(AF) My Poor Old Computer Fried

This week's mushroom find. (Oysters)

  My poor old laptop finally bit the dust. Oh, how I miss her! Her motherboard fried and they don't make them for that computer any more, so I was told.

I am FINALLY back online and hoping to figure this Windows 10 thing out soon (I was on Windows XP) and get some update posts up soon. Me and this current computer are NOT getting along!

Yes, we are STILL moving.  Updates on all of that shortly.

Have a FANTASTIC and BLESSED day! ! !

PHARMACY FRIDAY - - A Bad Virus and Antiviral Oils

Lemongrass

Yay! I finally got back in to the "new post" page! I have been trying for at least a week to get back in and write some posts, but . . . no such luck. VERY frustrating!  Anyone else been having any issues? In an oddly humorous way, I couldn't even get the "Complain to Google" button to work!

Okay, on with the post. Dave and I have been sick with a very odd and unusual virus. I find it unusual, anyway, to get one this time of year, but when you do, with the high heat, humidity, etc, it seems to be even harder to shake.

One of our relatives went for an out of town, routine doctor's appointment. Within a few days he/she came down with an odd and harsh virus. It affected not only the intestines, but the entire body. Several days later, Dave came down with it, then in a few more days, I came down with it. And THAT is why I don't go for "well check-ups!" We stayed away from everyone possible while we thought we were in the contagious stage, as we had not heard of anyone in our area with it, and still haven't.

This was, by far, one of the worst viruses we have had in a long time! It seemed to drain every drop of strength we had, the diarrhea was extreme (I have never taken this much Imodium in my life!), and it also hit our respiratory system, making our lungs ache and very difficult to breathe. Needless to say, this virus almost completely halted our moving activities for a couple of weeks. Dave contracted it about 3 weeks ago and still had some tell-tale signs of it. 2 1/2 weeks later and I am still having intestinal issues from it, although we have greatly improved, now.

I saw how bad it took down our relative and Dave . . . . to the point of not even being able to function at all for days. . . . and I was determined to keep going, even at a slow pace, but keep going with the sorting and packing. What did I do? I turned to my essential oils! I have a blend that I absolutely love for all kinds of "feel good" stuff, so I used the best ones of that blend that I thought would help.

Into about 1 Tablespoon of Coconut Oil (Virgin is best), I added a drop each of the following essential oils:
Orange, Cedarwood, Peppermint, Eucalyptus, and Lemongrass
Blend all together well, let stand a few minutes, then blend again before each use. 

Before I went to bed each night (and usually again in the morning), I massaged this oil blend into the bottoms of my feet. Why? Because everything that goes onto the bottoms of  your feet absorbs into all the cells of your body within approximately 20 minutes! It is a very fast way to get antivirals all throughout your body without having to put them into your stomach.

I use Orange because not only is it a great pick-me-up, but it is a muscle relaxant - helping to reduce coughs and muscle spasms.
I use Cedarwood because it helps to bring up excess phlegm from the respiratory system.
Peppermint is great as an energizer and is also a great antiviral. I have also found Eucalyptus and Lemongrass to be excellent antivirals.
Coconut Oil is an EXCELLENT and strong antiviral!
I just love this blend!

It didn't completely make my virus go away, but the severity of it was much, MUCH less than the other two people that I knew that had it! I was slowed way down by the virus, but I was never completely down and, though at a slower pace, was able to still keep going. My intestinal issues weren't even a fourth of the other two's, which also kept me from losing as much energy as they did.

As an added bonus with this oil blend . . . . the patch of athlete's foot I had on the bottom of one of my feet disappeared! That was a wonderful surprise!
We are still having a little difficulty with our intestinal and digestive tracts, but eating a yogurt a day is greatly helping with that, also.

So, even though I contracted this horrible virus several days after David, I seem to have recovered from it at a much faster rate and the severity of it was only a fraction of what it was for Dave and our relative, all which I owe (in my opinion) to the essential oil blend I rubbed into my feet.

Thank you for reading my post! May you have a very Happy and Healthy day! ! !  ! 

DISCLAIMER: Always check with your health care professional before using any natural remedies. If you are pregnant or nursing, DO NOT use any essential oils without checking with your health care professional! Some essential oils can cause miscarriage and/or birth defects and/or other complications.
I am not a doctor nor a medical professional. All of the information listed here is based on the results of my research, personal opinions, and personal experiences. This post is not intended to replace professional medical assistance.

(AF) MOVING UPDATE - - Rain Barrels and Tadpoles

 Please don't laugh too hard. One of the things on our list of outdoor items to move is my rain barrels. I collect and save some rain water to use to water plants, and, when it is fresh, to water my chickens with. They love it!

The problem right now, is .. all of my rain barrels are full of . . . TADPOLES! Normally this isn't a problem. Normally, it is a GOOD thing because the tadpoles gobble up any mosquito larvae that find their way into the rain barrels and really keeps the number of mosquitoes around here down to a minimum. But in order to move the rain barrels, I need to dump them, and I just can't kill all of those beautiful, graceful little tadpoles!

So what is a person to do, other than to relocate them? Some have been moved to Dave's rain barrels, but they are now full, and oh, so many tadpoles still left! We are now turning to Dave's pond. His pond used to be a nice, thriving pond, then a couple of years ago in the high heat, all the water drained out and it has never held water since. But this summer, during what is usually one of our driest months of the year, we have had well over 20 inches of rain! He checked his pond the other day and not only is it filled up with water, but the creek is still flowing into it . . yea! SOOOO.... I am spending a little time each day, dipping and catching the little darlins' so that we can relocate them to Dave's pond. The first bucket that went in acted overjoyed! Oh, how they loved that big, fresh, clear body of water!

Fishing out all of those little tadpoles is a chore, to say the least, but I just can't kill them without a purpose. If they ended up as bird food, snake food (we have watched this happen!) or some other natural food, it wouldn't bother me so much, but I just can't send them to their death for the sole purpose of moving my rain barrels. It just doesn't seem right. I have learned that shining a flashlight on them at night to capture them makes the odd chore much, much easier and faster. If I just leave the rain barrels, no doubt, the new owners would immediately just dump them out thinking they were eliminating a mosquito trap or getting the old barrels out of they way, (or the neighbors so they can walk off with the barrels) so the little tadpoles would still end up meeting their demise.  Relocating them it is!

Maybe they will hang around and gobble up all of Dave's mosquitoes!
Thank you for reading our post. Stay tuned and have a blessed day!

(AF) MOVING UPDATE - - A Buffet and a Piano

My emotions seem to be running on such a roller coaster of highs and lows right now. One minute I am so excited that I found something that survived the flooding and other destructiveness and got it moved, then the next I am at an extreme low when I learn of a total loss of a beloved keepsake.

Three of David's fantastic relatives came yesterday to lend their muscles to move the buffet and my piano. (Bless you all!) The lighting is very dim in this house, especially since I have had to cut most of the power to it off a few months ago. Both of these (piano and buffet) have been stored in a corner in an area we had thought to be one of the safest and driest in the house. When they went to move the buffet, they could see that quite a bit of the laminate was coming off of the back and it had sustained a little bit of some other high humidity damage, but it was movable. It may no longer have its full antique value, but we can still probably refurbish it into our kitchen counter/cabinet in our future Tiny House, as we had planned. I was so glad to see the great, extra pains they still took with the mirror to get it moved safely. That mirror is the original mirror on the piece and supposedly over 100 years old!

My piano, which I have had since I was 5 years old, and matches this buffet, doesn't have such a good ending. It is extra heavy ... an antique upright, player piano. We were so very poor when I received that piano and my dad must have had to pay half or more of his month's paycheck to get it for me. He had seen, even at an extremely young age, how much I adored music and wanted me to have something that would encourage that love over the years. I have had it moved to every house I have ever lived in over the years, always hiring piano movers to move it (it always took at least 4 of their strongest men), but this time, we can't even find a piano store in this town!

David and his helpers tugged and lugged on that old piano and, one broken toe, one asthma attack, one nearly broken arm, another smashed arm, and many more bumps, bruises and pulled muscles later, they finally managed to get it moved the 15 feet to the front door. On the way, pieces began  to drop off. As they got it into better light and looked inside, they could see that all of the metal parts inside were rusted up solid! Also, as the flood water finally made it into this front room during this last, very unseasonable heavy rains, the wood of the bottom half had apparently soaked up much moisture, making the already super heavy instrument, even heavier. Then they tried to get it across the thresh hold. Nope, wasn't happening. (Yes, the piano is on wheels) Even lifting it just two inches over the little hump seemed near impossible. It just wasn't going to move.

I stood there, hugging my beloved piano, tears flowing, and silently telling it good bye ... then told them to just push it back against the wall. I just couldn't ask them to put their bodies through any more to move a piano that could not be repaired (would have cost thousands of dollars and still wouldn't be the same) to be used again, and would only be able to be a wall decoration. Getting it unloaded where it was being moved to was going to be even far more difficult than getting it out of my house, and I could not ask them, nor anyone, to do that.

Through my tears, I asked them if there was anything at all on it that could be salvaged to be repurposed into something else, so I could  at least take part of it for memory sake. Everyone brightened up and the ideas began flowing! So . . . that will be today's project . . . to dismantle what we can of my beloved old piano, and move just a small portion of it.

Thank you for reading my post. Have a fantastically blessed day! ! !

(AF) MOVING UPDATE - Treasured Keepsakes ~ I

Yes, we are still at it, frantically trying to get all of my things moved before time runs out. Time is quickly ticking and there is still LOTS left to move, but we are beginning to see some progress.

As I said, I have lived here for 18 years, it is a large house, with several filled storage buildings. Some things I have not seen in a very long time! During that time there has been a destructive divorce and quite a bit of Nature's destructions, so every time I find a precious keepsake, I get very, VERY excited! It is mind boggling and amazing what manages to survive over the years. Here are some things I came across that I wanted to share with you .  . .

Okay, so why would I have saved baby powder jars? The one on the right is the one that came home in the hospital bag when my mom had me (her first baby). And yes, it still has the original powder in it!
The one on the left is the one that came home in the hospital bag when I had my first baby! It still has a little of the original powder in it. What a difference 19 years made in jar designs! The one on the left is now over 30 years old. I am going to have to see what the new ones look like.

This is the vase my mom received flowers in when she was in the hospital having me. The hands are long gone, and it has a couple of hairline cracks inside, but it is still completely intact and for being over 53 years old, and having been used a LOT for a variety of things over the years, I think it is still in pretty good shape! I used to get into trouble when I was little for playing with it every time I could get ahold of it, because I loved it so much. When I was grown and moved out on my own, my mom finally just gave it to me. Oh, yes, and the baby blanket that the above two items are setting on was also mine, given to me/my mom as a gift when I was born.

Awww.... my Tomahawk! When I opened up an old tub that had been stored for a long time, to see what was in it, this was the first thing that caught my eyes and the memories and tears flowed until I thought I was going to flood the yard again. Oh, how I loved looking for great rocks when I was little! (And still do!) This was a flint rock I found one day when I was out walking the shore at the lake with my dad. We thought it looked like a Tomahawk head, so he said he would make me one out of it, and he did! I wish I could remember what kind of wood the stick was, but it sure has held up!  I am sure I was totally annoying, but I hung over and watched his every move as he made my new "toy."  He worked the handle over with such love and care, then split the end. I was very little, yet I still remember my scared shock as he split that end, thinking he had just ruined that perfect handle! He calmly told me to just watch and wait. He expertly continued on has he inserted the head (rock) and wrapped it up tightly with waxed string. I thought it was finished and ready to play with but he still wouldn't let me have it, yet. I had already thought it was funny that he had put wax on that string, but he said he had to put some more and it had to dry good. He said it would hold it together much better and make it last much longer. It may have been just a "toy" but he wanted it made right and to last a long time for lots of good play. Too bad that kind of care doesn't go into today's toy making!
When it was finally finished, he handed it to me and gave me my "rules of play" (all those do's and don't's). I wasn't about to break any of those rules and get my precious new toy that my dad had worked so hard to make for me, taken away!
Oh the fun I had with that Tomahawk! I can still visualize myself as such a small child, running around in my little leather fringed moccasins swinging around my "real" tomahawk! It must have been a pretty funny sight for all those that saw me, ha, ha, ha. This is one treasure that NO price could be put on and it is MOVED!

Thank you for reading my post, stay tuned, and have a HEAVENLY day!