Marching In To Monday

Good morning friends. What a weekend it has been and I pray for our nation and the world. I pray especially for our troops, for their families, and for God's perfect peace to be over all. Psalm 46:1 tells us 'God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.' May we turn to Him now. 

Awkward segue here into the ordinary comings and goings of our weekend, but it's a topsy turvy world we're living in, and my blog will be a little topsy turvy too. 

Linking as usual this Monday morning with Holly (Pink Lady Blog) and Sarah (Sunshine and Books). 

I took very few pics this weekend but it was a busy one nonetheless. Friday morning I worked on the tax organizer and there isn't anyone who would find a picture of that very interesting, is there? I certainly don't. Completing this organizer every year is one of my least favorite tasks. 

I played Mah Jong Friday afternoon and then hubs and I went to a local spot about 5 to check on a reservation we have there next weekend. We wanted to see the space as there will be fourteen of us and we wanted to make sure it was going to work, which it will. We ended up having dinner at the bar and neighbors came in and ended up seated next to us. Small town livin' y'all. 

Saturday morning I was up in the early morning hours to make the two+ hour drive to Atlanta for a baby shower. The shower was at 11:30, but I left extra extra early in order to meet a friend for coffee beforehand. It was wonderful to catch up in person. 

The shower was lovely and who doesn't love celebrating a momma-to-be. The festivities wrapped up around 1:30 and I was back on the road headed home. 

Atlanta traffic, no matter the day or time, is the worst. Carry on. 

I got home about 4:30 and hubs made me a cup of tea while we chatted, then we were back in the car to meet up with friends who are renovating their house. They wanted us to see what all they're doing, and it kind of makes me want to build a house. I mean. not really, but a little bit yes. We got Mexican food afterwards and it was a nice relaxed evening. 

Sunday was a beautiful day. We went to church, then had brunch out afterwards, then made a stop at the grocery to get our pork butts for the coming weekend's BBQ. We'll have hubs mom here to celebrate a big birthday with her great-grandchildren and we'll be doing BBQ for Friday night's dinner. 

The weather was spectacular, sunny with temps in the upper 70's, so I took my book and sat beside the waterfall and read for two hours. 

As an aside, hubs has kept these plants in full bloom in our lower level garage all winter with just a grow light and he pulled them outside today. 

So glad one of us has a green thumb! 

Looks like we'll  have another bumper lemon crop this year. 

As I was closing the book on the very last page friends pulled up to our dock and asked if we wanted to go for a boat ride. 

Yes please. 

They had their two dogs with them and they were dying to get off the boat and into the water. 

We did pull up to a beach at one point and let them run and they were so happy. 

Me too. Sunshine is good for the soul. 

I made a salad for dinner and hubs ate some of the leftover pasta from my Friday night meal, so an easy peasy end to the weekend. 

 As we roll into this next new week may your faith be bigger than your fear.

Hodgepodge Questions-Volume 643

Here are the questions to the first Hodgepodge in the merry month of March. 

Actually I think it's May that's merry and March is something else, but it's always merry in the Hodgepodge, right? Answer this week's questions on your own blog, then hop back here on Wednesday (March 4th) to add your link to the party. See you there! 

1.  As the saying goes, 'March comes in like a lion and goes out like a lamb.' Did your March come in roaring or like some other animal? Every month carries with it certain feelings, which is why some people love and anticipate December and others dread it. How do you feel about the month of March? 

2. Where in your life are you a lion? Where are you a lamb? 

3. The Hodgepodge lands on National Pound Cake day. Do you like pound cake? If so do you have a favorite flavor? Let's play this or that-

• pound cake or layer cake?
• pound cake or cheesecake?
• pound cake or angel food cake?
• pound cake or brownie?
• pound cake or pie?

4. What makes you feel childlike wonder right now? 

5. What's one thing you need to add to your wardrobe to get ready for spring? If you're in the southern hemisphere, then answer for fall? 

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

Monthly Musings-February

It's the last Thursday of the month which means it's time for our Monthly Musings hosted by Patty (Good-Better-Best Life Blog). This month's topic is:  ways we make our weeks easier. 

Easier. Hmmm. Is life in retirement hard? 

No, not really. But also yes sort of. This season is much like every other season of our lives, except there's a lot more health related stuff and a lot less 8th grade algebra homework to stress you out.

No we're not running out the door early morning with kids in tow heading to high pressure jobs and juggling all the balls in between. But it's also not all late morning lattes wondering what in the world you're going to do today. 

I mean to be honest some days it is that, but mostly life in every season means dealing with things both large and small that vary in weight and importance. There's still laundry (a surprisingly lot of it for two people not working!), still meals to plan, shop for, and cook, still all the mundane household tasks, car repairs, taxes to file, blah blah blah. The kids may be grown and flown, but there are now aging parents to worry over. 

Also...about those grown children? They now have children of their own which adds a wonderful, lively takes- you-back-to-your-own-early-days-of-parenting sort of vibe to your days, and all that to say life is still plenty busy. It's just a different kind of busy. 

1. Paper planner, digital calendar, or other option. 

Don't come at me, but I use both paper and digital. I know,  I know... I should choose, but y'all I just cannot give up my paper planner. When I make an appointment or we have plans, travel, whatever, I do add it all to the digital version, but I update that paper planner regularly too. 

Digital might be handy, but it's not pretty and doesn't give you the same sort of satisfaction holding an actual product in your hand does. 

2. Meal planning, meal prep, or wing it. 

I plan meals, weekly for the most part. We're always up for spontaneous dinners out with friends, but I  still need to have a rough menu for the week. I would find not having a plan to be unnecessarily stressful. 

I can cook so if I need to wing it I will, but that is so rare. I make a menu for. the week, shop for ingredients, and for the most part stick pretty closely to that menu. 

3. Do you choose your outfit the night before? 

Nope. If I have an appointment, or we have church the next day, then yes I think ahead of time about what I'll wear, but life is super casual on the lake so dressing doesn't require a lot of planning. Swim suit-check. Cover up-check. Let's go. 

4. Tips for managing laundry and ironing. 

Throw a load in first thing in the morning and follow it through all the way to the putting away part of the job. Don't let laundry get away from you. 

Here's my tip for ironing-marry a man who excels at ironing. Works for me. 

5. Grocery shop in store or online. 

In store. Hubs likes to say I need to handle every single piece of produce before choosing the exact right one, and he's not wrong. For the most part I don't mind grocery shopping. 

6. Best tips for getting out the door in the morning without the chaos. 

Retire lol. 

7. Share your easiest dinners for crazy weeks. 

Tacos, breakfast for dinner, rotisserie chicken with some rice and veggies on the side, pasta sauce that's been frozen in batches to pull out when you're too exhausted to cook. Same with soups, chilis and stew. Make enough for two meals,  eat one when you make it and freeze the other. 

8. Best tips to keep your house organized during the week. 

Having grown kids certainly helps. Course then they have kids of their own and when they bring them to Nana's house all bets are off. 

9. Share your easiest breakfast. 

I make hard boiled eggs and keep those in the frig for an easy grab and go early morning protein.  I always have fruit and yogurt in the house. 

10. Share your best overall tip not covered. 

Set a timer for ten minutes and do a speed clean/pick up of an area that's making you twitch. 

Don't go to bed with dishes in the sink or crumbs on the counter. You might hate the idea of doing one more thing, but waking up to a sink full of dishes is a sad way to begin a new day. 

Prioritize sanity over perfection. 

You're doing great! 

A Noisy Hodgepodge

Welcome to this week's edition of The Wednesday Hodgepodge. Thanks for joining in here today and every Wednesday as we talk about pretty much everything under the sun. If you've answered today's questions add your link at the end of my post, then leave a comment for your neighbor there. Here we go-

1. America celebrates turning 250 years old this year. Primary cities set to lead the celebrations on July 4th are Boston, Philadelphia, New York, and Washington D.C. Other significant locations for celebrating will be Charleston SC and the 'historic triangle' which includes Jamestown-Willimasburg-Yorktown Virginia. 

Of the cities listed how many have you seen in person? Of the cities listed which would you most like to visit this year? Any plans to do so? What's one place in America you think everyone should see? If you're not American what's one place in the US you'd like to see? 

Of the cities listed I've seen them all. I've visited Boston...

and have lived in or around the others. I grew up on the NJ side of Philadelphia and my sister and her family (along with my mom) live in the city still. 

you have to run up the stairs and raise your fists like Rocky when you're in this spot

I've lived in the NJ suburbs of NYC twice. 

celebrating my 50th in The Big Apple

I also lived on the Maryland side of D.C. for nine years so am very familiar with D.C. 

                                Be still my heart

Daughter1 worked in DC after uni and I enjoyed spending time with her there. And my dad is buried in Arlington which is a really special place. 

I currently live in the Palmetto State, but in what's known as the upcountry as opposed to the low country, which is where Charleston is located. I have been to Charleston though and love it. 

I also lived in Richmond Virginia for a few years and have visited the three towns mentioned here, a lovely corner triangle of the country. 

I'm sure I'll be in Philadelphia this year, and maybe Charleston too. 

We've moved a lot. Can you tell? 

One place I think everyone in America should see? This one-

Arlington National Cemetery. 

If you visit D.C. make a stop here.

2. Three sounds you love to hear? 

children laughing, NANA!!!, and the many sounds of water including a gentle rain, waves lapping the shoreline or crashing along a rocky rugged coast, babbling brooks, and waterfalls including the one in my own backyard. 

3. Three sounds you hate to hear? 

chewing, the sound of someone flossing their teeth, and a dental drill

4. February 24th is/was National Tortilla Chip Day. Are you a fan? With salsa, guacamole, queso, or just plain please? Do you like nachos? With what on top? Is there anything (besides nachos) you make that calls for tortilla chips? 

I do like tortilla chips and my preference is to have them with a side of both salsa and guacamole. I like nachos but we have them very rarely. I'm good with whatever you want to throw on top. I don't like them soggy so go easy on any chili style toppings. Definitely lots of cheese, tomato, olives, onion, and jalapenos. 

I put a handful of broken (not crushed or pulverized) tortilla chips in the bottom of the bowl before adding my taco soup on top. So good! 

5. We March into March with next week's Hodgepodge...what's one thing on your March calendar that makes you smile? 

What isn't on my March calendar? Whew. Gonna be a busy one, but I'm looking most forward to a few days later in the month I've blocked to spend with my daughter2 and her kiddos. I'll go there during the week when her hubs will have some work travel, so it will be just us once her little ones go to bed. 

When we're together it's often related to an 'event'...birthday celebrations, Christmas, that sort of thing. It will be nice to have nothing we absolutely have to do. We plan to shop, watch baking, and solve all the problems of the world. 

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

Do you follow The Leighton Show on social media or maybe on his youtube channel?  If you have teenagers this site is a gem. Even if you don't have teenagers you'll enjoy it. Parents send him texts their teenagers have sent and it's hilarious. 

He also has a book out called 'What Time Is Noon' which was a text message a parent received. He's easy to find online but here's a link to his Insta (The Leighton Show). It's one thing on social media that always makes me smile. 

Have a happy Wednesday everyone! 

Weekend Chatter

Hello Monday. Can you believe next week it's March and then summer and then Christmas? A slight exaggeration maybe, but only very slight. 

We had a nice quiet low key weekend here. It felt good to be home sleeping in my own bed and catching up on things here. Friday the sun shone and it was glorious. 

Hubs and I opted for a hike in a nearby state park and the weather was perfection. 

Thermometers don't lie-

The little brown dog was along for the ride, or maybe I should say run, because we moved at a clip the first two thirds of our walk.  

I think he smelled water and was itching to get to it. There wasn't a great swimming spot so that didn't happen, but it wasn't for his lack of trying. 

If we were following the strict rules of 52 dates in 52 weeks we'd be at number 20 this week. We're at 15 and we'll take it. We had company one week, hubs was away one week, I was away one week, there were holidays in the mix, so it's all good. We make the rules, right? 

We were home for lunch and then spent the afternoon chilling aka napping and reading. We made Greek chicken bowls for dinner and they were super delish. 

I used this recipe (more or less) and the marinated chicken grilled was really good, as was the dressing drizzled on top. 

Saturday we watched Olympics, jimmy rigged an electric shade we have that's ridiculous in design, and did a lot of lounging-reading-blogging. The shade is up high and has a battery that needs recharging, not often but often enough to be annoying. Hubs has to get out the extra tall ginormous ladder to reach it, on a staircase to boot, so he came up with a solution to make it easier next time. No pictures because I was responsible for holding the ladder. He survived. 

Saturday night we had dinner plans with friends. We went to a new-to-us Italian restaurant and enjoyed every bite. They started as a pizza place but are more than that now. I could have made a meal of appetizers.  Turns out we knew the wine manager and he brought us a plate of their arancini to start which were scrumptious. Hubs and I both had their lasagne (it's somebody's grandma's recipe) and it was served in small iron skillets which made for a great presentation. Also the portions were enormous and we took half home for lunches. 

Sunday we watched as much of the hockey game as we could before church and were excited to hear the final score when we came out of the service. I saw a lot of the Olympics this time around and loved all that viewing. There were some exciting moments, some beautiful moments, some patriotic moments, and overall thought they were exceptional. 

I spent a lot of Sunday afternoon organizing a few things I'm in charge of organizing and it felt good to get that done. We tried a new recipe for dinner and it received mixed reviews. Bun-less burgers which meant a lettuce wrap in place of the bread. I used this recipe, and I liked the lettuce wrap which was less filling. Hubs wanted a bun. 

I'm joining Holly (Pink Lady Blog) and Sarah (Sunshine and Books) today for their Hello Monday blog hop. I have a busy week. Honestly the next several are full to the brim with a combination of fun, family, tasks to complete, appointments to keep, relationships to manage, and people to love. 

One of my very favorite verses was part of my last week's lenten reading in the Psalms, and it's one that helps me stay grounded when life is moving fast-

"I love you, O LORD, my strength. The LORD is my rock and my fortress and my deliverer, my God, my rock in whom I take refuge, my shield, and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold." Psalm 18:1-2

Have a great Monday everyone. 

Hodgepodge Questions-Volume 642

Here are the questions to this week's Hodgepodge. Answer on your own blog, then hop back here on Wednesday (2/25) to add your link to the party. See you there! 

1. America celebrates turning 250 years old this year. Primary cities set to lead the celebrations on July 4th are Boston, Philadelphia, New York, and Washington D.C. Other significant locations for celebrating will be Charleston SC and the 'historic triangle' which includes Jamestown-Willimasburg-Yorktown Virginia. 

Of the cities listed how many have you seen in person? Of the cities listed which would you most like to visit this year? Any plans to do so? What's one place in America you think everyone should see? If you're not American what's one place in the US you'd like to see? 

2. Three sounds you love to hear? 

3. Three sounds you hate to hear? 

4. February 24th is/was National Tortilla Chip Day. Are you a fan? With salsa, guacamole, queso, or just plain please? Do you like nachos? With what on top? Is there anything (besides nachos) you make that calls for tortilla chips? 

5. We March into March with next week's Hodgepodge...what's one thing on your March calendar that makes you smile? 

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

Gray Matters

Hello friends. I'm back home today after spending five days at my brother's house in NJ helping with my mama. My sister and brother-in-law (my mom lives with them) had the opportunity to take a big wonderful trip, some of it work related for my brother-in-law, and I hope they enjoyed every minute. We had my mom spend that time they were away at my brother's house.  

Caregiving is not easy and my sister and her family do so much on the daily for my mom. I'm thankful my siblings and I are a team as we try to make the best decisions we can for her. The 9th decade of life comes with some hard things and we want to treat her with the same sort of tlc she has given to us all our lives. 

While at my brother's I decided to try and meet Kym's everyday image photo prompt challenge. I spent a lot of time in the house sitting and commenting on the Olympics with my mom, coloring, reading, and thankfully getting out for a walk every day too. 

It was gray. Every single day. Gloomy gray. Not raining, but not a full minute of sunshine either. As a result most of these pics are gray too. Here are the most recent prompts, some of which required me to get a little bit creative-

middle-at work-shadow-weathered-pink-current project (quarterly)-sweet 

middle-my brother lives on a river and there are a lot of ducks and geese wandering the neighborhood. Some are swimming, some are sitting on the frozen water, and some are moseying down the middle of the street like they own the place.

at work-tree trimmers were at work removing branches from power lines in the area. This guy gave me a peace sign when I went by, but I missed catching it with my camera. Story of my life. 

shadow-honestly this was the hardest of all the prompts because the sun was out for approximately 3.4 seconds while I was in town. It was gray gray gray all day every day, so you have to look hard to see my shadow in this one. 

weathered-a tough one. How about the great outdoors? It's looking a little rough after weeks of snow on the ground. 

pink-my sister-in-law has quite the green thumb and the most robust Christmas cactus I think I've ever seen. It's just about finished blooming, but still has a touch of pink showing. 

Note to file: get a Christmas cactus

current project-my mom enjoys coloring so we did a lot of that while watching a lot of Olympic coverage. Pretty sure I could give commentary now on curling, women's slopestyle snowboarding, and the Nordic combined. 

sweet-my brother and sister-in-law are big on healthy eating and exercise so while sweets are not banned, they're not available 24/7 like some places I know. ahem. This is a good thing, right? Every afternoon about 3 PM my brother made my mom and I a cup of tea and there was always a little cookie to go with. 

My mama loves sweets so we had small desserts a couple of nights. A brownie bite and a spoonful of ice cream were the perfect combination. 

I've spent a lot of time thinking this week about how lucky we are to have in-laws in our family who love our mom and are willing to do whatever needs doing to make her feel safe and comfortable. What a gift.