Tweetsie Trip

Hello everyone! I am sorry that it has been a while since I made a post. Seems like we have been super busy here. Last Tuesday, the girls and I went to Sam’s Club. Wednesday, we went to the Pastor’s. They gave us 2 bushels of grapes and I have no idea how much corn-enough to make 31 qts in the freezer. So, I guess you know what we did Thursday. Friday we finished up the grapes and corn, cleaned the church and started revival. Saturday, we decided it was time to play. We met Dave, Jess and kids at Tweetsie for a fun day. We left about 9:00 A.M. and got back home about 9:00 P.M. It was a long day but SO much fun. Sunday finished up our revival. Today we are making peach and grape jelly.

They have these horses all around Tweetsie. The boys climbed up on them as soon as we got there. They really enjoyed seeing MawMaw climb on one. My mother was such a fun person. She loved doing things out of the box. She always wore a hat. One of her favorites was a bright silver one. As soon as I climbed up on the horse, Jess said all I needed was a silver hat. I think that is how I want my children and grandchildren to remember me. I want to be a person who is fun to be with.

Some of you mentioned that you were interested in knowing how to cook the dried beans. I’m sure there are lots of ways to cook them but the way we always do is just put them in a kettle, cover with water, add some bacon grease, salt and pepper. Mom always added a some navy beans to cook with them. It takes a while for them to cook and you will have to add water as needed. In my opinion, these are best with corn bread, but then most things are.

Well, I better get busy. I have so many blogs to get caught up on reading. Enjoy your day and God bless.

September 9, 2013 4

Making Ugly Dolls

Yesterday was a fun day at church. All year, we had been doing something at church called “secret sister”. We each drawed a womans name and for the year that lady was our “secret sister”. We gave her small gifts, cards etc. Then yesterday we all got together and revealed who our sister sister was. We also had lots of food.

Then we did a craft. We made ugly dolls. I’m not sure why they are called that. I thought they turned out very pretty.

We are cold here. Our temperature is 42 degrees with wind chills in the 30’s. We have been cold, rainy and foggy all week. We have had to build a fire several days. Oh well,it won’t be long until we will be complaining about it being too hot.

I hope you all have a great Sunday and God bless.

May 5, 2013 3

Merry Christmas!

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a great weekend. We certainly did. Saturday was a full day. All my kids and my grandkids here at our home. God is SO good. We enjoyed a good meal. We had ham, rolls, potatoes, green beans, corn and so many desserts I don’t think I could name them all. It was such a fun day.

We will be having our candlelight service this evening. We all look so forward to it. I think it is a beautiful service. I wish I could get pictures of it but my camera doesn’t take very good night time pictures.

I pray each and every one of you have a wonderful Christmas. God bless.

December 24, 2012 1

Monday

Little boys playing with toys!

Big boys playing with toys!

Chuck and his kids came over Saturday. He helped Hubby with some car maintenance. It was a fun day. He got here about 9:00 A.M. as he was wanting to eat breakfast with us. We had sausage and gravy, biscuits, fresh eggs, corn, canned apples and homemade waffles. We had a good day.

Grace was having trouble with her nose piece on her glasses so we made a trip to Rocky Mount to get it repaired. We did some grocery shopping while there. It ended up taking most of the day. We came home and worked on things that needed doing. We had planned on doing school today and then taking a break for the rest of the week. We’ll do school tomorrow instead and then break. I love the flexibiltiy of homeschooling.

Grace put one of our freshly butchered chickens in the crockpot today to cook while we were gone. When we got home it smelled so good in the house. We deboned it and make chicken and dumplings. They are delicious!! I think I am spoiled now to having our own chickens for meat. We plan on making stock tonight in the crockpot from the bones. YUMMY!

Well, I guess that’s about all that is happening here. My girls are wanting me to play a game of cards with them. Enjoy your evening and God bless.

November 19, 2012 5

Katie’s Birthday Party

We celebrated Miss Katie’s first birthday this weekend. Her actual birthday was Friday but we partied on Saturday. Jess made these beautiful cupcakes for Katie. They were delicious.

We traveled to Pikeville Hospital Sunday to see George’s Dad. He is still in intensive care but seemed to be improving. I talked to George’s sister today, however, and she said his mind is coming and going now. I am so thankful that when we were there he knew us and even talked some to us.

Yesterday, my baby girl Grace, turned 13 years old. My, my, how time does fly by. We didn’t celebrate yet as she had a sore throat and wanted to wait. We will be doing it on Friday. Friday will be a big day for us. We are butchering our spring roosters. The Horn’s are coming over and bringing their roosters. It will be a fun day. Our pastor and his wife are coming to help. They are the experts, we are novices. I plan on making a huge pot of 15 bean soup. Vicki is bringing drinks and making cupcakes which will serve as Grace’s birthday cake. Doesn’t every girl celebrate her 13th birthday with a chicken butchering day. Well, she’ll always remember it.

That’s about it for now. We are finished with school for the day. I cooked a beef roast on the wood stove for supper. I added some potatoes, turnips, onions, broccoli and carrots to the pot just a fewinutes ago. YUM!.

Enjoy your day and God bless.

November 6, 2012 6

A Ride Down The Parkway

Hello everyone! I thought I would share a few pictures from along our beautiful Blue Ridge Parkway. It is lovely this time of year.

I have always loved this church sitting upon the hill. Saturday was a wood cutting day here. Chuck and his family came over to help. We brought down 2 huge trees. We got them all cut and brought home. We still have to split them though. It was a really fun day. Chuck’s girlfriend had never been part of wood cutting. (She’s a town girl). I think she had a good time though. The kids had lots of fun.

Today the girls and I went to Roanoke to pick up a few things. We went walking through the mall, which is something we don’t do very often. I stepped into Macy’s-my first time. You all remember that I have been looking for a hard anodized pot to use for cooking down my sauces. One like Mrs. Sally let me borrow this summer. Well, they had one on sale for 1/2 price!! Yeah, me!!! I was very happy. I very seldom come across deals like that. I certainly am glad I walked into that store.

Well, that’s about all that’s been happening here. I hope you all have a great day and God bless.

October 15, 2012 3

Grayson Highlands Festival

I thought I would share with you all some of our pictures from our visit to the Grayson Highlands Festival today with the Horn’s. We saw lots of crafts and hand made items.

This was one of the biggest attractions. The making of molasses.

Here they are pouring the hot fresh made molasses into jars for selling. We, of course, bought one.

There was lots of food and lots of music.

But these little guys were the main attraction. They auction off these wild ponies every year. We stayed for a little of the auction but the rain finally forced us to leave.

It was a really fun day. I will show you some more of the pictures with the fall colors in my next post. I hope you all have a great weekend and God bless.

September 29, 2012 4

Tuesday

Hi everyone! Today is a beautiful day here in Floyd. Actually it has been a beautiful week so far. Our nighttime temperatures have been in the mid 40’s and daytime highs are low 70’s. Perfect temps in my opinion.

Sunday we took the girls to Tweetsie Railroad for a day out. We had actually planned on going with Dave, Jess and kids but the kids had some type of virus going on. Daniel and Sam had it earlier in the week and we thought maybe Katie had escaped getting it. However, Saturday afternoon Katie came down with it so they did not get to go with us. Hubby actually decided to go with us at the last minute. He is not much for amusement parks but I think he didn’t want us going alone. We had a really fun day but kept missing Jess and crew. Sam so loves trains.

Today we are working with apples, SURPRISE! We also had 4 more l00 lb sacks of apples gave to us Friday evening. We will have plenty of apples this winter. I am juicing most of the ones gave to us Friday. We are making applesauce and applebutter too. Our steam juicer and our sauce maker sure do make this work go faster. I am very glad we have them.

Seems like we have been so busy here. I haven’t had time to make a post or read anyone else’s posts. I will try to catch up some today. Enjoy your day and God bless.

September 11, 2012 8

Grapes

The girls and I are starting on our grapes today. We picked 1/2 bushel this morning. We plan on making mostly jelly from these. Tomorrow we will start making juice. Yesterday I went to our friend Mrs. Faye. I helped her with her grapes. She wanted to make jelly and juice. Last year, they purchased a steam canner and a steam juicer like ours but they were not too confident with using them. So I went over to help them a little. It was a fun day. We had green beans, corn, cucumbers, cole slaw and cornbread for lunch. YUM!

Not much else going on here. Just mostly canning. We plan on picking more tomatoes this evening. We have been blessed with lots of beautiful tomatoes. Our temperatures have been cooler at night here. You can feel fall in the air. The dogwood trees are starting to turn colors. Apples will soon be ready. I love fall. As I am sitting here typing this post, the sweet smell of grapes fills my home. God is so good to us.

I hope you all have a wonderful day and God bless.

August 28, 2012 2

Fairystone Park

Yesterday we met Dave, Jess and kids at Fairystone Park for a picnic and a fun day out. We have lived here in Floyd for almost 13 years. This state park is just about 40 minutes from our house. I have no idea why we have never been to it before. We all had a great time. We had grilled chicken, mac and cheese, potato salad, pork and beans, and a green salad. Delicious!!

Can you guess what we had for dessert?

While Dave, Jess, Daniel, Sam, Julie, and Grace spent all day in the water, Pawpaw and MawMaw had the “hard” job of watching Katie. She sure is growing.

We all had a great time and definitely want to go again. Enjoy your day and God bless.

May 28, 2012 4