Thanksgiving And Resolutions In November

As I try to finish some long overdue chores and brand new projects I find myself reflecting on Thanksgiving and this past year. Then the natural path of regrets, worries, sadness, stress of unfinished business creeps into my mind. Always does, and maybe, always will. That's who I am. Then, acceptance and new resolve to change some things creeps into my mind. For that process, I am proud and full of hope.In the past, it did not happen that way, I would always allow the first, negative, thoughts to creep into my mind. It would stop there, and I would feel horrible. Now, I allow the second process to take shape in my mind. Wonderful progress if I say so myself!!

And this is the conclusion I have come to for this Thanksgiving; I am truly grateful for so many things.

First and foremost for me this year is the simple fact I am here to be thankful. My brush with cancer this past year has renewed in me the wonder of my life and how blessed I am.

 My family. We are a mixed bunch who have evolved in some many wonderful, heartbreaking ways to become who we are now.If nothing else, we have survived and now, we thrive!

I am grateful that my son, husband, and stepson served our country in foreign lands during deployment and made it back home.

I am grateful that my son, daughter-in-law, and 2 youngest grandchildren live in the same state as we do now and not half way around the world.

I am grateful for the most kind, loving, funny husband this girl could ever ask for. Seriously, after 20 years I am still pinching myself about how lucky I am to share my life with him! AND, as a bonus, I am loved and accepted by his wonderful family who, over the years have become my family.

I am grateful for this guy. Blake has made us young again and we love his wit, sense of humor, kindness to others, and all around awesomeness.

I am grateful for my Sissy, who has been my biggest advocate, friend, and fan my whole life. She now suffers from Alzheimer's disease and as I watch her fade away I am so grateful for her love and loyalty. I treasure our time together and always will.

My friends. You know who you are.

So after counting my blessings, I resolve to try harder. To be a better wife, mom, Jamar, sister, aunt, in-law, friend, and human being. I resolve to enjoy my blessings and bask in the love. I resolve to be happier with me.

 Happy Thanksgiving!

Pumpkins

I love to grow Pumpkins. I have always been fascinated by them and how they grow......I know, strange huh? When I was a kid, in 2nd grade, we grew a Giant Pumpkin at school. We had an area outside our classroom that we planted that special plant that was once a seed. I will never forget watching that seed turn into a sprout, then a plant, then watching as it literally took over a large area with it's large yellow flowers and it's prickly, itchy, long vines that would grow overnight it seemed. I lived right across the street from my primary school so I would always go take one last look at that Pumpkin plant at the end of the day.I was so excited about that Pumpkin plant!

And I can still remember how it felt to touch the vines with their prickly hairs all over them. Maybe it was because I was a little kid at the time, but that plant seemed to take over the whole school yard and produced the biggest Pumpkins! And that is how I fell in love with pumpkins and growing them.

A couple of years ago, I went to a small plant sale and the Sonoma County Master Gardeners were there selling GIANT Pumpkin seeds. I could not wait to plant my GIANT Pumpkin seeds! When the plant was big enough, I picked off all the blooms except for 4 of them. One for each grandchild. They advise doing this so that all of the plant's energy can go into the remaining Pumpkin blooms. I was so excited to see how big the Pumpkins would get. I envisioned having to get a forklift to pick up the Pumpkins so that I could win the grand prize for the biggest Pumpkin ever! Well, as you can see, I did not grow the biggest Pumpkin ever but they were pretty darn big and my oldest granddaughter, Big E, was thrilled. I could not have been happier with my prized Pumpkins! Well, as a side note, at the time my 2 youngest grand kids were living half way across the world so technically, I would have been happier if they could have been there to see their Pumpkins in person......anyway......back to the pictures......

I also tried something that I discovered in one the many articles I read about growing these wonderful gourds.

When these 4 Pumpkins were just beginning to grow, I carved into each one the name of one of my grand kids with a straightened paper clip. The article cautioned that there were risks with doing this such as carving too deep into the skin of the Pumpkin, thus allowing bacteria and pests into the gourd. Unfortunately, that is exactly what happened to Little E and M's Pumpkins. I etched their names too hard and punctured the skin. Soon, these Pumpkins died. What you see in the above pictures are the 2 survivors. I made sure to save the seeds from the biggest Pumpkin for next year.

The next year's results reminded me again why you should always try to buy non-hybridized, heritage, seeds when you can. The plant did not flourish and all the Pumpkins were small. Seeds saved from hybrid plants do not do well at all. They are altered so that they produce something special for that season. That's why they are altered or combined with other plants to produce something different or special. Heritage seeds are tried and true to the parent plant's heritage and history. Nothing altered, you get what you get. Something true and comforting about that fact. So, what to do with alot of nice, small pumpkins? Especially after all the fuss and hype I created over last year's GIANT pumpkins. In a pinch, with Big E coming to spend the day to garden with me, and harvesting the Pumpkins, we created these funny looking guys and the day was a great day even without GIANT Pumpkins.

Going To Bloglovin!

Good Morning!

I have been busy on the computer the last few days working with a wonderful blog designer who is helping me spruce up my blog site as well as my new Etsy shop. I am so excited about all the new changes! I will write about Jane, my blog designer, and all that she has done for me later.

Now, back to me being busy on the computer. Trying to connect all the social medias together, creating new accounts, getting expert advice from my oh so smart daughter-in-law has my head spinning!
 As you can probably tell, I am not the most literate computer person. When I get stuck or do something unintentionally devastating while working on my computer, I always cry HELP to my go to guy, my 17 year old resident grandson/techie/ all round great kid.

So, I get great advice from the above mentioned daughter-in-law when I asked her about the best blog host site to be on. DIL suggested Bloglovin which has expanded her followers on her blog, Ramblings Of A Marine Wife , by quite a bit when she changed host sites.
 I am on Blogspot and like it but I am not getting the exposure or followers I would like.

OK.....so I set up an account, great. Now to finish and become a member I must post a blog about Bloglovin with the following link. So here goes...........

<a href="http://www.bloglovin.com/blog/4975049/?claim=hmpnttb47um">Follow my blog with Bloglovin</a>

Let's hope that this works! Before you feel cheated that there is nothing remotely connected to gardening or any pictures in this post, I promise another post soon about Pumpkins. I promise!