Cape May, NJ and Fall

I finally have time to post. The only reason I have time is that I hurt my back and cannot do anything else but sit in a recliner chair. No cleaning, transcribing, or cooking yesterday and probably I will not be able to do any of that until Monday. However, on the bright side, I could at least get to the bathroom by myself. Thank goodness for ibuprofen and Flexeril and my electric stim unit. Thank goodness, too, that this happened this week and not last week when we were getting ready for our weekend in Cape May New Jersey.

We had a lot of fun and I took quite a few photos while I was there. So despite having a very painful back,it is sort of nice to have time to do a bit of blogging about our weekend. We are really a very low-maintenance group of people. We eat, relax, play games, and then turn in for the night - none of us are night owls. Coincidentally, both of the other couples are celebrating their wedding anniversaries today.

Here are just a few of the photos I took.


















I should have taken photos of us playing Apples to Apples, however things got pretty intense during the game and my attention was focused on winning - which never happened.

What The Heck!!!!

I had a post that I typed up on my laptop (that is where all my photos are) but when I came here to my work PC to post it, the post was gone!

I am still alive, just busy with work and the college application/visit/panic stuff. Life is rolling along okay.

I will be posting again and visiting my blogging friends too. We are expecting more torrential rain this weekend. I may start to grow moldy at this point.....

Priceless Photos

I am so fortunate that last year my husband scanned all of the photos his mom had in a storage tub in her apartment. They are now safely tucked away here in this laptop and backed up on to disk too. There are some pictures that go back as far as 1915, when Mom was born.

The others chronicle Mom and her two sisters through the years. What gems these pictures are. My plan is make the walls of my office my own gallery of sorts and a lot of these photos will be printed, framed, and hung.

Mom left us last week after living until exactly one month shy of her 94th birthday. Her mind was a sharp as a tack - it was just her body that was so very weary. Her last words to her family were that she wanted them to leave the hospital and eat dinner, her treat. She even told them what restaurant to go to, however they didn't want to venture too far from the hospital and that restaurant was a little out of their comfort range.

I used these photos for a family DVD I put together as a Christmas present for Mom and the rest of the family last year. I'm so glad I did that as she really enjoyed looking through the photos and laughing with her sisters.

Here are just a few pictures -the first of mom when she was just about 11 months, and the rest are photos of Mom and her two sisters through the years.
























Now there are just the two younger sisters, 90 and 92. They have lots of nieces and nephews who will treat them just as kindly as we did Mom.

My Story in Photos: My Favorite Things, Week 39

There is no contest to enter this week over at I Heart Faces. However, they are running a fun theme where we are supposed to post photos of our favorite things. That is easy for me to do as I have lots of favorites.....


I love drinking hot tea and have no problem drinking it year round, even when it's 98 degrees outside.




I love chocolate - especially M&Ms.



I love to knit.




I love to quilt, it just takes me a looooooong time to finish a project.




I love to listen to my iPod.





I love to take walks (while listening to my iPod).









I love our family trips to the beach. My favorite time to be on the beach is late afternoon when the fear of sunburn is fading and we can sit quietly and watch the ocean and hear the gulls and just relax. We will sometimes go back at night with flashlights to seek out ghost crabs!







I love these two furry critters.




I love to witness a beautiful sunset. I'm sure sunrises are just as beautiful too but I'm too lazy to get myself out of bed to witness them...





Above all, I love these people very, very much and without them in my life, none of the above would matter in the least.

I Heart Faces - Completely Candid, Week 37

This is a photo of my niece and my new nephew on their wedding day. It was towards the end of the reception and I think they had just about had it. They never saw me take this as they were both in their own little world envisioning their honeymoon in the Dominican Republic. They are a sweet, sweet couple.



Be sure to visit I Heart Faces to see all of this week's contest entries.

I Heart Faces - sort of

I've been away for a couple of days to the beach with my sister. It was a great time of relaxing, reading, and knitting that I hated to leave to come back home to work. However, sometimes we do what we've just gotta do!


I got home at noon and walked the dogs, sorted some laundry, put some stuff away, and then worked until 6:30 or so, at which time I began putting my entry together for this week's theme at I Heart Faces. Sadly, when I logged on to the IHF site, I saw a note that the noon was the deadline today. (Amy and Angie, I hope you're both doing something fun!)

So, although I'm not officially in the contest this week, these would have been my entries. The themes were "Pets" (the squirrel is not our pet, only a visitor), and "Contemplative".



I blogged about our unexpected rodent visitor a couple of weeks ago. Here is another photo of "Oliver". I thought he had a cute enough face.




I knew I had the perfect photo for the "contemplative" theme. I snapped this photograph while on vacation. We were on top of Jockey's Ridge and I was fooling with the settings on my camera and just snapping random pictures. When I took this photo, I distinctly remember wondering just what my daughter may have been thinking of. I didn't ask her at the time and felt it didn't matter much - I loved the photo. So, when the theme for this week came up, I though "I have the perfect photo". She does look very contemplative.

Although I'm not officially entered this week, I am still posting my photos for fun!

Sweet Bribery

I asked my son if he'd mind if I took his photo. Look at his response....





"C'mon, it's not like I asked you to scrub the bathroom or walk the dogs or cook dinner." Please smile without rolling your eyes at me".




"There, that's a good smile. Can you give me another so I can snap one or two more pictures? I'll buy you a piece of candy if you do".





"Oh wow, mom, a whole piece of candy?" I upped the ante a bit here... "Okay, I'll take you out and look for chewy apple slices". (His favorite candy).




Just look at the smile that got me!!! Just a few sweets work as bribery for my son. Unfortunately, though, after visiting 4-5 candy shops, not one had those green,chewy, sugary apple rings. We are hard pressed to find those little buggers anymore.

But, I got my smile!