Meeting the President

on friday, june 29th, my son, nathan, and i had the privilege of meeting the president of the united states. nathan is a marine and ended his time of service in august. he was on the presidential squadron as a helicopter mechanic who took care of "marine one". whenever a member of this squadron ends his or her tour of duty, he is honored by being invited to the white house to personally meet and shake hands with the president. each marine can invite one family member...a parent or spouse. i got to go.
it. was. awesome!  
there were about 30 in our group. each marine in dress blues...such an impressive sight!  the lighting on this photo is terrible. my camera must have been on the wrong setting, but it's the only one i have.

we traveled into d.c. on a bus from quantico.  the security once we entered the white house grounds was impressive, too. no purses, no cameras once we left the bus. so the few pictures i have were taken with a point and shoot from a moving bus, thus the less than excellent quality.

it was during those hot, muggy, high 90's days we had this summer and involved a lot of standing and waiting outside. so by the time we got inside i was sweaty and frizzy. but it was worth it. being inside the white house surrounded by all that history was amazing. after all the waiting we were ushered into the oval office where each marine and guest was introduced to the president. he shook our hands, asked where we were from, thanked nathan for his service and said "we're very proud of you", then asked him his plans after the marines. we had our picture taken with him and were then ushered out. everything happened very quickly. after greeting everyone, marine one landed on the white house lawn and the president was off.

and i have to say...i'd never been so nervous in my life. i could just see myself stumbling over the few words i had planned to say..."it's an honor to meet you, mister president".  because no matter your politics or how you feel about the man, i very much respect the office. we met the president of the united states of america.  it was an experience i'll never forget. i was a very proud mother that day. still am.
it's now october and we have not yet received the photo taken that day. i hope to post it when we get it. 

A Little Behind

it is more than 3 months since my last post. unbelievable. however, the main reason for my absence has at last been resolved. after a thunderstorm and resulting loss of power one evening in late june i rebooted my computer to find that i was not able to access my user side. nothing else was wrong, it just wouldn't let me on the 'debbie' account. i could use the 'gary' side, just not mine. but the problem was that all, and i mean all of my photographs were on the debbie side. it kept asking for a password that did not exist. 
i have recently enlisted the aid of my eldest daughter, erin, who is pretty good with computers. at first, it appeared that all my pictures seemed to have been lost and i was devastated. but she persisted and finally found them and saved them on an external hard drive that i had purchased a while back for the purpose of backing up my photos but had procrastinated and not done it yet.  (that'll teach me.)  my daughter, the computer genius!
now i face the daunting task of catching up on 3 1/2 months of posts. and i do have to catch up. it'll drive me crazy not to. this is my online scrapbook and i can't skip things. i've been procrastinating getting started because the task is so daunting and now i have more to catch up on. there's a lesson here to be learned, i think.
i will close this rather long explanation with a few pictures of my front porch that i had planned to post next...from june.

flowers from our garden...

i love this...a christmas gift from my sis-in-law who knows my taste perfectly.

and finally, random shots taken while playing with my zoom lens.

one of our resident bluebirds...
 

The Joys of My Heart...Part 1

i've decided this year to do a series of birthday posts honoring my four children. i'm doing this in the order of their birthdays in 2012. it is important that i point this out, because ranking is very important to them, as in who is the favorite son or daughter ;). each believes him or herself to be the favorite, and in this, they are all correct. each one is my very favorite. 

andrea kathleen has the first birthday, june 25. she is the second child, and second daughter. 

what a cutie patootie!


ready to start kindergarten... 

all too soon graduating from high school....

 with grandparents

1999 was a big year. she got married, finished a year of college, and became a mother.

 a four generation photo...andrea, grandma gamby, me, and little mikaela.

she has since blessed us with three grandchildren, and now owns her own photography studio.

in looking for photos, i realized i didn't have as many nice photos of her as i wanted. mainly because when i point a camera at her i often get this...

or this...

but i did manage to find some good ones.

doing what she does best...

happy birthday, sweetheart!

Meme's Creamed Lettuce

our garden lettuce is coming in and so delicious and abundant. in trying to use it up, i'd been trying to think beyond the regular garden salad and remembered meme gamby's creamed lettuce.  she made it often for thanksgiving and christmas and always used this hand beater. 

 
it is one of my precious belongings, simply because it was hers. it always conjures up a picture of her making her sour cream dressing and having my dad taste it to make sure it was right.

i made some this weekend...a simple recipe and just as good as i remembered.

3 T. vinegar
3 T. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup sour cream

beat with love in an old glass hand mixer and serve over lettuce.

National Pike Festival

be still my heart. about 7-8 miles of yard sales and 2 beautiful days. this weekend was the national pike festival in my area. i haven't been yard saling for a long time. i took friday morning and hit almost every one. then hubby and i went out again saturday morning and there were even more yard sales set up. found a few neat things and good buys. here's my loot.

 *a very nice quality artificial winter wreath which i will tweak when the time comes ($4)

*a like new heavy duty tote which will be used for toting craft supplies ($3)
*a handled divided glass serving platter ($2)
*a lidded glass cracker jar ($2)

 

  
*6 etched glasses ($1)

*glass doorknobs (i have a few ideas) ($3)
*a yellow fiesta style bowl for my sister-in-law ($1)
*dollhouse furniture for my daughter (50 cents)

*silverplate utensils (50 cents)
*a mesh organizer tray (50 cents)

*old christmas ornaments ($3)

*a glass decanter ($1)

*4 oneida salad plates ($7)

 
i love these whimsical plates. they will look great mixed with my black and white.  the pattern is called "chefs to go".

*small vase ($1)

not pictured...
*a brand new decorative outdoor flag ($5)
*a starter spider plant ($1)
*a large clay flower pot ($1)

...for a grand total of $36.50.  when you consider that the brand new large stillinthesealedbag flag that i got for $5 normally sells for $20, i did pretty well.

the elderly woman i bought this from called it a "cracker jar". it's extremely heavy. here it is cleaned and filled with pretzels for now.  it has endless possibilities...cookies or crackers, soaps in the bathroom, etc....

i love having pretty serving platters. this will be great filled with different kinds of pickles and olives. 

love these etched glasses. aren't they pretty all cleaned up?

a great weekend!

Playing In the Dirt

there are not too many things i love to do more than gardening. i love being outside. i love being surrounded by beautiful growing things. i love watching the transformation from bare to lush. i love the feel of working in the dirt. (i hate wearing gloves, so i will never have pretty nails. i had them once... for my wedding. i wanted the traditional hands and rings photo.) i love coming in at night tired and dirty. and i am by no means a workaholic. you should see my house right now. but if it's nice outside, there's where i want to be. 
besides the beds, i've been filling every pot i can find with flowers or herbs. they are a little easier to control and maintain, especially if you have a dry season. 

pots have been filled with pansies....

'penny mickey' violas...
 

cats and kittens (or hens and chicks)....

and 'contessa burgandy bicolor' ivy geraniums.

i planted my three patio urns with spikes, bacopa and 'aloha purple sky' calibrachoa (my new favorite flower). i love how full it is and it grows like crazy. i'm anxious to see how it does throughout the season. 

the hanging basket, which i got for $5 at a yard sale (which i think was actually part of a light fixture), is planted with 'lanai upright purple mosaic' verbena and proven winners 'supertunia bordeaux' petunias.

the large pots at either side of the side door have spike plants, 'vintage mix' stock, 'sophistica antique shades' petunias, 'blush' euphorbia, and 'blackie' sweet potatoe vine.

i bought this galvinized metal carrier(?) at a flea market last year for $3, and had been just using it to hold garden tools, etc.

this spring i decided to plant it with 'dahlinova lisa white' dahlias and 'plum vein' calibrachoa.

i have to tell you a bacopa story. i could never remember whether it was pronounced 'bacopa' or 'bocapa'.  so one year we were at ashcombes, one of my sisters (i think it was jan) said..."you know deb"...(and the rest is sung to barry manilow's song copa cabana)..."at ba-co-pa, co-pa ca-ba-na, the hottest spot north of ha-va-na."   
i still have to sing that song every single time i see that flower, but now i pronounce it correctly.