Hurry - Quick - Too Much Going On

O.K. this is going to be a quick one. I don't know how I got so busy. I don't have kids in school, but I guess just the change of season has brought things to my attention that I need to do. And the Labor Day Weekend. So before I run out of time, I hope everyone has a great End of Summer, Four Day, Labor Day Weekend. The weather is supposed to be beautiful here. We're going to Buffalo on Sunday for a family reunion, maybe stop at American Niagara Falls on Monday morning, then head home. Austin and the two grandsons, Mom and Dad, and My Bob and I are going. Austin's wife isn't going. She didn't really want to, and they have recently decided they need to move closer to Austin's Recruiting office over an hour away, so she's going to look at rentals. They own their house (used to be my grandparent's house) here and they don't want to get rid of it so they are going to rent it out. Long story I don't have time to get into. More on that later.
I've been doing my Fall decorating all week. I love fall. Even though the weather is warm it still feels like fall in the air. I'm ready. And you know how one thing leads to another! So I ended up cleaning as I changed out summer "things" for fall "things". Then I got into window cleaning, which I hate. Then I couldn't just leave one window clean because the one next to it looked even dirtier, and so on and so on.
We have my cousin and family coming into town tomorrow . They always stay at our house, which I look forward to. They're not going to the family reunion because they want to spend the free weekend visiting with my grandparents in the nursing home.
I'm hoping to fit in a quick trip to the monthly summers only flea market. I haven't been to one yet and this is my last chance.
Well, it's Friday night and I try to reserve Friday nights for My Bob. He feels I don't pay enough attention to him. I don't know why he thinks that!! So I better get off this computer real quick. There's the rambling update and I hope I have more time next week. My grandson baby sitting won't start until the following week now.
Oops, he's coming downstairs, gotta g----.

Caves and Wild Animals

Our last couple of weekends have been busy with visiting the sites and attractions of Central Pennsylvania with Logan and Landen, our grandsons. They are now at the age where they enjoy doing these things and their attention spans are just a little bit longer. What is so much fun for My Bob and me is that we went on these same exact excursions with Austin and Brandon (our sons, L & L's father and uncle) about 22 or 23 years ago. In fact, I was going through some old picture albums and I have a few of these same exact pictures with Austin and Brandon at this same age.
Last Saturday we visited Indian Caverns. This is a walking cave tour with a guide. The boys felt like we were on a real Indiana Jones adventure and felt like Bobby (that's what they call Grandpa) should be carrying a gun just in case there were any bad guys or monsters. Fortunately we didn't come across either.

Outside the cave was this tee pee that little kids just love to go in. I didn't even remember this tee pee being there 23 years ago, but there in the old photo album was this exact same picture with my little boys peeking out the opening of this very same tee pee.

Also the same totem pole.

On the way back from Indian Caverns we stopped at a place that our boys loved to go to, even up into their teens, called Bilger's Rocks. This is like the best playground ever for little boys. It's a series of rocks and valleys and little caves and walkways deep inside the rocks that you can get lost in. It actually could be very dangerous because there are very sharp rocks and steep drop offs. The boys loved it. I complained that I was too old to be doing this until I saw an older woman than me just hiking and climbing along, so I shut up. Wasn't my idea of fun except for watching the boys have fun.

Yesterday, we decided to take a Sunday drive with Logan and Landen and also my parents to Penn's Cave. This is a boat tour through a cave and there is also a wildlife bus tour that we didn't go on. Their attention span (and mine and Mom's) wouldn't hold out.

This was a better cave tour for, shall we say, the older generation. No walking or climbing.
As we were driving up the entrance to the cave property this herd of Bison was off behind an electric fence. None of us had ever seen Bison, or Buffalo for that matter, up close or even far away in person before. They are huge.


Inside the cave and the back of My Bob's head with his little shadow, Landen, on his lap.

Took a little seat after coming out of the cave. It was a beautiful, autumn feeling day. Logan just couldn't sit still any longer, though.

So we were leaving the property to head back home and right in front of us, on the edge of the wildlife area was this huge elk. It was only there a minute and wouldn't turn it's head toward us, but we had never seen one of those in person before, either.

We stopped at this Harley Davidson store to show the boys some motorcycles but it was closed. So they got up on the rock carving and loved it just the same.

We had such a fun couple of weekends with our boys. And we should have just come straight home after the Harley shop, but thought we'd make one last stop in State College (Penn State) for ice cream cones at the Creamery. The ice cream was excellent, but we were sitting outside at a little table and Landen's cone was dripping all over his hand and table and a little bee thought the ice cream on his hand looked good. It landed on his hand and as Bob pushed it off with his own hand it stung both of them. Landen screamed. I felt so sorry for him. We got ice and wrapped his hand up and he was fine by the time we got home.

I just got a call from DIL and their Day Care subsidy is being cut off due to no budget for Pennsylvania. In order for them to keep both boys in Day Care from noon to 5 (after pre-school) five days a week it would cost $240.00. Isn't that awful? So DIL just put in her notice at work that she is quitting as soon as they can hire and train someone else. I'm very glad to hear that. So she asked if I would be able to keep the boys after pre-school for a few weeks. Of course I said yes. If it were not a temporary situation I wouldn't have agreed to that. It sounds like she and Austin are discussing a lot of possible adjustments and changes to their work and home issues. I'm much encouraged by this. Everything always works out eventually. Patience is the key.

Rooster Party Time!

Hello everyone. I hope I'm not too late for the rooster party. This is the first party I've done and I'm so glad Barb at Bella Vista is hosting this. I started my love and collection of roosters about two years ago quite by happen-stance. My 91 and 92 year old grandparents were moving into an Assisted Living home and my son was buying their home of almost 50 years. So in the process of cleaning out Grandma's things, there were several items that I wanted just because they reminded me of her and the warm, cozy and inviting home that she had created. The first item I asked for was this ceramic rooster/cookie jar that she never used as a cookie jar, but sat up on a shelf above her stove and refrigerator. Every time you would walk into her kitchen you would see this rooster. This was the start for me. I placed this precious memory in the little corner nook behind my kitchen faucet and thought, "Well, isn't that cute, and the colors go with my already grape/fruit theme."

Then in going through her knick knacks, many of which were packed away and hidden in drawers and cupboards I found this rooster figurine. I snatched that up, too. This sits on my desk (where I'm sitting right now) in the corner of my kitchen. He looks right at home beside my fruit lamp, doesn't he?
In Grandma's kitchen drawer we found these cork hot pads. They look to be very 1950-ish. They now have a home in my towel and hot pad drawer. And I do use them.

Well, by now I'm on a roll. I found this kitchen floor mat at Lowe's and thought it was perfect. My kitchen and dining room and my house in general has a European/Tuscan theme to it, so now this mat ties the two themes together.

Then I found pot holders and dish towels at Wal-Mart.

My latest rooster find was this table runner for my kitchen table. I also have placemats that coordinate, but they don't have the roosters on them. And, again, the colors are perfect. I like the muted reds, greens, golds, and purples. Nothing too bright and shiny or in the primary color scheme.

I love my roosters, old and new. The old especially hold so many memories for me and that feeling is just like a warm hug from Grandma. So I will continue with my rooster collection, but it always has to "feel" right. Not just any old rooster will do.

I hope you enjoyed the little tour of my kitchen and memory lane. Thank you Brenda!

I Think There's a Ghost in My House!!

Sometimes I really worry about myself. I hope some of you can relate, because if I'm the only one that does things like this then my husband is right and I probably need to be committed.

I have a nightly routine before I go to bed of making sure all the doors and windows are locked, pulling the chains on the cuckoo clocks, letting the dogs out to pee, turning out all my cute little lamps that My Bob calls my "light show", and getting the coffee ready in my coffee maker so I can get up in the morning and just switch the button to "ON". O.K., so my OCD is showing, but if I don't go through this routine I wouldn't be able to sleep.

Here's the scary part. Either a ghost turned on my coffee pot for me sometime in the middle of the night, or I'm going nuts. Both scary thoughts. I got awake about 5:30 this morning and couldn't go back to sleep so I finally decided to just get up, turn on my coffee, watch the sun rise and do a little bit of knitting. I walked into the dark kitchen and there was the little red light on the coffee maker with a full pot of hot coffee. The good part of that was that I didn't have to wait for it to brew, but how did that get turned on?

It's a good thing I got up so early before My Bob or he'd be yelling that I could have burned the house down and then he would have made my reservation at the Assisted Living Home. So I never said a word. I have another thought, though, that he got up shortly before me and turned it on just to see if I would mention it. But I didn't want to fall for that, just in case. Besides, I don't think he would have done that so early. So that only leaves the other two scenarios: 1) there's a ghost in my house, or 2) I'm going nuts and can't remember things that I do. Either one is scaring me. I must have automatically turned it on after I got it all prepared last night. I DON'T REMEMBER!

So this is just my little secret that I'm sharing with you, but don't tell My Bob, or I'll be writing from my room at The Assisted Living Home. He's threatened this before and I just tell him to be sure I have my computer, sewing machine, and knitting and I'll be happy. And he tells me that's fine, he'll bring my 22 year old daughter in to visit. (I don't have a daughter). Oh, he thinks he's so funny!

In the meantime, I better start looking for a more high tech. coffee maker that has an automatic timer and automatic shut off.

Spokane, At Last

Are we there yet? Almost.

We're still on Tuesday and left Hill City. Went through Deadwood. Did you know this is known for the grave site of Wild Bill Hickok? Into Wyoming and the Big Horn Mountains. The only thing we saw at all in Wyoming were rolling hills, cattle and mountains. Pretty, but a little boring.

Then as we crossed into Montana, I remembered that a friend of mine, Vicki, and her husband, Mike, moved from three doors down from us in Pennsylvania to outside of Billings about four years ago. We were going to be outside of Billings real soon. So I called a friend back home that I knew would have their phone number and I called Vicki. (What did we do before cell phones? Try to find a phone booth, I guess) She said she was home and they lived in Hardin. We were about twenty minutes away. We got directions and said we would stop but that we couldn't stay long because we had some time to make up. It was about 6:00 p.m. We did a lot of sightseeing and stopping already that day, but I couldn't be this close and not visit. When would I ever be back this way again? Never is my guess.

We were so glad we stopped. Vicki and Mike had cheese, crackers, fruit and wine waiting for us. We talked and talked and so much enjoyed their home and company. It's funny that Bob never was in their house that was practically next door to us, but now that they live half way across the country, he find that he really enjoys them. The location and home are just beautiful. They built a log home on 60 acres with the Big Horn River as their back yard. They have 5 horses, 4 goats, 3 cats, 2 lamas, and 2 dogs. Their furniture was all handmade out of logs and wood and leather. It felt so peaceful and calm. They are actually on the edge of the Crowe Indian Reservation. They love it. Mike says he can't even get Vicki off the reservation. I wouldn't leave either!

Taken from Vicki and Mike's back deck

Well, you probably guessed already. We spent the night at their home. There was no way we could get back in that truck and keep going after the wine and the sun went down. Best night's sleep we've had.

Wednesday, July 22, and we're back on the road. This is it. We're going to make it to Brandon's by evening. I can't wait. We're getting numb butts by now. The U-Haul is not the smoothest ride.We cross the Continental Divide into Butte, and then finally into the panhandle of Idaho. We're finally into Pacific Time and it's 5:30 p.m. when we stop in a little town called Wallace. It's a historic old mining town and all the shopkeepers dress in old vintage costume from the mining boom years. We thought maybe there was a festival or a celebration of some sort, but we were told they dress like that every day.

We liked Idaho. The small panhandle area was very pretty. I told Bob that I knew there was a lake resort town called Couer d'Alene, right on the border of Idaho and Washington. I saw it listed in our RCI time share catalog. We were going to go right past it so I wanted to check it out. Oh my gosh, was it ever nice. The lake was beautiful and the resort condos sat right on the edge of it. I made a note to myself to check on the possibility of booking one of these condos some time. It would be a great place to stay when we visit Brandon. It's only about 20 miles from his small, two bedroom, apartment.

At 8:30 p.m., we pulled into Brandon't apartment complex. Brandon got home ten minutes after us. We were exhausted. And it was sooo good to see Brandon. The guys unloaded the mattresses from the U-Haul and we crashed.

I hope you enjoyed this virtual trip Cross Country. I know my descriptions and pictures don't do it justice. We live in a beautiful country with a fascinating history that means so much more when you see it for real. We said we would never drive this trip again, but we are so glad we did it once. Everyone should that has the chance.