Airplanes

Saturday we decided to go to the Smithsonian's new Udvar-Hazy Air & Space Museum near Dulles airport in Virginia. This is an enormous hanger that houses hundreds and hundred of airplanes. There was a replica of the plane the Wright brothers flew ,the space shuttle Enterprise and some of every kind of airplane in between. It was amazing to see so many kinds of planes all in one place. We saw lots of World War II planes. The Enola Gay, the plane that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima, is there. The SR71, The Blackbird, a spy plane used until recently was there. That plane flew from Los Angeles to Washington DC in 64 minutes. There was even an exhibit about the IUE (International Ultraviolet Explorer.) That is a satellite that my beloved worked on for many years. It was cool to see him looking at something that had been such a big part of his life on display in the Smithsonian. It was a fun Saturday thing to do.


The Enola Gay



The white plane in the back is the Concorde



The space shuttle is huge!



Dennis by the IUE console

Laundry Room

I asked my beloved to take a picture of my clean, colorful laundry room. He put together this panorama picture that make my little room look deceptively large. It is only as wide as the washer and dryer. The end with the furnace and water heater is what you see if your back is to the washer. It is a small rectangular room about five feet wide by 10 feet long. I don't have any before pictures so it is hard to tell how much better it looks. It had never been painted. The walls were stained and scarred. The floor was dirty. Now it is clean and bright, but still small. I used up four of my partial cans of left over paint. I wonder what I can do with the rest of my paint. I still have two shades of green, dark blue, bight red, and some antique white.

Any suggestions?

Facebook

Last week I became a member of Facebook. It is a fun way to communicate with my grandchildren. Somehow it seems to be cooler to talk on Facebook than to just talk. It has been fun to set up my page and to add friends. I have found many of the children I was once close to who have now grown up and moved away. I have over twenty friends. I feel so popular. I haven’t yet figured out how to use all the features. You can send virtual gifts and hugs or poke your friends. I was just looking around the site and typed the name Barack Obama into the search. I did find several official and supportive websites as I expected. I also found about twenty-five sites that claimed Obama was the Antichrist. The hate just spilled out of those pages. It is scary what people believe and say. I then typed John McCain into the search engine and found several official and supportive sites. I did find one site that claimed McCain was the Antichrist. So I know some people hate him too. The part of the world I live in is mostly a friendly place filled with kind and gentle people. It always startles me when I come face to face with hatred.

Sunday School

I came across this picture last week. It is a photo of my eldest daughter’s first Sunday School class. She is the cutie pie wearing the bonnet in the middle of the group. The date was 1965. She was twenty months old. Going clockwise around the table from her we see Kim. Kim became an engineer and moved to Seattle where she lives with her husband and a menagerie of animals. The dark haired young teacher is Donna. She has moved to Nashville and is now a great grandmother. I don’t know who she has in her lap. Next is Melodie. She was married and divorced. Last I heard she was an aerobics teacher in Florida. Then we come to the twins, Rocky and Raye, daughters of the teacher Donna. They are both married in living in Nashville. Raye is a grandmother. I’m not sure who the next little girl is. I think her name is Joanna. Then we are back to daughter number one. She grew up, married, raised two beautiful children and still lives in Bowie. The baby in the crib is Graden, the only boy child in the group. He is married with a couple of kids. The last I heard he was selling medical equipment and living in Arkansas. I am just out of the picture feeding my newborn daughter who grew up, married, divorced, and is the mother of three beautiful children. They live here in Bowie too.

Church and Sunday School were a big part of all of these kids lives. Some of them are still faithful to the Church of Christ in which they were raised. Some have found a home in other denominations. Some are no longer believers.

Are you still a part of the faith community in which you raised?

Gettysburg

We have just returned from a two day vacation in Gettysburg, PA. We went to celebrate our forty-seventh wedding anniversary. One of the things we did was to take a Segway tour of the battlefield. It was just one more trip together on our journey through life.

Touring the battlefield was a very sobering experience for me. We stood on this peaceful, green countryside and remembered the tens of thousands of lives that were lost during this three day battle. The ground had been covered with the bodies of men who were fighting for what they each believed was holy and right. They fought for a cause that was worth more than their own lives. They died willingly and courageously. I felt like I was standing on holy ground. The picture of us on the Segways was taken at the High Water Mark of the Confederacy. This is the place where Lee’s troops almost broke through the federal lines. If they had succeeded here, the course of our country’s history might have been very different.



This is the spot where General Lee waited to greet his returning troops after the failure of Pickett’s Charge. Over half of his troops were killed. It was a great defeat and turned the tide of the war.


This is the view from Little Round Top looking down into what became known as the Valley of Death. This little hill was the site of great carnage.


This is a wonderful monument. It was erected in 1938 and dedicated by Franklin Roosevelt. Present at the dedication were many of the veterans from both sides of this great battle. The Eternal Peace Monument was erected as a symbol of this nation’s commitment to live together united in peace. I found it symbolic that one of the cannons placed there to indicate where it had been during the battle now held the nest of a bluebird.

It is my prayer that one day all the guns of the world become the home for nesting birds.

Ol' time Religion

Like the country song says I come from a long line of love. Today I was thinking about the legacy of fathers and grandfathers. The lives of these men impacted the lives of many generations to follow them. I wonder if they would be surprised at the stories that are still told about them today.

My grandfather was a Church of Christ preacher in Texas during the first half of the last century. In those days preachers were not paid by the church and they had to support themselves and their families with other jobs. My mother tells this story she remembers about a gift her father was given after holding a meeting.

Mom was about five years old. Her little sister Rubye was three. The buggy they used to ride to meeting had two small red chairs in the back where the girls sat for the long ride to and from church. That Sunday the congregation paid my grandfather for his preaching with two barrels of molasses. The barrels were placed in the back of the buggy next to the girls’ chairs. It was hot in Texas and as they rode home the heat caused the molasses to expand. The barrels began to leak and the molasses oozed slowly out onto the floor of the buggy. When they finally arrived home the girls were unable to move because their shoes were firmly stuck in the molasses. Their dad yelled at them to quit dawdling and climb out of the buggy. They started to cry because they could not move. Finally he figured out their predicament and he reached in and unlaced their high top shoes and pulled them out barefooted. She doesn’t remember how the shoes were freed, but since they were their only good shoes they were rescued, cleaned and worn again to meeting the next week.

What stories have been passed down in your family?

Painting

I walked into my laundry room this week and actually looked at it. It is really dirty! I started cleaning and sorting things out. I use that room to store the things I don’t know where else to put. It is a small, cluttered, dirty room. Among other things in there is all my left-over paint. I have decided to brighten the place up by giving it a fresh coat of paint, using all the half full cans of paint I already have. Today I painted the ceiling with the left-over half can of white primer. That has already brightened it up. Tomorrow I will figure out how to paint the walls and shelves with the two shades of red, two shades of blue, two shades of white and some olive green paint. It will at least be clean and colorful. Another good thing is I will not have all that paint on the shelf and there will be room for me to put up some of the clutter. I think it will be fun to paint.

Does anybody out there have a room decorated in all the left over colors of other projects?

Have a good week-end everyone.

Time Flies

Twenty four years ago today our beautiful daughter married her college sweetheart.

Time flies. Two grown children. Still beautiful and still sweethearts.

Happy anniversary

Nice Week End

Our church secretary’s previous employer was Ray Charles. She is a talented jazz singer who was once a backup singer for Ray, a Raylette. She has interesting stories. Friday night she performed in a jazz concert that was very good. Good music, good food and pleasant company made for a lovely evening.

Friday was the hottest day of the year, 99 degrees with thick humidity and no wind. Our church had a booth at Bowiefest, a community fun day with lots of booths, food, entertainment and kiddy rides. I worked in the church booth for a couple of hours and felt like a wet rag afterward. The heat made for smaller crowds than in years past. In the evening it was a welcome relief to jump in our daughter’s pool. Swimming and visiting with family made for a full recovery from the heat.

After church we went out to lunch and came home to enjoy a Sunday afternoon nap. This evening we went to the movies. We saw The Visitor. It was an interesting story about immigrants to our country and the struggles they can face. I did enjoy it.

Reading

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at an Elingsh uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht frist and lsat ltteer is at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a toatl mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae we do not raed ervey lteter by itslef but the wrod as a wlohe.

Finally

The primaries are finally over. It looks like our choice in November will be Obama or McCain. Who do you think they should choose to be their running mate?

Birth

Forty-one years ago today I gave birth to my third child, my first-born son, David. He is a wonderful man who has brought me great joy. Happy Birthday son.

The day of his birth was the closest I have ever come to dying. I don’t remember anything about my labor or his delivery. What I do remember is floating above my body and looking down at a room full of doctors and nurses. I heard one say, “Her pressure is 40 over nothing. I think we’re losing her.” Another voice shouted to pump in more blood. I drifted there watching the activity and thought that I must be dying. It was not a scary thought, just a realization of what was happening. Then I drifted off into blackness. It was thirty-six hours later when I next opened my eyes and saw my sweet husband sitting at my bedside crying. Bless his heart; he had had a hard day. In a day before fathers were allowed into delivery rooms he waited a long time without any information. Finally a nurse came to tell him he had a son, but they were still working on me. He saw the baby through the glass to the nursery, but I did not come out for a very long time. Finally the doctor came and informed him that I had hemorrhaged and lost a lot of blood. It was a close call.

I recovered and gave birth to another son a year later without any complication.

Have you ever had a near death experience?

Found

This morning I found my mother’s tablecloth. I had been looking for it for the past two months and this morning I found it. It was folded inside another cloth and I had just missed it in my searching. This is an old vinyl tablecloth made to look like lace. It is not valuable or even very attractive, but it was used by my mom and later by me at almost all our major family dinners. If this tablecloth could speak it could tell some wonderful stories. I cried with happiness when I found this cloth full of memories.

My mom was wonderful. Everyone loved my mom. She had many great qualities, but cooking was not her greatest skill. One evening the family gathered around the table for dinner. She had made a casserole of chicken and green chilies. It smelled and looked great. We all served ourselves generous portions and dug in. After the first bite we all grabbed our water and gulped it down. Our mouths were on fire. I’ve never tasted anything quite so spicy hot. We gasped and asked mom what she had put in that recipe. She swore she followed the recipe exactly. My brother looked in the trash and found the culprit. Instead of using green chilies, she had used jalapeño peppers. Mom said they looked green to her. She thought they were the same thing.

This tablecloth has heard a generation of stories and laughter. We have sung happy birthday around it more times than I can count. It held the cake when we celebrated my folks golden anniversary. I brought home with me when mom moved into an assisted living facility. It has great value to me.

What do you own that is worth very little money but is a great treasure to you?

Motown and More

Last night was the big concert for the Senior Chorale. We had an audience of 670 people who applauded and cheered for us. It was great fun to sing for such an enthusiastic audience. Singing such happy music just has to make a person smile. One of my favorites was “Wonderful World.” Our soloist for that song was Chuck. He is a frail little old man who can’t read music, is nearly blind and is easily confused. He never did get his solo right in rehearsal, but he nailed it last night. The audience loved him. We did a Motown Medley with the help of our own version of Pips who called themselves the Sparkettes. They danced and sang and made the music wonderful. It was a great concert. I love singing with this group.

Disney Dreams

My granddaughter just called from Orlando. She is just bubbling over with excitement.

Tomorrow morning she reports for duty as a Disney employee. This is her dream job assignment. It is wonderful to watch anybody who is so happy.

She has started a blog to record her adventures. I have added her to my blog roll. If you want to catch her excitement, check her out at Disney Dreams.

Week End Snapshots

Friday night Aunt Ann hosted a party celebrating Ashley's college graduation. Family and friends had a good time wishing her well as she heads off to Orlando for an internship with Disney.




We enjoyed Bowie's Memorial Day parade on Saturday morning. I think half the town was in the parade. There were Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts baton twirlers, and anybody who thought it would be fun to be in a parade. Uncle Sam led them all.




The fife and drum corp was one of several marching bands.




This old fire truck was one of many antique cars.




The Bolivian dancers were colorful entertainment.




The Abrakadoodle float with Splat riding in the back. Splat won the Best Dog award. My daughter is driving and several grandchildren walked along to pass out prizes to the crowd.




The weather Saturday afternoon was too nice to stay home so we took DQ sailing on the Chesapeake Bay. Here's a picture of Captain DQ at the helm of a seventy foot schooner.




This morning at church we honored our high school graduates. It is always amazing to me to see how quickly our children grow up. One of the girls sang an absolutely beautiful rendition of Amazing Grace. The song made me cry.

Silliness

I stole this idea from Jennie’s blog. It was a cute idea for a day when I had nothing profound to share.

1. YOUR ROCK STAR NAME (first pet, current car):
Spotty Dorland

2. YOUR GANGSTA NAME (fave ice cream flavor, favorite type of shoe):
Moose Tracks Birkenstock

3. YOUR NATIVE AMERICAN NAME (favorite color, favorite animal):
Green Cat

4. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME (middle name, city where you were born):
Rowland Cape May

5. YOUR STAR WARS NAME (first three letters of your last name, first two of your first name):
Eva-Su

6. SUPERHERO NAME (2nd favorite color, favorite drink):
Blue Coffee

7. NASCAR NAME (the first names of your grandfathers):
Gideon John

8. STRIPPER NAME (the name of your favorite perfume/cologne/scent, favorite candy):
Skin- So- Soft Chocolate

9. TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME (your fifth grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter):
Harris Huntington

10. SPY NAME (your favorite season/holiday, flower):
Summer Rose

11. CARTOON NAME (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now):
Strawberry Socks

12. HIPPIE NAME (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree):
Coffee Christmas

Birds

Yesterday while working in my yard I came upon a nest full of baby birds. The nest is in a row of bushes right at eye level so these babies could be easily observed. I found myself totally enchanted by these little creatures and watched them for a long time. They were tightly packed into that small space, and as they slept it appeared that the nest was pulsing with each breath they took. Their nearly featherless bodies pulsed up and down in a steady beat. I backed away a bit and watched as the mother robin returned to the nest to feed them. Three wrinkled little black heads popped up, beaks wide open. They truly are ugly with their wrinkled, featherless necks craning up hungrily. Their eyes appeared closed. I wondered if they were able to see anything yet. It has been raining here and I wondered about the birds in their little nest with only a few fuzzy feathers to protect them. I just checked on them again and they are all there appearing safe and comfortable in their wet little nest. I wonder how long it will be before they fly away and leave their mama with an empty nest. Will their mama miss them when they go? Is the empty nest syndrome just something humans endure?

18

Thank you for all the birthday wishes on my last post.

I found this picture of me on my eighteenth birthday. I’m all dressed up for a mother/daughter tea to celebrate my high school graduation which would occur a few days after my birthday. I am leaning on my birthday/graduation gift, my first car. It was a baby blue 1958 Studebaker Lark. Oh, how I did love that car!

67

I came home from Tennessee with a bad cold. Today I woke up with laryngitis. I was supposed to sing in our Senior Chorale Motown concert today, but my singing voice is gone. I was disappointed, but I did go watch the concert and those old folks really can sing Motown. It was great. Hopefully I will be able to sing with them on their next concert in two weeks.

I found a lovely swing in my backyard when we arrived home Sunday night. It is a mother’s day gift from my kids. They must think I am a swinging gramma or a rockin’ mama. It is a nice place to sit and enjoy the birds and enjoy the sunshine.

Today is my birthday. I am 67 years old. There is no way I can make that sound young. There has been a little flurry of well wishes from friends and family. I feel loved. Life is good.