Local Chubby Woman Shares 10 Quick Kayak Facts

1.  Old chubby women have difficulty entering and exiting a kayak gracefully.
2.  There are numerous helpful videos on You Tube to educate old chubby women.

3.  Helpful kayak videos feature young thin people and delude old chubby women into believing that they, too, could get into and out of their kayak quickly and gracefully.
4.  It would be helpful to watch the video more than once before attempting to exit your kayak onto a rocky shore.  (Especially if you happen to be an old chubby woman.)

5.  You should know when to quit if things are not going as smoothly as in the video.
6.  You should definately quit before you are in over your head.  Literally.








7.  A PFD is an old chubby woman's best friend.
(Although a STP with a good sense of humor is also helpful.)








8.  You should test the water tightness of your camera case before you put your camera in it and submerge it.
9.  A kayak can take on a lot of water in a very short time if it is turned over in a lake.
10.When kayaking, it is helpful to take a set of dry clothes along. 

Hope you find these facts helpful.   Because I will not be shooting any instructional videos for You Tube any time soon.

Miss You Like Crazy

(Really, why didn't we take at least one decent picture of ourselves?)

Touring the Grounds--the East Side

from the front porch looking North

from the patio looking South--I picked those little sunflowers on my morning walk with the SLD

From the SFG looking South.  The bed to the right is a new one this year.  Still working out the watering of that one.

A new perennial at the foot of the ladder in that bed.  A Peach Melba Heuchera.  This picture actually does it justice, but it is much more magnificent in my mind.

My Japanese fern (Recall that it should grow to 6 feet in height) has reached the 6 inch mark.  It did not fair well in the heat, but it is recovering and it had a baby last week.  Not bad for it's first year on the East Side.

Basil in a pot.  Remember when I pinned this on Pinterest and said I was going to do it?  TaDa!

I also have a pot of chives, and oregano.  The lemon basil did not do well. And the orange mint shrivelled and died while I was away ziplining.  I continue to water it in hopes that it will resurrect.

This is the lilac from Stuffmart from when the Goob ran 7th grade track.  Bigger than the fence.  It's yellow blooms disappoint me each spring, but the plant is growing well.

Coneflowers against the front fence.  This area needs some work.  It has great potential.  I just haven't invested much time on it. 

My favorite picture that I took in the East yard today.  I'm using it as my screen saver.  Because I am celebrating that my camera still works after the kayak incident...

Reason I Have a Kayak

I Believe I Can Fly OR Does This Harness Make My Butt Look Big?

(This is one in a series of vacation recaps that I need to do so I don't forget that I did this.)

As always, I am in love with the color green.   And on vacation I was surrounded by green.  I felt like I wanted to soak it in.  I even loved the green weeds.  So when my favorite nephew's twin brother suggested I go ziplining with them through the tree tops, my immediate reaction was, "Are you kidding me?"



My encouragers

But he is so cute and persuasive that I decided I would do this thing.




 I really hadn't thought it completely through.











 Because you have to wear a helmet.

On the plus side I got to hang out (literally) with Princess Amidala. 

On the negative side she thought it would be a good idea to take a few pictures. I'm filing this one in the "I wished you hadn't showed me that" file.

I replaced 'go white water rafting' with 'go ziplining' on my sand pail list. 

This Just In

Employee of the Month announcement was today.  And the parking space is mine.

I SPY

In a bizarre summer anomaly, I was moved to bake something this week.  And I was so caught up in the recipe (because it involved more than three ingredients) that I forgot to take pictures for my cooking blog.  Until the Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake was already in the oven.  And the kitchen looked like this:

And, clearly, I am better suited to write an I SPY book than a cookbook.

2 eggshells, a cutting board, a green bottle cap,

1 Pinterest recipe and 2 butter wraps

Measuring spoons, a knife, a pot, and a pan,

A compost canister and a watering can.

All of Us

Crossing "Take a Family Picture" off the sand pail list.

This is a picture of the STP and me.  And my parents, all of my brothers and sisters, all of their spouses, all of their children, all of my children and all of their spouses and all of their children. 

 To date.

No one not already in the family was invited to spend the week with us.  This is a protective measure because of the fear that anyone who sees what they are getting into may not want to get into it.  Nevertheless we expect the family to grow.  But for now--this is all of us.

Big Savage

Here we are at the entrance to the Big Savage Tunnel.  I have already ridden twelve miles at this point.  I have given up dressing like someone who rides a bike.  Instead, this year I went for cool, comfortable, and somewhat stylish.  I have kept the helmet as part of the ensemble, not because it is cool, comfortable, or remotely stylish, but because I might be the one who ends up crashing into the weeds.

The tunnel was cool on several levels.  Mostly I was glad to have accomplished this item from my bucket list.  The STP rode through the tunnel with me.  Up to this point I was riding pretty close to last place because I was riding with the handicapped division--those who struggle with an uphill grade.  I expected that my riding buddies would be waiting at the exit to the tunnel to cheer me as I exited. 

Here we are exiting the tunnel.  For the second time.  Because I made the Slovakian Princess return to this point and stage this picture.   After this point I was definately riding in last place.  Because not only did no one wait to cheer my triumphal exit, they did not slow down to take pictures with me at the Mason Dixon line.  To their credit, they waited for me at the end before they went for ice cream.  I breifly entertained the idea of being a more serious biker.  And evidently I can not entertain an idea and ride a bike at the same time. 

Regardless, cross 'Ride my bike thru the Big Savage Tunnel' off the list.

Whoa, Baby

Been out of touch for 10 days.  Saw TV pictures (with no sound) of Tom and Katie on my way through the airports going to vacation.  Figured  they were adopting a dozen Haitian children or funding research on alternate energy sources.  Imagine my surprise to find out that 10 days later they have reached a divorce agreement.  Anything else I should know about that happened last week?