A Crazy Life

Been out of pocket for awhile...We went to Tennessee for Spring break and was unable to get to a computer, then we came home just in time for Youth Conference at church, which we were all involved in. This week we've been getting ready for Scott's surgery, which is today. So...I guess you could say, I've been just a little busy. Hopfully, next week, we will have our lives back to normal, whatever that may be...

The Beauty of Spring

Spring is definitely in the air here in Louisiana! One day we have beautiful weather the next day horrible storms! I guess we have to have the rain in order to have the wonderful colors we experience here...

We have been trying to walk everyday, but some days it is just too stormy. Lots of thunder, lightening, hail and wind, so we stay in on those days...

But...the days with no rain, we are out there walking and enjoying the sights...

I decided to bring my camera the other day so I could share some of the wonderful colors of our neighborhood...

The Azaleas are especially beautiful...

Most people have pink Azaleas, but there are other colors--red, white, peach...

Hope you've enjoyed the colors of Louisiana as much as we do each day. Of course, it is much more prettier in person...

What You Think?

Ever since I can remember, my sisters and I have loved to craft. Growing up in the 70's we got into macrame and jewelry making. One of myy sisters has since made a career out of jewelry making by selling her items in various boutiques, writing books and she even has an about.com site and other blogs on all her gorgeous stuff.

Not only did we do macrame and jewelry, but we also got into crochet. I can even remember crocheting things with our fingers--no needle needed. Several years ago, I was experimenting on new media to use in jewelry. Actually, my sister was working on a mixed media book at the time, and that inspired me. As I was brainstorming with myself, I wondered if one could crochet beads. I started goofing around and found that yes, that is possible. I made a couple of necklaces that everyone seemed to like, and then gave them away as Christmas gifts. Today, I was playing around with my beads and made this necklace out of some cheap glass beads my mom had bought to make some jewelry with. She gave me the leftover beads, and I decided to try to use them. This was a fun, simple and cheap project. If you can chain stitch, you can make this necklace! Hey, this may even be a good project for pre-teens who would like to learn to crochet....

A Stormy Evening

The last few days have been very stormy, which means, we have been staying indoors. Last night was suppose to be the stormiest evening of all. The way the weather people were talking, we were going to be getting widespread tornadoes. Because of this, I had planned an evening hunkered down with the family.

As the day wore on, it looked as if we were looking at late night storms. My dh called to see if we all wanted to go out to eat at the favorite Mexican Restaurant. One of my sons was wanting to spend the night at a friends house, and the other son was not wanting to go anywhere (he's pretty much a homebody), so it was just the two of us. By the time dh got home it was 7:00. The storms still didn't seem anywhere near, so we headed out. When we got there we found we were not the only ones that had the idea of going out to eat.

We always like going out to eat, and we've taken our kids with us a lot, even when we had four very little ones. We took them out to eat to teach them how to act, and they have always been very good. From the beginning, though, we taught them that you do not get up and run around, and that you use a quiet voice, etc. I have found, though, that a lot of people do not teach their kids manners when going out to eat.

As a college student, I was a waitress, and it really got on my nerves when people let their kids run amuk. Numerous times, I can remember a kid barreling into me when I had a full tray of food or drinks--not fun. Last night was a night mare. As I mentioned before, the resturaunt was very busy. Many of the patrons were families, and most of these families let their kids run wild. I could not believe it! These kids were probably around 9, 10 or 11--old enough to know better. The resturaunt had a free ice cream machine at the front, so after you pay your bill you can get an ice cream cone for the road. These kids were running from the back of the resturant to the front and back again getting numerous ice cream cones. There were about 10 boys in all. They would run, get their cones, run back, finish their cones, and then run back for another one, making an extremely big mess of the machine. This went on the entire time we were there. Don't get me wrong, I love kids--I got four of my own--but I really hate it when other peoples kids are making such a nusinance. Not one time did I see an adult say anything to these boys.

When we got done, we went up front to pay our bill, and decided that we really did not want an ice cream cone. It was really a gross mess, and I noticed the kids opening doors on the maching and sticking their fingers and hands in it, I just really could not believe it. Anyway--it was nice to get back home to a quiet house...and the rest of the night was pretty quiet too, as the storms we were so worried about past us by with just a few drops of rain...

What A Day!

Yesterday seemed to be one of the longest days.

Tuesday, I took my middle son, Scott to soccer practice. We got there a little early, so he and two other boys were kicking the ball around and warming up. Scott kicked the ball, and his knee popped. It hurt, so he sat down, rubbed it and thought, "oh maybe I need to stretch a little more." After stretching a little more, he got up, and proceeded to kick and juggle the ball around like all soccer players do. Soon, he hears pop, pop! This time his knee gave out and there was no getting up. By this time, most of the boys and coaches were there. A couple of the coaches came up to Scott and looked at his knee. I'm sitting in the car wondering if I should just sit tight, or embarrass him by getting up to see what happened. Soon, he is hobbling to the car motioning me to stay, which I did.

It is about a 20 minute drive home, and by the time we got home, his knee was swollen and he could not walk on it at all. Now I had to figure out how to get my "little" boy of 5'11 and 167 # into the house and onto the couch. You see, no one else was home, and he is quite a bit bigger than I am. I don't know how, but we eventually got him on the couch and propped his leg up and started icing it. One of the ladies I walk with, her husband is an orthopedic doctor, he said that we were doing the right thing and for him to take 800 mg of ibuprofen and that he would probably need to be seen the next morning. That evening we played doctor by looking all kinds of things up on the internet. Scott has a friend that has had 5 knee surgeries and she was telling us all about it. We looked up the ACL, MCL, PCL, naw, we did not think that sounded right. Then we looked up about the meniscus. That was it! We knew that was probably it. It will be interesting to see what the doctor says....

Wednesday, first thing, I called the doctor to see if I could get him in. Yes, but not til 1. Well, Scott and his younger brother Benjamin both had eye doctor appointments at 2. It is so hard to get those appointments. I begged them to see if I could come in earlier. No way. So I called the eye doctor, and we were in luck. I was told to bring them in now. We zoomed over to the eye doctor, and got done there just in time to be 5 minutes late to the bone doctor. Then we sat, and sat, and sat. We were all STARVING!! We had not eaten since 7 a.m. and it was 2:15. So I got up and politely asked about how much longer. I was told the doctor had been in surgery and that it probably will be a while. I sure wished they would have told me this when we first got there. We could have ran across the street and gotten fast food and come right back. With my hypoglycemia, I really need to eat, and I was not doing to well by this time. I get very irritable and my mind gets real fuzzy, and I get shaky with a cold sweat if I don't eat.

Soon, we get into the see the doctor. After x-rays, the doctor comes in and sees that all seems to be ok. He starts poking and prodding, and nothing hurts much. THEN--he hit the right place and boy did Scott jump. "Hmmmm," the doctor says. He told us that Scott needed an MRI, because the xray dosen't show us all the ligaments and such. I asked him what he thought it might be, and he said he was not sure, but it could possibly be the meniscus (wow! we felt so smart....LOL).

This morning, Thursday, we took Scott in for his MRI. We won't know anything til his appointment next Wednesday. So, for now, we are holding tight, and Scott is taking it easy...

More Yard Work

This weekend we picked up our new water fountain. I really love this fountain. I have been doing a lot of shopping and looking around. Most everyone here has the same type fountains, and I wanted something different. The common fountains I see in our neighborhood have fleur de lis on the top--of course, we live in Louisiana! Those that don't have the fleur de lis, have a pineapple on top, which I really like. I also like the pots, but most are more of a Southwest theme, and even though I really like the Southwest look, that would not look right with our style of house. When I came across this fountain with it's old world pots pouring into each other, I knew this was the one for our yard!

Other things we did in regards to our yard this weekend, was to go shopping. We really did not buy anything, but did price comparison. After the shopping, we came home and took out eight of our bazillion azeala bushes and put them in the back along our fence. They really look good. We also potted some Mexican Petunias that one of my walking buddies gave me. Little by little our yard is coming together.

New Headboard?

Throughout the week, I sanded and prepared an old headboard we had in the garage. It was on my daughter's bed, but she did not like the fake brass and so we took it off. I thought it would look good black and maybe put it in our back yard garden. After painting it, I really like the look, and I think it may be going back on her bed. She's away at college right now, but I think when she gets back it will be a nice surprise. It still needs one more coat of paint.