Friday, November 28, 2014

Happy Thanksgiving!  We had a good time in Oklahoma City.  We got to Edmond on Tuesday without my clothes.  Yes, that's right...Jackie didn't pack my hanging bag with my shoes and clothes.  Luckily it worked out somehow because my dear, dear friend Stephanie's daughter passed away Monday and I had funeral clothes packed assuming her funeral would be today but it turns out it's next week.  So a trip to Old Navy Wednesday got me a dress to wear and some jeans I just rolled up (of course nothing is the right length when you're my height).  Jackie and I went to the Oklahoma City Thunder game that night and had fun catching up with old friends.  I figured out Thanksgiving morning that AJ's funeral was actually the next Friday which was good because we were planning to pack up Thursday to head to Dallas Friday but, of course, that wasn't the plan.

We had a great lunch at Lottinville's in Edmond, watched movies, went shopping and ate a good meal last night.  We did the Edmond Turkey Trot 5K Thursday morning of course, it was a cold start but a good run.  It's always so nice to do a run before all that food for sure!  The turkey trot is a fun family tradition for us, we think it's been 4 years now.  This year there were over 2,000 participants and a ton of dogs and strollers.  We saw a ton of people in costumes, I saw one man in a full turkey outfit, top to bottom and ran with a pumpkin pie and a can of whipped cream.  Hahaha!

I hope everyone had a good Thanksgiving with family and friends.

Brr....Chloe and Audrey were so
thankful they had gloves
and hats, it was about 32 degrees,
as it is every year.  My oldest niece
Erin made all three of us tutu's to wear.
They were exceptionally easy to wear
and didn't bother me at all.

I added this photo to have evidence that I too wore a tutu

Chloe at the finish

Audrey

Oh the way to lunch...this is the girls listening to Jackie, mom
and Gary discussing OU football..they were extremely bored :)

Village Creek Photo Day

After the photo shoot we opened up the east side of our yard into
the Birdeye Dog Park.  Chloe and Whit are playing catch with the
dogs, it was a cool but fun afternoon

Sunday, November 23, 2014

Two weeks ago school was out so I took Chloe and my nephew Whit with bikes and dogs to Village Creek State Park.  The park had contacted me the day before about coming out to have their park photographer take photos of mountain biking in the park. Chloe and I changed our plans to go to Shelby Farms Dog Park in Memphis and loaded up everyone for Village Creek.  It was a lot of fun.

We biked with the photographer for 2-1/2 hours...I know right?  We thought it was going to be 30 minutes.  Then we hiked for about 30 minutes and went to lunch.  We had a great time with Whit and all the dogs.

Village Creek has lots of hiking trails

Technically you're supposed to have dogs on a leash but it was
so early in the morning, we were the only ones out there

Whit and Chloe in white in back, me in red and a park employee
in orange and Jackie in the back...Photo by Chuck
Haralson, Arkansas State Parks photogrpaher

Denny Hess rolled out with us, this is a good shot of him,
Chloe and I close behind...Photos from Chuck Haralson,
 Arkansas State Parks photographer

Whit and not far behind in white is Chloe...photo
by Chuck Haralson, Arkansas State Parks....
Beautiful isn't it?

Cara and Truman, Birdeye

Cara, a shepherd mix is about 35 lbs.

Crazy Cara, she's about to get in trouble fence fighting our neighbor

A good quality about Cara is that she's a
fast learner.  She's crate trained, leash
trained and knows a ton of obedience
commands. 

Truman, very smart, crate trained, leash trained and great
with kids, cats and other dogs.  A real keeper and pleaser

I'm proud of this photo of Biscuit (lower left), Cara,
ding-dong Buddy and Truman.

Tuesday, November 25, 2014

Well Chloe and I have these two new fosters.  Cara, a shepherd mix, is about 7 months old, heart worm negative, vetted and ready for a home.  She's very smart, we've crate and leash trained her.  I'm not sure she can go to a home with cats but we're working on that.

Truman, a terrier mix, is about 6 months old and is a pleaser big time.  He loves to listen and learn.  He's leash and crate trained and is ok with cats, kids and other dogs.

Both are ready for a home and I'm 99% sure they'll be house trained since they choose to use it outside the kennel run.

Spay/Neuter people, it's not only good for the health of your pet but it's good for your community.  Some quick facts:

Think about these facts before allowing your pet to have "just one litter" of puppies or kittens!

• One female dog and her offspring can produce 67,000 dogs in six years! One cat and her young can produce 420,000 kittens during the same time frame.
• For every human born, there are 7 puppies and kittens born.
• An estimated 6 to 8 million dogs and cats are euthanized in shelters each year. That's about 55 percent of the animals entering shelters, based on reports from the National Council on Pet Population Study and Policy.

5th Midsouth Kids Marathon

Photos by Bill Blair...my camera died so unfortunately I didn't
have even a single photo of Chloe out there Saturday.
She and 2 other 8th grade track team members rolled out for the
2nd grade participants, they relayed them in...it was a fun day!

This is Rev. John G. Smith who has volunteered the last 3
years helping us with the marathon....he is so
motivating!! Just look at him and you can see Whit over there
on his right yelling with everyone!

Saturday, Nov. 3, 2014

Well thankfully we had another successful Midsouth Kids Marathon today.  We can't pull this off without each AND every volunteer!  We had parents, teachers, grandparents, sponsors, police officers, city workers and Chloe's fellow 8th grade track team members out helping us with the final 1.2 mile of the kids marathon.  I'm so thrilled it was a SAFE event, cars slowed, volunteers cheered everyone on and it was a great day.

Jackie and I went on and ran the half at 9 am with a late start.  We did good until I realized at mile 2 my Dexcom sensor wasn't getting a reading.  I felt great so I decided to give it a few more miles until I'd quit since I didn't even have a glucometer on me.  At mile 3 there wasn't a glucometer but mile 4 at Dr. Price's aid station at the country club, he had one and I went on.  I put the senor transmitter in my sports bra to warm it up and after 5 miles and 40 minutes it came back to life.  Thank you to Dr. Beaton who had the glucometers out there as a just in case situation, it saved me for SURE!!

Thanks again to all the volunteers who were out there on the course supporting this kids marathon.  Thank you to Mrs. Hollaway and the Wynne School District for supporting our kids marathon.  Let's keep these kids healthy and active!

Here's Kyra Dobson running with the 2nd graders...she and
Chloe have been friends since pre-kindergarten 

Linton Bradshaw with Rev. John G. Smith and Beth Bradshaw

I got this shot of the warm up.  We had 100 sign up and about
half that showed up because it was 30 degrees at 7:45 am

Lee's Chicken and Dumplings, Birdeye

Thursday, October 16, 2014

I have been reading Anne Levesque's cookbook for a while now and I was excited to try Lee's chicken and dumplings.  I knew Lee the last few years of her life.  She worked for the Smith family for many years and lived next door to Kara.  Lee was a phenomenal cook so I was intimidated for sure when I tried this recipe.  I happened to have a whole chicken, lots of salt and buttermilk on hand.  I did change her recipe by adding buttermilk to the dumplings because they rolled out dry.  I added about two more tablespoons of salt and pepper to the broth and some to the dumpling too. It was delicious and was fabulous leftover too.  Can I get Chloe to try it? No, she's still in her PICKY eating mode which drives me crazy.  Ya'll know I can eat anytime, anywhere and almost (almost) anything.

I've added some extra photos of what we've all been up to :)

I like the orange Flatlander logo

As her recipe says, roll it out thin...

I'm not going to retype her recipe as I usually do, this photo
is all there is to the recipe, it's a good photo and notice Anne Levesque's
note, "it's almost impossible to replicate the dumplings as Lee
made them.  Don't say I didn't warn you."

This is a pre-start photo of the first
Arkansas Delta Flatlander 66 mile
ride...Jackie and I rolled out for the 40
mile ride and it was fun until....the
stinking wind.  Nice ride put on the
Harahan Bridge Project director
Greg Maxted. I should blog about
the I-55 bridge that will become a
bicycle and pedestrian bridge in two
years connecting Memphis with Arkansas.
It's really exciting.  Jackie and I've ridden over
several bridges over the Mississippi and
Missouri rivers.  It's a wonderful thing
for tourism :)

Thank the LORD above for finally
finding Chica (now Lilly) a forever
home in Memphis.  Thanks to
Facebook too.  She's living with
Tara and John Burton and Emmy in
Midtown.  This is Chica and Buddy
two days before she left.  Chica was
really cool.  

Wynne's Walking School Bus celebrated National Walk to
School Day again Oct. 8.  We had a small turn out with the
clouds and sprinkles but had a great time :)

The cover of Anne Levesque's cookbook she
gave us last year.  It's full of traditions and photos
of her family.  It's crazy that she and Ed live less
than a mile from where I grew up in Oklahoma
City. Small world, great family, great cookbook :)

Garden Update and Jackie's Birthday Party, Birdeye

What's left of the herbs and peppers

I have to top the beds with chicken wire to keep the ladies out

We still have Chica and ding dong ding-a-ling Buddy
Check out Chica deciding to NOT get in that bed thankfully

The arugula is coming up...this is about 10 days 

Last week was spirit week and
here's Chloe for 80's day (supposed to be
teased hair and Flashdance outfit lol)

This is a pretty good looking nerd!  She
added her dad's thick Razorback tie :)

Thursday, Oct. 9, 2014

I finally got 4-1/2 beds seeded with Kale, Arugula, Mustard Greens and Romaine.  I'm fired up.  I generally plant greens by mid September but it's been so dang hot and dry and busy that I just got around to doing it.

We also celebrated Jackie's 44th birthday.  We had spaghetti and sang and played a Tonight show game.  It was a fabulous time.

Jackie's birthday party was a great time..I can't believe I didn't get a
photo of the shirt Chloe gave him.  She found it at Walmart last
weekend, it's Oloft from Frozen on a Beach with "Chillin" on it.
Kara's crew and Jeanie brought pretty impressive birthday cards
for him..I'm going to have to up my game on my cards :)

Chloe was extremely proud of icing his cake and drawing on it

We are big fans of the Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon and
we copied off of one of his games.  This is called Box of Lies
Here's Martin and Jeanie

How it works is each player gets a shoe box with 2 mystery
items inside and has to say what is in it and the other person
tries to decide if they're telling the truth about the items or
telling a lie....Kara and Jackie played it well

Here's August helping them along...he did slip and say out
loud what was in his mom's box

Lemme say that strawberry cake we made for Jackie was
weird.  It was as if I left out sugar or something....I did
make it with gluten free flour but I made it that way
last year....we threw it away right after the party

Stella and Whit.....they had a good time.

Chloe and Whit

Martin and Jeanie got in on the fun

Chloe and Audrey last weekend.  They are so sweet!

Stella vs. Chloe....

Chloe vs. August....the game was a huge HIT!

South on Main, Little Rock

Chloe took this shot at 6:45 am.  She and Stella had a blast
making Imovies and hanging out at the Hampton Inn.  Here's
Bob, me, Kara and Polly

Dang it if many of my photos are blurry, but I love taking shots
over my shoulder.  That's Polly and Bob behind me on the
Two Rivers Park Bridge about 7:30 am

My selfie with my phone before the ride started, thank
goodness for overcast skies

Sunday school has started up and we go by and get
Julia and John B Shepherd and take them with us.  They
are so sweet and we love having them.

Two weeks ago Chloe and Anna Claire helped me work a
PTSA membership booth before the high school football game.
We did get a few memberships but the most popular thing about
our booth was that big ole basket of candy!  lol
Here's front: Kip Patterson, Will Hood, Anna Claire Dallas, Chloe
Back row I'm not sure who those girls are with Camille Cathey :)

Jackie and I've done the Cooper Young 4 Miler over in Memphis
the last 4 years.  It was another great, well run event.  I was
very surprised with my time of 38 minutes.  I don't run very often.
Here's Beth Bradshaw, me, Jackie and Stan Bradshaw

This cyclist was around after the Cooper Young 4 miler
and I had to get a photo of him :)

Monday, September 29, 2014

Kara, me, Mel and Jerry Harvey and Kara's parents Bob and Polly Hardin all rolled out for Big Dam Bridge 50 mile bike race last Saturday.  It's been a tradition for the Birdeye Bicycle Club to make this bike ride and with everyone's busy schedules, it was just the Harvey's, Kara and I.  It actually turned out to be one of our favorite rides in the several years we've done the Big Dam Bridge.  It started at 7 am from downtown Little Rock and went to Roland, Ark and back.  It was about 65 degrees and was shaded most of the way.  It got hot right as we got to Burns Park near the finish line.  We all took our sweet time mainly because we didn't have fast riders like Martin and Kyle with us.  Anytime we ride with someone pushing it, we all push it and I've had at least 3 bad Big Dam Bridge bike rides and like Bob said, "we've started out in the past really pushing it and it can make it miserable to finish".  He's right about that.  We all took our time but still averaged just under 14 mph.

This year we had many firsts at the Big Dam Bridge.  The event goes from LaHarpe and Chester to the Two Rivers Park Bridge, Pinnacle Mountain and to Roland and back to Big Dam Bridge and finishes in North Little Rock.  By the time we started, about 7:10 am, it was packed and finally thinning out.  It is a crowded place with 3200 riders, half of which actually did the century ride, which amazes me.  The first "first" was right before we crossed the Two Rivers Park Bridge, a lady collided with a deer.  I found via Facebook that she was still in the hospital with a broken collar bone.  YIKES.  It is amazing to think about getting hit by a deer on a bicycle.  Kyle said at church Sunday that it didn't surprise him and that it wasn't unheard of.  Interesting.  I've learned from personal experience that bike chasing dogs are a threat, especially pit bulls, and cars and nut case drivers are the worst hazard but I never thought about mixing it up with a deer.  Their sheer speed is scary.  The second first was a crash at the finish line.  I was so excited to have all stayed together in our pack during the bike ride that just before getting to the finish line, Kara and I were trying to get her parents at the finish line so we could get a photo all together.  Well, there was a sharp corner and Polly went down.  Amazingly, she didn't break a bone but was pretty skinned up.  A nice police officer saw the crash, came over and offered an ambulance, it was kinda a big crash.  We didn't need an ambulance, just Polly's chain put back on so we could finish the race.

The most important FIRST was the fact that Kara and I did the race without Jackie and Martino. Martin wasn't "feeling it" and Jackie was with his Vanderbilt alumni friends at the Vandy/Kentucky game.  We survived but they missed a darn good and cool race.

Now to this gem that Kara had reservations at.  South on Main is located on main street not far from where Juanita's used to be.  It's owned by my favorite literary magazine the Oxford American.  It sits next door.

From the South on Main Website: South on Main is a revolutionary cultural experience that includes a restaurant and performance venue featuring the best of Southern cuisine and culture. With a kitchen helmed by Chef Matthew Bell, the restaurant offers a sophisticated but unpretentious atmosphere and a creative and accessible menu. South on Main also presents programming related to the content of the Oxford American magazine, including musical performances, literary readings, film screenings, and other offerings, making it the place where the Oxford American goes "from the page to the stage." The venue's multi-discipline programming provides a forum for established and unknown artists to perform in front of an appreciative audience, providing a full culinary, artistic, and educational immersion in Southern culture.

The restaurant has a wonderful, local menu that we all enjoyed.  We also had a mighty fine waiter (name....I can't find my receipt but I'd love to share it.  Tall, thin, curly black hair and awesome).  They of course offer many dinner specials but I stayed in the carb up section which meant I picked the tillapia with a huge grit cake.  It was outstanding and the perfect size.  I also added an order of pickled beets as an appetizer (I know, I'm not an appetizer orderer but it was great).  Bob was talking about how he had bad leg cramps the year before and had been eating bananas all week.  I told him he needed some pickle juice so on that idea I ordered up the beets.  He didn't have leg cramps the next day and I'm sure it was the pickled beets.  I will confess I also ordered a side of french fries to share with everyone for that extra carb.

Chloe and Stella were with us and of course they ordered the chicken tenders and fries.  They wiped it out and it was really nice of the waiter to bring their food on out with our appetizers.  These two also ordered their famous donuts and let me just say, delicious!  Their donuts were just drops of batter  (kinda like donut holes) topped with a little sugar and cinnamon.  The taste I had was outstanding.  I did order dessert, yes I was a big pig that night.  I got one of the homemade peanut butter cookies that usually comes as an ice cream sandwich which Mel and Jerry ordered and shared and wiped out.  That cookie was rich and just what I needed.  This restaurant reminds me a lot of The Second Line in Memphis.

You'll love South on Main.  Be sure and bring your book light, it's incredibly dark in there and probably your readers too.  Check out their decor in the restaurant which are past covers of the Oxford American magazine.  (Parking was a breeze too which was nice)

South on Main, 1304 S. Main, Little Rock, 501-224-9660 http://southonmain.com/