Family Visit

David's brother and sister-in-law came down from Kentucky to visit with us over the weekend. While here, Hilda and Austin made us a dinner from Hilda's native land, the Phillipines. The three items were Lumpia, Pansit adn Pinoy. All very delicious. We had a fun visit and hated for the weekend to end. Below are a few photos.

Hilda and Austin standing in front of their travel trailer.

the dinner
Lumpia on the left with the red sauce, it is a beef spring roll
Pinoy on the skewers is a BBQ pork
Pansit with chicken and it is a rice noodle dish

Hilda and Austin show off the meal



brothers.... David and Austin

Pollen

The only good thing about all this rain we've been having lately is the fact that it is washing all the pollen out of the air and trees. The rains have been steady and hard for several days now. I've been noticing the yellow powder of pollen on the lake edges but tonight we noticed a rather large area of pollen and the ducks were swimming around in it making tracks. I grabbed the camera and took the photo below. If you look closely you will see the large area of pollen on the water (it looks white in the photo but it is actually yellow) and the little dark dots are the ducks swimming and making swirls. Pretty neat. No end in site for the rains.

Spring Cleaning

I've been taking advantage of a spurt of energy this week to do some Spring cleaning around here. Mostly working on the inside the pas few days. David and I have both done some sprucing up outside as well. It just feels so nice when things are clean and uncluttered. I should do this quarterly instead of yearly. The birds have been busy at the feeders and there has been activity at two of our birdhouses. A family of chick-a-dees has moved into one house and eastern blue birds in another. I just love it! Looking forward to new life coming from those houses in the coming weeks. We've had rain and much colder weather this week so it's been a good time to work inside. Wish I had more exciting things to blog about but that's about it right now.

Main Street Jazz

Friday night we met up with our friends, Jay and Cheryl for a night out. We went to a free concert on Main Street in Greenville. Every Friday night from now until September, Main Street Jazz festival is going on with a different group each week. This week we were entertained by Elliot and the Untouchables a blues group. They were good. The show started around 5:30 and lasted until 9:30 with a couple little breaks. The crowd was large and we saw lots of families there with small children. What a nice way to spend the evening.

Elliot (yellow suit) and the Untouchables perform on stage at Main Street Jazz

Someone was photographing us... That's me in the center front row with the silver hair, Cheryl next to me(dark hair) then Jay (light blue shirt) and David (tan slacks). This photo must have been taken early in the evening because the crowd was much larger as the evening went on.

The Bunny Car

Recently I saw something that I had never seen before. It was a bunny car! That's right... it was all decorated up to look like a bunny rabbit. I just shook my head in disbelief and couldn't figure out why anyone would do that to their car. It finally occurred to me it must be in honor of Easter. I have seen some people decorate their vehicles up for Christmas but this was a first for Easter decoration on a car for me. The car was gray in color and on the grill was a big pink puffy nose. Big pink and white bunny ears were on the sides above the door windows and appeared to be attached like those athletic flags people put on their cars to show school spirit. I didn't notice the back end of the car but I wonder if it had a big white fluffy tail??? Guess I can safely say that now I HAVE seen it all! Too funny!

Red-winged Blackbirds

For those of you who read my blog on a regular basis you know I enjoy photographing birds. Yesterday I was sitting at the desk working on the laptop and noticed what I first thought was a crow on one of my birdfeeders. When it turned a bit I could see the markings on its wings and knew exactly what it was. I watched throughout the day and saw several of these beautiful birds visiting the feeders. Later in the afternoon I was outside working and could hear them singing in the trees. When we lived in Pennsylvania I saw these birds all the time but had never seen them anywhere else until yesterday. Below is one of the photos I took thru my window. I wish I could have gotten a picture when their wings were out more so you can see the bright orange and yellow coloring of bands on the wings.

Stork Bingo

So, the past month or so we have been going to Tennessee every weekend and ususally once during the week for me as well. My cousin died recently and we have been cleaning her house getting it ready to sell. Last weekend my sister was cleaning in one of the bedrooms when she came across something that caused us to laugh until our sides hurt. It was a Stork Bingo game from 1957, brand new, never played, still in the box. We had a good laugh just reading the items on the cards... nipples, rubber pants, chux, syringes, enema, boric acid... too funny! Guess those items really date the game. I was born in 1957 so wondered if it was a game she had bought for my baby shower and never played it. Who knows? Here is a photo of what it looks like.

Pear Trees in Bloom

Several days ago I was on my way to Tennessee when I passed by an old orchard full of pear trees in full bloom. That was on Friday and I knew I would not have a chance to photograph them in their full glory because I would not be back that way for several days. This is not far from where we live... only about 4 miles away. Of course I forgot about them until yesterday and decided to drive by and see if the trees were still in bloom. Many blossoms have already turned to green leaves but some remained in bloom and I took the photos here using my cell phone camera since I didn't have my camera with me. The fields looked so pretty when all the trees were in full bloom but these photos will give you some idea of what it looked like. It appears to be an old orchard.

A Lot Going On

Sorry I have not been blogging on a regular basis. I have way too much going on right now and can't seem to find time for it. Nothing has been interesting enough to write about anyway... that is until yesterday... If nothing else I learned a valuable lesson and I would like to share it with those of you reading this. Never, and I do mean NEVER, remove a new ink cartridge from your printer and shake it. I had been working on a project that I needed printed in brown. It was working well then suddenly the brown was printing out hot pink! WHAT??? Well I knew the color cartridge was almost empty and that tends to happen when it is time to replace it. So off I went to the store and purchased a new color cartridge. I came home, installed it and continued printing. All was well and a nice shade of brown. Then suddenly one came out hot pink again. I couldn't believe it. I removed the cartridge, gave it a little shake then replaced it and tried again. Brown! Yes! Every so often hot pink would show up again and I was getting frustrated. I kept removing the cartridge, shaking it then replacing and it would work fine for a while. Finally I had enough of this so I took out the cartridge one last time and this time I shook it with vengance! I was going to make certain the ink was distrubuted and would come out like it needed to. To my surprise I noticed pretty color ink drops all over the place... all over me, my clothes, the laptop, my camera, the wall, the floor, the carpet, the desk and all over some of the things I had printed. OH MY GOSH! I couldn't believe it! I just stood there for a few seconds in disbelief. I tired cleaning it up but that only smeared the ink. I finally got my project completed but I think my hair became even more grey from all the frustration I experienced in the course of the day. So please learn from my experience and never, ever, remove an ink cartridge and give it a good hard shake unless you want colorful ink droplets all over everything.

In Like a Lion

Old Man Winter decided to make a visit to our area yesterday. Fortunately for us we must have been in a warm pocket because all around us got quite a bit of snow but we got about 2 inches here. We woke up to a steady down pour of rain that lasted throughout the day and at times it turned to sleet when the temp would drop a degree then back to heavy rain. We also had high winds all day long. It was COLD! Around 6:00 last night it turned to snow and within minutes the ground was white. It was a wet, heavy snow so didn't take long to cover everything. Later it rained again then as the temps got lower it all froze and now we have ice mixed with the snow. David decided to go in to work this morning and when he arrived he found only 3 cars in the parking lot and a security guard told him to go back home... there is no electricity in the building. I keep hearing that lots of people are without power in NC and SC. We still have power but the lights keep flickering from time to time. The winds died down some during the night but are picking up again this morning. There is a major pile up of vehicles on I-85... the northbound lanes are backed up for 30 miles and the south bound lanes for 10 miles... as of early this morning. People have been stranded on the interstate since midnight last night. David is back home now, he said the roads are horrible and no one is out driving. We have food, heat and power so we are fortunate. Oh yes, last night we also had snow thunder. It's pretty rare but we had lightening and thundering while it was snowing. So the old saying goes something like this... If March comes in like a lion it goes out like a lamb. Let's hope the worst is behind us. I'm ready for Spring... to heck with snow and cold, winds and ice! Bring on the warm stuff and sunshine!!! I haven't ventured out today to make any photos. It's just too cold. If I get brave later on I may go out and see if I can find some interesting photos to take and share but for now I am staying inside where it's warm and cozy!