BOO

Tonight was the annual ghost walk at an area cemetery. This cemetery is very interesting and so pretty. During the ghost walk actors stand by the graves of people who contributed to this area in some way and they tell their stories. This year DD was the wife of Charles Kingsbury, who was the first superintendent of the biggest school in the area. She looks pretty good for a woman who had 7 children and has been dead since 1881.

I love looking around this cemetery and there are so many pretty places. This area is all Civil War veteran graves. During the ghost walk they have a woman with an amazing voice that stands in the back of this area singing Negro spirituals.

This is the actual horse drawn hearse that a funeral home (a local funeral home passed down through generations) used back before there were gas powered vehicles. A few years ago they brought it out of storage and had it refurbished.

Tomorrow DD and I work the museum. I look forward to spending the afternoon there, as long as our resident ghost stays away......wish me luck!

Have faith

So DD and I cleaned the camper and put a for sale sign up. I called our local newspaper and put an add in the paper for 14 days. If you don't sell your item in 14 days they run a new ad for you free for 14 more. My husband and my dad were both warning me that I would have a tough time selling a camper this late in the year. I was determined to try it anyway. The ad came out in Tuesday's afternoon paper. It was sold by late Tuesday afternoon. It sold to a very nice retired couple who used to camp and are ready now to camp again. Now if I could just get SH to pull the pontoon out of the weeds.....I think I have an addiction now to selling things. Must be my own form of gambling addiction. The pay off better in this case. So today after work/doctor appointment/bank stuff and possible football game I must get the rest of my stuff out of the camper....and say good bye. It will be hard, but I'll just clutch that check in my hand while I do it.
In other news, the State of Ohio discontinued aide services to one of my clients. That just means that the level of care he requires must be given by all skilled nurses. I'm not a skilled nurse so I will be unable to take care of my little boy. I am not surprised by this move and since his mother is a good friend of mine I still can see him whenever I want and I talk to his mom on the phone almost daily. Losing that job put me down to working 10 hours a week. I love the idea of working 10 hours a week, but my bank account seems to not be as happy with that as I am. I did pick up another client last night that I will start caring for next week. I was working 4 days a week at either 4 or 5 hours a day....now I will be working 3 LONG days a week at 9 hours 2 days and 8 hours one day. I know some people are thinking "you wimp that is not even near a full work week." I know that but it is plenty for me. I ALWAYS wanted to be a stay at home mom. My DH was fine with me being a stay at home mom. I guess what I never thought about was the fact that at some point I wouldn't need to be a stay at home mom. It is hard to justify being at home with no kids when we need my income. So, I am going to work a little more, eat a little less, exercise a lot more and become a skinny middle age fashion diva......ok so maybe I am going to work a little more. It's all about goals and I think one at a time is all I can handle.

Big boy toys

Superhubby loves his toys. The only problem with that is the fact that once a toy belongs to SH, it always belongs to SH. He hates to get rid of ANYTHING.... one day I am going to do an entire post on his piles of crap treasures. Right now I am just going to touch on some of the bigger objects.

This is our pontoon boat. It was great when the kids were small. It has 3 full size couches, a top that lets you get out of the sun and rails all the way around so you don't have to worry about anyone taking an unexpected swim. SH added the fishing seats on the front and I could drive while he and our DS fished.
All of that happened years ago. For the last 5 or 6 years it has sat behind one of his buildings in the weeds.....rotting........ruining.....and gathering snakes. The last time we pulled it out SH and DS had to fight with 2 snakes that had wrapped their long bodies around things under the boat and refused to come out. It has a nice big Evenrude (or however you spell that) motor on the back that worked last time we took it out. I loved that boat when we used it, but now....the love affair is over.



I couldn't get a good picture of this so you will have to use your imagination. When SH found this he spent days begging, pleading and generally driving me nuts. His promise "if you let me buy this I PROMISE to sell the pontoon." He lied. Now this one takes up half of our garage and is great to pile things on. It will probably get used again one day because he always wanted a bass tracker. He just doesn't have time to use one.



We bought this about 9 years ago. I love my camper and love to go camping...but we don't. Ever! When the children were younger we packed up 3 or 4 long weekends every summer plus spent at least one week of vacation camping. The kids aren't young anymore, gas is too expensive and campground prices are getting close to hotel prices. When I mentioned getting rid of the camper SH's first response was "what if we want to go camping." He finally admitted it wasn't worth holding on to this big camper if we weren't going to use it. I was a little surprised because he never, ever wants to get rid of anything. He finally gave me the ok and DD and I have been working to get this ready to try to sell.





I love my camper with it's tiny bathroom. I took this from outside the bathroom and I spared you the picture of the toilet.
The box you see in the shower will probably go with the camper. I bought that amazing battery powered coffee maker for SH for times we went camping with no electric. We used it once. 45 minutes after we plugged it in it finally started spitting out tiny drops of coffee, at the exact same time the car battery went completely dead. I usually love my camping neighbors but that day we had a hard time talking anyone into giving us a jump start. While SH was getting the car battery charged I walked the 4 minutes to the camp store and bought him a cup of coffee.







I love my bedroom in this camper. It has a much better mattress than my bed in the house. I was carrying out blankets as I was taking pictures so excuse the pile of sheets and blankets.
I also like the little kitchen. I didn't get the table in the picture but I did get the fridge, sink and microwave.
In case you haven't figured it out I love my camper. I just don't use my camper. I'm gonna miss it, but when I do I will just make me a camp fire outside and eat a few smores.

The magic box

In my home we have a magic box..... It looks a little like this one.


What? You say it looks like a microwave. Call it what you like but in my house it holds some magical powers.
When you hear those 5 beeps that means whatever is in the box is ready, my dog, who will only leave my side get excited to eat or go out to pee can be found standing on her back legs dancing like a ballerina. She knows that sometimes pepperoni is on whatever is being reheated.
When you open the door the tiny kitten that lives with us will come out from wherever she is sleeping and meow....over and over because her food gets warmed in the magic box. She can pop those little claws out and climb completely up your legs and end up on your shoulder in 5 seconds if the magic box is running.....which is great as long as you aren't wearing shorts. I quit wearing shorts around the house as much since she moved in.....I was running out of bandaids.
Superhubby loves to hear the magic box make that pop, pop sound that means the magic box is about ready to spit out some popcorn. That sound also makes the dog happy. She and superhubby love to share some popcorn.
If you get a few minutes go over and wish these people a little luck. Once again a member of their family is going to have to fight cancer.....they have had WAY more than their share.

One last fall homecoming....

One last fall homecoming. That means only one more spring homecoming and one more prom.....

Education......it's a beautiful thing

This week has been homecoming week at my daughters school. This is usually the kids favorite week of the year, other than spring break and the last week of school. Every day during homecoming week has a different theme and you dress accordingly. The picture below was from field day and you dressed in school colors. The girls really didn't have fake sports balls in their shirts but they did have their school name on them so I covered them up.
The school is set in a valley surrounded by very little other than hay fields and animal grazing land. There are a few houses, but they are few and far between. I have quite a few relatives that teach at these schools (the grade school/jr. high is on the other side of the high school.) When I say animal grazing land I mean it....one aunt had to answer questions from her 3rd graders as a cow gave birth outside their classroom window. The grade school is fairly new and has tinted windows, but no blinds.

Today was nerd/slave day. The girls dressed as nerds today and C, was their slave. On slave day they auction willing students and they must do whatever the buyer(s) tell them to all day. Poor C had to dress in a banana costume and sing "I am a Chiquita banana and I'm here to say, I am the best banana in the school today" every single time anyone said his name. ALL DAY! The kids always have a good time and the money they raise goes to the student government's Christmas/clothing drive for students who need it.

Tonight is the homecoming game and tomorrow is the DANCE. I was going to go watch the homecoming queen get crowned because I know it will be someone I know....at this school you know everyone. It has to be a senior girl and in a senior class of around 50 students there aren't too many choices.....

Have a good weekend. I am going to be watching Ike tonight and praying for all of those in his path.

Always remember

It is September 11th. Every year there is a September 11th. Every year on September 11th the world stops and remembers that one day 7 years ago....the day that changed our history. The day so many people lost their lives, the day so many people lost their loved ones, the day the United States lost its innocence.
I will be the first to admit that as an American I felt kind of invincible before that day. We were the biggest, baddest, safest nation in the world. We had people. People to make sure the bullies didn't come in and take our lunch money. People to go after the bullies before we had to deal with them. I was wrong. We have people, but those people are human. They work their asses off to keep us safe, but they aren't miracle workers. No matter how hard they try, how well they do their job, they can't fix everything.
I didn't know anyone who lost their lives that day. My sister knew one lady who brought her kids to day care at the same place my niece went. She brought her kids to daycare that day and never came back. Her husband was there picking up the kids when my sister went to get my niece. He was sitting outside, not able to go in. He said he knew the kids would want to know where mommy was and he would have to say "I don't know." He didn't know. He knew she had been in a building but he wouldn't learn until later that she never made it back out.
I still think often of the policeman, firemen, paramedics and other rescue workers who ran toward the buildings. They wanted to help. Their training said "run toward the fire and help people." They did what they were trained to do. May God bless them all.

A day in the life.....

Of a high school senior...
Every single day my DD is peppered with questions about her future.
What are you going to do,
where are you going to school?
major?
minor?
are you going away?
staying near?
health field?
education?
accounting?
She hates the questions and really has no idea, though she is working hard on figuring it out now. Today's mail brought 3 things and every one of them was for her (NO BILLS.)

The first was from Ohio State....Go Bucks! This college is about 3 hours from our home and would probably be great. She has a lot of friends there already but O.S. hasn't offered her much other than some scholarships. Ohio State never has problems getting students so they don't tell you too much about financial aid unless you ask.




This is a small college about 45 minutes from home. They have a nice campus and would be in driving distance. They have already offered DD a Presidential scholarship...which means NO TUITION, which is near and dear to my heart.

This was the third one in the mail today. This is many, many miles from our home, probably 6 to 8 hours but I am too lazy to wait on mapquest to load to find out. They have sent financial aid information and with her grades and our income level we would not be asked to pay anything for her education here. While that seems great the whole 6 to 8 hour thing is hard, though if she wanted to go.....I would let her and smile until she was on her way...then I would cry for 3 months.
We have a small college about 20 minutes from our home that a lot of local students use for the first year or two. You can get quite a few degrees there too and her tuition would probably be covered in full.

We also have the now famous "we are Marshall" about 40 minutes from here. I love the campus but it isn't in the best part of Huntington and I would worry. The good thing would be that her father works about 3 blocks from campus.
I will admit that a big part of her college requirements are going to be financial aid. My son was an honor student but his grades averaged a b+ and he got a 24 on his ACT. He only finished one year of college but we didn't have to pay much at all for it. DD has NEVER gotten anything but a perfect A on any report card (and if she did I'm pretty sure she would be devastated) and she has a 30 on her ACT. She should win enough scholarships to get almost all of her tuition paid, if not all of it. I'm keeping my fingers, toes and eyes crossed....
Have a great hump day.

My week in review

It's been a week since I posted here. Not because I have been super busy, but because I have no idea what I want to say. Here goes nothing.
The weather in Ohio has been extremely warm for this time of year. The high temps for the day have been ranging in the upper 80's and 90's. My plan to close the pool over the weekend got pushed back and I floated around in the pool today.
My work week is going to be very short. One of my patients is in the hospital which I means I can't work which means....no paycheck. I can live with that for a few weeks.
DD's senior year is well underway and she seems to be settling in well. She is missing her B/F who had to go back to college last weekend, but he will be back in a few days for homecoming...can't go to a dance without your boyfriend. I'm sure I will come up with a few pictures to show you all soon.
It seems that directv has given us free movie channels for a bit so even though it is almost midnight my SH is wide awake and ready to stay that way. He hates movies unless they are like this one which, from what I can tell, is a bunch of prostitutes from another planet who came to earth to catch men and FORCE them into sex slavery. Since when do you have to force men......

For sale....

I think I may have mentioned before that we have way too many vehicles. We have four drivers in our family...and 6 vehicles. My car insurance bill is almost equal to my house payment. When our son moved out we kept him on our car insurance because he would have had to pay an astronomical amount to get insurance himself, and his car is in our name. The vehicles we have right now are 1. Ford windstar 2. Ford explorer 3. Ford F150 4 and 5. 2- Ford zx2's (do you see any pattern here?) and 6 a Ford Taurus, which was wrecked and was supposed to be fixed so I could drive it....in this lifetime. I have been waiting for my husband to tell his little old ladies to buzz off for awhile find a little time to fix the Taurus up for me. He has tried lately to get it finished and we did buy most of the parts and he put a few on. I really want him to finish it so I can get rid of this Windstar I drive to work every... single.... day. To say that this mini van is a lemon would be an understatement. We bought it when the nearest salvage yard fixed it up for one of the employees and he decided he didn't want it. When we bought it about 5 years ago we had 2 young teenagers who each took friends everywhere we went. We had, on occasion, put my husband in the back hatch of the Explorer when we all went somewhere because of the lack of room and the fact we wanted all kids to have a seatbelt. Now I'm trying to write an ad that would sell my very few miles to the gallon mini van....if you can think of any way to make it better please let me know.
For sale...2000 Ford Windstar. Salvage title. Used to have a small transmission leak, now it just runs straight out a couple of hours after you fill it up(because my husband said "don't worry, it can pull a boat). Great dual air conditioners that work for about 2 weeks after you charge it....then you must charge it again. Dual am/fm/cd/cassette system that works fine....it just flips itself to CD when your favorite song is on the radio, but flips itself back in time for the end of the song.....sometimes. The people who rebuilt it just put putty on the roof and painted it....you won't even notice the fact it came loose unless it rains, and then the water runs to the second row seats so driver stays dry. The inside lighting is great, and sometimes it looks like a disco going down the road because when it gets in a mood the lights flicker off and on over and over and over. Sometimes I look outside at night and the lights in the van are flashing. I'm not sure if the driver who was in the car when it wrecked is still there...playing games with my mind or if the wires have a short in them that only acts up once in a while. There is a small miss while driving, but you don't notice it unless you are going slow, which I very seldom do. The electric door locks work, or at least most of them do. The passenger front door lock doesn't work, but you can climb over the drivers seat, stick your butt in the air for all going by to see and unlock it by hand. The side door locks work when they want to....and sometimes they don't. The clear coat that was put on when it was repainted is slowly peeling off. This van gets some crappy gas mileage. It costs about 120.00 to fill it up and you can drive it for a very little while on that. Please call for appointment....or the keys may be in it with a full tank of gas and I promise not to come outside if I hear anyone around it......take your pick.