And the winner is..........

The winner of my contest is The Happy Cottage Quilter!  She was the first one to comment and she guessed correctly, I am the first gal on the left hand side front row.  Some of the others guessed the same one but she was the first so a Christmas Table Topper will be going her way as soon as I decide on the colors I want to use.  Thanks for entering!

You know, I remember that day like it was yesterday.  Now don't ask me what I had for breakfast this morning as I can't remember but I can remember that day.  Notice how my hand is kind of on my hip with my wrist bent a little?  I remember doing that and the photographer snapped the picture and I was totally mortified that he did while I had my hand that way.  I was sure the whole school would laugh and carry on that I was so dumb to do that.  Well, not one noticed and I let it be my secret until today.  ha!  Isn't it interesting the things that go through a youngsters mind.  You never know what they are thinking.

I loved our little school that I went to up to 8th grade.  It was in walking distance of our home and I could walk home for lunch and not have to eat the hot lunch prepared for the students.  Thinking back I know they did the best they could with what they had to work with at the time.  When I saw what was offered at my son's school for lunch I was surprised.  Things like salad and even pizza!  I thought that was amazing.  Now the schools are much more health conscience due to all of the childhood obesity which is on the rise.

Which brings me to another rant, which if you read my blog you know I tend to get on one every so often.  I know I have gotten onto this one before but this morning on the news they talked about how many hours per day that our young people are spending on the computer, texting, television, Ipods and playing things like DS.

It is outrageous!  AND then I see the ads on televison reminding children to be sure to play outside at least an hour a day.  An hour?!  What has happened to a big segment of our youth? Think about all the hours and hours we spent as children playing in the snow in the wintertime, just coming in for a pair of dry mittens or for lunch?  Or the summertime when we were out from after breakfast until lunch and then out until dinner time and then out even after dark playing hide and seek and now they have to be reminded to go out and play for an hour?  Good  grief!

What have we done to our children to allow this to happen?  From all of your blogs I see that your children aren't in this catagory thank goodness.  I see good healthy kids playing and working outside,  riding their horses, doing chores, running, swimming, playing sports, doing the things kids should be doing.  Yesterday my two grands came over and went sliding on Grampa's hill.  It is a great hill and they had a blast.  A couple of the other neighborhood kids were there too and the four of them just had the best time.  I was bundled up but not enough to go down the hill and end up in a pile of snow as I had jeans on and no snowpants but they more then made up for it going down, walking back up and going down again. Where was my camera you ask?  On the kitchen counter. Sigh.... Anywho, I think I got that out of my system.  For now.

All is 'stable' pun intended, on the homefront.  Nick is doing well without his stitches and bandages.  I'm glad it's been a little milder as his shaved leg still hasn't grown much hair.  Hand walking starts Tuesday.  Skipper has not had any more episodes and feet seem to be okay so far.  Little Bud got himself hung up in some deep snow and the stable owner found him with his feet in the air!  Did I tell you this already?  Evidently he wanted to roll outside and got into deeper snow then he should have and got stuck!  This happened last year to my friend Ann's horse and he had to be shoveled out so that he could get out!  Finally after some hooping and hollering from the stable owner to encourage him he got himself out.  What next??!!

Guess that's it for today.  I know lots of you are having bad weather so I hope you stay safe and dry.  Keep the country of Haiti in your prayers, some things are getting better but they have a long, long way to go.  It was good to see that gigantic medical ship arrive there yesterday.  A young man and his wife from our church support a small orphanage there and he has gone over and everyone survived the quake.  He and a friend were on their way to get supplies when the big aftershock hit so they had to go back but hopefully they will be able to get out today for food and supplies.