Clouds, Clouds, Clouds

Do you remember putting your back to the grass and looking up at the clouds?  Ahhhh, that fascinating city of fleeting formations.

Hubby spotted this Loaf of French Bread Cloud yesterday as we were trolleying down the road.  Man, I scrambled for the camera so I could show it to you guys.

It's pretty silly to get bored with life when there's a sky to watch.  The movie keeps on playing, with no intermissions.  Mother Nature runs the reel, and She expects us to be paying attention.

Kids nowadays are growing up so different than we did.  Most little heads are looking downward, reading text messages from their little friends.  We didn't have these gadgets to keep us occupied, so we looked at the world around us and played with it.  We did things like watch the clouds, skip rocks on water, slide into first base, and climb trees.  All those things got us up nice close and personal with Nature.
 
A way to show little kids how to have fun with the clouds is to...

• buy them an unlined sketch book and pencil.
• have them write MY CLOUDS on the front cover
• sit outdoors with them and have them look up at the clouds
• have them sketch the clouds as they see them
• have them record the date, the time of the day, and describe the appearance of the clouds
• boost their confidence by saying there is no wrong way to sketch what they see
• size of cloud? color? happy clouds, swirling clouds, gloomy, beautiful, threatening?  fluffy, puffy, wispy? like a pillow, or whipped cream?
• sketching the clouds encourages kids to reach inside themselves and pull out their powers of observation
• this game can graduate to finding the fun formations, like this Loaf of French Bread Cloud.

We all see a different world.  Even though we have eyes that appear to be the same, they are as individual as our fingerprints when it comes to what we see.  Our brain and our eyes talk to each other, and the two of them decide what they want to show us.  Isn't that another one of the Creator's stunners?

"Look at your feet.

  You are standing in the sky.

  When we think of the sky,

 we tend to look up,

 but the sky actually begins at the earth."

  ~Diane Ackerman

My Rainbow

This isn't just any rainbow.  It's a rainbow over the farm where I grew up.  My brother and his family still live there, but now it's home to me only from a distance.

There wasn't an inch of this farm that my little feet didn't walk or skip across as I followed daddy fixing fences, bringing home the cows for milking, chopping bull thistles in the pasture, and trapping pocket gophers with my brother.  

There's a sorrow in my heart as big as the moon about the way my family split, leaving me in the dust.  There was no reason for it.  But, now that I'm older, I see life for what it really is....a crap shoot.  It's unpredictable, filled with problems, and risky business.  Bottom line, it's a gamble.

When families don't get along, it's sad, but it's okay.  The way I've dealt with the pain, is to ask myself, "Would I choose that person for my close relative?"  If the answer is no, well, then I let them dissolve into the nothingness relative they choose to be.  I sure wish I would have been smarter when I was younger, though.  My hair might still be dark brown.

When I did my year-long bible study, my greatest reward was learning an alternative meaning to Forgiveness.  I always thought that in order to forgive someone, I'd have to tell them I'm sorry, give them a hug, and go on like nothing happened.  Ah contraire.  There's another way to forgive someone, and that's by letting go.  It's hard to do, but it worked for me.  There came a day when I said to myself, "I can't take this crap anymore."  I cut the strings and let them go.  The funny part was their reaction.  There were those who would have preferred to keep throwing gas on the fire.  I turned away and thought to myself, go right ahead and burn yourself up.  It doesn't really matter to me anymore.

The root of our family problem wasn't my sibling and me, but it affected us majorly.  I honestly think he was torn between his married family and his birth family. Either way, the pain of losing him was the same.  It's so sad looking back at the empty days, weeks, months, and years without each other.  There were times that I so desperately needed my big brother's shoulders to lean on, but he was never there for me.  I'm just grateful that Our Creator installed a coping device in us so we can go on living with holes in our hearts.

Last evening's rainbow meant so much to me.  I'm assuming that Our Creator was trying to tell me that everything is okay so far as He's concerned.  Blue skies shine after the tear drops fell.    

Columbine

Columbines on Rock Ledge

Limestone ledges for their beds, the Columbines ask for nothing but a place to blossom in the spring.  I grew up calling them Honeysuckles, but they have several names like Rock Bells, Cluckies, Jack-in-Trousers, Granny's Bonnets, and Dancing Fairies.

Don't they look like drips of paint that might have fallen from Mother Nature's paintbrush?  The legend is that the Columbine blossom resembles a circle of doves drinking from a fountain.   Thus, the name Columbine from the Latin word Columba, meaning dove.

As much as we love the flowers that grow in the wild, we love the flowers that come inside our home just as much.  Most of them are silk, won't wilt, nor die.  Our hanging baskets out on the patio are silk for the same reason.  Not only that, but we don't have to water them or vacuum up the dried leaves.  One of the tricks to neatness is finding ways to prevent the mess in the first place.

Flowers bring life and smiles into a home.  We have a year-round tree that gets shuffled from room to room, and we dress and accessorize her with the season.  Right now she's wearing a garland of yellow and white flowers that sing of spring.  Once in awhile a colorful bird will fly from its storage box and perch inside the branches for a bit of playfulness.  Much like the tiny rubber mouse that has lived on our brick fireplace for lord knows how many years.  It's a family tradition for the kids to move the mouse to a different spot on the fireplace each time they visit.

There are uncountable ways to have fun at home, without spending big bucks.  Garage sales are treasure chests of knick-knack patty-whack things to add spice and flavor to any room in the house.....like the ceramic turtle from Mexico that makes his way around the house.  

Thanks for stopping by. 

 "May your life be like a wildflower 

growing freely in the beauty and joy of each day." 

 - Native American Proverb 

Rooftop Whimsy

In a small Mississippi River valley town this stately structure assumes the roll of ancestor to its neighborhood.  Shrubs of white bridal wreath, with their arching fountain-like branches, add charm and hospitality to the gracious property.  I feel the urge to genuflect before its threshold.

The crowning glory of this home is the rooftop Belvedere that affords a splendid view of the  river basin formed by glaciers millions of years ago.  Wouldn't that have to be the ultimate of personal sanctuaries?

If it were mine, I'd have a cozy couch, fluffy pillows, fleecy blanket, a table lamp with 3-way light bulb, a telescope so I could watch the barges hauling grain up and down the river, my laptop, the classics to read, and earphones to listen to piano music.  All those rooftop luxuries would make me faint, I'm pretty sure.

My fertile imagination conjures up all sorts of scenarios about me living in this home.  I'd have a kitchen staff, a garden staff, a cleaning staff, and maybe even a chauffeur.  I'd have my friends over for afternoon tea parties, serve plates of dainty confections and fancy sandwiches, wear pretty clothes with my hair styled on top of my head.  Oh, and the fuzzy one would get her exercise bouncing up and down the steps behind me like she does now.

The little girl in me is always wondering what life was like in another time and in another place.  Maybe I think I'd be happy living in a tower, but honestly I think I'd be lonely and afraid up there all by myself.  I've heard spooky stories about creaking stairways and people from the past still living in these old houses, and they terrify me.

Hey, the more I think about it, I'm gonna file this in my memory album and be hunky-dory with life in my cozy home that wraps itself around me and keeps me safe as the proverbial bug in a rug.

Love the Children

Laughter

Note to Self:

Morning Thunderstorm

The ceiling fans feel good, circulating the air in the house.  We're a household of cool temperatures and warm hearts.

For years I didn't want ceiling fans in our home.  I had this crazy notion that they belonged in a sultry and sweaty hotel lobby down in the tropics.  A couple of years ago I buckled, and one arrived in our living room and one in the den.  Now I'm the one coaxing for one in our upstairs bedroom. The central air doesn't cool the upstairs quite enough to our liking.

We woke up to hail hitting our windows, thunder, wind, and rain.  Thank heavens our vehicle was in the garage.  Now that summer storm season is here, that's one thing we'll have to be diligent about doing.  It's about 'an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.'  Hail storms have damaged our vehicles in the past, and our insurance company was very cooperative about settlements.  I remember when we had just bought a brand new Pontiac Grand Am, and I was caught in a hail storm on my way home from the office.  All I could do was pull off the road and cry as my car hood filled with dents.  We've adopted a household saying that if it doesn't have a heartbeat, it's not worth getting upset over.

Dark and threatening clouds in the northwest make the perfect backdrop for streaks of lightning.  Hubby is pleased that he took the time to mow the lawn yesterday.  Our house is surrounded by a freshly-groomed carpet of green.  Lots of intense color out there, considering the sun is nowhere to be seen.

Company is coming around noon.  It'll probably be too wet on the patio for a picnic, so we'll keep the visit indoors.  We'll see how the day plays out.  Burgers on the grill, a macaroni salad, a green bean hot dish will be served around noon, followed by an afternoon rhubarb cake dessert.  Our rhubarb crop this year is scanty, and all we salvaged was enough to try this cake recipe.

The recipe is made in layers:
1.  Spray a 9 x 13 pan.
2.  4 cups of thinly-sliced rhubarb
3.  1 cup sugar
4.  3 cups miniature marshmallows (I used the colored ones)
5.  A cake mix prepared according to directions.
6.  Bake according to mix directions, plus 10 minutes longer or until done.

We thought it only right to sample the cake before bed....wouldn't want to serve a bad cake, you know.  Whammo!  It's a winner and is gonna be the perfect dessert topped with a dollop of Cool Whip.....and, I just might warm up the caramel sauce and oozy goozy that over the top  of each piece before serving to my guests.

Even Mikey would like this one!

Saying Good-Bye to the Past

Today my mind is suffering writer's block, so I'll just scribble and doodle.

Yesterday we hauled out 20 boxes of stuff from our attic, drove them over to an auction house to be sorted and sold.  We're about half done up there.

Boy, I sure can get tired of a project in a hurry.  I can come up with the best excuses if I'm not enthused, but I'm disciplining myself to keep going even if it's filling just one box a day.

As I lay in bed last night, my muscles ached and weariness was all over me.  It's hard work throwing away the past.  The more tired I am, the easier it is for me to fall in a blue funk.  How can I part with my dolly's baby buggy, and how do I say good-bye to Gramma's mantle clock.  When it came time for me to say good-bye to Gramma's treadle sewing machine, that's when I hit the wall.  Nope.  Can't do it.

When I get to feeling sad about my age, I can't come to grips with me being 65.  How and when did that happen?  Wasn't it yesterday when I was a little girl standing by Gramma watching her sew me a dress out of colored feed  sacks?  Life has gone fast, and who knows how much time is left.

Guess I'll just keep on filling one box at a time.  A lot of stuff I'll sell, but there are a few things marked "precious"  that will stay with me for the long haul.

May Day and Lei Day

Hubby will always remember the date his Dad died.  He was with his Mother when her door bell rang.  A little neighbor girl reached out and gave his Mother a May Basket she made for her.  Ahhh, the power of a child to lift heavy hearts.

The word 'may' is with us all year long.  How many times in a day does each of us use the word 'maybe.'  What  emotions must have filled the pilgrims as they walked down the Mayflower Steps in Plymouth England, hoping to find a place where they could practice any religion they wanted.  And, what about mayflies, mayhem, mayonnaise, mayors, maypole, and the mayday call for help.

May is said to have come from the Roman Fertility Goddess Maiesta, and Mother's Day is celebrated on the second Sunday in May.  I could never wrap my head around a Mother's Day.  Shouldn't we honor them every day?  The mother who receives a bouquet of dandelions from her little boy or girl has to feel a delight that can't come FTD.  Anyway, that's how I would feel if I was a mother.

History hails May for Charles Lindbergh making the first solo Trans-Atlantic airplane flight in May of 1927, and Amelia Earhart is credited for being the first woman to do the same in 1932.

On May 13, 1917, three young children in Fatima, Portugal, saw a vision of, and given a message from, the Blessed Mother.

And, if I could be anywhere today, I'd choose Hawaii.  They're celebrating Lei Day.  Read about the festivities at www.hawaiimagazine.com/blogs/hawaii_today/2012/4/30HawaiiOahuWaikiki_Big_Island_Hilo_lei_day.

Hawaiian Lei

P.S.  If my cousin, Leilani, is reading this.......Happy Lei Day, my dear!