A Ton!

Before I tell you about how great today was I want you to see the beautiful wedding cake that sweet Nita made for her daughter's wedding. When Cindy and I first saw Nita's wedding cake we were not surprised that Nita had made it for Katelyn, because Nita is a gourmet cook and the best baker, in the whole Texas Hill Country. And needless to say, Katelyn's & Clay's wedding cake was the most delicious cake that I have ever eaten and this weekend I plan to beg Nita for her recipe.

Yesterday, we did our once-a-month lunch club with our dear friends. During our fun lunch, at Bella Sera, I told Denise that she looked great and asked her if she had lost some weight. Denise got all excited and told us that three days ago, she had joined Weight Watchers and that she had already lost two pounds.

Anyway, Denise was so excited about doing Weight Watchers—I came home and signed up too. Because this past year I have put on some pounds and I want to get rid of them, because I am sick and tired of my Levis being so tight. 

So last night after joining Weight Watchers I spent over an hour checking out their plans, menus, recipes and the over 200 free foods that you don't even have to count in your daily total. And then I got real excited when I discovered that Weight Watchers actually have delicious-looking recipes for my Instant Pot! 

So this morning was my first day to start doing Weight Watchers and for breakfast Tony and I ate muffins, topped with avocado and fried eggs and it was totally delicious. 

Weight Watchers use a point system and because you can eat all of the eggs that you want to without counting them, I had a half muffin, covered with a 1/4 slice of avocado and one egg. Compared to Tony's muffin, 3 eggs and the rest of the avocado.

Then after I cleaned up our kitchen, I spent 44 minutes, walking 4 fast miles, with Leslie Sansone and I plan to start doing that 5-6 times a week—starting today. And tonight as I am writing this I am drinking a glass of wine to celebrate, because today I still had 10 points left over.

This afternoon Tony and I decided to go buy some pea gravel, so we could start building the "slab," a flat place needed for our cistern, to sit on. Tony was a little hesitant about hauling the pea gravel, in the truck, but I persuaded him to do it anyway. So off we went.

Forty-minutes and fourteen and a half dollars later, Roy, our 2012 Dodge Ram, was slowly taking us back to the ranch and carrying 1 1/2 tons of pea gravel, in the back end. And I took these pictures of the pea gravel and the 12'x12' form that we are using to hold all of this pea gravel for the water tank.

Okay. Not to complain, but to complain—Tony and I shoveled 1 1/2 tons of pea gravel and then using wheelbarrows we hauled it to the "slab"and then unloaded it and raked it around. 

It took us over an hour to accomplish this task and tonight both of our backs and arms are paying for it. And the bad news is tomorrow we still have to go buy another ton, of this the pea gravel and do it all over again, before we can finish leveling the "slab."

When we were done Tony was growling a little bit, so trying to think up something positive to say, I said, "Hey, it's exercise and we both need it. And I bet that we burned up a ton of calories, too." But sadly my words went into one of his ears and out the other.

Late this afternoon my 6-string guitar/banjo arrived and I am totally thrilled with it. Here's the big box that it was shipped in.

And here is my pretty, inexpensive banjo, after I had tuned it and played it for a while. And just before Carol called me, I told Tone, "This thing is really heavy. It must weigh a ton." And that made him laugh.

So tonight as I finish writing this my jeans actually feel not as tight on me as they were this morning, so I am hoping that I might have shed a pound or two today. Even though in reality I know they are just stretched out until I wash them again,

Y'all have a great evening and keep on laughing!

And My Jaw Dropped Again!

Katelyn's & Clay's wedding was so great and so was my super-fun adventure up to Dripping Springs, Austin and Buda.

Saturday, I safely arrived at Ronnie & Nita's Ronderosa Ranch, ten minutes before the crack of noon and no one was home as expected. Earlier in the morning Ronnie had already told me that he and Nita were going over to the Ruby Ranch, in Buda, so they could help get things ready for Katelyn's & Clay's wedding and they were going in their RV.

Their two dogs, Brick & Maggie, played a game with me. They would act tough and bark at me and then they would stop and let me pet them, over the fence, and then they would start barking at me when Cindy arrived, at the famous Ronderosa Ranch.

Cindy came there to pick me up and take me to her lovely home, in South Austin, so we could eat lunch, at her home and visit and catch up with each others news and then get ready for the wedding.
And that was so much fun for me.

Cindy and I arrived, at Ruby Ranch, fifteen minutes before the wedding. She was dressed up real nice and I looked okay. I wore my only "dress-up" green blouse, new Levis, pink boots and cowboy hat. And I topped off my look—wearing one of my pink bandanas tied around my neck, to help hide my turkey neck.

Fortunately for me, the wedding was casual and most of the friends and family that attended wore Wranglers or Levis, cowboy boots and cowboy hats too, so I didn't feel like I stuck out, in the crowd, even though I was the only woman there wearing a cowboy hat.

After the beautiful bride and handsome groom said their vows and kissed Clay danced with his bride and when Ronnie danced with Katelyn, Cindy and I teared up and so did just about everyone there. It was all so beautiful.

During the reception, before we sat down and ate a delicious BBQ dinner, I got to visit with old friends and while I was drinking a beer I had this fun conversation with Joel, a fabulous friend and an extremely talented musician. He plays, guitar, mandolin and banjo, too.

Joel and I talked about our good friend Chet O'Keefe, Terlingua, Northern New Mexico, our mandolins, our guitars and about Neil Young playing a 6-string guitar/banjo, etc. And because a few days earlier I had also talked to Brook about 6-string guitar/banjos, at Wolfmueller's Books, I thought it was definitely a sign. So, before I adios-ed Joel and went to go eat a delicious BBQ dinner, at Cindy's big family table, I vowed to him that I was going to buy myself a 6-string guitar/banjo. And I  meant it, too.

To sum it all up, I had a wonderful time, at the wedding and getting to visit with friends and family. And in case you are asking, "Where was Tony?" He, at the last minute, decided not to go to the wedding, because of our dogs being left alone for too long. And everyone, at the wedding, was sick that he didn't get to come to the wedding.

Sunday afternoon on my way back to our Big Foot Ranch, Tony called me with some exciting news, when I was only about five minutes away from arriving, in Kerrville. "Nance, Steve Pietzsch and Andy are over here and they are putting our rain gutters up for us....Would you please stop, at Home Depot, to buy a few extra seamers, glue and....so they can finish the job, because they are almost finished and they need those parts?"

Of course my jaw dropped when Tony told me this wonderful news about our good friends installing the rain gutters for us, for free, because both Tony and I were more than nervous about us attempting to do it ourselves. And I am still in shock that these two men came over and did this hair-raising job for us.

Anyway, when I arrived at our new ranch, Andy was standing high up, on a ladder, Steve was holding up a gutter's end, so Andy could properly attach it to our roof and Tony was busy running around fetching parts and tools that they needed. And my jaw dropped again.

A few hours later, after their hard labor our beautiful, rain gutters were installed on the roof, so we celebrated by drinking a round of beers and toasting our dear friends and thanking them for volunteering to do this—just to help us out. And I do know that neither Tony or I will ever be able to thank them enough for doing this act of kindness. "Thank you so much Andy and Steve. We love y'all so much!"

This morning when I was on the phone talking to Ronnie about Heartland, the number one favorite, eleven-years-running series, in Canada, on Netflix and about how much we loved that show.

Then Ronnie laughed and then changed the subject. He told me that he and Nita were having a ranch party, this coming Saturday, to celebrate Katelyn's birthday. "You and Tony have got to come to this. It is going to be a pot-luck with about 40 people there. And all of our friends are bringing their instruments too, so we're going to be playing a lot of music...."

So after Ronnie and I adios-ed each other I did what I had to do. I immediately went Online, to Amazon and bought a beautiful, inexpensive, 6-string guitar/banjo and it should be arriving tomorrow!

I cannot wait for it to get here, because I have a lot of practicing to do on it, before we go to the fun, ranch birthday party. And that is about it for tonight, except I do want to thank sweet Carol, for letting us come over to her ranch, this evening, to wash and dry two loads of our dirty clothes.

Y'all have a great evening and keep on laughing!

Survivor!

Katelyn's and Clay's wedding was wonderful! I had a total blast being with my dear family and getting to see so many of our friends. Today was great and I will write more tomorrow.

Red Head! or Green Thing!

Today has been great or better said, "It ended up being a great day after all." This morning I slept in and had no regrets, because I stayed up, until 1:00, reading Marie Bostwick's fabulous (can't put it down) book The Promise Sisters. 

Talk about a fun book to read, oh my goodness—Marie's fictional characters were so real to me and they were so very quirky, so as you can guess I loved each one of them, especially Avery—the part-time, professional mermaid.

And even their mother Minerva was a true piece of work. Anyway the time flew by, because I was having so much fun reading this marvelous book. But, when I looked up, at our new, awesome, La Crosse Atomic Clock I made myself quit reading, with only one chapter left for me to read.

So this morning I climbed out of bed just a little bit before 9:00 and I had two adorable Chihuahuas under my arms—yawning. So my day started out fine, but only for a few hours, even though it was a full moon last night. Actually, it was a full Worm Moon and also a Blue Moon on top of that.

While I was trying to wake up and talking to Tony, I calmly said, "I think our cabin is haunted." Tone gave me a funny look that wasn't funny.

"No it's not. Why do you say that?" he asked.

"Because every night it only happens after you've gone to bed."

"Nance, our cabin is not haunted. I promise. What happens?"

"Every night, after 10:30, it starts and it only happens at night. It sounds like someone is outside chunking big rocks on our roof. Seriously, it is so loud it even startled Belle, Henry and Big Al(ice). It's scary." Tony stared at me and said nothing, then he went outside to work on clearing away some of the stuff, on our front porch. So I took a shower and got dressed.

Around 1:00, right before we took off for Kerrville, Tony walked into the kitchen wearing a red and black plaid, flannel shirt. "Oh," I said, because I realized that I was wearing my matching red and black plaid, flannel shirt.

"Oh what?" Tony asked.

"Oh, it's nothing," I replied, because he was obviously unaware that we were dressed alike, again. Then we took off, for Kerrville, to run a few errands, because tomorrow we are going to Austin, because Ronnie & Nita's daughter is getting married.

Our first stop was at the Post Office. Our next stop was, almost across the street, at a big box store, so I could make my monthly credit card payment and to also buy a brand new pair of Levis 501 jeans for the wedding. And that is when things started going haywire for me.

After I paid a friendly cashier, I went to the Levis jean department and grabbed a pair of jeans and when I walked up to the counter to pay for them a young, woman cashier said, "Did you find everything, sir?" Then she looked up at me/he and she told me the amount and I paid it.

Her remark embarrassed me, so as soon as she sacked up my "wedding pants" I walked as fast as I could to get out of that department store. But as luck would have it, as soon as I opened the door to exit the building, an alarm and buzzers went off, and a male voice, over the intercom loudly said, "Stop. Do not leave. You must return. Go to a checkout station..." or it was something like that.

Now truly embarrassed, for the second time, with a lot of shoppers staring at me, I marched to the nearest checkout counter, the Shoe Department and I turned myself in. Where minutes earlier I had made a payment on my credit card, before going to buy my jeans.

The cashier was very nice, because I guess he could see my red head. Seriously it was not just my face that was red. "May I please see your bag?" he asked politely, in a sympathetic kind of way.

I handed over my "stolen" goods. As he went through my shopping bag, I was standing there imagining a mall cop showing up next and putting handcuffs on me, so the real police could come and haul me off to jail.

Then as I was imaging how embarrassed and mad Ronnie & Nita would be about me stealing a pair of Levis to wear at their daughter's wedding, this kind man said, "I'm sorry. Whoever sold you these jeans forgot to remove the tag. Everything is fine. It will only take me a second for me to remove it...." I let out a big sigh of relief and those shoppers that had been staring at me went back to shopping or shoplifting.

When I returned to the truck and got in, Tony says, "Our satellite radio just quit for no reason. I was listening to Johnny Cash singing Folsom Prison Blues..."

"Yeah, and I was just living it," I shot back, because I was now in a pretty bad mood, because my head was still red.

On our way over to Wolfmueller's Books, I grabbed my iPhone and called the satellite radio's phone number to get them to refresh our signal. It should have only taken three or four minutes to accomplish this, but instead it took us over twenty minutes, as we sat outside Sandy & Jon's fabulous bookstore. And after much frustration we gave up on it and hung up on the tech.

I am so glad we went to Wolfmueller's Books, because when we walked inside, we were greeted by Sandy & Jon, Jon's sweet sister, Jean and Sandy & Jon's dear friend Brook.

When we walked up to the checkout counter, we greeted everyone and then Tony sat down in a chair and I sat down on a stool. Then the fun and laughter began, thank goodness, because it was exactly what I needed to get out of my bad mood.

But before I started laughing, I dumped on our friends and told them about my jeans and what happened to me at the department store. They were all sympathetic especially Jean.

She walked over to me, and said, "Hey, I've got something that will help cheer you up." Then Jean handed me this green thing. And I didn't know what to say, because I didn't know what it was.

"Thanks Jean," I said and then I lied to her wearing a straight face, "Gosh, I love this and I will hang it up, on the wall, right next to our pretty, pink potholder." Then I looked over at Tony and he was trying not to laugh. Which of course made me laugh out loud.

"Did you make this?" I asked trying to be nice, while praying to myself not to burst out laughing as I said it. Even though my shoulders were shaking trying to contain my laughter. 

"Oh no," she softly replied. "I found it this morning, on the street and it was free." And I am thinking thank goodness she didn't pay anything for this weird-looking green thing. I can't hang this goofy-looking thing up, in The Cabin. Our friends will think that were totally crazy.

Then Sandy or Jon said, "Hey, I like y'all's matching red shirts that you're wearing." 

We all laughed except for Tony, because he was too busy discovering that once again we had dressed alike. Something that he truly hates for us to do—especially out in Public. So now it was his turn to be the red head.

Tony and I had a total blast visiting with Jean, Brook and Sandy & Jon and with some of their friendly customers. We laughed and talked about New Mexico, Terlingua and West Texas in general.

Then Brook and I discovered that we had a lot in common. Such as: we are both Libras, love New Mexico and Terlingua, we both play guitars, banjos and mandolins, enjoy drawing and painting, etc. In fact, she joked, "We are soul sisters!"

Then Jean asked to take Tony's and my picture (dressed alike for laughs—I'm sure). And then she took a picture of Sandy, Brook and me. And later on Jean e-mailed me these two pictures. "Thank you, Jean."

Before we left Wolfmuellers and our friends, we remembered why we had actually come by the bookstore in the first place. "Sandy, I am sorry that we can't make y'all's book signing for Elizabeth Crook tomorrow afternoon from 3-5 PM, because we will be at the wedding. We want to buy a copy of Elizabeth Crook's book The Which Way Tree and could you please ask her to sign it to us?"

"Sure. Not a problem, Nancy," Sandy said. And a few minutes later Tony and I adios-ed our dear friends.

Tone and I ran a few more errands and by the time we got back to our Big Foot Ranch, we were happy once again and listening to our favorite satellite radio stations.

P.S. Later on Tony told me that it is Chinaberries hitting our roof top—not ghosts, but I am still not sure. And next week, after the wedding I am going to do some kind of a contest and the winner will be awarded "The Green Thing." So stay tuned.

Y'all have a great evening and keep on laughing!

Happy Birthday Mineral Man!

Peech Fuzz!

Yesterday was great or at least most of it was. Monday mid-morning, Tony and I took off for the Home Depot, in Kerrville, to buy some more 1"4"s Imported From Sweden and a few more cans of Rust-oleum's Black Gloss spray paint.

When we got back home Tony and I stained the boards outside and then Tone went to watch the high school baseball game, in Medina. So I cranked up my Bose and went outside to try to finish spray-painting our gate entrance's side fencing—glossy black. And while I was using up one can after another, three to be exact, our dear friend Steve Pietzsch, the incredibly famous, talented artist, pulled into our driveway to say howdy.

Tony and I love Steve aka Peech so much, for so many different reasons. First being he is a super nice man, a great friend, fun to hang out with and for him finding this fabulous, rare picture of Texas Ranger Big Foot Wallace. That he personally framed and gave to Tony, because he knew that Tony is related to this famous Texas Ranger.

Anyway, while Steve and I were visiting, I kept spray-painting the fence and when Steve told me something funny, I stopped spraying the paint and started laughing. And while I was laughing at what he had said I wiped my face with the back of my hand, trying to get a few stray, gray hairs out of my face.

And when I did that Peech frowned and made a face, like ooh, while shaking his head sideways. Then he remarked, "You shouldn't do that while you're painting..." I laughed and blew it off and went back to spray painting.

Steve stayed for about twenty more minutes, because he and I got to talking about the benefits of harvesting rainwater, because that is what he has done, at his home. And before we adios-ed each other Steve had convinced me that we should definitely consider harvesting rainwater.

I used up two more cans of black gloss spray-paint when I finally quit and came inside and I would have done more painting, but I had run out of paint, again.

It was nearly 6:00, so I decided to drink one of Tony's cheap beers and when I passed by a mirror I was shocked and nearly fainted at what I saw. "Omg!" I said to Roy, Belle, Beau, Henry, Little Debbie and Big Al(ice) and they just stared at me. Then Belle looked at me, again and she barked at me, because she saw my black mustache that was made up of about twenty, scattered, tiny, short, facial hairs.

"It's me, Belle," I said, as I skipped off, to the bathroom, grabbed a wet washcloth and began scrubbing my upper lip trying to remove the black glossy hairs. Seriously, I was mortified and embarrassed that Steve had seen me like this. And it must have happened when I had tried to brush away my strands if hair and wiped my face with wet paint. And that's why Steve made that face and suggested for me not to do that again.

Okay, in self-defense I admit that I have a part-time mustache that I pluck away at daily and so do most women my age. And also the late, great Nora Ephron even wrote about hers, in the book The Most of Nora Ephron. The chapter on Maintenance and I even blogged about it, on October 30, 2016 and I titled that blog For The Ladies Only!

Tony got back home around 6:30. Medina lost and I had lost my black, shiny mustache ("peech" fuzz), thank goodness. So I didn't say a word about our losses.

Today has been great. This afternoon, while it was still drizzling, we went back, to Home Depot, to buy more cans of black spray paint and gutters and all of the necessary materials needed for us to start harvesting rainwater.

Before we came back home, we stopped by TNJ Engraving to pick up our ranch signs. You see I had two made, because one will go on our fence and the other one we are not sure yet where we want to hang it. Anyway, these people are the very best at what they do and I would highly recommend them to any friend or stranger, because they are so good. And to say the least about our ranch sign—we love it! And I mean we absolutely LOVE it.

Right after we got back home I fixed us lunch and then Tony and I went outside to hang up our ranch sign, on the fence. And when I say "we" hung it up—Tony did all of the work, but I stood back and helped direct him where to hang it. So ladies and gentleman here is our sign with the name of our ranch on it!

The name of our ranch took me a long time to finally decide on what it should be and Tony is happy with it too, because he is so proud of his famous relative, Big Foot Wallace, and of course, as you must know by now—I am totally into Big Foot/Yetis, aliens, etc. So it is perfect for us. Thank you, TNJ Engraving!

Y'all have a great evening and keep on laughing!

Again!

Today has been great. Early this afternoon Tony and I started transforming his room (formerly the back porch) into a faux-looking log cabin room, like the rest of our cabin.

And we would have finished his room today, but we ran out of wood, at the exact same time that Kinky called me. We had a fun conversation and after we adios-ed each other I decided to check my e-mail.

Liz sent me an hilarious note about her running down to their gate, several times today, to check to see if I had left my red crock pot there and I am still laughing about that. Liz also told me that Jim does not want mine or anyone else's crock pot, because the secret to their long, happy marriage is: Jim only cooks outside with fire and Liz only cooks inside using all of her gadgets. And that kind of logic makes a whole lot of sense to me.

After reading Liz's funny note I clicked on Drew's latest e-mail and he sent me this picture, that Ellie took of him and his super-cool dog, Harry, actually hiking the Appalachian Trail today. And I must admit that I am kind of jealous, because hiking the famous Appalachian Trail is one of the things for me to do on my bucket list.

A little while later, while Hazel was helping me suck up hair and dust Ronnie called and left me a message, on Carlton, "Hi Nance. Just wanted to let you know that I am getting ready to cook some ribs, in my Instant Pot. Call me."

So I called Ronnie back and teased him. "....I just wanted to let you know that I am cooking another roast, in my Instant Pot..." And we had a good laugh about it.

And before I finish writing this tonight I want y'all to know that our new, motion-activated, solar-powered, solar light "As Seen on TV" works like a charm and we absolutely love it. Even though Little Debbie pooped on our front porch, again.

Y'all have a great evening and keep on laughing!