Clinton Apple and Pork Festival

We had a great time at the Clinton Apple and Pork Festival yesterday with Shelley, the grand boys, Marsha and Christine. We took both boys and let Cary have a free afternoon at home. The kids were pretty good, it was cloudy, so it was cool.

Aunt Barbie's birthday injury

Mom and I went to my brother's house and celebrated my sis-in-law's birthday, I won't say how old she is, but it was a "milestone"...hee. Anyway, after much coffee, talking and laughing, we decided to light the candles....Barb smacks the back of her head on the chair after blowing out the candles...we laughed even har...der after that...please excuse my LOUD voice, I forget I'm next to the camera.....Happy Birthday, Barb, glad we could share it with you..

Aye, Mateys, put on yer Pirate hats and set sail

International Talk like a Pirate Day

New Pictures of Molly Paige...

14 Classic Twilight Zone Episodes

My favorite: The Invaders....check out the rest of them here, what's your favorite?

14 Best Classic Twilight Zone episodes

A phone call from a dog

My phone rang, and there was a strange static sound, and no one answered, so I hung up. I could see who it was, but before I could call her back, she called me and said that her dog had called me...I guess he grabbed the phone out of her purse and hit the speed dial with his teeth. The static I heard was him chewing on Reba's phone...lol...never a dull moment...

Apples, apples everywhere

Making apple butter today, and freezing some apples for winter pies, oh, almost forgot about the rest of those green beans...I hope this is the end of the preserving food, I have enough to survive a post-disaster event, seriously..

Green Beanies

A beautiful day here today. We got 2 inches of rain Friday, and now I just picked huge quantities of green beans! I guess I know what I will be doing today!

Surprise party for Brenda Gordon

9/11 Anniversary

Red hat ladies meet again

Just got back from Red Hat meeting today. Great food and even better company. Those ladies can sure tell some funny stories, they are all such sweet ladies. Had a fun time. Next month I got talked into painting everyone's face for Halloween, this ought to be interesting...hee

Juniper-twig Geometers

Bill thought this was a leaf on his bumper, but it was a very cool moth, look at the amazing design on the close up of it's head, awesome..

Visiting my bro and sis in law

Mom and I just
got back from visiting my bro, Milo and sis in law, Barb. We had a
fantastic time, I swear we all talk as fast as we can, like we will
never see each other again....maybe it is all the coffee and sweets or maybe it's because we just like to talk a lot. (Really??)
I'm going to go work in the greenhouse a bit an...d wait for the rain to
get here. Have a great day all.

Kinmundy Labor Day Festival

Had a great time (and a very busy time) at the Kinmundy Labor Day Festival. We are tired but happy. I found Linda M. and we watched her grand daughter run in the relay race....so cute....I am uploading some pix of a few faces I painted today, but I never stopped for 6 hours straight, and so we were the last ones to leave the park.

Gettin' ready

Everything's
ready for the Labor Day festival tomorrow. I'm ready to go paint some
spidermen, and butterflies, and tigers...oh my....Made baked potato soup
and zucchini bread today....hope everyone has a fantastic Labor day..

Darren and Mindy came to see us...

Spent the day with Darren and Mindy. We had lunch at Pizza man, mom came along also, of course. We sat there for hours and had a great time, then went back to mom's for another hour or so...great to see those kids. It is Darren's 20th class reunion...am I really that old? Mindy brought us yummy jams, pickles, and pickled eggs...thanks Mindy.

4 Chords

4 Chords is all you need to write all pop songs of the last 40 years

Squash pie

Baking a pumpkin pie from home grown pumpkins, house smells yummy! Did you know that when you buy pumpkin in the can, that it is actually various butternut squashes and doesn't have any pumpkin in it at all.....and that's your cooking tip for today...anybody got whipped cream???

He always was a weird duck..but this takes the cake..

Did you know....that, Artist, Salvador Dali had an anteater as a pet? ....it's true...here's a photo taken in 1969..

Why do they call it a fish fry, I ask you??

The fish at the fish fry at Xenia, sucked, it was a frozen triangle, pretty tasteless. Some old man tried to grab my cherry pie as I walked past him, I said "Hey, don't you know you shouldn't try to separate a woman from her pie?" I have no idea who he was, but we both laughed. To my surprise, there was a huge cr...owd, and the festival itself was fun.....and that's my Mayberry report....:-)

Pumpkin belly

So my on-line face painting friends tell me the latest craze is painting pregnant bellies...so my friend, Shawny volunteered.....here's her pumpkin belly, literally!

Uh, I got nothin' to report, so here's
50 WAYS TO FIX MASHED POTATOES

Finally...a cool enjoyable day in Illinois

Potatoes roasting in the oven, steaks on the grill, listening to some Irish music with the windows open....makes you appreciate all of the little things so much. The cool breeze and low temps. are such a gift.

Pizza sauce and apple pie

Had a busy day! Made home made pizza sauce, and now that the blackberries are done, of course..the apples are getting ripe, so I made an apple pie and some applesauce!!! So we had pizza for supper and the laundry is done too....I am tired.....hope everyone had a more relaxing day than me.

Dancin' at the Hideout..

Went to THE HIDEOUT to hear my brother's band, Severed Society, play yesterday. Wow, they were fantastic. It was outside, but were under a shelter, so we did a little dancing too...really enjoyed it...they really rock! Nice crowd too!

Quiet day at home

We spent the morning drinking coffee outside, I picked green beans too. We just had my Super Duper Scrambled egg Extravaganza for breakfast..now it's too hot outside, so here I am, then going to read a bit..hope everyone is having a great day..

Forgot my camera, but had a great visit anyway

Mom and I went to see the grand boys in Decatur today. Loved seeing them, I helped them color, and tried to hug them every 5 minutes...I got away with it for a while...enjoyed seeing Shelley, Cary, Christine and Marsha too! Had Kentucky friend chicken for lunch and went to Hobby Lobby too....what a fun day.....

Anne Rice I forgot your amazing writings

OK,
I'm done jammin' (as in blackberry jam making)...so I hadn't read anything by Anne Rice for many
years, went to the library and checked out two book from a series, and
guess what? I already read them about 20 years ago....just didn't
remember the titles...I've read a lot of pages since then..and in my old
... and decrepit age.....well YOU know....(emoticon with eyes rolling here)

Will these blackberries never end?????

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

Dinner on the firepit

Remember
those potatoes, onions, butter and cheese in foil pouches we used to
make at girl scout camp? Well, we cooked over the fire pit tonight,
fried chicken strips, the potato things, had tomatoes with it....our
dog got to come out to the picnic too, and she knows there are
...special treats , and there were....what a great day... ...and the best part is, it was cool, and low humidity...

When opportunity knocks

Bill and I
went out for coffee at Omega today at the General Store there, ran into
Janet Carlson Rose. Was such a great surprise to catch up with her. I
froze some blackberries and tomatoes and took this picture of a
spiderweb and hummingbird at the feeder....

Iola Old Settler's Day Festival

Worked at the Old Settler's Day festival in Iola yesterday, those kids are so crazy. They would come get their faces painted, then go jump in the blow-up jumpy castle...and then wanted their faces fixed...lol....I had a great time though. Bill and I were competing for customers...well, of course he won, cause it was ...100 degrees....so I guess I was just the entertainment for the lemonade stand... :-)

"Illinois, Kentucky and Tennessee

Blues artist, Chris Black's, first music video....Illinois, Kentucky, and Tennessee....great little song, and a cool guy too.

So, what IS the mantis praying about?

I meant to post this picture yesterday. This very large praying mantis was sitting on my day lilies...they're kind of creepy, but cool looking. He was at least 5 inches long, I'm sure.

Tammy Faye Baker???

So, I was messing with the face paints today, thought maybe I would do an eye design, then changed my mind, a clown, nope a space alien...in the end I looked like Tammy Fay Baker from outer space......

Meteor showers tonight....

Meteor showers this week, tonight is the best night to see them. look north east under Cassiopeia, best time right before dawn..update: Saw a few very early in the morning.

Standing room only....

Bill and I helped mom install her new tv then went to the Salem Pool again, can you say "standing room only"?..how fun though we didnt'get home until almost 6:00, just had a light supper, and Bill walked the dog, so that's about it for this hot, hot day.

Goin' to Vegas???

Had lunch with my buddy, Linda Miselbrook today. We had a great time as always, when she brought me home we told Bill we were leaving for Vegas....lol...it would be a riot to go to Vegas with Linda, but alas we are back home in Kinmundy....Hope everyone is having a great day. I'm having some coffee and some poppy seed coffee cake from the bakery....yum

Tonight's sunset, a beauty. This has not been enhanced or tampered with in any way,just cropped straight from my camera...looks surreal, doesn't it?

Lunch at Java Joes

You probably all heard about the solar flair activity tonight and tomorrow. If you go outside right now and look in the northern sky (maybe slightly east) you will see the northern lights. You will have to really look as we are pretty far south to actually get a good view of them. Still it's interesting to watch the...m, just in case you have nothing else to do at 11:00 at night...

Solar flares

You probably all heard about the solar flair activity tonight and tomorrow. If you go outside right now and look in the northern sky (maybe slightly east) you will see the northern lights. You will have to really look as we are pretty far south to actually get a good view of them. Still it's interesting to watch the...m, just in case you have nothing else to do at 11:00 at night...

Stay in the A.C., people

just got back from Salem, where we had breakfast at McDonalds, went to Walmart and then went out to the fairgrounds to see what was happening....we didn't stay long, the heat index is already 109.7, dewpoint at 80.3...so peoples STAY IN DA HOUSE, or OFFICE of wherever there is coolness.....to dangerous outside.

Twilight fans, of course, we knew this HAD to happen

It's summer tiiiiime, and the livin' is easy...

Hey, peeps! So after a long chat with my daughter, I did some domestic chores and decided to listen to some new music on my ipod while I walked to the city hall to pay the water bill. Well the music helped, but it is so hot. Stopped by to see Wild Bill at the lemonade stand, came home and I was locked out....MIL had ...an extra key...yeahh...so I think I will stay in the house and out of trouble the rest of the day.

Happy Birthday to my fantastic, wonderfu husband..

Happy Birthday to my wonderful and always funny husband today! We took some coffee and sat on the beach at Forbes this morning it was so cool. I'm baking cup cakes with sprinkles, cause that's his favorite..hope everyone is having a great day.