Winter Wonderland

I just wanted to share a few photos of the winter wonderland we have going on in our yard right now.

When we first moved here the winding path from the parking area to the house was made of wood chips. It was very pretty as long as it was dry. However with rain it washed out and piled up on the front porch. With snow and ice it was slick and not too safe. We ended up replacing it with stones....... Just as pretty and a whole lot safer.

This would be a good time to check for any buds on the forsythia....Don't you think?

An up close look at this one doesn't show any sign what-so-ever of yellow.

I am thinking it will be a while before we have any buds in our yard. Oh well..... No problem, George made it up the mountain yesterday and we are all hooked up with high speed. So that should keep us entertained for a little while.

Have a wonderful blessed weekend.... ~Jo

Snow... Snow... Everywhere Snow

My Cyber-Sis, Julia (~aka~ Queeni), over at Interruptions and Willzmom at Lots of Little Things have tagged me for a new meme. It’s a 'Six Word Memoir', inspired by the story that Hemingway, who once bet ten dollars that he could sum up his life in six words. He came up with: For Sale: baby shoes, never worn.



For more examples, check out Not Quite What I was Expecting: Six Word Memoirs by Famous and Obscure, written by Larry Smith and Rachel Fershleiser.



Here are the meme rules:
1. Write your own six word memoir
2. Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration if you’d like
3. Link to the person that tagged you in your post and to this original post if possible so we can track it as it travels across the blogosphere
4. Tag five more blogs with links
5. Remember to leave a comment on the tagged blogs with an invitation to play!

I came up with two........... My first choice was: Life's A Journey, Hang On Tight. Although this is true of most of my life, present day life for me is quite a bit different so I did a wee bit of a variation on my original.

Life's A Journey, Enjoy The Ride!

With that said, I tag the following people to take part in this meme:

Diane at Diane's Place

Tammy at The Pink Magnolia

Lynne at Lynne's Little Corner Of The World

Mary at Mary's Writing Nook

BJ at Sweet Nothings

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Since my last posting we have had snow twice. We received about 2 1/2 to 3 inches of the white fluff on Wednesday. I ventured outside with the camera and took a few shots to share with you.

As you can see Frog Dog was completely covered. I brushed away a little hole so his smiling face would show.

There is usually very little traffic on our road, but for some reason when it snows there is even less. How ever the Postman's creed still holds true.

I can't wait until it warms up enough to once more sit on the pergola and drink my morning coffee and just enjoy the fresh air and sounds of nature.

Our welcome rooster is a bit taller than Frog Dog so he didn't require brushing off.

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Do you remember me mentioning that we were going to be getting high speed internet hook up via satellite? Well, yesterday was the day that the tech was scheduled to come. After the last experience with the Direct TV tech not being able to make it up the mountain due to snow, I scheduled this one in the afternoon, thinking that if we got snow, by afternoon the snow plow would have the roads cleared enough for traffic. It was a good thought, but it didn't work. About 2:30 the tech (George) called and said he was outside of Louisville, KY and would be here in about 3 hours. Right after I hung up the phone, the snow started to fall. It Fell.. and ~ It Fell.. and ~ It Fell.

Two hours later, he called back to let us know that he was hung up in traffic between Cincinatti and us because of an accident. By this time the snow had not let up. Adding what had fallen to what was still on the ground from Wednesday amounted to about 7 1/2 to 8 inches of snow. There was just no way poor George was going to make it up this mountain without 4 wheel drive. As a result, we had to reschedule. Hopefully come Saturday afternoon we will be buckling up the seat belt on our computer chair (mental note: install seat belt to computer chair) and whipping around cyber space at neck break speed.

Have a Great Friday and Wonderful Weekend...........

Weekend Recap

This is our frog dog. He sits on top of a 1 1/2 to 2 foot rock, half way down our winding path from the parking area to the house. He was laying on top of that rock when we bought the house 4 years ago and still occupies that spot welcoming anyone that should come to visit. I used to use him as a guideline for Riley when he was a little guy and played outside. He could play anywhere in the front of the property, but wasn't to go past the frog on the rock. I would watch him run up the path and bend over and look that frog over real good, then come running back to the house to inform me, "That frog isn't even real, Gummaw".



While I am on the subject of Riley, I have a story to share. About a week ago, out of the blue he asked if dogs can take cat naps!! That I think is an excellent question. He was told yes. Then he goes into the living room and lays down, closes his eyes and Mom and Dad hear...... "zzzzz... meow.... zzzzz... meow". This was their cue to carry the discussion of cat naps a little farther. I love it when these little ones come up with questions like this. It shows that those little minds are churning away and they are doing what they are meant to do................. LEARNING!!

The Direct TV tech made it up the mountain on Thursday morning and got us hooked up with some great reception. We questioned him about the lousy reception we had from Dish Network and he told us that from what he saw, as he disconnected their handy work was that it was never hooked up right to start with. I told him about the tech they had sent to install everything and how he kept saying he had a steel plate in his head and it was throwing everything off. I thought he was joking, but now I have come to wonder if it wasn't true. The Dish Network guy had been here for the biggest part of the day doing what it took Direct TV about half an hour to do. I remember thinking that if he stays a little while longer we may be able to claim him on our income taxes. Any way.... we now have a great picture on the TV and we had storms come through since Thursday and didn't loose reception. With Dish Network, everytime a dark cloud passed over Houston we lost reception.

Now comes the really great news. We have been dealing with a dial up connection since we left Louisiana in 2003. It wasn't too bad when we first moved back here and lived just outside of town. Our connection speed was around 56000 bps. We tolerated it, but for the past 4 years here on the moutain, we have been fighting with a 24000 bps which is the same as a snail's pace. Hughesnet is making the satellite high speed internet connection more affordable to people that live out in the booneys like we do. We made the arrangement indirectly through Direct TV and The Hughesnet Tech will be here Thursday to hook us up to that. Keep your fingers crossed that a blizzard doesn't blow through here and prevent that from happening. I look forward to being able to visit my blog friends again and leave comments for them. There are a few that have become so graphic intense that my slow dial up connection won't load all of the graphics and then when I try to leave a comment, the comment box won't even load. So if you wonder where I have been and why I haven't left any comments...... Now you know the rest of the story.

The Scioto River winds its way south through Ohio and empties into the Ohio River at Portsmouth. This past weekend Chris and Melody took us to Portsmouth to eat at the Scioto Ribber. It is a little sports bar the sits on Galia Street with dining available. They serve the best Ribs and Steak you could ever think of putting into your mouth. They have been serving up these special meals since 1978. Nothing is cooked ahead and put on the back burner. Your meal is prepared when you order it so there is always a wait, but it is so worth it.



G'pa and Seth before we left. Seth loves his G'pa. The boys stayed with Melody's sister, Mindy while we went to eat.

Of course Riley was busy working as he usually is. There was still snow in the yard and he needed to rearrange it and make room for new snow. From what I understand he and his cousin Calley tried to pull a few fast ones on Aunt Mindy while she was there, but it didn't work. He is so much like his Dad it isn't funny.

Melody displayed the menu for me to take a picture of it.

There were so many combinations and portion sizes that we left the ordering up to Chris and Melody. They did a great job. We all left 'full as ticks ready to bust' and even had left overs to carry home for Chris to take to work the next day for his lunch.

This is one of the 7 or 8 smokers that they keep going to cook all of that wonderful food in.

From the marks on the wall I am guessing that they are about due for another load of firewood.
We had a wonderful day with Chris and Melody. All that was missing was Tersie. She wasn't able to go with us because that flu bug had bitten her and she was home trying to sleep her way through it.

Speaking of the flu bug...... It finally caught up with JD Sunday night. I fixed fried chicken for supper last night and really had a problem eating it. I just felt quilty that I was eating good stuff and he wasn't able to. This morning, he said he slept good last night, so let's hope that he is on his way to feeling better too.

Wishing everyone a Blessed Day.

~Jo