Shopping for Clothes

The only thing worse than shopping for groceries is shopping for clothes.  I. HATE. SHOPPING. FOR. CLOTHES.   It is such a pain in the butt to grab a handful of clothes that MIGHT fit, take them to the dressing room, take off garments, put on garments, grimace at my reflection in a mirror that is definitely not my friend.  Repeat until frustrated and flustered and leave the store empty-handed.

I have never enjoyed anything about trying on clothes.  Shopping for school clothes were some of the most miserable days of my youth.  By the time I was in the fifth grade, Mama finally got the message and left me at home while taking the other three kids to buy new clothes and shoes.  Mama would pick out clothes and shoes for me with hopes that everything would fit properly.  There wasn't really any way she could go wrong with jeans and t-shirts.  Prom dresses?  Mama picked those out for me as well.  

Poor Kristin.  She had to suffer through my bad attitude when I took her shopping for clothes.  Thank goodness for Garanimals --- the best mix and match line of clothes ever! Kristin would try on a pair of pants, shorts and shirt until we found the right size of each.  From there, I bought one of each color.  Bam!  Finished shopping in 30 minutes or less.  

These days, I am so very grateful for on-line clothes shopping.  I have determined my "true fit" with each website I visit so all I have to do is figure out what I like and put it in my virtual shopping cart.  Pop-pop, click-click!  Finished shopping in 30 minutes or less.  My sanity remains intact and my attitude is right on track.  :) 

Official Rain Gauge

As most of you know, I refer to our rain gauge as the "Jetton Slave Ranch official rain gauge" when reporting rainfall at the end of the dirt road.  It isn't anything fancy.  No glitter or ribbons to attract the rain.  Just a simple, durable plastic contraption which captures measurable moisture.  

The actual gauge fits inside a cylinder.  Then a funnel (shown to the left of the gauge in the picture) is secured on top of the gauge.  The cylinder is secured to a fence post near the house.  This gauge measures to the (pardon me) "gnat's ass".  

It really is an "official" gauge.  We report our rainfall report to the National Weather Service which, for our region, is based in San Angelo.  We have actually reported mere/100ths of an inch (reference "gnat's ass" in previous paragraph) on more than one occasion.    

There are several rain gauges posted at various spots on the ranch.  Sometimes it rains more on the west side than east side, south side than north side, etc.  But we report only the rain in the Jetton Slave Ranch official rain gauge to the NWS.  Sam keeps rainfall records for the entire ranch for all pertinent purposes.  

And there you have it.  Let's hope we can get into a routine of reporting substantial rainfall amounts like we did earlier this week.  PRAY FOR RAIN!  :) 

Flying Kites

I.  Hate.  The.  Wind.  I enjoy a breeze while sitting on the porch on a hot summer afternoon.  There is a HUGE difference between a gentle, soothing breeze as opposed to the 30mph gusts we have been experiencing lately.


My only good memory of wind is flying kites.  Mama would take us to Gibson's (located across from the Texan Theater) and let us pick out kites.  Marshall was drawn to the ones with eyes and teeth.  I preferred the ones with bright colors.  There was never enough string on the roll that came with the packaged kite.  With that in mind, Mama would buy us more rolls of string.  We would prepare our endless amount feet of string rolls and be ready for  the WIND! 


We had a field in front of the house that was perfect for flying kites.  No trees, no electrical lines and unlimited space all around us.  With great anticipation, we would unfurl our kites, toss them in the air and run like heck to launch the kites.  Our kites would encounter a couple of nose dives before we got the hang of things.  I forgot to mention competition.  Of course we had to see who could get their kite the highest in the sky.  We would very meticulously let out more string and watch the kites become mere dots in the sky.  Our kites were soaring like buzzards!!


And then it happened.  The string on my kite broke and my kite sailed away.  I could only encourage Marshall to continue to fly his kite while I pouted about the loss of my kite.  Snap!  The string broke on Marshall's kite and it, too, sailed away.  Well, that wouldn't do!  We jumped on our bikes for a kite search-and-rescue effort.  For all we knew, the kites were halfway to the next county but we had to look for them.  By the time we got to the river, we had lost interest in the kites and skipped rocks (another competition) until our arms were sore.


Now-a-days, I cuss the wind when I'm driving. I cuss the wind when it blows so hard that the hummingbird feeders sway and sugar water goes all over the place.  I cuss the wind when I'm trying to contain my mail from the post office to the vehicle.  I cuss the wind simply because I. HATE. THE. WIND.  Maybe I should fly a kite just to make peace with the wind.  Nah.  I'll just stay indoors and cuss the wind.  :)

For the Love of Reading

Books are a mainstay in my life.  On cold winter mornings while sitting on the floor in the front of the fire place, Aunt Jane was teaching me how to sound out words when I was four years old.   Going to the public library with Grandmom was a treat!  I thought Mrs. Mahler had the best job in the world as librarian. 

I went through the Trixie Beldon mystery books like wildfire.  Mama bought "Little House on the Prairie" series which should have kept me entertained for at least six weeks.  Laura Ingalls was my new favorite pioneer girl.  I zipped through the prairie life in a couple of weeks.  Fairy tales and Little Golden Books were great places to visit.  

And then Nancy Drew took the spotlight from Trixie Beldon on the mystery front.  Mama signed me up with a book club in which I received one Nancy Drew book a month.  Each book had two mystery stories.  Each book equaled one afternoon of reading.  I would re-read each story just in case I missed an important clue along the way.  

Mama was in the same book club and received two Harlequin Romance novels each month.  I never could quite get a good hold on the romance novels.  Damsels in distress being rescued by pirates or rouges living the hard life didn't hold my attention like mysteries did.  

I still have my Nancy Drew and Little House on the Prairie book collections.  Over the years I have added new collections to my small home library which are shelved all over the house.   Mystery novels are still my favorite reading material.  It is best to steer clear of me when I'm engrossed in a darn good book.  Just ask Sam.....

Reading is good for the soul.  It is true what they say, "Don't judge a book by its cover."  You might just miss out on the story of a lifetime.   :)

Babysitting

That was a heck of a hiatus!  We have been super crazy busy at work (that's a good thing) but it sure has interfered with things I would rather be doing --- like blogging.  Sitting down at the home computer after spending hours on the work computer simply does not happen.  

I must give a "shout out" to Jerry Stewart.  He asked me yesterday, "What happened to your blogging?"  I promised him I would get back on track with a story about babysitting.  So, here goes....

My best friend, LeAnn, and I spent a lot of time together back in the day.  Our daughters, each named Kristin, were playmates and grew up like sisters.  Either we were all at my house or LeAnn's house on most afternoons and weekends.  We would sit outside in lawn chairs while the girls performed skits, dances and baked mud pies for us.  It was one such afternoon at LeAnn's house when we were perched in her front yard in our lawn chairs.  We were using the cooler containing adult beverages as a footrest and watching the girls play.  

Enter Jerry.  His parents live next door to where LeAnn lived.  Jerry came home from work and found us sitting in the yard sipping our beverages and talking about life.  He ambled over and asked us, "What are y'all doing?"  We both answered, "Babysitting.  Want to join us?" He pulled up a lawn chair, grabbed a cold one and helped us babysit.  

Here's to the days of babysitting and sitting in lawn chairs in the yard with friends and a cooler of adult beverages!  :)