Friday Feast #4 ~ October 5th

Appetizer
On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how much do you look forward to your birthday?

Probably a Seven. I get a lot of joy in buying gifts so I actually prefer other people’s birthdays.

Soup
What is one word you don’t like the sound, spelling, or meaning of?

Streptococcus – any of several spherical bacteria of the genus streptococcus, occurring in pairs or chains, species of which cause such diseases as tonsillitis, pneumonia, and scarlet fever.

Salad
Do you wear sunglasses when you’re outside? If so, what does your current pair look like?

Yes all the time since I live in Southern California. Because I wear prescription eye glasses my sunglasses are not very cool. They clip onto my regular glasses with a magnet.

Main Course
If you were to write a book, to whom would you dedicate it?

I would dedicate it to the family members who really love to read, my daughter Katie and my husband.

Dessert
Name a beverage that you enjoy.

I enjoy a classic G & T, with a high end G!

To see more Friday Feasts go here.

Alternate Name Game ~ Meme

Another Light Hearted Saturday Post for your enjoyment!

I saw this over at Lux Venit a while back and decided to play along…

1. MY ROCK STAR NAME: (first pet & current car),
Green Neck Camry
2.MY GANGSTA NAME: (fave ice cream flavor, favorite cookie),
Jamocha Oatmeal

3. MY “FLY Guy/Girl” NAME: (first initial of first name, first three letters of your last name),
E-Bay

4.MY DETECTIVE NAME: (favorite color, favorite animal),
Blue Hedgehog

5. MY SOAP OPERA NAME: (middle name, city where you were born),
Moiseyevna Los Angeles

6. MY STAR WARS NAME: (the first 3 letters of your last name, first 2 letters of your first),
Bay-El

7. MY SUPERHERO NAME: (”The” + 2nd favorite color, favorite drink),
The Green G & T

8. MY NASCAR NAME: (the first names of your grandfathers),
Fedot Timofey

9. MY WITNESS PROTECTION NAME: (mother’s & father’s middle names ),
Feoderovna Timofey

10. MY TV WEATHER ANCHOR NAME: (Your 5th grade teacher’s last name, a major city that starts with the same letter),
Helms Havana

11. MY SPY NAME: (your favorite season/holiday, flower).
Easter Tulip

12. MY CARTOON NAME: (favorite fruit, article of clothing you’re wearing right now + “ie” or “y”)
Nectarine Jammie

13. MY HIPPY NAME: (What you ate for breakfast, your favorite tree),
High Fiber Dogwood

14. MY YOUR ROCKSTAR TOUR NAME: (”The” + Your fave hobby/craft, fave weather element + “Tour”),
The Reading Sunset Tour

Feel free to copy and do your own.

What Season Are You? ~ A Meme

Saw this fun little quiz at Lisa Writes and Hiraeth and needed something light hearted to do…

Play along too and let me know if you do.

You Belong in Fall

Intelligent, introspective, and quite expressive at times…
You appreciate the changes in color, climate, and mood that fall brings
Whether you’re carving wacky pumpkins or taking long drives, autumn is a favorite time of year for you

What Season Are You?

Friday’s Feast # 3

Appetizer
How are you today?

Tired and full of heavy sighs as I recover from staying up late last night waiting to hear about my son’s status after going to the ER for a first time ever episode with Aphasia.

(Son was released that night, is doing well, and is having follow-up appointment with specialist and a couple more tests in the next week or so to try to determine what caused it)

Soup
Name 3 television shows you watch on a regular basis.

Survivor, CSI, Top Chef

Salad
What’s the scariest weather situation you’ve experienced?

Heavy rains that caused our area to be declared a National disastor area because of flooding which caused a huge landslide behind our 1st home in Washington. We heard a huge crash and watched a huge fir tree go dancing down the hill like something from Fantasia!

Main Course
If you could wake up tomorrow morning in another country, where would you want to be?

Oh this one is easy. Great Britain for sure….

Dessert
What do you usually wear (oops I didn’t copy the last two words) to sleep.

Jeans and a t-shirt. (my first answer) I really don’t wear jeans and a t-shirt to sleep 🙂

I wear one of those cotton t-shirt nighties…one size fits all sort of thing. Very romantic….

To see more feasts go here.

Ventura…Where it all Began, the Bayles/Spiro Friendship and First Hike…

On Sunday Dear and I drove North for a great breakfast at Allison’s Country Cafe in Ventura before we headed to the Ventura Fair Grounds Flea Market. The Flea market was row upon row of stuff, Antiques, Shabby Chic, New, Old, Furniture, Chotchkies, Jewelery, Treasures and Junk…

The weather was lovely but we got toasted because we forgot our sunblock. Silly Washingtonians in California!

But the real fun treat was to see Two Trees. This was the site of our very first Bayles/Spiro Hike way back in early 1985. We know it was before Katie (Katherine) was born so Jamie was a wee babe…

I stood at this intersection to take the photo of Two Trees. That was quite the infamous hike with Dave, Jody (who we think had her arm in a cast), Lucy, Bridget, Jamie (a baby then), Dear, Ellen, Josh and Dan. Of course the first thing our boys wanted to do was to climb those two trees. We were never exposed to being outdoor type people till we started our friendship with the Spiro’s. We credit them with dragging us along on their outdoor adventures and teaching us the love of being able to tell the story of survival after the fact… God Bless them dearly!

Click to read more about Two Trees.

Any photos missing from my posts are the result of Photobucket blacking out all my photos that I stored on their site since 2006.

Wedding Customs ~ A Look Back to the late 60’s…

These Photos were taken November 22, 1969. This was the day of my sister Vera’s marriage to Nick. I wanted to show y’all what we used to do to all the cars in the wedding party. We’d make these huge crepe paper flowers and string them together and decorate the cars. We’d use the colors that were going to be used in the wedding. The kids in these photos are my 4 younger brothers and sisters. Tim, Steve, Lana G! and her twin Leonard.

Lana G! has curlers in her hair. She and Leonard were the flower girl and ring bearer in the wedding…

One other interesting note was that it was very difficult to get our favorite florist to arrange and deliver flowers on this day because they were USC Alumni and huge fans and this was the day of cross town rival games so USC was playing UCLA.

Big mistake in my photo album experience is using these magnetic layered page albums that were so popular in the 60’s and 70’s that make your pictures impossible to take out and scan today….

Any photos missing from my posts are the result of Photobucket blacking out all my photos that I stored on their site since 2006.

Show and Tell Friday ~ Lavender Bathroom

Today I’m showing you my little dark lavender and green master bathroom in Washington. We have a Gambrel roof so the ceiling is slanted and cuts into our wall space. This gives us limited room for cabinets, etc.

This is a view to show you the slanted ceilings

We added this little cabinet above the toilet to give us some storage space.

I decided to use lavender accessories in the cabinet and most of these items are gifts I have received.

This Abalone shell and other shells are from a collection Dear’s parents had. The whole Master Bedroom Suite has a nice cozy retreat feel because of the slanted ceilings. They are the only rooms on the top level of our home in Washington so it’s a very private retreat. Thank you for visiting my site today. May God bless you with His peace and joy. Have a wonderful weekend. Oh and thank you for your comments. I do read every one and appreciate your kind words and the time it takes to post them…

For more show and tell head over to There’s No Place Like Home.

Friday’s Feast ~My 2nd ~ September 21st, 2007

Appetizer
What is your favorite type of art?

I enjoy the Impressionists like Monet…

Soup
When was the last time you got a free lunch (or breakfast or dinner)? Who paid for it?

My family was celebrating my niece’s birthday Saturday Sept. 15th at a wondeful restaurant in San Marino, California and my sister Lana picked up the tab for all of us.

Salad
On a scale of 1-10 with 10 being highest, how emotional are you?

I am probably a 6 in the world of emotions. I’ve become more comfortable showing my emotions as I’ve grown older. I’ll take a hanky with me especially at church because it seems this is where my tears flow easier. Oh and after I’ve had a glass of wine I cry easier, too. 🙂

Main Course
Approximately how long do you spend each day responding to emails?

Probably only about 15 minutes top…

Dessert
To what temperature do you usually set your home’s thermostat?

We like to keep the house on the cooler side especially at night. In California we like it at 72 degrees for air conditioning and 68 degrees for heat but we turn off the heat at night…

To see more Friday Feasts go here

Carpenteria ~ Sunday Drive

After church on Sunday Dear and I took a drive up the coast to the little beach side town of Carpenteria. After we got there we got a great tip on a Mom and Pop run restaurant where we had a wonderful breakfast with thick bacon and bisquits and gravy. If you are ever in Carpenteria we recommend The Worker Bee Cafe. The wife is the waitress and the husband is the cook who we saw come out of the kitchen to make sure he got someone’s order right. We walked along Linden Ave. and browsed through Magpie Antiques, Homestead Antiques, Hollyhock Cottage, and a candy shop called Robitaille’s Fine Candy. We saw some great old houses and the Historic Methodist Church (now Capinteria Valley Baptist) which was built in 1888.

A LOL side note: In order to post these collages with my minimal space on this blog presentation I have to narrow down the photo. When people are in the photos like myself above you get contorted and narrowed also. So my disclaimer is that I’m not that tall, do not have those longer legs, and am not that thin at present 🙂

Carpenteria is home to the largest known Torrey Pine in existence. Torrey Pines naturally occur in just two locations: Santa Rosa Island in the Santa Barbara Channel, and along the coast near La Jolla in San Diego County. Collected in 1888 as a seedling on Santa Rosa Island, Judge Ward planted it on the grounds of his home (Wardholme). This Torrey Pine thrived and reached beyond its 40 to 60ft. height. In 1988 it measured 128 feet tall, 121 feet wide at the crown, and 20 feet in circumference at four feet off the ground. It was an amazing tree to see. We drove over to the Carpenteria Cemetary where majestic towering oaks remain from the ancient oak forest which originally blanketed the Valley. We drove over to the Carpenteria Cemetary before we headed home and saw some great headstones and majestic Oak trees.

This was one of the most interesting headstones we saw. Dr. Samuel Austin Moffett and Mrs. Lucia Fish Moffett were buried on this site. They were moved to the campus of the Presbyterian College and Theological Seminary in Seoul, Korea on April 20, 2006. Dr. Moffett was a pioneer missionary to Korea. He founded and served as the first President of the Seminary from 1903 to 1924.

Thanks for coming along with us to Carpenteria not to be confused with Carpeteria…

Any photos missing from my posts are the result of Photobucket blacking out all my photos that I stored on their site since 2006.