Facebook Fee-nom

Okay, I did it. I joined Facebook. Basically, I've just been snooping around on Mark's FB account for months now. Something about the whole deal, just ooged me out. Like, do I really want people to know "what I'm doing right now?"

But then why was it so fun to read about what other people are "doing right now". So I did it. I joined the millions and billions of others and now Big Brother has yet another way to watch my every move.

And I get to snoop on all my friends, too!

Redneck Reality: The Education of My Sons

1. Don't look at this post if you don't want to see dead animals today. Oops, too late.
2. Don't look at this post if you think Bambi was the best Disney movie ever made
3. Don't look at this post if in your little world animal slaughter and back porches never coexist
4. What you're about to read is the brutal honest truth as best as it can be explained and embellished by me, the very biased onlooker.
5. I warned you.

(Dramatic Pause)


DEER SEASON!!!! While Luke and Caleb didn't get to go hunting with Daddy this year, they tried to soak in all the knowledge and experience they could watching Uncle BJ and Papa prepare the carcasses.

Exhibit A.

The cold, hard truth is that, evidently, after you shoot a deer you have to hang it upside down for a while to let all the blood drain out. There's nothing Redneck about shooting a wild animal and letting it drain. People all over the world do that. And I've never heard of someone in Timbuktu, being called a Redneck.

However, shooting animals and letting them drain next to your back porch in town is something reserved for the few among us who retain and embrace the Redneck mantle.

This is not strange. This is not weird. This is not illegal.

It's highly convenient and handy. And it's much easier to pull your friends outside to look at your catch(?) when they stop in for hot chocolate. You don't have to trudge out to some barn somewhere and let the 9 degree frigid air chill your bones. Nope, you can just come to the back door and look out the window.

Contrary to what the photo may portray this was not an enormously bountiful deer season. To my brothers' chagrin, you'll notice none of the deer in the above picture have antlers. But this was the end of the season. All season long the boys were "waiting for the big one", but by mid-December you just gotta shoot what comes along, because you're almost out of time. And no true Redneck wants to contemplate what a whole year of life would look like without homemade, homegrown, homedried deer jerky!

Now hanging up a deer is a tricky thing all of it's own accord. Something Luke and Caleb will remember all their lives.

Exhibit B.
First, ya gotta use this heavy-duty metal hanger contraption and literally jab it through the back legs of the dear. I know, it looks really painful. But I swear, the deer can't feel a thing! Then you attach the hanger to some kind of pully-rope combination. Then you tie that rope up. Not to the tree your deer is hanging in, but rather to Mom's apple tree that she got from Dad on the occasion of her 25th Anniversary.

But there comes a time in the life of all productive Redneckers when there's just no longer enough room in the tree to hang up all the deer. Never fear, if you're fortunate enough to reach that point, you proudly hang your deer on the porch itself! Okay, I think it might actually be a deck. It doesn't have a roof.

Exhibit C.
And if the deck isn't quite tall enough, the deer's not gonna mind if her face drags on the floor a little. You won't hear any complaints at all. And no, we don't eat the face! So it's not like we're gonna eat dirt or anything!!!



Then after all the deer have been properly hanged. (Wait, I think in this context it would be hung, because they were already dead before they got up there.) Anyway, after you've hung your deer, if you're a true Redneck you won't retreat inside to your nice warm recliner. Nope. This is when you start talking about the hunt.

Exhibit D.
If I remember correctly, this is where Uncle BJ said, "Yep, Dad, it went in right here. . . .
And came out over here. Huh! I'm just glad . . ."

And then I sort of tuned out because while I can sit here at my computer and type this whole post without a glitch in my fingers, actually thinking about animals walking around then not walking around all of a sudden really starts to bother me. I do much better to just think of them as dead. Let's not talk about them when they were alive. And that now they're dead, but they weren't dead before. And how they were all mama deers. Oh, good grief!!

I know. I've got a ways to go before the cloak of Redneck-ness actually fits. But I'm working on it. One post at a time. . . .

Oh, the thrill of the hunt.

We can all be thankful that I was not present when they skinned the deer. Evidently in Redneck Reality it involves attaching the hide of the deer to the back of a pick up truck and then stepping on the gas. I'll try to get those pics for you next year!

Cutest Boy Shirt Ever

This shirt makes me laugh out loud!!!! It makes me laugh out loud EVERY time I look at it! I've seen it many, many times now and I still laugh.

The handsome, diaper-clad boy is my nephew, T., who is 3 days younger than Lydia. He's Uncle BJ's boy and is all kinds of adorable. But when he wears that shirt, he's irresistible to me.

Lydia can't stop looking either. I'm telling ya, that shirt ROCKS!!

And here T's saying,

"Yeah, I have to be in by curfew, but they do pay all my bills and keep me supplied with milk and Huggies. I can't complain."

T.T., (that's what I call him, even though his middle name doesn't start with a T.) I'm so glad you're in our family. You fit right in.

Tomorrow (or the next day), I'm gonna post a Redneck Reality about your Daddy that will give many a faint-hearted girl, a very queasy feeling in the pit of her stomach. So for tonight, we'll just look at your shirt and laugh and know that even if your Daddy does some really gross stuff, he still makes really cute kids.

Hello Out There!

I think a person's kitchen counter tops can tell a lot about a person. Tonight my sister-in-law was over for dinner and she said, "Something seems different around here. Oh! I don't think I've ever seen your counter tops cleared. It looks really nice!"

That was such a fitting end to my month of crazy-busyness mixed with a little "unschooling", bolstered by hosting friends from out of town, and actually re-opening shop on the photog business.

But you see, the picture above was not taken today. It and the the ones to follow were all taken one nondescript day of the past month. Choose a day. Any day. The counters always looked like that or worse.

And because for some reason I feel a need to justify myself when I've been blogging AWOL, I will now disclose to you what my counter tops tell about me and what I've been doing.

The funky coloring of the first photo is this little action called Matt's Surreal Edgy Effect 4-Really Dark. The photo was just so boring and bland I had to do something. So I clicked on that. But then, I figured if I took the time to make all my boring photos Surreal and Edgy and Really Dark to the 4th degree, I'd never actually get this blog post made, and I'd continue my journey of AWOLness.

Bear with me. It's been a crazy month. One more look at the photo to refresh your memory.

Starting on the far right we have this:

A power drill and some quick dry caulk. In all honesty, the drill has nothing to do with what's gone on around here for the past month! Mark just likes to store dusty power tools on the counter for lengths of time. Whenever I see one I assume he's going to use it again soon. It takes me about 10 days of looking at it to realize, he's not actually using it anymore. The caulk has come in very handy. Mark and I have learned neither one of us is very good at caulking. He's too fast and I'm too slow. I go over and over and over again, because it never looks quite right. He puts HUGE globs of stuff on and tries to smear it semi-smooth.

Next photo:
Light bulbs. Those are for the New Old chandelier I found at the Goodwill store for $9.99. It's a big red globe that nobody but me really likes. The two designer-type people in my life both said, "Wow. I bet that's gonna be somethin'." That's designer speak for, "I think you're crazy. I'm glad I don't live here. And if I knew of a way to talk you out of actually hanging that thing, I would." But . . . I like it. However it didn't come with a light bulb. So we bought some. Now we just have to hang it.

And those Purdy packages . . . aren't they perty? Just had to say that. It leads us to our next slide:

These are 3 different paint rollers currently in use. We've got: your Basic white, your Dried Parsley green, and your I-Can't-Believe-You-Painted-Your-Stairwell-Dark-Dark Brown. That's just some of the things we've been doing. Painting, Painting, Painting. It's sort of fun. For a while. But not for weeks on end. And not till 1 AM for 5 days straight. And not hallways and stairwells. But you see those are the only places we've been painting because we love to torture ourselves. Let's move on.
But not before we take a peek at all those paint trays. If you look real hard you'll see The Red. The Red that Jody didn't like after she'd painted 2 coats of it on her hallway walls. The Red that has now been changed to Dried Parsley. She likes Dried Parsley. (Why did I just talk in 3rd person?!)

The fruit.
If you know me, you know I've got to have fruit around. Even if it's hidden under paint rollers and flanked by paint trays and brushes. There's no excuse for not eating your 5 fruits and vegies every day. No excuse.

Next slide.
These are books that I didn't know existed. I have never once in my life thought about the fertility of soil as something people write about or that someone would want to read! Just saying those words could get me ex-communicated from one side of the family. But I'm just being honest. This farming thing is a whole new world for me.

But here's a funny story. Mark was getting ready to leave town this afternoon, and as he was walking out the door he said, "I left my fertility books on the counter because Brian said he was coming here so we don't need them." It took me a whole 10 seconds before I was able to put the first 5 words into the appropriate context. Not be beat a dead horse here, but I've never thought my husband would refer to books about preparing and repairing dirt as, "my fertility books". Woh. I've got a lot to learn.

Moving Right Along:
Atop the toaster oven are the Christmas cards that were returned to us. So if you didn't get one and you wanted one, chances are it's on top of my toaster oven. I'm still planning to look up addresses and send them. Some people might like getting Christmas Greetings in February. You know, Jesus was not actually born in December after all. I might just hold on to those babies until Sept when it would be a more appropriate time of year to celebrate.

Then comes the list.

This is my To-Do list. I honestly don't like lists. I don't like that I have to make them. I'd much rather be able to remember to do stuff and live a relaxed, care-free, lifestyle where it didn't matter if I remembered to prime and paint the stairs before the carpenter came to hang crown molding. I'd like to live a life where I didn't have to put "Shower" as the 16th thing on my list for the day! Yes! That does mean Take a Shower! These days, if it doesn't go on the list, it's not getting done!

So there it is. The good, the bad, and the ugly.

I'm happy to say I did find at least part of my counters today. The painting is not quite finished, but it may never be.

Here's stuff my counters don't tell about:

Kendra and Co. came to visit for a week! We had a blast!


I've started up Moments by Jody in Illinois. It's going great!


Claire reads 1000 pages a week. I'm not kidding!


Lydia F-I-N-A-L-L-Y said, "Mama". To my sister in law, not to me. Seriously.


Mark and I took a weekend trip to celebrate our 13th Wedding Anniversary! What a FABULOUS time we had! I can't wait to be married 14 years so we can do it again!