OSCAR SNUGGLES SAVES THE NIGHT!

Oscar's favorite place to sleep is between us, under the covers. We turn our heat back at night, so it gets really cold in our house. I had a sleepless night and had been tossing and turning all night, I don't think I ever went to sleep. A few minutes after 4:00 a.m. Oscar jumps straight up and runs into the den. I thought he might want out, but he was running all over the den, just crazy like. I thought he was having some kind of a spell. He then ran into the kitchen. I followed him. He was darting around the island looking up, then back into the den. I turned on a lamp, but he was still darting around crazy, back into the kitchen he dashed. I turned on the light in there. There was something FLYING AROUND IN MY KITCHEN. I pulled the door closed with Oscar still in there. I ran to to bedroom and yelled to Hubby, "THERE'S SOMETHING IN THE HOUSE!" He was in a deep sleep so it took him a few seconds to comprehend what I had said. I realized he might think SOMEBODY was in the house, so I was a bit more specific, "THERE'S SOMETHING FLYING AROUND AND I THINK IT'S A BAT!" Hubby asked, "where is it now?" I replied I had closed Oscar up in the kitchen with the flying object. Hubby darted into the kitchen, pulling the door closed and dashed to the back door, opened it and the BAT flew out the back door.

After this little episode I sure couldn't sleep, so I stretched out on the sofa and read until about 5:30 a.m. The alarm went off at 6:30 a.m. I sure hope I sleep tonight.

I think an investigation into the attic might be appropriate to see if bats are getting through the air vents in the gables of the house or maybe in around the attic fan. There have been squirrels that have nested under the cover of that attic fan in the past, so tomorrow a look at the attic will be in order. We had bats in the air vents in Hubby's work shop, but he smoked them out with his beekeeper smoker and they have never returned.

I was so thankful for our little Oscar Snuggles, he certainly saved the night for us. OSCAR SNUGGLES, KING OF TIDEWATER! I wonder if that bat was flying around in the bedroom?!!!!! Oh my goodness!

Dust Starting to Settle

Whee! It's been a busy time for us. It all started last Saturday with the Little Woman's family party. Then dinner with good friends, John and Debbie, the Christmas Eve service at church, and Christmas Day with our Australian friends. I'm including a few photos from our busy week. Hubby cooking the hams on the Green Egg, sounds like a book! Both of us at John and Debbie's, our

church service, Steph (Aussie friend) preparing for Christmas Dinner.

We are finally getting some rain, not near enough. We need almost two feet of rain to get us out of this drought. We don't need two feet at once, but we desperately need rain. We got about an inch rain yesterday, and tomorrow we are suppose to get that much or more. When we came out of the movie yesterday it was raining quite hard. We are "National Treasure". Good movie.

This evening our Australian friends are coming for dinner and a movie. They gave us "The Dish", which is an Australian movie and thought we would need some "interpretation" of the language.

It has been a great Christmas season for us. We have enjoyed it, but we are ready for the new year. We have enrolled in Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University. It's a 13 week course on how to get out of debt. We're not in debt, but just feel lead to take this course. We are going back to First Place and attempt to get some of the weight off us that we have gained during December. How can you lose weight when you eat an entire box of chocolates in two days!? Not to mention all the goodies from Harry and David's. Actually, the day after Christmas we put all the "good stuff" in the freezer and are now grazing on salads.


Wishing you all a Happy New Year!

HAROLD TONEY, Life-long friend

L-R: Harold, Mr. Evans, their high school woodshop teacher, Hubby

ALBERT HAROLD TONEY

February 9, 1944 - November 29, 2007

After nine years of battling a brain tumor, Harold went to be with the Lord yesterday. On the way home from the hospice last night, Hubby said, "I got so tired of seeing Harold suffer." "You know, Harold have always been there for each other when we needed help, I don't know how I'm going to handle that now." There have been lots of tears, but we know Harold is in the presence of the Lord. The sting of death referenced in the Bible is the sting to those left, not the one taken.

A TRIBUTE TO HAROLD

If words could describe Harold Toney it would be, kind, laid back, unselfish and protective. We have been friends since second grade.
We went to the same grammar school, high school and we joined the Army at the same time. I was getting drafted and I thought it would be a good idea if Harold and I could join on the buddy system. When we got to basic training, we got off the bus, they shaved our heads and gave us shots and that was the last time I saw Harold until training was about over. When I finally saw him, I said, "you don’t look so good." He said, "I don’t?" "and the bad thing, I didn’t even have to go, you were the one who got drafted."
We got jobs at the Gas Company only nine months apart and we did almost the same jobs for 36 years.
Our childhood days were some of the best years of our lives. No pagers, no computers, no air conditioning, no cell phones, and no x-box. We always made our own fun, sometimes at the expense of others. Harold never liked being uncomfortable. He slept next to a fan in the summer, he liked cushy car seats, easy chairs and didn’t like walking long distances. It’s like the time Harold, Raymond and I went to the Southeastern Fair. Raymond’s mother drove us over to the fair grounds, which was a pretty good distance from home. She told us to call her when we were finished. We all had about $2.00 each to spend. Well, we all three spent ALL our money and didn’t have a dime (phone calls were a dime back then) to call Mrs. I. to pick us up, so we walked all the way from the fair grounds home. We were about two blocks from home when we saw something sparkle on Raymond’s shoes. He had two dimes in his penny loafers. We about beat Raymond to death. It had taken us two hours to walk home. This time Raymond was the one who was uncomfortable.
In closing Harold and I have been best friends for almost 60 years and we have never had harsh words. To me Harold was a Proverbs 18:24 man, which says, "A man who has friends must himself be friendly, but there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother." He was that man to me.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING

This is a great time to reflect on the many blessings we have experienced during this past year. We are thankful for our family and friends, our church, our home, we have had all our needs provided, good neighbors, I could go on and on. We are so blessed in our great nation to have so much. We take all of this for granted and have come to expect and even demand so many things. We are so thankful to the Lord for ALL our blessings, both material and spiritual.

I'm really thankful we have completed yet two more projects. The 18th C. floor cloth took weeks, but it's finished, well except for some nonskid backing we have to put under it. The outside shutter looks great that Hubby has made. The other one had not been primed when it was made and rotted out rather quickly. This one has been primed on every surface, even join, every crack. Hubby tells me that tricks of the trade.

Have a HAPPY THANKSGIVING and don't eat too much turkey.

THE NOISE

Packing our driveway.

It rattles our entire

house.

View from the mail box

looking towards the

house.

Oh no, Hubby has been talking with the workers at the road. They tell us it will be another YEAR before this project is completed. The good news, they are starting to grade the road bed in front of our house and will be putting the rock down today, then pour the curbs and sidewalks, then pave it. The paving part might be a while. They have had the road bed prepared for many weeks down the road, but have yet to put any black pavement down. It's really messing with our minds, not to mention all the RED mud we have tracked onto our driveway and parking area at the house and some even into the house. I have to keep telling myself, "this too shall pass."

Time Flys

October has been a very busy month for us. Projects, some traveling and life. The Hubby took a short trip to our favorite place, Colonial Williamsburg. We have friends that live there part-time and Harry's wife was going to be away for several days, so he invited Hubby up for a visit. They spend four days revisiting Jamestown, Colonial Williamsburg and Yorktown, all of which are in Virginia. Photo of the Governor's Palace.

These are very important places in the history of our country. Jamestown was the first permanent English settlement in the New World. It was settled in 1607. The National Parks Service has discovered the location of the original fort in the past few years. They thought it was out in the James River, but realize they were wrong. They are digging like crazy and finding lots of artifacts from the 17th Century. See the photo of Hubby by the cannon at Jamestown. This year was the 400th anniversary of the settlement at Jamestown. Remember when the Queen of England was in the US several months ago, that's why.

The Capitol was moved from Jamestown to Williamsburg, I'm not sure what year that was, so I'll not guess. It was here that many important historical events occurred during the fight for independence from England. The town has been restored to it's original condition and is a "working" 18th Century town

Yorktown was where Cornwallis surrendered to General George Washington in 1782, resulting in the Colonies independence from England. Actually, Cornwallis didn't surrender, he sent one of his aids to do the dirty work. Well, it was dirty work to the English.

Hubby decided he wanted to make an 18th C. floor cloth. They are very expensive in all the publication we get. Now we know why. It is very time consuming and very tedious work. All those stripes and checks have to be drawn and painted on the canvass, only after it has been properly prepared. Prepared means many coats of this stuff called Gesso, which is a special white paint. I had drawn all the stripes and checks on the canvass, then I read the instructions. It had to have four more coats of paint. Always read the instructions, FIRST! Before I did any drawing, I did a scale drawing to see how the end product would look. That took time as well. Now we know WHY floor clothes are so expensive. Hubby has decided this is the first and ONLY one we'll be doing. Hopefully this project will be finished SOON. I don't know HOW I manage to get involved in most of Hubby's projects. This time, perhaps, it was because it ended up on our kitchen table for a period of time.

The severe drought continues. Pray for rain, lots of rain. Our lakes and rivers are so dangerously low here in Georgia. I'm watering my outdoor plants with water collected in a five gallon bucket located in our shower when you have to run all the cold water out of the system in order to have a warm shower. There is a total band, state wide, on outside watering. We do cheat and give the birds water, but we bring the bucket INSIDE to fill, so not to actually use the outside water hose. I suppose this is a techicality, but we will continue to give the birds water. It also attracks those harry deals (squirrels) as well.

We are off to Blue Ridge today to visit some friends.

FISH FRY? FOR THE AMEICAN HEART ASSOCIATION?

This sign is on the lawn of the county court house. A picture can be worth a thousand words, but I just HAVE to make a comment here. What were these people thinking!? Having a FISH FRY to raise money for the AMERICAN HEART ASSOCIATION! I would think a barbeque would be better than a FISH FRY. Normally, when you have a fish fry there are also fries (as in fried potatoes), hush puppies, which is fried cornbread with onions and cold slaw. There are four items, three of which are FRIED.