A Gardener's Work is Never Done

Last summer was a rough and busy year not only physically and mentally for the people, but the landscape and gardens too.  We didn't have much time or money with all of the running to job interviews, doctor visits, helping MIL, and all of that to keep anything close to what I normally like to so.  You can really tell the toll the relative neglect has played on our landscaping, on our raised vegetable beds especially.

I wasn't around enough to keep them as weed free as I normally do, and now the grasses have claimed my wonderful soil and sent their tendrils to take over entire beds.  I have wished many times that I had gotten all of them mulched that lay dormant last year, but with all of the chaos and confusion I guess I wasn't really thinking of future gardening here.  We got the place ready to sell, convinced that we would never be able to stay in the place we had called home for 8 years at that point.

So now ahead of me lays the task of getting the beds weed free, dividing perennials to fill in gaps in the landscaping (I'm pretty sure the critters dug up and ran off with some of my plants), moving bushes and shrubs (that must have been planted in the wrong places because of labelling issues), and a long list of other maintenance issues.  It's almost like we moved to a new place as long as my list has become once again! I'm sure there are some out there who can relate.

So, in the coming weeks I will be posting some before and after pictures as I work my way around the garden (again).  I love to chronicle my yard with pictures so I can look back at how it has changed over time, don't you?  My memory isn't as great as it used to be.

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message. I'd love to hear your thoughts! Cindy

Why try Gluten Free?

Earlier I wrote a post about doing a gluten free trial and some of my thoughts as well as a few things I have read about gluten from various sources that all had a very similar message.  Cut the wheat to improve your health.  It will allow your body to do what it was built to do which is to heal itself when things go wrong with it.  I told you I would discuss with you the reasons for our gluten free trial later this week, so here it is.

We actually have many contributing factors that I think reflect much of what is going on in the rest of America as well.  Brain fog, inability to loose weight, joint pain, hypothyroidism, prediabetic, IBS, low energy levels, bladder issues, ADD, headaches, acid reflux, depression, I could go on and on.

I have been trying to lose weight for years, but I haven't successfully been able to do so since 13 years ago before my daughter was born.  Did I suddenly forget how to exercise and eat healthy?  Well, if you listen to the medical community that is the obvious fact.  I have been told to quit eating so many cookies, to be more active, eat healthier foods, and on and on.  I don't know about you, but I hate being lectured about things I already know.  It's even worse when you are trying to do these things but no one believes you and judges you to be a fat, lazy slob.  They have looked at my food journals and basically said I was lying and I must have forgotten to write down a bunch of food.  Seriously.  Then the medical community wonders why WE have so little faith in THEM?

My son has been a 3 sport athlete for 4 years.  At first the weight just fell off.  Being so active and lifting weights brought about a bit transformation in him.  But he totally stalled out when it came to weight loss for wrestling season this year.  None of our prior weight loss ideas has helped him a bit this year either.  What happened?

I could go on and on giving the back stories behind all of the symptoms listed above, but I think you get the point here.  I have been thinking and thinking about this and it just doesn't add up.  Is it the chemicals and preservatives in processed foods?  Overuse of prescription medications?  What gives?

Several years ago I began by cutting out the ready to eat processed foods that we used to buy from the store.  I began canning, dehydrating, and freezing foods that I grew myself or bought on sale and in season from farmers and grocery stores alike.  It does make more work for me, but it has helped some with things like ADD, but it hasn't completely solved all of our issues.  I continued to search for answers to our health dilemmas.

While studying natural remedies to replace some of the prescription and OTC medications we have been taking I kept coming up with the same information.  Our bodies have natural abilities to heal themselves.  Not that we will ever be able to stop everything completely, but it is a nice goal to wish for.  I began to wonder though, what was stopping my body from reaching it's full potential to heal itself?  The search continued.  I began seeing a chiropractor which has helped to increase my energy levels and clear the brain fog, but I still haven't been able to achieve much in the way of weight loss.

Now comes in the gluten free option.  I read the book Wheat Belly which I saw both on Dr. Oz and a few of my friends were trying it and seeing great results.  That book dealt with EVERYTHING on our list, plus others that weren't even on there.  Wow.  I think it's worth a try.  I mean, after examining our regular diet I noticed that we ate ALL of the no-no foods on a regular basis.  ESPECIALLY wheat.  Really.  Wow.  I never imagined that could cause so many issues, but it really does make sense.  When you overload so much on one particular category of foods, I suppose that is what you get.  I just can't help but wonder why wheat is in everything we eat.  I guess I'll be making MORE of our own stuff.

So, what did we like to eat before going gluten free?  Well, some of our favorite meals include burgers, chicken dumpling soup with a loaf of bread, grilled cheese and tomato soup, spaghetti, pizza, brats, breaded chicken baked in the oven, battered fish, ...  Notice what they all have in common?  Yup.  Wheat in every item there.  Guess who's in for a total meal make over?  Yup.  That's my next post.  So far we have tried a few items that I want to share with you.  I did manage to lose a couple of pounds so far so things are moving in the right direction for me.  Once I can get the rest of the family to jump on the bandwagon it won't be so hard to resist the temptations they keep presenting.

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Cindy

Living on One Income

It is hard to believe in this day and age that it can be done, but it has been.  By many people.  How do we do it?  And  why would we want to?

Ever since I could remember I had worked.  When I was 11 I got my first job, a paper route.  I helped my parents clean and paint the apartments we managed after we moved and I could no longer have a paper route. I babysat the neighbor's kids and I helped teach tae kwon do classes.  When I was 16 I got a job at the local Holiday station store.  I worked my way through college working 32 hour work weeks and some quarters I carried 18-20 credits when a full load was 12-16.  I have always worked hard and enjoyed having money to buy things I wanted, why would I want to change the way I lived?

As soon as I graduated from college I found out I was pregnant and went full time where I had worked my way through college.  When my son was born, I only got to spend 6 weeks at home with him.  It broke my heart.  Between all of the hours he worked and never being able to spend much time together as a family, it really started to get to me.  He stayed with his grandparents while I worked, so it was somewhat of a comfort to me that he was cared for my people who loved him so I soldiered on in my full time career.

When he was almost 2 I had to take over paying for the care of my son while I was at work because   his grandparents weren't available any more.  Between having an educational background and the discount I would get on child care I decided there would be nothing better than working at a day care.  I was even the teacher in his room and I got paid to spend the day with him.  What could be better than working with your kids???

I proceeded to have another child and would have probably been content to stay there but for the fact that I wasn't appreciated and my son was going to be starting kindergarten in the next town over in a few months.  I didn't get the pay raise I was expecting so I decided to stop paying all that money to drive where I wasn't appreciated when I would earn a whole weeks' worth of income in 2 days using my teaching license to sub.  So I put in my notice and quit my full time job.

At first I started finding ways to save money since teachers don't work during the summer.  I mean, I had already made my daughter's solid baby foods, finding new ways to save money was intriguing.  Growing our own veggies, making bread, sewing clothes, it was an adventure every day.  The more I learned, the more I wanted to learn.

The more ways I found to save, the more I started to wonder if I could really afford to stay at home with my kids.  I mean, as a stay at home mom the kids would always have someone who could come to watch their concerts, volunteer for their field trips, attend all of their sporting events, there was no end to the amount of time a SAHM could spend with her children.

We quit buying expensive Christmas gifts, we started making gifts for others instead of buying them, didn't spend large amounts of money sending kids to camp, less eating out, stock up on bargains to save future money,...   Yes, we made some major sacrifices, but I really don't think that we missed out on much.

I keep coming back to the  same questions.  Do we need all of the latest clothing styles?  Will my kids suffer if they can't go to art camp?  Are name brands and impressing people worth the extra effort and the time away from family?  The more I think about it, the less I think I am really giving up.  After all, if people just like us for what we wear then they are not worth knowing if you ask me.

The more I think about it, the more I think working outside the home costs a family.  As a working mom, you need nice work clothes, you are tired from working all day so you buy a bunch of convenience foods and dinners out that a SAHM doesn't need to buy, you feel guilty for not having time to spend with your children so many compensate with material possessions which really teaches kids the wrong message.

As an added bonus cutting out the dinners out and prepackaged foods has done so much for our health saving us trips to the doctors too.  Now I just can, freeze, and dehydrate all my own stuff.  After all, I only use recognizable ingredients that I know how to pronounce and it's still fast and easy for those busy nights.

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Cindy

Making my First Quilt

I have been talking to my hubby for years about wanting to be more self sufficient.  At first it started out as just wanting to do my own crafty things.  I mean really, no one made any palm tree quilts and I had all of these grand ideas of decorating my whole house in all home made items.  It couldn't be that, hard, right?

I am not relating this tale to make myself look like a bumbling fool (though I'm pretty certain I also do an excellent job of that as well), rather I am trying to prevent you from making the same mistakes I made.

Back in 8th grade home ec we were taught how to use a sewing machine to make a class sweatshirt.   Never mind that I had sewn the stripe on upside down in an over-locking stitch then proceeded to have to tear out all of that thread, I still wanted to sew my own pillows, curtains, and such.  My mom generously bought me a basic sewing machine for my birthday in 2005, almost 20 years after my first sewing lessons.

Over the next year, I began to hone my sewing skills with some simple projects.  I went to work right away making pretty purple curtains (complete with glitter) for my daughter's princess room, pillow covers for our couch pillows in the living room, a swag and some curtains for the living room, shortening pants for our short family.  It was going great!  I even started making some clothes.  I was really proud of my accomplishments and wanted to keep on learning to do more.

Thread tension wasn't right

I bought the fabric I wanted, got it all cut into squares and rectangles using a cutting mat and rotary cutter.  I wasn't going to use a pattern because the last time I used one I messed up and had to undo what I had done then do it right.  No patterns, no problems, right??

Wrong!  The first problem I hit was that we had to pack up and move because Cheesehead got a job transfer.  These beautiful squares stayed locked up in a box for 7 years until they were rediscovered!

4 block squares

Once I found them and felt adequately motivated enough to get going, I started sewing the squares together into my first quilt I ever made.  Well, when the thread tension isn't set correctly it begins to make the material pucker and not lay flat so I needed to adjust that.  Um, I didn't...

I sewed the smaller squares into blocks of 4 alternating the material and reorienting the fabric from the palm fronds into different directions to give the quilt some added interest.  Except apparently I didn't really cut them into all exactly the same size squares...  Note to self, measure twice, cut once, write some notes if you are going to put it away for a while.  Seriously.

Well I was feeling pretty darn good about myself and how wonderfully the quilt was coming together.  I got all of the 4 blocks together, sewed the rectangles into a line that would go down the center or the quilt, and then discovered a couple of other little problems with my process.

Ironing

I washed the fabric when I first bought it, but didn't iron.  I hate ironing because usually when I iron something I iron more wrinkles into the fabric than I get out and it ends up looking terrible.  Well, washing the fabric checks for fraying, but when it's not ironed it doesn't lay quite right, so it can make your pattern go awry.  Plus, you need to iron to make the seams lay flat.  I learned this from some friends I met online who have actually made quilts before.  Well, I ironed to give the quilt a nicer look, see?

I didn't watch my seam allowances closely when I was putting the quilt together AND I didn't make sure the raw edges were completely lined up all the way up and down the entire square so there were some sewing misses that I had to go back and fix.  Bad, this was very, very bad.

Now, when I put the center strip in and started matching up the 4 blocks to be put together the fabric didn't line up right.  Rather than doing what I should have and ripping it apart and beginning again keeping the exact same seam allowance and trimming the squares to be exact matches, cutting extra fabric from the rectangles, I pressed on and did some improvisation.  All to save myself from extra work.

I found this great brown fabric in my fabric stash, isn't it great?  I trimmed it up (thinking I had already washed to check for fraying) and set it in among my mismatched fabric.  Feeling pretty darn proud I showed it to my husband who said he couldn't wait to use it.   Isn't the color combination stunning???   I even found this great sheet at a thrift shop that made for a beautiful backing material, see on the bottom right corner?  I also bought an unopened bag of batting from there. (Or so I thought...)

Mostly finished quilt

Now I was excited to get the two sides put together!  I know this quilt wasn't the queen size that the back sheet was, so I knew I would need to do some trimming.  I laid out the top and laid the backing material over it and carefully pinned it together.  This is when my sloppiness would really shine through.  First I pinned the wrong sides together, when I should have pinned the right sides together so I had to repin.  I also did the batting at that time to save myself an extra step.  I pinned it to the sheet and started trimming.

The pieces I cut from the sheet came off lopsided.  I mean, not even slightly uneven, but majorly so.  I'm thinking I should have gathered up my measuring tape and verified sizes of everything because I obviously didn't remember from one time to the next.  Did that stop me?  Nope, I just kept right on going!

I got the 3 side sewed together, turned it right side out, and finished the last seam.  Then it was time to tack the 2 sides and the batting together.  It was already wonderful, as it sat on my lap I felt so warm!  I decided to just tie the sides together as opposed to really quilting it because I really didn't know the first thing about making a quilt and I didn't want it to look bad.  (A little late to worry about that now, huh? lol)

I decided to use a nice green yarn that I got at a thrift store because if would really stand out against the tan sheet backing. As I worked through I placed a tie at each corner along the row of squares.  The first edge looked great, but the further I went, the tackier it looked.  Places that lined up when flattened together from one way bulged and buckled when viewed from another way.  I don't know how many ties I had to remove to make it look decent again.

Then, came the worst piece of information.  As I proudly viewed my "completed" quilt, I saw some edges coming apart along the brown fabric.  Apparently I hadn't checked it for fraying.  So now this fragile beauty will end up hanging on a quilt rack not to be used, but as a gentle reminder of my failings and of my lack of humility.

Lessons I took from this experience.

1.  If you take a break for any length of time, get back in slowly so you don't make mistakes.
2.  Measure twice (or even more!), cut once.
3.  If it doubt, check it out.  (EX. Meaning rewash if you don't know if you did or not!)
4.  When getting things second hand, check the size BEFORE you do the project.
5.  Follow the correct seam allowances even if you DON'T have a pattern because you obviously had something in mind when you cut the fabric in the first place.
6.  Do it right the first time, even if it isn't the easiest path.
7.  Ask an expert.  Really, there are processes for a reason.  At least use a book for Pete's sake!
8.  Pride cometh before the fall.



Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Cindy

I Cried Today

I am not an overly emotional person. I am not in touch with my feelings. It is easy for me to put distance between my thoughts and my feelings. I keep drama out of my life at all costs. It is easy for me to keep people an arms' length away. I do not share my thoughts and feelings with many people, especially not those whom they should be shared with. I am not sure how I got to be this way.

I have searched for ways to connect more with both my feelings and other people, with little success. I barely cried at my dad's funeral, until I saw one of my friends from high school that I felt really comfortable with. The only times I can recall crying, aside from funerals and sad movies, are times that I tie into my depression. What made me cry? All I know is that this time it wasn't just because of my depression and this isn't any spilled milk we're crying about here. Or is it?

I madly started swiping the tears away with the backs of my hands. Why can't I stop crying? Thoughts and possibilities swirled through my head. Past events, circumstances, times I have just let people walk over both myself and my family. My insecurities surfaced and I could not quiet the voices that were telling me I would never and could never be good enough. Things I feel I have no control over, things I feel that I can not change, and people who won't hear me or don't care about my circumstances just frustrate me so much. Anchors I have tied my life to are slipping through my fingers. I have always thought having faith, dedication, perseverance, and making smart decisions were all I needed to get through this life in one piece, but now our life is so far off course, so far from what we tried to plan for ourselves I don't know which way to go. Storm clouds keep rolling through my life and I can not do anything to make them go away. It's all I can do to try to stay out of the pouring rains. I cry out to God, but he doesn't seem to be able to hear me. Where is that megaphone?

Why must life be so hard? It is obvious to me that I am supposed to learn a lesson in this, but what is that lesson? I am still searching. What choices am I supposed to make? What changes am I supposed to make? Is there such a thing as being too open to change? I refuse to give up. I will keep pushing on, pressing forward, and hoping and praying for God to show me the way.

God, please come and take me by the hand and lead me to whatever it is that you want from me. I can not find my way to the sheltered harbor without you. Please do not leave me to drown. Instead, give me the faith I need to get out of the boat and to walk on the water towards you through the scary storms of life.

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts! Cindy

Home Made Tooth Powder

In my quest to be more chemical free, I found so many interesting things that I could make with the same base of ingredients that I thought why not try to make some of these things. The problem is to actually find the products that I am looking for. I mean one recipe calls for powdered calcium carbonate. What the heck is that, why do I need it in my tooth paste, and where do I find it?

It turns out that calcium carbonate is in lots of stuff. It's in the lime we use to neutralize the acidity of our soil. I don't think I want to use that though... Those OTC antacids have it in there and they are already flavored so that's a bonus. That's what I ended up using since my choices are limited around here, but ideally I wanted to use something without any additives. I hear you can get it at health food stores so I may have to look into that next time I'm out and about.

The recipe in Home Made, Best Made from Reader's Digest called for 13 TBSP calcium carbonate (used as an abrasive to clean the teeth), 4 TBSP baking soda (detergent), 1 tsp salt (? more abrasive perhaps?), and essential oils of 12 drops cinnamon and 25 drops mint (to cover yucky taste and to soothe sensitive gums).

Well, I don't like to be wasteful so I used my berry flavored antacids. I used my pill crusher to turn it into powder. Somehow I don't think that would go well with cinnamon or mint, so I skipped that. It took a lot of work so I wouldn't recommend that unless there are no other alternatives. By the time I was done crushing all of the purple ones I had 4 TBSP of powder so I cut the recipe by 2/3. At least you could use the tums for their intended purpose though if you would choose to use them. I think I will also skip the salt next time. It does not taste the best though, so I will be doing some tinkering with the recipe. I also used too much baking soda in it. Blah!

It works well as far as cleaning the film off your teeth goes. I have used it twice. The first time I wet my toothbrush before I dipped it into the powder. Don't do that, it's messy and may leave clumps of nasty stuff in your powder. It is stored in a tightly sealed container and it's supposed to keep well. That's one of the reasons I made the powder first.

I think next time I may try to make a paste so I can add the fluoride that I keep forgetting to use. Save your smile says it's the most important ingredient in toothpaste. It's not required in the recipes I found, but it is supposed to help strengthen and protect our tooth enamel.

I will also need a humectant such as glycerin if I am going to make toothpaste. I would chose glycerin because it is also used in lip glosses and lotions so I would have it for more than one purpose.

I will not use a thickener, preservative, sweetener, or a coloring agent though. I am thinking that as a flavoring agent I may use some dried sage or mint from my garden. What would you use?

The actual paste in the book also called for wights of items, a few ounces of this,... so I want to get a digital scale before I do that. It will also help me make my soaps more accurately.

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts!Cindy

The First Day of School

The birds were twittering as we stepped out of our front door into a day that felt much more like the end of October than the beginning of September. The still dew wet grass shone like brilliant crystals as the sunlight streamed through the tiny droplets of water. I couldn't believe that school was starting already and Labor Day hasn't even come and gone yet. It just seems so strange.

Our breaths puffed out of our mouths as we talked about the events of the coming day. We passed the tarp covered tomato plants as we walked down our sidewalk towards the driveway. The plants seemed like giants next to my daughter as she walked down the sidewalk next to me.

The crunch of the gravel under our feet as we walked down the driveway was like a favorite song of mine. We had many good talks as we sauntered to the bus stop together. I couldn't help but wish my son had allowed me these stolen moments with him too. He asked me to stop accompanying him to the bus stop when he was in second grade.

The constant chatter continued until we reached the end of the road and stood on the corner. We took the ceremonial first day of school pictures. I made sure to move the camera all around as I took a few more shots than usual. I need at least one of them to turn out. I am annoyed that I can't even look through a tiny window to see if my subject is centered in the frame.

We heard the bus coming before we saw it. We hadn't really even been looking for it. We had been talking about the new school year and the coming day. She wondered out loud where her new line would be when they line up on the playground. She asked me who was in her class so she knew who to look for in the line. I reminded her of two of the names we read on the list last night at the open house. Her eyes shone as she thought about being in class with two of her good friends again. We exchanged a quick kiss and hug before the bus pulled into view.

As I saw the familiar yellow bus number 224 rumbling down the road towards our stop, I couldn't help but feel the anticipation and excitement of the start of a new school year radiating from my daughter. Larry has been Peanut's bus driver since she was in kindergarten so he knew the sight of us well. He smiled as he pulled up and drew the bus to a stop. It seemed somewhat strange to have the bus company's name on the side changed.

But even the rumbling down the road had seemed like it was just a matter of routine, so it might even be the same bus with a new paint job. It was almost as if summer never happened.

Larry waved my little peanut across the street. Her energy seemed boundless as she practically leaped over the road to the welcoming door of school bus. Her ponytails waved in the chilly morning air. Gentle puffs of white vapor rolled out of her mouth as she breathed.

The next thing I knew the bus was pulling away from the bus stop. I waved goodbye to my youngest child. How fast they grow up. She's already in third grade? It seems like just yesterday I was sending her off for her first day of kindergarten. I suppose that means it's time I replace her backpack. Has she really had it that long?

As I look ahead to the start or the new school year, I can't help but wonder where summer went. Did we even ever have a summer?

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

The Garden I Left Behind

I have talked to you often about the garden I left behind as well as babbling on about plants that made the trip with us on our last trip before the fire sale. Well, I finally got access to the old pictures that were on the computer that crashed. Now I can finally share them with you. Unfortunately we had to send the computer to the scrap yard as it was unsalvagable.

We moved into our second home when my youngest child was still a baby, just a three months old. She has no memories of our first home. We decided we needed a bigger yard for our children and a bit more space, so we moved about 5 miles away. It was the 30th of May in 2001 when we moved in.

We had looked at the house in March when the yard was still under snow. I fell in love with the inside, it was perfect for us! We put in an offer right away. It was only on the market a couple of days before came.

Imagine our shock when we saw the grass did not come back. Wasn't that the whole point of not buying new construction? Our first home had been new construction and we looked at established homes so we wouldn't have to do landscaping or finish a basement. The yard and landscaping were supposed to be in already. It looked wonderful in the winter with lots of trees and everything. Did I mention that most of the trees were dead too when spring came?

The back garden area was wonderful looking. I loved the bushes that hid our back yard from the street behind our house. It was a great place on a corner lot and it was close enough to walk to the beach. Inherited shrubs in the back mulch garden included a staghorn sumac in the center of the garden, 2 sensation lilacs, a white lilac, and red weigela, along with a few plants I never did figure out what they were.

The kids had lots of neighbor children to play with too. My son met his best friend when was about to start kindergarten. They seemed to be attached at the hip always either playing at our house or theirs every day after school.

After we lived there for a while and got to know the neighbors, we were told the people that sold it to us had lived there less than a year. The original owners were gardeners and the yard was always the best yard in the neighborhood. (I could tell from all of the earthworms that completely covered our driveway after the rain in spring.) It was just a shame a year of neglect could ruin all of that hard work. We intended to bring it back to it's former glory. After a bunch of hard work I thought it was right back up among the best.

We enjoyed most of the plant choices of the original owners, but the sumac was a total thug. It kept trying to take over the entire yard, sprouts shot up everywhere. I managed to talk Cheesehead into helping me rip it out even though it had beautiful form. To fill in the gap, we added some arborvitae that were passed along from some of Cheesehead's friends at work.

We added a couple of new garden areas including my prized rose garden. I had 3 climbing roses and 2 bush roses as well as creeping phlox at the entry path. The roses managed to thrive all summer and looked gorgeous each and every year. Somehow I was never able to keep them alive through the winter though. They got replaced each year. It sure was hard pulling out those rose bushes! But my was it lovely smelling to sit on that little bench under the arbor. When we were getting ready to move we planted 3 clematis to climb the arbor and two knock out roses to fill in the space.

The corner must have gotten too much salt spray from winter plowing, we never could get grass to grow in there so we expanded it into a large rock garden. We added a raised perrieneal garden as well as a wide variety of flowering shrubs.

There was a wonderful ornamental crabapple tree. The fragrance by our front door was always so sweet in the spring time. It was like heaven on earth between the flowering crab apple and the carol mackie daphne that grew next to the door. I put a bench there too. We also added plants that lined both sides of the driveway. Why in the world would you have all that rock but no plants anyway?

Near the door all plants the original owners had put in had vanished but the tulips they had planted. I filled it with color and various textures. Anything that survived our long absence before the fire sale came with me from this area. So far the monkshood is the only plant that died from the transplant process.

I added a pink weigela in an open space in the front garden, but the rest of the plantings were put in by the original owners. I think the green we chose looked better with the vinyl siding than the original color. I matched the new exterior lighting to the trim too. Looking back, I think we overspent on the improvements we made.

The back yard was spacious and we enjoyed outdoor entertaining here. It tended to get very hot in the afternoons in summer. We had plans of adding some sort of shade structure but never got around to putting one in.

This was the second garden shed we built. Somehow I never managed to get a picture of the whole shed. I am not sure what I was thinking when I planted these things in there, it was such a small space. They got very overgrown after we moved out. We like to landscape around all of our outdoor structures to add more enjoyment to our time spent outside.

Can you tell Cheesehead likes using landscaping blocks?

It was heart wrenching to have to move from our dream home just over three years ago. We had put a lot of blood, sweat, tears, and money into that place to make it perfect for us.

We moved into our "new" home three years ago this July. I guess I still call it new because we never really got the closure of selling our old home, signing papers, and the whole 9 yards. It was finally foreclosed on after being on the market for more than two years. Technically we've only really been rid of the burden of that house for 7 months. I'm sure glad that never ending saga is over!

Right now I wouldn't change our house for the world, it's really starting to feel like home.

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

Parades and Proper Flag Etiquette

I'm sure most of us will be going to a parade of some sort soon. If not tomorrow, sometime this summer. I am wondering what your thoughts on the following story are.

It happened last year at the forth of July parade. I arrived early at the parade route as usual to stake out a good spot for the kids to chase candy and hopefully remain in the shade so we would be less likely to get a sunburn. We didn't bring chairs, just sat on the curb.

I guess some people came along and decided we had a great spot and set up their folding chairs behind us. When the first flags of the parade passed by, everyone rose and removed their hats so there wasn't a problem with my standing in front of them.

After the next few color guards came by with their flags raised, I stood for those also. They got rather annoyed at me and complained that I was blocking their view. I explained how I was showing my love and respect for my country as well as my respect for their contribution to our country when these color guards came by.

They started sneering and jeering at me when I didn't stand for the cars that came by with their postage stamp flags on them waving from what seemed like lollipop sticks. I tried to explain to them how it wasn't the same, but I really don't think they got it. They just kept up with their rude comments.

Who was right? What is proper parade etiquette when it comes to flags and color guards anyway?

Wishing everyone a safe and happy forth whether they're driving or staying home. Try not to blow yourselves up!

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

Where Did June Go?

The month has brought about much growth both in my life and in our yard, I am constantly amazed at the progress I'm seeing. It's also brought me much needed peace too.

I'm looking at the calendar and I see that there in only a week left of June. Where did this month disappear to? I've been working on getting our current home loan modified, getting lots of little things done I've wanted done in the last three years, finding ways to cut our expenses so we can make it on our reduced income, and just generally getting everything in order.

I seem to have suddenly sprung to life too. I feel so much happier, unencumbered. I feel like life is good again and things are only going to improve. I see hope and harmony and I'm loving it. My energy levels reflect that too, I can't believe how many things I get done in a day nowadays. Not like the days when I was happy to even get one thing done!

Looking around I can see so many blessings that God has sent us, I think that helps lift my spirits too. Everywhere I look I am reminded of these wonderful things that tell me he still loves us. Blackberry brambles seem to have overtaken the entire woods surrounding our house. There are drifts of white blackberry flowers floating all over on the fringes of our yard. Any picture you take seems to inadvertently include pictures of these blooms. If we didn't like wild fruits so much this may annoy us, but it makes me feel truly blessed. I wonder if my blackberry jelly is good enough to sell to raise money to buy my dad a headstone....

The apples I pollinated with a paintbrush continue to swell into fruits. It looks to be covered in numerous apples that are on their way to becoming food for our table. One of the new trees we just planted this year even has one apple growing on it. I'm pretty impressed!

Our first strawberry of the season was ready today. I picked it and gave it to Cheesehead as a gift. He's been kind enough to water the veggie garden even though he hates any vegetable that's not corn or potatoes. He has even talked about giving me more room from his back yard for more future veggie gardens. Will wonders never cease?

I planted two tomatoes in coconut lined baskets earlier this spring. You know... like those green bags that hang on a hook? It's a little experiment. So far it seems to be working out great. Look at all of the blooms it is forming!

Our other tomato plants are taking off too. I have all 16 plants that are in the ground caged up with those cheap little cages. Two of them aren't doing so well, but the others seem to be thriving. Would you believe I got all of these as those cheap little 6 pack plants? We have a total of 18 tomato plants. Looks like I may need to start looking for ways to prepare and can some of my garden goodies! I also planted a six pack each of green peppers and zucchini and a three pack of broccoli in the garden.

Cheesehead can't believe the difference between this year's garden and the gardens of the past. We were just talking about that earlier. I guess I might not believe it either if I weren't living in my body feeling so much better and getting so much done. Cucumbers, beans, and peas are all growing from seed. I also planted some carrots, lettuce, water melon, banana peppers, and squash seeds last week. It may be a bit late but I guess we'll see soon enough. I think I'll try planting a late summer garden of spinach and other goodies too.

This fall I will move the asparagus I planted this spring to a sunnier location with much better soil.

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

If Only...

June 4, 2006 It was a tough day. The day my mom found my dad had passed away. It was so unlike him to miss church she decided to go over for a visit. They had been divorced since before my daughter was born in 2001, but they weren't bitter enemies or anything. I think they got along better after the divorce than before it. I know that dad regretted getting divorced every day. I know he wished he haded actually gotten the papers this time, he told me that many times. So many fights included the threats from both of them about divorce. If only he hadn't gotten those papers they'd still be together.

I know mom has her regrets too. I have heard her say it, if we hadn't gotten divorced I would have been there...
He wasn't living alone though, his brother, my uncle was living with him at the time. Unfortunately he was away and wasn't there to find him either. Why did he choose to be away? If only he would have been there, he could have called 911 and saved him.

Dad had just had surgery in February or March that year. He had a valve replaced in his heart. He was really weird after the surgery, seemed so out of it. He had needed the surgery though, but I wish I would have seen how much care he really needed. I think if he had health insurance in place after the surgery they would have placed him in a program until he was further recovered but they assumed I had the capacity to care for my dad along with the help of my mom and uncle. Little did they know... If only I had asked them to try to place him in that program.

He stayed with me for a after the surgery but I was under so much stress I couldn't stand it. Mom was living there with us and it was totally strange to have a divorced couple living together under your roof. Which one do you kick out? I was watching mom's friend's boyfriend's grand kids too. I never could say no to helping others you know... Mom couldn't care for him in my house while my family and I took vacation to get away from it all, it would just be too strange. The church set it up to bring him meals and check on him while I was gone. He seemed to be doing so well when I got back he decided to stay in his own house. If only I hadn't been under so much stress and he was still living with me.


Dad liked to spend time with his grand kids. He was trying to help my son learn to ride his bike. He took them to sporting events (like this Twins game), swimming, fishing,... if only he were here to still do that with his grand kids. He wasn't here long enough!


This was what his grave site looked like last summer after I visited him. He's been gone three years already? Where did the time go? If only I had the money to buy him a proper headstone...

Next week I'll be researching his side of the family tree some more. If only I had taken the time to attend some of those family reunions, I'd know his relatives a little better!

I better stop thinking about my regrets and start living in the moment! We are going to MIL's house this weekend to help her with some home repairs done and hopefully get some quality visiting time in with her and grandpa. Life's too short for regrets. I think I need to tattoo that on my forehead!

Thank you for stopping by to chat with me. Please leave me a message, I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

I Just Had to Laugh

Here we are, the coldest days of the season so far. Schools all around us are closing because of extreme cold. Tomorrow we are supposed to have windchills of 35 to 45 below (f, don't ask me to make the conversions) through noon. Brrr! I sure am glad we got those heaters installed in the kids' bedrooms this weekend or they'd be freezing down there.

MIL called and told us how all of the schools around their house were closing left and right, so we decided to turn off the bowling tournament to watch the news.

I have never seen the kids watch the news so intently, waiting for Rhinelander to scroll across the bottom of the screen as closed tomorrow. When it started to get close to the R's it seemed to cut right to commercial. I thought that he was going to have a heart attack he was so worked up.

Son was being so loud MIL just had to hang up the phone, she couldn't stand listening to him. I sent Peanut off to take a bath and told Son to settle down. He started chanting "Rhinelander, Rhinelander,..." as the schools flashed across the bottom of the screen. She started chanting from the bathtub. It was really quite funny. I tried to tell them they hadn't made the decision yet, but apparently I don't know anything.

How did I know that the decision hadn't been made? We have this fancy system that calls the district residents with messages such as delays, closings, and special messages. It always calls us before the closing would go through to the news.

I told them to watch for schools around us to close because that is usually taken into consideration. Tomahawk and Wausau were the first ones nearby to close.

Peanut was going to wear her pj's inside out for luck. Evidently her teacher told her that her son had done this once and school was closed the next day, so she thought it would be worth a shot.

Then the phone rang. Anticipation hung thick in the air. The children breathlessly waited until the caller id flashed school district of Rhinelander across the screen. Then they cheered and hooted so loudly I could barely hear the message. It's a good thing that it was a recorded message because I think the person on the other end would have gone deaf. My ears are still ringing.

I guess that means they'll be here to help me with my bloom day post. Lucky me.

Thank you for stopping by. Please leave me a message. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

Our Finished Basment (FINALLY!)

Some of you may have seen the post I did a couple of days ago about 2008 in review. I thought our greatest accomplishments were our shed and the basement. Since you have already seen the shed pictures shared on my blog, I though I'd share our other pet project of the year.

Our basement started out a normal run of the mill type basement. The spaces were wide open except for the supports and the stairs located in the middle of it. We found it rather odd though that the utlities were so widely spread out. We were forced to have two different utility/storage areas because of this.

I had some pictures of the basement before we did any work, but they must still be locked in the memory of my old computer. I guess that will teach me not to back up my files! I may one day find a way to unlock that computer, until then I'll have to improvise.



It stays pretty warm down there despite the fact that we haven't had money to install supplemental heating yet. We did insulate the walls on the exterior walls. Cheesehead and I did most of the work except for the drywalling which we hired out.



It was a bit difficult working down there while also trying to store 1/2 a house worth of furniture in the two storage areas and garage, but we got it done. As you can see, it was piled pretty high. Dry wall dust is a killer too, so we put plastic up to help keep our furniture clean.



This might look a little strange to you, but we wanted to build a bathroom without having to break holes in the cement. Our solution was to buy a lift station for our basement bathroom. This required a series of steps in the bathroom, so we decided to go all out and put in a tub/shower down there too.



The drywall was done early this year... in February I think it was. Then came the tedious job of painting. Drywall soaks paint up like crazy, so we used primer for a less expensive way to get the walls covered. We used a different color in each room.



The bathroom used the rest of the left over paint we had bought to stage our house in MN. I like the color, don't you? It also looks great with the leftover tiles from our kitchen and entry way remodels over at the old house. Boy, seems like we used a lot of leftovers around here! The accessories in our bathroom were purchased to stage our old house too. I think that the white looks nice with our floors and wall color choices.



The faucets were bought on black Friday. Apparently I didn't have to go quite as early as I did, but I guess I was better safe than sorry. Cosmetically our bathroom looks finished, but alas we are still not up and running with that yet. I am also still planning on grouting the tiles.



Peanut's room color came from a mixing of our paints from the old house. We had several cans with varying amounts of paint in them. I decided rahter than dispose of them I'd mix them all together and see what we came up with. The color ended up being almost the color of Pepto Bismol. She loved the color so we didn't even have to buy any paint for her room.



Son's room paint had been chosen for our master bedroom when we first moved in. It didn't match the bedspread that MIL bought for me for Christmas last year, but I thought it looked great with son's green furniture. Green and gold, it's his dream come true. A Green Bay Packer colored bedroom!



Our family room is a nice place for us to sit and visit. I showed you the workout angle before when I showed you that gym I put together so I thought I'd show you a comfy place where we could sit and chat.

I don't know if you can really see the green color on the accent wall in the corner, but it is also another free cycle paint.

Cheeshead had some friends come over that helped with the flooring and various other tasks. We aren't exactly handy at laying carpet if you know what I mean. He did a very nice job of putting down the laminate flooring that we bought on clearance.

We have a few finish details left to do, but they aren't obvious enough to show up in pictures. I'm so glad to have most of this behind me!

I have been babbling about my craft room too, but it is nowhere near ready for display yet. It won't be finished like these other rooms, rather I am working on getting it organized and easier to work in.

New year, new basement! I hope you all have a wonderful new year!

Thank you for stopping by. Please leave me a message. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

Whose Idea was This Anyway?

This whole idea of Black Friday is just bonkers. I guess it never really hit me all that hard until this year. I've only gone a few times in the past, but that's mostly been when I lived in the Twin Citites metro area. With all of the stores to choose from over there it must not have seemed so crazy to me. Maybe it was the fact that so much time has passed since the last time I went on a black Friday that I went when the store opened. Whichever the case, I was completely unprepared for the events of this morning.

It was a quiet morning at my house. MIL and BIL stayed over night so I didn't have to rouse the kids to take on the road thankfully. I quickly got ready and left the house at about 5:15.

I would have thought that getting to the store at 6 would be sufficient, but since Cheesehead works there he advised me to get there before the store opened to get a good place in line. Line? What? Who really heads out that early just to go shopping? Whatever. Dreariy I pulled out of the driveway into the blackness of night to buy fixtures for my new bathroom.

The roads were all still, I didn't meet a single car on my way into town. It was extremely unusual for such a time that was supposedly going to be so busy. Maybe the economy made people decide not to go out shopping today. Come to think of it, I didn't even see any deer.

When I got into town all of the lights on my side of town were flashing yellow or red, not even awake for the day. It was just about 5:30. I decided I didn't have to get there quite so early and decided to drive through town and hit Shopko first. I had plenty of time. Burger King was even closed still. What in the world was he thinking?

As I drove down Lincoln street I started wondering if this was really the same town I had just driven though. Cars were everywhere. Parking lots were packed and there wasn't a single place to bee seen from the road to park at either Walmart or Shopko. Hmm, maybe he wasn't mistaken after all.

I ditched my plans for stopping by Shopko first and headed towards Menards as fast as I could manuver, they did have the best ad after all in my own humble opinion. The cars were streaming into the already full parking lot when I arrived at 5:40. I got one of the few remaining places in the parking lot and parked my car.

Throngs of people were standing at both the entrance and the exit waiting to gain entry. The line was extended about 1/2 way through the parking lot when I arrived. I couldn't help but wonder why all of these crazy people were out at this time of the morning just to get a good deal. Then I caught myself. I guess that makes me crazy too! At least I already knew that.

I quickly walked over to the line of shivering masses to await my entry to the store. I couldn't help but think that if someone were to set up a stand selling sweet rolls and warm drinks they'd make a fortune as my teeth chattered. I snapped a couple of pictures, but they didn't show the mass of confusion that I was greeted with.

I didn't dare wear my favorite warm coat or my hat since they both had the store's name on them and I didn't want to get mobbed by people who were wondering where things were. Luckily I was able to distract myself from how cold I felt by chattering to some people in line behind me. Those poor people were probably sorry they ever said anything to me since I didn't really stop talking until the final comment I made that I wasn't going to run. I'm sure they were probably happy to be rid of my jabbering mouth by the time our "visit" was over. They really seemed very nice. They were from Chicago. I wonder if they found everything they wanted?

By 6 am the line was stretched all the way across the parking lot. People were parking out on the street. You could tell the minute the doors were unlocked as the crowd surged ahead. I bid the couple farewell and set out to grab a cart.

We were shoulder to shoulder, like a can of sardines. It was impossible to turn without bumping into someone. I found myself constantly apologizing to people whom I accicentally bumped or walked in front of. Ugh! I won't be doing this again any time soon. Securing a cart seemed an almost impossible task as I battled my way though the surging shoppers.

I emerged from the crowd into a less crowded area and set out to find my prizes via use of back aisles. First stop? Plumbing. I needed some faucets and a toilet for our basement we're finishing. I don't remember ever seeing such good deals for such nice looking fixtures. Once my two main objectives were secured I felt myself relax. I set out to search for the items it would be nice to have but we could have lived without. What a relief!

Once all of my items were crossed off of my list, I headed over to the checkout line. I must have stood there for about 15 minutes before I saw an employee who clued me into why I have sttod unmoving for so long. Apparently people were joining the line from the next main aisle so I manuvered to a place where I knew I might get into a line that would get me checked out sometime soon.

I found another group of shoppers to chat with while we stood in line waiting for our turn. I thought they had a good system worked out. The mom ran to get some of the things off of their list that they had forgotten to look up while shopping. I had seen a couple of the items they were looking for so I told here where I thought it was I might have seen the items and she set out to find them. Each time she made a triumphant return. What a great system. MIL might have been able to keep our place in line if she had been feeling well, but I don't think she could have endured the early trials of the excursion.

I wished as I stood there that I had picked up this or that, but I wasn't about to leave my place in line so I just made up my mind that I didn't really need them. All we really needed were some good deals for our bathroom fixtures. At least this year I'm buying stuff for our current house instead of spending my money on a place that we had moved out of that I was planning to stage for faster sale!

I was relieved when I was finally able to leave the crowded store to the cool breeze and lightening skies. Now if I could just remember where I parked....

Maybe the deer had the right idea to hide from the throngs of shoppers and hunters.

Thank you for stopping by. Please leave me a message and a backlink. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

A Journey Through Depression

I've been thinking a lot about blogging about depression again for some reason. I have found that if something's weighing heavily on my mind there's a reason and I need to share with others. This post is about my journey through depression and how I finally decided to seek help for my problem.

My struggle with depression started back when my friends left me behind after high school. I have a few family members that suffer from depression too, so I guess I'm sort of prone to feeling depressed and sorry for myself. I also tend to be a bit of a perfectionist and if I don't live up to my own high standards I can be a bit hard on myself. That's a big thing I've been working on lately. I tend to blame myself for things that I really have no control over too. I know it's crazy, but it's a hard thing to control.

After moving much as a child I found it difficult to form true and lasting friendships, so I did a pretty good job of sheltering myself from the pain of friends I had to leave behind. That strategy worked very well for me until I hit high school. I found some friends I felt I could really open up to, I could be myself and they didn't expect me to be anything but myself. I tried to do my best and to be a better person when they were around, but not out of crazed obssession but because I enjoyed it.

When they moved away to spread their wings and head off to college, I didn't feel that I had anyone to talk about my problems with. Our busy lives made us drift out of touch and pretty much loose contact. Stresses built up and I went back to my unhealthy ways of dealing with feelings, mainly eating those yummy comfort foods.

My expectations were high and I didn't do as well as I thought I should do the first year of college, I wasn't even getting a B average and my goal was to have an A average like I did in high school. Not to mention the stress of working 30 hours a week and trying to pay for most of college myself. The vending machines were everywhere and in those days I didn't seem to believe in packing my own lunch to eat at school. It was a crazy year and I gained weight like crazy. I spiraled farther and farther, I was out of control and I didn't even seem to realize it.

After I made some new friends at work and got back into the groove things improved somewhat. I even met this great guy (Cheesehead) who was super sweet eventually who was very interested in me. My underlaying problems remained though and I never fully recovered to myself again. I refused to really open up to anyone again because I just couldn't afford the expense of being discarded again.

Eventually I began to trust again a little bit and I became really good friends with Cheesehead. We began dating, got engaged and eventually got married in March of 1996. I didn't feel free to open up to anyone else though, there was just something about him that made me want to cling to him and him alone. As a newly wed I never felt like leaving the house to go anywhere with anyone besides my husband. I suppose it was the combination of being a newly wed and having a mild case of depression.

My sister decided she didn't like him because she thought I gained weight because I was with him. She thought he was controlling me and telling me that I couldn't go anywhere. She told my friends she thought he was abusive towards me.

I didn't want to go anywhere with anyone, it was the depression and fear of rejection welling up inside me. I never told her the truth since we were never close. She just wanted to blame someone for my problems. It couldn't have been health related or anything. I suppose thoughts like that don't occur to most people though when you're supposedly a young healthy person.

A few months after we got married I became pregnant. I was a little nervous and not completely sure I really was pregnant, I'd never been there before and I wasn't sure I'd be a very good mom. Shortly thereafter I had a miscarriage. Of course I blamed myself. I know now that it wasn't my fault, but this crazy voice inside my head just told me that I secretly didn't want the child so it decided to leave me before I could reject it. Was it my fault because I had just gotten a new kitten and shouldn't have been cleaning the litterbox? I must have given myself toxoplasmosis. I was stretched thin with work, marriage, a new house, and the loss of my baby and the blues seemed to close in around me a little tighter.

I talked to very few people about my miscarriage. They just didn't understand what I was going through. When I talked about it with others they tried to comfort me with comments like "it wasn't meant to be", "it wasn't alive so how could you miss it", "there must have been something wrong with it", the list goes on too.

Why shouldn't a woman be sad when the little life inside her goes away never to be heard from again? Why can't a woman cry when she sees all of these moms walking around with healthy children? I didn't feel it was okay for me to talk about such things, so I just buried them deep down with all of my other baggage. Cheesehead and I made a memorial garden at our new house for the poor life that was snuffed out before we got a chance to really get to know it. It helped me to feel better about life to get out there and get my hands in the dirt.

When I had my son a year later, I felt inadequate for him. He was so very small and I had so many problems with the preeclamsia during pregnancy. I was afraid I would break him like he was some little china doll or something. People were constantly offering me unwanted advise. I know that happens to everyone, but I took it personally of course and thought I was an unfit mother. He was so small, I was afraid to take him outside so I didn't get to garden as I wanted to. Having other people watch my son when I was home would make me a bad mom and I couldn't leave him inside all by himself when he was so small and fragile!

I kept myself mired in such thoughts for years. I tried half heartedly to get full time teaching jobs every now and then and wondered to myself why on earth I had wasted so much money on an education that I would never use.

It got even worse when I had my daughter. I had placenta previa with her (which was also obviously my fault) and ended up spending two weeks on hospitalized bedrest before I had her. I had no visitors really other than mom and dad and cheesehead. I never really thought about it at the time, I just assumed no one cared. Looking back I'm not so sure that anyone even knew I was in the hospital and it was an hour away from where my friends and I lived. That didn't matter to my mind though. I just beat myself up because nobody liked me or cared enough to even call me or send me a card or anything.

Still it never really occured to me that anything was wrong with my attitude or thoughts. As far as I was concerned all of these things were completely normal. I'm not sure how I stayed on the brink of depression for so long.

When my children were older I got back into gardening and started to feel a little bit better. Before we moved I talked with my doctor about thinking I may be depressed but we never did anything about it. I didn't want the label of being depressed.

My dad needed to have heart surgery so he stayed with us for a couple of weeks when he was recovering. Mom lived there too and but they had been divorced for several years before that. It was uncomfortable for everyone. I got even more frustrated because I could never get him to take his pills, I needed to have mom tell him to take his pills before he would take them. I beat myself up some more because he refused to listen to me because he thought I didn't know what I was talking about, it was all my fault.I told myself I was stupid and incapable of doing anything right. Looking back I'd say he just didn't really want to take instructions from someone so much younger than him.

When he died I just knew that everyone blamed me. He didn't live with me anymore and I should have had him move back in with us when my uncle went back to jail. I didn't go over to his house to see what was wrong when he didn't answer the phone. I should have gone over and seen if there was something wrong, why in the world didn't I? Truthfully he was always involved in something and he rarely ever answered the phone when I called but that thought also never crossed my mind when I was in the midst of beating myself up again. My depression kept me sinking deeper and deeper into a dark funk I couldn't break free from.

I blamed myself for moving my family far from home and not being able to sell our old house, for being stupid enough to buy a house upon the advise of the bankers and realtors when I should have been smart enough to know better, I should have thought to fix all of the little problems with my old house before I out it on the market, I shouldn't have been stupid enough to have spent all of that money on my old house's new windows, appliances, flooring, siding, roof, soffits, and paint. It's crazy the thoughts that kept flying through my head. It rarely occured to me that anything was wrong with such thoughts OR that having these thoughts would keep me stuck in a depression cycle forever.

I kept seeing these depression commercials on tv. Thoughts started playing around the fringes of my mind about needing help, but I kept trudging on through life. I was just being paranoid and a hypochondriac I chided myself. These thoughts kept weaving themselves into my mind though. I even started to dream about it. I dreamed about how I used to be with kids and I thought about how crabby I was with my kids.

These thoughts eventually even entrenched themselves into my waking mind. I thought about how I couldn't sleep at night, I couldn't lose weight, how I cried over things that shouldn't be cried about, how I never had the energy to motivate myself off the couch to do even the simplest of tasks, I had no energy ever, and I couldn't remember anything. I talked to my doctor about it again in the summer of 2007, but I told her that I wanted to try to snap out of it myself first.

I prayed about it a little bit and started making some friends on the internet. My friends and cousins started sharing the fact that they suffered from depression too. With their friendship and encouragement as my guide I finally gathered up the courage to ask the doctor for some medical intervention. Nothing I was doing for myself was enough to help me get over it and I decided enough was enough, I didn't want to feel like this anymore.

It's been almost a year now that I've been taking my meds. I can't believe the improvements I've seen in myself and my outlook on life in such a short period of time. I still have a long way to go with controlling the thoughts of worthlessness and inability to do things, but my frame of mind is becoming better with discussion, journaling, prayer, gardening, and self examination. One day I may not need the chemicals to help keep me in the right frame of mind, but for now I'll keep plodding on with therapy in hopes of a complete and total recovery one day.

Thank you for stopping by. Please leave me a message and a backlink. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy

Friends to the End

I have just recently started thinking about all of the friends God has sent my way during my life time. I know by all standards, it really hasn't been all that long of a life compared to some.

Some of those friends I have only known for a short amount of time. They are every bit as dear to me as those older friends I have, although we don't share as many cherished memories.

As a child we moved around quite a bit. My dad started out as a high school teacher, but shortly after he and my mom got married, he decided to leave the teaching arena and enter into sales. That's where all of the moving came from. I guess most businesses seem to like to have their salesman move to new areas. It was very frustrating.

I never particularly liked to move. Neither did my mom. I think my dad and my sister were more alike, they seemed to view it as an adventure and didn't seem too upset when they were uprooted. It might have been easier on my if my sister and I were close, but we got along like oil and water. At least we didn't fight too often, but she always seemed to be able to find ways to make me feel badly about myself.

The longest time we ever lived in any one area was about 5 years when I was growing up. In some places, we lived there as few as two years. I was always kind of a shy person who had a difficult time making friends, so it took me a long time to develop the true bonds of friendship that I truly enjoy still to this day. (I bet you can't tell from my blog, but somehow it's easier to write for me than it is to talk to people face to face.)

I got to see all kinds of interesting places and met some very wonderful people with whom I try to maintain contact, though at times I find it quite difficult. I have tried to visit most of my former homes at least once, but they are spread far and wide. I was rather young when we lived in some of those places so I'm not sure I'd be able to find my way around anyway. After moving I tried to remember to write to my friends, but somehow it just didn't usually work out to maintain those friend ships.

Friends come and go I guess, but I'd rather just keep them all as friends even if we are seperated by a few miles or a few thousand miles. It's always hard when the nature of your friendship has to change. Sometimes friendships end because you no longer are in the same clubs, you may have graduated from school, you may have quit your job, you may have moved, the list goes on and on.

I guess some people are out of site, out of mind kind of people, but not me. I think of most of the friends from my past often. I wonder where they might have moved to, who they married, what they made of their life, if they ever met anyone I also know, what kind of people they are now, and would still be friends if I hadn't moved? It's so hard to know the answers to so many questions.

I know some friends are meant to be in our lives forever, and some just are meant to come and go. Each departure can be a bit heart-wrending though. Especially the friendships that a person questions themselves about. Did I drive them away? Is there something I could have done to keep our friendship alive? No one is perfect. I know that I have done things in my past that have made people decide to avoid me. At the time I thought I was making the right choices, but hindsight tells me that I should have tried to be more understanding instead. One particular high school friend comes to mind when I say this. We tried to be friends later, but it has never been the same and it doesn't seem she was ever all that comfortable with me after that. I'm SO sorry!

I have made friends in many different ways. When I was in school I was really involved in a lot of activities and going to church. More recently I have made friends by working with people, chatting with others on the internet, and my kid's friends' parents.

When I was 14 years old I placed an ad in BOP magazine for pen pals. At one point I had over 100 different pen pals. Life was pretty hectic for a while with all of those people writing to me. A few of them strike me as people I would have considered friends if we had better proximaty to each other.

One of them is someone I consider a true blue friend. We still write occassionally too, though as we age life gets more crazy. Yumiko lives in Japan though, so it makes getting together to visit a bit complicated. She came to America and stayed with my family and I a couple of times. When I was 18 she and I took a road trip to Chicago together. I have often wished I could afford to go to Japan to visit her there, but time, money, and circumstances have never allowed me to. I'm hoping she'll stop by and chat with us here sometime.

Other people I used to write to that I may have become friends with include a boy (Trevor) from Brisbane Australia, a girl (Bridgette) from Louisiana, a girl (Amy) from Canada, and a girl (Mary) from Texarkana, Arkansas. Sorry I stopped writing to you guys! I don't even remember that there was a reason or if we just all got too busy or what the deal was.

I thank God each and every day for the friends he sent my way. Some friends come for a reason, some for a season, and some for a lifetime. I think about you often and wish you the best in your life. Hopefully our paths will cross again some day.

Thank you for stopping by. Please leave me a message and a backlink. I'd love to hear your thoughts!

Cindy