The Sins of the Parents become...Well, the Sins of the Parents.....

I like to mosaic.  Not exactly your "traditional" mosaic-type mosaicing, but rather, well...I break dishes, cups, saucers, ceramics items that have been cast off, and stick them onto things, then grout.

The "things" I stick them onto are flower pots, they themselves usually cast off because of a crack or a nick. But, as the flowerpot inventory runs low, and I am loathe to purchase new ones (have you priced those plain old terracotta pots lately?), I have branched out to other "palettes" upon which to stick my broken dishes....

Apologies for using the Victorian word loathe...I just did not want to describe myself as "cheap".....Sounds so Negative within such a Delightful activity....

So, I have begun looking at surfaces rather differently...There are many more venues besides typical curved pots to embellish....Like, say, for instance, an old wooden silverware chest.

This was made for my sister and brotherinlaw for their anniversary last year. It includes lots of the "stuff" of their (and our) lives....There's a church (in dark pink), a bass fish jumping (broinlaw, Don, is a fisherman), a pc of "Golden Wheat" dishes we used to get out of laundry detergent when we were children, dogs, a sleigh (Sherry collects sleighs), some pink Fiestaware (her favorite), a star (my icon) with a blonde headed baby (Amanda, who is now a grownup lady)..

Here you can see more Golden Wheat...and a picture of Elvis...

The decorated wooded chest was received with great joy and laughter. I lined it with fabric, and I think it took its place somewhere in my sister's pink livingroom...

This is The Planets....a collection of orbs depicting some of the stuff in our solar system.

Here's the other side....Saturn and his moons....

Any guess as to What the "medium" is for this creation?  Well....if you look closely, you will see that it is a dang toilet tank! Yep....found it in somebody's trash heap....Hey! It makes a great planter...builtin hole in the bottom and everything....

Of course, you cannot leave the tank LID on the side of the road, either....I've found several of these, and have made numerous creations from lids....Here's the latest 2:

These will go as prizes for the upcoming World Canine Freestyle Competition in Norman (OK) later on this month. The second one is the WCFO logo in mosaic.  Making recognizeable images in mosaic is NOT easy, but the challenge is quite fun.

I mosaic'd a birdhouse for the Habitat for Humanity fundraiser.

And then....Then, there's my bowling ball colletion...Of aliens from other planets. Here's my first one.  He's called Starman.

Dunno what her name is, but she breathes tree leaves....And sports a pillbox hat...I call her Althea.

I learned a lot making this one...FIRST of all that I must put the eyes up lots higher on the orb.....But I like him...He's my favorite color....and he has dorky teeth...He sits in an old bathroom sink in my back yard....

I have a wonderful studio setup in my storage barn. Anyone is welcome to come over and bust thangs and stick them on stuff.

 

 It is an activity that satisfies many elements in my life. Creativity, Serenity, and even, well...a bit of Anger Management....Bikeman and I haven't had a decent fight in months.....

Last year, when my  younger daughter and her two children came to housesit for us (Bikeman was playing his trumpet in Breckenridge for a few weeks; I was dancing with the younger Collies at a World Canine Freestyle International competition) and to keep watch over our older, retired Collie Baden. I stocked the house with food, and tried to think of as many fun activities as I could for the three of them to do. As it turned out, she cooked her own food and found her own activities....You can read about it if you follow the link to her blog and scroll down to last summer's entries.

I offered my studio to her if she wanted to create something from brokeness, and even made an effort to clean and organize the area a bit.

While I was cleaning, I noticed that a rubber mouse had fallen from the Halloween deocorations box.....

Hmmmmmm....always one to scare the dickens out of my children, I placed the rubber mouse beside one of the boxes, knowing that, once The Baby went out to the barn to create, she would be properly startled at the sight of the tiny rodent.....

She never went out there all week. So the mouse went un-noticed, and I had to find other means to frighten the child in other places.....(which, of course, I did, and many times)

The rubber mouse went forgotten, and the surrounding clutter swallowed it and its memory from my consciousness.....

Last night, I was looking for some table legs in the storage barn. It was dark outside, and quite late. I had just finished a wonderful session with a mosaic'd bowling ball.....I located the table legs and was "redistributing" the clutter, and what should appear but a tiny grey mouse from under the boards near the lawnmower!

I was appropriately and Completely startled, fell backwards a little, landed on a sharp piece of broken plate, and sat down hard.....

Change.....

I do not like Change. It is annoying and it rocks me out of my Comfort Zone. I'd like to stay the same age I am now.....I'd like for it to be Spring all the time....I'd like to keep Daylight Savings Time all year long....I'd like for all my clothes to fit, no matter what I ate.....And I'd like to have Andy Griffith on television all day long.

Even "good change" is bad....Like the positive stuff that can improve your life or bring you extra special joy and thanksgiving.

I'd just rather Stay The Same.

Change makes life difficult and unpredictable. It can just plain strip you of your confidence in everything that is normal and believable. It creates chaos and high blood pressure. It interrupts your sleep and limits your planning. It costs money and slows you down.

The older I get, the less I like Change....and, it seems, the older I get, the More things change.....

Have I mentioned that I am able to communicate with other species?  Yeh....It's a discovery that I have made about myself in the past few years. With a little help from some wonderful animal communicators and some kind friends who see me as quirky, but love me nonetheless, I have taken this gift to several levels higher and have actually been able to help out when the need arises. A lot of the "success" with this kind of thing is believing in what you see and feel and in the reactions of the animals themselves.

Once they start talking to me, they won't shut up....

Of course, I started with dogs. They are, for the most part, pretty willing to talk and communicate. I find it kind of amusing that most every one of them immediately wants to "show" me where they sleep--what their bed looks like. And many times they say things to me that I do not understand at all.....When I tell such nonsense to their owners, their owners know right away what the dogs were talking about.

In order to explain that point,let me digress a bit....When I met Batman, a big tricolor Collie

 one summer day, he immediately came up to me and told me "I eat bones...."  I smiled and told him I knew that (his mom and I had both started our Collies  on a Raw Diet several months before), and I was glad he was eating so good. Batman's mom and I had a little laugh about that "announcement," and continued strolling thru their lovely yard, enjoying the pretty perennials and the gorgeous view.

A few weeks later, Batman's mom called me and told me that she had learned there was "more" to the story about the bones.  She had gone to Dog Camp for a week with her two younger dogs, and left Batman at home with her husband and two sons. While she was away, Batman had gotten a bone caught in his teeth, couldn't get it out on his own, and None of the males in the house could understand WHY Batman kept "annoying" them, until, at last, they inspected his mouth, several hours later.

Apparently, this event impacted the Collie more than any of the humans were aware.....Enough so that he felt a need to announce it to a new friend, at the initial meeting.

Since then, I have tried to listen more, and realize that what they have to say is important, indeed. Still, they say the darndest things....

I've tried talking to cats. Mostly they just want to do what they want to do. They don't even acknowledge that I appreciate their beauty and athleticism. When I was telling one tom that he was going to go to the vet to get neutered, he hissed and spat at me....So, mostly, I just wait for them to come up to me, if they need to give me any information.

I've communicated with a few insects before. Praying Mantis and ants and even houseflies. It's been interesting to see flies zip out the door when I tell them that, even tho it is cool in here, they cannot stay and I DO have a flyswatter and know how to use it. Haven't had much of a fly problem in the past few months...Perhaps it is not as respectful as I should be regarding all life, but I have progressed into talking First, swatting second.... Mark Twain said that "the fly is the only animal that was made in vain."  I tend to agree with that philosophy....

And, so, this spring, when my watergarden hatched out hundreds of tiny black tadpoles....I sat on the rock and tried to connect.

I was amazed at the response I received! They all spoke together in one little pipe-y voice.

"We are many! We are Many!" they piped to me. 

"I can see that," I told them. "Do you have anything for me?"

"We are too little! What do we have that would be of importance to you?" they trilled.

"Well," I replied calmly and serenely as I could (but smiling at their humbleness), "there are lots of things you can teach me. Like, okay, well, maybe how about metamorphisis?"

"We like change! We like change! We Like change!" they chorused together.

And so it was that I began my journey of change this summer of my 58th year.....

Thru the eyes of the tadpoles I began to embrace the changes in my life, and have grown, maybe a little, since they began teaching me.

These creatures are perhaps the happiest beings on the face of the earth, and they start out Life completely different than what they will become as grown up frogs.  Even breathing is different for them
---and mobility---and vocalizing---and eating---and, for that matter, community life....All different. All changing. All a new journey once the tails are gone
and the legs grow in......

 

And it all happens so Fast! From eggs that look like clumps of jelly to tiny wiggling dots with tails to fullblown-grownup-mosquito-eating-lilypad-hopping true frogs. Family Ranidae.

Of course, it happens pretty fast in MY life as well...
Seems like we went from this:

To this:

in only a heartbeat.....

I didn't think I would like it....but I guess I really do.....After all, "amphibian" means "double life."  Perhaps this is what the Plan has been all along....If we allow Change, then we will be able to double our life...and perhaps have twice as much fun than we had before...... 

 Everything must change


Nothing stays the same

Everyone must change

No one stays the same



The young become the old

And mysteries do unfold

Cause that's the way of time

Nothing and no one goes unchanged



There are not many things in life

You can be sure of

Except rain comes from the clouds

Sun lights up the sky

And hummingbirds do fly



Winter turns to spring

A wounded heart will heal

But never much too soon

Yes everything must change



The young become the old

And mysteries do unfold

Cause that's the way of time

Nothing and no one goes unchanged



There are not many things in life

You can be sure of

Except rain comes from the clouds

Sun lights up the sky

And butterflies do fly



Rain comes from the clouds

Sun lights up the sky

And music

And music

Makes me cry

IDIOTS

Bikeman and I raised two very wonderful daughters. Girls. Females. Pretty easy, actually. Well, if you don't count the drama and the shrill screams and incessant clothing addictions and the fact that they never took the garbage out or mowed the lawn....

But, basically, we did a Very Fine Job raising these girls. Of course, it does help to have Quality Goods to begin with, and God certainly did send us the cream of His crop. Probably knew our talents and patience were limited, so He sent us the Best.

We never had any sons in our life....until we were presented with the finest two men who were brave enough to share their lives (and their names) with our high maintainence daughters. These men are Saints! And the ONLY qualification needed for that high esteem is that they are willing to love our daughters with total abandon and amazing patience.


I kept asking them, before they committed to the institution of marriage....."Are you SURE you want to Deal with all This for 60+ years?"


And, for Some reason, they looked at Bikeman, grinned real big, and said they figgered if HE could do it, they were certainly able to do it as well (Did I mention that, well....sometimes these girls will remind you of their mother....).

Now, the very Best thing about these boys is the fact that they love our daughters. Unfailingly and with great loyalty and lots of admiration and plenty of humor (you gotta have that in order to stay alive around these Bailey wimmen). They treat them with delicacy and with kindness and yet are willing to stand their ground when the times arise. Strong men.  And brave!

However, beyond these amazing qualities, these guys are just plain wonderful. They are Godly, hardworking, intelligent, lovers of animals and children, and, oh, yeh....Quite Handsome.   

The Time has come, the Walrus Said...To talk of Many Things. Of shoes and ships and ceiling fans, of cabbage slaw and.....possible death....

This is a Random Post.  Yeh...I'm sitting here alone while garage sales are selling all their treasures. It's been raining all week, so the garage salers must be out en masse today in this Sunny Day in Cherokee County. I should be out discovering bargains you cannot get anywhere else... But I am ALONE this morning. Alone in the house.  All  By Myself.  Alone.

Alone is Good for me a lot of the time. I like being alone in a noiseless (no TV) house with no one to talk to. I love the "zone" of quiet and the uncluttering of the mind.  I come and go as I please, and read and answer to no one.
I have always carefully guarded my Alone Time. Even when the children were little, I would steal away to the bathtub for Moments Alone. Some of my children's friends even remember my ritual of closed doors and 30 minutes of Peace....I Like being Alone. Give me an hour or so, and I am back and ready to face the world and solve all of its problems.

Bikeman is gone for the day. He's off to visit his mother, about 2 hours away near the Kansas line, via the Bicycle Store in Tulsa, and probably an ice cream cone at McDonalds. Lately we have discovered that we hate to leave each other.....Our days are so full of one another and familiar with each others faces in our view, that being with each other is the "norm" now, and not the exception. There's not even very much "Hi Hunny! I'm Hoooome" any more because we are Together most of the Time....And it is a Good Thang.....I like his face. I like his friendship. I love his voice and the way he cherishes me. I love the comfortable-ness he brings to me. And the coffee...And how he smiles so sweetly at my "Border Collie" ways.

But it is Good to be apart as well....If nothing else to be able to hear the "Hi Hunny! I'm Hoooome!" once again....

We bought two ceiling fans last summer, kind of on a whim....Well, they were a Very good price, and Bikeman said he would be able (and willing!) to install them quite easily. Summer rolled by, then Autumn...When Winter came, we decided to tackle the project, and it actually went quite well. We put one fan up in our bedroom, and it is wonderful. I love it! I love the convenience of not having to drag in a fan from the storage barn each Spring to stand in the way of the chest of drawers. Our ceiling fan even has a remote control switch, and that comes in very handy.  No divorce lawyers were involved in the installation at all. This is a huge step for us, for after 39 years of blissful marriage, we still do not work well together....Two very independent souls vying for the Alpha Dog status...We worked as a team, and completed the task in harmony.

The second ceiling fan lay dormant in the garage all these months, almost a year. It goes in the Guest Room, and when installed, there will be no rooms in the house (with the exception of the bathroom--hey! There's an idea!) that does not have ceiling fans. I thought this project would be similar to the last ceiling fan project. BaddaBing, BaddaBoom, and we have coolness, Houston!

No home improvement project ever goes like the ones on TV. On TV there is no cursing, no divorce lawyers, no yelling at the cats, no spilled boxes of glass thangs (it was an accident!), no fan blades put on upside down and backwards, no swearing that the instructions are all "written by people whose primary language is not English."  So, when I mentioned the Guest Room Project to Bikeman, he stalled for only a few days before declaring that this electrical job was way too complicated for him to deal with. Something about this particular room being a "hub" of all things wired in this house....

In his defense, I will tell you that this past spring we had an electrical problem that stumped not only me, Bikeman, and three electricians before they brought in the owner (Kelly Grant--if you live in this area, I highly recommend him) who quickly discovered the problem (well,yeh! after dozens of folks had eliminated other possible causes), and...BaddaBing, BaddaBoom....no more "weird" circuits going on and off in this house. The problem was, in fact, traced to said Guest Room.  So you can understand a little bit about Bikeman's hesitancy to risk becoming a Crispy Critter in attempting to wire a ceiling fan in that room. It wasn't your usual "put her off until she forgets about it"......And so, we called th' man.

The very FIRST thing they discovered was that the bracing in the attic would not support the fan. So, they had to shore that part of the ceiling before they even began any installation.

If any of you are wives who have "reluctant" husbands, you can certainly understand the next statement I am about to write.....


Had Bikeman been performing the installation, and had he come to me with that "discovery," I would have only thought that here was yet another excuse for him to delay the project. 

But, sigh....when the professionals encounter such delays, we trust their judgment and their decision to "go get a board" and lay it across the rafters.  Sorry, Dear Bikeman, for being so quick to judge you all these years.....

While the electricians were up in the attic, they discovered that the vent pipe that leads from the furnace to the vent on the roof was disconnected! They fixed that problem for us......and that is why I listed "possible death" in the blog title.....So, now, whatever they charge us will not be enough....I am eternally grateful that Bikeman saw to it to drag his feet on the problem and call in the pros.....We needed that fixed and didn't even know it...

Here's Kelly, putting the finishing touches on the project.

Don't you just KNOW they are so relieved to be finished with this whole project! What very nice men they are!  Just need to add the light cover, and they can head for the shop....

And, so, when  older daughter comes to visit (all by herself! while her children are at camp) tomorrow, she will slumber in the cool oasis of her former room, now the Guest Room for oh, these 18 years. Hope it doesn't fall, Em!! If it does, you'll be the first to know!

And then, onto Cabbages.  Here's a wonderful recipe for ya. I get a daily email from a really great low calorie/healthy eating company called Hungry Girl. The other day, she sent this wonderful recipe for German Potato Salad,. I made it, and Bikeman and I literally fought over it!  You can go to the link, or read "my" tweaked version here. Points value for only 3/4 cup is ONE. 

German Potato Salad

1 head cauliflower, chopped

10 oz red potatoes, chopped

3 cups dry coleslaw mix

1 cup chopped onion

Microwave cauliflower and potatoes for 6 minutes (I did not add the water that HG's recipe suggests). 

Put coleslaw and onion in a Pam-d (that Pam spray stuff) skillet, and cook, about 8 min.  Add cauliflower and potatoes. Toss with dressing. Top with chopped green onions.

   Dressing:

   1/4 cup rice vinegar (Oh! My! this is good vinegar!)

   3 bacon strips, cooked

   2 T. low fat Mayo

   one pkg Stevia (or sweetener of your choice)

   2 T. water

Microwave this dressing for one minute

Serve it on a table as pretty as this, with some sliced tomatoes, and you will feel like a Queen.  Thus ending most of the quote from the above title.....You'll have to fill in the part about ships and shoes....

   

Tour de Payne...or The Weekend About Nothing

Do you ever watch Seinfeld, the sitcom set in NYC. It is described as the "show about Nothing." We watch it every chance we get. We quote it often, and sometimes all it takes to get a laugh out of each other is just a few words from any of the episodes. 


(I was in th POOL!....I mentioned the Bisque..... yadayadayada...... It..OUT...Man hands....Festivus!.....Maybe the dingos ate your baby....)


This week DH Bikeman and I decided to get away for a few days. Looking for a destination, we came upon the annual bicycle ride in Stillwater, Oklahoma. Payne County, Oklahoma. The ride is sponsored by the Red Dirt Pedalers which is a group of bicyclers in and around Stillwater.


The Plan was....Bikeman bikes, and I shop. Works for me.


We reserved a room for 2 nights at the LaQuinta. They welcome dogs to their motel, and it is totally smoke-free. Plus, they have a wonderful free breakfast for guests in the morning, complete with waffles and fresh fruit. A little more pricey than Motel6, but, well, this is Vacation, and we won't have to pay a dog sitter.

Nice digs, and we had a room on the ground floor. No lugging crates up the elevators.

Stillwater has a very "famous" beer joint called Eskimo Joe's. Supposedly the coldest beer in the state...Their tee shirts are coveted all over the world. THE most "popular" tee shirt after Hard Rock. Our first night in Stillwater, we opted for Eskimo Joe's "brother" restaurant,  MEXICO Joe's, and filled up on wonderful salsa and nachos and tamales. Pretty good tamales. 

Now, here's the reason we suggested that this weekend would be "about nothing." The rain was moving in to Payne County, and, well, Bikeman said he didn't wanna ride in a downpour. I convinced him that "you gotta live somewhere, so it might as well be Stillwater for the next 2 days." So, the weekend getaway would not be in "vain," -----just "about nothing." 

And I could still go shopping in the rain......

Our tummies full to bursting, we returned to the motel, fed the dawgs, and then walked them in the rain. Nice thing about Collies...they don't even notice that it is raining. They just consider it "hydrating" their coats.....

We slept until 5 am, and woke to......Clear skies!!! Grabbed a quick breakfast at the lobby, and took off to the ride site. 

Here's Bikeman coming out of the bathroom. It's always a Good Thang to get all that taken care of before you sit on the bicycle for 62 miles...

Loading up his water bottles....

And strapping on his raincoat to the back of his bicycle seat....THIS will assure us that it will not rain anymore today.....

Have you ever SEEN a happier face?! This guy actually LIKES doing this....

That little square thang on the right side of the picture is actually a rear-view mirror.....Lets him know when anything is approaching from the back. How many fingers am I holding up, Dear?

 

I think he must be about 12 years old......

Here's a Cute Old Couple.  Taken at arm's length....

All gear on, saddled up, raincoat strapped on....Let the rolling begin!

And they're OFF!!! That's his cell phone in his back pocket, along with a TON of Lara Bars....

All except one.....But don't worry....he caught up quickly enough....

While the Bikeman rode, I went back to the motel and took a nap. Later, I hit a few stores and found a few treasures....INcluding a really cool thang that drills holes in rocks! All the thrift stores were closed today, so we'll have to hit them tomorrow on the way home.

After only about 4 1/2 hours and 62 miles (100 kilometers), Bikeman made it to the Finishing Line. 

He was fairly coherent and able to carry on reasonable conversations.....

Like what IS Farm Diesel???

And, yes, I do believe I would like to eat at another Eskimo Joe's "brother" resturant.... Joseppi's....

Tomorrow we head back East. To Home, the Best Place to Be.....