I Just Have to Say It!

Well, I'm not happy about what they call the "new normal"! I have been staying in every since they closed schools here in West Virginia. I haven't even been counting the days, so I have no idea how many days it's been.  I will say though that I absolutely love being able to stay home. The rush of live was wearing me down.  Run here to get this and run there to get that.  I live a good 30 minutes from any stores so just going to the store would have me out for a few hours.  There seemed to always be something that I needed to do.  Now since there has been a stay at home order I've done just that.  Stayed home!  

My husband is considered an essential employee so he has been going to work.  There are usually only about 2 other people and sometimes just 1 other person that are in the office. They work in their own offices. I feel alright with this. This week though his office is trying to reopen. Half the staff will work Monday and Tuesday. Everyone works from home on Wednesday and the other half works in the office Thursday and Friday. Everyone works from home on the days they are not in the office.  Since this all began I have been making him spray his shoes with Lysol before he comes in the house.  I also have him put his clothes in a designated basket in the laundry room.  Usually I wash his clothes on Sunday.  I feel that is safer to do it that way.  I've always washed his clothes alone and not with ours so that is nothing different. 

I've been ordering our groceries online and my husband picks them up on his way home from work. My first order I got most everything I ordered. My second time ordering I only got about half of what I ordered. My husband has one of the N95 masks. I think he already had it from where he has been working on a Bronco. I haven't asked. Maybe his work gave it to him. I'm not sure. lol  When he gets home with the groceries we ordered he wipes them down with wipes before we bring them into the house.  We throw the bags they came in away.  For some reason it is harder for me to figure out what to order.  I'm trying to order what we need and also what we might need in a week that will be safe to eat later.  

My Young Man is a Freshman in High School this year.  He was lucky that the classes he was taking at the time they closed the schools down he didn't have a lot of hard classes at that time.  If this had happened the beginning of the school year it would have been more difficult I suppose.  His last semester he had gym class so there isn't any homework to do with that.  He also was taking piano class.  I so hate it that he isn't learning how to play the piano.  He was doing so well with it too.  We tried the private lessons last year.  The guy we got would be late or not show up at all.  I ended up after 4 months and only about 3 lessons in that 4 months telling the guy we didn't want to do it no longer.  He also was taking Algebra.  His teacher gives him his assignment online.  She usually gives them a week to do it.  He is such a responsible young man in that he does his homework as soon as he gets it so he can spend the rest of his time doing what he wants to do.  His last class is Science.  His teacher also gives him his assignment online and gives them a few days to do it.  He was doing really well with his classes before school shut down and he's still doing really well with it being shut down.  He should have straight A's and possibly a high B in one class for the end of the year.  

Where I'm a breast cancer survivor of 8 years they say that I am of a higher risk of getting this nasty virus. I almost think that I may have already had at the end of February. All at once I started coughing and just couldn't stop coughing.  It was a deep and violent cough.  It felt like my ribs and sides were going to explode from how violent the cough was.  My husband told me to go to the doctor.  I called my doctor early in the morning and they brought me in later that day.  I was tested for the flu which to my surprise came back positive for the Flu A.  The lab technician that performed my flu test was surprised at how fast my results showed up on the test strip in less than a minute.  She quickly handed me a mask and told me I had to wear it to protect the staff.  I had a low grade fever, violent cough, cold chills, and just generally didn't feel well.  I was given the medicine for the flu and a cough syrup and a cough pill.  A day later or so I started noticing that I would get short of breath just walking to the bathroom.  I also would get dizzy when I would walk to the kitchen.  There was another thing that I noticed was that nothing I drank tasted right.  I couldn't drink anything with ice anymore either.  I still can't make tea to taste right to me even now.  It was really hard to get over it and I still get winded if I do too much. Now that the medical professionals know a little more about this nasty virus I've heard them say that some people can be positive for the virus and also the strep or pneumonia.  I'd say you could have the flu and also this nasty virus as well.  It had been a good 15 years since I had had the flu.  There are a lot of people in my area that think they had this nasty virus as well.  The ones I've talked to didn't go to the doctor for medicine but had similar symptoms as mine.  If I did have it my husband and son didn't get whatever it was that I had. It took me a good month before the cough ended.  I cancelled a lot of my doctor appointments for my cancer checks because I didn't want to give them whatever it was that I had.  

I absolutely hate how we keep being told we will have to get used to this new normal.  Why should we have to get used to it?  I'll write more later.  For now let's just say I'm not happy about what all is going on even though I am enjoying my down time.  

Angela

Happy Birthday Mom!

Today my mom is celebrating her 2nd birthday in Heaven.  Happy Birthday Mom!  I love and miss you like crazy! 

à tout à l'heure

Angela

First Day of School 2018

I hated to see My Young Man have to start school so early this year.  I sure miss having him hanging around with me this summer.  He sure has grown up on me.  Not only in age, but in height!  Around April I noticed he was shoulder to shoulder with me, but not as tall as me.  By August he is the same height as me!  If he keeps growing at the rate that he has been he will be taller than his dad.  

Angela

I'm Back!

I have been thinking a lot about blogging again.  I do miss it.  I'm going to make a better attempt at trying to at least put up something once a month if not once a week.  A lot of the blogs that I follow are no longer blogging from what I can tell.  I think fb consumed many of us.  I really don't like how fb works.  I get tired of seeing the same posts that friends in common share at the same time.  I still love seeing some corgi fb posts though.  I've also been working very hard on my family tree.  I love genealogy too much!  I've found a lot of distant cousins that are also working on their family lines.  We share information and have more complete trees that way. 

Here's a little update on a few things that have happened since I last blogged.  My young lady is now a married lady.  My young man is now a teenager.  My corgi, Jazz, is still corging along.  I'm still married to one of the best gifts that God has given me.  I recently lost my mom to copd.  I'm heartbroken over this and I might share more later.  If you followed me and know of the breast cancer I had 6 years ago then you'll be happy to know that I'm still doing great.  I did my 5 years on tamoxifen and so far every test my doctor put me through the past few months came back negative for any cancer in my body.  Praise the Lord!  My doctor put me through CT Scans, PET Scans, Bone Scans and I even had to have a MRI.  Everything came back negative.  I might share more about that at some point too.  Life has really changed a lot for me as you can tell from the updates.  It is different not having your children all living at home.  And now I have to get used to another new normal of not having my mom who was also my best friend to share my ups and downs with.  God is helping me get through it all.

I'll share more later.  I have been thinking of some posts that I want to do and I'm gathering information for that.  

Trail Mix

Angela

Dancing with the Stars ~ Part 2

I can not believe that I forgot to put these pictures up!  I guess I'll go ahead and put them up now.  A few months ago my Little Man and I went to see Dancing with the Stars when they were in our area.  We had a great time!  Here is a few more pictures that I took that night.

Angela

Where does the time go?

Time is flying by so fast lately that it feels like my head is spinning.  It does not seem like it should be March yet with Easter right around the corner.  I wish time would slow down some so I could catch my breath.  I can't believe it's been a few months since I've last posted anything on my blog.  Hopefully things will slow down some and I will be more regular with my blogging.  

Angela

Dancing with the Stars ~ Part 1

A lovely lady that works with my husband had 2 tickets to the Dancing with the Stars tour in Charleston for last night that she wasn't able to attend.  She offered them to my husband for me to go.  I was thrilled to hear this and quickly said yes.  My Young Lady didn't want to go.  She thinks she too old or something, but you Little Man wanted to go so I took him instead.  We had a great time! 

The seats were on the main floor row L close to the middle.  I am thrilled my pictures turned out really good because we weren't allowed to use flash.

I think I did a pretty good job at getting some pretty good pictures!  :)

We have been watching Dancing with the Stars pretty much from the beginning.  I was happy to see that the dancers performed at 100% just like they do on the show for television.  They put on a fantastic show last night.

Rumor Willis was supposed to dance with them last night, but she has done something to her foot and was unable to dance.  I was surprised to hear that she was going to sing during last night's show!

I was lucky to get the great shots that I got because this was my view if I sat straight in my seat!  I about died when this big bald old man sat down in front of me and I couldn't see.  He didn't move the entire show.  I had to look from one side to the other side of his head to see the dances.  And I'm pretty tall myself that I couldn't see over him....  All in all though we had a great time!  I have more pictures and hopefully a video or two that I'll be able to upload.  The first video I tried said it was too large, so we'll see.

Angela

Where have I been? What am I doing?

The answer to the question where have I been as it appears I've quit blogging is I've been busy with every day life.  Most are aware that 3 years ago I was diagnosed with breast cancer.  I'm still doing fine!  Praise the Lord!  But, I have a lot of doctor's appointments because of that diagnosis.  I also have to take my kids to the dentist to get their teeth cleaned and to the eye doctor to get their eyes checked.  That takes up a lot of my time.  I'm also now having to take my mom to a doctor about her COPD.  I finally talked her into seeing a pulmonary doctor who in turn did a lot of testing.  They did find a small nodule on her right lung which resulted in her needing to have a PET Scan.  That came back fine!  Praise the Lord!  Mom has been smoking since the age of 11.... Mom is trying to quit smoking so please say some prayers for her that she can quit.  The odd thing about her smoking is I'm allergic to it.  My allergy doctor told her back when I was around 11 that she needed to quit for me, but she couldn't do it.  


Back in December I was having one of my checkups about the cancer and my doctor told me the results of an ultrasound I had on my legs.  I had 6 bad veins in my legs.  3 veins in each leg that need to have an outpatient type of surgery.  I started having the vein procedures in February.  Because of the bad weather it put me behind, but I finally finished that up as well.  I was so shocked by how quickly my legs felt better after having the first vein fixed.  I actually lost an entire inch off of my ankles because of this procedure!  

I've also gotten back into my genealogy.  My husband made the mistake of upgrading my Family Tree program as a Christmas gift this past year. With that came a free 3 months to Ancestry.  I have searched and searched day and night.  I am totally and completely obsessed with finding information.  I have added over 2,000 people to my tree!  Back in the old days people had 10 kids and if the wife died the man would remarry a much younger woman and have 10 more kids with her until she died and he would remarry and have more kids!

Angela  

Finally! She's driving!

My Young Lady is finally driving!  She has fought with us tooth and nail over it because she just does not want to drive.  I have no idea why she is like this as I have been driving since I was 12!  I loved the freedom it gave me to drive when I was 16.  Back then you had to wait until you were 16 before you could drive.  Now, you can get your learner's permit at the age of 15.  She wasn't interested in driving at the age of 15 and to be honest I think 15 is just too young for kids to be driving a vehicle on the road.  I did, however, let her drive my old truck around in our hay field to prepare her for driving which that is how I drove when I was 12. 

We basically had to make her get her learner's permit last summer.  She has had that permit since August and still would not drive until this past Sunday.  My husband's 2002 Ford Focus is having some problems so he finally went and bought this cute Ford Focus he has had his eye on for 4 months.  So Sunday after church he asked me to ride in the back.  I knew something was up!  He drove us to a parking lot and he got out and made her drive!  It had to be done!  After she realized how easy it was to drive it she was alright with her driving lessons she had that day.  Notice I said driving "lessons"!  After she drove around in a parking lot to get the feel of the car he drove us to a park where he had her drive around the park a few times.  Then he drove us to a country road that was a 2 lane road that turned into a 1 lane road.  She did really good.  I just hope that she will continue to drive so she can take her driver's test before she turns 18 in November.  If she don't take her driver's test before then and get her license she will have to retake the learner's test.  In West Virginia they now require the young drivers to drive so many hours before you can take your driver's test. They even have a log that you have to log it all on with dates and times.  

Angela

Blue Rose

Having four visiting family members, the wife was very busy, so I offered to go to the store for her to get some needed items, which included light bulbs, paper towels, trash bags, detergent, and Clorox. So off I went. I scurried around the store, gathered up my goodies, and headed for the checkout counter, only to be blocked in the narrow aisle by a young man who appeared to be about sixteen-years-old. I wasn't in a hurry, so I patiently waited for the boy to realize that I was there. This was when he waved his hands excitedly in the air and declared in a loud voice, "Mommy, I'm over here." It was obvious now, he was mentally challenged, and also startled as he turned and saw me standing so close to him, waiting to squeeze by. His eyes widened and surprise exploded on his face as I said, "Hey Buddy, what's your name?" "My name is Denny and I'm shopping with my mother," he responded proudly. "Wow," I said, "that's a cool name; I wish my name was Denny, but my name is Steve."

"Steve, like Stevarino?" he asked. "Yes," I answered. "How old are you Denny?" "How old am I now, Mommy?" he asked his mother as she slowly came over from the next aisle.. "You're fifteen-years-old Denny; now be a good boy and let the man pass by." I acknowledged her and continued to talk to Denny for several more minutes about summer, bicycles, and school. I watched his brown eyes dance with excitement because he was the center of someone's attention. He then abruptly turned and headed toward the toy section. Denny's mom had a puzzled look on her face and thanked me for taking the time to talk with her son. She told me that most people wouldn't even look at him, much less talk to him. I told her that it was my pleasure and then I said something I have no idea where it came from, other than by the prompting of the Holy Spirit. I told her that there are plenty of red, yellow, and pink roses in God's Garden; however, "Blue Roses" are very rare and should be appreciated for their beauty and distinctiveness. You see, Denny is a Blue Rose and if someone doesn't stop and smell that rose with their heart and touch that rose with their kindness, then they've missed a blessing from God. She was silent for a second, then with a tear in her eye she asked, "Who are you?" Without thinking I said, "Oh, I'm probably just a dandelion but I sure love living in God's garden." She reached out, squeezed my hand, and said, "God bless you!" and then I had tears in my eyes. May I suggest that the next time you see a BLUE ROSE, don't turn your head and walk off. Take the time to smile and say Hello. Why? Because, by the grace of GOD, this mother or father could be you. This could be your child, grandchild, niece, or nephew. What a difference a moment can mean to that person or their family. From an old dandelion! Live simply. Love generously. Care deeply. Speak kindly. Leave the rest to God. "People will forget what you said, People will forget what you did, but people will never forget how you made them feel.

Author Unknown

We were robbed!

This morning my Little Man said it looked like someone stole the metal off of our well across the road. Sure enough someone had stolen it either late last night or early this morning! I can't believe someone would take the time to stop and take a big piece of metal off of a well like that. I hope Timmy doesn't fall in the well because we don't have a collie dog anymore because he wouldn't stay home. Everyone knows collie dogs are the dogs that tell you that Timmy fell in the well! Or if it was Timmy who stole the metal from our well I'd like to shove him in the well and close it up!  

 

The big piece of metal that we had covering the well was really heavy.  I couldn't budge it one time when I tried.  About 10 years ago or so my husband tore down the old well that was just cinderblocks and replaced it with this one that is nicer and sturdy.  The other one was falling apart.  He used the metal from the old well on the new well.  We have lived here a good 18 years and that metal has been on that well all that time! 

They took this off of the metal to steal it.

This is what it looks like inside the well. We do have water in this well, but we don't know if it is good water or not. We haven't had it tested.

My Little Man's reflection in the water of the well. He needs a haircut! I'll get out the scissors tomorrow! Plus it looks like I need to clean the lens on my camera!

Angela

Crumbling Roads

This Winter has been harsh on the roads here in West Virginia.  It has been especially hard on a less than a quarter of a mile of road that is on a small bench with a creek down below it.  There are currently 3 different slips within that less than a quarter of a mile road!  This past weekend it rained pretty hard on Friday.  Saturday we went out to survey the damage and this what we found.

 

This is a new slip although my husband says that it isn't....  A few of the other neighbors also agree with me that it is a new slip.  The road may have been cracking there, but there was not a slip! 

This picture shows just how close the road is to the creek that has a 15 foot drop off down into that creek!

This is the chunk of road that slipped down sometime this past weekend.

This slip above is one that the county has fixed I think 3 different times over the past 6 months.  It just won't hold.  I've blogged about this section of the road before.

It really is hard to tell from this picture just how deep this slip actually is.  Take my word on it you don't want to drive over the end right here!  I personally wouldn't even stand down there on that slip!

Here is another slip that hasn't gotten that bad yet, but it is a bigger slip waiting to happen if you ask me.

This is what this slip looks like below it.  You can see that some of the road has actually fell down onto the side of the hill.

I'm not sure what the county is going to do about this section of the road.  Like I said at the beginning this has been a very harsh Winter on all of the roads in West Virginia.  All we hear is how they don't have the money to fix the roads.  That leads me to believe that it will be a long time before the county will fix this road if at all.  Unfortunately, the second slip is on our property.  We own both sides of the road for a little distance in that area.  One neighbor mentioned to me in passing that she is going to request that they dig out the hillside.  I'm not for that at all, but I didn't tell her that.  It is straight up and down right there.  I should have taken a picture of it!  There is also some huge rocks right there on the side.  Another neighbor told me today that he thinks they probably should close the road before someone gets hurt.  I somewhat agree with him on that.  The only thing is then I can foresee people with 4 wheelers cutting themselves a path through our woods to get up and around this slip.  I don't want that to happen at all. 

I haven't called the county about the slips yet.  I'm not sure if I want to.  If and when this road completely falls into the creek my house will be on a dead end road.  It might be nice to not have any traffic going by my house.  I have a different mindset, I know.  There are a few others reasons I would like to see this road closed, but it is a road that my husband uses to go to work.  It's also my preferred way of going anywhere when I go somewhere because it is only 1 mile of driving on a one lane road.  After that it is 2 lane driving to where ever it is that I'm going.  

Angela

Random Thoughts

Yesterday my husband took us for a ride in the country on our way to Magic Mart.  We drove by a lake that we have taken our boat on.  I happened to look over and I seen something swimming in the lake.  It was a deer!  That deer swam a long way before it got out.  We didn't see it get out and I didn't get a picture of it.  Unfortunately it was just too far away.  I say it was a deer, but 2 years ago this particular lake actually had a real live alligator in it.

After we went to Magic Mart we went to a restaurant that we haven't been to in a few years.  It was alright, but it will probably be a few years before we go there again.  On our way in there was a man coming out of the restaurant.  He thought he was sexy!  Man o man!  The first thing I noticed was his cowboy shirt that was unbuttoned almost all the way down to his belly button!  lol  He definitely has been going to the tanning bed and it looked like he had on eye liner.  He had on tight pants and cowboy boots.  When I passed him he had on some nice smelling cologne.  After I passed him I looked back at my husband to see his reaction on his face.  It was funny!  The cowboy want a be didn't have anyone with him.  I still can't decide if the man was straight or not! 

We are anxiously awaiting an ice storm that is supposed to hit anytime soon.  On top of that we are supposed to get anywhere between 4 to 8 inches of snow.  I've already called school to be closed for Monday and Tuesday even though the county hasn't called us yet to say they will be closed!  They can be such idiots when it comes to a winter storm!  They will wait to call us at 5 o'clock in the morning just to wake us up.  I'm going to take the phone off the hook tonight!  American Electric Power isn't taking this storm lightly at all.  They have called in extra help from other states.  I keep seeing pictures on fb of all of the electric trucks that are parked in various parking lots around here.  I'm grateful that AEP is taking this winter storm/ice storm warning serious as they are! 

I will be sure to post some pictures tomorrow of the snow/ice that we are getting tonight. 

Angela 

Birthday Treats!

My birthday was earlier this week!  My husband brought home some sweet treats for us to enjoy after dinner.  Since my birthday was on a week day I decided to cook dinner at home and we'll celebrate my birthday with a dinner out at some point when the weather is cooperating.  I made homemade lasagna for my birthday.

The cupcakes were really good!  My husband also brought home a dozen roses for me for my birthday.

I put them in a vase he bought me a few years ago that has the roses on it.  The vase is a West Virginia Glass vase made right here in West Virginia with the radiant rose pattern on it.  I have a lot of pieces from their collection.  When my husband and I were dating we went to a flea market where he bought me a tea pitcher along with 6 tall tea glasses with the radiant rose pattern on it.  I've been collecting them every since then.

We were going to go out to dinner and celebrate my birthday today, but it snowed again.  The roads are icy so we stayed home.  I'm used to waiting because of the snow and weather.  When I was a kid in school it always snowed on my birthday and the school would be closed.  Old Man Winter always seemed to give me the present of snow!  He still does as it snowed on my birthday again this year. 

Angela

Help! Please Sign Petition!

An online petition related to the West Virginia water crisis that has affected the water supply for more than 300,000 customers has gained nearly 15,000 signatures since Friday.

A petition on the "We the People, Your Voice In Our Government" section of the White House.gov website had 13,972 signatures Monday and calls for an investigation of the "mismanagement of the West Virginia water crisis by state and county officials as well as West Virginia American Water."

You can view or sign the petition here.

The site said it has a goal of 100,000 signatures that must be obtained by Feb. 20. As of Monday, just more than 86,000 signatures were needed on the petition.

Angela

Cake Time!

It's Cake Time!  I have been wanting to bake a cake for probably a good 2 weeks now and I finally broke down and did it.  I used the cupcake mold that I bought 3 years ago!  Yep!  I have had a cupcake mold for 3 years and I have never used it....  My bad....  I just never took the time to do it until today.  I watched a video a few months ago I found on Pinerest on how to make the roses for a cake.  They are really easy to make if you have the right tools.   

It looks pretty and it taste great!  Here's a little personal information that many don't know.  When I was in the 6th grade I went to 4-H camp and took cake decorating classes.  Once you learn how to do a little decorating you never forget how to do it.  I don't decorate as much as I should.  I've been using the same icing recipe that they taught us how to make from back then too!  I also won 1st place for cake decorating that year at camp.  The other class that I took that year was archery!  There is another story there for another day!  Here's the recipe for the icing.

1 cup of Crisco
1 teaspoon of Vanilla Flavoring
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 boxes of Confectionary Sugar
1/4 to 1/2 cup of cold water

Angela

State of Emergency Continues

The State of Emergency continues here for 9 counties in West Virginia due to the chemical leak that contaminated our water supply.  (I'm not affected by this as we have a well.)  I've been reading a lot of different things about this disaster.  I read earlier today that there are a few people who lit a match to their water and it actually caught fire!  A family from our church has said that they can still smell the odor from the plant that the chemical leaked from.  They live about a mile from it. 

On a different note, I knew going to church this morning would pose some problems for me since I'm severely allergic to perfume.  I knew that since a lot of people are without water that they would be wearing the entire bottle of perfume to cover up the fact that they haven't had a shower since Thursday or even Wednesday if they hadn't already taken one before the do not use order came into effect.  I was running late as usual.  My husband goes an hour before me because he runs the sound.  I don't want to get up at the crack of dawn so I drive myself.  As soon as I walked through the door of the sanctuary I could smell the strongest odor of perfume that I have ever smelled EVER!!!   I went and sat where I usually sit which I moved to that area because someone was wearing strong perfume where I used to sit and I kept getting sick from going to church and smelling her perfume.  After a few songs Pastor told us to greet one another.  I shook hands with 2 women and 1 man and sat down thinking I was safe.  Nope!  I had a sneak attack from the back!  A woman whom I love dearly hugged my shoulders and touched her cheek to my cheek from the back.  She was wearing some seriously strong perfume today.  I kept eating some cinnamon hard candy I had to mask the smells in there.  Once church was over and I was in the comfort of my truck I could smell a strong odor of perfume.  Where was it coming from?  Well, at first I thought it was on my hair so I took a wipe and wiped my hair off on that one side.  I still smelled it so I then took a wipe and almost wiped off half of my make up on that one side.  Yeah, I looked like a freak show after that!  Then I ended up putting my hair up in a pony tail because I couldn't take it another longer which made me look even prettier.  I could still smell it so I then realized it was on my jacket!  I guess she had it on her hands, probably a lotion of some sort.  Thankfully it was warmer than it has been so I took my jacket off and had it in the floor.  I could still smell it!  I then realized that the heat was on and coming from the floor and thus illuminating the smell upward into my face!  I then turned off the heat and it finally went away.  Once we got back to church and my husband got in his car to drive home I tossed my jacket in the backseat of my truck.  Thank God again that we have well water because I'm going to have to wash that jacket and I wouldn't have been able to do so if we didn't have our well water!  The local Laundromats were packed.  The news said people were waiting in upward of 2 hours just to use the washing machines!  They still don't know when they will be able to flush the main water company's lines yet.  They are saying that they are going to let the areas of Charleston to be the first to get their water back because of the hospitals.  They are going to do it in zones.  Once they give people the all clear then they are supposed to turn on their hot water and let it run for so long to flush out the water from their hot water tanks.  If I had an old water tank I would be draining the old one and replacing it.  People with ice makers and filters on their water and refrigerators will need to replace those also.  The water company is going to put up a map on their web page to show which areas they are working on.  Funny how they can make an interactive map with details in a short period of time and the Obamacare web page, well....  I won't go there! 

Angela

Photo editing software

I'm needing some suggestions from those of you who take lots of pictures and edit them by resizing mostly before you put them up on your blog.  My photo editing software I've been using came with my old camera.  Here's what I was having to do to get my pictures ready for my blog.  I'd have to put the memory card from my new camera in my old camera and plug it into my old laptop and edit my pictures from there.  My old laptop's usb port broke so I can no longer use it that way.  My new laptop has a port where I can put my memory card from my camera in it but I don't have any editing software on it.  My husband doesn't want me to use an editing software that is on the internet.  He works in IT so he knows the problems that might could happen from doing that I guess.  I'd rather not have to upload a picture to the internet to edit it either just because it takes too long.  When you don't resize your pictures smaller it uses up all of your space on your blog really fast and it takes longer to upload.  I tried uploading a few pictures of the ocean to fb last night and it just couldn't do it because the pictures are too big.  Thanks for your help! 

Angela