Friday Photos

Happy to see the weekend! No, the week was not bad or super stressful just a tad bit dull. After a busy weekend, I thought I was ready for five days of being a shut-in but by the end of the week, I was going a little stir crazy.

My driver, Miss Lyssy-lu, had a full week of school and AP exams. And prior to the exams, lots of studying. Donnie worked, of course, so he was not around during the day. That is just how it is and I am not complaining too much, just a little bit. 🫣 I am grateful that Donnie works super hard and Alyssa takes her studies so hard. 

Next week will be much more lively as we have a family member coming over for short visit and Abby comes home for the summer next week as well. Also, by next week, some of the items I’ve ordered for Alyssa’s graduation should come in and those items will give me a project to work on. 

One item that I ordered for me came in. The wording cracked me and I could not help but indulge in taking a picture to display the irony. Just Keep Running- HA! That’s a good one. The item is a holder for an iPhone and the Just Keep Running admonition is an insert for where the phone should go. The phone holder is to be worn around the upper arm (I placed the holder against my boot for ironic purposes only). In another burst of irony, back when I could, I had no desire for a phone holder such as this because I never ran with my iphone. When Donnie and I started walking outside this year after the weather warmed up, I realized that I wanted a phone holder to have on our walks in case the kids called. I didn’t get one but was planning on it. Now I am not going on walks but I knew I would be spending time outside doing gardening work and I figured it would be nice to have my phone with me without having to hold it. So I ordered this and chucked the Just Keep Running insert out in the trash as soon as I took this picture! I have enjoyed being able to listen to my favorite podcasts while spending time outdoors. 

Speaking of the outdoors and gardening, I made big strides in weeding and cleaning up the garden and mulch beds around the house. Not enough for a photo but... much improvement over last week. A couple of days this week, the ground was nice and soft after rainfall which made weed pulling a slightly less pesky chore than it is.

Speaking of rain/ weather related events, we had tornadoes touch down in our county early in the week. The evening that they happened, I had just texted Abby to tell her that I’d made hair appointments for us for when she comes home for the summer. I asked her what she was doing and she replied that she, her boyfriend and his roommates were preparing a spot in the bathroom for when the storms hit their area. I decided to call Abby (I knew there was the possibility of bad weather but the day, that far, had been nice and sunny; I’d forgotten about projected bad weather) to find out more and right as I did, I received a text from a friend asking me if I realized that terrible storms were about to hit Abby’s college town. Well, I had just found out! I had Donnie turn on the TV to watch coverage and then talked to Abby. 

Abby was at her boyfriend’s apartment as they’d had dinner that night. With news of imminent bad weather and no basement to go to, the kids improvised and sought shelter in the bathroom. Abby sent me this picture.

Operation Command Center, the porcelain pot!

Abby’s boyfriend asked to talk to me, specifically to assure me how seriously he took protecting Abby. My stars! The tornado watched turned into a tornado warning in Abby’s town. I got off the phone with Abby very glad knowing her boyfriend wouldn’t let anything happen to her. 💕

Meanwhile, a thunderstorm and heavy rain had made their way to our area. The weather forecasters on the TV kept us appraised of what was going on in Abby’s area which is to the west of us and warned us that tornado warnings were heading east and our area would likely be affected. Indeed, our tornado sirens came on around 10:00 pm and we headed to the basement with water, snacks and the sweeper. Alyssa did a thorough sweeping of the basement knowing that spiders inhabit the basement. Well, they did at least. No sooner did Alyssa finish sweeping and the sirens ended. We got the basement swept out of the whole thing!

The next morning I read that one tornado touched down near Abby’s campus and that five tornadoes touched down in our county. The tornadoes in our county were not severe though north of us, tornadoes did a lot of damage. We never lost power and just had to worry for a little while. I was worried that the ferocious wind and torrential rain damaged newly planted veggies but a quick walk through the garden the next day showed no damage.

This was one of those weeks where the weather was absolutely terrible or absolutely delightful.

I love seeing the azure sky out one of our biggest windows. The weather was perfect on this day!

Exercise under that clear blue sky is going to be limited to gardening work for quite some time. I decided to start incorporating some weight lifting (lite!) in an effort to stave off severe upper arm jiggle. It felt good to do something for the ol’ arms. Goodness, think of how fit I could be if I had started this earlier! Oh well, better late than never! I will post pictures of my arms when they are swole🤭. 

Donnie has a bunch of heavier weights for if/ when I need more.

Feet/ shoe problems! I took this after an arm workout- it cracked me up. My “house shoe” is not holding up so well being worn as much as it is! I wear it in the house constantly as it elevates that leg. The decorative chain broke this week and now the pieces of it clang. Every time I walk, I hear this annoying clanging type sound. (If I ever needed an excuse to sit down mostly in the house, this is it!)

Speaking of Humpty Dumpty’s big fall and subsequently the hospital trying to put Humpty Dumpty back together again, our insurance has denied the hospital bill claim! Surgery was not medically necessary, apparently. I have talked to various team “surgery was absolutely necessary” members since receiving this and all feel confident that we will get it resolved. For the love!

Happy Mother’s Day weekend! May you spend time with loved ones and nothing befall you for which insurance can deny coverage...