Wow Finally a Productive Day!

With all the sickness going on with the kids as of late things have really been put on the backburner...But hopefully things are coming around and falling back into place...YAY!!!

Well yesterday started out as a cold, wet and miserable day, so I was really dreading the thought of trying to get down to the garden and work...But as it turns out (as usual) it was a blessing in disguise...I had forgotten to soak my onions and other seeds before I took them to the garden (out of excitement at getting them planted..LOL) so as they sat in the kids little red wagon, during the morning they got what seems to be the perfect little drink of water and were in perfect condition to be planted when I got to the garden yesterday afternoon...Thankfully it had stopped raining by then and the garden wasn't a wet muddy pit, that I guess I had in my mind it was going to be. It was almost unreal how perfect everything seemed...

Soon after I got to the garden (the kids stayed up at the house with dad) my sister/cousin Amy arrived home from work and was Ready to go...lol she didn't even change out of her scrubs from work...lol it was a wonderful sight and quite funny to see her barefoot and her pants legs rolled up to her knees in this wet and cold Oklahoma dirt...But we must have gotten a much needed and appreciated burst of energy from all the laughter as we got 200 onions planted, the lettuce, collard greens, radishes and spinich all planted...Our rows are long as it's a very good sized garden, so after almost 4 hours of bending over and squatting...we are both pretty sore, more so yesterday than today...I went to bed with a wonderful back ache, that woke me in the night a couple of times. But it all seems so worth it...all the aches and pains seem to be worthwhile, I can't really explain it, but it's a Good hurt if that makes sense...Something I wanna celebrate rather than complain about...

Well until the next time, Lots of Peace and Love
Tonye
P.S. I really need to figure out how to put some pics up on here in these blogs...So if someone could help me out with that I would really be grateful :)

It's been so long

It's been so long since I have been able to get online...Nov 5th 08 was the last time I was able to write...The only other computer we had was a laptop and well guess what? LOL if it weren't for bad luck, well it would be slim pickins around here...lol I am only kidding of course, but it sure seems like that's how it works around here, anyways, the laptop fell off the table and ended upside down under the recliner, since we have no carpet it slid, so when Danny leaned forwards to see what fell, he crushed the screen...Needless to say, we have been computer free all this time, except for the computer in Dans office at the church building, an let me tell you the withdrawl is awful, even for a self thought of mountain woman as myself...who thinks she can do without most of lifes conviencies like, electricity, running water, etc...lol well I can assure you doing without the computer was by far, worse than ever having to light lanterns or haul water up from the pond, both of which I have done many times...lol

But since then we spent alot of time indoors as it seems to get harder to go outside in the cold as you get older, or maybe I am just becoming more sensitive to it as I get older...

Since Feb though we have managed with the help of a cousin (and his tractor) to get 2 half acre gardens plowed, they look huge to see our children out there running, playing and pullin weeds, but to get in there myself and try to figure out what veggies are going where, all that room seems to go away quickly, then the panic of I am not gonna have enough room for all these veggies takes over until my ever so sweet husband assures me there will be plenty of room with Both gardens. We have big plans this year concerning getting most of our food canned and getting our root cellar finished.

The mobile home that sets on our property is now empty as the renter we had bought a home in town, so we will be using that as our base of operations for the majority of canning, freezing and sewing and all the storage that goes along with it...I LOVE that idea and am pretty excited...

My sister/cousin and her daughter who also now live on our property will be moving her sewing machine down there as well and we will both be able to free up lots of room in our homes...Since my home is less than 1000 sq foot, I am REALLY excited about it...LOL

The reason we decided to not rerent the other mobile home on our property is we decided that with the all bills paid method my late father in law was using was bringing in maybe 100 extra dollars a month, and def. NOT worth the hassle of a renter, especially since all but 1 of the last 5 renters we had were for a lack of a better word, awful lol...so we decided we would save more by turning the trailer into a storage/work area, because the money we will be saving and not having to fork over to walmart will be fabulous and well worth the effort.

All I have to say

is WOOOOWHOOOOO...
I am very pleased with the results of the election...It was a wonderful victory and I truly have Hope that this man will be able to change things...Although the mess he has to clean up is truly horrendous. I Hope he is able to get it done.
History was made last night, something I Never thought that I would see in my lifetime, it made me Proud.
Go Obama!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's been a while

It seems time has flown by with so much going on...My cousin and her daughter are here for good now. We have had lots of fun, but are working on getting back into our own daily routines..It makes it hard to do that when it has been forever since you spent time with them...So everything has been in dissarray as I still feel I need to entertain, instead of get everything done. But I am sure things will eventually settle back into place...I am so thrilled that they are here with us, I am getting used to them being here now and can't imagine them being anywhere else now.

Halloween was so much fun, we took the kids house to house in town and they had lots of fun, they were all 3 exhausted but had a blast.
Our congregation had a hay ride and weinie roast and everyone had lots of fun as it turned out to be a really chilly breath seeing night, so the fire was much appreciated.
We also had a weinie roast and smores at my aunts homestead place, it was lots of fun and all the cousins got to play and had a ball...along with the adults. They have been working very hard out there and it is looking great, can't wait to help them work on getting their home built.

As for us as a family, it has been rather quiet, except for a trip to the ER on saturday night...we had gone to bed a little early to hopefully enjoy our extra hour of sleep we were gonna get...but plans changed...lol
I had decided I was done reading, so I turned off the light and turned over and had started to doze, when I felt something start to crawl into my ear, I panicked and jumped up, and stuck my finger up into my ear just in time to feel what I thought was a lady bug go into my ear..I freaked out because almost instantly I felt this excruciating pain set the side of my face, ear and neck on fire and it just got worse from there...I have 2 words for you on this subject...Excruciating Pain...I have to say it was really bad and just might be up there with an exposed nerve in your mouth....I was screaming and crying the pain was intense and bad...I have had a broken wrist that didn't hurt that bad...so anyways after several attempts to boil the bug out with peroxide, and it not working, I just could not tolerate it any longer, so off to the hospital we go...They were wonderful, I got in immediately and they were so kind...It took 5 nurses, 1 doctor and 9 attempts at flushing that bugger out of there but they finally got it out....I was so relieved that I started bawling again, they all felt so bad for me that I got lots of hugs from the nurses...and my lady bug turned out to Not be a ladybug...it turned out to be one of those nasty ol water beetles....and it done alot of damage to my eardrum and inside my ear...they have what look like little hooks on all of their legs and just shredded my ear up...so I was given cipro ear drops, it's an antibiotic and some lortab for the pain to follow...The doc said my ear was gonna hurt like heck the next day, and you know what? He was Right...it did hurt pretty bad and is still pretty sore today...And as much as I hate to admit it, this experience has left me with yet another phobia...lol
It was always one of my worst fears...and now that it has happened, it just let me know why I was so afraid of it...I never wanna experience that again, EVER...
I have now started sleeping with cotton balls in my ears...LOL
Well I hope you all have a blessed and lovely day,
Love
Tonye

What a week...

Wow, what a week this has been...
So far we have welcomed a new family member into our lives, my cousin and his wife delivered a sweet baby girl Haily Ann on the 15th, what a blessed occasion...Abby and I are both sick again...I broke a tooth in half and am suffering terribly as the nerve is on the verge of being exposed and that is the worst kind of physical pain I have ever known (worse than a broke ankle..lol)..and to make it worse, the dentist can't see me until November 3rd... ughhhh I honestly don't know if I can stand it that long :(
I also found out I am going to be an aunt again...my sister in law and brother are expecting again...their baby is 15 yrs old..so there is quite a bit of difference in age there, but all will be fine...I am Praying hard for her baby bean to stick, as she had a late miscarriage about a year ago...it really hurt her and took a toll...Sadly I have plenty of experience with miscarriages to be able to help her thru alot of the emotions and feelings as they come up. So if you read this, Please keep them and their precious baby in your thoughts and Prayers

Adam didn't have school yesterday or today so it has been fun around here with both kids home..They love each other to pieces but fight like cats and dogs. Although today with Abby being sick and it being kinda cool outside they spent most of the day inside playing and watching movies...Adam is such a wonderful big brother and I do Pray that when Abby is old enough to understand she will truly appreciate him. There is almost 9 years difference in their ages, and Adam takes his job as big brother Very seriously...lol almost too much like a daddy sometimes...not really sure why he does that, but he has to be reminded that he is the brother occasionally...lol
well I will go for now because my tooth is really hurting and I need to find something to ease it up some...
Much Love,
Tonye

Come walk with me

I think that Fall (well Oklahomas version) is finally here, I do so love this time of year and it is my favorite...if it were fall all year long, I would be happy about it.
Seems like so much that people do can be gotten past and forgotten this time of year...Fall is romantic and whimsical, all the daydreams I had as a child were always related to fall somehow, it just seems like such a special time of year, and if I don't say so myself, I do some of my best photography this time of year...I feel called to do it more now than any other season, probably because Mother earth has so much to share with us right now.
If your interested you can see some of my work at www.RedBubble.com just type in Gentlerain in the search window :) I tried to put a slide show up, but I cannot get it to work :(...I would be greatly apprecitive if someone could tell me how to do that.

We should be starting on getting our goat pens up on the side of the hill soon...seems I am putting it off for right now, probably because I know it is going to be miserable and cold work before I am done getting that fence put up...but better to do it now that to wait until it get's too cool even during the day to get it done...without having to come in and warm up...since only the kids have good winter coats.

Danny (my beloved) worked on my clothes line again today...LOL that poor ol thing is about southern engineered to death...I think we will just have to make due for a bit longer, but should be able to get some good supplies before the winter and get it up good...lol right now the poor ol thing is pitiful...it's a long lead rope tied to a big ol oak limb and the doorway to the chicken yard, with an oak limb down in 2 cinder blocks in the middle keeping it from hanging too low...LOL it really is about as make due as they come...but it works somewhat :)

Sadly we lost one of our best laying hens...not really sure what happened to her other than she became a snack to a coyote or something along those lines..We let them out during the day, but 2 of my girls made a habit of getting out of their yard and going up into the woods(my bad, I didn't wanna clip their wings)...well Penny came back, but Henny never did...we hunted until dark and then the next day me and Adam went to hunt again, and we never did find her or any remains...so we like to think she is up eating tons of nice juicy bugs and greens up on the hillside somewhere :)

well I guess I have completely bored you to death by now if anyone actually does read this mess...but I need to go get ready, tonight is the school halloween (fall) carnival...Adam is so excited and we really do enjoy going...lol it's like the town social or something

Lions and Tigers and Viruses, OH MY!!!

Today started off with a bang...lol a bang of coffee of course, but then it proceeded to become interesting when I tried to get online to check my email...noticing for the last several days the computer was acting funny, I quickly thought, well my virus protection will take care of it...unbeknownst to me, that our virus protection had expired, and me merrily gathering viruses by the boat load...decided to continue on and never gave it another thought, until....well my computer just decided it would not work unless forced...I think some might call that a strike...I call it deserving of being thrown across the room...but since it really does not belong to me, but to my husband...I decided to try and check a few things out...When suddenly, there it was...Virus Protection Expired!!!!!!!!!! Ahhh well, yep that might really be a big problem...so after several minutes, which may have actually been an hour or more and 5 complete and unprovoked shut downs, I finally found what I thought was a Free AntiVirus...now let me tell you...they were full of bologna...nothing about it was free except for the stupid little annoying bar it downloaded above my screen...Anyways, I was really becoming distraught as I do have a little bit of my photography on here and I know I would never be able to retrieve it...I call my beloved and oh so smart husband Danny to come home (it was 10 minutes until his usual lunch time) and help me figure this out before I completely destroy everything...lol
So in his kind and gentle way of putting things, I heard Good Grief Woman, what did you do? LOL
He was so sweet though and helped me fix the problem by buying a program to get rid of all the gunk that had built up over the course of no protection at all...and installed it for me...I was so relieved to actually be able to get the computer to start and not crash within 10 minutes after it took me 8 just to get online...only to find out the reason for all the problems...145 different viruses were invading my computer...WOW 145, almost made me feel like I needed to go take a bath...LOL...so now our laptop is running smoother than it has for many days and I feel, well Safer... :)

But on to a different subject...
I have exciting news...well it's exciting for us...
My cousin, who is actually more like my sister will be moving back up here soon...she has spent the last 5 years down in Texas, and I have missed her every single day...but she had her reasons for going and a momma does what she has to do...
She has decided to buy the house that is on our land, that my fil moved there to use for rental property...it is perfect for her and her daughter, and she wants to homestead right along with us...I figure 25 acres is more than enough for her to get in here and get dirty right along with us to :) She is very happy and I am so thrilled to have my women folk close to me again. I have spent many years dreading certain seasons, because all my people were gone and even when you make the best of it...you always have that longing for the ones not there with you...
She came in last week and brought many of her things with her...lol it was so funny to see her pull up in a midsized car, that was packed and loaded down like it was an SUV...lol I had to tease her about blowing the spring hinges on her doors...So we did alot of unloading and getting things in the house and in the rooms they belonged, but we ran out of time to unpack them and we even started painting her kitchen, it is a beautiful shade of a soft green and I fell in love with it, although she still isn't convinced...maybe it will grow on her.. Anyways, we had a wonderful part of the week and weekend thru monday..many good laughs and just good quality time all together as a family...Oh and she went to church with us sunday morning and evening worship services as well...she even went to the ice cream social after services with us and got to meet everyone...I was so happy to see my little family there, I felt so blessed that I just broke out in tears, although I didn't miss any of Danny's sermon...lol
But the fun had to end sometime and she had to go back down to texas monday afternoon...but it has worked out even better than expected because tuesday she got a call from one of the places she turned in her resume up here and they offered her a nice job with enough pay to live on...she was thrilled and called to let us know, she was turning in her 2 week notice to her employer and would be here a month sooner than expected..which completely made my day...I so love getting good news like that...but the bummer to the end of the conversation, was she was supposed to come back down this evening to bring some more of her things (the big things, fridge, bed, couch, etc...) with a trailer and truck that her blood sister was suppose to bring to her, but never showed up for some reason, so now she won't be able to be here till either late tommorow night or sunday evening...and then turn around and be back down to texas on monday evening... :(
Well I reckon I have talked your ear off enough for now and since it's late, words are becoming foreign to me, so I guess I had better get to bed for now..
Love and Peace :)