Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving! 🦃 🍽

This is the holiday that I love most because it reminds me of home and it holds great memories for me.  I remember the delicious smells coming from the kitchen as my mother cooked a wonderful feast. She would be humming or listening to music as she cooked. Further back when I was little and my father was alive, I remember him saying grace before we ate. I remember my sisters and brothers being joyful that it was finally time to eat 😁 Through the years as everyone grew up, the traditions shifted from one house to another, but we were together and the love was there.

So as I have Thanksgiving dinner with my husband here in England, 4,200 miles away from home, I'll carry on the traditions that I learned from my parents and keep their memories alive as I do everyday. And through the wonders of technology I'll check in with my siblings today and have some laughs and it'll be like old times in a way 🙂

Gratitude, family, friends and sharing food...the joys of life 🙂💖

Happy Thanksgiving! 🦃🙂

A Friday Photo and Huge Trees

Today's Friday photo is one that's a visual representation of what's been on my mind lately. This photo is from sometime in the late 2003/ early 2004 era when I was still back home in Georgia. I can't be more precise than that because that's all that I noted back then. I took this on an old camera that I had back then that took kind of blurry pictures. Lol. So this one is kinda blurry. It's okay though...this one isn't so much about the prettiness of the photo and more about memories and feeling :-)

As I mentioned, this represents what's been going through my mind lately...back home :-) I haven't been home in FIVE years and it would be beyond wonderful to just set foot where I was born again. I like being here in England, but touching base with where you come from from time to time is essential I believe. My staying away for five years isn't because I don't want to go back, it's just that it's expensive and things haven't lined up in my favor lately. I won't bore you with the details ;-) Anyway, I'll get there one day very soon. I know this to be true :-)

I guess you're wondering what this actually is. Well it's the top of the huge magnolia tree that was in my mom's yard. That tree is at least 80 feet tall. It's been huge for as long as I can remember. I always loved that huge tree. I used to climb on it a lot when I was a kid. It made a great hideout.

On the day when I took this photo I guess that I was just taking snapshots of everything just because and I'm glad that I did :-)

Have a great weekend!

My Love For the Color Blue

Today I'm here for my love of the color blue! ;-)

As I've mentioned before here, I love the color blue and I always have. Granted, in my twenties I had a brief flirtation with pink and even had a bedroom that was embellished with all things pink. It was a phase I guess. But it was there for a while and then one day the pink fascination was just gone. No offense to pink or to anyone who loves it. It's still a lovely color, but I'm all in with blue now. Lol.

I don't remember when I started to like blue...I've always liked it, but it wasn't as obvious when I was younger. It's funny that even though I don't consciously choose blue things when I'm shopping, blue items always seem to find me :-)

Here are a few examples of my love for the color blue:

I love wearing blue. I don't wear it everyday, but it's definitely a color that's present in my wardrobe. These are just a couple of tops that I love to wear and also some of my blue jewelry.

I made this photo of  perfectly innocent white flowers blue one day just because...

Of course, I'm not alone in loving that blue sky up above us. Granted we don't get a chance to see the blueness of the sky here in England nearly enough, but when we do I'm a happy woman :-)

This is my blue bottle. It usually sits on the windowsill in the bedroom. I love having a bit of blue decor in my surroundings. As I think about it, I really haven't gone overboard with the blue around the house at all. There's just a sprinkling.

These are just a few examples of how the lovely color blue pops up here and there in my life. I'm not obsessed, but if you were to hang with me for a while you'd see it's the color that I gravitate to ;-)

What's your favorite color? I'd love to know.

Have a great day and a wonderful week!!!

Books and Cookies and Drinks...Oh My!

It has been a fun time around the Yellow House these past few days...fun because I've had a couple of packages delivered to my door. The first one came a few days ago and it held my reading material for my new school year that begins at the end of September. I have about thirty books to read along with any other textbooks that may arrive. It's a lot of reading, but I love reading and I'm up for the challenge!

As you might be able to see from the pic, there are some children's books included in the pile. That's because one of my courses is a course called Children's Literature. The subject can sound a bit deceiving and maybe conjure up thoughts of this being an easy course...but no way! I've heard that this course is just as challenging as any literature course and I think it takes a lot of skill to write for children and teens. So I'm really looking forward to this course. I've read some of the books years and years ago, but it will be interesting to read them from my adult perspective now. And some of the books are new to me, so it promises to be intriguing! I'll share my thoughts on the various books as the year progresses. Also, incorporated into the pile are my other books for my other course. It's a wide-ranging reading list and I'm trying to get a bit of a headstart on the reading so that when they come up during the year, I won't be so rushed. One more note, I know this box looks big even for this amount of books, but there was another bigger item in the box that took up lots of space. So no waste there :-)

My other package arrived today and I don't have a photo because I forgot. Lol. Anyway, it was a standard puffy envelope chocked full of home goodies from my niece. This was my favorite package of the two because it's a bit of home. My niece lives in California and even though she's my niece, she has always felt like more of a cousin. We are not that far removed in age and we have a lot of shared memories. Whenever I remember something from pop culture from back in the day, I just send her a quick message and we'll laugh because she knows 95% of mostly everything I remember. It's nice to hold memories with someone else that knew you when you were so young. She is a good friend :-) She sent me some cookies and drink mixes and I'm so grateful. She could have sent a pouch full of California dirt and I would still be happy...in the end it's the connection that matters!

So it's been a package-filled time around the Yellow House and the weather has greatly improved over the last few days. Instead of continuous rain for weeks on end, we finally have some sun! I can't believe that the opening ceremony of the Olympics is tomorrow. Time is going so fast! I'm gonna have to start thinking about what to pack for our trip to London next week. I'm getting really excited to take it all in and as I've mentioned before, I'll be sharing some photos.

Thanks for stopping by to visit me!

Remembering Donna Summer

I want to pay tribute today to the beautiful and oh so talented Donna Summer. As many of you know, she passed away yesterday from cancer. Like everyone else, when I saw this sad news I was shocked and saddened and simultaneously so many memories came flooding into my mind. It sounds cliché nowadays, but when artists like Ms. Summer pass away, we do remember their work as a soundtrack to our lives. Donna Summer was known as the Queen of Disco and she was definitely that...but she was also truly an AWESOME singer!

When I saw on Twitter that she had passed, my mind immediately went back to my seventies childhood and wanting to be a combination of Donna Summer, Diana Ross, and Chaka Khan J . I always imagined that I was this great singer when I was a child even though I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket. But I let it rip anyway. I would tie pieces of cloth around myself in elaborate styles and fashion myself an evening dress. Then I would go out into our yard and stand on this huge rock that was my stage and I’d sing Donna Summer songs to our cats. The cats would ignore me or run away, but I was gettin’ down! Some of her songs had saucy lyrics, but in the 70s it was about the party and it wasn't about over analyzing everything. It was just fun and great music! When she brought out “She Works Hard for the Money” when I was a teen, I had dropped the makeshift dress and climbed down off that rock, but I was still singing along!

Donna Summer sang so many great songs and if you go on Youtube, they are all there to enjoy forever and that is a great thing! She will be truly missed, but her music will live on and that is the beauty of music.

Some of my favorite Donna Summer songs are: "I Feel Love", "She Works Hard for the Money", "Bad Girls", and "Last Dance".

"Last Dance" (below) is my all-time favorite song by her and it's the first song that popped into my head when I heard that she had made her transition. It showcases her beautiful voice and it makes you want to dance!

Rest in peace beautiful Donna Summer...

Grits and Memory

In my last post, I said that I would be doing a food post. Well this is a post about a craving and not about something I've cooked. Oh I wish that I could right now. I don't have any on hand, but I know that I will have them again ;-)

For the last few days, I've been thinking quite a bit about one of my favorite foods and it's something that I can't readily get here...grits! :) I never in my life thought that I would miss any food so much. And here's the thing, I'm not a person who just has to have certain foods on a regular basis. I'm not usually a craver, but I am truly craving grits these days. And just to clarify it all...I'm not pregnant so it's not those kind of cravings. LOL.

I get the worse cravings on weekend mornings because that is when I would have them mostly. I guess that they are a fully entrenched food memory. Grits make me think of home and my mother cooking them for our breakfast for decades. I know that there are people who hate grits and can't understand the fuss and that's cool...I respect that everyone's likes are theirs and this like is truly mine :) I was thinking about it the other day and yeah, my craving can be reduced down to simply having a taste for grits. But also I think that they were such a part of my experience as a southern girl and that connection with my culture is so strong that an ocean can't even keep me from it.

I am happy most days with my different life here in England. But sometimes I miss the simple things about back home so much. The list changes depending upon my mood that day. And it's not one of those grass is always greener situations. I'll tell you, I've learned one thing about having lived in two different countries now...there are bad, good, annoying, and uplifting things about both places. Neither one is better than the other...they each have things going for them for sure. I'm not trying to sell grits to anybody or even attempting to validate my love for grits. I don't need to :) I just thought that I would make my perspective clear. Love is love and I've got it bad and grits are it baby! LOL.

Food memories are great. I guess that's the good thing about food memories or regular memories...you always have them to call upon whenever you want to remember a person, time, or a place. I know that we can't go back in time and it's not good to always be looking back, but sometimes it doesn't hurt a thing...especially when you're trying to remember the taste of grits! :)

Photos and More Photos

So here I go with my photo post that I promised in a previous post. I had mentioned that it’s been a long time since I did a kind of photo snapshot post with a few words about each. I figure that this will be a good way to get me back on my blogging game a bit more since I’ve been away for chunks of time lately due to school and life in general :-)

When I looked back over the photos that I’ve taken these past few weeks, it was like experiencing those moments all over again. Most of the photos here are of nice things, but there’s one that I’m adding that isn’t. I feel the need to include it because life is a balance and everything isn’t all fabulous all the time, you know. Plus, a mini photo vent is good ;-) Nothing else sums up the frustration of my week more than this photo.

Here is my annoying photo:



This is our stupid electric shower...GRRRR! It has broken down again for the umpteenth time and we have truly lost count now. We have been struggling back and forth with our landlord and his middleman to get our shower fixed. For those of you who have been reading my blog for a while, you know that Brit Boy and I have had this problem before. Here’s the thing, it’s already bad enough that it’s malfunctioning again, but the real reason that we’re ticked off is that the landlord doesn’t want to pay to fix it. It’s not our fault...it’s simply a cheap shower. To call him cheap would be a gross understatement. It has been total Crazyville around here. So I’ve spent the week calling back and forth to the management office. Finally things got going today, so hopefully this photo and the situation will fade into the past and stay there ;-)

Anyway, that’s my annoying photo just to shake things up a bit. The rest are calm and nice...a gentle respite from the chaos :-) So on with the calming section of our show!

Below are my beautiful flowers that Brit Boy brought home to me one day. Aren’t they pretty? It was on the Friday right before he had his vacation time a couple of weeks ago. He surprised me and these put a big smile on my face.



This next photo is truly the last of the pink roses out back. I posted some color pictures of this bush before here, and I thought that that was the last of them but alas, these are. I took this picture after a rain shower and I thought that the black and white represented how it looked outside very well. I LOVE black and white photos!




These next pictures were taken when we were further out in the countryside. Whenever we are further out like that, the rural beauty of it all reminds me of back home. The beauty of the family land where I grew up is echoed in my heart when I see the natural beauty here. I am definitely a nature girl. Maybe it’s God’s way of connecting me with home when those thoughts come into my head. Natural beauty...there’s nothing like it...

All of these were taken from the passenger seat as Wiltshire passed by our window, so some are blurry but you can get the idea of how it looked that day I think.




Above: Wiltshire scenes


Above: This one is kinda trippy...Everything blurred as we swept along...


Above: I like that the traffic signal is set off by the flowers...


Above: The clouds marching along the field...


Above: A shady and bright spot...


Above: A blurry shot of sunlight raining down on Stonehenge...

Well, this post is very long, so I will post some more photos in my next post. These will be of our trip to the beach one day and I'll throw in a few lake shots too. And don't worry, these upcoming ones were taken while I was standing on my feet so no blurry trippy stuff ;-) Until next time...

Spring

I’ve gotten behind on my posting lately. I can’t believe it’s been nearly three weeks, but I’m back here again and I’m glad to be here. Just like many of you, life gets busy and some things slip...and my blog slipped way down the list ;-) Anyway, I’ve returned so thank you for visiting me again!

I was going to post about my food adventure in this post, just like I promised in my last post, but I just wanted to ease back in with one of those take a breath posts. I’ll do my food post next time.

Spring will be arriving in a few days and it brings to mind the feeling of renewal. Both of my parents have been on my mind quite a bit lately, so when I snapped the photo below of the daffodils blooming in our backyard, I thought of how I love and miss both of them. These daffodils remind me of being back home when I was growing up...when my parents were both alive. I love spring because it makes me remember the longer days and my daddy being out in the garden. I remember the smell of the freshly plowed earth and all of the planting going on. It's amazing how those little things stay in your mind forever.



So I welcome the arrival of spring and I pray for good things ahead for all of us everywhere, all around the world.

Two Forests

Yesterday, Brit Boy and I were out and about, and decided to stop off on the way back, to see if we could spot any fall colors in the forest. Well…we didn’t see much color yet, but it was still pleasant to take a walk in the woods. Hopefully a variety of colors will spring forth in the next week or so. So anyway, we enjoyed just being out in nature with the customary green all around us :-) It was lovely.





When I was growing up, I loved walking in the woods back home. We lived in a rather wooded and green area in Georgia, so I’ve always loved the peace of surroundings like that. Recently, they’ve constructed a nature trail back home, so it makes it even easier to enjoy it all. When I went home to visit last summer, I really relished the experience of reconnecting with what I did as a child. When I’m taking a walk like that, surrounded by all of the trees, I always get a sense of peace that I don’t get anywhere else. Walks like that are cool…aren’t they?

So yesterday, when we were in the woods here in Wiltshire, my mind wandered to the woods on the family land back home in Georgia. These places are thousands of miles apart in distance, but come from the same place of serenity. From time to time I find myself having these moments of my life here and my life back home occupying the same space at one moment in my mind. I’ll think, ‘Wow, this spot reminds me so much of home’. It’s like the two places touch across a vast ocean and I’m the bridge between them and it’s cool :-)

More and more as I go forward in my life I’m seeing vividly that yes, these two places that I’ve lived have things that make them different and many things make them similar, and that’s truly great. Variety is amazing and makes us unique. But in the end, the saying is true…we are more alike than we are different and sometimes our surroundings are too. And this chick that lives in this yellow house right now is cool with having a foot in each forest, on either side of the water.

So I hope you enjoy seeing a bit of what I saw today… :-)

The Moon and Happy Feet

It’s a beautiful sunny Friday here in Wiltshire. It seems that nowadays we get all of our beautiful weather in September instead of during the summer months. Better late than never I always say :-) Although while I was gone home to Georgia in June, Brit Boy tells me that the weather here was lovely. He blogged about it here. So I'm making up for missing it then. I’m soaking up as much of that vitamin D as I can.

This is gonna be a random post…I forgot to mention that in the opening :-) Okay, so I can’t remember if I’ve written here before about how much I love the moon and can gaze at it forever. I’ve always been intrigued by it and its beauty has the power to just stop me in my tracks when I catch sight of it. I’m sure that many of us have been enticed by a full moon or two or a few hundred in our lives. There is just something about that beautiful orb up there. When I’m gazing at our beautiful moon, I often think of the longevity of it and how my parents, grandparents, and all of the people who have ever lived on this planet have seen that same moon throughout their lifetimes. It makes me instantly feel connected to humanity through the ages. And I don’t just get excited by the full moon…oh no…I love the crescent moon too :-) It’s all amazing to me!

So last night, I was fiddling around with my camera and trying to photograph the moon because it looked like I could reach out and touch it. Well I did miserable at it. LOL. To tell you the truth I wasn’t really trying. It was late and I wasn’t using a high powered camera. I was just fooling around. I’m easily amused as I’ve mentioned before and I’m a night owl, so I just let it flow ;-) The photos turned out blurry and weird, but I like the eerie way it looks. So I want to share one of them anyway, just for a Friday laugh. LOL. And no, I was not drunk. LOL.



In other news, I’ve received a couple of comments here and on Facebook about my shoes that I wore on our trip to London last Saturday. Let me tell you, I LOVE those shoes!!! :-) They are so comfortable! For all you bloggers out there, you know how sometimes you get a meme or something and it asks you to tell something about yourself? Well my choice of footwear is something I’d like to share ;-) As you will notice from the photo, these shoes don’t have laces on them and they are my absolute favorite shoes. You know why? Because I really dislike untying and tying shoe laces. LOL. I'm sure there's some psychological reason behind this, but it doesn't faze me...I guess I would just say that I like ease in life and there are other things to think about besides my shoes ;-)


I learned how to tie my shoes many moons ago like everybody else, but I have developed this thing about not bothering with tying shoe laces. Even when I wear other sneakers, I will wrench them onto my feet somehow so I won’t have to untie them. LOL. I know…I'm a quirky chick. LOL.

So when I found these shoes I was in love!! ;-) Actually, these are the second pair of this style of shoe for me. Here’s the old pair that I still wear even though they’re a bit worn out now.



Interestingly enough, I bought both pairs of these shoes on visits home to Georgia, a few years apart. I bought the beige ones at the end of 2006 and I got the black ones when I went home in June. They are Skechers brand and they make my feet happy. They look nice on the foot and the best part is that they just slip onto my feet. Now isn’t that a beautiful thing ;-)

So this is the end of my random post and I will say here, that I was not paid to say something nice about these shoes or compensated in any way whatsoever. I just felt like sharing some info about these shoes, because you never know…there may be others out there who just don’t like tying their shoes either ;-)

Have a great weekend everyone and to all the folks back home in the States, have a Happy Labor Day weekend!!!!

More Photos Of Home

Today I wanted to share the last of my reflections and photos from my trip back home. There's a bit of this and that in this post :-) I had a wonderful time. It was good to touch base with where I come from. I saw things with fresh eyes in some ways and yet the familiarity was still there :-)

Early in my trip, we visited our old home place where we grew up and did some looking around. I hadn’t been inside for quite a few years. When Brit Boy and I visited in the fall of last year, we didn’t go inside. We just walked around the land. So this time I got the chance to go inside and boy did the memories come flooding back. The house has been cleared out and things are being stored for now. The bulk of the furniture hadn’t left the house in 100 years and I’m not even exaggerating :-) There has been a LOT of family history in that house, from well before me and my siblings were born. So for me, the energy of the past was palpable. I felt it very strongly. It was strange to see the outlines of furniture from long times past and not see the actual pieces in their usual place. The familiar pieces were there no more. It was a strange feeling, but not in a bad way. I just felt very peaceful, because I know that this part of the story has wound down, but I know that a new chapter is waiting :-) I’ve always been a family historian of sorts, so the way I see it, it ain’t over ;-) The story continues…

When we were walking around and picking up a few final things, I noticed some smoky looking glasses on top of a cupboard…way in the back corner, that had been left behind. I asked my nephew to use his long arms to retrieve them for me. They are so lovely and haven’t been used in forever and a day. I felt like I found buried treasure when I spotted them and at that moment actual buried treasure would’ve paled in comparison :-) There were quite a few, but these are representative of the set. Here they are:

At first glance I thought that they were naturally this color, but then I quickly realized that they were just grimy from sitting there for so many years unnoticed. I cleaned them up before I stored them, but here’s the thing…I got so excited in the process of cleaning them…(you should’ve seen me)…that I forgot to take a photo of them all sparkly clean and beautiful. So please use your imagination here…they turned out lovely and as people often say, they don’t make things like this anymore :-)

On one of our roadtrips, I caught sight of this pretty little church in a small town called Eatonton, which is the hometown of author Alice Walker, who wrote “The Color Purple” .



On another day, my sisters, niece, and I went for a picnic at the reservoir and I saw these two sitting on the shore.



The white duck reminds me of my pet duck that I had many years ago. My duck was like a guard dog and quacked loudly whenever anyone came into the yard, yet he was very quiet otherwise. LOL. Here are a few photos of the reservoir. It was a wonderfully peaceful day out.



The time spent back home was renewing. I’m so glad that I went and I was able to take you all along with me.

You can go home again and I did that indeed! :-)

Quaintness, The Moon, and Rocking

Today I want to share more photos and thoughts about my trip back home to Georgia. This post is gonna be kind of random and photo blog-ish, but since it’s hard to remember things day by day, I figure this is the best way to share a bit of my trip with you all :-) I hope you enjoy taking a look.

I took some photos as we were driving along like I often do when I’m here in England. I love catching things on the fly even when they come out blurry ;-) I enjoy that for some reason. Anyway, on one of our road trips, I snapped a picture of this shed/barn. I just thought it looked really quaint and rural :-)



Here’s dinner from one day. You all know how I love taking pictures of food ;-) Funnily enough though, this is the only food picture that I took the whole time…I’m slipping. LOL. Anyway, my sister prepared this meal for me one day. It was really tasty.



One evening I went outside as the sun was going down just so I could enjoy it all. I love this magical time of the day :-) I was greeted by this pretty sky with a bit of the moon there to set it off. It was so beautiful to experience the peacefulness of it all. I loved the color of the clouds as the sun bounced its light off of them.

I took these pictures one morning as I stood on my sister’s carport. The light in her yard in the mornings was amazing. I loved the peace of it all.






I love rocking chairs because there’s nothing like sitting in one on a front porch and just letting the motion take you off on a trip of pure relaxation :-) The morning light loved the rockers too!



Thanks for coming along with me as I show you back home. Next time I’ll share more pictures from my journey!

Nature and Life and Going Home

My trip home to Georgia was wonderful. It was just what I needed. I got a chance to be outside and to retrace the paths that I walked as a child. It was very therapeutic and satisfied something within me. I hadn’t realized how much I needed that trip home. It’s a trip that I’m glad that I took (smile).

One thing that stuck out about this trip was how green everything was. For the past few summers, Georgia has had its share of drought-stricken weather. But this year, there has been more rain and it shows. As my sister drove me from the airport I kept thinking to myself how much all of the green reminded me of when I was growing up.

On one of my Saturday mornings there, one of my sisters and I decided to take an early morning walk for the exercise and also to enjoy the quiet of the morning. Right before I left the house, on my way to meet her, I thought that I should take along my camera and I’m glad that I did.

The sun was coming up and I caught a glimpse of it peeking through the dense green growth. The trees and bushes just looked so alive.





Here are a few of my sister’s flowers. I had to snap a few photos of them.



Here are some roadside flowers that I caught sight of too. I don’t know what they are, but they were so dainty and pretty.




Here are a few photos that I captured during our walk. I was snapping pictures of everything. LOL.




I loved looking over at the woods as we walked back towards home. I spent many days of my childhood running around those woods and God certainly had me protected because I was never snake-bitten or harmed (smile).



As I reminisced in my mind, I relished the simple life that I led as a child. It wasn’t always wonderful, but whose life is, you know (smile). Looking back, I’m just thankful for all of those experiences growing up…the good and the bad, because they molded me into who I am now. Life is such a blessing.

While I was home, one of my childhood friends passed away from cancer. She had had such a hard time. When I was on that walk, I thought about her and how we would walk from my house to hers back when we were girls. We lived in the same community, went to the same schools and church, and her family has known my family for years. Our paths had run parallel for a season of our lives. We hadn’t seen each other in quite a while, but when I heard about her passing, it hit my heart in a place potent with memories. And I will have those memories forever.