I have had two golden retrievers. I lost one in February. Her name was Annie. I’ve posted her picture. Wasn’t she beautiful? She loved the snow. It’s almost June and my husband and I still miss her. She could be a stinky girl but if I could place my face in her fur and breathe in her doggy smell, I would be grateful. Do you believe dogs go to heaven?
Our beloved Annie
Hay Cutting Time May 2012
Last week I made an overnight trip to Alpharetta, Georgia for work. I got home just in time to see Mr. Faust mowing hay in the backyard. Smelled so good. If I could package this smell, I’d be a rich woman!
Even after one night, I get excited returning home to Mendota. Clinch Mountain…happy feet…security. All one and the same to me.
I am a mountain person. I don’t feel safe if Clinch Mountain is not at my back. In Adriana Trigiana’s book Big Stone Gap, Ave Maria describes herself as a “mountain girl with a flat butt.” That’s me.
I am not, however, dissing an overnight trip. I even brought a pal back home with me.
My pal PB!
She’s got good taste! Stuff for the master bedroom. I’ll show you the pictures when the goodies come out of the bag. Currently, I’ve got PB and her contents hidden in the closet. Beginning next week, I’m starting the process of cleaning and painting and freshening up the inside of my house. It’s dirty filthy nasty!
Do you want a little honey from the country?. Sweet, warm, golden?
Here ya go! Stop by my house with $6 and she’s yours!
Honey
There's gold in them thar hills
Here’s the garden that sits beside the raised beds. These are my potatoes–not just any potatoes. These are Yukon Gold potatoes. My favorite. Just past the potatoes but before the raised beds, there are some zinnia babies that will show up soon. There are also a few bell peppers in the picture. We’ve had trouble growing corn. The crows eat it. This year they are not bothering the corn. Maybe it’s all the cicadas keeping them interested and full.
Yikes! Could the crows be eating our honey bees instead? I hope not!! Whatever the reason, they have left the corn alone for the first time in 7 years.
Anyway, while I was gone last week, my husband received some visitors.
I’d like to introduce you to the Corn Family…there are a lot of them!
Mr. and Mrs. Corn
Only ten more days and I am unemployed. It’s a little scary, but it is so necessary. Check me out. I’ve got so pudgy I could be a chipmunk. Ok…maybe a chipmunk is a little small. How about a hog? I’ve got to lose weight before fall as that’s hog killing time in southwest Virginia. I will keep you abreast of my progress. It all starts on May 31. My new healthy life.
Back to the hogs. I can never recall my family setting down to a Thanksgiving dinner when we grew up in Mendota. I remember other families having Thanksgiving but not us. I asked one of my sisters, and she explained that Thanksgiving was hog killing time. Oh. Yuck. I wonder…why was it Thanksgiving?
What do you think Dale Jett is thinking in the picture below? He’s digging around hunting raffle tickets, but I’ll bet he’s really thinking…”she’d better be careful at Thanksgiving.” Or…”hummm….I smell bacon.”
That’s okay…go ahead and make fun and think pig thoughts. I’m gonna be skinny by summer’s end!!
Oink Oink Squeal
It must be trendy to write letters to God. There are billboards that say “God…” with the “…” being something about how we’re failing. I’m not sure what to think of that particular ministry.
However, this is not about those signs. If I were writing my own letter to God this evening it would read like this…
Dear Father,
Thank you for the wonderful success of our Mendota and Mt. Vernon Cemetery Benefit Friday night. As you know, I’d prayed for 200, and you sent over 350. What was I thinking??? Why did I doubt you? Maybe you did try and tell me, and I was so busy worrying that no one would come that I missed the message about the 350 you were sending. I believe it was my sister Nancy’s fault as she made me worry more because she was worrying so much.
We ran out of food, since we only planned for 200. I was left hoping the food would multiply or perhaps baskets of fish would be delivered, but you opted a different solution — you only sent kind people. They were gracious even though they were hungry. We will do better next year, as we have been reminded that we do serve a BIG God–one that doesn’t fit in a box. We’ll plan for 350 plus some extra!
As for the quilts we’re raffling, we keep running out of tickets to sell. What is this about?
But for this year, thank you for seeing us through this. Giving us ideas. Giving us donors. Giving us musicians. Giving us salvation. Giving us your closeness, your humor, your love.
That’s what I’d say…if I were one of those people who write letters such as this.
Dale Jett & Hello Stranger
Last night was the Mendota/Mt. Vernon Cemetery Benefit 2012. Here’s what went good and what when bad:
Good things…people came! They came to our benefit. I never doubted the talent of the artists — Dale Jett & Hello Stranger (in the photo…that’s Dale Jett, Theresa Jett and Oscar Harris). They have played at the Opry. However, I kept thinking of Oscar’s comment that sometimes “at home…people just think that’s ol’ Dale and ol’ Oscar…we see them at the Rally Mart.”
That was not the case. They played their best, and the people gave their best. They clapped and clapped and when Oscar thanked them, they kept clapping. I teared up. Bet that Dale, Oscar, and Theresa were sniffling around on the stage, too!
Note to self: Next year bring tissues!
Bad things…we ran out of food! Given the opportunity, we’ll do better next year. We planned for 200. 350 showed up. We totally underestimated this benefit.
My feet are hurting but my heart is full.
Oh….and we raised money. It looks like each cemetery (we divided the proceeds between Mt. Vernon Cemetery and the Mendota Cemetery) will get about $1500 to help with the mowing expense. We sold a bunch of quilt tickets, too, and that is not in the count.
I recall my sister, Pat, nudging me a few years ago when we were sitting at the Mendota Homecoming. She said “don’t you just love living in the country?”
I do.
Hi everyone! I can’t quit posting! I have so much to say. And I’m also learning how to do something new. Maybe that is more the story. Here’s another flower for reading this post.
My pink lupine
My parents are buried in a community cemetery. It’s so pretty. So peaceful. My husband and I will be buried there. I hope that’s not for a while.
At one time, the Mendota Cemetery had enough money gaining interest to pay for the upkeep, but that was when interest rates were 12% and gas for the mowing was 60 cents per gallon. Now, we have to do fundraising. We are quite a little fundraising machine. There’s bingo. We have afghans with screen printed pictures of our rural scenes. We have cookbooks. Did I tell you that we never charge any community member for burial there? Part of the tradition of rural life is pulling together during hard times, and death is a hard time.
We’re raffling off a quilt this year as part of our fundraising. We’re having a benefit, too, but I’ll write about that later.
Quilt called Common Ground
The quilt is a compilation of 30 women, but there were really only a few that did most of the work. I was not one of the few, but I did sew six or seven strips together, so I can claim my piece of the quilt’s history. It’s called “Common Ground”…or maybe “Uncommon Ground”? See, I don’t even know but I’m still taking credit for part of the quilt!
As the quilt neared completion, we wondered if we could sell 500 tickets. Margie called me. I called Nancy. Nancy called Margie. Margie called Lisa. Lisa called Chris. Chris called Linda. Maybe not all in that order, but you get the picture. We could not decide.
I ordered big. I recalled my neighbor Jennifer saying “we serve a big God…think big!” She was talking about another subject, but I recalled her statement when ordering the raffle tickets, so I ordered not 500 — but 1,000!!! Guess what? Tonight I ordered another 1,000 tickets!
We will have to do a quilt every year following this success. Maybe I can do more than six strips!!
This is my raised bed garden. There are actually six 4 x 8 raised beds. The one in this picture has salad greens. We need to eat from them every day to keep them from bolting.
Salad anyone?