Stop and visit, talk all you want. Pt 22

Oh no! Seeds all over the grass! LOL

I put a huge amount of seeds out in my front bed and I couldn't figure out why none were coming up. This morning, I was up very early, just as the sun was making light. I heard something tap the glass and looked out just in time to see a tiny house funch eating my seeds. At least I know what happened to all of them. LOL I keep some dead grass and such to hold the seeds in and he was finding his way through it all.

I went out a few minutes ago and I saw this guy...

The late bird gets the worm?

He sure did! LOL

The storm seemed to peter out by the time it was right outside of town. We've been running around, on Fri. we went over to Peru and ordered a leather couch. On Sat. we picked up 4 pieces of furniture from Oak Express over in Davenport, IA. Taking them out of their boxes before we brought them in, we discovered one was defective and put in the box that way by the manufacturer, the other was simply the wrong coffee table. They loaded the wrong box. I was pretty ticked and boy did they know it. 2 out 4 weren't right? Geez. The kid who loaded it drove here to swap them out. Then yesterday, uhboy. Taking my dads truck back out to their house, but taking all that cardboard out to the recycle center first. Backing out, my husband says "we don't have the closer for the garage door opener". So I hop out and run into the garage. It's an old garage door opener, it doesn't stop when it hits something. That's o.k. though, done it a million times already right? Yea right. Miss Klutz me, hits the button and takes off running as my right foot gets tangled in an extension cord, left out by---well let's just say it sure wasn't me. Anyway, I flew to the cold hard concrete, scrapping my knees first, then my face slammed into the concrete, bouncing up after I hit my cheek, then back down to hit my nose and bouncing up and down again to hit my mouth. I have "road rash" all over my face. Went to the ER and had a CAT scan on my face, X-ray on my knee. Nothing broke. I have a fat lip (with a flap of skin that'll probably come off) and it's swollen out to there. My left knee is pretty scraped up. The ER doctor and the nurse told me that my face would be all sorts of pretty colors, but for some reason, I'm not. I'm just swollen and in pain. One of these days I'm going to kill myself with my not picking up my feet when I walk!!

Oh MAN Terry!!

Soo bummed to here of your fall. Oh gosh, At least youll be Pretty colors! So,so glad nothing got broken.

Oh my goodness poor baby...sleep as comfy as possible. sending you some very gentle hugs.

Hi ya Celia!..and everyone.

Oh no!!! Oh, that's aweful! Sooooo glad you're not more hurt! I was cringing while reading that. I've taken some nasty falls but I usually just run into things. Like the corner of the table with my toes or doorframes with my shoulders. Ugh! Anyway, don't do it again!

Hi, Judy!!! LOL

Mom is still hanging in there. It might be very soon, though.

Got some new plants today.

And this one was hiding.

Good morning, all.

Mom passed away early this morning. I'll be back in touch in a couple of days. I'll miss you while I'm away.

Celia

Mom's favorite flowers.

Oh, I am so sorry to hear. I send my condolences.

This message was edited Jun 3, 2008 9:11 PM

I am so rude! I didn't post my latest pictures I took last night!

This was kinda dark, but it really brings out the colors!

Another picture of the same bed.

The sunflowers are getting big!

These were the guys that were all blown over. See the rocks and bricks holding them up lol

And beside the sunflowers we have cucumbers and onions!

These logs were hit by lightning last Sunday! I heard the big boom from an extremely close bolt, but we always have those out here. This one was wwaaaaayyyyyy too close!

Here's a better picture:

And another one, just for kicks!

LOL it helps to attach the picture!

i'm sorry to hear that, Celia.
Safe travels, and take care.

amy
*

Celia! I'm so very sorry for your loss. Even when it's expected, it still feels so unexpected.

I'm healing, sort of. I still ache and I'm still swollen. I never did turn any colors on my face, thank goodness. It's hard to eat when my lip is busted and so big. That's a good thing though, right? ☺ We go tomorrow to pick up a bunch of native shrubs and flats of native forbs and grasses. I need to find a big hat and some big sunglasses!

Good morning, everyone. And it is a good morning. The best all week, under the circumstances. We laid mom to rest yesterday. I had forgotten how beautiful the spot was that she picked. It's on a hill overlooking the city. She is surrounded by big pines and the smell is incredible. She's far enough away from local traffic that you can't hear it very well.

Lots of people came and we have out-of-staters here, too. One of my brothers travelled two days to get here. Everyone is staying until late Saturday.

It's a good day.

Terry, sorry you hurt still. I've had a fat lip before and I know what you mean about not being able to eat very well. Sucks!

Amy, thanks. Very pretty color on the cosmos.

Crissy, those are pretty neat pics!

Terry, I tripped over a brick once and did that, broke my glasses and had a Huge canker sore on the inside of my bottom lip, hurts like the dickens! I'm glad your face didn't bruise, that's a good thing!

Celia, sounds like you have a lot of family around you, I'm so glad. It really helps the situation. I noticed last night that my sunflowers are budding! I can't wait to get some pictures of those! I forgot what color I bought though.

Crissy, I have chocolate sunflower seeds I have yet to start! I really wanted them this year.

Ah, I bet those are pretty! I think I have the yellow pedals with orange center. I need help with remembering what's what LOL I bought seed packets at Lowes but the empty packets saying what everything was, was thrown away or put in that one place where it'll never be found again LOL.

I think mine are this one...

http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/showimage/163776/

I know it's a good thing that my face didn't bruise, but it would make more sense! Adds to the whole "you should see the other guy!" part of it! LOL

Celia, remember that your mom is in a beautiful place. Grieve as you need to grieve, with the remembrance of that beautiful place she is now.

I have a big family reunion coming up in 2 short weeks. Unfortunately, I'm not sure I can make it this year ;(

If sunflower seeds you buy act like sunflowers you feed the birds, they sprout any old time they want too!

We were gone all day yesterday. I got, of course, my pre-ordered shrubs. I added in a really cool dwarf native oak tree, of which the Latin name escapes me right now. It's a dwarf Chinkapin Oak. A quick search on here and I believe it's a Quercus prinoides. Out of the 19 flats I had ordered only the day before, they only had 8 1/2. Bummer!!

Thank you, Terry

Why can't you make the reunion? That sucks. And that you didn't get your plants all at once.

Mostly because my husband works on Sun. It is a 2 day event down in Springfield, but that's 2 1/2 hours away, so my family (mom, dad, brother, sister and families) only go for the 1 day, Sun. I've been under Doctor orders not to drive since Jan. 10th. He hasn't released me yet. My dad will have his last chemo treatment on Mon., so I doubt strongly they'll go all the way down there, to turn around and drive to Iowa City, IA the next day. Stories are all way too long to get into regarding my brother and sister and because I love them, I'll just say that it would never work, going with them. It was so much easier when my paternal grandpa and grandma were alive. It was always here in town. Even when grandpa died back in '77, it still stayed here, in town. When grandma went into the nursing home in '99 and my uncle took her (his mother) to a nursing home down there just for Christmas the next year, but never brought her home and then she died (and that broke my heart and being like a 3 yr. old, it's all his fault!!), well, the reunion has been down there ever since. I mean doesn't everyone want to go to a "Yacht Club"?? My uncle and his wife are extremely hoity toity and to say they drive me crazy with what they do and what they have to have, is putting it quite mildly. This is a long story too, just suffice it say that they are a "keep up with Jones' " personality and have to point what they bought and how much they paid and my parents ARE the Jones' they're trying to keep up. Huge difference is the what they have and how much. It's not advertised by my parents. Because really, who cares? I haven't called them uncle this and aunt that in years, so this is really a very sore subject. I could tell you how grandma didn't want to go with him, and she cried and asked me how she make it there without me and what would she do without me and he took her anyway,
but I won't ☺

The plants I didn't get are for my parents house. I really bit off more than I could chew out there, so this works, probably for the better. I can always get more and add them in later. My mom and dad won't think it works, but hey, it's MY project and I know EXACTLY what I'm doing! I mean really. Why'd they ask me to do it if they thought I couldn't??? You know? And suddenly I'm feeling as if I'm 6 yrs. old again ☺

Oh Man Terry,

Bummer about the relatives being like that. Geesh, Glad to hear you are feeling better and didn't get the artwork on your face from the fall.

Hi Celia...Hope you are doing well today.

Have a good day all, really I must get into some action today!

Be cool in this heat,

Oh, Terry! LOL I understand. I know the feeling of being 6 yrs. old again.

Wow Terry, they sound like my mom's half sister and her husband, except they weren't hoity toidy, just decided to make a living out of suing every family member they could, especially when there was a death involved. My half-aunt did this out of jealousy, her husband did it out of greed. My mom still talks to her half sister, her husband has passed on. I won't even think about it, I don't need people like that in my life.

So my hubby had last night and has tonight off, so he went to Home Depot this morning and bought me some new plants to put in the front of my flower bed, since it does look a bit bare.
They are "Katie's Blue" Mexican Petunia's.

Here's another pic

My uncle and his wife live far enough away, that's easy not to have them in my life. It is my dads brother though, so it's not always possible to get away with that for too long. Those 2 of had that snotty attitude towards us since I was a kid. It's not new. With my brother and my sister, I don't get either 1 of them. But it's their life and I stay out of it for the most part. Until, of course, something happens and it's especially with my sister, that she "needs" me. It's hard to understand without knowing the whole darn history and I understand that. They're my family and I live with it. I wouldn't put up with it from anyone else, but when you're raised with 2 siblings that are so different from yourself and always have been, you just move on and basically accept them as they are. They do with me, so I do with them. Doesn't stop me from complaining about them, nor them about me. Some day maybe they'll be as mature as I am ☺☺☺ And it does it help to say that I'm the middle child at all?

It was hot outside today! We worked out at my parents today. Digging up some of what I wanted saved and then my mom was trying to get the landscape fabric pulled up and couldn't do it, so we took over. Then I didn't like where this evergreen ball thing was, so we yanked it out. We still have some bulbs that I dug up from my grandma's house about 9 yrs. ago and get those moved and move the Sporobolus heterolepis (Prairie Dropseed) so my dad doesn't hit it with Round-Up. Dig up and pitch a ton of those sedums things whose name escapes me right now. And move the Peonies. And dig up and pitch more of the daylilies. Stella D'Oro or whatever they're called. And rain in the forecast every day. I'm tired at the thought of everything we need to do.

This evening the phone rang. Caller ID told me it was our former neighbor.It wasn't. It was 1 of her daughters. Our neighbor isn't doing well. She's in ICU on a respirator, has congestive heart failure and her kidneys are shutting down. Her name is Phyllis. She and her husband lived next door to us from '84 to '03, when we lived in another house. They became "grandma and grandpa next door" to our daughter. Stacy, her husband, passed away back in the mid 90's. It was just Phyllis there, with many health issues, so I helped her as much as I could. Her sons and daughters all live far away, so I did it. I was more than happy to, she's a wonderful woman. Jean told me it doesn't look good. Everybody is on their way to say good-bye. sigh. We're all going tomorrow and I'll walk, if I have to, to make sure I see her every day. She's so much like my grandma---she loves with all her heart and never holds judgment against anyone. Please say a prayer for our dear friend Phyllis♥♥♥

Wow Crissy! You can trust your hubby to purchase plants for you? I'd be afraid of what mine would come home with!☺

Terry, I'm so sorry about Phyllis, the both of you are in my prayers.

That is awseome you had neighbors you can get along with. When I was growing up there was a family directly across the street from my family's house and all of us became very close, they were like my second set of parents and two sisters I never had. The husband of that family passed away a couple of years ago due to Diabetes, and now I'm not as close to them as I should be and I feel horrible about it, I never have any time it seems!

My grandpa passed on from Congestive Heart Failure, but his was different, I guess. He kept having stomach problems so he went to the doctor for ulsers (he had a few anyway and thought they were acting up.) Then one day he passed out for a minute while he was driving and crashed his truck into a brick wall. He said, after denying anything was wrong for a couple of months, that he did have congestive heart failure and they couldn't do anything and gave him a year to live. They said when it was time he was just going to drop and he would never know it. Unfortunately 1 year and 14 days later, he dropped in the grocery store! I couldn't go in that store for a couple of years after that, it gave me the heeby geebys!

Shoot, my hubby has the green thumb LOL He tought me how to plant them!

Thanks Crissy, that means more to me than you know☺ We did go see her today. It was hard and I couldn't help crying. She means the world to me. Losing my grandma was hard, and this is like going thru it all again. Phyllis has diabetes also. She has 6 kids, most older than I am. They're all just scattered everywhere. I had forgotten until I was reminded today, that she (Phyllis), always calls me "her good daughter"..lol. The people that bought our old house there next door to her (and recently sold it), stopped by while we were there. I found out that the "new" people that bought "my" house, are pretty busy digging up "my" backyard!! I'm livid. I know it doesn't technically belong to me anymore, but jeepers. In my heart, that will always be "home". So anyway, I found out about that and after those 2 left, I turned to Phyllis and took her hand again and she opened her eyes. Then I went into this schpeel about hearing about those people digging up "my" plants and her head was nodding as if OH YES!!! I told her I was going to her house and looking thru binoculars from her family room. I know it hurt her with the tube down her throat, but boy did she laugh!! Of course I couldn't stop. I went on about how it was best for me not to go outside because then I'd find a shovel laying somewhere and have to hit 'em with it! That had her laughing hard and really squeezing my hand as if to tell me to go get 'em!

She's on less oxygen than yesterday and her kidneys seem to be working again. I don't know what's going on. I can only hope for the best.

I'm also sorry to hear about your grandpa Crissy.

We didn't do much of anything today. I worked myself so hard yesterday, I slept till 11am!! This has just been a rough year for me. Hopefully sometime soon, I can work my energy level back up to where it should be.

We've got some storms coming our way again, they broke in on the t.v to announce some severe weather coming, so I'd better shut this thing down before it all hits!

Have a good night all☺

I'm right there with you, Terry. It HAS been a rough year for us, hasn't it? I'm keeping you and Phyllis in my thoughts and wishing you the best. ☺

I went back to work today. I kind of wish I hadn't. Everyone was so nice but...I cried a lot. I don't think I was emotionally ready for it. A good friend I work with (and fellow gardener) gave me a Bleeding Heart plant. Cried some more. She's such a doll. I've been mentoring her in gardening. She caught the bug from me.

I planted it as soon as I got home. It's in a shady spot along the garage wall. I'm going to have a small plaque made and dedicate it to my mom.

I've been thinking hard about mom the last couple of days. I'll miss her but she got to do all things she wanted to do. Lots of people don't. She saw lots of things others haven't. She did things women in her day would not havedreamed of doing. Two things come to mind...

My mom left home in Utah at the age of 18 and went to California all by herself. This was in 1942. She left home without telling anyone she was leaving and got a job in a bank. She worked in a record store after that. Her parents sent her money to go to college there and that's where she met my father.

Speed forward to 1964. Mom decided she wanted to be a police officer. In 1965, she went to work in uniform. I've always thought she was a sworn officer but have since found out, she was not. She did wear a uniform and she did work in the jails as matron. She also did the dispatching for two separate precincts in CA and one in Utah.

My mom was awesome, in the original sense of the word. I have big shoes to fill. I should get moving.

Goodbye mom.

Yes Celia, how very selfish of me to say me! It's been a rough year for US.

Your mom sounds like an amazing woman. You can't be her, you can only be you! Your mom wouldn't want it any other way.♥

Your friend is a friend indeed! What an appropriate plant to have given you. I love bleeding hearts. For some reason, when everybody else's would go dormant when the heat came, mine never did. It wasn't even in shade, but the south side of our former home up here! I've never liked picky plants, as in watering, endless deadheading, etc. etc., so my bleeding heart sure didn't get any extra water, yet it lived and thrived in that spot. Since I'm into native plants now, there's a bleeding heart that's also native. You can bet I have some! I don't even know how to describe the beauty they have, they just do!! ☺

You know that calm before the storm? Or when somebody gravely ill becomes better and then dies? I FEEL that. I don't know why, other than to say that she has many family members that are trying their darndest to get here and see her. I hope I'm wrong, I just hate getting those hopes up to have them dashed. And this is really depressing to think about, so I'm going to stop now ☺

Rainy here, so I'm not sure if we can do much at my parents house. We'll see. My back sure hurts this morning. sigh.

Terry, you're a sweetheart! Phyllis has a good person looking out for her.

Don't you worry one bit about the "me, me, me" factor. There's a lot of that going on around here with me today. My eyes can't seem to stop leaking. I'll be here for you if the unthinkable should happen.

Here's the plant. It will get some sun but mostly early morning and late afternoon.

Be calm, be assured, be honest, be you.

Well, I think both of you are sweet!

Celia, my mom was hired on at the Modesto Police Department in 1967 I believe, and became a Community Service Officer in 1980, which was the same year my grandpa retired. My mom retired in 1997, I think, which was the same year my grandpa passed AND my parent's divorce became final, AND I graduated with a Bachelor's Degree, talk about a year with ups and downs, that was wild!

Anyway, the whole Eastern half of the country has been hammered this spring, I know we had our share from January to the middle of May. The amount of tornados this year is just insane! I'm keeping ya'll in my thoughts hoping everyone stays safe. I'm breaking the ball and getting a storm shelter, hopefully Wedensday.

I'm gonna check the weather...