Leap year Birthday girl.....

Happy Birthday to my bestest buddy, Linda. She's a leap year girl. Linda's been able to celebrate only 12 times on her actual day. The kids at school today were kidding her that she's only 12 years old.
Happy, Happy Birthday to a great friend. May your cup over flow with blessings...

Monday's Memories.....

   Little Sandra was celebrating her 3rd birthday. Was so excited all day, kept ask me if it was time for her guest to come. She received some money in one of her cards and said, "Oh wow, now I can go shopping for Barbie clothes".

  

The neighbors cat......

Lily says to Bristol, "There goes that darn cat again" Bristol barks, "I got my eye on it, let's just see what it does."

Loving old photos....

December 1958, I was 14 months old. Such a great picture of Mom and Daddy. We tease Mom about her red lipstick...Mom says back then a lady never went without her lipstick. How funny....

Daddy is still celebrating, had left over birthday cake for afternoon snack with his coffee.

Happy Birthday Daddy.....

How exciting to celebrate Daddy's 86th birthday. Thomas ask Daddy how old he felt he said, "I feel 16 today, just like a young boy on the mountain." We had a great time enjoying dinner and laughing. Mom was giving Daddy a hard time when we were taking pictures, giving him kisses and trying to put icing on his nose. Sandra said they were acting like two young kids on a date......... How blessed my family is to still have Mom and Daddy.........such a blessing. 

Seaman 2c, United States Navy



This is one of my favorite pictures of Daddy....... He's a young handsome single boy, just 18 years old. He was on the base at San Padro waiting to be shipped out to Great Lakes Naval Base. Daddy said he can still remember this picture being taken back in 1944. Daddy enlisted in the Navy on July 19, 1944. He was a Seaman 2c. (2c stands for second class.)

If you look in the background you can see that other sailors have their wash on the line.  Daddy said you had to keep those tee shirts white. A salior had to be perfect. Shoes shined, shirt pressed, crease in your pants and your hat on straight.

Celebrating Daddy......

Daddy has always loved to put out a big garden. He's told me many times of the big gardens they would put out on the mountain when he was a young boy. Now that Daddy has gotten older the garden has gotten a little smaller. Daddy has always been picky about his tomato plants. He usually plants a few red and a few yellow.  The tomato he's holding almost weighed a pound. I believe he sliced it and made his self a bologna sandwisch......

Celebrating......

   Daddy will be 86 years young on Wednesday and our family will be celebrating all week. Daddy was born February 22, in the hills of eastern Kentucky in Harlan County. He is one of twelve children. We always make a big deal of birthday's in our family and Daddy is at the top of the list. We're having a birthday dinner on Wednesday at my home. Thomas will be frying his secret recipe chicken along with tators, corn, tossed salad, cooked apples and corn bread. Nothing fancy for Daddy, just a home cooked meal.

   All this week I'll be sharing pictures of Daddy over the years and funny stories. The picture below was taken on Foresters Creek in Harlan County not far from Daddy's home place. He was 16 years old.

Sunny day.....

   Today was a wonderful day...the sun was shinning and I had the day off. Been in the VD Day daze for a couple of days. Was glad to be home, kick back and do nothing. Took Bristol and Lily for a long walk and the sunshine felt good. Checked the trees and bushes around the house and the majority of them are starting to bud out. I can't wait for spring and to get my hands in the soil and do some planting. Can't wait till my gardens look pretty again.

Last of the Valentine's.....

   We were all tired when we came into the shop today. Our feet hurt and our fingers were sore. I touched base with a few of my florist friends in Kentucky and they had the same aliments. There wasn't much to pack away for next year. Just a few bears, couple of mylars and the red hearts that hung in the window. That's what we like, sell it all. We made notes for next year and did our final count of flowers. We went through almost 1100 red roses and could have used about 400 more.
   Now, it's time to put out the spring flowers in hope that it's just around the corner. Here's some pics from the last few days.....

Paper Valentines....

   Do you remember back in elementary making paper Valentines. We would take construction paper and make special ones for our friends. I remember a week before we would get those white paper sacks and we would cut out hearts and paste them on. and draw on them with our crayons. We would go to the dime store and buy a box of little Valentines with corny little sayings on them. The envelopes were so thin that if you wasn't careful they would tear. The teacher would give you a list of the names in your class and we had to make sure we gave everyone a Valentine. We had party's and our Mom's would take turns bringing in cup cakes and we would play a couple of game. We were able to look in our sacks and couldn't wait till we got home to see who they were from and if our girlfriends or some cute boy wrote anything special on them. We didn't know who lucky we were back then.
   Still today, I get excited when I open my mail box and receive Valentines......

Flowers, Flowers and more Flowers....

   What a busy day... we were swamped all day. Phones ringing, men standing in line and men wondering around not knowing what they needed. What fun....I love the excitement that Valentines Day brings. Yes, it's extra work, long hours and you must be on your toes at all time. But the joy you see when a husband sends his wife flowers for the first time on Valentines since they got married. The man who came in and told us how he has never missed a holiday in 52 years and he writes her a special message on the card and how she has kept all the cards. It's a day for love and friendship.
   One young man I waited on today really likes this girl and he was taking her to dinner tomorrow evening for their first date and he wasn't sure of what flowers to give her. We decided to give her a single rose when he went to pick her up and then give her another rose on the way home. Each card was written with special note. Young love......
   We all left about 7 tonight. Our cooler was full and all orders were filled and ready for delivery. But come 7 in the morning we will start all over again.

Putting up the tent......

   Daddy came back to the house a little bit ago for a visit. He wanted to know how Valentine's Day was going at the Jubilee. He started remembering all the Valentine's at Mountain Memories. Daddy talked about all the times we put up the tent by the back door and how cold it would get. All the precautions we would take for the snow and ice that would usually come. We had some fun times at the shop during the holiday. We laughed about how you couldn't get out the back door with your next delivery unless you were checked off on Nathan's list. Linda lining up vases and running an assembly line, those were some fun memories lots of work and no sleep.

The special....

   Today was suppose to be my day off but due to the Valentine's Day rush I went in for a few hours. I had just finished with my funeral work and in came a customer. We greeted each other and we talked for a few minutes. As I began taking the order for his sweetie, he ask me if we had a, "tight ass special." I started to laugh and told him the "tight ass special" starts as $40 bucks.  He thought that was a good price and made me promisee that I wouldn't tell anyone just how tight he was.

 One of these day's I need to write a book about the happenings in a flower shop. I've heard it all and seen it all. But I'm like a doctor, I've taken an oath to not tell everything.....

Valentine's Day....

   The season is upon us. There were quite a few times today when both lines were would ring at the same time and we would have customers standing in line waiting to place their order. Jan and I made it through the day but tomorrow the pace will pick up even more.
   Today, we received our Gerber's, gyp (baby's breath) and carnations. Tomorrow we get the bulk of our flowers. Tuesday we received our roses. Heather orders our roses straight from the farm in Ecuador. No lay over in Miami to dry out for a few days. They are cut on Monday and we receive them on Tuesday. Can't get no fresher than that.
   Valentine's Day is our biggest holiday next to Mother's Day. You have to stay focused, laugh and have a good time. But the most important thing is to be organized. I did it for 14 years and I mastered the holiday. My little shop use to put out over 300 orders.
Jubilee is ready for the big day. Our list of things that needed to be done is all crossed off. Let the madness begin...... 

Sarah took this picture about 8am one morning as we were ready to load up and head to the high school.

Snow??

   Weather man said we could get about of inch of snow starting about daybreak. Snow, what's that? Do you remember all the snow we had last year? Seems we were shoveling snow almost every week.

Back in 1990 I took a drive around Vernon Twp. and ended up on Twin Bridges road. It was beautiful that morning. The snow had clung to everything. I remember rolling down my window and listening....all you heard was the gentle sound of the Muscatatuck . Peaceful, I set on the bridge for the longest time and took in the beauty. I drove around a little bit longer and realized it was almost 9am and I needed to get to the flower shop. What a beautiful morning.....

I took this with colored film, but everything was black and white that morning.....

Monday's Memories....Mr. Johnson

   Back in 2001 I took a floral class at Midway College in Midway, Ky. The class is sponsored by the Kentucky Floral Association. The course is a week long, eight to ten hours a day studying floral design, care and handling and anything that pertains to being a designer. There is a test at the end of each day and then at the end of the course there is a final exam and you must score high to receive your Master Florist degree. It's not easy, you have to study and be able to design. 
  Mr. Jim Johnson is the instructor. He is a Indiana farm boy and owned his own shop for 14 years before moving to Texas in 1975 to become head of the Department of Horticultural Sciences at Texas A&M University. Mr. J just retired this past August. He is one of those folks who comes into your life and leaves an imprint. He loves floral design and steps out of the box with each design.
   Mr. Johnson was one of the designers this past weekend at our floral convention and once again I was able to work side by side with him and learn new designs. I found a picture of him and I taken ten years ago and we took another one the other day. Mr. Johnson said neither one of us has aged at all....

Floral Convention....

                                                   Kentucky Floral Convention Rocked.......

Flowers.....

   Another day of both phone lines ringing, people in one after another. We got the big funeral done. Lots of big arrangements. I need a few days of rest--and that's what I'm planning.

   Got my suitcase almost filled, will put in a few things in the morning. Jason, the KFA president called this morning to keep me posted on the flowers that were to arrive today and what would be arriving about the same time as I would tomorrow. It's a lot of work keeping the design room in order. Have to get all the flowers on the stage in order that the designer needs them. Then have to do it all over again with the next designer. But it's enjoyable. You just have to have a plan, pretty much like organizing the festival. We have more fun in the flower room then they do out front. I'll take lots of pictures for you to see next week.

Beautiful February Day....

   Wasn't today a beautiful day. Who would have thought it was February. This time last year we had snow on the ground. I hope you were able to get outside and enjoy it. I was inside the majority of the day at the shop. We were extremely busy, we have a big funeral Friday morning. Meet with the family and helped them pick out their flowers.

   Day's like today gets me excited about working in my flower garden's, mowing grass and spending time on my back porch.