Of Cookies, Sunshine, and a Reality Check

Many thanks to Lisa of Laughing Orca Ranch for naming the I Heart You cookie and Deborah (the Lone Star Queen) of Howdy from Cowtown for naming the Cookie of Paradise! Your half dozen cookie rewards will be winging their way to you later today. I've added the cookies to my Lazy G Ranch website and revamped the website too!

My readers simply rock! You guys came out in full force with so many cookie names, it was hard for me to choose. I liked so many of your names ~ thanks so much for being the best friends any blogger could have. I wish I could send y'all some cookies to thank you, but the USPS (translation = expensive!) makes that rather formidable.

And along that "expensive" vein, a little soul-bearing is in order here.

As my readers, you probably already know that when you come to my blog, you'll be treated to fun photos, beautiful Kansas vistas, and upbeat, positive stories of my life here. Trust me, my intent is not to make you vomit every time you come to my bucket of sunshine!

Like everyone, I have my fair share of life's reality checks. A few of my biggest sunshine-robbers?

1. No job. I've been looking for a job since I moved here in July 2008. I lived off the profit of my Ohio house sale for almost a year, and then the small 401k that I cashed out last year. Two temporary stints at a local hospital have helped me bulk up my checking account so I could keep my car payment current, and family has helped me several times. (Thank you my lovely family and y'all know who you are!) The hospital wants to hire me full-time but they have not had any position become available for me. In the meantime, I often have sleepless nights wondering how I'll make my March payments... or is that just that nasty midlife menopause working its magic on me??! (This is why I peddle my dog biscuits and cookies!!)
   
2. My grandmother in Ohio is not doing well. I went back to Ohio the 2nd week of January to visit her... after a brief hospital stay and a few weeks in a nursing home, she went back to her home. A home health care worker is visiting her 3x a week, and a friend who lives a few blocks away checks in on her several times a week. She has macular degeneration, and the doctors felt she had onset Alzheimer's. We seriously doubt she has even a speck of Alzheimer's... her wit and her sassy tongue were back in full force the day we got her situated at her house!
3. We've had serious septic problems the last week. Hubby dug up the back yard and replaced a section of pipe. The problem seems to be fixed now, but just in case, we haven't backfilled that section of yard just yet! We'll still need to have the septic tank pumped. I mean, may as well, it's all dug up and easy to find now.

That's a few of the rainy spots in my life. And the only reason I decided to put it all out there? Because I know my fellow bloggers have problems too. Many times they air out their issues on their blogs. Often I can identify with them and I feel better, knowing I'm not the only one with issues.

Every day that I wake up, I try to think about the blessings in my life, the positive things. And there are many! Here are just a few:

1. My son (only child!) and his wife are pregnant! THIS is a big deal. They've had 2 known miscarriages, heartbreaking for us all, but this time she's made it to 20 weeks and the baby is doing great. They've been seeing a high-risk specialist, and it looks like I am finally, finally going to be a gramma! I.AM.SO.EXCITED. This is the biggest blessing in my life, even though they are in Ohio and I am in Kansas.
2. I'm healthy, albeit a tad overweight, but I'm healthy. Well, at least as far as I know. ;-)
3. Hubby is healthy, the rest of my family is healthy. What more could one ask for?
4. I love my dogs. Trixie and Tori are my salve. And Ringo too.
5. I love our kitties and our horses too. Animals add so much warmth and love to a human's world.
6. I have a home that provides warmth in the summer and coolness in the summer, with a very comfy bed. We have adequate clothing and vehicles to get us to work (when I'm working). We have enough food to eat and more than enough water. How could one NOT be thankful for these things, when so many people the world over don't even have the most basic need of adequate shelter?
7. The sun shines most days here in south central Kansas. Sure, we still have gray days, but in winter, you can still count on seeing the sun every few days.
8. Baking makes me happy. I love making dog biscuits for my pups and my customers' pups, and now I get to make my favorite cookies for all my friends and customers! Cooking for my husband makes me happy too... because he appreciates it!
   
9. On a lighter note, a well-mixed chocolate martini can make me very happy.
10. I love my life here on the Kansas plains! I know I've said it before, but I really do. :-)

Those 10 happy items come to you, my faithful blog readers, courtesy of Linda from Wander to the Wayside and her 101 Sweet Friends award to me last week. So now that I've named 10 things that make me happy, I need to pass this award forward to some of my readers. I'm just going to say that if you have 10 things (or more!) that make you happy in your life, then you need to grab this award and acknowledge all those happy things.


And thank you to all my readers who come here to visit. I enjoy your blogs just as much, even if I don't get there as often as I might like. I appreciate your comments so very much and I will always leave comments for you... as Linda mentioned, it's this back and forth that makes this blogging adventure so much fun!

Our next post will return to our regularly scheduled dose of sunshine... and vomit.