A new day

What a difference a day can make. You saw what Sunday was like and today I'll tell you that Monday was nothing like it. It was cold, gray and gloomy. There was a bright side to it though.

I went to Cracker Barrel for lunch to meet up with some very old friends. These were girls that I grew up with in my neighborhood. Two are sisters that I saw a couple years ago and one more recently at the beginning of the year. The third one I hadn't seen since I married my first husband in 1982.

We had a nice lunch then I came home and napped for the rest of the afternoon.

Not a bad day

Aside from having to get up at 4am and go to work, yesterday was a rather nice day. The temperature wasn't very high but the sun was shining and it felt warmer than what the thermometer said.

I popped out in the yard and took a few pictures with my cell phone. We don't have a whole lot of leaves on the trees yet and this one in the back yard has fewer than the tree in my front yard. I loved the blue sky though

And there are dandelions out there. I love seeing them but I bet my neighbor who has his yard sprayed every year hates seeing my yard full of them

In amonst the weeds I found some grape hyacinth too.

Looking back

Part of the reason I didn't post yesterday was because I can't get my computer to read my SD card. The other part was because I was just feeling lazy.

Still can't get the pictures off the card but I thought I would go back a few years to around the same time of year.

2018 

I think that was frost on the grass and why I took the picture

2017. It looked a bit stormy but I think we had more green on the trees.

2016 No leaves on the trees but we had lots of dandelions.

Can you guess

I'm sure that if you read my post yesterday you will have no problem guessing what I did when I got home from work yesterday. Yep, I got that lawn mower filled with oil, gas and my grass is cut. Yeah me!

I thought I was going to have a picture of fresh cut grass but apparently my computer doesn't want to cooperate today so today you just get words.

The lawn still doesn't look great because when I mowed I just chopped up all the leaves that were still laying there from last fall and now they are all just laying there but it's cut and it looks better than it did. Looks like I got it done just in time too since there is rain in the forecast for Friday, Sunday and Monday. Saturday it says no rain but it's only supposed to be up to 47.

The struggle is real

You may recall my griping last year about my broken mower. I made it through with what I had but knew this year I would have to buy a new one. In the past week everyone around me has mowed making my yard look absolutely horrible.

Although I didn't want to go, I forced myself to head to Home Depot after work and buy a new mower. I got it home and sent a text to my daughter asking if they could stop on their way home so Rob could get it out of my vehicle for me. There was no way I was going to get that box out on my own. He stops puts it in the basement for me and they are on their merry way.

I head downstairs to open the box and put it together. Piece of cake right?

Pardon the crappy cell phone picture but it's what I had to use.

Perhaps my brain was just too tired but the pictorial directions for putting the handle on and then adding the oil was totally confusing. I sent a text to my son asking if he could put it together for me. He said sure, probably this weekend. That's great but I was hoping to mow tomorrow after work. I stewed a while and headed back to the basement to show this mower that I am not as stupid as it is trying to make me feel.  I won the battle of the handle which is now attached. Today I battle the oil.

From Easter

Today I can finally get to posting about Easter. I did have to work that day but only half a day. Then I went home to start dinner. Both my kids were over with future spouses and the star of the show Presley. I didn't take a ton of pictures because my phone takes horrible pictures and I didn't feel like getting out the good camera.

I posted this on Facebook the other day.  Looks like she was having a chat with the Bunnies.

And by the looks of that finger I think she was letting them know that next year she better get a bigger and better basket.

Amanda took this one with her cell phone. Cutest bunny around.

A birthday in heaven

While going through wedding pictures for my post yesterday I found one of Wade, my brother and myself and realized that today would have been my brother's birthday.

Happy Birthday in heaven big brother.

Mike was 5 years older than me and he passed away when he was 57.

13 years ago

On April 22, 2006 Wade and I were married. Today I celebrate the anniversary of that date alone.

Can someone please tell me why I always get caught with the weirdest looks on my face?

This was the group shot with some of my family.

Happy Easter

Wishing everyone a very happy Easter

Busy day

I've got a ton of things I need to get done today. Now I just hope that I have the ambition to get it all done. Oh well if I don't, there's always tomorrow or even the next day.

I found a couple more pictures of past craft projects. I'm pretty sure I took these to work.There were felt bunny and chick pins and little baskets made from peat pots

Who could ask for anything more

Yesterday was another beautiful day. The temperature got up to 75 and I had my first lunch in my car of the year. When it's warm enough I go out to the parking lot and sit in my car rather than in the breakroom. That way I not only get to enjoy the weather but it gets me out of the building for a half hour. Today the forecast is for rain but still not to bad temperature wise. I think I can officially put the snow shovel away.

This is an old one but it's all I've got for today.

A little progress

I haven't finished but I did make a little progress on my wood burning project.

I might have to go over the wood burned lines again because I got paint on some spots and couldn't wipe it off. I'm not a neat painter by any  means. His face still needs some work too. At first I wasn't going to totally paint it, I was trying to just add color to the edges but that wasn't working out so well for me so I changed the plan.

Happy Birthday

Monday I sat down and made a couple of birthday cards. It's actually the same card but done with different papers and stickers.

This is a cut file from Birds Cards. After I cut this on the cricut then I added the patterned paper and stickers. I also used markers and glitter pens on the Happy Birthday. Since I cut the card on plain white cardstock the white letters were a little boring. Besides everything can use a little glitter right?

Lets start with a close up of the words. This is a multi layer card. The base is the part with the word happy. The section with the word birthday is a separate piece and I used foam dots to raise it up from the base.

Here's the whole card.





Finally the same card with a different color patterned paper and different stickers.

Mixed bag

Mother nature seems to be a bit confused. First she was giving us wonderful warm weather with temperatures as high as 70. Then she lowered the heat and threw in some rain. Sunday night we had thunder, lightning and wind plus lots of rain.Monday morning it was cold and rainy, then it changed to snow and by late afternoon the sky was blue and the sun was shining.

My poor forsythia had just started blooming. As you can see it needs a bit of a trim but it's too cold out right now for yard work.

Movie night

I had the opportunity to see Bohemian Rhapsody last night and let me say I'm so glad I did. It was an excellent movie, especially if you are a fan of their music.

Bohemian Rhapsody celebrated the band Queen, their music, and their extraordinary lead singer Freddie Mercury, who defied convention to become one of the most beloved entertainers ever.

I had the opportunity to see Bohemian Rhapsody last night and let me say I'm so glad I did. It was an excellent movie, especially if you are a fan of their music. While I can't say that I was ever a huge fan of Queen, there were quite a few of their songs that I absolutely loved and Bohemian Rhapsody was one of them. Rami Malek did an excellent job of portraying Freddie Mercury. 

I'm no artist

After doing a few household chores yesterday I sat down and played with some watercolors. 

I'm no artist and I was really just playing around but I thought instead of just tossing them I could make them both into cards

Add caption

My System

When Wade passed away and I had to start taking care of everything myself I knew I needed to have a system. Being the procrastinator that I am, I had to have some kind of plan especially when it came to paying the bills.

For the first couple of months I wrote everything down on one piece of paper. I included who needed to be paid, the due date and how much I owed. When the first of the year hit I started a new plan. I bought a cheap calendar and now this is how I do it.

On the calendar section I write the name for each bill on the date it is due. When it's paid I write the date I paid it and either a confirmation number if it's paid online or a check number if I pay by check. Down the side of the page where there's a notes section I list each bill that I have with the amount due. This has been the easiest system I have ever used and so far it's kept me on track and on time.

All in a days work

When I'm low on blog material it's nice to have the occasional picture that I snap at work to use.

Last Friday I did this cake. They asked for gold, rose gold and wanted daisies. I told them I couldn't guarantee anything on the colors because I go by a color chart when mixing colors and it may not be exactly what they were picturing. I also told her that I'm more of a rose person so I wasn't sure about daisies. She said no problem just do whatever. I did mainly roses but threw in a few flowers that were daisy like but not great. My version of rose gold looked more like peach to me but I heard she was happy with it.

Yesterday while at work someone mentioned that it was one of the guys birthday. As a quick last minute thing I drew him a birthday cake on a piece of cardboard box. This is his redneck birthday card cake.

Trying something different

One of you, and I can't remember who, told me about a YouTube channel to check out. Would you believe I don't even remember what the YouTube channel is any more. But I did go check it out and I did watch a couple videos. The one I thought looked like fun was the wood burning she did and then painted it. I have a wood burning tool and I have lots of wood pieces that I can practice on.

So far this is as far as I have gotten with it. I need to go over it again with the wood burning tool and then I can paint

I found the bunny online and used that and the text tool in photoshop to make a picture the size of the round wood piece. I taped the picture to the wood then traced over it to make an indent in the wood. Then I went over the indent lightly with a pencil and then finally over the pencil mark with the wood burning tool.

Now the big question is, will I finish this before Easter?

What you do

I came across this quote the other day and I liked it. I thought I would play around and do a picture edit and add the quote to it. I was going to post it on Facebook but opted not to so as not to possibly start drama.

The reason I like the quote so much is because one of my biggest pet peeves is someone saying they're going to do something and then never following through with it. I don't care if you have a busy life. We all have a busy life. If you are too busy to do what you say you're going to then don't say you will.

So much for that idea

Monday did not go at all as I had planned. I had an appointment scheduled in the morning but they called and had to cancel. The case worker I was meeting with through OVR had some kind of emergency. Actually that was fine with me because I didn't feel like going any way. I promptly curled up on the couch with a blanket and my tablet. I read, took lots of naps and in general had a very restful day.

Then came time to schedule a post. I grabbed a few pictures from my cell phone and tried to upload them to blogger. Whether it was an issue with my computer or one with blogger, I couldn't upload any pictures. 

I'll try again tomorrow

Spring is here

Or at least it sure feels like it. Saturday the temperature was somewhere around 60 and Sunday it reached 70. I took a little walk around the yard and see that I have a lot of work to do out there. Too bad I haven't taken care of all the things I need to do inside yet.

There are a ton of leaves left over out there from last fall but at least there are some flowers coming up through them to welcome spring.

There's also lots of sticks laying all over the yard and dead things sticking up out of the ground

The deck is going to need to be stained again this year as well as fixing that railing and then doing something about where the pool used to sit. Oh well, all in good time.
I liked the way this shadow of the tree looked. Won't be long before there will be leaves on those branches.

Craft blast from the past part 4

So today is the final episode of my craft blast from the past. I may do this again another time but after seeing all the old Easter stuff I've made I'm ready to move on.

I didn't really make these but bought the plain items and painted them. These used to come in a kit with the plain white pieces and the paints to finish them with. I also did some of these for Christmas.

First I have a set of 4 bunny egg holders.

And where do all those Easter eggs come from? Well here is the official Egg factory with the crew hard at work getting ready for the big day. This one also has a light to sit underneath it .

Craft blast from the past part 3

Are you getting tired of my old craft projects yet? I have one more post tomorrow and then I'll move on to something else.

Yesterday Ginny reminded me of one that I almost forgot about. I've shown this on the blog before. This is a bunny made from a straw hat. It was spray painted white and over the years some of the paint has chipped off but it still isn't in too bad of shape.

In the past I have just hung this on the door like you see above. This year I had hung the spring wreath my daughter made for me a few years ago before I pulled the bunny out. I decided rather than replace the wreath I would just stuff the bunny into the center of it until after Easter. One wreath, two looks.

Next up is a rabbit that is made with a two liter pop bottle, a styrofoam ball and tea dyed tubs socks. I made a ton of these one year. This has also made an appearance on the blog before but here he is again.

Last up today is a stuffed gingham chick. He's cute but doesn't stand too well on his own. I always have to prop him up to keep him standing. This year he stands on my kitchen window sill and watches me while I do my dishes. I made 3 of these guys a long long time ago. This year two of them sit out and one has been rehomed and is living with my daughter now.

Craft blast from the past part 2

Lets hop on down the bunny trail and look at a few more of my crafts from the past.


This is made from a brandy snifter for the body and the head is a Styrofoam egg. The ears and arms are made from jumbo loopy chenille. As you can see, this poor bunny lost his arms and he hasn't found a good craft surgeon to reattach them yet. I suppose I never felt the need since he no longer gets brought out either. If I remember correctly, I made several of these. I don't recall if I was selling them or giving them away but I did make a few.

This one actually isn't all that old. It was done sometime in the last 10 years. I don't really know just how long ago it was.

This last one is a bit on the ugly side. The body is a plastic pop bottle. You poke holes in it and then the yarn is  looped around a pipe cleaners and then poked into the holes to fill the whole thing in.

I've still got lots of handmade Easter decorations so stay tuned for part 3 and maybe even part 4.

Craft blast from the past part 1

Since I can't motivate myself to do new crafts I thought I would take a little trip back in time and show you some from way back. These are from a different lifetime.

My crafting obsession started with plastic canvas. For a while it was a big thing. I know it's still out there but I don't see as many things about it any more. That sounds like a good place to start. I thought of this when I was going through my Easter decorations. There are a lot of handmade things that I no longer put out but haven't gotten rid of.

First up is two doorknob hangers. At the time I thought they were pretty cute but now not so much.

These sat out for many years. They are a little beat up from not being carefully packed away but not in too bad of shape. These also no longer come out of the box.

This one I don't think ever got hung. After I finished it I didn't like it much

Rounding out this group is a little basket and a bunny box.

For the longest time I had supplies laying around for this type of craft but I have absolutely no interest in doing it any more. I gave all the supplies as well as some books with patterns to a girl I worked with who enjoyed doing it.

Tomorrow I have 3 different bunnies to show you.