I have been having a very hard time getting any good rest at night lately. Actually it seems to be the norm. When I lay down for the night, even though my body is tired, my mind will not shut itself off. Thoughts continue to just tumble over themselves and fight for attention in a space that is trying to shut down. And my back keeps acting up and having spasms. Sometimes it will wake me up as I sleep.
I want to be doing so much right now. Work with crafts, write, take pictures, work on organizing my recipes, the list goes on. Plus, I need to figure out what to do with my life. I have to make some kind of life for myself now that I am unable to do so much of the physical things I used to do. At the age of 45, I do not want to live on Disability for the rest of my life. With this hanging over my head, I feel like I am on some kind of deadline. I think about it everyday.
The problem with my back seems to nag at me all the time. Today for some reason, it felt pretty good though. I could actually bend down to put cat food in the cat's bowl today. Usually, I have to bend at the knees because of the pain, and hold on to the table in case it spasms so I don't fall down. I am hoping it is not a degenerative problem, cause I cannot afford to go to the doctor to have it looked at. I'm hoping it will just go away. But pain is a way of life for me. If it isn't the back, it's the knee the horse fell on 25 odd years ago. Or my arthritis acting up. Or my muscles hurting. Or almost anything else my body wants to throw at me. But I get through each day as best I can.
And I think, no one wants to read an account of my daily routine or thoughts. And I have to remind myself, that is not why I started this blog in the first place. I started it to hone my writing skills and get my mind active. And I started the food blog to keep myself in the culinary world. And I started the photography blog to practice with my camera and see what I can do with it.
Life goes on and I have to go with it.
Wednesday, November 18, 2009
Sunday, November 1, 2009
Sweet Success with Sweet Bell Peppers
I have never had luck growing peppers in containers on my porch. Maybe the containers have been too small. I rent where I live and don't have much of a garden area. So after another futile attempt this year, I figured what the heck, I'll dig a hole and put them in the ground. So I just dug a hole beside the back steps and in they went. And what happens???? They actually grow and produce some peppers. This is the first "crop" I have gotten after about four attempts at it.
They are very small, that is why I used the butter dish as a reference. But I finally grew some sweet bell peppers!!
Friday, September 25, 2009
Not A Cloud In The Sky
Well, it seems that I am a little more behind than I thought I was. I thought I had already posted the second picture of my series, but I guess I was wrong. I remember thinking about what I wanted to write, but never managed to get it out. So this post will contain two photos. The one for the Spring and the one for the Summer.
I had to switch sides of the tree at springtime, because the branch I chose to photograph for Winter, was a dead branch. Lucky me. So that is why it is switched.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Enjoy The Simple Things In Life
My birthday is coming up this month. This past weekend, one of my sisters and two of her sons came to visit me. It was a last minute decision road trip and I was excited to hear they were coming.
A few details pertinent to the story. I live 350 miles away from the rest of my family. That includes my mom, sisters, their families and kids and my brother. They all live in the same general area, no more than 30 minutes apart from each other. I decided 12 years ago that I belonged in a different area, and proceeded to replant myself in coastal North Carolina. If you have read any of my past entries, you know I have recently suffered from heart problems. That being said, on with the story.
So, Friday I got on one of the social websites I use, and my sister chatted me and said, "find me prices on a motel room for the weekend, I am coming down". Oh, okay! I go tell my boyfriend and he looks around the living room and says "we have some cleaning to do". Yes we did. I had let the house get a little messy this past week. So we straighten up the house, and waited for their arrival.
My sister wanted to take me out to dinner for my birthday that is coming up in two weeks, and she told me to decide where I wanted to go. After thinking on it, I could think of nothing better than going to dinner in my own back yard. So we got all the provisions from the store, and proceeded to cookout.
My boyfriend got the fire started in the firepit and my sister and I grilled. The fire was going beautifully and the weather was great. Food was wonderful and I had the best time I have had in a very long time!! My nephews enjoyed helping with the fire. (It's okay, they are 21 and 17 years old.) We sat outside for over three hours, enjoying the breeze, the fire, the company, the food. And oh yeah, the home made sangria.
It is moments like this where the atmosphere is perfect, if only for a split second, that my defenses go down and I begin to think. I do miss my family, I wish I could see them more often. I need to make the effort to see them more often. Don't get me wrong, its not that we don't communicate. I talk to one of my family members at least daily and most of them once a week. Ahh, the beauty of internet chatting and unlimited long distance phone service.
Life is short. Remember that sometimes the little things are the most important. Love, live and laugh every day. Pet a child and kiss an animal. Ohh, maybe that should be the other way around. Ha! Ha!
A few details pertinent to the story. I live 350 miles away from the rest of my family. That includes my mom, sisters, their families and kids and my brother. They all live in the same general area, no more than 30 minutes apart from each other. I decided 12 years ago that I belonged in a different area, and proceeded to replant myself in coastal North Carolina. If you have read any of my past entries, you know I have recently suffered from heart problems. That being said, on with the story.
So, Friday I got on one of the social websites I use, and my sister chatted me and said, "find me prices on a motel room for the weekend, I am coming down". Oh, okay! I go tell my boyfriend and he looks around the living room and says "we have some cleaning to do". Yes we did. I had let the house get a little messy this past week. So we straighten up the house, and waited for their arrival.
My sister wanted to take me out to dinner for my birthday that is coming up in two weeks, and she told me to decide where I wanted to go. After thinking on it, I could think of nothing better than going to dinner in my own back yard. So we got all the provisions from the store, and proceeded to cookout.
My boyfriend got the fire started in the firepit and my sister and I grilled. The fire was going beautifully and the weather was great. Food was wonderful and I had the best time I have had in a very long time!! My nephews enjoyed helping with the fire. (It's okay, they are 21 and 17 years old.) We sat outside for over three hours, enjoying the breeze, the fire, the company, the food. And oh yeah, the home made sangria.
It is moments like this where the atmosphere is perfect, if only for a split second, that my defenses go down and I begin to think. I do miss my family, I wish I could see them more often. I need to make the effort to see them more often. Don't get me wrong, its not that we don't communicate. I talk to one of my family members at least daily and most of them once a week. Ahh, the beauty of internet chatting and unlimited long distance phone service.
Life is short. Remember that sometimes the little things are the most important. Love, live and laugh every day. Pet a child and kiss an animal. Ohh, maybe that should be the other way around. Ha! Ha!
Thursday, July 2, 2009
My Potatoes Got Wizzed On
I felt like a little kid watching my school project grow when I discovered that some potatoes I planted as a goof, actually grew. So imagine my disappointment when they started dieing. They turned yellow and shriveled up, and then they were gone! Eventually I figured it out. The wonderful, wandering dogs of our village would come by and pee on them. Maybe it was only one dog, but it was enough to kill my potatoes, and my excitement!
So, after mourning the loss of my potatoes, I turned my attention to my poor sweet pepper plants, that were not doing well at all in the confines of a pot. I decided to place them where the potatoes were. As I dug holes for the new plants, I was astonished to find a few little, tiny potatoes amongst the dirt. Yeah! There was only three, but they were there. I had grown potatoes!!!
Now I need to take what I have learned and apply it to a new crop of potatoes. Wish me luck!
Tuesday, April 28, 2009
Gone Wireless, Finally
I have finally dragged myself into the 21 Century of Internet accessibility. I have now gone wireless in my home. Before, I would drag all the cables and stuff along with my laptop into the whatever room in the house I wanted to be in at the time and have to reconnect everything. Cables would be all over the floor, not to mention the mess I made of my office unhooking everything. (I hate cables and wires!) Then I would have to reconnect everything back in the office when I was back in there.
So this is my excitement for the week. Gone wireless! Now maybe I will pay more attention the my blogs here, seeing as I can be outside if I wanted or just relaxing in the bedroom, and get an inspiration. I can just blog away anywhere.
So this is my excitement for the week. Gone wireless! Now maybe I will pay more attention the my blogs here, seeing as I can be outside if I wanted or just relaxing in the bedroom, and get an inspiration. I can just blog away anywhere.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Potatoes, Potatoes
I’m so excited!! I have potatoes growing beside my back porch. Now some of you would say, “So what! I grow potatoes every year.” Well, I have not been able to have a real garden since I was in my twenties. That has been over fifteen years ago. I have lived in areas where conventional gardening was out of the question. I have container gardened; cultivating herbs, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, leafy greens, squashes, some beans and even a couple of stalks of corn one time. Some things didn’t like being confined to container and wouldn’t produce well. But I keep trying.
So, back to how excited I am about having some potatoes growing out back. It was actually a goof, just to see if they would grow. I was going to have mashed potatoes for dinner one night and when I got out my bowl of potatoes, some of them had started to grow some very nice “eyes”. I thought to myself, it would be cool if I planted them and they grew. So I just cut them out like I remember doing as a child, and used the good part for dinner. I took my cuttings outside and dug a little trench beside the back porch and covered them over. I really didn’t think they had a chance to survive, as it was the beginning of March and still pretty cold outside. But survive they did and they poked their stems out of the weeds and dead grass where I planted them. I pulled the weeds away so they could get more sunlight and I could see them. They are growing strong and I cannot wait until they are ready for harvest and I enjoy some of my very own home grown potatoes.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Recycling - Being Kind to Mother Earth
Over the Christmas holiday, I went "home" to visit my family. I am the black sheep and am the only one who lives outside the "hour drive circle" the rest of my family is in. They all have children and busy family lives; football practice, band, after school activities, things like that. Busy, busy, busy my family is. Me on the other hand, I was never blessed (or cursed :-) ) with children. My children are fuzzy.
But back to the topic. Recycling. It is a very conscious effort on one's part to help the Earth by recycling. My youngest sister, who has three kids, ages 14, 8 & 2, is my model for my recycling efforts. With all she has to do, she still finds the time to separate items into different containers. Watching her the week I spent with them got me to thinking why I couldn't implement the same routine in my own home. I use paper, cardboard, aluminum and steel cans; why not separate them and take them to the firehouse where the county recycle center is for our town?
Since the beginning of the year when I started my own recycling efforts at home, I have reduced the "trash" going out of the house by over half. I find myself looking at just about everything to see if it has a recycle number on it, separating glass and cans. I even bought reusable bags at the grocery store. I'm so proud of myself. But I should have been doing this a long time ago!! Our Earth has been in jeopardy for a long time now. I was reminded of that this weekend by a DVD I bought my boyfriend for his birthday.
I don't know who may remember the Saturday morning cartoons of "Schoolhouse Rock"? I loved those cartoons! So did my boyfriend. Well, I found them on DVD and we watched it this weekend. Remember the one with the Earth singing about recycling? That was almost 40 years ago. And the hippies of the 60's? They knew what they were talking about, but people just didn't want to listen because of their lifestyle. They recycled and organic gardened.
Now, Earth friendly just seems to be a new way for someone to make a buck. What I mean by that is, because it's popular and the trendy thing to do, you have to pay alot more for products. I'm am confused as to why that is. I saw a commercial on TV for "earth friendly" cleaning products from a major chemical corporation. You could order all three for just $18.99. By the time you add S&H, you would be paying over $8.00 a bottle for Earth friendly cleaning products. I don't know about the rest of the world, but here in my little corner, money is kind of tight. I'm not saying the Earth is not worth helping, I just disagree pockets should be lined to do it.
The same goes for organic vegetables. By reading up on definitions of organic gardening, basically it means growing without the means of artificial additives. Simple enough. so why it it so expensive to purchase organic food?? If you don't use all the extra additives, doesn't it mean the cost would be less to grow? Most certifications allow some chemicals and pesticides to be used, so they can't say the bugs are eating their crop.
Well, I digress. Point here is I am proud of myself for my effort in recycling in my little corner of the world. Should have been doing it sooner, but better late than never. And it has given me a feeling of accomplishment.
But back to the topic. Recycling. It is a very conscious effort on one's part to help the Earth by recycling. My youngest sister, who has three kids, ages 14, 8 & 2, is my model for my recycling efforts. With all she has to do, she still finds the time to separate items into different containers. Watching her the week I spent with them got me to thinking why I couldn't implement the same routine in my own home. I use paper, cardboard, aluminum and steel cans; why not separate them and take them to the firehouse where the county recycle center is for our town?
Since the beginning of the year when I started my own recycling efforts at home, I have reduced the "trash" going out of the house by over half. I find myself looking at just about everything to see if it has a recycle number on it, separating glass and cans. I even bought reusable bags at the grocery store. I'm so proud of myself. But I should have been doing this a long time ago!! Our Earth has been in jeopardy for a long time now. I was reminded of that this weekend by a DVD I bought my boyfriend for his birthday.
I don't know who may remember the Saturday morning cartoons of "Schoolhouse Rock"? I loved those cartoons! So did my boyfriend. Well, I found them on DVD and we watched it this weekend. Remember the one with the Earth singing about recycling? That was almost 40 years ago. And the hippies of the 60's? They knew what they were talking about, but people just didn't want to listen because of their lifestyle. They recycled and organic gardened.
Now, Earth friendly just seems to be a new way for someone to make a buck. What I mean by that is, because it's popular and the trendy thing to do, you have to pay alot more for products. I'm am confused as to why that is. I saw a commercial on TV for "earth friendly" cleaning products from a major chemical corporation. You could order all three for just $18.99. By the time you add S&H, you would be paying over $8.00 a bottle for Earth friendly cleaning products. I don't know about the rest of the world, but here in my little corner, money is kind of tight. I'm not saying the Earth is not worth helping, I just disagree pockets should be lined to do it.
The same goes for organic vegetables. By reading up on definitions of organic gardening, basically it means growing without the means of artificial additives. Simple enough. so why it it so expensive to purchase organic food?? If you don't use all the extra additives, doesn't it mean the cost would be less to grow? Most certifications allow some chemicals and pesticides to be used, so they can't say the bugs are eating their crop.
Well, I digress. Point here is I am proud of myself for my effort in recycling in my little corner of the world. Should have been doing it sooner, but better late than never. And it has given me a feeling of accomplishment.
Tuesday, February 10, 2009
Monday, January 12, 2009
Back To Roots
I need to get back to my roots. Not going home or anything, but back to the basics of me. Too long I have just made it through each day just to get to the next, and have not enjoyed the ride getting there. I need to savor every day and realign my karma to bring back harmony in my life. It's like a Christian going back to church.
My spirituality is very deep and I have tucked it away. I need to bring it back out and start honoring my beliefs again. I have been struggling with my creativity recently and I know it is because I am in a rut. I have allowed myself to become mired down in what is the muck of everyday life and I need to pull myself out. If not for my own soul and peace of mind, but maybe to improve my daily life with better karma.
Getting back to the natural religion I practice, will improve every ounce of my being. Reading and researching will not only sharpen my mind, but bring the necessary information to help imporve my health. Improved health and mind leads to improved quality of life.
I want to refresh myself on the use and healing properties of herbs and crystals. What comes from nature is some of the strongest medicine you can find, and in the right combinations can heal anything.
My spirituality is very deep and I have tucked it away. I need to bring it back out and start honoring my beliefs again. I have been struggling with my creativity recently and I know it is because I am in a rut. I have allowed myself to become mired down in what is the muck of everyday life and I need to pull myself out. If not for my own soul and peace of mind, but maybe to improve my daily life with better karma.
Getting back to the natural religion I practice, will improve every ounce of my being. Reading and researching will not only sharpen my mind, but bring the necessary information to help imporve my health. Improved health and mind leads to improved quality of life.
I want to refresh myself on the use and healing properties of herbs and crystals. What comes from nature is some of the strongest medicine you can find, and in the right combinations can heal anything.
Update!
I've been lazy lately. I have not been thinking about my blog at all. Well, maybe in the back of my mind, but that's all. I have all this neat stuff I make up in my mind to blog, but it gets no further than that.
With the Holidays finally behind me, I want to start taking this undertaking of mine seriously. I started blogging because I wanted to practice my writing skills. But if I don't write, there's no practice.
I was able to go "home" and see my family after Christmas. With all that is going on with my health and unable to work like I used to, money has been very tight. Christmas was a very slim affair in my household. One of my sisters sent me money for gas to make sure I came. I love my family and miss seeing them, but I am still on a path away from them.
I was able to visit with my nieces and nephews I hadn't seen for two years. I spent time with my Mom and my sisters. I was concerned with how my Mom looked. Her skin color was not so good. She looked very gray and I asked her about her pace maker. She said she felt okay, but I knew better. After I got home I still bugged her about going to the doctor and getting her pace maker checked to be sure it was set to where she needed it to be. She just recently got it put in, so it wasn't tuned into her yet.
Just the other day, I get phone calls from two of my sisters, telling me they were taking Mom to the doctor. But she didn't know it yet. My one sister had called my Mom's doctor and told them about my Mom's color and energy level and they said to bring her in that morning. My Mom works for this sister. So when she got to the office, my sister told her she had a doctors appointment.
So, long story short, her pace maker was set too low and they bumped it up a little. She says she feels alot better and her color looks good too. I told her when I called that she wasn't allowed to be mad at us for shanghaiing her. We were only concerned for her health. So all is well. She knows we love her and not just being bad children. :-)
With the Holidays finally behind me, I want to start taking this undertaking of mine seriously. I started blogging because I wanted to practice my writing skills. But if I don't write, there's no practice.
I was able to go "home" and see my family after Christmas. With all that is going on with my health and unable to work like I used to, money has been very tight. Christmas was a very slim affair in my household. One of my sisters sent me money for gas to make sure I came. I love my family and miss seeing them, but I am still on a path away from them.
I was able to visit with my nieces and nephews I hadn't seen for two years. I spent time with my Mom and my sisters. I was concerned with how my Mom looked. Her skin color was not so good. She looked very gray and I asked her about her pace maker. She said she felt okay, but I knew better. After I got home I still bugged her about going to the doctor and getting her pace maker checked to be sure it was set to where she needed it to be. She just recently got it put in, so it wasn't tuned into her yet.
Just the other day, I get phone calls from two of my sisters, telling me they were taking Mom to the doctor. But she didn't know it yet. My one sister had called my Mom's doctor and told them about my Mom's color and energy level and they said to bring her in that morning. My Mom works for this sister. So when she got to the office, my sister told her she had a doctors appointment.
So, long story short, her pace maker was set too low and they bumped it up a little. She says she feels alot better and her color looks good too. I told her when I called that she wasn't allowed to be mad at us for shanghaiing her. We were only concerned for her health. So all is well. She knows we love her and not just being bad children. :-)
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