OH bummer on your trusty if not a bit rusty truck. Maybe some one needs a farm truck . I know farmers drive their trucks into the ground and then some. And they usually know how to keep them running.

Totally forgot yesterday was Tuesday. Been thinking today was all day. I am so mixed up lately. I know I started drinking iced tea early both days and still drinking it tonight. 96 degrees on the front porch right now at 8PM. I need to get out and do some yard work. Hopefully the sun will set behind the hill soon and it will cool down.

Hi hi all! Impromptu tea; I love it! I hope you'll all allow me to join even though I'm a coffee drinker. :-) Just made a pot here in the living room. My house is in disarray with the unpacking, sorting, and the kitchen being painted, so the coffee maker is on a stool in the LR next to the sofa. It's 6:40 pm, but caffeine doesn't keep me up at night.

I'mhappy, so sorry about your truck! These things seem to happen at the most inconvenient times, don't they?

Eld, how's the foot? Shades is right, as usual: pain is your body's way of saying "Stop it! Don't move like that!"

AAA, welcome!! So happy you can join us!

Steph--haven't heard from you in a day or two. Everything OK?

Shades/Chris--the chemo regimen sounds grueling for both of you. I'm so sorry you're going through this. I'm sure neither of you envisioned this as "growing old together."

Caroline, sounds like you're overdoing it! Don't get dehydrated out in your garden!! You can get dehydrated really fast, without even realizing it. Bring your iced tea out there with you! :-)

Lass, you never cease to amaze me. Your imagination is a gift, and it's so cool that you're sharing it with us!

I agree with Caroline and the rest of you about how hard it is to have to (over)pay other people to do things we could have DIYed a few years ago. I know that over the next decade I will spend thousands of dollars for labor I could DIY if I didn't have the arthritis.

OTOH, I have met some really great people that I have been able to help out financially by hiring them. The couple who's painting my kitchen, for example. They've been married a year and they are really broke. Spokane is a rough job market. But they are not sitting on their butts waiting for someone to bail them out. Caden (the husband) is a sheet metal worker, but only gets called in about two days a week. Joy (another Joy!) just got a part time job at a garden nursery but is still applying for full time jobs. Meanwhile, they get on CL every night for labor gigs. They also have a paper route. They work really hard and no job is beneath them. It is my pleasure to be able to help them out financially and they're helping me with something I am simply unable to do. I will definitely hire them to do Joy's room next month, and for any other jobs I have around here. And now I count them as friends.

Happy tea time!

My truck is a farm truck! And if it's too expensive for me to repair no one else is going to repair it either. Now days, everything is computerized and the back yard garage mechanic can't fix them.

You should see the trucks the farmers around here drive. New. Big. Expen$ive. And mine is 16 years old. My plan was to drive it until the wheels fell off and I think it might be now.

I'll be shopping for another old truck. And bracing myself for sticker shock.

ImHappy Yes the farmers around here do drive big fancy trucks for them selves. But the workers drive the beaters. So sorry your old one is giving up.

Debbie I am so glad you have found some one that can do some work for you. I need some one to help me take down a tree in the yard. I need to take down some fence to get it out of the way first. Unfortunately the tree is leaning the direction of all my new fences and it needs to come down. I should not have planted it.

We will be having company next month. I was actually thinking of setting up my little coffee pot in the bedroom for early morning coffee for me before I have to face the company each morning. Or maybe do tea then I do not have to deal with the cream.

Well, I just had an embarrassing moment. I posted about our forgotten tea over on the Kitchen Table. Two women played along, but I'm sure they didn't understand what i was talking about!!!!

Anyhoo, yesterday I had tea in the city. We are helping our youngest move into her apartment. She starts a new job next week.

OH Eld how sweet of them to play along. Hope your foot is doing better???

7 more jars of peach jam ready to come out of the canner. I'm done until the elderberries are ready. And I'd better be checking them! The birds got them last year. I should have picked beans today. Tomorrow for sure. I picked 3 tomatoes. They are yellow. I didn't recall planting yellow ones. The care tag is by one of them if I could find it.

Shades, thanks for asking. It is getting better. I try to only take the Motrin every other day, but if I know I am going to have to walk a lot then I just take it when I need to.

It certainly could have been worse. A co-worker had to have her foot broken by the doctor in order to reset it so that it could heal properly. There is possibility of nerve damage. But, she is a trooper. She has hers wrapped, but also does't need that dreaded boot. She has a heavy cane that she uses.

Hello! One of the confused from KT here. I had missed something, but it was still a delight to think of my having my afternoon repast and just hearing from your life eld6161. Thanks for the shout out to check this forum out. I'll be looking forward to looking around some.

On another note, I have no idea was smaller homes is about, and that sounds interesting too. Cool for new stuff!

Welcome over to the "Smaller" side Rob!

I'm really enjoying it. I have a smaller home and this place is nice. Good ideas and great people.

This is a cozy corner of the GW/Houzz world. Pull up a chair and enjoy your favorite beverage : )

Looks like I missed all the fun this week. :) Things have been busy, hot and humid! The replacing of siding on the addition of my house is now complete. The guys did a great job and cleaned everything up. So well, in fact, that I had to really look around to find a castoff piece of the siding to take along to the paint store today. A piece of great news that I got this week is that when my brother comes to visit over Labor Day, he is going to paint my front and back porches to go with the color of the new siding (Mastik siding color is Rugged Canyon). I am beside myself with happiness!! I probably could do it if I had to, but I am not a painter and don't know what all should be done to have it done right. I got a new porch light for the back porch too and I love it. It was a long time coming, but it had to be done. Here's a pic of the light and the back of the house.

The support for the overhang will be painted by my brother. We are going two shades darker than the siding.

That green triangle with cream trim in the middle of the picture is actually the house next door. I love the color of their siding. It is that fiber cement kind of siding. And the red on the steps and landing will be painted a hunter green.

This picture shows the house while the work was still in progress. I'm very happy with the way it all turned out.

Welcome Rob333. This is a fun forum to visit on. The more the merrier. I am Chris the crazy one in this group that flys in the face of convention of just about everything. My motto is if you love it in your house do it.

Lass I read your Book Down In The Well last night and it truly left me wishing I had not come to the end. I will leave you a review later when I am more awake. HA I trust you all to listen to my sleepy babble but do not want to put it on a review. Can't wait to read your other book.

Murraysmom. Lovely light and the siding looks amazing. Hunter green porch will look great as accent with light and house.

Eld I am glad your foot is doing better. Let it heal and be done with it don;t over do.

murraysmom, I covet your little porch. I want that even before my gravel road gets paved! I wonder if I will live to see the day I don't choke on dust 10 months of the year. What is that stuff on your steps and floor? I like the red, myself.

Shades- Thank you : )

Murraysmom-The house looks great!

Thanks, everyone. I'mhappy, that red is what is going to get covered with the hunter green. I liked it when the siding was the light color of the rest of the back porch, but now with the darker siding I want to do something different with it. The shutters and the two storm doors are all hunter green.

Murray's Mom, your porch is beyond perfect!

Would you consider making a post just to describe the long (and I'm sure tedious) process of how it came to be! I'd be spellbound!

What rooms are in the addition? I love the little garden and the Virgin watching over all. The green storm door, and the green in the new lamp shade is so beautiful.

I wish we were neighbors!

The stone toppers I did for a friends memorial garden for her hubby. They are not stepping stones. Too slippery for that. After she installs them on her stone tops she will fill in around them as she chooses with glass globs or?? I used up a lot of already cut pieces of glass left over from earlier projects of mine. Each one is 10 by 8 inches or close.

Shades- Those are beautiful!

Wow, Shades, those are amazing! I can see your "style" and it is wonderful. I love all the colors and your scenes are neat! Just beautiful. And you have nice handwriting. :)

I will add some more of my stuff too. I did two smaller stained glass pieces. One is a tree and one is a water lily. Then I took some glass dinner plates and dressed them up. I just have one of those here. The last two are paving stones I made in a little class at a friend's art studio. I had them on either side of the fountain in the backyard, but I just pulled them out and cleaned them up again.

Murraysmom I LOVE them. And you have it way over me because I can not draw one thing. HA on the handwriting. Can you see the catholic school coming out? All these years later it has stuck with me. My husband says my writing is awful??? Go figure.

I really love your plate done up. I did a small one for a mosaic challenge and we were each given the colors we had to use. Mine were turquoise orange and lime green. It was fun. O do not do much in orange. I had to buy some beads for that and I did have a little bit of orange glass.

One thing I really like about your work and I see others do this. It looks so simple but I have not mastered it is............ You can make your tree look like a tree and your water lily look real with just using any shaped bits. And it totally works. When I try that it does not look like anything.

I sent a gal a box of glass one time and she did an amazing window using the bits as they came out of the box. No nipping shaping and her flowers were amazing.

Thanks for sharing. More???

Catholic school? Ha, ha! I knew we were kindred spirits!! I really like the way you can create a picture using patterns and such. That is a challenge to me. Yours are fantastic! I am rotten at trying to make shapes using glass. I have the cutters and nippers, but mostly I have to make my pictures out of pieces. I have learned to cut a straight line though and that comes in handy. :)

So this is a watercolor I did in 1991. I went to college as an adult, a nice smaller Catholic college when I lived in Baltimore. I didn't need the degree for work, I was just doing it for my own satisfaction. So my degree is in English, along with a heavy emphasis on History and just to challenge myself I took quite a few art classes. I think because I got some encouragement, it allowed me to try different things I would not have had the courage to try otherwise and I found I had a real love of art. I took quite a few classes from Kevin Raines. He is an artist in his own right, taking inspiration from the Hudson River Valley artists. He makes beautiful watercolor paintings of nature in the Adirondacks.

I drew this picture from a postcard I have of Harpers Ferry, West Virginia. There is a wonderful national park there. It borders on Maryland and was not far from Baltimore, so I visited there many times.

I was happy with the way it turned out and my boss loved it, so he paid to have it framed! It hung in my office for a long time and when I left I got to take it with me. It is a constant reminder of those fun days at college. It was so much better to go as an adult and enjoy every single minute. The teachers loved having adults as well because of the life experiences we brought to class. The program was geared toward working adults, so classes were Friday nights, Saturdays and Sundays. Very convenient and I thank my boss for encouraging me to go to school and get my degree. As he so famously said "the time is going to pass anyway, why not do something good with it". Wise man!

I have other paintings and pieces that I did at that time, but have not done anything with. I have one in mind that has a tea cup and tea bag in it. I should dig it up and share it here. :)

How fun to be able to take an art class later on out of high school. I left home the day after I graduated from high school and never went back. I stepped right into the work force and worked for 45 years. I was also working before I left home for several years babysitting and sewing. There is some art in my family I found at 32. Nephew is a tattoo artist and does amazing work. Art not icky tats. Another nephew is a musician and cousin was too before she passed. When I sit down to do some thing I might have a vague direction I want to go. Usually I just let the glass direct me. I am worried about the grapevines I am wanting to do next above my flower wall. Working on all the pieces it will take to put it together. Hoping I can just let it flow onto the wall. Anything too realistic and I get pretty worried. LOL

There is one grape cluster with a bit of vine with symbolic leaves on my bench on the right of the mess. I just wanted to see if the leaves I was working on were going to work. I think close enough. I am not going to even try to make them look like real grape leaves. My life is not long enough for an many as I would need. LOL

Edited to add picture. DUH

"...I have one in mind...a tea cup and tea bag in it. I should dig it up and share it here..."

I whole-heartedly agree! :)

You ladies are absolutely amazing!

My DH is a 12-year-survivor of a strict Catholic school education!

LOL I am a 16-year (or is it 18 since it took me longer than 4 years to finish college?) survivor of Catholic school education. LOL

Well, I found the picture. We were to do a still life. I remember it was a Sunday morning that I made this painting. Thanks for getting me to stroll down Memory Lane!!

I hope you can recognize the Red Rose teabag, spoon and teabag holder. I still have that green cup. I found some other things I made that I will share in another post, but I have to go get something productive done with this day.