A BIT PEEVED RIGHT AT THE MOMENT.....

2:15 PM Posted In Edit This 2 Comments »

Let me tell you, I am getting worried about myself because I think I just pulled a stunt that, in my previous experience was reserved for the "old people" of this world. The CRANKY old people of this world.

Here is what happened. I came home from work. On my way home, I gave Cameron a call to see if he wanted to go to Panda Express with me for lunch. He said yes so I picked him up and away we went, to the one on Higley and Elliott about a mile from my house. It is the only Panda I know around here with a drive through. But we went inside to enjoy our dining experience.

We got in line behind two other customers. They were served and their orders rung up. In the meantime, the guy working the drive through was finished filling his order so he came over to wait on us. But, then a cook dropped off a tray of fried rice so he had to pause in his helping us to get that new batch of rice into the heating tray. Fine. Then we were ready to order and guess what, someone showed up in the drive through and with that, he was gone! To serve them. The customers that showed up AFTER us!

So, okay, no problem. The guy ringing up the two prior customers was finished so he helped us and we got our food. Upon ringing us up, we ordered one soda and one cup for water. He informed us that the soda machine was broken so I asked for another cup for water. He gave them to us and then when we went to fill the cups, no water came out!!! I looked around at all the other customers and they all had bottled water. I guess you had to buy the bottled stuff if you wanted a drink today.

But, later, though the soda machine was still not working, water came out of the water thingy and we were able to get a swallow in with our last bite of food.

During this time, there were about six boys that were hanging out there with their scooters and their skateboards. This was annoying as they were very disruptive of the diners and the manager said nothing. But, this is not the time when I turned into a cranky old person. No, I bit my tongue though I did think they were a bit annoying. But, I remembered that I have a son that age who can be annoying like that so I did not even think disparaging thoughts on their mothers at this point.

But they soon left the restaurant as we enjoyed our pseudo Chinese sans water. They went outside to toss a football around. To those that do not understand AZ, there are planned greenspaces in all the neighborhoods that are really there for water retention when we get a lot of rain but since that happens so rarely, they are mainly greenspaces that are great for playing football. There was one directly across the street from Panda to both the west and to the north. They could have chosen any number of spots to toss a football around but they chose to toss it OVER my parked car in the Panda parking lot. So, as I ate lunch, I watched them, just waiting to get a football dent in the fender or door. Finally, I had enough. We were finished eating and headed out to the car and I just couldn't do it. I could not bite my tongue, get in the car and drive off. I just had to ask those boys why they were playing football in a parking lot over my car instead of one of the numerous greenspaces surrounding them. They told me this, "We can play here because we are not going to hit your car." Well, I can tell you having raised three boys that I have HEARD THAT ONE BEFORE! HA!

So I told them that indeed they could not guarantee my car would not be hit but that until they paid for a car themselves, they could not possibly understand the pain of looking at a dent every time you write out the check for a car payment.

They assured me that THEY lived in Circle G therefore their mothers could pay for any damage they would do so it didn't matter!!!! (For those that don't know, Circle G are custom home neighborhoods scattered around Gilbert, AZ and full of filthy rich kids! ) Well, I nearly blew my top at that comment. I mean, if I were a mom, filthy rich or not, I would certainly NOT want my kids having such a 'who-cares" attitude. So I told them I did not think their moms would appreciate having to pay for damage to any one's car simply because they chose not to play football in the right place, even if she could afford it! (This is the point where I starting having disparaging thoughts towards those mothers.)

I will give these boys credit, they did not curse me or make rude comments to me. They were simply, matter-of-factly stating that they basically could do whatever they wanted because they lived in Circle G and their parents would cover the cost of anything they did. Holy Cow! Is this how our youth view the world??? I am scared.

Nevertheless, I was more mad at myself that I even had that discussion with them because that disturbed me more than a dent in my car!!!

DINNER, ANYONE?

9:56 PM Posted In Edit This 5 Comments »





Wow, I was thinking about food storage today. I was thinking about how we should store food that we actually eat. I was thinking about how chicken and the extra lean ground beef have been on sale all summer long. And I was thinking how happy I am that I learned how to can it when it was on sale and when my stove did not decide that canning on it was much too big of a task for it. (Don't use this kind of range for canning, it doesn't like to be heated up and trips some sensor or another. I need an old electric coil range out on my back patio or something for canning.)





Then I remembered someone saying something about taking the rings off the jars after they seal. I remembered that I had not done that. I remembered that I did not feel like digging them all out of the pantry and doing that tedious job. Then I remembered all the hard work I put into canning and if leaving the rings on would in any way affect my jars, well then, I would do that tedious job!

So I dragged out the jars and took off the rings, and lined all my beautiful bottles up and guess what, I have 104 pints of meat! My original goal was one pint per day for three months. One pint equals a pound of meat and a good amount for our ever dwindling family size. I figured one meat a day (dinner) and I have three months of already cooked main ingredient for dinner!
Now I just need a month's worth of recipes to keep my family happy with chicken and ground beef. I canned a few jars of pork but I really don't like it all that much and when you see the fat that will need to be skimmed off that when opened, well, ewwww!


A few necessary pieces of equipment, like a pressure canner, some jars and some food AND a stove that won't give you grief, and voila! Canning is easy. And we tested out the food after a few days and we all lived to tell about it so I must have done it right. And it tasted good too!





Rings off!

ARIZONA FALL!

2:10 PM Posted In Edit This 2 Comments »



The weather is cooling down here in AZ but for those of you who are gearing up for the winter, brrrr................here are some pictures of the "fall" folliage we experience here this time of year. This is what we live for. Citrus starts to ripen and many plants, gulping and gasping for water in the heat of the summer blossom and bloom when they are not being drained just to survive. So while you might be shoveling snow, we will still be mowing our winter lawns........................

AN ATTITUDE OF GRATITUDE

7:53 PM Posted In Edit This 1 Comment »

  • I started a post about my complaint that my garage door opener decided to stop working today. Aarg! Frustration. I complained about it then, soon afterwards, I realized that I was once again having a complaining voice and that I wanted to work better on a gratitude attitude. So, I have decided, then to list a few things I am grateful for:
  • I am grateful for the years of service this garage door opener put in before deciding it was tired. After all, our family uses the opener like a traditional door, raising and lowering it several times a day not only for cars, but for foot traffic as well because with a keypad on the door, it is easier to use than keeping a key around.

  • I am grateful for the good neighbor who came and helped me get the door opened manually so that I could at least get my car out for use this week while Tim is out of town.

  • I am grateful for the wonderful letter I received from our missionary son who is out serving and doing the Lord's work and loving it and doing good things with his life.

  • I am grateful for my other two sons, who try hard to make things easier for me while their dad is out of town, again.

  • I am grateful for the cooler weather we are starting to see here in AZ which gives us much needed relief and a break on our electric bills!

  • I am grateful for friendships that endure time and distance, and where we are able to just pick right up where we left off.

  • I am grateful that we have heard good words this weekend that help buoy us up and give us courage and hope as our life progresses.

  • I am grateful that we live in this great country, flaws and all, and that we have the freedoms we have and I hope we continue to have if we live worthy of them.

There are so many other things but I fear that this list would get too long so for now, I will close and say that this felt much better than my previous post, that just whined about a broken garage door opener.

WHAT IS LOVE? OUT OF THE MOUTH OF BABES

6:09 PM Posted In Edit This 2 Comments »
Tim told me that yesterday's post was a real downer. I was trying to be silly, make something that has been a source of irritation into something funny. But, I guess it was too close to home for him and he did not find it at all funny. Therefore, I decided to add a cute little list of what some children in a school, when asked what they thought love was, gave as their answers. These are so sweet and hopefully a more uplifting thought for the day.

WHAT IS LOVE?
A group of professional people posed this question to a group of 4 to 8 year-olds, "What does love mean?" The answers they got were broader and deeper than anyone could have imagined. See what you think:

"When my grandmother got arthritis, she couldn't bend over and paint her toenails anymore. So my grandfather does it for her all the time, even when his hands got arthritis too. That's love." Rebecca - age 8

"When someone loves you, the way they say your name is different. You just know that your name is safe in their mouth."Billy - age 4

"Love is when a girl puts on perfume and a boy puts on shaving cologne and they go out and smell each other."Karl - age 5

"Love is when you go out to eat and give somebody most of your French fries without making them give you any of theirs."Chrissy - age 6

"Love is what makes you smile when you're tired."Terri - age 4

"Love is what's in the room with you at Christmas if you stop opening presents and listen."Bobby - age 7 (Wow!)

"If you want to learn to love better, you should start with a friend who you hate." Nikka - age 6

"Love is when you tell a guy you like his shirt, then he wears it everyday."Noelle - age 7

"Love is like a little old woman and a little old man who are still friends even after they know each other so well."Tommy - age 6

"During my piano recital, I was on a stage and I was scared. I looked at all the people watching me and saw my daddy waving and smiling. He was the only one doing that. I wasn't scared anymore."Cindy - age 8

"My mommy loves me more than anybody. You don't see anyone else kissing me to sleep at night."Clare - age 6

"Love is when Mommy gives Daddy the best piece of chicken."Elaine-age 5

"Love is when Mommy sees Daddy smelly and sweaty and still says he is handsomer than Robert Redford."Chris - age 7

"Love is when your puppy licks your face even after you left him alone all day."Mary Ann - age 4

"I know my older sister loves me because she gives me all her old clothes and has to go out and buy new ones."Lauren - age 4

"When you love somebody, your eyelashes go up and down and little stars come out of you."Karen - age 7

"You really shouldn't say 'I love you' unless you mean it. But if you mean it, you should say it a lot. People forget."Jessica - age 8

And the final one -- Author and lecturer Leo Buscaglia once talked about a contest he was asked to judge. The purpose of the contest was to find the most caring child. (Now this will melt your heart.) :)
The winner was a four year old child whose next door neighbor was an elderly gentleman who had recently lost his wife. Upon seeing the man cry, the little boy went into the gentleman's yard, climbed onto his lap, and just sat there. When his Mother asked him what he had said to the neighbor, the little boy said, "Nothing, I just helped him cry."

ONE INGROUND SWIMMING POOL FOR SALE!

5:10 PM Posted In Edit This 1 Comment »
OK, so I know I should count my blessings, and really I do, but I am really hating pool ownership. The honeymoon is over between the pool and me. When we first moved to AZ, we thought we did not want a pool. Our youngest child was only 4 and it seemed a scary thing to be responsible for. But, one summer in AZ and we understood why probably 75% of the homes here have one. It is miserably hot and if you want to be outdoors in July or August, you want to be wet! Of course, being wet does not mean being cool, because in July and August the water temps in the pool average 95 degrees. Amazingly, if the humidity is low, it is actually chilly when wet skin is exposed to the air! So, we caved in and put a pool in. The boys played in the pool a lot. There was a really cool fountain that they would turn up high and the neighborhood kids would take turns trying to jump over it. There were next to no problems with this pool so we liked pool ownership.



Then we moved to this house a little over five years ago and have had nothing but troubles. The vacuum never functions and it has been taken in a half a dozen times for repair. The cost of the vacuum later and it still doesn't do what it is supposed to do, which is; walk around the pool all on its own and suck up the stuff that gathers on the floor. (I really would like one of those for inside the house as well but after my experiences with the pool vac, I have lost faith in vacuums doing the work on their own. They are lazy.) We also have had many things flake off the pebbletec finish of the pool and thus have had to drain it on several occasions for patch work to be done. All this is not without a price. This summer we had to pay $40 just for a little plastic screw on lid!!! It is highway robbery but they charge it because they can! Every pool store and online store does! The smallest of parts cost a fortune and apparently the vacuum has 27 moving, and constantly failing parts. The water seems never to be in balance and the only one that uses it is the dog!!!!


So, as you can imagine, I am putting this pool on the market and if you can get it out of my yard, you can have it! The fun pool is on the top, the one for sale is on the bottom. EMPTY

THE BIGGEST JOB I HAVE EVER DONE

7:17 AM Posted In Edit This 4 Comments »




















We bought our house in 2003. I hated the color of the paint but you know home owner's associations and their tight restrictions not to mention the big job of repainting. Though the house was built in 2001, I always thought the brown trim on the house was from back in the70's. But we lived with it until we started seeing paint flaking off the stucco and patches of fading stucco all over the house that gave it a sort of camouflage look. We are the oldest house in the neighborhood as we were the original model home so we knew it was a matter of time before the association gestapo came around with a letter telling us to comply with keeping our house paint up. Oh how I lamented my days in MO where you had vinyl siding and brick and very, very little exterior paint!!! Stucco is so hard to paint!!! Well, Tim and I thought this would be a good learning experience and decided to do it ourselves. OK, so we are cheap. In the end, though, while it took about two weeks of pretty much nonstop work, I think we did a pretty good job. We set a trend for the neighborhood and others are following with painting of their own. NO one, not one other person, has attempted to tackle it themselves. In the end, when asking people what they paid, I realized we saved virtually nothing in cost doing it ourselves but what we did get out of it was two coats of high quality paint that hopefully will last more than seven years like those that sprayed a thin coat on. But, I like the color better considering color restraints.Guess how many gallons of paint it took? 45!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

MISSIONARY MOMENTS??

7:26 AM Posted In Edit This 2 Comments »









Have you ever wondered what missionaries do in the MTC during their "down time"? I know they have very little of that, but I guess there is an occasional chance to show off your unusual talents .....Click to enlarge the photo and see the details better. Then, later, they are still playing around in their apartment. Really, I did teach him not to play with fire, though this is not actually Chris doing this.

THE FUNNIEST OF COINCIDENCES...

4:10 PM Posted In Edit This 1 Comment »
Okay so my friend Loretta just got her blog up and running. Congratulations Loretta! Check out her blog down below. But, I wanted to tell you about the funniest of coincidences we share with each other. Sorry, Loretta, I beat you to this story~

So I met Loretta back when we both lived in MO. Now neither of us do and we could have been two ships passing in the night if it were not for my mom, who told me she knew of a girl in her ward that she thought I would really enjoy getting to know. So, one day after the birth of my second child and her third, we were introduced and the rest is history! So, Loretta, I guess this means we have known each other about 18 years! Wow!

Anyway, upon getting to know each other, we realized we had some amazing things in common:

Her first child was a boy, born before Tim and I had started our family. But, our first child was born a few months after her second and both were boys. They were in the same grade of school together. Our next children, her third and my second were born within two weeks of each other. This is when we met so her second and third were instant friends with my first and second! Then, amazingly, we started discovering this crazy phenomenon, like that we are both left handed. Both of our husbands are named Tim and both are computer geeks of sorts, (and I mean that in a very good way!), and by the time we discovered we were pregnant again, we found that her fourth and my third had the very same due date!!!!!! ( I beat her to delivery by three days as I was two days early and she was one day late!) Now it was getting quite freaky. Her husband Tim and I share the same birthday and my husband Tim and she share the same birthday. Our only sisters each share the same birthday as well!!!

Loretta, the brave woman that she is, went on to have two more children and got two girls out of the deal! Great job. It has often made me wonder what would have happened should be have gone on to have more ourselves, hmmm..............

We have had many a laugh about that and as our years have progressed have shared very parallel lives.................It has kept us laughing and crying together often. I only wish we lived closer so we could take a picture of the two of us together. Hey, Loretta, do you have one and could email me?? :)

BRINGING YOU UP TO SPEED......

5:06 PM Posted In Edit This 0 Comments »
So, I got an email from my great friend Loretta after she read my new blog. She said that her husband, a real computer genius, asked her if she would like to set one up as well. She said she was afraid she would not have anything interesting to write about. I am hearing her loud and clear as I, too, really wonder at anyone wanting to read my ramblings. However, I enjoy reading other's so, maybe it won't be so bad. C'mon Loretta, give it a shot. I resisted and resisted then decided, what the heck so now you get a rundown of my family for now, just to bring you up to speed.

Tim is currently working for a big bank, which name I will not mention just in case I say something negative about it later! hee hee Of course with all the banking and investment situations happening in our country of late, working there seems a bit precarious. We will see. This particular bank, however, was very conservative in its subprime investments and have seemed to have recovered nicely as a result. So, for now, he plugs away doing his auditing thing and wishing, as do I, in our middle age, that we could change careers midstream.

I currently work two part time jobs doing bookkeeping and payroll for two completely unrelated small businesses. I am certainly hoping NOT to make a career of it but have been doing it a while so I am wondering..... In actuality, I want to go back to school. I think something in the medical field would be a good choice, but oh how I wonder if I can handle the gross stuff!!!!

Chris, our 20 year old son, has just over 10 months left on his mission. (Check out the countdown to the right!) He is serving in the Nashville, TN area and doing really, really well! We hear good things and have actually heard twice from his mission president telling us how grateful he is to be able to count on Chris to put forth 100% effort in everything he is asked to do! I am grateful to hear that. It gives us more peace of mind. Christmas is just three months away and we get our third phone call! WooHoo!

Cameron is attending community college and doing well. I think he needs a job and tell him it every day, so I am a big nag. But at least he is in school. He stays busy playing dodgeball, skateboarding on a friends half pipe, playing softball, and watching UFC fights. I hope he is doing some preparations for a mission as his 19th birthday is only 9 months away! I try not to nag, I just have learned a thing or two since getting Chris ready.

Brandon currently plays football for a league team. He loves football but the poor kid is too small for high school football. However, he is an excellent wrestler and so the wrestling season will be upon us in less than a month or so and then he will really shine. He started high school this year and seems to be "into" it and happy enough. The work is not too hard for him.

Bailey is doing well with her treatments for her renal failure. I mean, I am NOT going to pay out to put my dog on dialysis. Sorry about that to all you that would do so. I love my dog but going into debt to treat a chronic disease for a dog I won't do. So, we are grateful that her overpriced prescription dog food and the pills she was given are doing the job for now. She is also being treated for her thyroid and amazingly she is not the lazy lump of a dog we have always known her to be. She actually has a bit more energy!

So, there you have an update of things in a nutshell! I really need to take more pictures. I am hoping this blog will get me back in the mode of doing so. In the meantime, Loretta, give it a shot so I have another blog to follow............



RHEA, THIS ONE IS FOR YOU!

6:55 PM Posted In Edit This 1 Comment »
Okay, so I am finding myself posting on a blog, though I highly resisted doing this. It is hard for me to come up with what to write that would interest anyone. But, for you, Rhea, I have decided to give it a try. This may be my one and only post. We will see how inhibited I feel about it all!!! ha ha ha

I am only just learning about the fancy things that can be put on here so don't laugh to hard at how amatuerish it all looks. Those of us that are out of our 20's and 30's are waaaaay behind on these sorts of things. Sigh..................
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