Birthdays Aren't So Bad

I love celebrating birthdays, other peoples birthdays. When it comes to my own birthday I always want to let it just sort of slide by. Thanks to wonderful family and friends it doesn't happen that way. My birthday was this week and I had a great day. I woke up to cards and gifts from Doc and Dodger. I went to work and got more gifts and the afternoon off. After a phone call from my son and his family who are on a camping trip I went to lunch with my daughters and their kids, made extra special with hand made cards from the kids. EJ was especially proud of hers (bottom right) which was so thick with paint it is probably still not dry.

After lunch I went swimming and to the ice cream shop and candy store with a couple of my grandkids. When I got home there was a package on my porch from my friend Betty at A glimpse into midlife. Betty, who lives in Paraguay, is so good that she managed to send a package from over 5000 miles away and have it land on my doorstep exactly on my birthday.Way to go Betty and thank you very much. The package contained this beautiful wooden picture frame. The frame swivels on the stand so pictures can go on both sides. Betty, who also has a birthday this month, is a special person and a great blog friend to me. I hope someday that she can land on my doorstep.

Last night I went out for a birthday dinner and to our town's Street Fair with my friend, Claire, and today I am going to a birthday lunch with my brother and sister-in-law. We'll have a family get-together soon where I will get cake and hopefully (hint, hint) a new picture of all my grandkids together.

Thanks to everyone for showing me that Birthdays Aren't So Bad.

Old Fashioned 4th

Our holiday weekend was pretty quiet with Doc and Dodger going to the dog park and working in the yard a lot and me doing, well, not much. It ended with a 4th of July which felt kind of like an old fashioned day to me. I went with my daughter Jill and her family to their swim club, a club which has been around for over 50 years. 

The pool had the feel of the kind of pools I went to when I was a kid. It even still has a diving board which Jared and Justin made good use of.

The boys played some water football with their dad, who showed great skill in catching the ball mid-air as he jumped off the diving board. He showed even more skill with some fancy dives. 

There were pool games and "biggest splash" contests for the kids and lots of old-fashioned fun.

Later in the evening I went with my other daughter, Joanna, and her family to watch their town's fireworks.

Beck watched the fireworks wide-eyed, saying an occasional "oooh!"

EJ was all smiles and kept saying "I love celebrating the 4th of July."

I agree.....it was fun celebrating the 4th of July.

Panty Hose

You remember panty hose, those not-so-comfortable leg covering things many of us used to wear almost all the time. 

Thanks to Katie Couric and a few other high profile women, wearing panty hose has become sort of an old-fashioned thing to do. Sadly, panty hose became old-fashioned at about the same time that I looked down at my legs and noticed that little place just above my knees had started to look like it needed to be ironed. That was also about the same time that I realized that those creases around my ankles caused by wearing socks were starting to take at least a half day to go away after I took the socks off. And, sadly, a good sun tan on my legs is no longer allowed. It seems panty hose went out of style just when I really needed them.

I know, I know, it is very shallow to be swayed by the dictates of fashion. I guess I shouldn't worry too much anyway.....I'm probably old enough that a fashion faux pas would not be noticed at all or would just be considered quirky. I guess for now I'll just stick to pants and those, what are they called-oh yeah, trouser socks. I just wish those things came with control tops.

Road Trip

Image from Google Images

I wrote most of this post over two years ago, but I am starting to feel this way again. 

I wish my title meant that I am planning a road trip. Unfortunately it only means that I have been thinking about road trips a lot lately and wishing I was planning one. It's been a while since I have been on a road trip.....California to Colorado with my sister-in-law, Nancy

A good road trip is hard to beat. A good traveling companion, like the above mentioned Nancy, is a great plus. Whether alone or with someone, I love the "cocoonish" feeling of being in the car with nothing to be responsible for but putting the miles behind you. Good scenery or just one town after another, I love seeing things I've never seen before. I love having hour after hour to listen to old songs on the radio (and sing along if I'm alone) or listen to a book on a CD.. I love the time to talk with someone without all the normal distractions. And, there is no better excuse for eating junk food than a road trip.

I know, there are all kinds of road trips. Road trips with kids are in a class by themselves, but I bet most of us have memories of family road trips that were good, or at least memorable. I remember my Dad being stopped for speeding and having "words" with a policeman that I thought were going to land us all in jail. My kids learned that I could get from the front seat to the back of the station wagon or van with amazing speed.

My longest road trip was driving from Colorado to Belize.....seven days there, five days back and weeks in Belize in between. There were things about the trip that weren't great (a not-the-best traveling companion), but the road travel was an unforgettable experience. I tried to find some pictures from that trip, but I ran into some old Christmas candy, or maybe it was Halloween candy, in the closet and I got distracted and gave up.

As I said, I don't have a trip planned right now, but I may have to pull out a map and start planning.

Would You Look At That or Little Things Mean a Lot

A work colleague that I have talked to a lot on the phone but never met in person came into my office today with a gift for me. The gift was a very cool little electric candle operated by a tiny remote control that turns it on and off, changes the color, sets the light to flickering or steady and sets it to turn off after after a set amount of time. It is even scented, and it was a very apt gift since we have a strict prohibition against burning candles in our offices.

A cool gift, but it meant so much more on a day that was stacking up to be hectic, bordering on stressful. It was a gift that allowed me to stop for a moment and appreciate someone's thoughtfulness. It was a gift that made me think about needing to show that thoughtfulness to others more often. It was a gift that made me feel good and made me want to do something to make someone else feel good. The giver said "oh, it's not much," but to me, today, it was a lot.

Freewheeling Friday

Between baseball and, frankly, a little summer laziness I have been away from my blog for nearly two weeks. I thought that after that much time away I would be full of things I wanted to write about, but it seems like whatever little blog mojo I might have is a use it or lose it thing. Oh well, I can't let having little to say get in the way of a Freewheeling Friday catch-up.

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I have been going to a lot of baseball games and I have missed a lot of games since the schedules often overlap. What I haven't been doing is taking lots of pictures. I borrowed this one from daughter-in-law's Facebook page. Wil, who will soon be 6, is a first time Little Leaguer and he takes his baseball very seriously.

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A couple of things that happened this week showed me that even things that irritate us can give us something to be thankful for.

I missed a baseball game on Wednesday night because I got caught in a traffic back-up caused by a very serious wreck. Even though it was irritating to be stuck in traffic for over an hour and to miss the game, I was very grateful to be the one stuck in traffic and not one of those involved in the wreck.

Thursday morning at about 2 a.m. I was startled awake by the phone ringing. (The only good middle of the night call I have ever gotten was when Joanna called to tell me Brandon had been called up to the major leagues).  This early morning call turned out to be a reverse 911 call about a missing little girl. The phone rang again about an hour later with the information that the little girl had been found. Even though it was irritating to be woken up at that time by a ringing phone, I was thankful that our town had made the effort and that the little girl had been found.

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My friend Sonia at Gutsy Writer has asked her readers to write a life list, a list of 10 things you want to do. I haven't come up with a list and I am wondering if it is because I have a waning sense of adventure (which I don't think is the case) or if I am just feeling a sense of contentment with my life right now. Of course, there are always new things I want to do and places I want to go, I just can't seem to come up with a list. Go visit Sonia to see some very interesting lists.

I Blame Baseball

I have never been what anyone would call a prolific blogger.  The truth is that I am more of a hit and miss bogger, but I usually come up with a post at least a couple of times a week. Lately I feel more like an almost never blogger. 

I blame baseball.

My four oldest grandkids are all playing baseball this summer and it seems like almost anytime I am not at work there is a baseball game to go to. I am, in fact, missing a game this morning, but there are two more I could go to today. There are two Monday night, one Wednesday night.....and so on until sometime in July.  I don't get to all of them by any means, but I love to go to the ones I can, which leaves me with little time for blogging or much of anything else right now.

When time and energy permit I will, of course, choose blogging over cooking, or laundry or any other chores, but if I don't show up here much for a while it is all baseball's fault.