I’ve got somebody I want you to meet….

My friend, Nisha, is a new grandmother to baby Gabby.  Nish and I have been friends forever, and I’ve known Gabby’s mother, Mandi, since she was a toddler.  Isn’t she a precious little baby?  Oh, it’s so much fun when your girlfriends are new grammies, too! 

Nisha is so proud of this grandchild, and she’s having so much fun on an extended visit, getting acquainted with her.

She’s almost two weeks old now, and I can’t wait to meet her!  Oh, she’s just too cute for words!!!!!!!!  She’s gonna be a beauty, just like her pretty little mama!!!

~ jan  

More of those simple things…

I’ve changed so much with the passing years.  Things that once gave me great pleasure no longer hold any interest.  I’m happiest when I’m home, puttering around the kitchen, walking thru my flowers, playing with my dogs, remembering the good times…

My memories of mother come often now, and they’re happy memories. Thoughts of her and the things she did brings a smile to my face daily.  I find myself doing things that she used to do, like cutting fresh roses from the garden for my kitchen, washing my lettuce in her favorite stainless steel bowl that I talk about so often, even sticking the knife in the lettuce the way she used to.  A basket of napkins sit on the counter, just simple things like this give me so much pleasure. 

Our family is on the move this month.  Ryan, Lindsay and bebe Abby are returning from her birthday week with her family in Washington State today.  John and Deanna are leaving in the morning for their vacation in Europe.  They’re going to Switzerland, driving thru Italy, and they’re going to Tuscany, and Verona, too.  Oh, how I look forward to the pictures and hearing about the italian countryside, the villages, and the people.

I’m missing Abby already and I just saw her two weeks ago.  She talks on the phone to me now, she yells “Hi,” “Hi,” “Hi.” I think there will be a trip to Lexington in our near future. 

But for today, I’m content to be home with the dogs and my music, just kicking back with a good book this afternoon.

Safe journey, dear family, life is good…

I’ve come to the realization….

I don’t like to smell like fruit.  So many of the body washes smelly “fruity.”  I’ve tried several, butthey’re just not right.  I like to smell like soap.  Is it my age?  Does this come from growing up using Safeguard and Dial? 

I’m not going to buy anything “fruity” again, even though the Dove Peachy one is pretty delicious smelling.

I just bought a new bottle of Dial Fresh Body Wash, and dahlings, I do smell ‘mahvelous’ today, I really do.  Much better than smelling like a pomegranate…

I’m old now, set in my ways, just can’t go with the trends on this one.  Nope, not even gonna try…

But the good news is that the old standby’s, Zest, Dial, even Caress have slashed their prices deeply, trying to compete with the new kids on the block.  Works for me…

So this is what I've been up to....

Every once in a while I get on an organizing kick.  I learned long ago that containment is the secret to organization, but then I somehow don't always apply it.  My pantry needed a redo.  We always have a lot of food in the house, and it's stacked in the pantry, and half of it you don't see because it's hidden in the back, and when you try to get items from the back, everything falls over or falls off the shelf.

So, I decided that it would be great if everything was in baskets, the way they do it in the Williams-Sonoma or Pottery Barn  catalogs.  Beautiful, brown baskets, all stacked in rows with all my staples in them.  But there are two problems with that, first of all, it could be really spendy.  Baskets aren't cheap, they would easily cost me $20-35 dollars each and that would be a major expense.  And second, they wouldn't be at all transparent, it would be hard to see inside them.

So Sunday I was on a mission, I went to Wally World, checked out their storage section, and found these plastic baskets.  The small ones cost me $1.50, the large size was $2.50, and I bought one jumbo one for $3.50.  And as a result, I bought a total of fourteen baskets, and reorganized my entire pantry for $30, yes, all of it for $30!  What a deal!!! The big basket on the bottom of the pantry I've had for several years, and you can't see the top shelf in the picture, but it's all organized, too, and I think it looks great!!! So here are the pictures, before and after, and yes, that's Hamburger Helper you see in there.  *blush*  Well, after all, it does make a great meal!!! And yikes, I didn't realize it looked that bad before, I really didn't.

What does your pantry look like?  Maybe you would like to redo yours, too.  These baskets work great, you can pull out, for instance, all your pastas, take a look at what you need and put them back, nothing falls over, nothing spills out.  Works for me...

 ~ jan