Bibbity-Bobbity-Boo!

Since Thursday last week I have been working on a project (well, two really) that is near and dear to my heart.  Making my granddaughters happy.  No, we haven;t had any tea parties in October, but I have been doing something that is very Octobery.  Making costumes.  Last month I was looking up little witch costumes, in fact, I had been dreaming of one and designing one for Lily since I was in England with Sara.  Or was I in Logan with Lizzy?  I think it was in England and I was trying to explain to Sara this cute little witchey costume that I had in mind for Lily for Halloween.  Well, there I was getting it all designed in my head and even had a couple of pictures to help me turn it into a reality when Morgan told me that Leah and Lily wanted to be princesses for Halloween.  I should have realized the impact Disney has on my little sweethearts.  So, I shelved my witch plans and decided to do what they want and make princess costumes for them this year.  I got the pattern a couple of weeks ago and on Thursday and Friday last week I sewed Leah's beautiful dress, which she has told me is her Sleeping Beauty dress. 

 When I first started Leah's dress, she was ecstatic and couldn't wait to try it on.  She would whirl and twirl all over the basement and cried when the fittings were done and she had to take it off.  Now it is all done, and we couldn't get her to smile for anything when we took these pictures tonight.  I guess Sleeping Beauty was really sleepy and needed to get home and have her beauty rest.  But you can see why she would love this dress.  It's pink and pretty poofy!
I got a good rest on Sunday and then on Monday and Tuesday I tackled Lily's dress.  I wanted something different from Leah's dress, but cute and charming to match Lily's cute and charming personality.  Her's was to be the Cinderella dress, according to Leah.  So blue was the color for Lily, and this is what I came up with.  Here she is posing with her pumpkin.   How do you like it?

When they come over to my house and I'm doing something downstairs, all they want to watch on the TV is Sleeping Beauty or Cinderella.  I've heard them both about five times each this last week.  I did the poofy tutu underskirts today and now the dresses are cute as can be.  I just need to take each of the tutu elastics in a couple of inches because they work their way down and are soon showing below the hem of the skirts. 
The girls, M & A, Zack and Sara are all headed to Disneyland next week.  The dresses are going with them and Leah and Lily will be able to wear them on one of their days in the Magic Kingdom.  How fun is that going to be?  I told Morgan that she can't let the girls eat in them, so she's going to pack shorts and T-shirts along to change into for lunch and when they get tired of wearing the costumes.  I'm sure they will want to wear them when they get to meet the Disney Princesses and get pictures taken. 

Pretty fun to be the Fairy godmother this week and make all their dreams come true.  As far as dresses, that is. 
On a totally different note.  We picked apples last week.  We must have picked a total of two or three bushels which I juiced two days later.  I did six batches of apples at 80 minutes each and I got 18 quarts!  YUM!  I don't think it's really worth my time to juice all of the apples, but when they are just hanging there on the tree and you know they're going to go to waste if you don't use them, it makes me feel guilty, so I do it. 

On a sad note.  I snowed a week ago and many of the branches on our trees cracked under the weight and fell off the trees.  We woke up Friday morning to a terrible mess all over our lawn.  The weeping willow and Box Elder in back both lost major branches too.  I felt terrible about the early storm.  Later Alan reported to me that our raspberries were hit really hard.   And below is the picture of how I felt when I heard that bad news.

I had just been over cleaning out the dead canes and was going to get them tied up the next day.  It looks like almost two-thirds of the canes were broken off because they had full foliage and the weight of the snow was too much for them.  Darn it!  I just can't win with my raspberries. And as Scarlett would say, "I can't think about it anymore. There will be berries next year.  After all, tomorrow is another day!" 
And that is the way my last week has gone,  busy busy busy! 

Order in the Court! Please, Control your Laughter!

Because I have an IPad, I just find it so much easier reading books, articles, etc. on it rather than cracking a book open.  Books are heavy and cumbersome, but I found myself the other day really wanting to hold a book in my hands, turn the pages and smell the paper.  I love reading books, and I missed it!  When I was in town on Monday, I stopped in at the library and checked out three books I thought looked good – all law and order types,  you know,  John Grisham and Kate Wilhelm books. 

I finished  The Confession,  by John Grisham, last night and I have to say it was a pretty good book.  Kate Wilhelm is much better at the court scenes.  Sometimes when I read a book, I wonder if it has any foundation in the truth, so today I was googling a little about courts and laws and found these quotes.   These are from a book called Disorder in the American Courts, and are things people actually said in court, word for word, taken down and now published by court reporters that had the ...torment of staying calm while these exchanges were actually taking place.  Pretty funny, hope you enjoy them as much as I did. 

ATTORNEY: What was the first thing your husband said to you that morning? ... WITNESS: He said , 'Where am I, Cathy?' ATTORNEY: And why did that upset you? WITNESS: My name is Susan!

 ATTORNEY: What gear were you in at the moment of the impact? WITNESS: Gucci sweats and Reeboks. 

ATTORNEY: This myasthenia gravis, does it affect your memory at all? WITNESS: Yes. ATTORNEY: And in what ways does it affect your memory? WITNESS: I forget.. ATTORNEY: You forget? Can you give us an example of something you forgot? 

ATTORNEY: Do you know if your daughter has ever been involved in voodoo? WITNESS: We both do. ATTORNEY: Voodoo? WITNESS: We do.. ATTORNEY: You do? WITNESS: Yes , voodoo. 

ATTORNEY: Now doctor , isn't it true that when a person dies in his sleep , he doesn't know about it until the next morning? WITNESS: Did you actually pass the bar exam? 

ATTORNEY: The youngest son , the 20-year-old , how old is he? WITNESS: He's 20 , much like your IQ. 

 ATTORNEY: Were you present when your picture was taken? WITNESS: Are you kidding me? 

ATTORNEY: So the date of conception (of the baby) was August 8th? WITNESS: Yes. ATTORNEY: And what were you doing at that time? WITNESS: Ummmm. 

ATTORNEY: She had three children , right? WITNESS: Yes. ATTORNEY: How many were boys? WITNESS: None. ATTORNEY: Were there any girls? WITNESS: Your Honor, I think I need a different attorney. Can I get a new attorney? 

ATTORNEY: How was your first marriage terminated? WITNESS: By death.. ATTORNEY: And by whose death was it terminated? WITNESS: Take a guess. 

ATTORNEY: Can you describe the individual? WITNESS: He was about medium height and had a beard ATTORNEY: Was this a male or a female? WITNESS: Unless the Circus was in town I'm going with male. 

ATTORNEY: Is your appearance here this morning pursuant to a deposition notice which I sent to your attorney? WITNESS: No, this is how I dress when I go to work.

ATTORNEY: Doctor, how many of your autopsies have you performed on dead people? WITNESS: All of them.. The live ones put up too much of a fight. 

ATTORNEY: ALL your responses MUST be oral , OK? What school did you go to? WITNESS: Oral... 

ATTORNEY: Do you recall the time that you examined the body? WITNESS: The autopsy started around 8:30 PM ATTORNEY: And Mr. Denton was dead at the time? WITNESS: If not , he was by the time I finished.

ATTORNEY: Are you qualified to give a urine sample? WITNESS: Are you qualified to ask that question? 

ATTORNEY: Doctor, before you performed the autopsy, did you check for a pulse? WITNESS: No. ATTORNEY: Did you check for blood pressure? WITNESS: No. ATTORNEY: Did you check for breathing? WITNESS: No.. ATTORNEY: So, then it is possible that the patient was alive when you began the autopsy? WITNESS: No. ATTORNEY: How can you be so sure, Doctor? WITNESS: Because his brain was sitting on my desk in a jar. ATTORNEY: I see, but could the patient have still been alive, nevertheless? WITNESS: Yes, it is possible that he could have been alive and practicing law.

OK, I thought they were really funny, especially when the attorney said, “All your responses Must be oral!”

Tea Party with the Girls

A Walk on the Farm

 It takes me forever to do anything with this blog because I am so inept at technology.  The downloading of pictures alone is enough to put me into a foul mood.  But, I did it tonight without any help from Alan although it took me about half an hour.  Curses! 
Our weather has been very nice (a little warm) lately and the yard and flowers are looking nice.  I enjoy being outside more than inside on summer days, so when Morgan sent the girls over yesterday afternoon I decided we all needed to take a little walk.  I got the girls an ice cream treat out of the freezer, washed out my yellow wagon, put a rug down for sitting in it, go my clippers and we took off up the back road to the mint field to get peppermint and spearmint for more tea parties.  It is really green.  The wheat is looking great - all headed out.  And in the background of the picture below, you can see one of the new pivots.

 When the girls came over, they had dress-up outfits on.  Leah's was good, but Lily's ballgown was a little long and as she trotted along the road to my house, she almost took a nose dive into the gravel because she trod on her skirt which was working it's way down off her bottom.  She just barely saved herself from a bad faceplant in the driveway.  The recent watering from the pivot made lots of mud puddles which caused Leah and Lily both much concern. They were afraid I would somehow accidentally pull them into the mud and then leave them there. They both insisted on screaming, "There's a mud puddle, grandma!" over and over again, even as we came closer, as if I didn't have eyes in my head. Usually all you have to do to stop the constant screaming is acknowledge the mud puddle and then they're on to screaming about the next exciting thing they see.  So our walk up the back road was all about mud puddles and wheat, and Leah saying over and over, "I want to get out."  I told her as soon as she finished her ice cream she could get out and walk. 



 Here's a good picture of the bunch of spearmint that I cut for fresh tea, and below is the peppermint which went into a pot last night and today I have been drinking peppermint tea all day.  I'm really proud of Leah.  She likes the mint tea with a little cream, sugar, and lemon slice.  Just perfect.  She had  three cups the other day.  I never could get Morgan to like it. 

 After we cut the mint, we headed down this semi-path.  It is not a path, just the smoothed dirt they dug up when they dug through the field from the pump to place where they put in the new pivot.  Anyway, it was good enough for us to walk on. 

By this time both girls were out walking and Lily was having trouble keeping up with Leah.  Dang those ballgowns!

The wheat is as high as Lily and soon will be taller than Leah. 

 They started to follow this pivot tire path through the wheat, but soon found that was a mistake because they both got stuck in the mud and Lily freaked out because her gown got muddied when Leah pushed her aside in her rush to be first. 

 So then we had to stop and clean off the sandals because Heaven Forbid if we have a little mud on our shoes!

Then Leah started jumping over places that she called "mud" which weren't muddy but she was having fun.  If you didn't know it by now, Leah seems to be pretty coordinated and sportsy.  I'm not going to say athletic yet.   And, of course, Lily had to try her best to copy Leah.  The funny thing was that when she jumped, she would jump right into the place she was trying to jump over. 

Then we turned on the road and walked back to home.  The girls got way far ahead of me running down the little hill, but then would turn around and race back toward me. 

When we got home, I remembered that I had a job to do and the girls helped me out.  Well, kind of.  All of what they picked went into their mouths.

After they had eaten quite a few, they lost interest in helping me out and Lily had lost interest in the lower half of her outfit.  Leah decided they needed some different footwear to go with their ballroom attire, or in Lily's case, what there was left of it.

  Yes, I'm talking about thigh-high boots, aka irrigation boots.  I've always thought irrigation boots add a certain panache to a girl's wardrobe.

There were so many to choose from, she went through four pair before she decided that these ultra-cool black and red ones were the ones for her.  It was funny to watch her try to maneuver through the grass.  At one point as she was walking the boot toes were actually pointed backwards.  And then it was on to the cherry tree.   The cherries aren't actually ripe yet, I think three or four days ought to do it.  But they're going fast because the birds are snatching them.  Darn those birds!

And then we walked around the yard - most my days come to an end by me walking around my yard.  These are what're bloomin! 

And then I saw these beautiful colors this afternoon at about 5:00 p.m. and had to get thes pictures. I love this purple behind that beautiful green field. The clouds were so thick and dark that we couldn't see the Tetons. Beautiful Colors!

And that's what I've been doing.  HOPE TO SEE YOU ALL SOON!