Saturday Again

The kids had a great party last night with lots of good food. Everyone seemed to have a good time visiting too. I hadn't seen my great nephew, Jeff, for some years. He brought his daughter and his girlfriend's daughter too. One was 7 and the other was 15.  His was the 15 year old. They were both very well behaved children. There were 16 there, I believe.  I think she had invited 20 or 22. Some couldn't make it, I guess.

I am having my niece and her husband over for lunch today and I have invited her son, Jeff,  and the two little girls too. Jeff,  wants to try to connect with a cousin  of his today and so they may not make it.  

I  took some photos of the party and will share some of them here.  

This is Denise and Diana, Bob's daughter's, with a sad Bob.

  Alberta and Ray, her husband. Cyndi is the smiling one.

This is Jeff C. with Dee, Bob's granddaughter and Leslie and John in the background.

This is Jeff, Bob's grandson with his daughter, Brianna.

This is Tony, Diana's husband.

This is Terry, Denise's husband, with Jeff, Brianna and John in the background.  

And this is Shaggy, Leslie's pet Llama.

It was a fun party. Everyone seemed to have a good visit. We left just after the fireworks started. Bob and I were both very tired. I kidded John and about making pets out of his cattle and then having them slaughtered for their meat later.  Here he is feeding them some of Shaggy's treats. That's Speck, John's dog, beside him.

And here they are again...

Diana and Tony and Jeff and the two girls all made it for lunch today.  The meatloaf turned out fine and the meal went well. Bob came over to help me put the second leaf in my table and we set up a TV tray for the 7 year old. My table just seats six.

After they all left and Bob left too, I took the leaf out of the table and put away the chairs.  Missy had disappeared under the coverlet while they were here but after they left she came out and lay in the recliner in here with me.

Friday and the Cook Out

Today we will not have a cooked lunch. We will be going to John and Leslie's for the cookout and fireworks tonight and I never like to overload my stomach with food twice in one day.

I will probably just have a yogurt at noon.

I got all my housework finished yesterday. I vacuumed the rest of the apartment, fixed creamed peas and chicken over biscuits for lunch and cleaned up the kitchen.

I will need to fix my baked beans. I fixed the potato salad yesterday and put it in Tupperware and in the frig to allow the ingredients to mix throughout.  We are not supposed to be there until 6:00 this evening.   The guys will have spent a small fortune on fireworks and we may or may not stay for that. It doesn't get dark until 9:00 and we are both ready for bed by then.  Getting old is not for sissies. :)

More later....

I got my baked beans done and then I went over to the shopping center and bought some mulch and mulched that new flower bed. When I finished, I heard the mower going and found that Bob was mowing that back yard. I took him over some tea and also alternated mowing with him. We got it finished at least for this week. It looked horrible but the landlady will only have it mowed every other week. 

That's a tragedy. I am used to having it mowed every week and I always mowed my own at least once a week...sometimes even more.

I didn't get the large one mulched because it's so full of flowers.  Maybe this fall after the flowers are finished blooming. I still have some mulch left.

This entire lot used to be a parking lot so you can just dig down a little and run onto gravel.  I am determined to have flowers though.

Busy Thursday

Today I will make up the potato salad for tomorrow's cookout at John and Leslie's house. It will be better if it sets in the frig overnight.  I will also make up some baked beans for tomorrow. But I will bake those tomorrow.

I need to go over to Brahms and get milk and yogurt when they open. I got everything else I needed yesterday at Wal Mart.

I will also do some housework.I  have wiped and washed the bathroom and kitchen floors and vacuumed the dining room rug but did not do the rest of the apartment. I want to finish that today.

It's chilly today. Strange, since it's July 3rd. But this is Kansas and anything can happen in Kansas.

Yesterday evening I redid the brochure for our congregation at church. The old photo  of the building showed yellowed grass. I took new photos for the World Church yesterday so I used one of those for the brochure. Here are the new photos. I used the top one on the brochure.

It looks like that hedge could use trimming again. We trimmed it last fall but it grows back fast. This church is in the country..... half way between Independence, Kansas and Coffeyville.

More later...

I made an Apple Brown Betty this afternoon and Bob and I had a small dish of it before we had our wine.  It was very good...although very sweet.

After he left at 7:30 I took my bath and tried to stay up. About 8:30 I gave up and went to bed.

Wednesday Again

I will need to go to the market this afternoon in preparation for the dinner at John and Leslie's on Friday evening.  I am out of a lot of necessary groceries. I haven't bought groceries of any amount for a week or so.  I am to take baked beans and potato salad to the dinner. John and Leslie will have 20 people coming if everyone shows up.

We will attend exercise class this morning. Afterward I will warm up the hamburger pie for lunch.  We will have the cottage cheese with it. I made ice cream last evening and we will eat some of it for dessert.

I opened the carport door this morning as usual and Missy just had a fit. That little tom cat was out on the carport and she was NOT happy about it. She was growling and hissing so I went to see what was wrong. I just closed the door and he ran away.

I will make  my potato salad tomorrow and  it will set overnight in the frig. That will give the flavors a chance to merge. 

More later....

It was a lovely day! It was nice and there was a cool breeze. In the late afternoon, Bob and I mowed the front yard and the side yard of my apartment.   It must have been seven inches tall. The new landlady thinks it only needs to be mowed once every two weeks. By then it needs to be baled! Looking at the back (which we did not mow) you can tell that.

Well, I will not live somewhere where the grass is allowed to grow that tall even if I have to mow it myself twice a month.

Bob came over in the evening for an hour. We watched the Big Bang Theory even though we had seen those episodes. There simply isn't anything worth watching on TV anymore....except PBS.  I watch Nature and Nova if they aren't reruns , And most of the time I like "American Experience", "History Detectives" and  sometimes I like "Frontline". But it's really hard to find anything worth watching anymore. ....and commercials...there are jillions of commercials...which I mute!  In fact, my "mute" button is worn smooth now. I have muted so many commercials.

Hairdo Tuesday

Today I go back to Independence to get my hair done. It's supposed to rain today. At least there's a 50% chance of rain.  I'm glad I didn't wash my car.

This will be a quieter week until Friday anyhow. John and Leslie are having a cookout for the family Friday evening and I imagine they will have fireworks too.  I will take a large bowl of potato salad.  Bob will take deviled eggs.

On Saturday noon I will cook lunch for them and Bob and myself.  They will leave on Sunday morning.

They are coming here a week or so early for Bob's upcoming 80th birthday. His actual birthday is July 12th. They couldn't get that weekend off work. And I will be at reunion (church camp) on that day.  The camp begins on Friday the 11th and ends on Tuesday the 15th of July.

More later....

After I got home from Independence, Bob and I went to Bartlesville to eat at Dink's Bar B Q.  We then walked around the mall and then came back home. Later in the afternoon, my niece, great niece and nephew in law came to visit for awhile. We sat out on the carport and enjoyed the outside. Missy sat out there with us and listened to our conversation.

Tomorrow we have exercise class again. 

Graveside Services Monday

This afternoon I will do graveside services for a member of my congregation. She was 93 and living in a nursing home here. She has outlived her husband and two of her three sons.  I used to visit her when my sister, Phyllis, was there but have only seen her twice since then.  For some strange reason I have a problem with visiting the nursing home. It's an excellent place to live if you need that kind of care but I never want to live there. I am too independent and will bathe when I want to and not when someone else tells me I must.   I have the same feelings about hospitals. I still visit hospitals though. They are not quite so depressing.

I will go to exercise class this morning and afterward go out to the cemetery to check out the site and then come home to fix hamburger pie for lunch. Bob has coleslaw in the frig here and it is in Tupperware so it may still be fine to have with the hamburger pie.  I'll check. I will need to change clothes before the service.

Juanita called last night. She has a problem with one of her automatic withdrawals from the bank and is frantic again. I told her I would come up tomorrow to get it straightened out.  I may just go up after the services today. I'll call her later and see if that would work out for her.

Tomorrow is my daughter's birthday and I would like to have lunch with her if that will work out. I will take her birthday card to the service today.....just in case. She has a huge caseload and has
problems getting away for lunch.  She is going to assist at the graveside today though so I will see her there.

More later....

I did go up to Juanita's this afternoon after the graveside service. I got her concerns worked out. This bank change has been a nightmare for her. She is 92 and also nearly completely blind. Now she can sleep again.  The poor woman has found this entire process a nightmare.

Sunday Church

Today we will go to church. I am to be a greeter with one of my great granddaughters.  We will see which one wants to serve.

I got the photos from yesterday's party uploaded this morning.  I will share some of them.

This is Keith from the Living the Questions group. He was treated to a surprise 80th  birthday party in Tulsa yesterday. This is Keith and his wife Joyce. He was really surprised.

 This is Keith while opening an album his grandson made for him. His grandson had us all write letters about our experience with Keith and also send photos if we had any. Those are members of his family watching him.

This is his stepdaughter, Allison, serving birthday cake.

This is a group of his family with him. The two on the left are his sons and the one looking over his shoulder with Joyce is his grandson who was the photographer.  I think another grandson is obscured in this photo.

This is Karan and Bobby who took me with them to the party.

Some of these folks in the photo here are members of Keith's family . He is standing at the back of the table with his brother. You can see the family resemblance.

I have a lot more photos but these are a smattering of the best ones. There must have been at least 50 people there. All fans of Keith and Joyce.

This party was held at the Crowne Plaza in Tulsa...a lovely place for a party.

More later...

I got my letters finished and out on the mailbox. I also got a good nap with Missy on my lap. Tonight we will watch 60 Minutes and have some wine.