Isn't It Amazing...

I love this picture (#3) of three of my grands waiting in line for Space Mountain at Disney World. I stood in long lines with the kids waiting to get on rides. It was half the fun. Watching them in line was like a pile of puppies falling all over each other. Laughing, hugging, pushing, teasing, calling Papa Harry Porter cracked them up and the anticipation of fear! Some of my favorite moments of our family trip.

Questions from O, August 2013. I saved this page.

1. The best surprise I ever had...was my surprise sixtieth birthday party. I had no idea.
2. I wish I had invented...that soccer ball that generates and stores energy by being kicked in play.
3. The most awe-inspiring place I've visited is...a Lake Superior sunset. The entire lake was pink and
     gold. Breathtakingly beautiful.
4. When I'm really excited, I...prepare! I get ready. Say, I'm going on a trip. I have been known to pack a month early!

Easter shopping, an excuse for sugar, Sugar!

Today's pic #2 is my sweet haul from a shopping trip to downtown Escanaba, MI. Hand made fudge egg dipped in chocolate with my name on it. The woman who wrote in frosting is the same one who has been personalizing my Easter eggs for at least 40 years. Double dipped malted milk balls. Cherry, white chocolate scone from Stone's. The queen would be lucky to taste this treat for high tea. My grands will love this.

O questions from February 2015 issue. 

1. I wish I had the guts to ask...

     For a photo shoot from a local photog. I wonder what I really look like. I have such a good (personal) body image of myself, but is it a true view?

2. But I'd rather not know...

     If my family and colleagues think less of my abilities because of my age.

3. I'd love for someone to ask me...

    Please, because of your unique perspective, will you do photographs of my family?

4. My favorite icebreaker question is...

     "What are you reading?" I'll ask anybody that question. Standing in line at the grocery store, 

      sitting by the pool, at lunch with friends. I really want to know!

Twenty nine days til my sixty fourth...

April Fool's Day...but this is no joke! On the twenty ninth of this month I will be sixty four. Just like the old Beatles song. I did not think that this could ever  happen to me. But here I am. I will post every day this month. Twenty nine pictures. Twenty nine posts.

I like to read the answers to the questions the writers who contribute to O magazine answer every month. My answers to the April 2015 questions.
1. When I need a change of scenery I...
     Go out my front door and sit on my old front porch. Bikers, walkers and kids playing.
2. The change maker I most admire is...
     Elizabeth Cady Stanton. A leader of the suffrage movement. Her sacrifices paved the way for   women's rights. I am humbled by her willingness to give up her own comfort to make a difference.
3. I would love to change...
    My exercise habit. Or non habit. I just can't make myself  a regular at the gym.
4. But I'll never change...
     My family. They are the joy of my life. The grands make life youthful and new all over again.

When I'm 64...

                                             Flower child and me on the beach in January

                                                         Selfie with flower child

                                                     Self-ie portrait-first wrinkle sighting

 I know it is only February but in April I will be 64. You know how I am. I want someone to sing me the Beatles song "When I'm 64" preferably Paul McCartney.

I' m reading my first Nick Hornby book. Juliet, Naked. So good. I am going to have to read About a Boy. A former rock star and a museum curator both face aging, don't we all, but feel they have wasted years. Big question. Do you remember what you were doing on any given date? Say April 09, 1988? I got nothing...
Also reading Escape From Mr. Lemoncello's Library for a book report to my 9 year old in FLA. listening to An Echo in the Bone by Diana Gabalden. Outlander series #7. I do not want to finish this series. It has become the background of my life. Watching True Blood season 3. So bloody. SNL 40th Anniversary last night. Paul Simon made me cry.

Time,once again, to play 20 questions courtesy of Oprah magazine's 20 questions every woman should ask herself today!
#1 Do I enjoy my own company?  Easy. Yes. I have always lived by the, "If you want to have an intelligent conversation, talk to yourself," school of thought. I know what I like to do and at this point in my life I have the time to do it. Reading, porch sitting, biking, photoging, spending time with the really interesting people in my life, the grands. I do not mind alone time at all.

To Rise Again at a Decent Hour by Joshua Ferris...

First Chapter, First Paragraph Tuesday Intros

The mouth is a weird place. Not quite inside and not quite out, not skin and not organ, but something in between: dark, wet, admitting access to an interior most people would rather not contemplate--where cancer starts, where the heart is broken, where the soul might just fail to show up.

Would you keep reading? I am going to take this one on!

Pages read, travel and pictures...

                                          Packers and Lions and Cowboys...Oh, my!

                                A bike repair stand with tools for every imaginable fix. Vero Beach

Sand man + grands on Atlantic Ocean beach

Flower child, sand man and Granny on the beach

Packer fans in Florida

Frame tree on Indian River lagoon

Food truck with tofu

January has been a month of interesting pictures. I spent time in Vero Beach with my daughter 

and family on the Indian River lagoon. I sat with a cup of tea on the dock. Pelicans, flying mullet and dolphins crossed my vision. A tree that is a picture frame. I read part of Captain Rodney Smith's journal. Enjoying Life on the Indian River Coast. I enjoyed the beauty and peace of this bio diverse boundry water. 

My most notable books read in 2014

January 2014 I read: The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt, Voyager (Outlnder#3) by Diana Gabaldon,

February favorites: Salvage the Bones by Jesmyn Ward, Swamplandia by Karen Russell, The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barberry March #1's: The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, Songs of Willow Frost by Jamie Ford, The Invention of Wings by Sue Monk Kidd and the Girl Who Played with Fire by Stieg Larson April: The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert, Nightwoods by Charles Frazier, May: Forgive Me, Leonard Peacock by Matthew Quick, Drums of Autumn by d. Gabaldon, Shotgun Lovesongs by Nick Butler, I Remember Nothing by Nora Ephron, Arcadia by Lauren Groff, The One and Only Ivan  June: Please Ignore Vera Dietz by A.S. King  July: The Interestings by Wolitzer, Still Life With Breadcrumbs by Anna Quindlan, Eleanor and Park by Rainbow Rowell September: The Miseducation of Cameron Post by Emily Danforth, Americanah by Chimandah Ngozi Adichie October's best: A Breathe of Snow and Ashes by Diana Gabaldon November: Euphoria by Lily King December: All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

These are the best of the many books I read in 2014. I hope I find books equal to these special reads in 2015. 

Happy New Year 2015...

                                           At the Ice Rink

My family on Christmas Eve 2014

                                                         Flower child contortionist

                                            V and H at Broadway Rox Christmas

                                                            Youngest Texan grand

                                                  Ivan, Cammy and Kelley

This year our family could not all be together for Christmas. My youngest daughter moved to Florida.
I miss them so much. I loved being able to visit them whenever I wanted to. The five kids, including the baby of the family, are now over a thousand miles away. Our Texans left yesterday. My oldest daughter who lives two blocks away has just announced that they will be moving to Florida as soon as they sell their house. 2015 is going to be tough for me. I have loved having family so close.

I can not think of any resolutions for the New Year. I hope I am aging gracefully. Sixty-four this year. I am the girl who did not think I would survive sixty. I went to my work Christmas party. I am invited every year even tho I have been retired for seven years (what?). I sub quite a few days. There are only three co- workers left from my time. For the first time ever I felt out of place. Three new babies. Everyone seems so young. They are now mostly in their late 20's or early 30's.

I am reading Lincoln Ladies by Suzy Duffy. I just finished All the Light we Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. This story made me so sad. WWII story of such suffering caused by war. Little glimmers of light, character, in the darkness of inhumanity. I watched many sappy, fun, Hallmark movies with my daughters. It's a Wonderful Life made me cry again.

Goodbye 2014. Where did you go and how did you go so fast?