Moon, alas, and a shaky hand

I tried to get a good shot of the moon but having no tripod or car to lay it on the night exposure means it will be blurry. The camera really needs to be still, and I guess holding my breath isn't enough. But it was a crisp night and the sliver looked so bright...

Today at work was a lovely day. Field Day to be exact, spent outside on the field playing with kids as they rotated from station to station. In one, they carried a dry sponge from one side of the field to another where they dunked it in a bucket of water and ran back, wrang it out into a bucket, and handed it to the next kid. It was fun, but then Coach said (wink wink) here is a coffee can, that will be easier to bring lots of water back, but you have to hold it over your head as you run'. The can actually had holes all around the rim and as they held it aloft it sprinkled water on their heads. Of course they thought this was hilarious.

What was even funnier was about half an hour later, one boy felt his previously wet shirt and said, "Hey, it's dry now!" He thought that it was a miracle or something.

The parachute always is a big hit. They hold it up and shake it and shake it and try and get all the balls on it to drain down the hole in the middle of the parachute. And the coup de grace is the moment when they can throw it high and then slam it down with them inside. They think they died and went to heaven.

After that was hot dogs and apples and chips and milk, and then recess, then a movie. Toy Story 3. "The Clawwww!" By then they were wobbling in their seats, eyes at half mast, insisting 'no, I'm not tired."

A good day at school, all in all. Fun under the sun.

High five for first kiss

"You kissed me because you like me, I kissed you because I like you." Elliott and Bowie.

Good old car!

I love my car. It is an SUV, Ford Explorer. I bought it when it had 181,000 miles on it, four years ago. It still runs. I haven't had a lot of problems with it, except for a few minor things a while ago. The last year and a half I have had no problems with it. Knock wood. I hope by saying all this that it will not suddenly poop out on me and leave me stranded. I do rely on my car. I mean, who doesn't?

It passed a milestone the other day. I was driving home from the grocery store and it turned 211,111.1 miles on the odometer. I liked all the ones, so I stopped to take a photo.

Good old American car!

Yesterday morning was gorgeous. The weather has been warm but not hot, and the nights with windows open just cool enough to warrant one slim blanket. I noticed the ground fog was lifting over the hayfield next door, so I snapped a couple of quick photos to commemorate the beautiful moment. The birds were happy, chirping away. My cats like the cool and refreshing weather too. nice morning.

I love the rural mornings around here.

Funny kid comments- redux

Kindergartener asked his life's goal:
"When I grow up I want to be an animal."
Uh, ok!

In math, a boy was asked, "Can you count by fives?"
"Sure! Five, Five, Five, Five..."
Well, he did what was asked!

Girl dancing during indoor recess in the classroom.
"What are you doing?"
"Spanish dancing in outer space."

Now, there's a creative kid!

Peeps On A Stick, the newest culinary creation

I had a lovely dinner of spinach lasagna, light salad of Boston lettuce and vine ripe tomatoes, and fresh strawberries with whipped cream. And lest you think me too fru-fru, I am now eating PEEPS ON A STICK! booo-yah!

Peeps on a Stick, for those who do not know,are the famous marshmallow Peeps, but arranged on a stick, likely so that more can be consumed at once. Yes, I am a Peeps fan, and I follow the Washington Post annual Peep Show Diorama. This year's winner was: "Chilean CoPeepapo Mine Rescue"

"This year's winning diorama, which depicts the dramatic rescue of 33 mine workers in Copiapo, Chile, last October, is the work of Mary Jo Ondrejka from Reston; Bryn Metzdorf from Fairfax; and Margaret Hartka from Parkton, Md. A Peep version of miner Ariel Ticona meets his newborn daughter for the first time, while Peep Johnny Barrios Rojas is greeted by both his wife and mistress."

Check out the other entries, always a blast to look at the fun and creativity.

The Poky Little Egg Hunt

The beginning of the egg hunt:

The end of the egg hunt:

I am all for kids having fun, and I had fun the day I took these shots for the Athens Banner Herald. I mean, look at those precious babies in the photos! So sweet.

I recall my own Easters. My mother did take great care to create special Easter baskets each year. She delighted in stocking them with our favorite candies, and a sweet stuffed animal or two. She loved making them look pretty. I appreciated the baskets and the lengths she went to on our behalf.

The Easter Egg Hunts...not so much a fond memory.  Actually, I hated the Easter Egg Hunts. I am not athletic, see. I am slow. I contemplate actions before taking them. I am not competitive. When I was a child, I stressed easily. I like peace and quiet, a tree perhaps, to recline under and read "The Poky Little Puppy." I could really relate to the Poky Little Puppy.

But the Egg Hunt is filled with tension as the kids line up. There's high competitiveness. Me, a slow mover, always got creamed at the start. I was run over, tripped, or just fell due to clumsiness. I always got to where the eggs just were. While everyone was screaming in giddy glee, I was crushed at the one or two measly eggs rolling around in my basket. The whole egg thing was torture, and embarrassment. It was not fun.

Well. Ahem. I'm over all that now, and I have the privilege of working with children in our church. This week I got to share with them the real meaning of Easter. I read to them directly from the bible, the story from Matthew. I got to explain to them the wonder of resurrection. I shared the glory of salvation through Jesus. I never got an egg treasure on one of those Egg Hunts, but I brought the true meaning of Easter alive to a room full of 7 year olds. Now that's the treasure I was looking for all along!

Some photos I like

Beauty...

Villa D'Este, Lake Como, Italy

And the beast

Green eggs:

Cooking green eggs for Dr. Seuss day at school

And ham:

Bert:

And Luke:

Easter outfit, age three

Me at age three, waiting to go to Easter Dinner with my grandparents. I loved the outfit. I really loved the Mary Janes! Back then, 47 years ago, Easter meant grandparents, Easter Basket (loved that!) Easter Egg Hunts (Hated those) and a ham dinner.

I am grateful that though it took another forty years from that moment on the swing, I eventually came to understand - and love- the true meaning of Easter.

Puddling my curtains

The new chic thing for upscale homes is ‘curtains that puddle’. This means that the curtain length is deliberately long, and the bottom portion of the fabric puddles on the floor. It is supposed to evoke the feeling of a long wedding train, and therefore is romantic.

I hate it.

I am not a fan of curtains anyway, and yes, I’ve been blessed with not having to have any in most of the places I’ve lived. Either my property lot has been large, or set back from the road, or there have been no neighbors. I don’t like feeling hemmed in. I love light and I love the breeze at night.

But recently neighbors moved in right next door and I bought some curtains. (I do not live in a drapery kind of home.) I like symmetry. I like order. I like clean lines. The curtains I’d bought were simple and neutral colored. The TV design show hosts would balk at my design scheme, no doubt. I’d be on the show for “Color Intervention” or “Design Faux Pas” if they had shows like that. But I live in a two room apartment and excess fabric weighs down the room and too much color distracts. I like it the way I like it.

One set of the curtains I bought fell to the floor exactly. I had not measured prior to going to the store, thinking that the curtains at the thrift store were so inexpensive I would not mind simply cutting them if I needed to, but likely I would not because the windows are standard.

On the window at the front door, I put up a long curtain that has big pleats. It falls to the floor perfectly. However, I discovered that I obsess over making sure the pleats are equidistant from one another and perfectly in alignment. At one point I thought about getting a measuring tape to make sure the pleats are separated evenly but I had seen an episode of Law & Order last year where the wife had measured each shirt in the closet to make sure they were exactly separated from one another and one day she just snapped and shot her husband, so I left the measuring tape in the drawer and now I just eyeball the pleats.

The bedroom curtain, though, is satin and a little fancier, coming to a Vee with a tassel. It is long. It puddles. All that means is, it lays on the floor and gets in the way. When I open and close the curtain, it drags the dust from the floor (if there is any, ha ha).

I think puddling curtains are not romantic. They are simply impractical, messy, and unsymmetrical. And in my world, symmetry is everything.

Old car, nice scene

Yesterday was a beautiful day. As I waited at a stop sign in Comer, I saw this old car turn up a drive, park, and an equally older gentleman step out. The tree lined driveway and the greenery along with the old car made me grab my camera and...SNAP