Steeple Sunday...

Life got busy for a while and I've missed showing you Steeple Sundays. I have a bunch I photographed last summer in the archives and I continually notice new ones I need to stop and take a photo of. Today's steeple is small, probably the smallest I've shown besides the garden ornament one. It is only slightly higher than the church's door.
We discovered this tiny church while cycling to Blue Mounds State park last September. It is a wayside rest that invites you to pause, rest and worship.
The inside held six tiny pews, bottled water to quench your physical thirst and brochures covering any topic that you might be restless about to quench your spiritual thirst.
There were 6 tiny stained glass windows
I loved that it had a note to leave the light on...it sits waiting for the next visitor day or night.
I don't remember the name of the hwy but it is on the road to Luverne, MN.
Have a wonderful Sunday!

the last of the amaryllis...

My last amaryllis bulb from American Meadows is in full bloom - I ordered "Full House" and the bulb included a tag saying "Full House" but...I was expecting a bright red blossom with a solid white star center and it is definitely a striped blossom. I am wondering if it was mislabeled and I got "Amsterdam" instead?

Whatever the variety, I am enjoying these bright spots of color in January!

mosaic Monday...community support

Today's mosaics tell the story of how wonderful it is to live in a rural area where everyone knows everyone, supports and prays for each other and joyfully spend a Sunday afternoon in a hot and overcrowded gym. Some background info, Justin & Heidi live on a farm located about 1/2 way between 2 rural communities - one with a population of 900 and one with a population of 1,200. A large group of volunteers composed of friends, family and co-workers organized their fundraiser by soliciting donations, food and silent auction items for the benefit event that fed 1,400 people in a 3 hour time period yesterday. It was AMAZING!

Saturday am started with groups of volunteers bringing in the items for the auction and peeling and cutting potatoes for potato salad. My beautiful daughter, Jayme, bottom left and my son-in-law, Scott, and Jeff were not afraid to be the only men in the kitchen :)
Saturday afternoon brought many hands to set up tables and organize and set up the over 300 items for the auction.
The items for the auction ranged from power tools, quilts, gift certificates, handmade art, home canned jams, prints & toys. Those little hand carved work shoes were amazing, the detail work on a pair of 3" shoes shows a lot of talent. Also pictured is the Marsha's Garden tea party display which sold for $205, I hope I can make it worth that amount next summer.
One of my favorite items was this quilt made by Alexis' kindergarten class! She has an amazing teacher with many talents. This was generously bid up and given to Alexis as a gift.My nephew, Kyle (Justin's brother) worked many hours creating a gorgeous dollhouse. A week before the benefit he slipped on the ice and severely broke his ankle. Supplied with a wheelchair and some good friends the finishing details were added in time for the benefit. Kyle had surgery on Friday and was discharged on Saturday in time to help his friends deliver the dollhouse. The details were amazing, look at the stone fireplace with flat screen tv, the detailed decking, built in grill, and a framed photo of Justin & Heidi's family in the lower bedroom. Kyle has built several of these over the years including one for Alexis so this one was generously bid on by anonymous donors to give back to Kyle's own daughters, Keena & Ketcie. Ketcie is pictured being held by Justin.
Sunday morning, workers started at 5 am making pulled pork from 5 hogs roasted overnight and later the other food was prepared and 1200 dessert bars were plated. We took some photos of Justin, Heidi, Benjamin & Alexis and with Justin's parents, brother & sister's families, said a group prayer and then opened the doors at 10:45 am.
It was so wonderful to see the huge turnout of people to be able to hear them say they were praying for the family and to thank them personally for the donations and gifts. To see how as soon as they ate, they got up to create space for those next in line and went through the auction tables and generously bid. One of the bigger surprises of the day was when two families donated a snowmobile to the family.
I personally want to thank all those that contacted me and donated to their fund, it is heartwarming to see the kindness of friends as well as the readers I do not know well. Justin and Heidi would like to thank all personally but since so much was given anonymously here is their note to all.

May all of you be blessed as we felt being part of this event.

I love my family...part 2

This is a post one hopes and prays that they would never have to repeat. I wrote the original I love my family post on May 29, 2007. On that date, I posted this photo
and asked for prayers for Heidi, Justin, Benjamin & Alexis while Heidi was going through the battle for her life after the initial chemotherapy for her Hodgkin's lymphoma failed and she then went through intensive chemo and a stem cell transplant. When a few bad cells remained she went through a full round of radiation and has now been cancer free for 3 years - YEAH!

I know my regular readers recognize Benjamin and Alexis, I love them like they are my grandchildren instead of my brothers. Remember Alexis dancing here...
and here?
Do you remember that until allergies forced me to quit getting "real" Christmas trees, the only ones that graced our home were the ones Benjamin picked out and helped cut down...
and attending his piano recitals was showcased on the blog?
Back to the reason for the part 2 to the "I love my family" posts. As you may have seen on my sidebar for the last several weeks, this family is going through the unimaginable. My nephew, Justin, was diagnosed in October with a rare and aggressive cancer, peritoneal mucinous carcinomatosis, and currently is fighting his own battle for his life. They travel 4 hours (one way) every other week to seek the best medical care they can at the Mayo Clinic which is one of the best in the world. The first four rounds of chemo did not bring the results everyone was praying for so he has begun a different chemo regiment and will have another scan after 4 treatments. Please pray for him and the doctors so that the right treatment will be found.

Through all of these trials they have kept such positive attitudes. In a recent conversation with Justin he said if you don't keep positive and have faith it would be impossible to get through this. Look at their smiling faces at our extended family calendar shoot in December.
This weekend, I will be taking a break from blogging while my family does all they can to help put on the benefit for Justin and his family. You can read the details of the benefit on my sidebar. Everyone has heard the saying "it takes a village to raise a child" but you cannot imagine the support our small rural communities have come forth with to "raise this family with emotional and financial support". We have received many donations of food and labor to put on this benefit as well as over 200 items to be auctioned at the silent auction.

One of the items on the auction will be a old fashioned garden tea party for six in Marsha's Garden. I couldn't find the photos of my later parties where the treats got much more elaborate but here is a collage of the first one I ever did.
If you live in driving distance of my garden and would like to bid, please do so. You can attend the benefit to bid or if you email me by Saturday evening (click on the icon on the sidebar), I will be happy to put a bid in for you.

We hope to see many people at the benefit on Sunday and are hoping our Minnesota weather cooperates. I'll be one of the many clad in green t-shirts.
To read more about Justin & Heidi's battles with cancer, read this article from the local paper written by John White.

turkeys in the tree...

It is always a thrill for me to spot wild turkeys since they do not live in my immediate area so even though these photos are bad (taken through the pickup windshield on a gray snowy day) I am posting them because we have never seen a turkey so high up in a tree before. You can see the height of the cottonwood compared to the regular trees. Yesterday, Jeff & I were driving down by Echo, MN when we spotted something high up in a cottonwood tree from a 1/2 mile away. As we drove closer we spotted not only one but 3 wild turkeys.
One was spooked enough to fly to a different branch but they remained on the tree as we slowly drove up to them.
We stopped long enough to catch these last 2 shots before driving on but it was crazy cool to see them up high up in a tree like that.

Have a wonderful day!

cheeky lime...

Look what I got in the mail today!
cheeky lime - what a fun name.
I placed my order online Sunday evening and when I came home today the mailman had set the box in my garage making me very happy. I ran inside, threw my coat on the floor (I know that's bad but you see it later in a photo so I had to admit to it) and opened the box revealing the white bag in the first photo, I practically ripped that off revealing my new cheeky lime bag...do you know what kind of bag this is?
How about now...Have you figured it out?
It is my BEAUTIFUL new camera bag and it is stylish yet holds my camera with the 17-55mm lens attached, the zoom lens, the telephoto lens, extra batteries, memory cards, my manual, my mini-canon camera and everything else I usually carry in my purse. It has 3 outside flapped pockets as well as a zipper pocket and inside there is also a small coin/cosmetic purse.
I have wanted one of the stylish big purse sized bags forever and have checked out Jill-E, Kelly Moore & Epiphanie but they are all out of my price range. I tried to make one of my own using a cheap purse and sewing some padded dividers but it only held one extra lens and wouldn't snap shut to secure anything in the side pockets if the camera was in the center zippered part. Then last week while browsing through the blogs I read, I saw the cheeky lime bag. I had not heard of them before and was thrilled to see them offer this fun bag at almost half the price of the other brands with free shipping.
My Tenba camera bag also fit all my equipment but it is a much bigger bag and boring looking. If you know me in person you know the lime green one is much more my personality.
In fact, I didn't even suspect my cheeky lime bag would arrive this fast and look what boots I was wearing today. Yes, that is my blue coat thrown on the floor in the photo too :)
Look at the cute little pink camera charm hanging down in the front. Have you figured out I'm excited about my bag yet?
I really was excited to find Cheeky Lime on another blog last week so I wanted to pass along the bag info here as well. They are a new company and currently only offer this lime green "classic" style but told me in an email they are currently working on more models and styles. I drag my cameras everywhere and I am so happy to be able to do so in style now...check them out cheekylime.com.

After yesterday's American Meadows plug and today's Cheeky Lime - maybe I should go into advertising but I truly am happy with both companies. Today, while out and about in the snow I spotted this little miniature horse and some wild turkeys roosting high up in a tree (tomorrow's post).

bright spots of sunshine...

Last November, I ordered several Amaryllis bulbs online at American Meadows. Every year, I usually grow one of the $4.99 big box store variety but found that they are the same old red ones every year and I wanted some variety and hopefully pink ones. I figured I spend $$ on my summer garden that I should invest in a indoor winter garden that hopefully will rebloom year after year.

First up is my white one - it did not have a fancy name but was labeled "Christmas Gift Amaryllis Bulb" and it promised up to 8" blossoms. So far there is only one stalk with 4 buds and this is the first bud that opened - I just measured it is 7" across and looks HUGE in person.Then I fell in love with this double variety labeled Elvas Amaryllis Bulb. It has sprouted 2 stalks of which one is just sprouting up and the other has 5 buds and two blossoms have opened. This plant is also labeled as up to 8" blossoms and one is 6" and one is 7".
I just love these two :)
The white one is planted in a larger pot with another bulb...
It is the Neon Rose Amaryllis Bulb. This is the only bulb that was blooming for Christmas and all were planted Thanksgiving weekend. The blossoms are much smaller at a little under 4" but the stalks are filled with blossoms. I do not remember how many were on the first stalk at Christmas and I have already cut that one off but this second stalk has 8 buds with 5 of them currently blossoming. They are gorgeous hot pink streaked with white.
I gave one of the neon pink bulbs to Jayme since we are pink loving girls and check out her artistic photo of them HERE.

Nothing brightens up a cold Minnesota winter like giant blossoms on the dining room table!
I have one more amaryllis potted and it has 2 giant stalks so I look forward to showing you that one soon.

These bulbs arrived with a brochure on how to care for them to make them last for years and years. I saved it and will follow it faithfully as well as add bulbs each year until I have a regular indoor garden to enjoy. In reading the tips I found out why I could never get my cheapo bulbs to rebloom, I would keep them alive till spring, plant them in the garden, dig them up right before the first frost, cut off the tops and let dry a few days and then put them in a brown paper bag in the fridge for 6 weeks before potting once again. The tip sheet that came with the new bulbs states that those steps are correct in one of the ways to get them to rebloom, but I also found out that storing them in a fridge containing apples makes them sterile. Our fridge always contains apples :( I thought I would pass on that tip to anyone else having trouble with reblooming.

Have a wonderful day! I am busy with office work and chores but every time I walk by these flowers I just smile wide :)

mosaic Monday...wildlife

I was surprised to wake up Sunday morning and see the whole garden covered in rabbit tracks. I hadn't seen a rabbit or even their tracks in the garden all winter thanks to Hershey & Ruger's regular patrols. We had a blizzard here on Saturday so I imagine their usual food source was covered and they discovered the free corn buffet on Santa's sleigh that he graciously left parked in the gazebo to feed the wildlife all winter.While rabbits might get a little expensive to feed the storm also brought in the first pheasant to feed. She was a little spooked when I saw her on the sleigh and ran before I could get the camera. Hopefully, she will be back soon and bring with her a new generation of Josephs and Johnnys.
Sunday afternoon we took a drive with the dogs and the camera and spotted a doe and her two fawns. I was thankful they just stood and looked at us so I could get some decent shots though I wished they were closer (these images are all cropped). Unlike my daughter, Jayme, who can just look in her backyard to see deer, Jeff and I usually have to go on a photographic hunt.
Have a great Monday!

Happy New Year!

Hershey, Jeff & I wish you all a Happy and Healthy 2011! Ruger wasn't in the celebrating mood :)