Wednesday, April 27, 2016

Wednesday Hodgepodge

Time to link up with this week's Wednesday Hodgepodge! And I can even have the button on this post that you can click on to get to Joyce's blog to join in and read others answers to these questions. Why is it a unique thing that I have the button? I have finally gotten a new laptop. My old one pooped out four months ago. Here's to  blog posts with embedded links and have formatting and pictures and everything! Woohoo!
 
1. This is the last Hodgepodge in April. Share something you learned this month. 
I am learning how to use this new laptop and a new camera. I tend to go slow on those types of things because too much technology in this brain does not work.
2.  It's National Poetry Month, and we all know you can't escape an April Hodgepodge without a little poetry. Keeping the first line as is, change the rest of the wording in this familiar rhyme to make it your own - 'Hickory Dickory Dock...

Hickory Dickory Dock
My poor little brain is locked
I can not think
To write a poem
My brain does not work that way 

(Oh gosh that is soooo sad.)

3. What were one or two rules in the home you grew up in? Growing up, did you feel your parents were strict? Looking back do you still see it that way? 
We couldn't play the piano when someone was watching TV. We were supposed to turn off the lights in our rooms and comb our hair before we came to the dinner table. Napkins went on our laps and we always used a spoon in a bowl. Those are all pretty minor rules, but are what popped to mind when I read the question.
I would say my parents were strict, but I don't think it was oppressive. They were parents who were parents. Parents who loved us and taught us how to respect authority.  
4. Tell us about a kitchen or cooking disaster or mishap you've experienced. Do you have many from which to choose? 
A couple of weeks ago we had some really good friends from college days visit. I decided to make some hot fudge to go over our ice cream and brownies and in my true fashion I didn't follow the recipe exactly and it turned out in a globby (as in one giant glob) chocolate mass. It tasted just fine, but then I left the hot fudge in the pan on the stove-top and did not turn off the burner. An hour or so later Hubby realized he could smell burning chocolate. Sigh. It only took a day and a half of soaking and scraping and soaking and scraping and soaking and scraping to get the pan clean. 
And, yes, after almost 32 years of marriage I have my fair share of kitchen disasters to choose from.
5. Plant a kiss, plant doubt, plant a tree, plant yourself somewhere...which on the list have you most recently planted? 
Absolutely I've planted a kiss most recently. Just one benefit of being married. Grin.
 
6. What's your most worn item of clothing this time of year? Are you tired of it? 
I can't think of a particular piece of clothing I wear a lot except whatever pair of jeans are feeling the most comfortable that week.
At each change of season, I seem to all of a sudden decide that either I hate all my clothes or I don't have any to choose from (which really isn't true). And then I go shopping and realize that I don't like many of the clothes our there. I really need clothing designers to stop making the neckline so low and to use such thin fabrics that you can't see all the details that are supposed to be hidden under the clothing,
7. I'm wrapping up the A-Z Blog Challenge this month and our Hodgepodge lands on letter W. What's one word beginning with W that describes you in some way? How about a word to describe your home, also beginning with W?
 Me: Witty. I love humor and I love sarcasm. (Hopefully not mean sarcasm.) I have noticed myself being (what I consider) more witty lately and that makes me happy. That means I am feeling a lot more comfortable with the people we hang around with.
Our Home: Warm and Welcoming. At least that is what we are striving for. 
8. Insert your own random thought here. 
My son and daughter-in-law came for a five day visit a couple of weeks ago. It was their first time to South Carolina and we had a blast showing them our favorite places. We went to Charleston for a couple of days to see the ocean and experience some southern history.

Here's the two of them taking a Charleston Harbor selfie. (Can you see her tiny baby-bump?)  The dude to the right is my hubby.

Monday, April 11, 2016

God's Plan All Along

Last Friday was my wonderful husband's birthday. While every year I am so thankful to celebrate his birthday with him, this year I learned something that shocked me and at the same time made me all the more thankful.

When I visited my parents shortly before Christmas, my dad gave me a box that was filled with my childhood mementos that my mom had saved. It had my baby book, (with not a whole lot in it which comes from being the fourth baby in six and a half years), old photographs, concert programs, the newspaper clipping with my photo from when I was four years old, to copies of my family's Christmas letters. As part of my birthday present (which is about two weeks after Christmas) I asked for Hubby's time to go through the box with me. One night I started to read several of the Christmas letters starting with the one from the year I was born. That year my parents had taken some time away alone without all four of us kids.  They picked me up before they gathered my three older siblings. I was in a basket on the front seat of the car between my parents (no car seats) and my dad tried to pass someone on the two-lane highway. There was a slight rise in the road and he didn't see the oncoming car. There was a head-on collision. Dad broke an arm, Mom shattered a knee cap, broke an arm and cut her head and spent three months in the hospital. I rolled on the floor and wasn't hurt at all. I was three months old.

I've known about the car accident my whole life, so what about that shocked me so much? The date of the accident was April 7th. The day before my husband was born! I fully believe that God spared my life that day to be that man's wife 23 years later.

Talk about God having a plan! Pretty cool, huh?

Me (the baby) and my family. My first Christmas. Notice my mom's left leg? Ever since the car accident she has only been able to bend that leg to a right angle. 

My sweet hubby as a baby and his mom.