Category: Just Beauty

  •     First of all… Happy New Year! I can't believe this is my first post of 2015. I have had so many ideas for posts, but alas, no time to write or publish them. Have you picked a word for 2015? I have, but I'm going to save it for another post. I hope…

  • Wednesday afternoon a friend and her husband braved our dirt road to deliver a huge bag of Christmas goodies to my family. They do this every year. Seriously, they're crazy! They give each of us something and there are always lots of cookies and other treats. We've just learned to accept the gifts with gratitude.  But…

  •     Mama and I were visiting in her room yesterday when the sound of Christmas carols reached our ears, even over the high volume of her roommate's television. I stepped into the hall. It was coming from the dining room.  She wanted to go listen, so a couple of aides helped get her situated…

  • Like my Daddy, and his daddy before him, I have a coin collection. My coins aren't categorized into small blue books like theirs, though. Mine -all wheat pennies - jingle around in an old bourbon bottle.   This doesn't look like much of a collection after fifty years, does it?   I'm not sure when or…

  •   It snowed in Texas today, and it's not even Thanksgiving yet.  Granted, it was in Lubbock, up in the Panhandle, farther north than most of Texas. My son and daughter-in-law (a Texas Tech graduate) were there this weekend, celebrating her birthday, and she welcomed the snow as a special birthday gift. (I just hope…

  •   This evening my family commandeered the sunroom where my mom lives to celebrate her 83rd birthday a few days early. It was the only day we could all be together, but besides that, when you're turning 83, you really should start celebrating early, don't you think?     I know Mama loves being with…

  •   After a long day of driving and showing houses to clients all over Austin, then a never-long-enough visit with my mom, I arrived back home yesterday evening just as the sun started its goodbyes. The light was golden, the sky a crisp and an ever-deepening blue.  I set aside the list of things I…

  •   Temperatures here have been in the 70's and 80's. Wildflowers, mostly yellows and purples, line the roadside and dot the woods. Birds chatter and sing in the treetops, bright green bushes dotted with new blooms hum with industrious bees, and Monarch butterflies dance among the snow-on-the-prairie.     Is this spring or autumn? It doesn't…

  •   Just before sunset this afternoon, I escaped to the front porch swing with a glass of wine and a long-lost book from my childhood. I'd spent the day taking care of the dogs, going to church, fixing one of my signs that got knocked over by city mowers, visitng my mom, and finally making…

  •     Our grandfather clock is chiming midnight. Rain pours – no, roars – outside my window, just the kind of rain we need. A blessed sound, for sure. Every once in awhile I catch a flash of lightning in the distance. I've just finished a few things for work … or at least all I can…