Retirement Can Be Hard Work!

When we retired, almost two years ago, I thought we could dump the calendar--wrong. Seems like we are busy doing "something" all the time.

There are always projects around the house that have to be, or at least, need to be done, so we have slowly been working on those. We washed the trim on the house, then we needed to paint, because we used too much bleach when we wash the trim. One thing calls for another. Slowly, but surely, we are working on the paint project.

Then there are parties to attend! My niece, Lizzie, graduated from college two weeks ago, so there was a BIG party in celebration of her achievement. Her family had a low country boil and grilled chicken. I must say, the low country boil was new to me, but it was sure delicious! We did have some much needed rain than kinda put a damper on the party, but we retreated to the covered shed in her backyard, which was really nice.

The next weekend our neighbor had a fish fry. The weather was perfect. The food was wonderful, even the fish was pretty good--I'm not fond of fish. I love the things that go along with the fish--hush puppies, cold slaw, potato salad and homemade banana pudding. Yum, yum!

This weekend we had another graduation celebration with friends from church. It was a great celebration for a young lady that has had many, many physical struggles during the first few years of her life, so it was really special. Her Mom and Dad are in the ministry and he made the statement if he could have fast forwarded to this event, he would not have worried so much when she was so very sick, struggling to live. This was a wonderful praise to the Lord at His faithfulness!

There are other necessary jobs, like grocery shopping, ugh, keeping the house in some kinda of order and there is ALWAYS laundry to do. I do believe those close are in that hamper reproducing. We must be the cleanest dirty people in the world, or the dirtiest clean people. Haven't figured that one out yet.

We decided to have some fun, so we went fishing. Mr. Fisherman insisted we get up EARLY, so we could catch all the fish. I reminded him the weather report chart indicated that 5:00 p.m. was the best time of the day to fish. No way! We had to get there early. Well, we drove over to a wildlife refuge with several lakes, found one that would allow us to use the gasoline motor, launched the boat, only to discover the plug was not in properly, which meant we were taking in water. Not a good thing. Sooo, we had to put the boat back on the trailer, pull it out of the water, properly secure the plug and then re-launch the boat. We finally made it into the water. On the way to the lake I pointed out to Mr. Early Bird Fisherman that the cows were lying down. When the cows are lying down, the fish don't bite! Totally ignoring me, we proceeded on to the water. We did manage to catch a few fish--a total of five, four of which was my catch. I must admit we did have fun, even though the fish weren't jumping into the boat. It just does us good to get out on the water. We had a visitor along the edge of the lake that was keeping an eye on his favorite place to eat. That's how we were able to get this photo of him (to the left). When we were coming in to the dock to leave, there was a man on the shore that caught a small fish, and that crane was lurking close by, the man took the fish off the hook, tossed it towards the crane and the bird caught the fish in mid-air! Nice easy meal for the bird. Notice the umbrella on the back of my seat. I don't bake my brain in the sun!

Then there is the garden. We moved our garden spot this year and Mr. Farmer decided we needed fertilizer on that plot of ground, lots of fertilizer. Our garden is struggling--it's burned, really burned bad. In fact, we have had to replant all the squash and cucumbers, and about half of the green beans. The tomatoes are doing okay, some better than others, but not like they should be doing. We found out from the owner of the local feed and seed store that the garden plot needed only about one-half bag of fertilizer, rather than the three bags put on it. Now, we are having to water, water, water trying to save those poor burned plants. I hope they make it. It wouldn't be so bad if we were getting rain, but we are in a severe rain shortage and we have watering restrictions. If this plot of land manages to produce any veggies it will be great, especially the tomatoes. I can't wait to eat a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich (BLT) with those Georgia tomatoes. Better than steak!

Then Mondays are art lessons for Kerry. He admits it's hard, but he's learning a lot. At the moment, he's working with three pencils to sketch pears and strawberries. This morning he was working on one of those pears. It looked really good. I can see in just three weeks he is improving greatly. I hope he will continue to work on his art, because he has a lot of talent. The teacher says it has nothing to do with talent, but with desire. He has both and I know he can do it!

Happy Memorial Day. I want to honor my Dad, who served during World War II. He fought in the Battle of the Bulge. He was in Northern France, Belgium and Germany, and crossed three rivers, Seine, Rhine and Elbe. My brother tells me his unit, the 102nd Division (Ozark Division), marched 100 miles in two days, then had to fight the battle when they got there. He was wounded twice and I have his Purple Heart with an Oak leaf Cluster. I wished I had asked him more about the war when he was living. I have a millions questions now. If he was alive he would be 92. Unfortunately, we lost him at age 51 as a result of heart disease. Thank you Daddy for serving our country well. I love you and miss you.