Happy Halloween-ween

Happy Halloween-ween!  It is a beautiful fall day.  I miss the Halloween I had as a kid.  Friends my age-you know what I mean.  The real Halloween-ween.  Making our own costumes was a huge part of the fun.  Some years we planned for weeks, consulted with each other, eves dropped, got Grandparents involved-pretty good stuff!  Some years it seemed to sneak up on us-those were the 'Hobo' or 'Ghost' years.  I know your picturing it now.  My Dad would take us after dark with a flashlight.  No sidewalks on our street-oh horrors!  We knew to stay out of the way of cars and of course they drove slow and watched for us.  It was the one night of the year you got to see every one that lived in the neighborhood.  Not too many surprises there but Flour Bluff had a military base and us locals were always happy to meet 'the new ones'.  It was just as fun to pass out the candy after hearing "Trick or Treat. Smell my feet. Give me something good to eat".  Times they are a changing as Bob Dylan says. I wish some things just stayed the same way.  Have a Happy Halloween. kisses

Dad's Voice

It is a beautiful cool weather happy October day.  I love this weather.  I tried to call my Mom earlier and her answering machine picked up.  My Dad’s voice came on the line and I felt so happy and then I teared up.  My Dad passed from this world to the next almost 2 years ago.  I asked my Mom to leave his message on the answering machine.  My kids tell me the same thing that I do…if we call and the machine picks up we call back at least once more just to hear Dad’s/PawPaw’s voice.  Something about Dad’s voice was always so wonderful.  He would say to me ‘Hello Pumpkin’.   There is no one to call me Pumpkin anymore.  I guess that is silly for a 51 year old woman to say but I was never grown up to my Dad.  I miss him so much.  He was the best Dad in the wide world. He had a ‘regular’ job while us kids grew up but he went to TCU (Texas Christian University) and graduated with a double major, to be able to Pastor a church and he was always a Preacher at heart.  He is the only man I know that truly lived what he preached every day the very best he could and was always trying to do it better.  I learned so much just from his example.  I still am in wonder at how he chose to be a preacher.  I really think God chose him.  He had just the coolest family ever but they were not ‘religious’ and the only mention of church around my Grandmother and Great Aunt was talk of the Christian Science Reading Room.  It is the Friday before Halloween and I have a super cute costume.  Hope everybody has a party or a place to go have some Halloween fun!    kisses 

Feel Real

Today I will feel what I feel and try to keep it real.  I think so much of what we feel is a decision we make in how we look at things.  Since I was old enough to listen to adults talk I was always perplexed at those that said, usually over and over, “I have lots of problems”.   I don’t think I have ever had a problem.  I was taught early on that God loves us and even though some times bad things happen it is all part of life and something good can come out of even the worst stuff.  Cause, well, Jesus loves us and every little thing will be all right, simple as that.  I have recently let myself question some of  those things I tried to question as a kid and was told “Steffie, stop being so rebellious.”   “Steffie, Don’t question God!”.   Well I do have lots of questions cause lots of stuff just does not make sense to me or it seems just really mean hearted or unfair and gives me that yucky down deep feeling that it is just not right.  Like, ‘God is in control’.   If that is true then I do not think he is doing a very good job of it.  Just common sense or if you have ever watched the 10 o’clock news how could you not question that statement.   Another one is the no sex before marriage rule.  Like really?  Talk about a man’s world.  I wanna know what I am spending the rest of my life with and while sex is not everything it is really important. I think this rule was most certainly made up by men with very small penises or homosexual.   When God said go into all the world and preach the Gospel I do not think that was a business model to have Americans with real jobs support ‘missionaries’ that go to Peru and dress the natives in Wal-Mart clothes, pump them with our medication and tell them that what they have been doing for the last thousand years is all wrong.  America has been around for only 200 years and look what we have accomplished-so much better than jungle natives… yeah, right, whatever!  I just don’t buy it.    This next one really gets my goat ‘God never gives you more than you can handle’.  Is that even in the Bible?  I have heard that statement said during horrifying situations by well meaning otherwise nice people.  Can I be the only one that realizes what that statement implies?      So that I guess is how I feel today.  Tomorrow is another day.  Since I don’t make the rules....Today I will feel what I feel.  kisses         Photography by Michael Jameson

Music & Memories

I am up after midnight for some odd reason and watching that music video channel.  You know, the free one since I refuse to pay for cable.  But I will save that story for another day.  They have an advertisement for ‘Singer and Songwriters Collection’ from the 60’s and 70’s.   How very groovy.   Music must be hardwired into our souls I guess.  I love how I can hear a song that instantly transports me to another place in time and all without a Flux Capacitor.    Carol King “I Feel the Earth Move ” –I am back in Lisa Wilkey’s bedroom listening to her turn table with the plastic thingy in the middle that you push down for 33 1\3 albums or pull up for the 45’s.  She is so cool cause she had that Carole King album, Tapestry.  I loved every song and so did she.      Peace Train-I am with Kathy Armstrong, we knew each other from church youth group, and we are talking about how Cat Stevens might be a Christian.   Fleetwood Mac is just a flood of many memories.   My boyfriend from high school, David said our song was England Dan and John Ford Coley-‘I’m Not Talkin About Moving In’.   So silly to think of now since we were in like 9^th and 10^th grade and never even talked about ‘moving in’.  My favorite I think is James Taylor with Carole King a close second, Jim Croche, Bread, America, Dan Fogelberg, Paul Simon, Peter Paul and Mary, Janice Joplin, just on and on.  John Denver singing ‘Country Roads’ takes me to the Volunteer Fire Station on Laguna Shores Road in Flour Bluff.  The brave Firemen let us kids have ‘recreation’ there all summer.   This nice lady named Kathy would play her guitar and we would sing along. I think her name was Kathy.  I remember she had big beautiful eyes with dark blue eye shadow, late 60’s hairdo-short, teased on top, and never ever was impatient with us.  What an awesome lady.  I don’t know what ever happened to her.  I know she worked at Flour Bluff as a secretary.  Flour Bluff was the greatest place ever to grow up.  Have a groovy singing in the sunshine day. Why dontcha put on some Dion, Don Mclean or The Mama’s and the Papa’s, and see if Flower Power, hitch hiking long haired hippie boys with Army surplus back packs, yellow smiley face buttons, pet rocks/pet socks, MIA/POW bracelets, maybe Bobby Sherman posters, green shag carpet and bald Hari Krishna's dressed in sheets with big smiles selling flowers in the airport don’t just start dancing before your eyes.  Neat-O,  I can dig it!  Peace  kisses 

Grandkids R Great !

Grandkids are just the greatest things ever in the world.  If I would have known how great having grandkids would be I just might have had more children.  But then again maybe not since the two are not always directly related.  Well, sort of related since you do need at least one child to produce a grandchild but anyway....    One of my children has all boys and another of my children has all girls.  Like, go figure how that happened?   I don't know, I don't make the rules!  I just enjoy the results.    My grown up chilldren have been rather unhappy with my current life choices-you know since my life does not revolve completely around them anymore.  But not those grandkids.  They love Nana to pieces, they love my new tattoos, my leather boots and just anything at all since I am Nana!  Life as a grandmother is not how I had once pictured it and not at all like my Grandmothers.  I loved my Grandmother's to pieces also and I still miss them.   That being said it seems that times have changed somewhat in how we age or something.  Well that is a story for another day.   I just know I color my hair, plan on more tattoos and my new bikery attire from the Harley shop is really cute!  Have a beautiful fun Manic Monday.    Grandma Rocks!!   kisses 

Rainy Day Monday

 I love rainy day Mondays!   What a magnificent day of the week to rain.  Rain is a good thing.  I love the smell of it, the sound of it and gheez the very fact that we cannot very well live without it.  The Bible uses rain and water as symbols of life and power.  I use it as fun !   It fills up my pool, my yard turns into the jungle it was ment to be and tubing down the Medina River,  Frio River , or mighty Guadalupe is better than any Theme park ride anyday ever !     Rainy days and Mondays always make me cry...Ummm Nope, not this girl.  Singing in the rain, oh yes.  I don't know why I see people, well usually always grown-ups running in the rain.  Are they running away from it?  I kinda don't think running in the rain will keep you from getting wet.  In fact I would tend to think you might stay drier if you walked cause running causes those puddles to splash really big, all up and over your shoes and sometimes even to your knees if you run like I do.  Puddles of mud are a wonderful byproduct of rainy days as are loud croaking toads, and resultant tadpoles.  Go sing in the rain and jump in a mud puddle while you still can.  This is Texas and you never know when we will have another chance.  Thanks for Buckets of Rain-Bob Dylan, and Who'll Stop the Rain- CCR, I sure like those Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head-BJ Thomas.  kisses                 Photography by Michael Jameson