Words And Pictures

Hello and happy Monday. I intend to do a catch up maybe tomorrow, or maybe Thursday, or if not then sometime, but not today. Today I'm making the trek back to the lake after a week spent watching my Tennessee grands. 

Not for the faint of heart. 

Also, highly recommend. 10/10. Except when it's not, but it's for sure mostly 10/10. Grandparents reading here are nodding because iykyk. 

Keeping it easy today with a few random snaps that I'm linking with Kym's most recent Everyday Images Photo Prompts. Linking too with Holly and Sarah because it's Monday and some of these pics are weekend related. Today's photo prompts are:

at home (monthly)~in my cup~path ~Tuesday tranquility~ summer~golden hour~

out for a walk (quarterly)

at home (monthly)-

We had a few friends for dinner on a recent Thursday evening and it was a lot of fun. There were twelve of us and everyone brought something. Hubs grilled a cut of meat called a Teres Major and served it with cowboy butter and horseradish on the side. We'd never tried this particular cut before, but the butcher suggested it and we loved it. It's said to be second only to the filet in terms of tenderness and we would agree. 

I also made stuffed shells filled with a mixture of cheeses and zucchini and we had yummy appetizers, a delicious and refreshing white bean salad, a cucumber tomato salad, and blueberry cobbler for dessert. 

This outdoor dining space is one of my new favorite spots 'at home'. 

in my cup-

I rarely drink soda anymore. Almost never. Unless I'm in charge of a two-year old and a four-year old whose parents have been out of town for ten days, then all bets are off. 

This was my last night in charge. A glass of wine sounded nice, but I needed to keep my wits about me so opted for caffeine instead. 

path-

I snapped a picture of this cool piece by the artist Baggs McKelvey at the Discovery Museum in Chattanooga Tennessee. She primarily does large scale, site-specific installations using a variety of materials, which in this case is toy cars. 

Tuesday tranquility-

last Tuesday...

We were en route to Tennessee and stopped for lunch at a tiki bar sort of place about halfway to our destination. The restaurant sits across the street from a popular lake and is all open air which was nice. We had our pup with us so it was lunch in a covered outdoor space for the win. 

summer-

My daughter's garden is bustin' at the seams and we've had so much heavy crazy rain while I've been here that her tomatoes have been overwatered. I'm doing my best to pick and the kids eat them almost as fast as I get them in the bowl. Still we're not keeping up.  

Her okra got ridiculously ginormous overnight. Not sure if these jumbos will taste any good but the kids were impressed. The flowers on the okra plants are so pretty. 

We can't pick the blackberries fast enough. It's also been really wet so I haven't tended the bushes the way I would have if everything wasn't soaked, but we've eaten our share of these beauties too. 

One more summer snapshot, no explanation needed...

golden hour-the golden hour is defined as the first hour after sunrise and the first hour before sunset. It's when the sun sits low in the sky and creates a soft warm glow. If you read here at all then you know this is my favorite time of day to snap a picture. Here's the most recent-

And then just a couple minutes later...

out for a walk (quarterly)-

Pawpaw and one of his grandgirls...

The grandgirls adore their pawpaw. I hope once in your life someone greets you the way these little girls greet their pawpaw when he walks through the door. It's literally life giving. 

I enjoy these photo prompts which are posted every other Thursday.  Hop over to Kym's for a new batch this week. I do have a few grandparent-y related thoughts to share still so will get to that one day this week. Happy Monday everyone! 

A Few Days With My Favorites

Hello friends. It's Friday. Yay! 

We're retired so I'm not sure why the fact that Friday's here is still so exciting, but it is. 

I'm going to recap the past few days which definitely falls under the heading of favorite things, and I'm also going to try to meet the Everyday Image photo prompts at the same time. Mine might land a bit out of order (and I may have missed a couple) but I think that still counts. 

My daughters very rarely post their children's faces online so I have to get creative with my blog pics. I take plenty of their faces for our own enjoyment, and all you need to know is they're the cutest humans on planet earth. 

The most recent prompts Kym (A Fresh Cup Of Coffee) posted were-

wildflowers, water, neighborhood spot (quarterly), nature, adventure, favorite, twilight

We've had our Tennessee grands and their momma here this week and the local grands spent most of the week with us too, so lots of noisy fun was had by all. My favorite thing is having all the cousins together. There's a six year age gap between the oldest and the youngest and plenty of personality to go round. 

Daughter2's hubs had an out of town work commitment all week, so she brought her two sweeties, plus her big puppy to the lake for a few days. They arrived around lunchtime Monday and their Carolina cousins were in the driveway shouting their welcome. Did you hear them? I feel like you might have heard them. 

We had lunch then hit the lake. The lily pad is a great thing if you have little ones around open water. Everyone wears a life jacket or some other type of Coast Guard approved device at Nana and Pawpaws, and they all know they aren't allowed on the dock without one. The oldest (aka the mancub) asked me recently how old he has to be before that rule doesn't apply and I randomly said 18 ha! Maybe? 

Anyway the lily pad is great fun and they all love playing sea monster or alligator where hubs shakes it and tries to grab their feet and they try not to fall off. You can literally stand on the lily pad which makes it especially great for the smallest grands. 

Daughter1 took her kids home for dinner, and I'd made cold shrimp with cocktail sauce, cucumber and tomato salad, and crock pot chicken for dinner. Easy peasy is the name of the game with a houseful. 

After Daughter2's kiddos were tucked in she and I watched the second to last epsiode of last season's The Great British Baking Show. It's only taken us three months but we were determined to finish it up while she was in town. We watched the finale Tuesday night and were happy with the outcome. 

Tuesday was a beach and boat day. Let me just say here that getting five kids under the age of 8 into life vests, sun tan lotion applied, toys, drinks, snacks, towels, and floats all safely on board the boat is not for the faint of heart. Oh, and four adults too. Can't forget the adults. 

The weather was fantastic and we had the best day. All the grands wanted a turn as co-captain so half drove us out to the island and the other half motored us home. 

~adventure~

~wildflowers~

~favorite~

This particular island has a nice long beach and everyone swam and dug in the sand and collected shells and explored the local habitat. 

I wonder if this is our beaver's handiwork or one of his buddies? 

~nature~

We had lunch at home, the littlest cousin had a nap and everyone else rested until we were ready for round two, which was a trip to the neighborhood pool. It's literally about ten houses up from mine, but we still took two cars, several bags, and a trunk full of noodles because go big or go home, right? 

~neighborhood spot~   ~water~

We pretty much had the pool to ourselves which was so nice. Our pool is never jam packed because we have a lake in our backyard.  Also, we definitely sound like more people than we actually are. 

Once home the kids watched a show while Daughter2 picked her pup up from doggie day care and hubs and I got dinner going. My son-in-law arrived in time to eat with us, and hubs grilled brats, we had corn on the cob, slaw, and a big veggie tray. 

Then it was time for birthday presents and ice cream cake celebrating the newly minted four year old. His birthday was the week before but we wanted a family celebration at the lake. 

The cousins went home and the two staying here got so excited when our sprinklers popped up. Whoohoo! Ran through in their clothes like it was the best day of their lives. We'd been boating, swimming in the crystal clear lake, and playing in a huge pool but nothing could top running through those sprinklers in their clothes. Life's simple pleasures are usually the best. 

Wednesday hubs played golf with some friends. It was good lol. He's the king of fun and his back needed a rest. To answer your question, yes. Golf is less taxing on the back than slinging five kids in the air and on and off your shoulders into a pool. 

We girls plus their kids hung out in the lake for a while, then everyone changed clothes and the sisters took all the kids to Daughter1's house for lunch while Nana stayed home with the dogs and made sauce for dinner. 

Nana may have also sat on the porch in the quiet for a quick minute too. Just sayin'. 

The oldest two boys had piano lessons late afternoon so their momma took them to that and Daughter2 and I took the three youngest back to the pool. 

I told you grand parenting wasn't for weaklings. 

After piano lessons the boys moved on to baseball practice, but their dad took over there so daughter1 and her little miss could have dinner with us.   

Which brings us to Thursday morning. Hubs had a work meeting so we girls took the kids to our neighborhood playground to play for a while before lunch, and then daughter2 and her crew got on the road to head home. Boo. 

~everything's an adventure when you're two~

I did laundry and managed to get three sets of sheets washed, dried, and back on the beds, along with two loads of towels, then hit the grocery store to grab a few things I needed for company coming on Friday night, picked up dry cleaning and two library books that were on hold and then back home to put away the 'kid gear'-stepstools, a small table and chairs, the toybox, toys and games, books and more.

For the record...it's all worth it.

Linking today with Kym for Everyday Images 

and 

Friday Favorites with Erika at A Little Bit of Everything) and Andrea (Momfessionals)

Everyday Images

I enjoy the Everyday Images link up hosted by Kym (Another Cup Of Coffee) and thought I might try to make some of my recent random photos fit the prompts. Bloggers tend to snap a lot of pictures and a prompt like this one is a nice place to set them down. 

Kym posts new prompts every two weeks and the most current are-

flag, simple and/or complicated, at home, Wednesday weather,

 doorway, movement, and branched

Well flag is an easy one because I'm adding patriotic decor in spots around the house and several feature flag motifs-

This is on my coffee table, a little vignette that's fun and festive. I chose poppies because they make me think of soldiers and sacrifice. The pop of red in a little blue floral vase is so pretty. These are artificial poppies, but look so real. I ordered them from a company called Luv Sola Flowers which I think is out of California. The stems have some bend to them which made arranging easy. 

Love my 'smells like freedom candle' too. What does freedom smell like? For some reason I immediately think of freshly mown green grass, which is not the scent of this candle, but that's the first thing I thought of. The label on the bottom says gun powder, but I had to check so I don't think it's obvious. 

Since we're talking flags I also bought hand soap for my powder room and some disposable towels, both with red, white, and blue flag designs on them. 

Simple and/or complicated-

I spent Thursday afternoon cooking. I made dinner to take to a friend as part of a meal train (pot roast, mashed potatoes, green beans, and glazed carrots), then made a big pan of ziti to have ready to go for Friday night's dinner when my two sisters, my brother-in-law, and my nephew will be at the lake. 

And I made hubs and I a big cobb salad for our Thursday dinner. I'll make a dessert tomorrow but it felt simpler to devote an afternoon to the bigger cooking as opposed to spreading it out over a couple of days. 

Hubs is grilling wings Friday too but that's his department and he's got it covered. 

at home-

I'm writing this post at 8 PM on Thursday and this is the first I've sat down today. Maybe all week? 

Here's the sofa on our upper deck which is pretty much my favorite place to sit and it's currently on point with my patriotic theme. Happy birthday America! 

Wednesday weather-

Hmm. I take a picture almost every morning, but did not snap one on Wednesday. It was drizzling when we got up, we had thunder at one point, humidity, clouds and then a very pretty sunset. We had gone to dinner with some neighbors and I attempted to take a photo of the pastel skies from their driveway. 

Doorway-

I didn't have anything that fit this particular prompt so I scrolled back through my camera roll and found a photo I took back in March that I never posted. Yes, of course that counts. You make your own blog rules, right? 

I took this when I was visiting my daughter2 in Tennessee and we shopped in the prettiest little store. Even the doors were beautiful-

Movement -

Well the beaver family has returned. Not the original beaver family because ahem, they're goners, but maybe one of their offspring? 

He's movin' alright. Moving is good though because we do not want him stopping and staying a while. 

We started seeing one good sized beaver swimming from the back of the cove towards the channel, which means he swims under our dock bridge. You have to get up very early to see him (which we do) and he is busy. As a beaver. Ha! That saying has merit y'all. We watched him one morning swim across our cove and under a neighbors dock all while carrying a large branch with the leaves still on it. Crazy! But kind of interesting too. 

On Tuesday he had a friend with him. Oh boy. 

We don't want him/them setting up house on our property so we're doing what we can to deter them . I don't think I'll elaborate. 

Also, I wrote back in 2020 about the beaver who ate his way through our hillside landscaping and if you've never seen one you might think they're cute, but I'm here to tell you they are not actually cute. One reason we put in the waterfall was to save the hillside and the beavers have not come up the hill since so it's working. 

branched-

This one feels like a challenge. Technically they're under some branches-

These two deer were in my neighbor's front yard the other day. They were not bothered by me at all. 

Happy weekend everyone! 

X Is For Not A Xylophone

These last three letters might just send me over the edge. Let's get to it...

Day 24-X is for boXes 

Listen. This is totally fine. Three tough letters remain and one does what one must to meet the challenge deadline. 

My theme for this A-Z Blog Challenge has been The Things We Keep: Ordinary Objects from A-Z and when I think about the things I keep I think pictures. Ironically, there won't be pictures in this post today because I'm eXhausted, and getting this one written just under the wire. 

While I don't have nearly as many recent photos printed as I do old photos, I still have plenty of both. Some are in scrapbooks, some in frames, most though are in boxes. Now in my defense some of the boxes are actual photo boxes and they're organized with the pictures filed by year. Some are slightly disorganized boxes containing photo albums which I suppose are organized in a sense but still need to be dealt with, and some are shoeboxes filled with an 'I'll get to that later' sort of filing system. 

Hubs and I started cleaning out the attic this winter and it's in pretty good shape at the moment. But there are three large boxes filled with what I've just described and I'm determined to get to them before summer rolls around in roughly 55 days. 

Plenty of time, no? 

So tell me, do you own a real camera or do you take pictures strictly with your phone? Do you print those pictures regularly and if so, now what? Also, how do you organize the photos on your phone? 

I have a hard time letting go of pictures I've snapped. I have plenty that aren't great, yet they still mark a moment in time I want to remember. My mother-in-law used to have an end table whose drawer was filled with the most random assortment of photographs you ever did see, and you couldn't help but rifle through it every time you were there. 

I want a drawer like that. 

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. 

Skiing In To The Hodgepodge

Welcome to this week's edition of The Wednesday Hodgepodge. If you've answered today's questions, add your link at the end of my post, then leave a comment for the blogger before you. Here we go...

1. Ice skating, skiing, sledding, snowshoeing, playing in the snow, or a snowy walk...which winter activity do you choose? Have you done any of these activities so far this winter? 

I choose a snowy walk. We haven't had any snow this winter so none of the above have happened. 

2. Everyone is posting pictures from ten years ago on their social media sites so let's jump on the bandwagon too. Share one photo and one thought to go with said photo from the year 2016. And maybe everyone isn't doing this, but many are and we're going to be part of the fun. 

I wrote a whole post relating to this topic on Monday which you can read here (Throwback Monday). Bring your coffee...it's not short. In a nutshell we spent 2016 building our current house so most of my photos are related to that event. 

I have a million so will share one I didn't include in Monday's post-

Our family has more than doubled in size. 

3. What's a trend you hope disappears in this new year? 

Rioting masquerading as protest. I'm so over it. 

4. 'They' say there's a day for everything and January 21st proves it. National Granola Bar Day. Do you like granola bars? How about just regular granola? Do you like bars of other kinds? 

I like granola okay. If I'm having yogurt for breakfast I'll put a small sprinkle of granola on top because I like the crunch. Granola can be calorie heavy and also full of sugar so there's that. 

I'm not a big fan of granola bars or other types of bars unless I'm hiking, and then I appreciate the energy boost they provide. 

Wait. Do candy bars count? I do like those. 

5.  A frozen lake, a trickling stream, a raging river, or a deep well...which one describes something about your life right now? Elaborate as much or as little as you like. 

I like the idea of a trickling stream at the start of this new year...gentle progress, subtle changes, reflection. That one seems to fit best right now. 

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

I haven't ventured too deeply into the world of AI, but recently I used it for a little project with great success. My pantry had gotten out of control over the holidays. It was to the point where I was setting things in there telling myself I'd sort it out later and eventually get to a re-org in the new year.

Well the new year is here and the job felt overwhelming. Ugh. 

So I did what we do in the age of technology and snapped a photo. Then I showed it to my imaginary friend, aka AI, and asked her if she could sort it out. 

She did. In about ten seconds too. 

Also, I'm calling 'IT' a she and her response was amazing. 'She' started with some general suggestions then drilled down into some of the finer details when I said tell me more. She said she could organize it by shelf and even tell me what sort of containers I might need to purchase. 

I finally tackled the job today (Tuesday) which meant pulling everything out of the pantry, three bags of trash removed, a box of assorted items including some flower vases, pitchers and trays I've never used, etc to give away, all the shelves wiped down, the floor vacuumed, and best of all I now know what had been hiding there. Nothing exciting, nothing expired, but a lot of duplicates, including three jars of capers??? and an abundance of honey. 

Feels so good to have this job done. Now if only it will serve to inspire my cooking. 

Hodgepodge Questions-Volume 637

Here are the questions to this week's Hodgepodge. Answer on your own blog, then hop back here on Wednesday (January 21st) to share answers with the universe. See you there! 

1. Ice skating, skiing, sledding, snowshoeing, playing in the snow, or a snowy walk...which winter activity do you choose? Have you done any of these activities so far this winter? 

2. Everyone is posting pictures from ten years ago on their social media sites so let's jump on the bandwagon too. Share one photo and one thought to go with said photo from the year 2016. And maybe everyone isn't doing this, but many are and we're going to be part of the fun. 

3. What's a trend you hope disappears in this new year? 

4. 'They' say there's a day for everything and January 21st proves it. National Granola Bar Day. Do you like granola bars? How about just regular granola? Do you like bars of other kinds? 

5.  A frozen lake, a trickling stream, a raging river, or a deep well...which one describes something about your life right now? Elaborate as much or as little as you like. 

6. Insert your own random thought here. 

Everyday Images Mid-October

I'm joining Kym at A Fresh Cup of Coffee today for her Everyday Images link up. She posts new photo prompts every two weeks (on Thursdays) and leaves the link up for the whole two weeks, so lots of time to make it happen on your own blog. 

I got a new phone for my birthday a few weeks ago and the camera can do a lot. I need to spend some time learning all the bells and whistles but I enjoy these bi-weekly prompts to encourage and remind me to take more pictures. The most recent prompts are-

listen~matching~clock~current season (quarterly)~dishes~orange

I found a couple of these to be somewhat challenging, but that's part of the fun.  

Listen-

I've mentioned before that hubs and I are reading through the Bible this year, and we're actually listening as opposed to reading. We use the Bible app and we're in awe of the narrator and his ability to pronounce long lists of seemingly un-pronouncable names and places. 

After the daily reading we listen to Tara Leigh Cobble's podcast called The Bible Recap where she helps bring clarity to whatever was read that day. 

Every day looks different here and sometimes we sit with our coffee and listen. If we have somewhere to go that's a bit of a drive we'll listen in the car. I actually like that because there are fewer distractions. Last week we listened on our drive into the mountains. Day 284!! So happy we've stuck with it. 

Taking the word listen in a different direction...we are loving our backyard waterfall. 

The sound is bliss. 

Matching

I had a hard time with this one and resorted to taking a picture of two matching catalogs we got in the mail this week. They arrived on the same day too, and I have no idea why they're sending us two???  I have ordered from this company several times, but I never order via the catalog. 

Do you still get magazines? How about catalogs? Do you ever order from a catalog, or are you like me and you go straight to the website? I suppose the catalogs remind me of companies I don't think about on a regular basis and that's probably a good thing. I do enjoy browsing catalogs of all kinds and sometimes find gift inspiration there. 

In case you're wondering this company's Kringles are yummy. Not a paid endorsement, just an opinion. Carry on. 

Possibly a stretch here, but I also took a photograph at the restaurant we ate in last weekend, that I thought might work with this prompt. We ate at the bar and I liked the symmetry of the matching glass hangers on either side of the bar. 

I spy dishes on the counter, and now that I look at it, those bartenders kind of match too. 

Clock-

There's a clock in front of an old hotel downtown and while at the fall fest I snapped a picture as we walked by. Jogged by? The streets were packed with people and I was trying to keep up with hubs and friends who were on a mission to get to the next stage. (I wrote about the fall fest here-The Weekend Roundup)

Current season-dishes-orange-

I'm going to combine these three prompts because I feel like my pictures suggest that. For instance, is this our current season or is it orange? You decide-

Here's another-

We belong to a wine club that meets once a month and I snapped this picture at the October dinner-

I hit the trifecta with this next picture. These jars sit in a corner of my kitchen and I change them out seasonally. Right now they're saying fall. And orange. And dishes. 

I got this mug last year when I was Boo-ed by a neighbor. Does your neighborhood do this? You find a bag of fall/Halloween goodies on your front porch from an anonymous neighbor and you take the little ghost out of the bag and hang it on your mailbox so everyone knows you've already been hit. 

Then you put together a bag,  pick up a ghost from the neighbor who organizes it all, and leave the bag you made on one of your neighbor's porches. It has to be a neighbor who doesn't already have a ghost on their mailbox because the ghost is how you know who's been Boo-ed and who hasn't.  I love this mug and have my afternoon tea in it this time of year. 

Also, everyone has doorbell cameras so it's not as easy to be anonymous as it used to be lol. Still fun though. 

Happy fall y'all!