2 awards for me? thx

Claire, over at Is this heaven? No, this is Iowa! gave me the Tree of Happiness Award. Thank you Claire, and I'm am to list six things that make me happy.

1). Claire, and all the folks that rescue homeless animals, make me happy. I don't know how many farm animals and misc critters she has adopted since I started following her blog, I eventually lost count. Like Claire, and all the rescuers that I have met, they lead such active lives, it's amazing they find the time to do it all and yet give quality time to the animals. Rescuing is time-consuming, labor intensive, expensive, and you see a whole lot of stuff that makes you very sad.

2) Trees make me happy. Do you know that Mike and I have never given each other any wrapped gifts? For many years, on special occasions we would go together and buy a special tree or bush, bring it home and plant it. The crabapple tree off the back deck is still the one we talk about the most often. It was Mike's birthday, and I drove the car while he rode in the trunk of the car holding on to the trunk of this large tree. We found it on sale at Kmart and brought it home, the Crabapple has always had the most gorgeous blossoms, however, every year without fail, just as soon as it blooms, it snows, and ruins the show.

3) Although there have been times that I wanted to kill him, Mike makes me happy. 99.9% of the time, he goes along with what I want to do. We've had a lot of good times together. We met at the duplicate bridge table, I was playing with my mother, and we became partners for many years after that, going to tournaments around this region. Now, I don't like running the roads anymore, and Mike plays bridge online with his regular partner, Denis, who is up in Quebec City. They play against people from all of the world. My parents have passed but they loved Mike like a son. Mike provided much care to them when their health was declining.

4) Being at home makes me happy, everything I enjoy is at home. I've never stayed in a motel or hotel that is better than home. All my dear animals are there, I love to cook, read all sorts of things, my camera , I love my laptop that takes me out on the internet, my husband is there and he loves the home life now just like I do. And yes, people, I like watching TV, certain things anyway. For the most part I don't think the TV programmers are targeting the 52yr old female who likes to be frugal and has no interest in fast food and the lastest movies. Composting and dirt are at home, love them. Mike and I both work away from home because we need the incomes and health insurance but we sure do look forward to pulling in the driveway at the end of the day.

5) I like green. environmentally and cold, hard cash man. Yes, green makes me happy.

6) Animals make me happy. I love, love animals. I grew up with my parents teaching me to respect all of God's creatures. Yes, I love snakes, spiders, rats, bats, all of the "creepy-crawlers." Whenever I'm around animals, I feel good, I feel goodness, I feel God.

So, now, I will re-award the Tree of Happiness, to 6 blogs that make me happy, and here they are: Gals, list 6 things that make you happy.

1) Jennifer at Goats in the Garden
2) Jama at ProperineGoatHill
3) Mary at AnniesGoatHill
4) Michelle at SugarCreekStuff
5) Amy at TwelveAcres
6) Diane at Loess is More
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Flartus, over a My 2 Cents, a fellow North Carolinian (although she's transplanted from Ohio) Butterflied me. She and me are big fans of Alix over at CasaHice. Alix is an awesome writer and storyteller who lives the high life down in Florida. I love people who make me laugh out loud and she's one of the rare ones that can do that. If ya get a chance, read back through some of Alix's writings, she's a hoot. It's like any friend of Alix's is a friend of Flart's so thank you honey.