Starry skies..............

I think one of the advantages I like most about living out in the country is being able to see the stars in the sky at night. On a crisp fall night with a clear sky and no city lights to interfere. It is magnificient. It is so peaceful and beautiful. Hubby even bought me a telescope a few years ago to search the skies at night.
It is one of the most enjoyable activities for me.

Rabbits!!

Another Saturday of yard work. This time it was fun. Husband decided he needed to trim yet more branches off the trees, to make it easier for him to mow. Mowing takes quite a while on the hilly, holey land. It's almost three acres! (more on that in a minute)
So with all the branches, we created a habitat for the Rabbits that live around us. There are a lot of Rabbits. I like them, hubby not so much. It will be interesting trying to protect my garden next year.
Now, as we were tidying up all the branches, I ask hubby if we can finally fence in the rest of the land. he says "sure", then we proceed to walk the property line!! WOW! We have almost 2/3rds of an acre that is just sitting there. The only catch is, the soil is CLAY. Not too good for much of anything. So hubby thought a pond might be fitting for that part of our property. I am in agreement, along with some more trees if we can find some that will grow there. We had apple trees in that area and they didn't do so well. They were moved 2 years ago and are thriving now.
Another fun and interesting morning, and I learned something new about our land and property lines.

Seven Things Week 12

Nothing overly exciting this week. I'm cleaning out the laundry room and found a few things. And back to the closets, actually it was bins I have clothes in. I am finally going through some of them as time permits.
* Mouse pad, with Bunnies on it. Brand new, I didn't like it.
* Green dresser skirt, a cloth doily type thing to put on top of the dresser.
* One beige dress blouse.
* Two white turtlenecks. How many do I really need?
* Black and white dress slacks--don't fit anymore.
* One box of powder bleach, never opened.
* Two bottles of Clorox 2--never used
* Two Downy balls--pictured.
The clothes I am glad to be passing on. I'm weary of holding on to all of them.
The laundry stuff? Well, lets just say that I cannot use them in my front load washer. On July 4 of this year I had a bad laundry "incident" with adding too much Clorox 2 along with a bit too much HE laundry soap. It was very unfortunate and yet comical at the same time. It was just like on TV where soap is exploding out of the washer. Yes, it really was that bad. I had to go to the laundromat and wash my towels several times to get all of the soap out and that was after spraying them with the hose outside! So, I am giving away the laundry products that are not compatable with HE washers.
I'm finding it a bit difficult to let go of some useless, yet sentimental items that are cluttering up my space. I'm sure I will find a way in the coming months to let most of it go. I know I am not the only one with this issue, otherwise our homes wouldn't be so cluttered!!!

The swing

Today is yard cleaning day. We have already made a trip to the dump--the part of the dump that takes demolition/redecorating stuff.
We also have a swing like this one except ours is much, much more weathered.
Since we now have a play yard where the swing used to be, and we haven't used the swing in years, we decided to let someone else have it. So, we put it to the curb. One couple already stopped and I thought they were going to take it, but alas, they didn't.
I will update when the swing has found anew home.
UPDATE: The swing is GONE! I think it took less than three hours. We love the curbside recycling. We have put shelves, cabinets desks, chairs and bed frames out there and people have always taken it all. Most everything we put out there is in very good shape.

Seven Things Week 11

Wow, it's been Eleven weeks already!! The VietNam vets came yesterday to pick up a load of stuff. It felt good to say goodbye to it all.
Lots of household stuff this time.
*Two pictures shown here. I have had these forever and haven't hung them in at least 12 years. They are kinda neat pictures, with different textures and they are done in browns. I always liked them.
*A hummingbird candle that I never used.
*A matching set of green bathroom rugs in very good condition.
*Muffin Pan that I never used anymore.
*Four burner covers I never used. They have hummingbirds on them.
*Box of unopened stationary.
*Package of 8 baby shower Thank you's. I never used them.
*Cannon 35 mm camera.
I find myself wondering what and where I can declutter next. My closets look reasonably good. The kitchen drawers are looking less cluttered as well as the shelves above my cupboards.
I need to tackle my rolltop desk and a "bar" storage cabinet my husband made. I still need to go through a bunch of clothes bins as well. Clothes I haven't worn in ages. You know the clothes, the ones where you keep because someday they will eventually fit again!! Well, I've decided that they need to go too. Let someone else get some use out of them instead of taking up space in my home.

A bonus Seven Things

Really only two things though.
* Childs shopping cart--son kept using this for a chair/ladder/climbing cart. Time for it to go
* Leap Frog learning table-- son has outgrown this long ago. He had lots of fun with it. Time for some other child to get some use out of it.
We gave both of these items to the church nursery.

Seven Things week 10

Sorry for the crappy picture. You can even see the Border collie on the floor!! That's Maddie. She is almost 12 now. Great dog too!
Back to the closet for this weeks seven. I went through two bins and two shelves.
This weeks stuff is all things that I haven't used in ages that was just taking up precious space in my closet.
* One set of burgundy Flannel sheets. Too hot for me and DH. They are almost brand new.
* Brown leather purse
* Black canvas type shoulder back pack. Too small for me since having my son and I have a bigger one I like better. This is very gently used.
* Small, very small white canvas bag. The very small says it all.
* Jean skirt-- wore it a few times, it's too short for me.
* Long sleeve blue shirt, sorta dressy/casual
* Blue hoodie shirt--never wore it
* One pair of jeans--too small
* Three VHS tapes--cartoon type
My closet looks a little neater. My husband wonders why he doesn't have more room though!!
Next project before it gets too cold are my clothes bins out in the shed. I have a habit of hanging on to clothes for some reason. No more!! It's time to let the clothes go now. And I am excited to do it!!

Seven Things week 9

Nothing too exciting this week.
*Safety kit for blinds, pictured
*Green polo shirt
*Pair of leather sandals
*Four Veggie tales placemats
*Eleven (yes eleven!!) Dog bowls
*Eight leather and various other dog leashes and collars
The safety kit I just happened across and I have never used it, maybe someone else can.
The dog stuff--let me explain. Two years ago, we inherited THREE dogs. That is on top of the THREE dogs we already had! But this was a special circumstance. These were my Dear Aunts dogs and she had died suddenly. So my dear husband drove from Minnesota to Maryland in one weekend to pick up these special dogs. Luckily the dogs knew all of us. They came with dog bowls, toys and lots of collars and leashes. We weeded through what was going to work for us and put the rest in the closet in a bag. I am finally getting around to finding a new home for them all. The bowls--well, they came with bowls too, but a lot of the bowls were from me too. But, now they each have two Stainless bowls . And we only have one of the dogs with us now. Sadly, two of them nipped at my son and we found new homes for them.

The dreaded Kilowatt update

The picture is Reddy Kilowatt, from the electric company. He's been around for a while.
I received the dreaded Electric bill today. Again I was absolutely stumped. We used a whopping 1210 kWh!! Down from the 1981 of last month. Granted we only used the air conditioner a couple of times during the billing period, but that's a huge drop in usage IMO.
It was however, up 10 kWh from last year at the same time.
I'm still going to watch my usage and continue to track and post about the dreaded electric bill!!
I think this might be something I continue to track throughout the year. I can make it a companion journal along with my Seven things project!