Wordless Wednesday-Relics

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'58 Bel Air

Not sure about this one:  maybe a Ford?  I'll have

to go back and see what it is.

Wilson?

Luna Moth

Waiting for nightfall:


Luna adult moths only live a week and they don't eat.  Their purpose in life is to mate and lay eggs for the future generations.  He/she is very colorful and pretty.  Here is a video about their life cycle:

Klompen

Cat in klompen

World's largest klompen

Wordless Wednesday-Wooden Shoes

"Wooden" you like a pair of Dutch shoes?  


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The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler

I watched "The Courageous Heart of Irena Sendler" last night.  What a wonderful, heroic woman!  What an inspiration she is!  I loved the movie.  I had never heard of her before.  


During World War II, Irena Sendler worked for a unit of the Polish underground, Zegota, which was formed to help Jewish children in hiding. As a health worker, Sendler had access to the Warsaw Ghetto. In 1942 and 1943, she led some 2,500 children—twice as many people as Oskar Schindler—out of the ghetto to safe hiding places, the Jewish Virtual Library explains.

Dubbed the “Female Schindler,” Sendler saved babies and children while wearing a Star of David armband to show solidarity with her Jewish protectorates, wrote the Daily Telegraph in its obituary of Sendler. She was technically a welfare worker, distributing medicine and supplies in the Warsaw Ghetto, but she simultaneously “formulated extraordinary schemes to spirit children to safety,” according to the Daily Telegraph.

You can read more about Irena here.  

Also here is the story of Life in a Jar:  

Students from rural Kansas discover a Catholic woman who saved Jewish children. Few had heard of Irena Sendlerowa in 1999. Now after 250 presentations of Life in a Jar, a web site with huge usage and world-wide media attention, Irena is known to the world. How did this beautiful story develop? Read below for the answers.

In the fall of 1999, a rural Kansas teacher encouraged four students to work on a year-long National History Day project which would, among other things, extend the boundaries of the classroom to families in the community, contribute to history learning, teach respect and tolerance, and meet our classroom motto, “He who changes one person, changes the world entire.”

Three ninth graders, Megan Stewart, Elizabeth Cambers, and Jessica Shelton, and an eleventh grader, Sabrina Coons, accepted the challenge and decided to enter their project in the National History Day program (Eventually a number of other male and female students were added to the project). The teacher showed them a short clipping from a March 1994 issue of News and World Report, which said, "Irena Sendler saved 2,500 children from the Warsaw Ghetto in 1942-43." He told the girls the article might be a typographical error, since he had not heard of this woman or story. The students began their research and looked for primary and secondary sources throughout the year.

Wordless Wednesday-High Heels

Comfortable?  Yes!

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Fun Monday

Jil at The Adventures of Lil Mouse is the hostess this week.  "Today’s Fun Monday Topic: Strange Dreams. Do you have any dreams, particularly recurrent ones that you feel no one else has? Or, just tell us about an odd dream you had as a kid."

I have a recurring dream that probably other folks have had but it is indeed strange to me.  I will be looking for a bathroom and I am usually in a big old mansion and the bathrooms are very weird.  They are also very disgusting and dirty and overflowing.  But the weirdest bathrooms are not really toilets. They will be chairs and not have any plumbing.  I sit on these chairs and think "how can I go on a chair?" And they are never private.  Somebody always comes and interrupts me and I can never go!  It's hilarious since it's only a dream but it wouldn't be if it were real life.  I also carry this dream to many other buildings too.  There will be schools and hotels and shopping malls.  Public bathrooms with tons of toilets (all crappy)  and open to everyone with no doors.  I search and I search and no one helps me and I think I've finally found a private spot, but no!  The ones without plumbing are the worst!  Can you imagine?  I hope not.

Go visit LilMouse for more fun dreams!

Wordless Wednesday-Outstanding

This man presented this girl with a scholarship.  
She received The Mary Ellershaw Heckendorn Outstanding Student Mother Award

Outside of the historical Holmberg Hall.  This girl is outstanding.  Really.

For more Wordless Wednesday click here.

Chicken Breasts in Lime Teriyaki

Growing up I never would have even tasted the ingredients below.  It's funny how your taste changes so dramatically.  I absolutely love ingredients like these now and I love trying new recipes.  I love experimenting and trying to find new ways to cook chicken and salmon especially.  I think I could eat salmon every day!

Here's a recipe for chicken that I tried and found to be delicious.  

1/2 cup soy sauce

1/4 cup dry sherry (I did not have this on hand so I used chicken stock)

1 shallot or green onion, white and green parts, minced

Grated zest of 1 lime

3 tablespoons freshly squeezed lime juice

2 tablespoons minced fresh ginger

2 tablespoons brown sugar

1/4 teaspoon pepper

4 chicken breast halves (about 2 pounds)  (I used boneless chicken breasts)

In medium baking dish, combine all ingredients except chicken.  Add chicken, cover, and refrigerate 3 to 4 hours, turning chicken occasionally.

I used a grill pan to cook the chicken.  You can serve this with rice and a side dish of steamed broccoli.  

From Kitten

A nice bit of sunshine for me!  Thanks to Kitten.

Earth Hour

Untitled from Junebug57 on Vimeo.

Four Wheeling Heaven

With me driving my own four-wheeler, I didn't get as many photos as I would have liked.  It was impossible to get any action shots or riding trails.  A couple of my friends will have some action shots that I can borrow later.  Here my hubby and I are at Little Missouri Falls.  This day turned out to be beautiful and sunny in the afternoon.
This lake was beautiful and big.  There is a fisherman and his dog that pulled up when we were eating our lunch.  I have some more shots of him later.  That dog was a real fisher!  
The fog was thick this morning as we rode.  It started to burn off in a few hours.
A little rain must fall even on my lens.  oops!  This is Sugar Creek overlook.
This was a small cave.  The water flowing in these creeks was extremely cold.  But it made some beautiful music as we rode along.  There were great big ferns growing and little wild flowers everywhere.  We could even tell the direction north by the moss growing on the trees.  

I Wear My Helmet!

It was pretty cold this day but we had the best time.  It's not too hard to dress warmly in layers and shed them when it warms up.  This is at the top of an area called Sugar Creek overlook.  We rode for miles and miles.  I honestly can say that I have never in my life had this much fun.  I mean outdoors, wind on your face, sailing along the road, climbing up mountains, eating a packed lunch outdoors, crossing creeks, and being with good friends, what more could you ask?  It's like being a kid again having outdoor adventures.  Fresh air is not highly overrated.  It's priceless.  

Greetings from Arkansas

An old rock tower at the top of the mountain.  (and Pamela, I do wear my helmet when riding my ATV)  :D

Wordless Wednesday-On Fire

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(We're back from trip and I will post photos soon.)

Spring Break

We're headed for Arkansas tomorrow for spring break.  It will be so good to get away with some friends.  We'll be staying in three bedroom/three bath cabins that have fireplaces, hot tubs, and grills.  Also all the amenities of home to use.  We most likely will be eating out every evening, but we might choose to grill sometime.  There is a lake and marina.  We will be taking our four wheelers out every day.  We won't be far from Crater of Diamond State Park.  I have so over packed but we don't know what weather to expect and I have plenty of room in our Tundra.  We'll return next week and I will post photos and videos.  

Income Tax

Here begins my little rant:

I always put off rounding up my income tax information to take to the CPA because we always have to pay.  I avoid it as long as possible. I don't mind paying the government for their job of governing and the freedoms we enjoy in this country.  

BUT...

I don't like the idea of redistributing my wealth to bailout Wall Street and whatever else the government tacks on to it.  My husband and I work hard for our money and I don't mind sharing with the poor and needy, but I don't enjoy paying for unnecessary spending and funding people who buy houses above their means and expect the government to bail them out.  (or banks that were predators in lending)

We are very fortunate to have our house paid off.  Our vehicles are paid in full.  We do not have credit card debt.  Two of our children are in college and that is paid in full.  Our oldest daughter has graduated from private college and that is paid in full.  We are very fortunate to be in this position.  

When I think of the term "paid in full", I must tell you that I am reminded of our salvation which is paid in full.  I also must admit that everything we have been given is from God.  

Deuteronomy 8:18 NIV
But remember the LORD your God, for it is he who gives you the ability to produce wealth, and so confirms his covenant, which he swore to your forefathers, as it is today.

So there you have it.  A political and religious post all in one!  What is the world coming to?  It makes me wonder how far down the road to socialism is the United States?  We may find our tax bracket increasing to 39.6% with the Obama administration this year.  We already pay 5.7% state income tax in Oklahoma.  We also pay 9.25% sales tax on most everything we buy, including groceries.  Our gasoline is taxed at a rate I don't even know.  We give at least 10% of our money to the church and a few charities.  We also pay for all of our own health insurance and health care.  We can't even deduct that 100%.  We find ourselves in the middle where we make too much to get any breaks or tax credits and not enough to get any breaks or loopholes like the rich.    Adding together federal and state and contributions we get about 44.7% left for ourselves.  I hope that President Obama does not retroactively take back our tax cuts (?) from the last few years we supposedly received from the Bush administration.  I read in Obama's programs listed before he was elected that he intended on asking Americans to give back those tax cuts.  If he is asking, then I guess I will just say "no."  

Does anyone understand why everyone paying the same percentage of their income on taxes wouldn't work?  Just a flat rate for everyone?  

I apologize for the soap box.  I will now step off it.

Lunch with Swampy

What a great delight to get to meet and visit with Swampy and her Little Miss P.  We had lunch together at Frank and Lola's restaurant.
This is the very first time I have been able to meet another blogger.  I tried to find a way to meet Bossy but it didn't work out.  I must tell you that after 1-1/2 years of reading Swampy's blog and her comments to others and me, I felt completely at ease.  It was like meeting someone you already knew to some degree.  She made me feel very welcome and we visited and had lunch together with Little Miss P.  I hope she enjoyed it as much as I did.  It certainly made my day!  It's such a small world after all.  When you think of all the people that are connected to other people, really we are just degrees away from knowing many people.  

Something funny that we have in common is my nickname and her dog's name, Junebug.  My middle name is June and my dad always called me Junebug.  My mother's middle name is June also, but at least she was born in June.  I passed the middle name on to my oldest daughter too.  

Now isn't everyone envious that I was able to meet Swampy?  If you noticed that road trip she made recently I think half the country could have met her!  (ha ha)  I count myself lucky and can't wait to see her again someday.

Super Heroes Unite!

My Super Hero self.  You can make your own at The Hero Factory.

Wordless Wednesday-Like Mother, Like Daughter

Like Mother, Like Daughter

Like Grandmother, Like Granddaughters

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P.S.  I will tell you about the two beautiful people I met yesterday.  You'll recognize them too.  It was a wonderful day!