~~ODNEAL FAMILY BLOG~~Port of Readlyn, Iowa

I'm not a big fan of Halloween and dreaded it actually when the kids were little and having to dress them up in costumes they hated, walk from house to house to house so they could fill up a bag with candy that they didn't need! SO glad that we have been done with that for a long time. I do however every year get out the witch and pumpkin crafts that my Mom made for me. And this year I made up some treat baggies for my office co-workers and bosses. I would have been more creative but I decided to do it on Thursday night around 8:30 so pumpkins out of construction paper and sandwich baggies was all they got. With candy of course! I'm sure they will enjoy them. And don't you love the witch wall hanging? She is so ugly that she is cute. This picture doesn't do her nose justice. It is large and has a black wart on it that sticks up. I wish sometimes that I had my Mom's creative genes but apparently I didn't because I struggle every time I even do a s...

This was on the same memory card with Friday's Foto of me sleeping with Gadget. Guess this is why he felt the need to get me back! Gizmo actually has her leg over top of Bruce's arm while they are both sleeping. I guess maybe we need to get rid of this comfy old leather couch since it seems to bring on sleep. And even for the cats! Actually no, I don't know if I will ever totally get rid of this furniture. We bought it used from friends of ours and it is the most comfortable and has held up great compared to other crap we have had over the years. I guess when I put new flooring in the living and dining rooms this winter I will just redecorate some because the furniture is here to stay! Why change something that is perfectly fine and functional? And still looks good. I think our friends got screwed on what they charged us for it! Oh well. That was over 6 years ago and I can't help it that they HATE the furniture they bought to replace it. They shouldn'...

This picture is Bruce getting back at me for all of the photos that I take of him sleeping with or without the cats on the couch! The other night I was feeling exhausted so made the mistake of laying down on the couch instead of heading to bed (Absolutely cannot go to bed at 9:30, right? Just have to stay up for the news! Or try in my case.), and Gadget climbed on the couch with me and then cuddled right up by my face apparently! Don't we both look so peaceful? Niether of us can be called a little bitch (we call Gadg that alot!) when we look like this. Maybe I should nap on the couch more often. For me it is a very rare occurence. I bet Gadget wouldn't mind if I did more often. Everyone have a great weekend. Enjoy the sunshine and warmth while we still have it around!

I apologize for not posting all week long but it has been a busy week.  We made the football playoffs and had a game last night.  BRRRRRRR, yes it was cold with the horrible wind but we were able to pretty much get out of it.  Thank goodness for hand and feet warmers.  But Wapsie won and it was a good game so all is well.  Tyler played pretty much the whole game also so it was fun for Bruce, Cole, and I to watch!  We play next on Monday night at West Branch.  Good luck Wapsie Valley Warriors!  And I promise I will try next week to get back to my regular posting for the 3 or 4 family members and a few strangers that check this little blog regularly!  Have a great Friday! 

Even though I call you my "little brother" we all know that you are OLDER than me. You are just the youngest of my other brothers. Here is a picture from our family weekend and I guess I took this because you must have been losing your ass and was giving up to sit down like that! Just kidding. We had a great time that weekend and I hope we can continue to do it year after year. Life is way too short we all have found out, and we need to enjoy every moment that we can! I love you my brother Rick and am so glad that I have you as one of my awesome bros that I know would do anything for their little sister. Right?????? Love, FRED

Here is one of my fall photos that I submitted to Schnack at KWWL from our final river ride of the year last weekend. And it made the 6 o'clock news last night. What was really strange was that Bruce happened to come into the house just as I was done showering after Jazzercise and starting supper, and we were just chatting in the kitchen when he saw my name on the TV screen. I might have missed seeing it if not for him taking the time to talk with me before heading back to his shop.  Thanks for taking the time honey!  I saturated this photo so I think it looks prettier than the one I emailed Schnack. Oh well. Still a very nice photo of the bluff in Lansing. Everyone have a great weekend!

I hate to admit it but over the years I seem to be pretty good at just putting the dates out of my mind to ease the agony. On this date in 1999 I got the most awful telephone call at my work from my Grandma (my Mom's Mother) screaming to me that my Mom was dead. And telling me that "of course she is since noone was here with her all the time". Let me just say that I think to this day that was THE VERY WORST DAY OF MY ENTIRE LIFE! Yes I forgave my Grandma because after all it was her daughter she had to find, and noone can or should have to endure that. But it really hurt very deep for a very long time. I had taken Mom that week to a doctor appointment and we had eaten "happy meals" at George Wyth per her request. She knew her health was bad and her prognosis not good (she had asked her doctor that day), and I treasure the memory of her and I stopping after our lunch and helping a turtle off of the road to safety. I hope his fate was much better than my...

Here are a few pictures that I took of all the crap that I was packing up to take home from the houseboat. What a mess it always appears to be when loading and hauling everything out that might freeze or go bad over the winter. Luckily I had taken most stuff home when we knew the marina was going to flood and power was getting cut off. I always feel the happy and sad emotions on the weekend of closing up for the year. But this year I think I am more on the happy side because I have a lot of stuff that I want to do and get done in the house over the winter, so I am happy to not have to pack and load and unload every single weekend for the next 6 months. I love you houseboat and the river, but I will be just fine not seeing you until April 2011. Oh wait, I guess I will "see" you in January but just to check on you. Happy hump day!~

This is what our view inside the houseboat is when we get everything put inside for the winter. And this year we went ahead and pulled up the front deck carpet as we need to repaint in the spring anyway so it will get a good bath over the winter maybe. I didn't think to snap any pictures when we left looking down at the dock, but as usual it looks like deserted boats for the most part. Except Ray and Tracy had Monday off so in the one picture I believe you can see her lights lit up on the front of their boat. Glad to have the job of closing up and helping all of our friends and family that need it get winterized and done for the year also. It is a lot of work for one day. I need rest!  Too bad that just never seems to happen during the week or on the weekend.  What is up with that?  I think I need to adjust my priorities don't you think?

These are some pictures that I snapped Sunday moving our houseboat up river for the winter. The leaves were at peak last weekend but we weren't there. I still think that they look gorgeous even though not as bright as last week.  It was a great fall weekend in Lansing and everyone got winterized and moved without incident. Everyone have a great week! Gotta love pictures of the historic "Lansing Bridge". Nothing prettier than that! Happy Monday!**click on pics to see bigger view***

This is such a cute picture of you two at the BBQ and I am so glad to have known you guys for like forever. What fun we have had. What ever happened to our big get rich "boobie bumper"? Yeah I know. Took too much money to get a patent and etc., etc., etc. Oh well. I think we all do okay without being famous for them. Enjoy spending time with you guys at the river, and I'm so glad that we stuck to our story and still tell Helen that we did not climb the "rubber dolphin". Yep, I don't think she believes us at all. Oh well. Guess sometimes she isn't as guillable as we think. Hope you two enjoy your anniversary weekend at the river, and may you have many more to share with all of us your family and river family/friends. Love you both! Enjoy your day and extended weekend!

Today is my sister in law Helen's birthday. I love this gal. We have been friends for a very long time, and we truly have a blast with each other. Thank goodness we can spend a lot of time together because we spend literally EVERY weekend together April through October at the river on our houseboats. We do crazy stuff, we cook awesome food, and we just hang out and talk. And in the off months or when we don't see each other, my car just seems to turn down her road when I am heading home from shopping. Even when Bruce has just waxed it and done the wheels. Right Helen? Oh well he washed it again quick when I got home. He knew I had to have my fix of "Hellie"! I love you Helen Hildegard like a sister and I know that we are having an awesome day moving and winterizing our boats for the season on your birthday! May we have many more river summers to celebrate birthdays and anniversaries with our friends and family. Oh, and this winter when you are having th...

Today you turn 47. Yep I know both of us have been calling you that all year practically because lets face it..... We drink too much and forget many things! (wasn't that funny?!) No, on a serious note I love you like crazy and enjoy you so very much (well most of the time). I personally think you have gotten better with age, and I can't wait to spend many more birthdays with you. Too bad on yours this year you will be at the river and "working" on stuff, but any weekend at the houseboat usually turns out to be a good weekend! (RIGHT? wink wink)  So Happy Birthday Honey! I love you and will try and make your river birthday weekend memorable.  And not by falling in the river or doing anything stupid.  Aren't most weekends when we celebrate at the river usually memorable? Note the hair hat in the picture above! And maybe I should get you a cake with 47 candles on it since we have no electricity. WOOHOO! We can celebrate in the dark! And it might warm the place up!!!...

We are starting what may end up being a new family tradition for our immediate family this Christmas. We always celebrate with our kids on Christmas Eve and open presents so not much will change. But on Christmas morning this year instead of heading to my brother Rick's to spend the day playing pool and just hanging out with my brothers families, we will be piling 8 of us into Mom & Dad O's van and heading to Kansas City. I am so very excited. The plaza is just gorgeous all decorated for the holidays and it will so make my Christmas to be able to spend it with our children there. I will miss the "old" Christmas tradition somewhat, but it just hasn't been the same for me since 1999 when my Mom passed away. She really loved Christmas at the old house! So time for some new family traditions and I cannot wait for Cole, Ashley, and Taylor (and whichever friend Ty decides to take with) to see KC on Christmas . We will have so much fun and I really am hoping ...

This is Ashley's cheesecake from Saturday nights dinner that she decorated with some caramel topping and chocolate that I had. I think she bought the cheesecake (sorry Ash if you did make it-can't recall!) It was yummy. They picked up some beef shoulder tenders from Fareway Saturday and so as usual we had to have a nice spread of food for dinner Saturday night. It was awesome. It is nice to be spending some time at home on the weekends so we get to see the "kids" more often and hang out with them. I wonder when we will lose that "cool to hang out with" status? Does it happen at 50, 60, 70? I really don't know. We still spend a lot of time with Mom and Dad Odneal and enjoy it, but we are all at our houseboats together every weekend and pretty much have to see each other all the time. Maybe they do still enjoy us because we are pretty much gone every weekend in the summer? Maybe they miss us? Nope, I think they really miss my cooking and food....

Okay I am the worst picture taker of myself always, but for some stupid reason I always try when I have a new "do" I want to blog about. So today I went and got my hair "darker" like my roots for winter. And decided I was getting bored and might cut it all off (Bruce would not like that), so I got bangs. Yep I really liked it the way my stylist did it but I can guarantee everyone it will not look as good when I do it tomorrow morning. Or ever again for that matter. She is awesome. Kudos to Julie at Visions Salon in Fairbank. You rock! And of course I snapped these a few hours after I got home and had changed to my sweats so maybe she wouldn't want any kudos! Oh well. Sometimes you just have to change things up. When I pulled in the driveway and opened up the garage Bruce came out and asked who was driving his wifes car. I think he might need some time to get used to me being dark haired and bangs again. Oh well. At least he noticed. Sometimes he d...

Tonight Wapsie played N. Linn at home. Tyler had an excellent game. And we won 62-7. Tyler had his first two (yep I said 2) varsity touchdowns tonight, 101 yards rushing, was in on 11 tackles with 5 on his own (not comfirmed stats), and just basically got to play all 4 quarters and did an excellent job. Hopefully we will see him playing alot for the last two games against Turkey Valley and Starmont. Should be some exciting last two regular season games. Let's go Wapsie Valley in the post season! And it was nice to get to see so many JV players get to get some play time in at home. You all did great. And hopefully our injured players will be back strong for next week!***Again Ty is #36-and once again my batteries died way too early!  Damn!

So here are my flowers for our 20th from Bruce that were delivered on September 29th. Still look pretty excellent, don't they? I plucked out a few of the roses that were wilted before I snapped this picture yesterday, but seriously this bouquet still looks great. I use to get so mad at Bruce for wasting money on ordering me flowers. I told him to at least order a plant so that I could keep it forever. So he switched to that, and suddenly I ended up with too many plants in the house. I told him to NOT order any more anything for me and waste money. Well he pretty much has stuck to my wishes for quite a long time. Once in a while a bouquet would show up for special occasions but not often enough to make me mad. Yes ladies, I think flowers regularly is overkill! Make me dinner one night or fold a load of laundry. Not that means something! But anyway, I have no idea where I was going with this but everyone have a great Friday and weekend. And savor the flower bouquets th...

Last Friday night WV played at Maquoketa Valley. Our JV had the first points scored on them this season in the opening quarter. We were actually behind 8-0. That doesn't happen to this team. But our boys ended up getting it together after that first other team score, and won 54-8. Ty had 3 touchdowns (woo hoo!) but got credit for a 4th that wasn't his. Sorry Ethan! I'm sorry to report that our varsity boys had their first loss of the season. I think they must have not been prepared and maybe thought that it wouldn't be a tough game. At least that is what it looked like. Hopefully they can shake that first loss off and get a big win this week to get their confidence back. I really hate the end of the summer, but I do love football season and watching Ty and his classmates play ball. And do they know football. That is one talented class of athletes in the class of 2013! Cannot wait to watch your junior and senior years. Go WV Warriors! *****Ty is #32 on JV and #36 for ...

While I was on my cleaning frenzy all weekend long I finally tackled the walk in closet on Sunday. I got rid of clothes that hadn't been worn in forever, moved stuff around to make more room, and re-organized all of the shelves and such. I even put Bruce his own "work clothes" shelf that he can just grab his clothes in the mornings after showering from the closet shelf instead of having to come back into the bedroom and wake me up. So far it is working great. Of course I took Monday off so I don't think anything would have bothered me knowing that I didn't have to get up for anything. And what a great day off I had. I took Bruce lunch, cleaned some upstairs, took recycling to the city shed, and baked monster cookies and banana/blueberry muffins and bread. I'd say my day off was more productive than it should have been, but I had fun. Hope everyone has a great week. I know I am looking forward to work so I don't have to work so hard! Have a great T...

We ran to town Saturday morning and I wanted to hit up Goodwill so Bruce dropped me there while he went and got materials he needed at Menards. I picked up all of these finds for $15.50. Oh, I guess one jar is missing because I had already put it in our bathroom full of Q-tips. The picure is of a dock and beach and will be perfect in our extra bedroom. And the "antique" office chair for $8 is much sturdier than any other we have ever had and cleaned up great. I had fun browsing for stuff since I had not done that in a long, long time. I could have spent a lot more time searching for "goodies", but Bruce came and rescued my bank account. I ended up taking Monday off (I'm hoping my co-worker still loves me), so I am taking Bruce lunch and spending the rest of the day doing whatever I feel like. Everyone have a great Monday! I conquered the downstairs Sunday so maybe I will try my hand at the upstairs today. Or maybe I will just enjoy my much needed mental...

So for supper during the Iowa game I made homemade pizza for my "boys". It was awesome. These pictures don't do it justice, but Ty and some of his buddies came back tonight and asked to take it to eat at another buddies house and I was happy to send it with them. I hope they thought it was as great as we all did. Of course they all are HS football players, so I'm guessing they thought it was divine! We will see if I get any shout outs from them on FB for giving it to them. Oh and the pineapple... well Kwik Star sells them and it looked yummy. I will let you know tomorrow morning when we have it with our omelets, toast, and bloody mary's. Have a great Sunday!

I know that I don't get a ton of traffic on my blog but I'm hoping someone can help me out with this. I used to think it was a "cupie doll" until I googled that and found out it certainly isn't. My Mom had this for many years (as far as I know) and I ended up with it, and am just curious what it is called. I currently have it sitting on our dresser but I'd just like to know what to call it. I doubt I would ever get rid of it (unless of course it is worth a ton of money), but it has been driving me crazy that I cannot find anything like it on ebay or anywhere. And no, I haven't spent a ton of time searching but my curiosity is killing me. So family and stopper by people please leave me a comment if you have any idea what it is. Everyone have a good weekend. I am looking forward to getting some work done at home this weekend since our houseboat is without power due to the flooding. Enjoy the fall football weather!