A Day Off

It's been a beautiful day in Texas. Sunny, in the 70's and windy. Reminded me of growing up in Southern California and the Santa Ana winds coming up in the afternoons. Today was my first day off in a long time. I started the day connecting with some of my loved ones. It was a sweet time of chatting about nothing and that feeling of belonging. The rest of the day has been spent with the husband. We popped in on his Dad just to say, "Hello". Funny how we live next to each other and I barely see these people more than when we lived 7 hours away. They actually had to come through my line at Hobby Lobby just to get some face time! We almost finished up our Christmas shopping, had lunch together at the Olive Garden and walked the back 40 together. As we were walking along the back fence, we came upon our neighbor. Funny that we had to go all the way back there to meet her. She was friendly and telling us tales of how she was checking the fence because one of her cows, who is actually her friend's cow, freed itself from the pasture and was roaming the neighborhood when she came upon him on her way home from work. My husband's barn is coming along so nicely, although not as fast as the framing. It's a much slower job working on your own. It's a beautiful place to me (and I hope to my husband as well). He is now officially retired from the Air Force and stays home full-time handling the main portion of the household duties and the child-rearing. He's a good, good man. We are preparing to receive our first pension payment; that in addition to my part time pay at Hobby Lobby is somehow going to sustain us and build the big house. I see through my bookkeeper glasses that we may not have our home built any time in the near future and I am truly okay with that. We have all that we need, and the rest will come in its due time. We have managed to set aside enough money to go up and celebrate our Grandson's second birthday with him the first week of January and we are just ecstatic about that! As I write, dinner that my husband lovingly prepared is cooking in the crazy 1950s oven that never has the right temperature. The little artificial Christmas tree is shining and we are blessed to have gifts underneath it. The laundry is going and I even have time to put some thoughts down on cyber-paper. I still have lots and lots to do on my 'day-off-to-do-list' and I have this assurance: If I do not get to it today, it will still be there on my next day off.

I will leave you with the view out my front door this very minute...




Blessings on your day my friends,

Nothing Much *

*edited to include missing pics

My husband is sad that I, "sold him out" that he doesn't take me on many dates, and also he is bored with my last post and would like me to give him something else to read, and also requests that I post about him. We have been on vacation since the 23rd here at our property in Texas and I haven't posted much because there is not a whole lot to report.
I AM glad to be able to tell you that for Christmas we bought tickets for the entire family - including the Grandparents to go see Bedtime Stories on Christmas day. We all enjoyed it very much.

But before we headed to the movies, we walked our property and of course, planned out our compound homestead. My priorities have changed slightly from; Hubby's shop first, fence second, house third, pool, vegetable/cut flower garden, guest cottages....

to; Fence first, Hubby's shop second, my recording/photography studio third (who cares if we have to live in a trailer for 3 years - only half the kids will be still at home by then) and then whatever else. (By the way - I got a remote control for my camera for Christmas and so I could take a picture of myself while recording a song. I know you agree with my priorities) And think of all the jam sessions when singing friends come to visit! (I will only charge them nominal fees) Maybe then my Chicas will be happier about visiting me here. 'Cause it'll be way cool then.

My hubby showed me this tree he found when he was working on clearing some of the back 40 and he called it the climbing tree. It has a limb growing from one tree into another.



He then exhibited to me how it got its name.



There are lots and lots of trees here. Some of my favorites are the dozen or so Pecan trees which seem to give off a crop every couple of years or so, several Osage Orange trees which are neat but the fruit is really weird looking and makes a giant mess, and then we have a bunch of one of my favorite species of tree - the Honey Locust. Now this bad boy, currently is dormant from the winter - but it does not loose its macabre thorns. Here is a small sampling.



My father-in-law would like to cut them down because they are pretty dangerous when riding around on the tractor, and those thorns have flattened a tractor tire in their day - I am hoping though, that we can just prune them high enough to be able to go under them with the tractor cause I surely do like the looks of them. I'll show you them in bloom when I am here during blooming. The twins took ill night before last and we have been having the on again-off again barf-fest to close out 2008 with a bang. Today I was in Sam's club and there was a family with 9 month old twins buying piles and piles of diapers and piles and piles of formula. *cue cha cha music ~ and dancing ~ my twins are thirtee-een, my twins are thirtee-een* They were really so cute though and I had to work really hard at not staring and making a scene.

Blogger is resisting uploading the rest of my pics, so you have two choices:

1.) Post anyway and follow tomorrow or so with the rest of the pics
or
2.) Save as a draft and post when it can be done in its entirety.

What's your vote?