Getting the Spring chores done

Where did our Spring temps go?  Supposedly it is 50 degrees, but the wind is blowing, and it's not hard at all to imagine snowflakes flying.  We've been so spoiled this Spring with the unusually warm days we've had.  My sister Mary Ellen did think of one possible advantage to this cool weather - perhaps it will keep the tulips looking beautiful longer.  She and Doris are planning to come here next weekend, and we are so hoping the tulips will be in full bloom at the arboretum.  

My tulips in front of the house have really been showing off this week.   I love red, but when I see all the different colors of tulips that Jeremy grows I realize that I would like to have a variety of colors too. But each fall I forget about getting and planting more bulbs.  Maybe this year??

Now catching up on all that's been happening since my last post.  On Friday afternoon Calvary Christian High School in Clearwater, FL, where Lisa teaches and coaches and Sophie attends, had their last regular season track meet.  I was on the road running errands during the first half of the meet.  I did catch Sophie running the 100-meter dash when I was in our bank parking lot.  She came in first, of course.  

After I was home, Dick and I watched her run the 200-meter dash.  However, there was no sound with the live video!  The only thing we could hear was when they would call for the events that would be coming up, and occasionally giving the scores of events.  So while we knew that Sophie would be running the 200, we didn't know for sure which heat she would be in, so this video I took has no narration except Dick and me trying to figure out if she was running or not.  Lisa thought it was hilarious.  She told us to keep our day jobs, hahaha!!  Again, Sophie came in first.  

The next day I realized that I had missed her 4x100 relay, probably while I was driving.  Lisa posted this.  That's Sophie taking the baton for the last leg of the relay.  Look at her face!  And the muscles in her arm!!  She is just incredible!

Also on Friday, I saw a picnic table offered for sale on Facebook Marketplace.  I sent the link to Dick at work and he told me to get it.  A man in Lock Haven, about 45 minutes from here, makes these tables as a retirement project.  He even delivered it to us Saturday morning for a fair price.  It is so well made and absolutely beautifully finished.  We are so happy with it.  

Saturday was a work day around here.  We weeded and cleaned out old leaves from all the flower beds.  Dick thinned out some of the tall grasses and yucca plants and took some things to Lori because she wanted them.  At one point I was emptying out some potted plants behind the side porch.  I threw the first empty pot up over the porch railing because I intended to put it in the garbage can up there. 

 

Then I threw the second one up over the railing and it landed right inside the first one!!  I was all by myself, but I cracked up!  I am the least athletically gifted person ever, and I was pretty proud of myself!     

When I posted the picture on Facebook, my sister Mary Ellen reminded me that I had been good at corn hole the other summer when we siblings were together.  I told her I had thought of that too.  It was the craziest thing!  There we were, playing corn hole at my brother's place, and I was having my normal bad luck, and then I suddenly had a streak where I was getting the bean bag into the hole time after time after time.  We were just dying laughing, because it was so unexpected and unusual for me, haha!

When I was finished with the flowerbeds on Saturday I started my next project.  Our modular house has a low basement under the back part of the house, not high enough to stand up, but good for storing some things.  There is a cinder block wall around it that had never been painted.  A couple of years ago I had primed and painted the wall on the back side of the house, but I hadn't ever done any more since then.  The flowers get so big and thick that it has to be done either in the early spring or late fall.  I decided to tackle it again before the flowers get too big.  I got the priming done on the one side of the house.  

The daffodils really were too big already,  and I wondered how I was going to paint behind them.  Dick had a great idea that worked well.  He got a thin piece of plywood out of his shed.  I held the plywood between the wall and the flowers and leaned in over the plywood to paint the lower part of the wall.  There are no pictures of that process, trust me.  It was not a pretty sight!!

Dick got some mulching done while I was doing the painting.  We were tired puppies by evening, but were satisfied with our accomplishments.  

We ended the day with a campfire and some roasted sausages.  It was so nice to have a picnic table on which to put my stuff instead of needing to drag a card table outside.  

While we sat at the fire (it was getting rather cool),  the next door neighbor man came over to show us his vaccine card.  Then he sat down at the end of the picnic table bench and we continued chatting.  After a while the lady that lives behind us came up the little hill and joined in the conversation too.  Before long she sat down on the other side of the picnic table!  They both stayed for quite a while.  

I wanted to take a picture for the Front Yard Missions FB group that we belong to, but I decided that would be weird.  We had been talking lately in the group about the book "The Turquoise Table."  Look up the book if you're curious.  Anyway, the leader of our FB group offered to pay for turquoise paint if anyone wants to paint their table.  I told the group that apparently it doesn't have to be turquoise to draw the neighbors in, haha!   Dick said there's no way we're painting ours turquoise.  Maybe I'll compromise and get a turquoise tablecloth for it.  

Look at this amaryllis!!   It was getting so top heavy we had to tie it to a dowel rod on Saturday.   Three beautiful blooms.   It sat completely dormant for over three months after my secret sister at church gave me the bulb at Thanksgiving.  And then some green popped out of the bulb and it just shot up in no time!

Sunday was an interesting day, weather wise - rain, warm sunshine, extreme thunderstorms. It rained in the morning and was very overcast.  I took the picture on the top left (below) from our car in the church parking lot.   

When we got home from church I said, "I don't feel like staying home all day."  Dick's always ready for a drive.  So after we had watched Calvary's service online, and had the YouTube video of our GBRV service uploaded and put on the church's Facebook page,  we hit the road for Lancaster County.  

The pictures above were taken as we were driving that afternoon near Alex's dad's place.  I was imagining what Anne of Green Gables would have called the road if she had driven on it.  

I was hoping that maybe we could see Bjorn and Jess's house that they recently bought.  Sunday was his 25th birthday.  But they had other plans and would not be home.  That's what I get for being such a spur of the moment person.  

Then I thought perhaps we could meet Alex's grandma who was visiting from Puerto Rico.  But she was doing something else with Alex's sister that afternoon.  So we hung out with Destiny and Alex and Elizer at his dad's place where they live.  Then we got an idea.  They had been sleeping on a full size mattress on top of a queen size frame, and it had been giving me fits because it was a safety hazard.  Destiny had a queen mattress and box spring in her storage unit, they just needed a way to make the switch.  So we found a U Haul place that was open and we rented a pickup truck.  We got the full size set taken to the storage unit and the queen size set brought to the apartment.   I was a happy grandma, getting rid of that safety hazard!  Trust me, I did not do any of the carrying!  I was the babysitter!  

Look at this boy in the car seat and then in his daddy's arms!!  His personality and physical strength and coordination are just growing by leaps and bounds!  

Here's a picture I took while we were FaceTiming this week.  He had no interest in looking at my face.  He just wanted to touch Destiny's phone and press buttons until he had hung up on me, hahahaha!!  Not intentionally, of course.  Little stinker!

On Tuesday I got the tan paint done over the part I had primed.  I was satisfied when I was finished.  

I was not, however, satisfied with this part!  At one point, in trying to step over a stump of cut-off grasses, I stumbled, and both I and the paint can went for a sprawl.  I scooped up as much of the spilled paint as I could with my paint brush.  Dick said it will grow out.  

Actually, Tuesday was not a good day.  I was doing laundry, and for the first time ever my washer leaked.  I did not know it until the load was finished and there was water all over my laundry floor and in the two laundry closets and on the bathroom floor that is next to the laundry.  So with many towels everything got wiped up.  But then there were many wet towels and I couldn't put them in the washer.  And I couldn't finish the loads of laundry that were in piles on our bedroom floor.  That evening Dick did manage to fix the problem and before I went to bed the wet towels were washed and spun out with no more leaking.  Whew!

What made everything worse was the issues I've been having with my left hand.  I think I probably have carpal tunnel issues.  I've been to the family doctor and have other appointments coming up.  My hand and arm tingle absolutely all the time, and at night I have a good bit of pain.  On Tuesday my wrist and fingers were so painful, I felt like a one-armed paper hanger when I was trying to paint.  So the laundry problems seemed so much bigger than they normally would.  

I'm going to add here that in sharing this I'm not really asking for advice.  Like I said, I have been to my doctor, I am taking/doing some things she advised, and I'm waiting for some scans and an appointment with an orthopedist.  

I've been wanting to tell you about this Bible study I'm doing with the Abide group at Calvary.  Beth and Melissa Moore's study of Galatians.  We meet on Thursday mornings and watch that week's video, then there are five days of homework to do between Thursdays.  This past week I have managed to do each day's homework.  Oh.  My.  Goodness!!!!  I have never taken a Beth Moore Bible study before, and I had no idea how incredibly GOOD and interesting and challenging it would be.  Studying with her is like including every reference in a cross reference Bible.  Back and forth between the Old and New Testaments and other books in the New Testament.  And so much more as she brings in profound thoughts and stories from other writers.   If you ever have a chance to be part of this Galatians Bible study, I highly recommend it and encourage you to do it!

That's it for this time!