Fall Comes to Florida

 

Fall in Florida means 80 degrees instead of 90's and less humidity. Waiting for 70 degrees. It means getting out the Halloween and Fall decorations.

 

 Is this a weird seasonal rash???

 

Fall means school activities. Here is Jill and some of her friends in chorus getting ready to perform at Barnes and Noble.

 

Fall means celebrating Fall birthdays. We celebrated Alan's birthday at Senior Tequilla.

I made his favorite apple walnut cake.

 

 

 Everyone had a good time.

 

Unfortunately, fall also meant roof leaks. We finally cut a hole in the ceiling to see what was going on. If you look closely at the picture below, you can see many nails sticking through the wood roof.

 We had roof problems but also car trouble and a broken air conditioner. Arrggggg!

My Workspace

  Desk top

A sign I found at an antique store in Ybor City. I like to imagine it hung on a school principal's door.

The coffee table is always full of cook books, magazines and catalogs.

One bookcase and a basket of Country Living and Country Home mags.

My reading spot. Also used for watching Project Runway and the Cooking Channel. The long brown pillow is a perfect neck prop.

Bedside table. I am trying to read "The Piano Teacher" but haven't gotten into it yet. Instead I reread old favorites like "Under the Tuscan Sun" and "A Year in Provence". I am also a Susan Isaacs fan.

For artwork I have posters I found years ago and family pictures.

My new office for my part-time job with my friend, Dr. Linda Hebert Ford at Worldview Publishing.

I was inspired by Ruth's posting at Sync-ro-ni-zing of her work spaces and her book shelves. She has wonderful books but I must be honest. I am a reader of coffee table books, shelter magazines, and cookbooks. I did recently read "The Help" and "Water for Elephants" and I loved them. My daughter-in-law, Stephanie, recommends books to me. I also have a wierd interest in true crime books such as the ones by Ann Rule. I occasionally break out old favorites such as "Gone With the Wind" and "Little Women". Right now, I am reading "Hatchet" by Gary Paulsen with my grandson. My husband loves Dan Brown, Clive Cussler and James Rollins.

I used to love to read "Ladies Home Journal" and "Redbook" at my aunt Nellie's house. I never noticed for years that the dates on the magazines were very old. I still enjoyed them. Maybe my granddaughters will enjoy my magazine collection someday.

I have a new part time job with a long time friend. Years ago, as a school counselor, she and a co-worker created a social skills program called "Right Choices". She has parlayed that beginning into her own company, Worldview Publishing. I have done some editing and desktop publishing for her over the years, but now will be her part time secretary. My duties include mailing out materials, answering emails, creating a monthly newsletter using Constant Contact, and a little bookkeeping. I am excited.

A New Chapter

A few pictures of Jaime and Aaron's new house. Already a path is being beaten between my house and theirs. The double garage is becoming a party room. The huge back yard being cleared. Dark wall paper being peeled away for a new coat of paint. Then the dark red carpet will be replaced with a wood floor. A wall added to create a room for Jonah. The kitchen is cute but small. The house is a little quirky. See the door from Mia's room to what will be Jonah's? A little closet has become a vanity area for Jaime. The master bathroom lacks a door??? But there is a large covered car port and a basketball hoop in the driveway. Jonah has found friends from school on his street and he is only 2 blocks from his friend, Seth and 4 blocks from his grandma's house. Friends and family are dropping by to check out the new digs. They came home last night to find the water had been cut off. Oops! They forgot to switch the water bill since they didn't have one in the apartment. The old apartment is clean and empty. The new house overflowing with boxes. The beginning of a new chapter in our lives. Next goal, a wedding in October.

1965 Love Story

I walked down an old street the other day right by the house where I lived in 1965. I loved that house. I loved the boy next door. We built that house new after my father died. We chose it from a model home display - the first one I had ever seen. It cost $16,000 to build back then.

The house was red brick with double white doors. Everything in it was brand new since there was nothing from our previous life that we wanted to save. There was a curved brick wall and a little fountain at the entrance. There was an upstairs room with big windows, a peaked ceiling and a parquet floor. At 17 I did most of the decorating. We had sleek, dark Danish modern furniture, beige carpet and a muted color scheme downstairs. Upstairs was a modern sofa with a kind of orange burlap upholstery and a futuristic beige leather rocker and ottoman. The man from Sears came and took measurements for drapery. I showed up and managed to object to some detail from every room. My mother gently but firmly stepped in and the drapes were made to her specifications. They were beautiful. For my room I chose a dark Danish modern bedroom set and dramatic seagreen drapes and bedspread. I used a dark coffee table as a bench in front of a long window. I had a seat cushion on it and a little aqua princess phone that lit up at night. The room smelled like "Wind Song" my favorite perfume. It was a great room!

I was engaged at the time to my first boyfriend who was serving in Vietnam. Someone built a house next to ours with one empty lot in between. My mother became friends with the owner who was a pretty divorced women. Amazingly she was a medical record librarian like my own mother. My mom kept coming home and telling me about the cute guy next door. I would peek out the window and see a tall boy with glasses. I wasn't impressed. One day I answered a knock at the door with a towel on my wet hair and there stood a very cute guy with short dark hair and crinkley gray/blue eyes. I literally lost my breath. He was returning some lawn chairs that had blown out of our yard. It turned out he was staying with his mom on break from going to Oklahoma University. The boy I kept seeing was his brother who became friends with my brother.

Anyway, long story short. I fell in love with the guy next door but I kept wearing my engagement ring and writing to the guy in the army. The day came to pick him up at the airport. I was all emotional and dramatic but determined to marry my fiance. My friend Sheila went with me and took pictures of us embracing. But I tell you as soon as I saw him I realized I loved the other one. What to do??? I went with him to get a car that he had been saving for. He picked a new burgundy 1965 Mustang.

Inevitably we had a dramatic scene with me and my neighbor running to meet each other in the middle of the vacant lot next door. My army boyfriend was very upset but he met up with my friend, Sheila. They eventually ended up getting married. Unfortunately the neighbor went back to school a few months later and I ended up alone. I went heartbroken with my mom and brother to our new home in Florida near my aunt Nellie. That was 45 years ago!

So, the other day I typed what I thought was the old address into Googlemap. I turned on Street View and there it was. The big windows upstairs, the double white doors, my bedroom window in the front. And there was the vacant lot still vacant and my boyfriend's house next door with the windows covered over with boards. From the satelite map I could zoom into the back yard and pick out the octagon shaped patio we put under some trees to hold a covered swing. So I knew it was the right place. I don't have many pictures of that time. Army boyfriend burned the ones I sent him and I didn't have any copies.

Imagine this post with Sonny and Cher singing "I Got You, Babe". I was into the popular songs of the 60's along with folk music and Bob Dylan. That is my memory trip back to 1965.