Purposely Going ....

... 'Old School' ....

(Made in the U.S.A.)

Sick and tired of crummy crackly VoIP phone service with wireless handset, we've gotten our land line back and opted for a wall phone, curly cord and all!  And I'm about to ditch my smart phone for a internet free flip phone.

Sick of the pull being 'tethered' to the www all the time.  Spacebook ...don't get me started, oy!  Oh .. and all of it's spying with advertisements for this or that when I search on google or Pinterest.

My absence in blog land has been mostly due to the vacuum sucking effect of being on Face Book; where there is boundless selfie action and TMI being shared.

There is more to life than snippets of this and that.

OK ..

Rant over!

Has anyone else fallen into this 'rabbit hole'?

In the mean time .. I am enjoying sitting on the front porch rocker sipping coffee each morning with hubby; spending time with the grandboys .. including the newest little feller that is a month old!  Visiting with my folks every few days .. enjoying their presence making up for many years of lost time due to time and distance apart.  The garden flowers .. new church fellowship ... RETIREMENT life tends to be busier than when hubby worked a full time job!

Nathan begins his last year of high school.   Ann is coming up on two years of marriage!  Patrick is off fighting wild fires in the Salmon Mountain range of Southern Idaho .. his third wild-land fire deployment this summer.  We have a very full and rewarding retirement life.

Enjoy each day that unfolds .. count your blessings!

Battle of Deep Creek

The Mr. and I, once again, trekked to see the Battle of Deep Creek Civil War Re-enactment near Spokane, WA.   Maybe next year we will take the evening lantern tour through the north and south encampments .. complete with ghost stories!  While the Mr. chatted with Mr. Lincoln and General Grant, I opted to hear a talk about the language of fans, parasols and gloves .. who knew?

Busy In The Garden

Summer arrived a few weeks early .. everything has bloomed and the garden is on its way.  Did I mention we're going to be grandparents once again?  Mid July .. oldest daughter .. so excited!!

Tomatillos

Onions, herbs and lettuces

Sugar snap peas

Nasturtium, forget-me-not, baby's breath

Strawberries .. covered with bird netting

Grapes

Tomatoes

Clematis, cat mint, spirea, delphinium, fox glove 

New wood shed

Cannon, whiskey barrel filled with flowers, day lilies 

Fragrant peonies

Waking Up From .....

.... Winter

Cabin fever.  Low sunlight.  Doldrums.

The earth is brown.  Garden landscape looks dead.  My insides are silently screaming to 'get out'.

Waiting for spring.  Changing gears.  Kayaking.  Bike rides.  Digging in the soil.  Planting.

The rhubarb is breaking ground.  Overwintered herbs are perking up.

It won't be long.

Welcome March!

A GIANT Step

Nathan stepped out in style last Friday!  He attend the Tim Tebow Foundation's Night to Shine Prom!  This was a huge-big deal for him ... the Mr. and I tagged along and had one of the best evenings ourselves shadowing from the sidelines.

All participants were crowned King or Queen

Dancing to the beat of the drum!

These two have been sweet on each other since early elementary school

A Vacation Reprieve

 This past October the Mr. and I strategized with great detail to GET OUT, GET AWAY, GET FREE from the tethers of home and the supervision of our special needs son.  Our get-a-way was planned a year in advance and took many caring people (care givers) to pull off such a fete.

Old Faithful Geyser

We met up with close friends for five nights at the Old Faithful Inn in Yellowstone National Park two weeks before they closed for the winter season.

To say we had a grand time is an understatement!

A side trip to Grand Teton National Park and a gourmet picnic at this beautiful chapel .... LIFE IS GOOD!

Chapel of the Transfiguration, Jackson, Wyoming

Generating Power

The best laid plans are often set aside when times are easy going.  But when the doo-doo hits the fan, it's awful to be stuck and remorseful about not having taken steps to be prepared.

After our last great wind storm and losing our electric power, we got on the stick and purchased a generator.  We even had it sitting in our garage with an appointment scheduled for our electrician to come out to rewire our electric panel to switch to generator power throughout our home with the flip of a switch.

So close were we!  And then SNOWMEGADON arrived with HEAVY-WET-SNOW blanketing our area weighing down trees and power-lines alike.  Again, we were so close to having alternative power.  This time our power went out five times in a two day period.  We would just get it turned back on when another tree would topple over somewhere down the line and BAM!  During this weather event, we finally got the generator up and running and performed a practice run.  It worked beautifully.  This same day in the early evening the power went out for a sixth time.  I was never so excited to have the power go out!  I woke hubby up from a nap and he quickly switched the breaker panel and started up the generator.   Yippy-ki-yay & hot-dang!  We barely skipped a beat!

Table Time

For some reason the past year I've gotten lazy about setting a proper table for our meals.  There's been more 'grazing' (eating mindlessly), snacking, and family members eating in their own little places of preference.

The 'pop' news of late has been about setting purposeful goals.  Thinking on this, my purposeful goal is to get back in the habit of meals with the family AT the table.  Setting a proper table that includes real plates, metal forks, napkins (cloth or paper), etc.  This will be to our benefit, and if I eat at regular meal times, there will be no need to graze or snack (in theory).   So, not calling this a new year's resolution, I (ahem) plan to 'on purpose' eat only at the grown-up's table.

There.  I said it.  So now must live it!  Nothing like the typed word to hold a person accountable, especially when published on the WWW.

Happy New Year!