Quick Take Friday

Seven Quick Takes (Snow Day!!)

--1--

Snow day!  I can't tell you how amazing it was to not have to go to work today.  I am afraid that it is way to close to Christmas break and that I am getting to comfortable being home again.  I miss being home.
Summer is just around the corner - I just keep telling myself...

---2--

Back to the snow day.  I know that if I had any northern readers you would comment and laugh at how the south immobilizes when it snows.  We have no salt, no gravel, no plows.
So laugh all you want.  Sure we drive like crap in the snow.  You would too.
We are relaxed down here.  Our motto?  We'll just wait until it melts....

--3---

I live at the top of a fairly steep hill.  My neighborhood is old and thickly wooded.
Hill + woods+ snow= ICE.
Ice and hills DO NOT MIX.  And I don't care if you are from New Hampshire, Illinois or Timbuktu  you will not navigate this hill safely!  At least that is what I spent the day telling people on the street outside.  I'd say I personally saw 12 cars careen down the hill into the curb, onto the grass, or spin a 360.  the results?  One tire blow out, a few bent rims, lots of burnt rubber.  But the worst?  The run-away trailer that had been pulled by an F-250.  After jack-knifing and blocking the street completely it got away, slid down the hill, banked off the curb and hit a car 5 feet into a driveway (the blown tire car-- crappy day for them).

The worst thing, is that despite several people calling the city to complain-- we got NOTHING... no salt, no gravel, no barricades.   

--4--

On a positive note, snow days can be fun!  I reconnected with several neighbors today.  Met a few new ones.  Shared some movies with a few - can you believe there are some people out there who have NEVER seen Dirty Rotten Scoundrels?  We shared some hot chocolate with our mailman who skied down the hill on foot to deliver the mail! We LOVE our mailman!

--5--

My sister Sheilah is in Virginia these days.  Yesterday she had mohs surgery on THREE separate spots on her face.  Poor baby.  Amazing woman that she is, she posted a picture of her bandaged face from the car on her way home from the hospital SMILING.  She amazes me, truly.  I sure hope she takes advantage of my mom while she is there- and keeps Perky out of the local thrift shop and away from the cool whip.

It's just peanut-butter cups, some sugar cookies and some cool whip....oh my!

--6--

I feel very efficient this winter.  By the end of the winter my wooded back yard might look half way decent.  We have been burning anything and everything from back there.  Well, anything not covered in a hairy vine.  Because we all know that this is POISON IVY, and it can be nasty when burned.  Another thing we southerners just instinctively know. 

--7--

Christmas is almost put away.  :(

I think I might leave the snowflakes up indefinitely.

I like them.

Stop by Jen's for her Quick takes!

Saving Frank

You know that old expression  you never see a dead cat up a tree? 
I actually heard it for the first time a few weeks ago when a friend mentioned that her neighbor's cat had to be rescued removed from a tree (hence proving the old saying wrong...)

This afternoon I heard it again.  Only this time it was Frank, my dear friend's cat, who was up the tree-- at LEAST 40 feet up.  He had been up there for two days.  We have had record low temperatures.  The wind-chill was 5 degrees... Thankfully, Frank was cold but alive and well up there on his perch.  He was just not willing to come down.

With no success after calling the power company, the fire department, the local news, the vet...,  Bri and her kids did everything to get him to come down on his own.  Yummy food, treats, yelling, throwing sticks.  He was too high for nerf darts and the tree was too big to shake or bend.

Frank wasn't coming down on his own.

In desperation Bri called our house looking for a chainsaw to cut the tree down. 

Who am I to not help a friend in need?

So we show up en-masse  ready to  help extracate Frank.

The chain saw did not cooperate, despite coaxing.  It was having performance anxiety. 
Ry tried shooting Frank in the bum with an airsoft...  no luck 
He settled for using his newly acquired knot skills to tie the pull rope to the tree (good Christmas gift Claire!)
She and E suggested psychological ways to coax him down (ah, girls)...  no luck
The little boys just ran around in circles
The big boys young men opted for the physical route-- chop it down with an axe.
 
Which they did
With great force
(picture soon-- when I can figure out how to get pictures off my phone)

Watching Frank ride that tree like the Silver Surfer was a thing of beauty.  A quick hop and a skip before touchdown and he was off.
Hopefully NOT up another tree.

2009 --- It's in the past....

January brought devastating news about my sister-in-law Biffy.  Rhett and I made a trip down to visit and hold her hand and pray.  Claire went back to school and life went on -- at least for us here in Atlanta.  It would also bring my baby's 10th birthday.  Who strangely asked for a fondue party?

We, of course obliged.  Because we LOVE fondue. 

So do Mumma and Poppy!

February  brought about some stir-crazy kids and the death of my lap top. I also chaperoned our Sean's orchestra trip to Savannah for the GMEA convention.  Isn't he handsome here in his tux?

 

February would also bring a newly confirmed Catholic!! Sean's sponsor, Uncle Rob, was in Iraq.  Here he is with the rest of the family

March  would begin my   fascination addiction to Facebook.  You can see a direct correlation between this addiction and the number of blog posts from here on out.  While I love FB, I would become disenchanted by it as we learned of the death of my mother's best friend Cate, via FB

Throw in the obligatory Irish celebration, the annual church party...

and a LOT of rowing,  and chaperoning a GREAT group of kids from church on retreat.

April would continue with more rowing...and a quick trip up to Charleston the visit the girlie and play tourists.

May saw the end of the rowing season...the end of the school year -- my first employed school year!!  Sean turned 16!  God received 2 souls into heaven, our friend Judith our friend and neighbor Erin, who was only 17.  We would celebrate Mother's Day by giving mom a gift that she would, OF COURSE, return...

June would bring the whole clan together to celebrate the baptism of the newest member of the family and finally another girl! Welcome to the world Keira Rose!

The rest of June would be spent poolside enjoying our cousins before the Davidson's next move to Virginia.

July would bring sadness.  My dear sister-in-law Biffy would lose her battle with cancer a short seven months after her diagnosis.  I was blessed to be with her at the end and pray everyday that she is at peace with our Lord and is looking out for me

.

  I have fought the good fight, I have finished the course, I have kept the faith; 2 Timothy 4:7

August brought the back to school frenzy and one-day, round-trip jaunt to Charleston taking the girlie back.  Not something you want to do frequently. Once again I will have 4 kids in 4 different schools, and I am the mother of a 19 year old!  YIKES.

September would bring more rowing.... more carpooling....and lots and lots of rain!!  Our rowing club boat house would flood 3 times.  Each time would involve shoveling the remnants of sewage overflow -- YUCK
October brought the sought after Head of the Charles Regatta

November was full of Thanksgiving goodness.  The girlie came home.  Family fun was had by all

December brought Christmas fun and sad memories of Biffy's struggle.  Ryan would finally become a teenager!  We would also have another basement flood and a broken hand on Daniel.  We spent the holiday snuggling in front of lots of fires in the fireplace watching movie after movie.

 

2010 HERE WE COME!

Old friends

I grew up here in Atlanta.

Well, let me take that back -- I went through puberty here in Atlanta.  I consider that growing up.

By the time I got to high school as an 8th grade "sub-freshman" I had started my 7th school.

That would have been THIRTY-TWO years ago.  Yeah, you heard that right.

A lot can happen in thirty-two years.

First love and the inevitable heart break that follows,

Leaving the nest

Weddings -they are the easy part- and MARRIAGE

births and deaths

Toddlers and TEENAGERS (sometimes together)

laughter and tears.

I have been blessed to share these times with these lovely ladies.
Aren't they pretty?
We don't look old enough to have known ANYTHING for 32 years, let alone each other!


I must say we all look much better when not sporting plaid skirts and saddle shoes.

"The best mirror is an old friend."
--George Herbert

Old friends are a mirror to your old self.  You know, the one you see in the mirror when you wake up-- before you rub the sleep out? When I look at them I can see myself 16 again, ready to take on the world.

Old friends not only remember who you were and know how you got where you are now,
they still like you.
 
Or are at least willing to have lunch with you every once and a while.

Who is your mirror?