Hello World!

Has it really been almost a year since I have bored you with my blog?  Amazing how timed flies when you are having fun with life.  Our remodel we started in 2014 is finally complete; 15 months of dust and everything in disarray.  I made the statement that I would rather nail Jello to a tree in this heat rather than remodel anything else in our home....until I came up with a grand idea to knock a partial wall out to enlarge my sewing room and swap the current sewing room with the guest bedroom.  Yep, if I had made a bet on remodeling again, you would see me in 90+ degree weather covered in jello trying to nail it to a tree.  Oh well, I am female and can change my mind!  Getting Bill in on the plan took non-stop talking about how it would give me so much room...in other words begging him to do it for me.  He got tired of hearing the plan and gave in in a moment of weakness.  Mr Contactor, laborer, plumber, electrician and wonderful husband started a couple of days ago.  Whoopee!! ❤️ 

I have 3 new quilts to post that are finished and lots of Purdy plumerias blooms to post too.  My yard looks like a jungle and I have been giving plants away coming and going.  I love my plants, but they have all gone crazy and left me in the weed patch!  I had appendicitis mid March, with a few complications, fine now.  Bill was biting at the bullet to go to NC and as soon as my Dr approved, off we went.  Between the trip and surgery, my yard grew and so did the weeds.  I wish I could see weeds in the darkness, since that is about the only time it is cool enough to work in the yard.

I love this little cactus with its lifesaver blooms..so far, it is living and growing...3 of its relatives bit the dust over the past couple of years.  Just wanted to say hello world and I hope life is treating you well!  Until we meet again....

I love this quilt and would do it again.  It is the Big Ass uhh Star quilt.  I finished it earlier this year and don't remember if I posted it.  I used this quilt to choose colors for our remodel.  I love sleeping under it.  Just testing my blog to see if any one reads my ramblings.  Life goes on and until we meet again....

Sweat hog goes public

This past week has been a busy week.  Hosted a sewing group in NC before I left.  We all learned to make the little clam shell bags.  Our instructor was a new friend, Glenna Beaver. And she did a great job giving us step by step instructions.  I used Halloween fabric and I like the finished product...Emily, GD, has already weasel end away from me...which is fine because she loves treasures.

We drove home from NC on Friday, so I could attend a garden tour at Ryan Calohan's home.  He and his wife Katrina were wonderful hosts to the get together.  We got to see all of Ryan's beautiful Plumerias, addeniums, cacti, and other lovely plants.  I looked like a sweat hog having just come from much cooler weather.   My hair was plastered to my head and actually dripping in the back.  No, I really don't look good when I am melted down in my shoes.  Anyway, I enjoyed seeing  old friends and meeting new friends.  After the tour, we all had breakfast/brunch at a local diner in Melbourne.  We sat across from Bryan and Bill from B&B Exotics and Plumeria at brunch and we finagled an invite to see their nursery and gardens which was only about 6 miles away.  They have a very lush garden with several hundred beautiful plumerias, addeniums, cactus and just gorgeous plants.  I felt like Alice in Wonderland in their back yard.  They also was very hospitable to us.  All in all, it was a great day even though I presented my self as a very sweaty old lady.  Today, I planted my seedlings from  the last group that have sprouted.  I also had funerals for about 10 plumeria cuttings that had rotted in the rooting bags...so sad to lose Plumie stalks...but oh well,  I avenge about 15 new plants that did root from the stalks I planted and bag rooted before I left.  I am happy those look like they will make it.  I also have an addenium seed pod, first forth me and two new Plumie seed pods.  Whoohoo.  Yes, head was sopping wet today to, but I am in for the day so and a shower just fixed the sweat hog queen!  Until we meet again.....
 

Whoopdedoda! I got a seed pod!

I have learned it does not take much to make me joyful.  Yesterday, my friend sent me a picture of a seed pod on one of my Addenium plants.  Also known as a dessert rose.  I immediately ran to Walmart to pick up some fabric (netting) to make some clothes for my new baby.  If you don't protect the pod, when it opens, the seeds blow to never never land and no more babies.  You never know what the babies will be either...might be like the Momma plant or might be totally different so you don't want to lose them when the pods open.  I am prepared when I get home to cover my treasures with their new outfits that I crafted up.

I seem to have difficulties posting pictures from my iPad which is so irritating.  Now if I can figure out how to add the seed pod pictures.

Until we meet again.....

Sometimes, we just need to be lazy!  Maybe need is not the right word...want might be a better choice of words.   It has rained for two days and the temperature is cool.  I have not broke into the sweat hog mode for several weeks.  The rain has made me so lazy.  I have read emails, looked at all their beautiful plumeria that my new online Plumie friends have posted and thought I need one of those!  If I got one of each that I think are eye candy, I would need a couple of acres and a green house to house them in the cooler weather.  I napped...faint days cause your eyes to get heavy and the napping fairy sprinkles her dust and poof I am dosing.  I finally got off the couch, made dinner and looked at some sewing projects.  I picked a scrappy quilt that one of my friends started.  She passed away and her husband gave me the scraps and 4 rows she had put together.  She had ripped a lot of it apart.  Some of the pieces were not cut the same.  I just decided I would try and figure out what she had in mind.  No one can figure out what a woman has in her mind, even another woman...silly me.  Anyway, I have sewed all the blocks together, some a little off but the colors are bright and they make me happy on this gloomy day.  I am putting the rows together and enjoying the memory of my friend.  It will not go together perfectly because I am using the strips she cut and I don't want to destroy the work she did on the quilt. It will be less than perfect but a happy little quilt and a fun remembrance of a funny friend.

The Jungle

Well yesterday and today, I seem to be calming down in the cough and snot chapter.  It seems I cannot get totally over this bug and then it starts all over.  Hopefully, it is leaving permanently soon.  Knee is better too so pretty much all good news.

I went to a plant swap that was a lot of fun on Saturday.  I won a Coca Cola bird bath as one of the door prizes.  The best thing I brought home was new Plumeria and I am so excited to smell their wonderful fragrances.  The host and hostess, Jim and Debbie Burch, were extremely hospitable hosts and just nice friendly people.  We all thoroughly enjoyed the new friends we made and the old friends we knew.  My birdbath was filled with Plumeria blooms which were gorgeous.  I also got to bring home the floating Plumeria blooms.  Isn't this gorgeous?  The other picture is of my Hawaiin Pink Plumeria that my friend brought me back from Hawaii last year.

 Plumerias seem to be my newest obsession.  I have grown them from seed and from sticks and they smell good along with being beautiful.  Since my knee has been out, I have spent lots of time online looking at those many varieties, drooling and some times green with envy.  There is something appealing with that beautiful color and fragrant smell.  Now I need to get moving and get the house back in order from the phase 2 part of the remodel and all I want to do is just sit and look at plumies.  My sewing room is next on the remodel but it will take a lifetime to get all that stuff straightened out so we are not starting that for a few weeks anyway.  I am really missing my sewing and I am tired of going through "stuff" and putting it up or out the door.  Anyway, looking forward to a break and now since it is raining and probably cooler, I am headed to the back to see what I can do with all those new plants I got at the swap.  Until we meet again........

Whines and Blessings...blessings win!

Oh my, the year will soon be half over and I won't know how that happened.  We are still remodeling and Phase 2 is almost finished.  The guest bedroom has a complete make over...whoohoo!  Not so fast, all that KRAP...uhhh treasures from the bedroom and living,dining, and bath that I could not find a spot for after Phase 1 seemed to end up in that room.  Now I am again up to my knees in stuff to sift through and put up, donate or throw away!  Don't you hate when you do this.  Most of you probably would never do this.  In the meantime, I have had two sinus infections since April, fractured ribs from that famous "hindlick" maneuver. and a fall that tore rotator cuff in the shoulder and tore the meniscus in the knee.  I kept walking...had to get the yard and house straightened up so we could go to the mountains for a rest after Phase 1 and now I have a stress fracture in the knee.

Some days, it just ain't nice in my world.  Other days are wonderful, when the g-kids come over to stay,  when my kids are happy, when my husband looks at me like he did when we married, when my flowers bloom, when I work in God's world of flowers, when I get good news on friends who are ill, when my friends and family make me laugh.  When you are as blessed as I am, I have nothing to really whine about.  Two friends have been diagnosed with cancer this month and as they have both been tested and finished surgeries, they are both going to be fine.  Life is good when you get great news that tumors have not spread and the friends are going to have good health again.

Here are some examples:
The furniture almost back in place after the new floors installed.  I might get that look from Bill more if he had not been working so hard.  My son and daughter and friends helped also.  Rug had not been picked up from being cleaned, but I sure felt good when all the bedroom furniture got moved back and the new floors down in both places.  Don't have pictures of the bedroom or a current picture of my sweet, granddaughter, Kallie...will have to take care of that soon.

 two of my beautiful orchids blooming away

 One of my favorites is when my hoya blooms

 My lovely smelling Plumeria

 My son Jason and grandson Austin with today's catch

 One of the last blooming amaryllis

 My sweet Cooper

My pretty Emily with Bella...Bella is the dog

One of my red adeniums, desert roses

My blessings are great and plentiful...sometimes, I just let other things get in the way...like torn muscles, broken bones and enough snot in my head to fill a gallon bucket.  This helped me tonight to bring those blessings up in my face.  When you read this, think about how lucky you are and put some of your blessings in your face!

Until we meet again.......