Not a Good Weekend, At All!

We went to California recently to visit with our daughter and attend a celebratory dinner for her marriage. She's a widow as you can read about here and recently remarried. She had a small dinner party of about 40 people at a restaurant near her. It was a pleasant evening of eating and chatting with her co-workers, friends and the new side of the family. The story will continue down the blog with photos of what happened.

But first, here's the most recent photo of Miss Caroline in her daycare class, a totally new adventure for her. She's been in daycare before for one week because she cried all the time and was unhappy so her mummy and daddy made other arrangements for her. But it's been a year now, so they bit the bullet and put her in. She seems to be enjoying it now and we believe she has a new little boyfriend sitting to her right. Can any eye candy be more darling than your great grandchild eating spaghetti? I think not. ;-)

Ooops, looks like I almost lost a string of spaghetti there. Fingers are required eating utensils for 2 year olds.

And this is a photo of our new great grandchild, Miss Caroline's sibling. I think it looks like a girl, don't you? It would serve her daddy right to have a house full of girls! LOL

This is our clematis finally taking off. If you've not been reading me long then you'll be interested to know we've tried planting 9 clematis' and only one has survived. I'm not planting any more, thinking I won't push my luck any further. But it is magnificent this year.

Pale lavender.

I love trying my photography skills out for th' blog with you bloggers as my audience/critics.

Our peony bush is just taking off this year also. We've had it for about 5 years and this is the first year we've had so many blooms on it. They bloomed while we were in California but I was able to get in a few good photos before they succumbed to their life cycle.

They are gorgeous.

Same blossom just a tad closer. Practicing my macros. ;-)

Another bloom.

Yet another bloom with one just starting to open up.

Love their color.

A close-up of a bud. I think this close-up turned out pretty well considering I'm a very inexperienced amateur photographer.

Full shot of the clematis up against the south side of the house.

Okay, now for the story. My daughter's house is two stories with a step-down to the main area of the first floor. You enter in a large entry and then step down from a hallway to the back family room, breakfast area and kitchen. Then to the right of the entry is a step-down to the living room, dining room and other entry into the kitchen. I fell twice while over there. The first time was in the back hallway. I was walking barefoot, a throw rug went flying out from under me on the slick wood floor, I went sliding towards the step-down head first into the family/breakfast room, sent the table toddling and landed on my knees. I immediately yelled, "I'm fine!" But it hurt. I was so embarrassed. The photo below has nothing to do with that fall.

The next day as we were preparing to go to the restaurant for the dinner, I realized I needed something from our bedroom upstairs. (All the bedrooms are on the second floor.) I slipped off my shoes and in my nylon stocking feet ran up, got what I wanted and as I was coming down the stairs, I slipped on the landing midway up and went sailing towards the half wall. This is the result. I yelled again, "I'm fine." But I really wasn't. I hurt for a long time. But we were heading out the door and I didn't want to make a big deal out of it. My son is a nurse, my grandson is a medical technician for a doctor so I felt like I could handle it. Everyone was standing in the entry watching this so hubs told me he thought I was going to go over the half wall. I landed on my knees and they bruised but nothing like my left arm. Both arms are sore, along with my neck. I drew lots of attention at the restaurant but I tried not to let anyone see the bruises. I was so embarrassed again. You'd think I could walk around a wood floor without flying through the air! Actually, my daughter's stairs have a double landing midway down and since we'd never been to the new house I wasn't familiar with it enough to know how to step. Sigh. What a mess it was. I had to sit in the back seat of our car coming back home because the back of my leg was hurting so bad. I hate flying so we drive to California, which is about an eleven hour drive.

But also in the Sierras, just after the California food inspection station we got caught in construction. We went 20 miles in two and a half hours! I think most of the people in that line probably wet their pants. They wouldn't let us stop at all and we couldn't get off because most of the places had no facilities. We got past the plethora of road workers and saw a porta-potti on the left and no construction workers were around so we quickly pulled over to the left lane, hubs went in and relieved himself. He was in there for about 4 minutes just getting rid of water! But we didn't get caught or impede the long line of traffic. Then we got back in the long, slow line and continued on. I waited until we got a few miles down the road and found a bathroom at Burger King. I'm not fond of porta-pottis. It was the worst trip we've ever had.

This is actually two days after the fall.

Gads, I didn't realize I had so many age spots! I'm brave showing you all this. That bruise is my upper arm. My arm is so swollen you can barely tell it's the inside of my elbow here.

This is a macro photo shot I took from our rose garden very early this morning. I'll show you more of these later, but this one is exquisite, even if I do say so myself. ;-)

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Phone Messages That Can Turn You Nuts!

My granddaughter and I are more alike than my daughter and I are. Our messages on the phone are very short. Mine: "This is 555-5555, leave a message", repeated fast. Mandy's is "This is Axxxxx and Ixxxx. Leave a message." Short, fast and sweet. Hubs and our daughter go slow and give them who they are and on and on and on and on. Hubs also sounds like he's in a tiled bathroom. Daughter tells them if they're a solicitor, don't even bother leaving a message because it won't be returned. I have no patience with sales, soliciting or people I really don't want to talk to.


I also leave a quick message on a phone message machine. Hi, it's Connie, call me. That's it. I don't like wasting time if the person isn't home and a long message is just ridiculous to leave on a phone. Hubs has an acquaintance who leaves 5-7 minute messages. Unbelievable. A message doesn't have to be long.
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While I love the color, I doubt I'd paint my house this color but I'd definitely paint a shed out back pink.

Lovely and relaxing front yard.

Cute way to have eye candy in your kitchen and store your cupcake liners.

WANT!! Or should say I want my porch to look like this...

or this.

Back patio could look like this.

Lay down and take an afternoon nap in this tranquil setting.

Tents can be beautiful in pink, too!

Don't you just love these little caravans they use in Europe? Our RVs are beautiful but they don't have the sweet ambiance these have.

One of my favorite because of the pink and yellow—my favorite color combination.

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Photos courtesy of tumblr, pinterest and google images.

Connie Talk 5/21/2012

When we moved to Idaho, it was a bit of a culture shock. City vs. small town. We even had friends who'd ship in S.F. sourdough bread to us in big boxes because it wasn't available here yet. I have to admit I wasn't ready for it. So several years later, we moved to a larger town with a much larger population. I'm. Glad. We. Did!

It took a lot of getting used to. For instance, a woman once was talking about a vig net. I had no clue what she was talking about until she pointed out the word. She meant vignette, pronounced vinyet. But I graciously corrected her, telling her the word was french.

Then there is the word bathe, pronounced with a long A like bayth, and bath. The people who were new to us would say, "I'm going to bath the baby." I'd never heard that before. It's always been bathe (with a long a). In our speech it was always bathe the baby and taking a bath (like bathroom). Took some getting used to, but I wouldn't correct a person unless I knew them well and was alone with them to prevent them from becoming embarrassed.

Okay, San Francisco area is a lot different from rural Idaho and sometimes we'd see people who were too tacky for even a monster truck rally. Come to think of it, it's the norm today in most parts of the world. I'd rarely shopped at KMart up to that point in my life and the first year in that small town we Christmas-shopped at, yep, you got it right, KMart, because it was the only big store in the area. I was almost embarrassed to tell my kids. I'd never in my life been in a WalMart until one came to another town close to that small town and we'd go there instead of KMart. I began to love WM then and still do. I don't buy clothes there but I do buy just about everything in the way of food except for their meat. I don't like their meat at all. I like angus beef and buy it almost exclusively. I don't buy WM brand items as a rule as I'm very picky about our food. But I can buy the name brands much cheaper than any store around here.
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I love doing silk embroidery. I don't do it very much anymore but this little embroidery is beautiful.

I like this idea. I'd do it in pink and white if I did it though.

What a quick, easy, clever and cheap idea for a patio sofa. Cute!

Just goes to show you that rustic can also be romantic. I love this.

This is also a favorite room of mine. Pink always wins with me, along with a gorgeous window.

By now you should know I pretty much only post photos of room I love. Not always, but mostly. This is one I love. It's simply elegant to me.

Leather chairs, wood floors, french doors, ambiance, beautiful surroundings and furniture will always draw my attention.

I wouldn't even share this little sofa with Love Bunny. It would be mine!

You could make these for your bar stools. Darling.

An area I would love to duplicate if Love Bunny wasn't so cheap!

Beautiful pink French chairs.

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I'm not the richest person in the richest city in the richest country on the face of the globe in the history of mankind. But tomorrow is another day. I am, however, richly blessed. ;-)

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Photos courtesy of tumblr and pinterest.

Sailing on the San Francisco Bay

I’m not fond of sports at all. When we had a television and watched television, we—or I should say hubs—watched football once a week. I could never understand the game and was always asking questions. But it really didn't interest me. He isn’t into sports either although he pumps iron and walks the treadmill three times a week. (Remember, he’s a retired Marine and keeps in shape.) But I just am not into watching any kind of sport. Except sailing. I could watch it if we had a television. I absolutely love sailing.

When hubs and I lived in California, I belonged to a yacht club where I took sailing lessons. It was the thrill of a lifetime. I'm only qualified to captain a 25' boat though. But it got me hooked on sailing. We don't have a sailboat, never did, just rented them when I wanted to sail.

Two days stand out vividly in my mind however.

I wanted to take a friend of mine sailing once and she agreed. It was just the two of us and she wasn't a sailor but as I kept to an estuary in the San Francisco Bay I felt safe. The winds in SF are treacherous, let me tell you. You'd be warned to wear a coat even in July or August there.

Anyway, my friend was red-headed and fair. I warned her that day to put on sunscreen but she said she knew her limit so I didn't nag. But I know the water.

We sailed up the estuary and I had things under control until we decided to stop at a marina restaurant for lunch. The wind caught me and we were coming in too fast so I shouted a warning to some men on the dock and they helped me a bit. We laughed and I was humbled, but not enough that I was too proud to ask for help.

Also, needless to say, she suffered a severe sunburn that day. As I said, I warned her the sun and its reflection was worse on the water.

The other day that I'll never forget is when I took hubs, my daughter and my granddaughter out for a sail. Again, sticking to the estuary because of my precious cargo, we planned on sailing up the estuary for a lunch at a marina restaurant. Since my granddaughter was only about 3 years old, I wanted to put a rope around her just in case she went over the side and I wasn't able to come around in time. She absolutely wore a lifesaver. But when we tried to tie the rope around her she had a fit. No way was she going to let us put it around her. I let it pass but told hubs and daughter to watch her very, very carefully and they did. Neither one of them—hubs or daughter—had ever sailed so I was very nervous but I showed them what to do when I gave certain orders to them and to do exactly as I said. They did it well. It's amazing we're all alive today! I enjoyed it but I could tell Love Bunny was very nervous since I was a pretty new sailor.

We don't own a boat and there isn't much water near us to sail anyway. But I thought I'd share a few boats that I think are gorgeous.

If I could sail on this I'd be in heaven.

I love that sail in red and white stripes.

I was never this adventurous in sailing however. Actually, I'm not fond of being in the ocean. I may tell the story why in another blog post.

I. Absolutely. Love. This. Room!

Isn't this settee adorable? Squeeeeal.

This looks like it's an entry to a side or back yard.

See what you can do with an old globe you have stuck back somewhere? Make it into an adorable lamp for a study or a boy's room.

This is a room by one of my favorite decorators, Charles Faudree. I've seen his decor in books, magazines and on line and he's very much a French decor decorator.

Time for eye candy here. Pretty papers stacked in a pretty pink bucket.

I wish these were still available. Aren't they adorable? I'd love to know where to buy them if they are. I think they're very glamorous and remind me of the 1940s and 1950s when things were much more glamorous than today. It all went down hill with the 1960s and the hippie movement. Sad.

A cute little private area to have a secluded lunch.

I don't care for orange but this is more a cantaloupe color. Very pretty.

A sweet tiny dollhouse or cottage.

More eye candy for you to enjoy.

Now, while this is adorable, I can't see it in many homes though.

My kinds of draperies, if they were in pink of course.

Can you believe this sofa? Wild, but beautiful.

 I like this room but I'm not sure I'd be comfortable in all this luxury. I'm really a simple gal.

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Photos courtesy of pinterest and tumblr.