AtomicMrX

Shannon and I went for a ride and drove through the Christmas In The Park were they take a camp ground and fill it with beautiful lighted scenes. You’ll have to excuse my video taking skills. This is the first movie made from a new little camcorder that I just got. I tend to bounce around alot and move too fast. It’s also a little over 16 minutes long. I hope you can enjoy it - just ignore our talking.

Christmas In The Park 126.9 MB (16:46)

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Christmas in the Park is one of Jackson County Parks and Recreation’s most celebrated events of the year. Three hundred thousand lights and 175 animated figures and splashes of Christmas color transform Longview Lake Park into an enchanting winter wonderland. The entire family will delight in the warmth of this fun-filled, holiday display gift from your Jackson County Parks.

• Times: Night Before Thanksgiving thru December
  Sunday - Thursday: 5:30 PM - 10:00 PM
  Friday - Saturday: 5:30 PM - 11:00 PM
• Address: Longview Lake Campground, Longview Lake Park
• Phone: (816) 503-4830 (Always call and confirm events.)
• Admission Fee: No Charge. Donations, benefiting local charities, are accepted.
• Additional Notes: Directions to Christmas In The Park: Take 470 East to the View High Drive Exit, Exit South on View High Drive and follow to 3rd street. Directional signs will be posted off of View High Drive for Christmas In The Park.

It was a great day Sunday to work in the yard. Shannon mowed while I broke sticks into small 1 foot lengths (so they will fit into our cast iron Chiminea to burn them). Jaki enjoyed being outside so much and ate up the sun as much as possible. She was very exhausted later that evening and into the next morning. She was definitely walking like an “old lady” the next morning after she ate her food.

Shannon wrapped the garden “cross” with red Christmas lights so it’s ready for winter to hit. I still have to clean out the gutters and then put the blue “old time” Christmas lights up onto the gutters around the house. I’m kind of procrastinating on that job!

It was great to do stuff around the yard instead of running around town like I usually do on Shannon’s day off.

Enjoy the pictures! They are located under Photos (across the top of the web site) click on Fall Garden.

Well, I haven’t written on the blog in a few weeks because there was a lot of stuff going on and I wanted to wait for it to be over so I could just write about it once.

First our washer died - in mid wash of course. Shannon was doing his laundry (I know - shocking that he got around to it - he has a tendency to wait well past when he should be doing it) and the washer was full of water and went into the spin/drain cycle when it decided not to drain out the washer and just plain died. So Shannon left the items in the full of water washer and there they sat till we got a new washer which arrived yesterday (Saturday). Yep that is right - they stuff in the washer sat for two weeks! Ugh, boy did it stink. Shannon should have taken them out of the washer when it broke and “finished” them up in the bath tub then put them in the dryer. Oh well, that’s ADD for ya. I ended up doing them in a laundry load for him.

He was just going to leave the clothes in the washer untill the repair guy came (one week after it broke) but the washer was un-repairable. Actually it could have been repaired but it would have cost $700. A new washer is far less! Shannon went shopping for a new washer that same day the repair guy was at the house (Monday). He bought a new washer for around $500 (a Whirlpool) but it would not be delivered until the next Saturday (yesterday).

Our floor drain next to the washer has been flooding and creating a nice pool of black gunk about 4 to 6 foot in diameter each time the washer would go into the drain cycle. So since we got a new washer and had cleaned the floor under the old one and around the drain - I called Roto-rooter and had them fix the floor drain so it would stop flooding. We apparently need to do some preventative maintenance so it will not happen again. So I bought their jug of stuff to pour down the kitchen drain once a month to help eat all the black gunk out of the pipes and keep the water flowing. Roto-rooter cost $200. Ouch!

I was so happy to get my laundry done yesterday and not have the floor puddle up with nasty water. And while I was doing the laundry I put together the heavy duty plastic shelving I purchased on Friday for the basement. We seriously need to get stuff up off the floor and onto shelving to save some space and clean up the basement. I bought 5 shelving units that consists of five shelves each. I put them all together but made them into “four” shelf units which made an extra shelving unit out of the unused shelves. So I bought 5 and ended up with 6 shelving units!

Today I want to start going through the mess in the basement and getting them organized up onto the shelving units. I’m going to take before and after pictures of the basement. It is really scary looking right now. Everything is piled up on the floor to waist height and there is a ton of junk that could just be thrown away!

This little guy was perched on the side of the house next to the garage entrance. He is pretty good sized - about 8 inches long and well, pretty creepy looking.

I took the pictures and was a little freaked out because Shannon said the walking stick could sting me with it’s tail. I didn’t think they could hurt humans and don’t remember them hurting me when I was a little kid and found one - but then again I don’t have a great memory.

So Shannon freaked me out and made the picture taking a bit of a challenge to overcome a fear of getting stung by the little guy if I got too close. I used the micro mode on my little camera and the pictures came out great! It was overcast so I was afraid they would not look good.

Okay. It stopped raining enough that this morning I was able to run outside and take the pictures of Shannon’s Fall Garden. There was quite a bit of dew on the plants and the flash picked it up and made it look more like frost but it isn’t.

I was able to get a picture of our humming bird. It’s not the best because it’s shot through the kitchen windows screen but you get the idea.

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Good thing I got the pics taken this morning because it’s raining now. We have had a ton of rain this week. Nothing damaging - just a nice gentle rain every day.