THE VERSATILE BLOGGER AWARD

  The Rules:
 1. Add the award to your blog. 
2. Thank the blogger who gave it to you.
3. Mention seven random things about yourself. (see below)
4. List the rules
.5.Award to 15 bloggers
6. Inform each of those 15 bloggers by leaving a comment on their blog. 

The lovely April of April's Homemaking has honored me with The Versatile Blogger award.  Thanks April!   


So here's seven random things about me:  


1.  I'm the youngest of four girls.  Being surrounded by all that femininity made me a rather prissy little girl and my nickname growing up was Lady Jane.  My mother claims I'm the only child she ever saw that could play all day making mud pies and not get dirty.


2.  I have a slight German accent that I wasn't aware of until I left home and everybody  (and I mean everybody) asked me what country I was from.

3.  I'm a crazy cat lady and I feed all the neighborhood strays.  Last year we  fed about two dozen, but this year thankfully we only have about six.  Here's a picture of Mama Cat  (yeah I name them too).  Cute huh?  

Lest you worry about them in our cold winters, the neighbor keeps his garage open for them and I built shelters for them.  They are the most spoiled strays anywhere.  Just recently I ran out of the expensive brand of food I was feeding them and bought some unbranded kind from the local grocers.  They won't eat it!   I'd love to catch them and adopt them, unfortunately they are just too skittish and fast to catch.  They seem pretty happy being wild.


4.  The hardest thing I ever did in life is care for my father as he died.  


5.  I don't like chocolate, bacon, ice cream and cheese (unless it's in a casserole or on something Mexican).  Should be easy to stay on a diet right?  Unfortunately I love potato chips and spice cake with a thick layer of buttercream frosting.  I also don't like coffee unless it has a lot of cream and sugar, but I love the smell.  And I don't like tea either, but I love to make it properly and serve it to others.


6.  I grew up in a port town that was home to The Great Lakes Fleet.  When I was a baby one of the ships sank (the Carl D. Bradley).  My uncle Elmer Fleming was one of the only two survivors.  He was offered the job of captain on another ship (the Cedarville) but turned it down.  It sank too.  As a result many of my friends were fatherless.  And those who did have fathers, sailed and were gone for long periods of time.  So my perception of  fathers and families is perhaps a little different than most  Shows like Father Knows Best and Leave it to Beaver seemed very foreign to me growing up.


7.  Many of you have read my post about having the German measles when I was fifteen.  The rest of the story is that I came as close to death as anyone can get without actually dieing.  The doctors couldn't find my pulse for fifteen minutes and when they took my red blood count they couldn't find any red blood cells.  In other words there was an infection through my entire body and I was in a coma for several days.  Sometime during that period, I had a near death experience.  I can tell  you death is nothing to fear if you believe in Our Savior.  As a result I don't really fear anything.  Which may come across as being frivolous to some.  I just don't take this life too seriously.  


Now comes the hard part; selecting others to award.  Since I only have a few followers and some of them have private blogs and others have mentioned that they don't care to participate in these sort of things,  and several others that seem to busy at the moment, I'm going to break the rules and just give it to five.


Matty at Lazy Bee Farm, who has been my blogging pal and confidant for several years.


Sandy at And He Shall Direct My Paths, who has been a source of inspiration for several years also.


Andrea at Buttercups and Bees who remind me of the gals I knew back home.


Delisa at Dances with Yarn, a real southern lady that always has the most beautiful pictures and wonderful stories. 


And last but not least, Rainey, at Flower Lady's Musings whose beautiful gardens are always a joy to behold.

PS:  We are finally getting our winter. Look at the beauty I awoke to this morning!