[morning8glory]

Dear Mom

I hope you are having a nice day.

I am having a great day.

It is sunny here today.

John is at work.

Bob cat is out side playing.

I have laundry to do today.

I love to hang laundry out side.

I now can put my clothes line back up we moved a very large mulch pile that was in the way of my clothes line. It took us both a long time to work on moving that mulch and it was only one of two such piles.

Baby snakes can be found among the mulch the bigger birds love to eat them

and feed them to their baby's.

I think I found the momma's snake den in the woods it is only a big old back snake that we see from time to time in our yard he pose's no fear.

The cat even plays with him.

The mulch came from a hudge oak tree that had 4 trunks to it that we had cut down.

I planted flower seeds in my veggie garden so far instead of flowers. I planted for the fun of it the tallest sunflowers I could find so they will be seen from our house windows and I planted zinna's in all colors since they are so cheap and pretty and crow easy. I planted a red morning glorys to climb up the garden fence and another vine that has white flowers that only bloom at night.

The little seeds are coming up already and fun to watch.

John bought me a red rose bush for the yard it has tiny roses on it.

I have a similiar one he bought with salmon color roses.

He always celebrates the day we met and that was this years gift.

He also bought 12 pints of strawberrys or the whole crate because we celebrate with strawberry's every year.

They were so good being from Flordia.

I froze the biggest ones to eat like popsicles this summer.

I am moving many flowers around to different area's of our yard.

The deer herd that moves in at night when no one is watching is eating most my flowers that are in the center of the yard like my Hostas.

Those Hostas must taste real sweet.

I have good soil for Hostas and I have many to move. I moved half of them already to the front bank the front bank is rocky and so every hole dug needs a boulder removed from it.

If I sit quite at night on a dead tree root at the very bottom of yard behind our use to be veggie garden now a Zinna bed. It still has herbs like parsly in it I reseeded them also.

If I sit still and quiet I can hear the deer work there way down to the yards and

some times I can even see them.

I was working on sowing my tiny seeds in the veggie/herb/now flower garden

one evening until dusk and I could hear the leaves being trodden on beneath the deer feet and I left out a big sneeze and a big herd of deer went galloping for the hills.

I can see their foot prints in our front yard also were they have walked over to eat the bird seed left on the ground.

I think if I put corn out for them on the front porch they would walk up onto the porch and eat.

John says they would come in and eat at the Kitchen table if I invited them in for corn. I should plant rows of corn in my center garden.

You would think that at night it would be so quiet but just the opposite it is so noisy so many bugs and birds and animals come out at night.

We had a racoon again several times rading a bird feeder on the front porch he knocks things over and makes quite a racket that we can hear him out there and then we can watch him from the window.

There is small pond down the hill from our house and it creates so many night noises.

I sit out back in the woods at dusk some nights and It is very noisy.

I can not decide what all the noises are from but they are natural noises.

John says it never got cold enough last winter to freeze out any of the bugs so we will have grass hoppers as big as our long tall 14 pound cat this summer.

I found just yesterday a small light tan cocoon for praying mantic insects.

I pull a twig off the bush it was spun on and put it on a bush that is the same type growing near the back porch so I could keep an eye on it.

Every time I walk around our yard and home I find a nice suprise.

The flowers and bushes in my yard are very pretty.

We have Columbine blooming in three different shades.

There are two colors of Trilliums blooming.

I have a pink bleeding heart my best girl friend in Springmills gave me to remember her by when we left PA she cried.

And a Jack in the Pulpit.

I have tiny purple crested dwarf Iris blooming in abundance that a friend gave us from Stone Mountain NC.

I many and 4 different types of Azalea blooming in shades of pinks and purples.

Our bright pink Rhododendrons are starting to bloom.

We have a fragrant tulip tree blooming in center of back yard.

The tiny wild flowers in our yard are to numerous to name.

Some of them I have found in the woods and replanted in our yard.

I have many wild strawberrys blooming on the front bank and the pink dog wood are blooming. They make a nice carpet of small white flowers.

My yard is always a canvas to work with and the flowers are different every season.

The lawn is full of wild flowers more tiny wild flowers than grass.

Last year John put in clover seed out back instead of grass seed.

I hear owls and whippoorwill birds at night.

There are several chip monks that keep Bob cat active and we have squirrels and so many different type of birds the yard is humming all day long with bird songs. I have found pieces of blue and white eggs shells.

I noticed an Ant hill cleaning up the blue eggs so now I know were they all go.

There are large red headed wood peckers.

We have two humming bird feeders out on front porch I can sit on the porch

swing on a rainy day and the red ruby throated birds buzz above my head they are a delight to watch.

I have two bird baths out and its fun to watch the birds soak in them.

One bird bath is out in front bank I can see it from inside my living room windows or my front porch swing it was a gift from a neighbor and it has statues of 3 birds sitting on the rim of the bird bath. It is fun to watch the bigger birds vie for a chance to sit among the fake birds the loud quacking Blue jays, the sweet singing Carnals, cooing of the mourning doves and the Red Robins.

They bath in the waters and sit among the statues except at times the Mourning doves will sit on top of a bird statue and when walking around the rim of the bird bath to check the waters they will walk over each statue to get to the other side of it. Quite amusing.

Bob cat thinks the back yard bird bath is his sitting place if the water is low or his drinking dish if the water is full.

So I rarely see a bird in that bath just a cat.

One day I had a very beautiful sight to behold a bright chili pepper red Carnal was sitting in a bright hot pink crap apple tree.

Its a wonderful time of the year here and we are very active out side.

I so often thank God for all the wonderfull things I have to enjoy.

When not in our yard we are listening to our records we have taken up a new hobbie we are both enjoying very much.

We bought a very good record player for 5 dollars it is about 30 years old and sold for over 300.00 then when new and we put a bit of money into fixing it up a needle and so on and we are buying very good old records at sales. It is like treasure hunting going in search for records. We look for no scratches and then we come home and wash them good and dry them.

We have fun hunting for them and playing them and singing to them and even dancing to them.

I have some records as low as 33 cents and spent no more than 1 dollar so far for a record.

So far my favorite album I have found and bought for 1 buck is a Carol King record.

She wrote all her own stuff and I found her first album called Tapestry the songs on it are from the late 1960's and very early 1970's the

album has her cat on the cover and she is sitting working on a piece of Tapestry and the album folds out like a book and on the back of the album are the words to all the songs on the album.

I Feel The Earth Move, So Far Away, It's Too Late, Home Again, Beautiful,

Way Over Yonder, You've Got A friend, Where You lead, Will You Love Me Tomorrow?, Smackwater Jack, Tapestry, A Natural Women.

I like singing best. I have a guitar to play around with and a key board but for now they are stowed away untill I have time for them.

I am working a piece of lovely embroidery in the evenings a few minutes before I retire.

It was a very old piece a small girls pillow. Probably as old as I am. Many stitches were missing and the linen was stained. I got most the stain faded and I pulled out the broken stitches.

Part of the piece looks like it was done by some one who could

really embroider and she stitched holly hocks in different colors on the piece they were in great shape and so they stay. The hair was tinted a light pinkish red color but the rest of the linen is off white.

I bought a light purple and a light pinkish cream color thread for the face out line and the dress out line.

The dress has blue knots worked into it like potka dots.

It is a lovely piece and it only cost me a quarter and I found a linen pillow

case for a quarter that some one did some nice tatting on and I am going to use that pillow case to repair and finish the small one with a tatting edge.

I will use the new pillow case for the back of the piece and instead of a square pillow I will make it round since there is a round circle out line that had embroidery on it around the doll and around the circle were squares to be embroidered but I am going to cut it out round leaving the squares behind and use the tatting as a lace edging.

It will look so sweet in my sewing room that I made curtains for out of white and purple fabric with lilac in them. I have similiar curtains made for the bedroom and I bought a bed spread to match.

I bought the fabric and bedspread and pillow shams at a very low cost at an out let.

I can create many things on my sewing machine.

My up stair rooms are very pretty and pleasant to rest in. I have a day bed now in my sewing room it is a light soft green frame with metal leaves weaving around frame and I bought a green bed skirt for it of the same color and plenty of pillow shams to match the curtains and pretty sheets and a comforter in greens and light purples.

I like to rest there in the day and look out the windows at the sunshine and look at all the pretty things I have in my room.

My favorite things are mostly in that room for my enjoyment.

I have a purple lace clothed doll that I wind up and it plays a tune.

I have a stereo for music in that room.

Its a nice room.

I have started a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle on the kitchen table it has yellow tulips on it.

I work it a few pieces at a time when I sit down to rest with a cup of Chinese

Jasmine tea I make from lose tea leaves. It all I like to drink now in the way of tea.

I love to read books about my flowers and the birds I see.

I keep books handy to check things in.

I am going to search the internet and find out why the whipperwill bird only sings at night.

I also started to check out poem books from the library of the famous literature type and I like to go to a special new coffee tavern along a River and sit on the out side deck and drink coffee out of real coffee mugs and read and learn about the different old poets.

The coffee mugs have a picture of the lamb and the lion on them. They are like old white china restaurant coffee mugs. Coffee taste so good in them.

They have wonder full sandwiches made on home made breads of all sorts when I get hungry and home made goodies.

Last night we watched a PBS special on Alaska it was really enjoyable.

The bears and wild animals and Salmon runs and the cold conditions there.

I have letters to write to my Chinese girl friends.

I have to write a letter to China Saya she moved a few weeks ago back to New York and she called me and gave me her address.

I also have to write to China May Fay.

She also called after moving to tell me she loved me she is also back in New York.

These wonderful spring days I am not much in the mood for phone talking.

I am often out when the phone rings and when I come in I need a shower and some thing to eat and some rest.

It stays light out side almost up to my bedtime now.

I am a writer by heart and love to write.

But that takes time also.

I worked on this all morning.

So this is probably the longest you will get for awhile things don't change much around here.

Time flys very fast around here.

And we have our 25th Anniversary to celebrate soon.

If you get a good dark warm night and a chance go out after twilight and look up into the sky over the next three weeks the best night will be May 14.

You will see the 5 brightest planets from Earth, Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Saturn, and Venus they will be clustered so close you'll be able to spot them in a single glance. This will not happen again until the year 2040.

I will be about 81 years old next time it happens.

So take care.

Remember No News is Good News if you do not hear from us for awhile.

We are happy and busy living and learning about life.

Jeanie



I added to this letter in my own writing a chinese proverb it" Life begins when you start a garden" and I taped a sunflower seed to the letter one like I planted that will grow a very tall sunflower and wrote next to it" plant this and think of me." I typed this all on pretty parchment papers of yellow,ivory and violet and added lemon verbena leaves to sent it and put the letter in a yellow linin envelope and added sunflower and bird stickers.

[Zenobia]

This is a beautiful letter. One that I would like to get from my daughter someday. Should I get it I would feel like I did a good job raising such a well adjusted person who knew how to enjoy her life.
Zen

You can't always get what you want but if you try sometime you might find you get what you need.--Rolling Stones

[morning8glory]

Dear Zen Thank you for your nice thoughts.
Even as I reread the sweet letter I am afraid my mom will read some thing into the letter of a negative manner.
A hidden message.
Or think I am very sick and going to die so I write a nice long sweet letter first.
She is so paranoid about stuff like that. I guess I can expect her to be paranoid at this time of year since my brother was killed on May 8 she has been afraid every year that some thing is wrong with one of us kids. One year she called each of us kids she was over at my Aunts house and would not stay for the meal she was invited to she thought some thing terrible was happening to one of her kids so she called all 5 of us.
Later that day a small boy fell and died near were she was visiting and she had paranoid thoughts about that.
She thought she could sense he was going to die.
Recently she called me early in the morning and I was getting ready to go out the door and she said I just want to tell you do not get in to a Mustang today. I made a tongue and cheek joke and said Ok mom I won't ride any horses today.
She was so worried about what she said to me that she called my husband and told him she never should of called me to tell me that first thing in the morning but she had a dream I died that day in a car accident and I was in a Mustang car.
Good night thanks again.
I will send nice letter tomarrow to mom and await the reaction and their is always one I just never know what direction it will be going in.
Morning Glory