Sorry there is no picture. The kids ate it up as fast as I could get it out of the oven. The son, daughter, daughter's boyfriend, and neice were here tonite for supper. I have been telling the daughter's boyfriend that I could actually make homemade lasagna, so today I bought the ingredients so I could make it tonite. It sure was good..........Sure beats Stouffer's ;-)
I have had a pretty busy day. Had to run to Vinita to do some business, came home and started supper. But, before going to town I waited on Ritzy's call so I would not be distracted when talking to him. I sure do miss him, and this waiting is so hard.
Tonight after supper I had some business to take care of for the church, then get all my bills paid for the month. That is a job in itself.........
I have to go buy groceries tomorrow,,oh joy!!!!! NOT!!!!!
I think that is my least favorite housekeeping job, ranks right up (or down) there with cleaning the toilets ;-)
The son mowed the lawns tonight, they look good.......Boy, this week the heat has returned to Oklahoma.........As far as I am concerned it can just go back to where it came from. I am ready for some cooler weather...........
All my friends can't believe it when I tell them that I keep it at around 65 degrees in the house all the time. I say: What's the use of having an air conditioner if you aren't going to use it????
I think I about freeze the kid's friends and cousins out of here.....................which could be my plan in the first place...I'll never tell ;-)
I can finally count on one hand the number of weeks Ritzy has left in Iraq. I guess that should make me feel better, but, sometimes I still think that this is never going to end.
I still haven't emailed him yet, so I guess it's time to depart here and email my husband and fill him in on what happened in this part of the world today.
I'm outta here for now........

I finally had time to take a picture of that cover we put on my truck. It was fairly easy. Only took about an hour. I emailed this picture to Ritzy so he could see it also.

Had a pretty busy day today. A friend asked me to tag along while she did some running around in Bartlesville. We ate at at mexican cafe for lunch. The daughter's "boyfriend" joined us. I told him that I had to hand it to him wanting to eat lunch with two old women ;-) He works just across the road from where we were eating.

After eating we had to do some more running around and then stopped at the grocery store ( which had a Starbucks in it). I tried one of the blended frappucinos. Wow!!! It sure was good......

I finally got home around 4:45 pm. I fixed bacon, eggs and pancakes for supper. It was just me and the son. The daughter had to work late. Her boyfriend came out and I fixed him the same thing to eat..........The daughter just got home (10:30pm) and we are eating some Key Lime Pie...Yumm!!!!!!! Hope I am able to fall asleep ;-)

Ritzy called today while I was running around, he didn't sound too good. I asked what was wrong and he said that he has not been able to sleep during the night. It is really a stressful situation over there for all our soldiers. I just keep counting down the days until he and the rest of our Oklahoma National Guard soldiers are able to leave Iraq.......I miss him so much!!!!!

Speaking of Ritzy, I better leave here so I can send him that daily message from home. After all that running today I am about ready to "hit the sack"..............

Ritzywife is out for now............................................

The day started out ok I guess. Ritzy called and we were talking, I told him that me and the son were going to go outside and work on the drain for the washing machine line.
He was talking and said: "By the way, on those pictures you sent of your truck I noticed the trash cans in the garage were a little full." Leave it to Ritzy to notice the trash cans instead of the new truck!!!!!! ;-)
I told him it was kind of funny he mentioned that because me and the son were going to clean out the garage after fixing the drain line. So, don't worry your poor little head about it, Ritzy, hahaha!!!!
I even took pictures to email Ritzy to "prove" that we cleaned ;-)
We started on the drain around 11 this morning, got that finished, started on the garage which we finished cleaning at 4 pm this afternoon. The only break was about 30 minutes for lunch. I noticed the guy at the store was smoking ribs today so I went over there and bought a rib dinner for each of us. Was pretty good!!!!
We got 4 vehicles in that garage right now and there is probably room for 2 more. It's a big one.
Was a pretty productive Saturday around here, and my poor body is feeling it now. I was so dirty that I washed my hair and took my bath at 6 this evening. It felt soooooo good to get all that junk washed off!!!!
The daughter was inside cooking supper. Lasagna and garlic bread. She did a very good job.
The son is now outside shooting some fireworks we found in the garage, and the daughter and a neice and the daughter's very good friend (I'll put it that way) are in the living room watching NASCAR. ((((B O R I N G !!!!!!!!))))
I have told the daughter's friend that he will never get me interested in racing. hahahaha!!!!!!!
Ritzy is missing out on all this fun stuff happening. I sure miss him when things like this need to be taken care of.....
We have managed to get by so far with his being gone, although it has not been easy. But,,,, I keep telling myself - only a few more weeks to go.
It looks as if I get the pleasure of cleaning the kitchen tonite, don't think I am gonna be able to pry those young adults away from that race.......
I still have to send Ritzy those pictures, clean my kitchen and study my Sunday School Lesson for tomorrow so, Ritzywife is out for now.......

It has been pretty "gloomy" here in this part of Oklahoma the past few days. Toward late afternoon the sun finally showed itself. It's about time. I hate cloudy days......
Yesterday on top of it being cloudy, Ritzy called and before we could end our conversation their phone system went down. That makes for a "sad" feeling the rest of the day when that happens. I do not like not getting to tell Ritzy that I love him and to take care and have a good night......
Thank goodness he was able to call today. He has had some rough days this past week. I always pray for and think about him.
The son got home from work tonite, I just about had supper ready and he said he was going to mow tonight. It is 8:50pm and he just came inside. He had just gotten started, I heard the lawnmower pull up to the back door and he came in . It seems a wasp had just stung him. I mixed up some baking soda and water and put it on the sting, covered it with a bandage and he went back outside. He said gee, it's been a long time since he'd been stung ;-)
I don't care how old a person is, it still hurts !!YEOW!!
That brother-in-law has gotten stung by red wasps and bees this year. The wasps are trying to take up residence on his house and he was in the hayfield when the bees got him. !!!!!OUCH!!!!!!
I guess I had better get some spray and try to show those darn wasps they are not welcome at my house. hahaha!!!!
I got out there and used the weed-eater and leaf blower. I cut some low-hanging limbs so they would not be in the son's way. It wasn't too bad outside. We have had some pretty decent weather the past couple weeks here in Northeast Oklahoma, can't complain..
I feel bad when Ritzy tells me how hot it is over there ;-(
These days waiting for this deployment to be over are going by soooooooooooooo slow!!!!
I miss Ritzy!!!!!!!
I still have to email him so I better go for now.....hope to see more of that sunshine tomorrow........

Today was kind of a rough day. Ritzy's call came a lot later than expected. I was beginning to think the phones were down again. He finally called tho, seems he was having to deal with some problems in his work. It was good to talk to him. I miss him so much.......
When the daughter brought in the mail there were about 8 letters from Ritzy. I opened them and "this" one was the last one I read. Sure brought a smile to my face ;-)
Also in that "bunch" of letters there was one that I had sent to him the middle of July that was returned. I kept asking him if he received it and he kept telling me that he had not. Well, today I found out why. I don't know what the problem was, I used the same address that I have sent all his mail to since he has been gone. Somebody was not doing their job that day. Makes me kind of mad, because these soldiers are waiting on anything they can get from home and to see that the address was correct and it still get sent back is kind of irritating! Well, he got it anyways cause I scanned the envelope and letter and emailed them to him.........
The daughter came home and cooked supper tonight. She is pretty good at it. Her and a friend cooked outside. I told her friend that I'm gonna have to tell Ritzy that I have forgotton how to cook since he has been gone ;-)
If only that would work...........don't think I will get out of it that easy.......
About 6 more weeks of this waiting. Sometimes I get to thinking it will never be over......
That's about it for now, I still have to send Ritzy that email...........................

The daughter bought her a new truck yesterday. Nice, huh??? She had better like it cause she gonna have it for a while. ;-) You will notice Ritzy's "farm truck - 'little red'". He has had that truck since 1996 when he bought it new. I don't think he will ever part with it. He will drive his Ford when he wants but he likes driving the little nissan.
The daughter has hit a deer with it, run it off in the ditch when there were snowy roads and it has still survived.
She told me something interesting today: "you know mom, when you are paying for your own vehicle you look at it different, makes you care about it more" I said, ya think?????"now do you understand why I was concerned about you driving my car these past 3 years. she finally gets it.........

I saw something yesterday on my way home from town and..... No, I don't have a picture of it.....As I was driving home from town yesterday, I noticed an older Ford truck with it's hood up parked beside the highway about 1/2 mile away. There was a car parked behind it. Just as I was getting closer all of a sudden the motor shoots out fire and a big fireball goes to the side toward the ditch and another one shoots out in front of the truck. There were 2 people that I could see get out. I slowed way down and just about the time I got to the truck the smoke was so thick you could not see. It looked as if everyone was ok. I called 911 and asked if anyone called it in and they had not. I did not stick around to see what happened after that. I was sure wishing I had that camera on me. Where is that darn thing when you need it???????? Guess a person needs to carry one all the time. Of course I have the one on my phone, but I am just beginning to know how to use it after having it for nearly a year ;-)

Ritzy called this morning. He has been cut to 8 hour shifts for the remainder of this deployment. I asked if he was going to get bored and he just laughed.....This is to allow the replacements to start learning and doing their job.

I had a LOT of running to do yesterday, which means I am doing NOTHING today......which is fine by me.
Just sitting here watching people come and go at the convenience store across the road. There are a lot of boats being taken to the lake today.
I like watching people, they are fun or funny to watch..........whichever way you want to put it.
I guess that's all for now, I still have to send Ritzy his daily email. Gee, this time waiting for him to finish this deployment is going by so slow!!!!!!!

Here in this part of the state, today was a pretty depressing day. It was either moderately raining or misting ALL day.......I hate days like that. I never even stepped outside today.
I guess I ought to be thankful becuase it is August in Okahoma and most people know that August is our harshest month of the summer. We have had a break in the weather and the highs have stayed below 80 for the past few days. During August our temperature is ususally 100 degrees or above.
The rain sure has made the grass green back up....
Not much to do today. Got a couple of letters from Ritzy. He actually wrote them on our anniversary. It is always so nice to get a letter from Hubby. I love to see his handwriting and know that he took the time to write me a note.
I am now watching his Green Bay Packers on ESPN play a pre-season game. If I stay up til it is over I will email him the score. You see, he grew up about 45 miles south of Green Bay, Wisconsin. He came to Oklahoma when he was about 22 years old. He will always be a Packer Fan even tho he has now spent most of his life in Oklahoma ;-)
Wisconsin is where we are headed as soon as he is released from this deployment. I am so looking forward to that trip...........
I am an Okie girl but I want to get out of here with Ritzy and just spend some time alone, away from everyone, including our own kids. I love them as much as a Mother could, but I want to get away with Ritzy and everything that reminds me of the past 12 months of this deployment!!!!!
I have 2 neices that could deliver babies while I am gone, but they will be here when we return....
Even tho we are staying with Ritzy's parents, I have said before it is like we are alone because they have their own schedule and we just come and go as we please.
Uh-oh I see the other team just scored again and Ritzy's Packers are trailing 20-10.
They better get with it!!
I am going to try to get to bed earlier tonite. I have been actually getting sleepier a lot earlier than I was a few weeks ago. I am thankful for that. It used to be 1 or 2 in the morning before I would even get sleepy.
Early in the morning, before sunrise is the best time to view the Perseid Meteor Shower. I usually go out and look, but it looks like it is going to be too cloudy this year...
Yea, the Packers scored a touchdown & extra point!!!!!!!!!! 20-17
I guess this is all I have for now, til tomorrow.........

This is one weekend I am glad to see come to an end. To start with I had a "Reintegration Meeting" to attend at Tulsa on Saturday. This is for families of returning troops .That went well and it provided a lot of helpful information. I had a birthday party to attend after the meeting, which I did. Had a good time.......
The night went pretty well, had some thunderstorms move thru the area. Only got about 4-5 inches of rain ;-)
After all that, later I noticed the air in the house was not feeling cool, so I go to the air conditioner unit outside and see that it is just buzzing. Keeps tripping breaker too, which is not good.... Wonderful.................
I get the son out there and look at it and we try to figure out what is going on. Can't find the problem, so I call my dad, the heat & air guy, and he tells us that the compressor or capacitor is bad, which means it will be Sunday before it can be fixed. Let's just say I did not sleep very good saturday nite. Sunday after church my brother-in-law finds out there is just a loose wire, thank goodness, and takes less than 5 minutes to fix it. I was so relieved. That air conditioner is working very well tonite. Gonna get some good sleep tonite.......if I ever get to bed, that is.....
I still have to email Ritzy, so I am outta her for now.....................

I just finished my phone call with hubby. It is so hard to think about what you want to say when you know there is a time limit on the call. I wonder- "did I say everything that needed to be said?" Hanging up or ending the call is one of the hardest things I have to deal every time I talk to Ritzy during this deployment. We say our "I Love You's" , "Have a good day/good night".........but I always wonder if I forgot to say something important.......

Like I have already said, this deployment is about to "eat my lunch"!!!!!!

A "very good" friend of the daughers's is having a "port" taken out today. My thoughts are with him also. He found out he had cancer last year before Christmas, but Praise God , after surgery and chemotherapy the cancer is gone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The daughter and he are very close, which is fine with me. He is a fine young man.

We treat him like family, which in this family means he gets teased and laughed at...We believe in having fun.................I warned him that we were "crazy" and liked to have fun......He said that was just fine with him. I told him that if he didn't get "ribbed" he should be worried.

He just blends right in ;-)

Our church supper is tonite and I have to start preparing something for that pretty soon.

Guess I need to grab a bite for lunch too.

Well. I got thru the day, went to church. Fixed beans and cornbread. One lady at church said that she liked chocolate cake with her beans, so I fixed a chocolate cake also. She was sitting beside me tonite eating her cake and beans and told me I ought to try it. I told her that it just didn't look right to be eating anything but cornbread with my beans. Maybe another time.......
I don't care for chocolate cake anyways, maybe that's the reason I could not picture eating that with my beans. Who knows????

I have sent Ritzy his daily email and I am about ready to check to see if he has returned a message. After that I am going to bed. I getting tired.
Have a couple of errands to run tomorrow.

The daughter has to be at work at 4 in the morning. YUK!!!!!!! That's still the middle of the night to me. She went to bed early, hope she gets some rest. The good thing is she gets off work at noon.
I do not like getting up before the sun rises. There ought to be some kind of law against that ;-)
I am outta here for now, we'll see what tomorrow brings..........................

Yup, that pretty much describes how I am feeling these days. The countdown is on for the end of Ritzy's deployment. I have about had it. I can't begin to imagine how Ritzy feels....
I just want this to be OVER!!!!!!
I have been pretty busy the past few days... Went to town today to buy "Sissy's" Birthday present. She will be 3 tomorrow, but her party isn't until Saturday at Nana's. She wanted a tent, so of course that's what I got her. Got her a little rocking chair that sits low to the ground so she can sit in it and play that DS that her Nana is getting her. I already warned big brother that his skinny little butt had better stay out of the chair ;-)
I have a "yellow ribbon" reintegration meeting to attend Saturday before the birthday party, so that means my Saturday is pretty well filled. Supposed to be at the meeting at 9 and it is over at 3. Sissy's party starts at 6. Whew!!!!!!!
Back to the way I have been feeling......one minute I'm thinking gee, only a few more weeks til Ritzy leaves Iraq, and the next minute I wonder if the date will ever get here!!!!!! This goes on every day, all day long.......The range of emotions I am going thru is about to wear me out........You would think I would have it under control by now, but I have to say I have never had "it" under control. Only God has gottten me thru this.........plus going to see that great-neice and great-nephew ;-)
I have been trying to get to bed earlier, at least before midnight, and it has worked a couple of times. This hot weather isn't helping anything either.......I almost feel like I don't have the right to complain about the hot weather here in Oklahoma when it is only 120-130 degrees where our soldiers are.
Ritzy was telling me today that he is tired of being hot, and he ready to come home..... I sure do miss him ;-(
It is 10 pm and the daughter is in here cooking brownies.....these kids sure keep strange hours. She even has to go to work in the morning. She and a friend just got thru eating a steak dinner. I would just have to plan on staying up all night if I ate something like that this late at night...hahaha!!!
I must say that those brownies sure are smelling good.......
I went up to my parent's house tonite and Dad was at the door when I came in and told me I needed to take that new truck back to town to get a trailer hitch put on it so it could be used to haul hay...........sorry, Dad......not with my new truck. ....he was laughing when he said it ;-)
The first "job" this truck is going to do is get Ritzy and I to Wisconsin after he returns home. I am so looking forward to that trip.......I love my kids and family, but I can't wait to get away with Ritzy so we can just enjoy one another's company ...............
I still have to send Ritzy that daily "report"...... so I'm outta here.......................

Well, here is a little bit better picture of that truck. I emailed this one to Ritzy earlier. This was taken after I unloaded groceries, (a job which I do not like)...Notice the step......that nephew's dad was too busy so I called my brother today and asked if he could put them on for me. As you can see, he did. I told him it was not going to be fun getting in and out of the truck at church tomorrow without those steps. hummmmmm, maybe short people should not buy trucks???

NOT!!!!! After driving Ritzy's truck for the last year, I knew that's what I wanted. I bought me some of those whistles that are supposed to keep the deer from running in front of you. I guess I will see if they really work. I was driving down to my sister's yesterday evening and a small deer just about jumped in the road. Thank goodness it stayed in the ditch, I was going slow and looking out for them. We see one just about every time we drive down there. The daughter actually hit one a couple of years ago in the middle of the day. It jumped out in front of her while she was driving the 1996 Nissan. Messed up the truck, but we fixed it. Have to really be careful around here........

Gee, it sure was hot today. I was just standing and watching my brother and I was sweating. He had a fan blowing on him, so it was at least bearable.

Ritzy called just as my brother was finishing, the brother said let's go inside cause it was too hot to just be standing out there, so for our 30 minute call I was at least in a cool house........told Ritzy that the humidity here is terrible. We said our good-byes and I left for Vinita to buy my groceries. Did not get home til around 4pm. It's been so busy around here the past few days, I am ready for a little break. The only thing is: that when things slow down, I start thinking about and missing Ritzy more. Wish I could find some "neutral" ground. hahaha!!!! I am beginning to think there is no such thing.

I still have to study my lesson so I am prepared to "teach" my class in the morning. Still have to email Ritzy.

I'm outta here for now!

I told Ritzy last fall when we were pretty sure he was going to be deployed that if it happened I was going to get a new vehicle out of it. You see, the daughter has taken over my car, which I loved, for the past 2 years. Since Ritzy has been gone I have driven his Ford truck (which is in front of this one)......We were going to wait until he got home to make the purchase, but he told me the other day that he did not want to deal with it and if I wanted I could go ahead and buy one. He didn't have to tell me twice ;-)

I told him THANKS for the Anniversary Present..hahahaha!!!!!!!!!
It basically looks just like his which is a 2004 model, and this one is a 2008 model. I researched online, found a dealer close to home, knew what I wanted and went "locked & loaded" to buy this truck. It was the easiest car buying experience I have ever gone thru!!!!!!!

The salesman said he wished everyone would come as prepared as I was Thursday.

I know the picture could be better, but I have been extremely busy the past couple of days and I will get a decent picture pretty soon.

The nephew and I went to the movies this afternoon to see the movie: "The Mummy" I must say it was a really good picture. We both enjoyed it. On the way to the movie I told him that he was the "first passenger" to ride in his Aunt's truck. He thought that was pretty cool. Afterward I went to Best Buy to get a cd/player deck and have it installed in the new truck. It came "armed" with only a radio, but it had the more important features I wanted that the others did not have.

A couple of them being an automatic transmission and cruise control. YEA !!!!!!! I don't have to shift gears anymore...........I don't mind a standard transmission, but they are a pain in city driving. And when I first started driving Ritzy's truck, my leg would get a cramp because I was so used to using the cruise control on my car. Don't have to worry about that now. haha!!!

This truck also has small doors that open up to make it easier to utilize the space behind the seat. This will be the truck we take on our trip to Wisconsin when Ritzy gets released from this deployment. I can hardly wait........I told him he was going to have fun driving this one. It also has split seats and adjustable back. I can just lay over there and snooze away while Ritzy keeps it between the ditches ;-) The only thing left to do is install some "steps" so getting in and out will be a little easier. I have already bought them and made a "deal" with the nephew's dad to get that little job done.

Guess this is all for now, better leave some thinkin' for another day