A Year Ago Today

Last year at this time, we had a monster of a hail storm. I took pictures of the event. The hail looked like snow in places and took several days to melt. The damage it did was tremendous for plants and trees.  

  That's our intersection. Those who have been reading this blog will recognize that intersection from all my snow pictures. 

 I took this to show how deep the hail was--you can see the ruts. 

 I took this two hours after the hail storm passed. If you look at the upper left of the picture, you can see the storm clouds hovering.  

 That was our backyard--several inches deep in hail. 

 Our lilac bush was damaged badly in the storm. Many trees on the block suffered from tremendous damage from this storm. 
                                     
  The morning after the storm was cold. Hail littered the yards along with the leaves and branches from trees and bushes.

This afternoon, it grew dark, similar to last year. I finished my email communications with my students, shut down my computer, and waited to see if we would have another hail storm. Shortly after I did that, the sky turned black and I decided to suffer from the heat--and shut all the windows. Then a storm began. 

At first I breathed a sigh of relief because while there was hail, it was smaller than pea-sized and infrequent. I was worried about my garden as we had just planted pepper plants and petunias this week. By the time I finished my sigh, the hail came more frequently and grew to marble sized. I hurried and gathered my supplies of gallon-sized ziplock bags, barbecue skewers and the big umbrella we've never used. I went out the back door. Immediately, I was pelted by the hail, despite the protection of the umbrella.

Now I've been in hail storms  before. There was the summer I worked for the Youth Conservation Corps and was caught out in a hail storm on a mountain top. But I was rescued before it got too bad. Then there was the time I got caught in the parking lot with my son. The car was only seconds away so it wasn't that bad. There was last May when I was photographing the storm. 

But today, I felt each and every hail that battered into me. All I could say was "OUCH! OUCH! OUCH!" over and over again. I wanted to protect the pepper plants so I went into the hail storm voluntarily. Those plants are producing food for me. It's kind of that nurturer syndrome that affects some of us. I have it bad at times. Most of the times I can control it. And I say that, knowing full well I'm lying through my teeth. 

Anyway--I managed to get them covered with only a few leaves shredded. The petunias were a different story. The front yard flowers had to take their chances. 

 The columbine did ok...not as bad as I feared. Of course it wasn't as bad as last year's storm--thankfully! 

 The African Daisy took a shredding as did the Blanket Flower. 

  We lost a few leaves off the trees, but luckily, it wasn't as bad as last year's storm.  I realize that we're not out of May yet--but I'm hoping I don't have to worry about another bad hail storm. Of course, this is New Mexico. You know what they say about our weather:  if you don't like it--stick around a few minutes--it's bound to change!







 

Midterms Week!

It's midterms week here--which means it can be hell for both students and professors. I haven't forgotten any of you--just been up to my eyeballs in students, papers, grades and "stuff on that." That's a saying from my best friend's husband and it's caught on with me. Stuff on that.  I'm behind on my blog reading/commenting but will catch up as soon as the last grade is turned in. I promise. 
I thought I'd leave you with a few signs of spring.

Crocus

Miniature Iris

 Ava sleeping in the sun

MC, Tabby, and Swirly (some of our ferals) catching sunbeams

A definite sign of warm weather....bikers.

My Other Vice

We all have vices, habits, addictions that we find it difficult to break. Naturally there are vices, habits, addictions that we are just not going to attempt to break because we enjoy them so well! That's where I'm at in my journey. I've given up a lot of my favorite foods, disgusting habits (like smoking) and have sacrificed convenience for quality. I've formed new habits, spend hours--literally, spend hours reading labels on my foods, doing lots of research, and I let my 80-year old neighbor drag me around the park every other day. I've even stopped doing chores in the most time-saving and efficient manner so I'm that much more active. 

I have two vices--I call them vices. Whether or not you do is up to you. But I call them vices. These two shall not be touched. I won't give them up. Not now. Not ever. Don't ask. 

My first vice is my coffee. I was willing to give up smoking just so I could have my coffee. Seriously. Most smokers think I'm a total headcase because I was willing to throw away the cigarettes but not the liquid. Don't ask me to give it up. I won't. You don't know the pain I went through just cutting back from 2-4 pots (and mostly drinking that by myself) down to three measly cups per day. I made others miserable. It ghastly. It was difficult. Giving birth to my son was easier and less painful than cutting back on my coffee. 

(And here comes Harley as I type this. He has to "neck" when he feels traumatized. I mean do the nursing-mama-thing and suck on my neck--complete with kneading. I'm guessing he's feeling my pain at giving up a lot of my coffee and it's traumatizing him. He wants to neck. It should make me feel better. It works for him. But I digress...)

My second vice is beading. Don't ask me to give it up either. The need to bead is strong within me, do you hear?  And please don't ask me which one I value most--my coffee or beading. It's no competition! I've got to have both.

The need to bead goes back to my first real release from the hospital back when I was sick in 2008. I was hospitalized the first week in March and had four more hospitalizations by May. In June, although still pretty frail, I was feeling somewhat stronger. I still had the last vestiges of the suicide ideation which was caused by all the medications shoved, poked, and needled into my body during the past two months.  (Yes, being allergic to medication can cause suicidal thoughts.)  I decided that if my time was limited (and I felt at the time, that the end was fast approaching), I couldn't leave without first making some sort of memento for my sisters. I have two younger sisters. Middle Sister and Baby Sister. Despite all the fights, bickering, slap-downs (verbally--not literally) and miles between us, I still love my little sisters. 

I had seen this Sisters pin of three female figures-each figure done in silver, copper, and gold. Well at the time, I couldn't afford it and at the time, none of us would ever wear a pin. But I loved the idea of symbolizing the concept of "sisters." So I used silver, copper, and gold metal plated seed beads. I wanted a stone that would represent women, sisters, bonding. I found some beautiful rhodonite. I didn't want to make the necklaces exactly alike, but make them to reflect our differences despite us being connected by blood. I chose different colors of 6/0 seed beads.

That's Arby's paw in the upper left, holding down the shot.

  

The concept began growing in my mind. I realized there were several women in my life that I recognized as my "sisters." I wanted them to have a necklace too. So I made one for the special women in my life.  Unfortunately, I was in a hurry to mail out their jewelry, I didn't take the photos I should have. I wasn't quite thinking that clearly yet. 

Beading helped me get my life back into perspective. It gave me purpose. It helped me to get my brain functioning again. I temporarily lost the ability to read, count, do simple thought processes. It was a scary, scary time for me. Beading helped me by giving me something to focus and concentrate on and work through logistics of putting a piece together. It helped me burn the last of the medication effects out of me. 

The first piece I put together that helped me to start functioning again.

 It also gave me my new vice. My other vice other than coffee. I may not be able to drink coffee all day long any more, but I can certainly bead all day long! Well, when I can. When students are demanding lessons and graded papers back. When I don't have to clean the house and plan dinner. Or shop for food. Things like that.

 

I found I could make my own funky but stylin' earrings. I found these beads on eBay, created by Terri Stone at TLSClayDesign. I need to finish the bracelets. Did I mention I have a bunch of her beads?  







Middle Sister's birthday is in December. Last year I decided I wanted to give her something special. I found these beautiful clay shields on eBay, designed by Linda of NKDesigns. I saw one that would be perfect for Middle Sister. When it arrived, I discovered that I really liked it. I kept telling myself that once I made it up, it would look like it BELONGED to Middle Sister and I would be happy. Which reminds me, I need to visit her shop and pick up a few more of her beads. It's an addiction, I tell you!

   

Naturally, this set didn't make it to Middle Sister. I LOVED it when I was finished the necklace. I loved it so much, I had to make earrings and a bracelet that can be worn with the necklace or separately. Yeah, I kept the set. Couldn't part with it. Which meant I had to find new beads for Middle Sister's birthday present. But that was ok since I'm up to the challenge of finding new beads. It's like getting a daily fix. It's rewarding. It's thrilling. It's an addiction to put it simply.

This is the set Middle Sister got for her birthday last year. The flowers came from a very talented artist, Mary Ellen at BeeTreeByME.  I told her she could have the clay shield set after I die. 

 

A close up of Middle Sister's birthday necklace.