We have a good friend who hated his shaded and sickly lawn so he covered most of his back yard with a giant deck and built a great big multi-platformed, non-walled tree house just off it. When he throws parties, he moves all of his indoor furniture outdoors... but I always end up in the treehouse with a bottle of wine and a couple of friends overlooking the chaos below. You have to climb one of those nailed-in ladders to get to it, but I've never been able to resist doing so... no matter how high my heels are at the time. Things I've learned in life: 1) Never wear mirrored shoes with a skirt. 2) Never climb into a treehouse while wearing a skirt. (I'm beginning to understand why my mom expressly forbade me to wear skirts when I was little.)

I was taking care of my Grandfather, 92, and my Mom,79, after my Mom,with dementia broke her hip and then my Grandfather had a stroke. After a couple of months I finally got them to agree to move 500 miles into assisted living near me, and my Grandfather died two weeks later in 2007. My Grandfather was the last "with it" member of my family, and I was shattered. I spent 2008 managing my Mom's deteriorating health, totally depressed and unable to work much at my self-employed business. I went through all my savings just living, going from crisis to crisis with my Mom. I slowly stopped crying every day, but still couldn't manage to even tackle packing up my Grandfather's things, much less start dealing with his house full of stuff. When my Mom went into the hospital with her 2nd bout of pneumonia this Feb. and the doctor told me a week into it to take her off support since she would never be able to get out of bed again, I knew I couldn't spend another 6 months without income crying every day, and I decided to go on Prozac to see if it made a difference. Mind you, I only go to an MD for antihistamines, antibiotics or stitches, and use natural, holistic medicine otherwise. But I couldn't live totally depressed all the time. It has made such a HUGE difference, all through the 5 weeks my Mom was in the hospital, on her death bed every day of it, and finally dying of pneumonia and MRSA. I still have bouts of crying, but I am not wanting to sleep all the time, unable to manage daily living chores. I would urge you to also consider taking something, just to get you over this time, since it sounds like you are in the same space I was. You'll still work through the pain, but it's not as likely to consume your life.

Color Flip.....just a silly site to pass some time. Put your mouse in the upper left corner, then click and drag. Here is a link that might be useful: Color Flip

Beautiful! That's what a sunset picture is supposed to look like! I was trying to take some sunset pictures this evening but couldn't get it right. Still learning slowly. I did see a owl fly by while I was outside.