not me.

Chapter two of our book is entitled, Toward a spirituality of the senses. Here is the blessing at the end of the chapter:

A Blessing for the Senses

May your body be blessed.

May you realize that your body is a faithful and beautiful friend of your soul.

And may you be peaceful and joyful and recognize that your senses are sacred thresholds.

May you realize that holiness is mindful, gazing, feeling hearing, and touching.

May your senses gather you and bring you home.

May your senses always enable you to celebrate the universe and the mystery and possibilities in your presence here.

May the Eros of the Earth bless you.

We were blessed with perfect weather for yard work on Friday and helping our daughter move on Saturday. We were also eventually blessed with movers to help with their heavy stuff. The original movers that were supposed to show up between 8 and 9 am Saturday did not even know where their truck was when they were called midmorning on Saturday to find out what might be holding them up. They thought they might be able to have a truck there between 3 and 5 that afternoon, though. Very irate and upset Daughter was on the phone telling me this as I was getting ready to make a Mary Kay delivery nearby and I promised to bring Donkey and do whatever we could to help as soon as I finished that one little job.

As I arrived at this MK customer’s home, there was a large moving van parked in front of her neighbor’s house and the movers were just standing there waiting around. After we finished our business, I looked again as I was leaving and the movers were still looking like they were waiting for something or someone. I rolled down my window and asked if they were busy later that day because I knew of someone who might just really need the use a mover. The owner of the company was in the house with the lady that was moving and I spoke with him to see if it would even be a possibility. He asked the movers working on that job if they wanted another one that day and they both said yes. I called Daughter to give her their contact information so she could get something worked out with them if she and her fiance decided not to use the original movers with the MIA truck.

The “replacement movers” arrived at her old place and had everything loaded up a little past 3:30pm. Everything seemed to take such a long time (isn’t that the way of it–especially when you are paying for work by the hour!) to get done, but the transfer of major household items was complete by early evening and they figured that the final amount they were charged was about $100 less than the quote from original movers, so that wasn’t too bad! The only really nasty wrinkle in the whole ordeal was the gouge in middle of the brand spanking new kitchen floor that occurred when their fridge was brought into the new house, but I am hoping that the mover’s insurance will take care of that without too much trouble…

Maybe it’s just me. Maybe I need to get a life, but this one just about split me in two when I read it. I got this from a friend earlier today who prefaced it with the comment, ” I don’t care if it is true, it is hilarious!”

Hope it brings a smile or chuckle to everyone’s day:

Dillard’s Shopping trip

(This is just too funny! This could only be true; you simply can’t make this stuff up!)

Clutching their Dillard’s shopping bags, Ellen and Kay woefully gazed down at a dead cat in the mall parking lot.

Obviously a recent hit—no flies, no smell. What business could that poor kitty have had here?’ murmured Ellen.

“Come on, Ellen, let’s just go…”

But Ellen had already grabbed her shopping bag and was explaining, “I’ll just put my things in your bag, and then I’ll take the tissue.” She dumped her purchases into Kay’s bag and then used the tissue paper to cradle and lower the former feline into her own Dillard’s bag and cover it.

They continued the short trek to the car in silence, stashing their goods in the trunk. But it occurred to both of them that if they left Ellen’s burial bag in the trunk, warmed by the Texas sunshine while they ate, Kay’s Lumina would soon lose that new-car smell. They decided to leave the bag on top of the trunk, and they headed over to Luby’s Cafeteria.

After they cleared the serving line and sat down at a window table, they had a view of Kay’s Chevy with the Dillard’s bag still on the trunk. BUT not for long! As they ate, they noticed a woman in a red gingham shirt stroll by their car, look quickly this way and that, and then hook the Dillard’s bag without breaking stride. She quickly walked out of their line of vision. Kay and Ellen shot each other a wide-eyed look of amazement.

It all happened so fast that neither of them could think how to respond. “Can you imagine?” finally sputtered Ellen.

“The nerve of that woman!” Kay sympathized with Ellen, but inwardly a laugh was building as she thought about the grand surprise awaiting the red-gingham thief. Just when she thought she’d have to giggle into her napkin, she noticed Ellen’s eyes freeze in the direction of the serving line. Following her gaze, Kay recognized with a shock the woman with THE Dillard’s bag, hanging from her arm, brazenly pushing her tray toward the cashier. Helplessly they watched the scene unfold: After clearing the register, the woman settled at a table across from theirs, put the bag on an empty chair and began to eat. After a few bites of baked whitefish and green beans, she casually lifted the bag into her lap to survey her treasure. Looking from side to side, but not far enough to notice her rapt audience three tables over, she pulled out the tissue paper and peered into the bag. Her eyes widened, and she began to make a sort of gasping noise. The noise grew. The bag slid from her lap as she sank to the floor, wheezing and clutching her upper chest.

The beverage cart attendant quickly recognized a customer in trouble and sent the busboy to call 911, while she administered the Heimlich maneuver. A crowd quickly gathered that did not include Ellen and Kay, who remained riveted to their chairs for seven whole minutes until the ambulance arrived.

In a matter of minutes the woman emerged from the crowd, still gasping, strapped securely on a gurney. Two well-trained EMS volunteers steered her to the waiting ambulance, while a third scooped up her belongings.

The last they saw of the distressed cat-burglar, she disappeared behind the ambulance doors, …………………… the Dillard’s bag perched on her stomach!!

Sometimes, God does take care of those who do bad things (AND once in awhile.. He allows us to witness it!)

Do I need to get a life or IS that a really funny story, true or not????

I just love this new book we are reading in our book group & I wanted to share some of it with you. The Celts live each day by blessing all sort of things that are in their lives–even simple, ordinary things like waking up & eating breakfast. Anam Cara translates to “soul friend” and the first chapter is entiltled, “the mystery of friendship,” so the blessing at the end of this chapter was just begging to become my next blog entry:

A Friendship Blessing

May you be blessed with good friends.

May you learn to be a good friend to yourself.

May you be able to journey to that place in your soul where there is great love, warmth, feeling and forgiveness.

May this change you.

May it transfigure that which is negative, distant, or cold in you.

May you be brought in to the real passion, kinship, and affinity of belonging.

May you treasure your friends.

May you be good to them and may you be there for them; may they bring you all of the blessings, challenges truth, and light that you will need for your journey.

May you never be isolated.

May you always be in the gentle nest of belonging with your anam cara.

Bless all of my xanga friends this day & always!

Tax Update:
TurboTax has worked it’s magic with our pile of paperwork & our return is completed. The refund we should be getting has not yet begun it’s journey to our bank account though. Donkey likes to examine anything he signs very carefully, so we are waiting for a break in the work “firestorm” so he can peruse our return before we file it. Sometimes I find it difficult to be patient, but there have been a number of times that the extra pair of eyes over all those figures turned out to be a good thing, saving us a lot of trouble later on….

Flower Update:
Usually by our anniversary near the end of March and always by Easter, the daffodils  and amaryllis in our yard have begun to bloom. This year the daffodils beat the amaryllis!

It was a fairly close race, though….

Even some of the less established ones were so close…

The peach blossoms were also out…

And the geraniums were still hanging in there after getting the snot knocked out of them from a storm right after I planted them….

Oh, what a difference a couple of weeks and a few inches of rain make!
Wow. The amaryllis is definitely caught up with the daffodils….

Even the newer ones have really put on a show!

The geraniums are doing quite well now, too…

While Donkey slaved away this weekend working, I got to go to Houston with my Mary Kay gal pals. Sharing a hotel room with 3 other ladies that I really enjoy running around with but haven’t had the chance to see for a while made for some serious sleep deprivation, but that’s a small price to pay to see such dear friends. Made some new friends, too! This is a picture of a part of our group (I am second from the left) after our “stage call” when we were honored as Star Consultants:

Have a super week, everyone!

Don’t anyone get worried or offended if you don’t see me around for a while. I just have to get going on these taxes–the suspense of not knowing if we will be getting money back or not is really getting to me!
There sure are a lot of numbers here. Good to know that my tax program can put them where they go on all these forms …

Do you like this picture?

Here’s my top 10 list:

1. I pay off my credit cards EVERY month. All those extra interest & finance charges will eat your lunch–literally! Unless it is a basic need purchase like food, medicine, car repairs or gas,I try not to even put it the bill unless I KNOW I can pay it off when it is due. The only time I have ever carried a balance on my cards was once for a couple of months when our grown daughter was about two years old & had to be hospitalized unexpectedly in the space of time between when we qualified for health insurance on her daddy’s former job & his current one at the time…

2. I limit dining out, especially fast food & coffeehouse purchases. If I decide that I deserve more than just the usual sustenance & am willing to pay a premium for the food that I eat, I try to spend that extra bit of food money on higher quality food, not convenience, “ambience” or internet connections…

3. I keep my car for at least ten years–or until maintenance costs start to outpace new car payment costs. The typical time we have kept ours is ten to twelve years & we have never had more than a three year loan on any of our vehicles. That is a minimum of SEVEN YEARS that we don’t have to make payments! (Our youngest is STILL driving my old 1991 year model.) They cost less to insure (who wants to steal an old car & if it is totalled, the amount you would get out of it is a lot lower than on a newer model so the premiums are also lower) and also to register–at least in the state of Texas…

4. I start saving for my next car as soon as I buy my current one. The less I have to finance, the better value I get for my money since more of my cash can be used to purchase the vehicle instead of financing. We still sometimes have to borrow at least some of the
purchase price, but it is not difficult to get a decent deal on a loan for a vehicle that is
already at least half paid for since the lender takes very little risk on the
deal…

5. I shop for non-upholstered furniture at consignment shops. I get a little squeamish thinking about what nasty critters and/or people may have slept or sat in the upholstered stuff before I got it, so we buy those new, but most of our tables, dressers, chests, of drawers, entertainment centers, desks, etc., were someone else’s before they were ours, purchased at a fraction of the cost of new or even handed down from friends & family at no cost at all. Many of the older pieces we now own are also of much higher quality than we may otherwise be able to afford since a lot more “real wood” was used in earlier times than now. Sometimes it does take a little longer to find what you want, but the search can be quite an adventure…

 6. I go on “cheap dates” & low or no-cost outings. When our children were growing up, some of their favorite activities were swimming at the (free) neighborhood pool, going to the (free) story time at the library & taking our stale bread & cereal to the park near where their dad worked to feed the ducks on the lake. There was a playground at the park & sometimes we “splurged” & took the little train ride or met dad for a frozen custard during his lunch break. They are both grown now, but still talk about how much fun that was! (We did go to Six Flags, too, but the only thing I have ever heard the kids say about that experience was how long they had to wait in line & what fell out of their pockets when they were upside down in the roller coaster.) Hubby & I have had some of the best “dates” doing things like going to a book or Bible study, building or repair projects together…

7. I make annual payments instead of monthly ones for insurance premiums & investigate discounts for combining home & auto together. There is usually at least a little price break for decreasing the number of times I pay & they have to process my payment. Some companies also offer quarterly discounts for the payments that I find too tough to come up with an entire year’s premium all at once…

8. I started a college saving plan as soon as possible. We really did not get too serious about this until they were in middle school & I do feel like we should have gotten things going a bit sooner to give them more options. Putting it off until later forced us to borrow what we still needed, costing us even more by the time it all gets paid back…

9. My personal Rule of thumb: The amount of time considering a purchase should be directly proportional to the amount of the purchase. Impulse buying is usually not a good idea, but the “damage” is minimal on a candy bar or something like that. Impulse buying big-ticket items can REALLY exacerbate the situation…

10. I buy clothing near the end of the season when it is marked down & resell “fashion mistakes” at a consignment shop before they go out of style. Since I don’t feel like I am desperate for clothing, the wait until the end of the season is usually not that painful for me. I do sometimes have difficulty determining which items should never have been purchased in the first place in time to get them to the resale shops, though…

I just answered this Featured Question, you can answer it too!

I know that Arbor Day actually comes a bit later in the year, but I had an “arbor day” of my own last Wednesday….

WooHOO!!!I finished the arbor that I was in the process of building since last year!
Our back porch (where I had been storing all of the components to build the thing) now looks a bit more like a porch and less like a construction zone. Here is a shot from the walkway at the end of the part of the driveway that curls around to the side of the house looking into the back yard:

The exposure coming from the back yard toward the front turned out a bit dark, but here it is anyway. In the middle of that puff of last year’s lantana that shows up nicely in front of the dark colored vehicle driving by is a 1/2 barrel where I also planted some geraniums on Friday:

That was after I planted some Indian Hawthorne in the spot where we used to have more deck (shown below) and also some more star jasmine for the fence on the other side of our property:

Saturday was mostly weed-pulling and brush trimming….

This is totally unrelated but i just liked it, so I wanted to share:

Title of a book by Patricia Wilson: When you come unglued, stick to God
 
Okay, I’m done now…

Another winner (thanks, lil’ sis!) from the email inbox….

It was a busy morning, about 8:30, when an elderly gentleman in his 80′s arrived to have stitches removed from his thumb.

He said he was in a hurry, as he had an appointment at 9:00 am.

I took his vital signs and had him take a seat, knowing it would be over an hour before someone would be able to see him. I saw him looking at his watch, and decided, since I was not busy with another patient, I would evaluate his wound.

On
exam, it was well healed, so I talked to one of the doctors, got the
needed supplies to remove his sutures and redress his wound. While taking care of his wound, I asked him if he had another doctor’s appointment this morning, as he was in such a hurry.

The gentleman told me no, that he needed to go to the nursing home to eat breakfast with his wife.

I inquired as to her health; he told me that she had been there for a while and that she was a victim of Alzheimer’s Disease. As we talked, I asked if she would be upset if he was a bit late.

He replied that she no longer knew who he was, that she had not recognized him in five years now.

I was surprised, and asked him, “And you still go every morning, even though she doesn’t know who you are?”

He smiled as he patted my hand and said, ‘”She doesn’t know me, but I still know who she is.”

I had to hold back tears as he left. I had goose bumps on my arms and thought, “That is the kind of love I want in my life.”

True love is neither physical nor romantic. True love is an acceptance of all that is, has been, will be, and will not be.

This one I thought I could share with you:
The happiest people don’t necessarily have the best of everything; they just make the best of everything they have.

“Life isn’t about how to survive the storm, but how to dance in the rain.”