Leap

So today is Leap Year Day, a day that only occurs every four years.  I've had a Leap Year Day eleven times in my life.  My grandma was born on February 29th (but got stuck celebrating on the 28th) and I think I remember going to school with a girl who was a leapling as well.

How will we spend this extra day of life we've been given?  Well, it's a Wednesday so most folks will be working.  I'm planning to do something FUN with mine!  Sleeping in is first on the agenda.  :)

I think Leap Year Day is the perfect opportunity to take a leap of faith, don't you?  Just do something crazy, something so unlike you that it makes people sit back and take notice.  I recently took a huge leap of faith when I quit my job without actually knowing for sure when I was going to start my new one.  Folks thought I had a screw loose.  Now I wouldn't recommend doing that unless you are financially able to but it just felt right to me.  As soon as I knew I was selected for the co-op, I quit, without knowing if it would take one month or six for me to be working again.  I felt that it was time for me to go.  I trusted God and He's never let me down before.  He didn't this time either.  Taking a leap of faith requires just that, a HEAP of faith!  

One of my and Larry's favorite scriptures is Mark 5:36.  Don't be afraid.  Just believe.  It's gotten us through some pretty dark hours, some pretty unsure days, and we've been blessed and rewarded for our faith.

Take a deep breath, read that scripture and leap!  Sign up for a class, ask that guy or girl out, eat cake for breakfast, ask for that raise you know you deserve, do something wild and crazy!

Seize this day!  It only comes around every four years.

I swannee, Grandma, it's your birthday!

I've talked quite a bit about my Maw here on my blog but like everybody else, I have two grandmothers.  My mama's mama.  Grandmama when we were little, shortened to Grandma as we hit our teenage years.  

Her name was Edith and she would have been 92 years old today.

My granddaddy was quite a bit older than Grandma so when he died in 1957, he left her with five little children to raise.  She raised them on her own, she never remarried.  She devoted her life to those five little children -- my mama, her sister and three brothers.

I think my earliest memory of Grandma was when I was 5, I think, I don't believe I was in school yet and me and Ricky stayed with her while Mama had surgery and was in the hospital for a while.  I remember "helping" Grandma hang her laundry out on the clothesline and I remember how goooooooood everything smelled.  Grandma used Downy fabric softener.  April Fresh Downy in the blue bottle with the little girl on the front.  I loved that smell!  Grandma let me walk through the towels and sheets just smelling them.  I think Downy's probably changed that formula because I've tried to recreate that feeling and it is impossible.  Maybe they changed the formula.  Or maybe it was Grandma and her sunny backyard.

I was in my early twenties when Grandma passed away, too young and self-centered to realize what I'd lost.  I realize it now, though.  I miss her every day.  I'd give anything to be able to talk to her again.  And maybe hang out a towel or two to dry.

Grandma used to say "I swannee" a lot.  For those of you who've never heard that, it's an old southern saying that means, "I swear" or "my goodness".  I use it in my every day conversation because it makes me feel closer to Grandma.  I do it to keep her memory with me.

So, happy birthday, Grandma!!  I love you and miss you so much!!

Happy day! Happy day!

I got my call from the base today!  I start my new job on March 12th!!  I am so excited to get started.  I had to go out there this morning and pick up my new hire package and fingerprint card, then go get my prints done.  I'd never been fingerprinted in my entire life but it was a pretty painless process.  I just relaxed my hands and let the lady who was doing it DO IT.  It turned out less smudged that way.  :)

This is what my fingers looked like after four washings.  Ha!  It's all worn off now.

I really appreciate all the support and prayers and good wishes that y'all gave me while I waited this thing out.  My mama and daddy were awesome, as usual!  Most of all, I thank my Jesus for seeing me through, for keeping me sane and for keeping my hands busy.  Larry and I got some pretty amazing news (details coming later!) last week and now this.  God is SO good to us!!

It's his birthday but I got the gift

Today is my sweet Larry's birthday!  Maw always thought it was pretty cool that she shared her birthday with him.  I did this "Ten Things" that I love about him a couple of years ago and I'm adding to that list today.  There are thousands of things that I love about my husband, from his gorgeous blue eyes to the way he can always make me smile, even when I'm mad as a hornet about something.  Here are but ten:

I love how he always gives me the center of his cream cheese danish.  'Cause that's the best part.

I love this, too.  There's an episode of Gunsmoke that he reenacts, adding his own dialogue, that makes me laugh SO hard that I cannot breathe.

I love that all I have to do is HINT that I might want something and he makes it happen.  He spoils me rotten.

I love that he never met her but he loved my Maw as much as I did and he cried with me the morning she died.

I love that he thinks I'm beautiful without makeup.  Bless his heart.

I love that he inspires everyone who is fortunate enough to be around him. He makes people want to be better, do better.

I love that he can fix anything.  And that he has the patience to tell me how to fix stuff, too.

I love how he lights up every single time he sees me.

I love how WARM he is when I'm cold.

I love how I'm his Sunshine and his Rain.  He gave me the nickname "Sunshine" years ago but you can't grow a thing without a good soaking rain and he says I'm that for him, too.  He is such a romantic soul.  I love that about him.

Happy Birthday, baby.  You make my world better just by being in it.

A lady of leisure

Okay, so now I'm on Week FIVE of waiting to start my new job at the base.  Still don't know nothin'.  I was thinking just this morning as I drank my third cup of coffee with the yummy hazelnut creamer that I LOVE so much, that for the past two years (well, nearly, in April) of my life, ALL I wanted was to be picked for the co-op.  I prayed for it, studied hard and read even harder, soaking up every electronic detail I could absorb.  I talked to my Lord and I asked Him to "gimme gimme gimme", but ONLY if it was His will.  I didn't want it if He didn't want it.  He wanted it.  I got it.  And still, here I sit at home every day.  Waiting.  There's a whole new process to the co-op hiring and they're working through that.  New people, new policies, that's what's taking so long.  It's starting to become comical to me.

I'm cool, though.  I've been doing a Photo-A-Day challenge on Facebook with our Macon County Georgia Photo Walk group and if you're my friend on FB, you've seen my pictures all month.  Today's photo was "where you work".  Bwah!  Hysterical.  Um, my house, maybe??  My yard?  Words With Friends on Facebook?  Ike Godsey's store??  (I watch The Waltons every day, all day.  Don't judge.)

This is the photo I took and posted for today.

 Where I work, indeed. 

Right out of the cabinet under my kitchen sink.  

I had planned to just transfer some $$$$ from a savings account to my checking to live on until I started, you know, actually getting a paycheck again, good LORD (read that like Grandma Walton says it!), but my sweet husband had an even better idea.  He collected autographed photos for over 30 years and we have nearly 11,000 in this house so he suggested that I just try to sell some of those on eBay and see how it goes.  

Y'all.  It has gone beyond my wildest dreams!!  I have made more money in the month I've been at home than I would have made at my old job.  It has been AMAZING.  I cannot believe in this economy that people would pay hundreds of dollars for an autographed photo.  But they HAVE.  And some of them come back for more.  I've had repeat business!!  

You know this is NO accident.  This eBay thing is the Lord working it out and it makes me giggle when I think about it.  He is so awesome.  This base job IS what He wants for me.  And He's taking care of me until it happens.  

Happy Valentine's Day!

I found some vintage Valentines online and I just LOVED this one.

This is what I got from my Valentine.  A yummy box of chocolates and Breaking Dawn!  In Bella's wedding dress box with the huge fabric wedding photo poster.  Oh my!  :)

And I got a chocolate rose from my mama and daddy!

I have some friends on Facebook who say they hate Valentine's Day.  Even when I was single, I didn't hate it.  Valentine's Day is all about love and that doesn't necessarily mean romantic love.  Everybody has SOMEBODY they can love on today.  Parents, friends, pets, but if you still don't have any of those, pick a flower today and give it to a stranger.

There's nothing you can know that isn't known. 

Nothing you can see that isn't shown. 

Nowhere you can be that isn't where you're meant to be. 

It's easy. 

All you need is love, all you need is love, 

All you need is love, love, love is all you need.  (The Beatles)

Happy LOVE Day!! 

Love birds

I am constantly amazed at the talents my husband has.  He can write, he can draw, he can take a bunch of little dots and turn them into stories for blind children.  Months ago, he memorized Jesus' Sermon on The Mount (Matthew 5 - 7) for a Bible study class and he can STILL recite it.  He'll be 59 the 24th of this month and he can still slam dunk a basketball and hit a baseball over the fence.  It's hard to keep up with him.  :)

He also makes the most amazingly beautiful, detailed soap sculptures.  He's made me a lighthouse and he's made a few others for family members.  He just made Ami a kitty for her birthday. They are such an actual labor of love for him, as he strains his eyes so badly making them.  But for our anniversary today, he made me this.  I've had it for a couple of weeks but couldn't open it until today, on the phone with him, so he could hear me squeal.  He loves to hear me squeal.  :)

Love birds!

Aren't they just precious?? 

He's always tried to follow the traditional anniversary gifts for me, like the third anniversary was leather and he got me a new wallet.  Some years he's had to be creative, which is another one of his many talents.  This year, our 13th, is the lace anniversary.  So look what he did!

Of course, he couldn't get his hands on any lace so he formed a number 13 on the bottom of my love birds with his SHOELACE.  How sweet is that??  I just love him.