Making my day and so much more...

My friend Paula is doing a July Blog Challenge. If you click on the link below the banner that says Paula's Place it will take you to her blog if you'd like to join. If you click here it will take you to the list of daily topics for the month also at her blog..

Paula's Place

TODAY’S TOPIC

Post a picture of something or someone that made your day special.

Independence Day  is a rough holiday for me . On the third of July seven years ago our daughter Gretchen 30 and our son Eric 23 were killed in a horrible accident here on the highways of Virginia. 

As I reflect on my loss I cannot do so without also reflecting on the many blessings of our family, friends and a faith that continue to lift me up and give me strength. 

This part of the challenge was a no brainer for me. He not only makes my day but he is my rock.

My husband Bill...

Bill standing in our tomato garden. 

I got space for Christmas...

I was thinking of posting something yesterday with some pictures but wouldn't you know it the amount of space that Picasa and Google Drive allows was at the limit; so my best intentions were thwarted until I was able to sit down and buy some more space for my photos. Buying space; what has this world come to? I can tell you there was no picture needed for this post. And for the space? A valid credit card :)

Is anyone else afraid that their photos will be off in the computer junkyard somewhere if they don't make sure that they're backed up and stored somewhere? I've lost enough stuff on a few computers that just up and died to have learned my lesson. As much taking pictures is easier since photography has gone digital and storing/organizing them is really rather more convenient I still like my real photos. I like the look, the smell and the feel of them in my hands. Or maybe it's just the memory they evoke, old times usually are good times.

I think my torn-ness (I just made up that word) between my digital photos and the printed ones sort of similar to the  feelings evoked when reading on a Kindle and reading a real book, totally different experience. When it comes down to it however I still have my huge blue bins full of our life in pictures currently located above the closet in the blue guest room upstairs. I haven't taken the time nor do I have the inclination to transfer them all to digital. Does anyone really do that to all their photos?

Bill, my husband always jokes with me that if this house ever caught fire (heaven forbid) he half expect to see me lit aflame jumping out the second floor window with those bins since they're the only things I think I'd save besides ourselves and the three cats.

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wordy wednesday

This tea set has been passed from my grandmother to my mother's older sister Winifred and then to me. Like most with family treasures I was curious to know its origins. I had after all coveted it since first spying it in my Nana's curio as a young child.

Mom told me the local theaters back in the 1940's for the price of a movie ticket would  give you a chance to win pieces of china and that's how we got our set. She lived in NYC.

When I asked her the name of the theater...

She said,  "it was the Scratch House - the Scratchy Theater.

"That's the name of the theater?" I asked.

"Oh that's not the real name that I don't remember" she said.

"You called it that because?" I asked curios as ever.

"Well every time we'd go there we'd scratch ourselves, it always felt as if there were bugs in there!"

My mother is too funny!

I told Mom we could always Google the name of the theater.

In the end we decided to scratch that idea :)

2,285 days since you've been gone

I am so fascinated by the moon, the stars, the clouds and the sky

 that I find myself constantly looking up. The heavens take on a whole new meaning 

when your kids are there; in heaven. 

I  know I don't write about the kids 

all that much on this blog. But don't let that 

fool ya, parents never stop grieving 

the loss of their children 

EVER!

And although our family has moved forward with 

living our lives the best we know how,

we take moments to 

remember.....

Today we remember Eric's 28th

 birthday but there will be no celebrating. 

He and his sister Gretchen 

 died in an accident 

  July 3, 2006.

wordless wednesday- blooming confusion

My lilac bush is all mixed up!

A Sept 26th bloom.

Views from the Cape...

Oh my goodness! 

We had the best time on our vacation in Cape Charles. And I have to tell you the weather was sunny and breezy every single day. We take a family vacation most every summer and we've been very lucky every single year with the weather!

1920's bungalow.

This is the house we rented. I don't think my Mom left this porch much the whole time we were there. She sat there doing her word puzzles and enjoyed the breeze. You can see her head just slightly poking over the left rail by the window and my godson Gerard at the door.

view looking up the block

The people of Cape Charles very friendly. Many of residents would walk past the house saying hello while either taking their daily walks or walking their dogs. Like most beach towns many people walk or ride bikes but in this town you can also rent golf carts to get back a forth to the beach with all your stuff. We actually just piled in Gerard and Denise's van with all our chairs, umbrella's, coolers, floats, towels and other junk.

this way to the beach

This shot is the view looking down from the front of our house the two blocks to the beach (zoomed). This gazebo is the beach entrance. We chose to hang out on a beach a couple of blocks over where we could spread out a bit more. 

The beach tended to be narrow in some places although the sand is wonderfully white and soft. The water is also quite shallow and you could walk FOREVER to just reach waist high water.  The water was pretty warm too; I would guess due to the unseasonably warm weather. It"s quite possible it could be warm every summer. I really can't say since this was my first visit.

sushi anyone?

This gull just swooped down and scooped up this fish and snacked on it right in front of where we were sitting. 

live crabs

If you are at all familiar with the Chesapeake it has a reputation as a source for wonderful fresh seafood, specifically blue claw crabs. Bill went out one day and purchased this bushel of crabs (approx 6-7 dozen) straight off the fishing boat. They are lively little suckers trying to run away and dashing all over the front deck of the house trying to latch on to toes.

My brother Gerard, bless his heart worked his rear off cooking them in a variety of ways. One night; crabs with pasta in a fresh marinara sauce and the next day for lunch tossed cold in a lemon-herb and olive oil vinaigrette YUM!  ( pictures in another post)

Sorry but! Doesn't this cloud kinda look like the shape of Virginia? 

Well it did to me... but then again it might have been the beer :)

I sat on my chair on the beach under the umbrella and took a lot of pictures.  Most every picture that I'm publishing today are ones I took of strangers and scenery of the beach. There might be an exception or two. In a later post I'll get to showing you some pictures of the family.

I really thought this shot was kinda nice and I love how the sun glistens off the water towards the end of the day. This is just a couple of strangers on the beach walking the forever walk. Like I said the water is very shallow in the Chesapeake but it's good for the legs. I can't say we didn't get exercise.

That is my niece Sydney walking out with her sisters float to cool off. Some of the days although breezy were quite sunny and hot. Umbrella's were necessary as was plenty of sunscreen!

Boats would come in towards the shore frequently and people would walk out to them visiting with their friends.  Every once and a while all the people gathered round would have to push the boat so that it could get to deeper water so it could put its motor down leave the shallow areas.

This is what its all about isn't it? Just relaxing in the water with your gal pals...This group of ladies were at the beach every day with a larger family group and usually sat next to us under some big tents with their husbands and kids.

I probably took 150 or more pictures while on vacation. Don't worry I won't show you all of them, I promise just a few favorites.  The town of Cape Charles is a nice lazy beach town with quaint shops, churches, seafood restaurants, pubs and all streets lead to this beach. No stress here!

wordless wednesday - do you have a favorite color?

    Mine is red!                                                                                                       

Catching up

Things have been crazy around here! If you haven't noticed I've been missing for a while...

First my anti virus software went on the fritz ( don't ask how that happens since it just stopped working ) It took me two or three days to get them to fix it, all sorts of strangers remotely accessing my computer.

Then the sad parts... The anniversary of the accident was July 3rd. It's hard to believe Gretchen and Eric, our children have been gone six years.....But it helps when the family is together, when our friends show their love and support. And they did in many ways...

Matthew was here for a week. Billy was here with our granddaughters for 10 days and Heather and her husband and our grandsons were in and out. Not to mention, the phone, e-mails, flowers, cards, visits from friends and invitations to spend time with friends who care about us and the children when they were alive.

Blogging really wasn't in me. Sorry. I really missed you all. That is the truth.

Then there was the heat and the storms.... Some days it was 108 most days 104-102. And then the electricity went out due to a storm in the surrounding area. Going without  A.C with such high temperatures was difficult for my Mom whose elderly.

Needless to say that was a long three days, running our generator which runs our whole house but isn't strong enough to run our central  AC. Lots of fans and lots of water. I might add thank goodness my friends Becky and Buzzy's down the block have a lovely pool and pool house because we spent many many hours there. Mom wouldn't budge and go to Heather's or to my friends although invited she stuck it out here with us. We watched her like a hawk, made sure she drank plenty of water. Plopped her down in front of and under a fan for cooling.

All the kids are now returned to their own homes for now, as is Mom. Funny how when the kids were growing up I could sleep thru anything, now the slightest noise wakes me up. Finally last night I got my first full nights sleep in about two weeks now I have an empty house again and its just Bill and I.

In my next post I'll be sharing something Fabulous that was given to me by my friend Mare over at adventures in the ballpark before I took my little break from blogging. I know you just want to come back and see what it is don't ya??

my vintage chairs are done!

I' m so excited my husband worked on our old vintage chairs while I was up in New York isn't that sweet? If you missed my last post jump over now and see the before pictures here. They have really been a labor of love. Actually we want to put a clear sealer on the yellow accents just in case but that's a quick spray. I'm afraid the camera isn't doing justice to the color the red really is fire-engine red, the marigold yellow is showing pretty true to the actual color.

What do you think of the table? I actually stenciled that pattern off the pair of chairs that are the same and then transferred it to the table so that it would match. The table isn't really the old fashioned metal like the chairs it's just aluminum and has a lot of imperfections so I thought it would hide a multitude of sins.

The seat on the right is a rocker. I'd love to trim those round areas but cutting out templates just seemed like a lot of work! There's a chair too so the work would be double! What do you think?

This is what they all look like together. There was a lot of sanding and priming and many many coats of paint involved in this project but I love love love these chairs. I can't believe they only cost $110.00. When we came in from taking these pictures before Bill said he's ready to look for a glider, I can't believe it!! 

beautiful thief

My husband and I were out in the backyard the other day drooling over the nectarines growing on a small tree we have growing amongst  other fruit trees growing on our property. Three days later the tree was stripped bare. I believe today I identified our thief!!

He's a beauty isn't he?
Enjoy.

when nature calls

"N"

I thought today since it's Saturday and most of us are going about our chores and spending time with our family that I'd do something a bit different kinda low maintenance, less wordy. I would like to show you in pictures the natural beauty that surrounds us every day where we live.

My "N" words for today Natural and Nature.

Bill and I actually live on a rather large piece of property, 26.5 acres in a rural area of Virginia. It really is a lovely piece of land. Sometimes it calls to me.... Jen get off the couch and come outside and enjoy my beauty.

 I'll then go out in the quiet and walk, listen to the birds or take in the quiet enjoy that very beauty that surrounds me every day; drink in the smells of the flowers and the grass.

Today I'd like to share a tiny bit of that with you .....I do hope you're enjoying my photographs. I haven't used any photographs in the A-Z Challenge however today nature calls hee hee! I could hardly pass up an opportunity to share my beautiful plants with you. 

Nature is man's teacher. 

She unfolds her treasure to his search, 

unseals his eye, illumes his mind, 

and purifies his heart; 

an influence breathes from all the sights and sounds 

of her existence. 

Alfred Billings Street 

The hen's and chick are multiplying more than usual in the front garden since the spring has been so lengthy this year. In fact everything in our yard is greener and more lush than I've ever seen it.

Nature abounds! 

And this sweet little flower is a left over from last year.

These are little peaches from a four year old tree in our back yard. I might have a lot of peaches this year. Who knows I might have to try my hand at jam or ice-cream. 

I truly wish that computers had a scratch and sniff button or option because my lilacs are so amazingly fragrant; I just wish you could smell them!

There aren't many blooms left on my Magnolia but this is really beautiful cast against the gleaming green leaves. This tree is rather young only about eleven years old but it's a beauty.

And this is one of many azalea's that we have at our house, this particular one sits right in front of our deck. During the day it is actually buzzing with different types of bees and hummingbirds; it's as if the bush is alive.

I hope you've enjoyed the pictures may they serve as a reminder to get outside and enjoy a bit of nature yourself this weekend....maybe with the one you love; that's always best :)