Life lessons in the blackberry patch

The last few days have been spent in the sleepy little town of Boston. Georgia, that is, not the Bean Town one. When I tell people , with my sweet southern drawl, that I was born and raised in Boston, I always get the same look. A puzzled look until I explain that it is in South Georgia. I used to think that growing up in a small town, and even worse, on a farm in a small town was so "small"!! Nothing to do , nowhere to go, not even that many people to stir up good gossip(although my Grandma Girlie and her sisters, Eva and Nellie, could burn a hole in that party line telephone!) I couldn't wait to move to the big city. I had no idea what the big city was but I was going to find it! So, here I sit in the even smaller town of Sasser, Ga some 40 odd years later thinking about the fun that we had these last few days on those old familiar dirt roads. Nowhere to go, nothing really important to do, and nobody to stir up a whole lot of gossip! We got up with the sun and watched it rise over a cotton field, we took a walk down a canopied dirt road, and we picked blackberries. My Lindsey and I love to pick blackberries. Not the hybrid thorn-less kind but the good ole prickly kind that taste so yummy. We discovered that there can be a lot of conversation that happens while you are searching for the perfect berry. Finding that perfect berry can be tricky too. Sometimes you have to sort through a lot of buggy and mushy berries before you find the one that is just right. There are also a whole bunch of stickers that you have to wade through to get to those plump black berries. The more stickers you encounter, the better you get at learning to avoid the stickers. And one of the most frustrating lessons is when you think that you have just picked the perfect berry and then, dang it, you DROP it! But, guess what, there is always another perfect berry right around the next bush. When your buckets are full and the sun is starting to set ,you can set out for home and enjoy the fruits of your labor. Our buckets were full; we made and ate 3 whole cobblers; and we are all the richer for our time spent on a dirt road in a small town in the middle of nowhere with the people that we love dearly. I hope that everyone can find their own berry patch and it tastes as good as ours did! Till tomorrow....

'Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond imagination. It is our light more than our darkness which scares us. We ask ourselves-who are we to be brilliant, beautiful, talented, and fabulous. But honestly, who are you to not be so?

You are a child of God, small games do not work in this world. For those around us to feel peace, it is not example to make ourselves small. We were born to express the glory of God that lives in us. It is not in some of us, it is in all of us. While we allow our light to shine, we unconsciously give permission for others to do the same. When we liberate ourselves from our own fears, simply our presence may liberate others.'

Marianne Williamson

happy saturday

happy list - two words - air conditioning

beating them off with a stick

We are back in Georgia and low and behold if it isn't still HOT. It was a great trip but it always feels so good to get back home. Now, I am sure that everyone knows our security guard, FIFE(some people call him Spence) by now. He is my Dad and he is 87 years young. He is the best part of our trips and we love having go with us. He is so easy going and willing to do anything we decide to do. He always makes friends along the way and this trip was no exception. This time we had to beat the ladies off with a stick! Every time we turned around he had another lady making googly eyes. All the ladies making googly eyes and my Mom rolling her eyes! We tried to get him to share his secret but he just gives us that sweet little grin and giggles. I came home with a BIG black book full of ladies phone numbers and addresses waiting to meet up with Spence on our next adventure.

stop by and see us

Whew. We have packed the trailer full and are on the way to Sasser. We started the day with a flat tire but thankfully we were staying in a hotel across from Wal-Mart. Wal-Mart never looked better than it did this morning in the pouring rain with a very flat tire. We have traveled from Indianapolis, Indiana to Springfield, Ohio picking up lots of great new things for the store and meeting new friends all along the way. We will be unpacking the trailer this weekend so we hope that you can stop by and see us next week. I am too tired to find any pictures tonight so I will leave you with a funny quote that I saw today, "There is a skinny person inside of me screaming to get out, but I can usually shut them up with a couple of cookies!"

Our personal assistant(my lovely daughter) looks thrilled to be up at 6 am. She would rather the early bird have all of the worms but we were the first ones out this morning and we got all of the BEST junk. Hopefully we will be able to have a few new things in the store by this Saturday.

In between our junking, my botanical roots(I actually have a degree in plant sciences) always seem to surface. We kept seeing these white feather looking things floating all around and could not figure out exactly what they were. Finally, I found this GIGANTIC dandelion. This thing was incredible. I am pretty sure that we could hear the Fantasia melodies as Jay took a breath and set the fairies free.

Then, I turned the corner and found the sweetest bed of lavender. It was full of busy bees and smelled so heavenly. We can't grow Lavender in Sasser so it is always a treat to find it growing.
A great day of junking followed with a prickly pear margarita and a great Midwestern sunset. See you tomorrow.

GPS - gettin' people stranded!

Does anyone else in America have a GPS that routinely gets them lost? And not only lost, but lost in the worst of situations. Today we found the ghetto section of Louisville, KY thanks to our GPS. We put in the exact address and when we were "arriving at destination" guess what?? we were in the middle of a back road on a one way street at an abandoned building. NOT FUN! GPS = getting people stranded, getting people screwed, getting people scared, ..... Lesson learned-there is nothing better than a good old fashioned ATLAS! Once we calmed Jay down a bit, we found our way back to the Interstate and ended up going through Cincinnati. Poor Jay, this may have been worse than being lost in Louisville. We did get to make a few stops today and found a handful of new and unusual treasures. Great ironstone, fun antique concrete planters, an apple butter copper pot, the best old green cupboard and lots more!
love this building in downtown Cincinnati. It looks like a giant apostrophe from the side.
Wouldn't this be a fun place to rent a room?
And as always, we have FIFE on patrol! My Dad is the best! He patrols the trailer while we fill it up and he always manages to make a friend or two. We will let you know what tomorrow brings.