Are you rich?

What does it take to make you feel like you have enough money, to make you feel like you've arrived? When I was first married it was an entire case of coke, yes a whole case. You see when I was still at home, coke was rationed. I was lucky to not have to share a bottle! My sweet husband brought home a case for me and I can still remember the feeling that gave me. Yes I had married a rich man. All my troubles were over. Now I feel rich when I can go into ANY department store, head straight for the clearance rack and feel like I can buy absolutely anything on that rack. I doubt I'll EVER get to the stage where I pay full price. There's too many fantastic bargains out there. My best seem to be after holidays, Halloween being my favorite. You can get good tablecloths after Easter too and you hardly notice the bunnies on them. Christmas is good if your house is done in either a red or green color scheme, So if I have enough money to buy anything on sale, I'm rich.

You know how your kids or in my case, my grandkids try to get you to buy them something when you are out shopping with them? Well I did have to laugh when one didn't say "Buy this for me Oma" but instead said "Is this on sale?"

Spring?

"Spring has sprung, The grass has ris, I wonder where the flowers is?" I'll tell you where the flowers is or are----under 10 inches of snow! We had a surprise storm night before last and we woke up to a Winter Wonderland. It was gorgeous but heavy snow so of course, we promptly lost power which means no electricity, no heat, no water, no phones and even no toilets! We started a fire in the fireplace where I attempted to heat soup which boiled over and the pot is now a nice mess. We played "Sorry", worked a puzzle, TALKED and played cards. My husband was truly lost as he loves his computer and was lost without it. We got power back last night and then lost it again this morning. This wasn't really a hardship just an inconveience but it makes one appreciate the things we take for granted. Now if I could just get a shower! By the way it's amazing the things you can do with snow, ie. make coffee, flush toilets, put in dog's bowl!

Parents' sacrifices in WWII

I just finished another book on WWII and this one got me to thinking. Could you give up your kids for what would be indeterminate time to keep them safe? That’s what so many on Guernsey Island, part of the Channel Islands, as well as many Londoners had to do during the war. (There are probably other places where they had to do this as well but I haven’t read about that yet) Many times they had as little notice as 24 hours. This was the case on Guernsey as the Germans had bombed and now were going to come and occupy the island for what turned into 5 years. The majority sent their children off on the one and only ship going to England where they would be farmed out to families in the countryside hoping that was safer than the big city or an occupied island. It’s hard to put yourself into their places, I know, but imagine what a huge sacrifice that was. WWII had many hardships but this one has got to rank near the top.

Reflections on Easter

This is referring to the Easter Bunny Easter not the religious Easter. It's no fun without kids or grand kids! Yesterday may be the first Holiday I've spent with just my husband! This is going to take some getting used to. We were so desperate that we even dyed eggs on Saturday. By the way when I had the solution ready to begin coloring the eggs, I called Opa in to the dining room to dye. He didn't think that was at all funny. We even got the Easter decorations and put them all out. So the house looked very festive and I suppose that helped some. But the thing is you think to all the family traditions you have. We always hid the 4 kid's baskets not just the eggs. Believe me you have to get inventive after you've used the dryer and the oven. Fortunately being a Navy family, we kept moving houses so there were always new nooks and crannies.

Also we carried on my dad's tradition of dressing up in new clothes for THE EASTER PARADE. He was affected by the Judy Garland movie, The Easter Parade. One year I even knit a yellow dress for Susan ( VP now of Nanny Poppinz} to wear. It was a masterpiece of cable and popcorn stitches. I also inherited a stuffed bunny that was hollow inside that my dad filled with jelly beans. He was brought out every Easter.
The bunny is pretty bedraggled these days as my dad got it from his dad and we think he got him from Germany. This year we had no jelly beans, peeps or chocolate bunnies because Opa is on a diet. Maybe that's why I am depressed! Yep you definitely need some kids around on these Holidays!

Dogs, Cats and Crows

How many things can you do that bring joy to BOTH you and your children? I can tell you of one. Get a Pet! Okay, okay I know that pets are time, trouble and expense. Let's get that out of the way first. I am not denying that but I also know how much you can get back.
Dogs are probably my personal favorite and I have had many. Nobody can look at you with such love in their eyes like a dog can. Nobody can beg with such sincerity either. I used to have one dog at a time but now we have 3. For sure I would always have two and if they are fairly close in age, they will be buddies that are hilarious to watch. They can play with their toys in a tug of war endlessly. It's nice to think of them having somebody when we are off without them too. We always board them together in the same pen then they have each other. It's cheaper that way too!

We have had our share of cats too. One stands out because he thought he was a dog. He always barked instead of mewing and he was fearless. I suppose you had to see it to believe it.

Then there were the days we had our pet crow, Sparky. We were in southern Maryland at the time and some farmers actually paid someone to go up to get the crow eggs before they hatched. Well sometime they had already hatched and then they were distributed to anyone who wanted to try having a pet crow. We were one of those. You have to raise them by stuffing scrambled eggs down their throat til they can eat on their own. Sparky survived and from then on he thought we were his family not other crows. He was smart. He was mischievous. He was loving. We have more stories about him then any other pet we have had all demonstrating his intelligence.
I'll only tell you one. If we came out our back door bouncing the basketball, he immediately flew (as the crow flies) to the basketball court and was waiting there ON THE RIM of the hoop when we got there. We took lots longer as we had to follow the road not cutting through the woods as he could. He only did this if he saw the basketball

I can't imagine life without a dog. They love you so unreservedly. They don't even care if you have makeup on!

Weight Lifting for Women

Have you tried every kind of exercise and found you can’t stick with any of them? That was me till my grandsons started me on weight lifting. I think it’s actually called strength training but all I know is there are weights and I lift them. I have been doing it for over a year and I love it. Part of it is I know my program by heart and I just go through it, never cheating even though I am often alone at the weight room {small town high school weight room not commonly used till after school} . Another thing is you are never rushed. You stop after 1 set of reps, walk around and then do another set. You set your own pace and as long as you get all your reps in, you’re fine. I do 3 sets of 10 on all the muscles except for sit ups at the end and then I do 3 sets of 15. This usually takes about 40 minutes. I love that I can see some definition on my arms! Maybe eventually I might see a muscle. However the main thing is I can stick with this and one thing leads to another so my cardio is also picking up.

Josh, my grandson, competed on the state level last year when he was a senior in High school and I was amazed at how many girls competed and how much weight they could lift. Seems this is a “new” sport in high school complete with coaches and teams. This was certainly new to me.

I think I also get a kick out of doing this because I used to be a real weakling when I was in school.

My son tells me that this will keep my joints from tightening up. Whatever it is doing, I feel great and so I highly recommend it.