the grass is always greener…

my minister, laura, was married on saturday.  it was a beautiful wedding, and she was a gorgeous bride.

her groom, nathan just graduated from duke divinity school, while she still has 2  years to go before she can be a full time minister.  so they’ll be married ministers, who both come from minister fathers.

nathan has been given a small church ( a little bigger than ours) about 20 minutes from ours, and to save money, they’ll live in our parsonage until she graduates and has to leave us; then they’ll move to his church’s parsonage.

they left on their honeymoon on sunday, driving to florida, where they’ll both be in a wedding on saturday.  they have already stopped in charleston and savannah, then it’s on to st. augustine to go on a ghost hunt or something or other.

together, they have 4 dogs: laura bought versace about a year ago, then reese came to her house as a stray.  nathan has layla, and due to his allergies to cats, she traded her 2 cats to her parents for her childhood shih tzu, cheyenne.

they boarded cheyenne and layla with the vet for the honeymoon, but surrogate mama here has the other 2.  reese is extremely skitterish, taking FOREVER to warm up to people, me included.  and versace is so tiny, she didn’t want him to get sick or get hurt, so those 2 didn’t get to go the vet.  they got to come here and remind me why I love my kitties.

yeah, they look really cute all curled up next to me on this ugly couch, don’t they?  and they are cute, until they come in from a 20 minute walk out back and go right over to the corner and poo.  right then, they are not only not cute, but a pain in my ass!!

I borrowed some puppy pads from mama (by borrowed, I mean that she gave them to me, she’s not getting them back) and have put up the baby gates to keep them in the kitchen.  I hate not having them in the living room to snuggle up on the couch, but every time I bring them in there, EVERY. TIME., they crap on my floor.

that’s not even the worst part.  the very worst is that the cats are terrified, and they’re living upstairs.  their food is in the kitchen (where the stupid dogs are) and their litter boxes are in the laundry room, which is accessed through the kitchen.

at night, we crate the mutts in my work room, and the cats are finally free to run around their home.  I feel so bad for them, poor kitties.

laura and nathan should be home on monday, please pray that her dogs are still alive then. 😀

hi, my name is heidi* and I like bubbles.  I’ve had a problem with bubbles for many years, I’d say 30 or more.  I really don’t think it’s much of a problem, but my mother does, that’s why I’m here.  I could quit the bubbles anytime I want to…I really could!  I just don’t want to right now.

so, I really do love bubbles, that’s true.  but my love escalated a couple of years ago when I found a little bubble machine in the toy section at walmart.  Oh, man!  now I could have bubbles on demand, not just when I felt like blowing them myself (a tiring job) or when I could con someone into blowing them for me (that never happened).

we would have bubbles with our morning coffee and chat, with our evening wine, our friends also enjoyed my bubbles, they became conversation starters.  the kids and I enjoyed them in the afternoons; they would try to catch them, or hit them with tennis racquets, even recruiting the little boy next door.

so, my bubble machine and I had a fantastic relationship for 2 summers, it entertained countless children while doing my bidding~I suppose you could equate it to the court jester.  but this summer, it didn’t blow very well.  it was just tired, I reckon.

I went to walmart to find a replacement.  I picked out one just like the old one; the price was right and the old one had been good.  when I got it all unwrapped and batteried up, it wouldn’t work.  like an idiot, I listened to tony when he said, ‘maybe it needs some bubble solution to work’.  it didn’t…I returned it and decided to wait to find a replacement.

soon after, I found one in the bridal aisle.  I got that baby home and filled it up and man, oh man, the bubbles really fly now!  I’m keeping my fingers crossed that being made for weddings means it’s gonna hold up awhile.  but for now, I’m havin some fun.

and just for the record: bubbles do not interfere with my family relations, they have not replaced people in my life, and they do not cause my family to avoid me.

I just wanted to lay that on the table there.

*name changed to remain anonymous

I’ve lived in this little town for 11 years now.  I have almost everything I want/need within about 20 miles from my driveway.  3 miles down my road is the little town of ruffin, where my church and favorite post office are.  on the north east lot of the cross roads are these steps:

I’ve always wondered why the steps were saved from demolition   when the house was done in.  they’ve always intrigued me, with their sad loneliness.

but all the brilliant green around somewhat neutralizes the sadness.  there’s just something here that pulls me in…

for several years, we had a little street (road) festival on this corner, to benefit the volunteer fire department.  this lot would fill up with tents: crafts, food, organizations.  and the steps would fill up with kids.  they would sit, people watching, gossiping, flirting.

I would like to know what these steps have seen in their lifetime…

,

rich took last week off work, with a list of things he wanted to accomplish.  I’m not sure how many he actually managed to get done, but he worked his tail off.  he worked over the weedbed, and we planted several pretties

I can’t even remember all the things we stuck in there, but I know I wanted moss rose for my wagon, and tony really wanted that lilyish thing there in the right corner.  in the summer time, we have an air conditioner in that window, hence the latice.  it’s been there for more years than I’d like to remember, bare as a baby’s butt.  I planted jasmine in front of it once, but my black thumb prevented it from prospering.  then I planted something else a couple of years ago, and it also died.

the bush in front of it will only bush out, not vine.  then, last night, my very generous neighbor brought me some clippings of this beautiful weedy fern that takes over her fence every summer.  it has red flowers and the hummingbirds and butterflies just love it.  so, I think I’ll pull out the bush thing and plant the vining ferny weed.

the pump in the corner came with us when we moved down here.  it’s been buried under weeds by an outbuilding in the back yard for 11 years now.  when we capped the well at the old house, I decided this would look great either in a flower bed, or in a fish pond.  it’s been gone so long, I had totally forgotten about it.  rich uncovered it when he cleaned up the weeds by the building so he could build me a compost container.

see the mushroom he got me for mother’s day?  I’d seen it at walmart, and told him that I wanted it.  I just think it’s so cute.  on either side of it are the azalea bushes that my boy toy jerry bought me.

for mother’s day, rich took tony and I out to ruby tuesday’s for lunch after church.  jessica was going to eat with us, but her manager changed her schedule, so she had to start at 10:30 instead of 1 o’clock.  so instead of eathing with her, we sat in her section.

having the hubs home for the week, and having a nice, relaxing meal with just my guys (not the whole fam like last year) made this the best mother’s day.

I hope y’all had a nice one, too!