Looking for something to do . . . .

. . . other than laundry and cleaning. Thought I would show you some of my favorite things.

These are some of my Willow Tree figurines. I think they are beautiful and so far I have 13 in all.

This one is my favorite. I bought it for Carter on his 2nd birthday.

Anyone that comes to my house notices the paper towels and toilet paper in my curio. They always ask about the story behind such an unusual display. As long as I can remember my grandpa, my dad's, dad, has loved to shop sales. He would take his coupon to the Greyhound (a grocery store in Southern Indiana) on double coupon day and get a cart full of coffee, ice cream bars, toilet paper, paper towels or whatever else was on sale that week. He'd store the toilet paper and paper towels in his homemade truck top camper that sat under an awning in his back yard or in the building out back that was dusty and smelled like moth balls. After I got my own home I began getting a large black yard bag full of soap, bath towels, washcloths, trash bags, toilet paper, paper towels and whatever else he had stashed just like my mom and aunts had gotten for as many years as I could remember. We called them carepackages. The first year I received my care package was probably 1996. The one thing that I remember was opening the pink toilet paper to find a coupon that expired in 1982. I didn't really care that it was so old, it was just pretty funny and gave me a giggle. Well, in 2002 my grandpa passed away and the next summer my mom and dad went back to Indiana to help my grandmother go through some things. My mom called me kind of chuckling and said that they had just spent the last 30 minutes moving toilet paper and paper towels by assembly line from the building and truck top camper. He still had tons of this pink toilet paper and paper towels that he'd probably bought in the late 70's or .early 80's. I told my mom that the only thing I wanted her to bring me was one package of each and it's been in my living room as a reminder of just one memory I have of my Grandpa Pershing. Carter has his name and I can only hope that he grows up to be as great of a man as my grandpa.

This is my family picture wall in my livingroom. I love pictures of my family. In case you haven't noticed.

This is a drawing of me when I was about 6 or 7 years old. I was waiting next to the tree in front of my house for the VBS bus to pick me up. A neighbor sketched this from across the street and gave it to my mom. I wasn't actually sitting like that but I did have that dress on and my hair was up like that.