Good morning all! Mmmm...while I'm not the tea drinker you guys are, right now I could go for that herbal orange, or especially the cinnamon! Better yet, ooooh some hot spiced cider, sugar free, natch! :-)

I just woke up a half hour ago (4:00 AM) because I was freeeeezing! My bedroom window got stuck open a few days ago, lol! I normally keep all the windows open at night because it cools down the house so nicely. But I close my bedroom window because my bed is right under it and it gets cold!! So now I'm in the ridiculous position of an open window and my space heater on! Hahaha!

I have my door propped open just enough for Bentley to get in and out, so I'm not heating the hallway, just my room. :-). It only takes about 15 minutes to get it nice and cozy in here, but my footsies are still like two blocks of ice!

Lass, I hope your evening of herbal orange, sitting in bed, and watching your show went well. It sounds lovely! But where are the aforementioned garden pictures, lol?! I want to see the literal fruits of your labor! :-)

Chris, you've had another busy day, but when do you not! :-) All that watering and tiling! I'd say your cinnamon tea was well deserved! And now my mouth is watering for it, haha!

Well, my yard has been watered too, but not by me. I just have the greatest neighbors! Yesterday, my next door neighbor, Barbara, came aknockin' and introduced me to Sherry, who lives four doors up from me. Not to be confused with Mary, the neighbor four doors down from me.

So Shery says she noticed all the many boxes by my little deck and knows I have a disability and was probably having trouble breaking them down. She also noticed my yard was getting tall and very dry and was concerned about a fire hazard. So she says that she really loves yard work and could she do some yard work here?

So...she spent all day yesterday and all day today working on my yard! My yard is really mostly weeds, not much grass. Yesterday, Sherry got all the boxes broken down and about half of them loaded into her car.

I only have one hose (and one soaker) and I spigot is on the wrong side of the house, so she brought over one of her hoses to connect them. Sherry watered the whole yard, after she fixed my sprinkler, she weed whacked part of it.

Today, Sherry weed whacked the rest of the yard, watered the entire yard again, and pulled up four ginormous tarps of weeds by hand! My yard looks amazing, almost like grass! I'll take some pics today. Dave, another wonderful neighbor who is kind of the resident handyman, helped her carry the tarps of weeds and dump them across the alley where he's still cutting up all the trees that fell over in last November's big storm.

Meanwhile, Mary from four doors down came over and pushed my garbage can up to the curb because she knows Joy isn't here to do it. Sherry, Mary, and I, and their dogs, both named Sam, enjoyed some diet root beer on my deck and had a good conversation!

I believe almost all people are good, and my kind neighbors confirmed that once again today. :-)

As for me, I got the kitchen all cleaned, sanitized, and mopped--wow did it ever need mopping, lol! I use a regular Swiffer, but I don't buy the pads--too expensive! I use a microfiber cloth, and a bucket of hot water and dollar store floor cleaner. Works for me!

I also got the living room vacuumed and dusted. I actually like doing housework, especially puttering around in my kitchen, but one of the few chores I don't enjoy is dusting. It seems so futile! Haha! Since I leave my windows open 24/7 during the summer, dust just blows in like crazy! I can see dust on my coffee table five minutes after I dust it, lol!

I had hoped to clean the bathroom and fold clothes, but Mary and her husband Frank, who has cancer, and two of their kids popped in and stayed over an hour, so that didn't get done. But...the kids completely wore Bentley out with his feathers on a stick toy, so that was great, hahaha!

Wellx, I have to get up pretty soon. I'm taking Mary and the kids down to Cheney Outreach while Frank goes for his radiation so they can get registered for the food bank and hopefully get an emergency rent payment. With Frank's cancer, he can no longer work, and money's really tight.

I hate to disappoint you all, but I'll enjoy a lovely hot mug of coffee or two with my breakfast, haha! I hope you all have a great day!! I'll pop by later with a meat & cheese plate and a relish tray with olives, pickles, deviled eggs, and crackers! :-)

Good afternoon, everybody! Nice to see you all here. I started my morning off with a cup of Twining English Breakfast tea and a couple of blueberry scones. The pups and I sat on the front porch and watched the guys across the street who are building the new house. It is supposed to be done this Friday but I don't see how that can happen. Too much still to do. They are finally getting ready to put the driveway in. I would have thought that would have been done before this. But I am not a builder, so I will defer. :) My yard got watered yesterday by Mother Nature, so today I am hoping to get it mowed. I am going out of town on Thursday (until Tuesday) and I have a lot to do to get ready.

It's still hot here. It's getting a little old now. I get tired of summer right about this time. It's so hard on the flowers and I don't like all the bugs.

LL, I'm not familiar with the show you are watching. I'll have to look it up. I don't have Netflix but I'm always on the lookout for a good series.

Shades, I so admire your tiling talent and look forward to seeing this latest work. You seem like a very organized person and smart to take care of Joe so well. I hope that he will come through this well.

Debbie, you do have wonderful neighbors and they are worth their weight in gold, aren't they? I love mine too. We all are there for each other. It's quite comforting to know there is someone to help if ever needed.

Have a good rest of the day everybody.

LL - I'm here with a tepid cup of reheated Tetley's. Too stressed and too busy going around in circles to post right now, but later this evening; I promise!

I watered my big gardens in the front yard yesterday and pulled out a contractor-sized wheelbarrow full - full and packed down tight - of weeds. My gardens are awful this year. I didn't get things planted properly before my trip to AR/TX, then it was too hot to plant, and the season is too short for late planting, then I got ill...and the gardens just look tired, sparce, and unloved.

Miss Fisher's Murder Mysteries are on my "too be watched" list. Two of my friends have recommended this series to me recently.

Shades; I hope you and Joe had as good of a day as possible and that you're both relaxing/snoozing right now.

Debbie, "tea" time can include any and every beverage! So pour something and enjoy! What great neighbors you have! (Could you pack them up and send them my way!)

Murray's Mom - I received your message! Will respond soon. Re: paragraph 1 above. LOL

LL, I binge watched the Miss Fisher series last winter ... Loved it! Wish there had been more seasons alas. Have you watched the Rosemary & Thyme series? Loved that one too - saw it on Youtube a couple years ago. It's available on Netflix.

Enjoying summer days in my corner of the world this week. My Mom gets her Pet scan results on Thursday. We are cautiously optimistic.

My tea time today was a cappuccino and tea biscuit with my husband at an Italian pastry shop.

My tea time got wasted on spinning my wheels with my genealogy: Thomas, Thomas, Thomas, John, John, John, Thomas, John, John, Thomas. UGH!! And every John and Thomas named a son Thomas AND John.

I should have mowed today because it's going to be too hot tomorrow.

Today went well for us. I did a big bunch of shopping in a short time and made it back about 15 minutes before they were going to turn Joe loose. We stopped for gas on the way home and it was great to be home. Now I need to get all I bought put away. Starting to stock up on the animals winter food supply as finances allow.

Thought I had posted this and it turns out not. So better late than never. I drifted off to my studio to do some more glass work. Bed is calling me.

Pictures!!! : )

Kitchen garden from road and slowly moving closer....

Right side bed of arbor with benches

Left side bed...lots of marigolds! LOL

Really looking good LL. So nice and formal.

I am still working towards reducing the yard chaos here. Then find myself adding more. I did discover hollyhocks decompose quickly so just cutting them down and letting them lay with a few added chops here and there eliminates the need to drag them off and rebuilds the soil a little bit. Next years plants are already growing to cover the litter. Makes me happy.

Been really tied up in my hallway wall and another coat of paint in the dinning room rug. i decided to paint the light out side border. The over all rug now looks richer. And that light border was making me crazy. Had to put on my sweat shirt to do it because the air conditioner was right there and I actually got cold. Now drinking hot tea. Hope to have a work in progress wall mural picture tomorrow. It is dawning on me I got a grape thing going on in here. You know some people do apples or strawberries. OH NO not the OLD LUSH Chris. I had to do grapes in kitchen/dinning room , mannequin and now hallway. I might have to set Eve up in the hallway as a night light. She will blend right in.

I was up a good part of the night dealing with cranky kitties and sick hubby. I will try to catch up tomorrow on every one else fun.

Thank you, Shades. It was too hot to do much out there, today. Just about to go water, then done for the day. When it cools off, we'll hopefully get the fence finished!

Also, I will have my new book Dare To Cross The Water for FREE on Sunday only. It's the first part of the story, which is the romance between Katherine and James in 1849 Scotland. They are Clara's parents, from my earlier book.

I hope you all have a lovely weekend!

https://www.amazon.com/Dare-Cross-Water-Railway-Romance-ebook/dp/B01JFAZUNC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1470444776&sr=8-1&keywords=dare+to+cross+the+water

Well, it's official. I'm fat. I bought a pair of jeans the next size bigger and they feel wonderful! I'm 2 months from 70 and now I wear a different size Wrangler. Still the slim fit but THE NEXT SIZE BIGGER :-(

I know how it happened but choose not to do anything about it. Blue Bunny Cherry nut ice cream was on sale, $1.99 a carton. I bought 2.

ImHappy it is just the summer heat making you puff up. I do like those skinny jeans. They control my sagging skin much better.

Yeah, right. It came through the winter and never left. It should only take until May to be back to my old self. Not this year. I can get the old ones buttoned and by the second day, zipped, but the overhang is disgusting.

Iamhappy I just bought some jeans at a yard sale and was confused by the size 8S. When I got home and tried them on I guess the S means short waist. They are low. Not too low but the sag I tucked so nicely in my high wasted jeans also goes over the edge a bit. OH my. Time for long shirts again. It is just sagging weirdly. Going through the odd faze of not losing pounds but bones are appearing. Ribs collar bones. I do understand all of it and I guess I could have another drop coming. If I do not that is fine too. I have lost enough. If I did drop then it will put me to my High school weight. Going to be 67 this month. Chemo day for Joe tomorrow I will probably be late to tea unless I get on line at the chemo lounge. And BTW those Flash drives I bought on the cheep 5 for 10 dollars all work well so far.

LL--what a spectacular yard! Wow! I've got to do something with my yard of weeds, but I'm just not sure what to do. I'm just happy it's all short now. I really don't want to spray poison, but it would be impossible for me to dig them up myself, and it is beyond my financial means to pay someone to do it. But I can't plant anything out there until I get rid of the weeds. Any suggestions?

I'mhappy and Shades: the weight battle rages on. It's an everyday challenge. I have a 40 year high school reunion in 2018. My goals are to be at my goal weight and have my PhD. by then. Sounds silly, I know, lol! But they're good goals to have anyway. I'm ABD (all but dissertation) at Gonzaga, so I just have to write the darn thing and be done with it, lol!

I don't even try to diet anymore, my body just goes back to the weight it wants to be anyway. Exercise helps more than anything else, this summer has been too hot to much of anything outside or inside. That's my excuse and I'm sticking to it.

I am not really dieting any more either. Just sticking to the way I have been eating for the last year and a half with the slight addition of some veggies and cottage cheese. Amazing how a fresh picked tomato and big spoonful of cottage cheese can taste like desert. I lost another pound yesterday. Was kind of unexpected as it has been so long since I have lost any more weight. I am pleased with how I am now and will continue to add a bit of veggie until the weight loss stops then I will hold at that level for life.

I am not much on exercising. I get enough exercise just taking care of this place. I imagine I would or could be in better physical shape if I did exercise but I just am not into it. Other then my stretches in the morning and that just gets me up and going with out as much body pain.

HA I did get a cramp in my calf the other morning and I was doing some pretty fancy contorting to get to it but the cats had me pinned in place laying on top of the covers over me. OH that hurts so bad. Leg is still sore from it two days later.

I did the Walking with Leslie DVD for a couple of years. It works! and it was the only exercise I actually looked forward to and kept up with. I got to the weight I wanted and felt great - then quit. Never could get the ambition to go back to it. Still have the DVD tho.

I am on my feet most of the day now with all I need to get done. Then my mosaic project on the wall is mostly standing at this point. So even when I relax I am walking back and forth from hallway to cutting table in my studio. I know when I get up higher and have to use the ladder I will really be getting some exercise. Up and down at least once for each piece. I might be able to set some thing up on the ladder tray to work on. I am hoping. The ladders are both big step ladders so that is easier on my feet. I made big progress yesterday and today on the wall.

This morning was not good for hubby and I thought I was losing him but he rallied around after a few hours. Calling in to triage tomorrow for advice and possible an appointment. I know it sounds crazy my working on my mosaics but it is a good way to hover and not hover at the same time. And it helps me to cope.

I hope he feels better, tomorrow. You take care of yourself, too : )

Hugs to you, Shades. That sounds so difficult to me. I hope he is feeling better soon.