Everything in Moderation Fail

 One of the sayings I try to practice is "Everything in moderation." That helps me keep things in check and not worry too much. I am much better at this than I used to be, but I am still a work in progress. That may have been the case last weekend.

Last weekend was my annual family reunion. We rotate among the families for hosts; this year, it was my family's turn. My sisters and I spent months planning with meetings, phone calls, lists, and spreadsheets. The event was held in the area where most of my cousins live, but unfortunately, that's about five hours from here. So, there were extra considerations for transporting and refrigeration. But we had a plan.

A view from one of our rest stops

We left Friday morning. I had to work the night before, but we were pretty well-packed, so that was not a problem. We were joined by another sister and friend and took off for our trip across the mountains. The trip went well despite the fact that we drove through heavy rains from Storm Debby. 

We arrived at our destination late afternoon where we had arranged to get into the church where we were holding the reunion tomorrow to drop things off. We met two more of my sisters there. After unloading the cars and doing some initial setup, we visited my cousin Jo because she is housebound and wouldn't be able to come to the reunion. It was a good visit, but it had to be cut short because we were meeting another cousin, Jewel, for dinner. That was also a good visit, but the food took over an hour to arrive. I was very tired and hungry at that point. After dinner, Jewel invited us to her house for a brief visit. 

By the time we reached the hotel, I was exhausted and ready to veg a little and go to bed. However, Miss Landers discovered a leak in her car, and I went down to help her clean it up. Now, I was ready to drop. However, sleep eluded me as my brain was busy processing all the social things I did during the day. Have I mentioned before that I'm an introvert? So, even if I enjoy social interactions, they zap my energy and can overstimulate my brain.

Anyway, we woke (so I did sleep a little) the next morning to a bright day and a good hotel breakfast bar. Before meeting at the church, we had to make a grocery store trip to get some last-minute things. And at the same time, we were trying to fix flowers for a couple of cemetery visits. Many of our relatives, including our parents, are buried at a country cemetery in the area, and we try to visit when we are in town. Two of my sisters took off on that task while Ward and I hurried to the church, meeting friends before the reunion. We finished setting up and started preparing the taco bar we were having. 

A photo of my grandfather my cousin found

The reunion went great. Good people, good food, and good fun. Our extensive planning paid off. Then, it was clean-up time. We cleaned up, packed the cars, and were on the road again. After a long drive, we got home around 9 p.m. Let me be the first to say I was worn out! However, a night in my own bed was a good start in recovering from our whirlwind 36 hours.

Our careful planning made the reunion a big success, and I loved visiting with my relatives and friends. However, I will be the first to admit this was not an "everything in moderation visit." But the problem is we feel compelled to tend to many things while we are in the area since we only make it there once a year or so. And work schedules prevent longer visits to spread the activities out. Maybe next time, I will remember how tired I was at the end of this and do things differently. We shall see how good my memory is.

Until next time...

Things Blooming Despite the Heat

 We continue to have very hot and humid days that are stressing many of the plants, but some are managing to bloom despite it all. Here are a few of them.

The ground has cracked open because of dryness,
but volunteer begonias are sprouting in the cracks.

Our one day lily bloom. Deer ate all of the orange ones around the corner.

The first surprise lilies have bloomed. More to come, I hope.

Black-eyed Susans, Maryland's State Flower

Purple sage

Allium (Millenium var.)

Dianthus

Abelia (Canon Creek var.)

After a flush of blooms in the spring, the spirea is starting to bloom again.

Two late bloomers on the oakleaf hydrangea bush.

One of the zinnias that survived the attack of the earwigs.

So, amongst the crunchy grass in some places and dying plants in other places, there are still plenty of things in the yard to make me smile - when I brave the heat to go find them. 😃

Until next time...

This and That

Flowers for my birthday a couple of weeks ago.

 I woke up early this morning and couldn't go back to sleep because my busy mind was making plans. In the forefront was the family reunion my sisters and I are planning for next weekend. It will be five hours from here, where most of my cousins live, and the distance makes everything a bit more complicated. We are providing the main dish, which will be a taco bar. Also, we've got games, displays, and giveaways. And an impressive spreadsheet tracking it all. Now we're trying to figure out travel coordination with cars converging from different directions, grocery store trips to pick up perishables, hotel check-ins, Friday night dinner, a cemetery visit to decorate my parent's graves, and set up. 

The allium is in bloom now.

My sister and brother-in-law are coming down from Maine for the reunion and will come back to Maryland for a few days afterward. Their visit will be relaxed but full as we try to schedule times for them to visit with all of their nieces and nephews and work around everyone's work schedules. But I am looking forward to it all.

In the meantime, we are making progress with some of the house issues we were having. We've gone a couple of days without catching any more mice, and all of the bait has been untouched. I hope we got them all—at least for now. Interestingly enough, I have learned that several neighbors have been having mice problems, too.

Also, we got our washer fixed. We weren't sure if it was worth it to fix it since it was 18 years old, but because it is 18 years old, it was much better made than today's models. According to the repairman, we should be able to get several more good years out of it. So, for much less than the cost of a new washer, we're back in business washing clothes. And the convenience of that makes me happy.

The tomatoes are doing okay. I have been freezing some and have a box of yellow ones on the counter that I should do something with today. BTW, I love vine-ripe tomatoes.

It's still very hot and dry here, but we've had a few storms that brought a little rain. None of it has been a soaking rain, and the cracks in the ground are still there, but rain is rain, and it has been a welcome relief. Our rain gauge sits on one of our fence posts, or at least it used to. We haven't put it back up since we got the new fence, so I couldn't tell you exactly how much rain we've had. After Ward gets done building five easels to display things at the reunion, he is going to put the gauges back up. 

Ward is up now and going for his first cup of coffee. It's on days like this when I haven't had enough sleep that I wish I drank coffee. However, I never have. I say when they make it taste as good as it smells, I start having my morning cup.

Until next time...

More Books

 The other day, Kris said that she was interested in the children's books and mysteries I was reading in addition to Horse. So here are some of them.

In no particular order:

 Operation Do Over by Gordon Korman (a middle-grade fiction book)

(Note: I listened to this book, and the narrator was excellent.)

Ty and Mason have been best friends forever. They are 12-year-old, straight-A students and science geeks. Their favorite topic is time travel. All goes well until a new girl, Ava, comes to town, and they both have a crush on her. Their relationship is severed over Ava. I won't give any more away, but the book has a time-travel element to it. As with Korman's other books, the characters are well-thought-out and relatable. The time-travel element adds an extra dimension to the story.

Korman's stories are told with humor and heart. I have not read all of his books (he's written over 100 middle-grade books), but my favorite is The Unteachables, about a classroom of misfits and a teacher who is just biding his time until he can retire. 

The Boxcar Children by Gertrude Chandler (an elementary school fiction book)

The first version of this book was published in 1924. Another version was published in 1942, and that version is still being published today. It's been on several lists for the best children's books of all time. 

I first heard the story of the Alden children in second grade. Every day after our noon recess, Mrs. Murry, my teacher, read us a chapter. I loved the book and liked how the 4 orphaned children made a cozy home for themselves in a boxcar. In the end, they go live with their grandfather. I read this recently when I needed a feel-good read with a bit of nostalgia.

Down Cut Shin Creek by Kathi Appelt and Jeanne Cannella Schmitzer (a children's nonfiction book)

This book is about the packhorse librarians in Kentucky. I picked it up at the library after reading The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, an adult fiction book, to learn a little more about them. This book agrees with the descriptions of things I read in the Troublesome Creek book.

Across So Many Seas by Ruth Behar (a middle-grade fiction book)

From the publisher: Spanning over 500 years, Pura Belpré Award winner Ruth Behar’s epic novel tells the stories of four girls from different generations of a Jewish family, many of them forced to leave their country and start a new life.

This book is fairly typical of many kids' books today that deal with serious subject matter. It was a well-written, good book, and I predict it will be an award-winner.

House Love by Patic Richardson

This is the same person, also known as the Laundry Guy, who wrote Laundry Love. Both books are told in a folksy way, including stories about people from his life who inspired him. Unlike Laundry Love, which is full of all kinds of laundry advice, House Love is more general with fewer specifics. This is one of my nighttime reads when I want a non-emotional book before I go to sleep. I actually asked for a copy of Laundry Love last Christmas after reading a copy from the library because of the wealth of info in it. I am going to be perfectly happy reading House Love and returning it to the library.

I think that's enough for now. I'll add a few more to the list tomorrow (or whenever I get around to it.)

Until next time...

House Aggrevation

It seems that there has been a lot going on with our house recently. Two weeks ago, we got a new fence. The fence was 35 years old and was rotten enough that it was getting to be a fruitless job to repair various pieces. This is something we have talked about for a few years, and we finally made it happen. We have a split rail fence and used black locust for the posts and hickory for the rails. Hopefully, these will be maintenance-free. They cost a little more than the pressure-treated option, but there are black locust posts still in use that are over 200 years old. 

And by a scheduling chance, the next day after the new fence, we got all new locks and door knobs for our outside doors installed because the original locks were getting difficult to operate. Also, we wanted more deadbolts and everything keyed alike. This is also something that we've been meaning to do for a while, and we finally made it happen.

When those were completed, we were looking forward to focusing on non-house things. However, the next day, we started noticing an off smell that we couldn't seem to locate. Then Ward was in the basement looking for something and discovered the carpet was wet. It took a while to figure out, but we found a small leak from a water filter in the next room. It must have been leaking for a while because the carpet was sopping. And it really stunk like a litter box that needed to be cleaned. With all of the cats over the years, there had been peeing on the carpet. We got the carpet cleaned pretty well, but we never made it all the way to the pad. I think the dried pee in the carpet was reconstituted when it got wet. 

Wally and Theo came over and helped cut out the wet, stinking carpet and pad, and luckily, the smell quickly dissipated once the rug and pad were removed. We were bummed about this. We liked the carpet. It was of good quality and in good shape. We will have to eventually have to put a new floor in. Thankfully, we have time to figure that out.

Yesterday, the plumber installed a new filter and replaced some other corroding pipes. Hopefully, we will be done with leaks for a while. As a side note, we have a drain on the floor about two feet away from the leaking filter. However, the water did not run to it; it chose the expensive carpet instead.

Moving on to last night, we saw another mouse in the house. I didn't get quite so excited this time, but I'm not happy. We are used to a few coming in when the weather gets cold, but not in the summer. A little reading said that just as the mice will seek a warmer spot in the winter, they will look for a cooler spot in the summer. I hope that these are just random occurrences and that we don't have a nest of them in the attic. It's a whole issue we don't want to deal with but will have to.

And this afternoon, when I came home, Ward told me the washing machine was not working. After a lot of fiddling and a couple of false starts, we have observed that it fills with water, and then the cycle stops, not to be restarted again. More investigation is needed, but for now, we have a bunch of wet soapy clothes. I think a visit to Wally and Theo's to use their machine is in the near future.

But first, something good. Ward smoked a turkey today, and Wally and Theo are coming over for dinner. Add new potatoes, a tomato pie, and some broccoli, and all will be happy. Actually, I'm not sure the Carnivores will notice anything but the smoked turkey. After dinner, maybe Theo and Wally will take our laundry home and do it for us. 

Nothing is horrible happening here, but I sure am aggravated with it all.

Until next time...