Marching to the Beat of Your Own Drummer

I’ve been known to take this term to a whole other level at times. But, it’s OK since we are all different and we have to do it our way, right? Surely we can’t all be alike, that would make life so awfully boring! I will tell all of you kind readers a secret…Autumn marches to the beat of her own drummer, too! Did  anyone really doubt that for a minute?

Anyway, I was thinking over this phrase and wondering how many people really choose to conform just to be accepted more easily. You know what I’m saying, they just don’t want to call attention to the individuality that is in each of us. Well, come on…That just isn’t good either! We all need to be ourselves and just have a joyful time of doing so is my opinion!

I have been known to dance in the rain (Autumn loves doing this herself), lead a spur of the moment parade around the block one time with a few friends (this was done with Autumn by the way who was co-leading), and the neighbors so dearly loved this one!

I sometimes sing loudly in the middle of a store by mistake. Well, this happens when I get carried away when hearing a favorite song and Autumn has also joined in or started this one all by herself. Rode our chosen merry go round horses like princesses waving to all who were watching. I know, all kids do that you may be thinking to yourselves…But this was just last week! These are just a few examples, but there’s more of course.

Oh, I almost forgot  one really fun time Autumn and I crawled out on a roof to star gaze and how exciting it was, too. Until our Dad happened to notice what we were doing and hustled us back inside, we were only young teenagers and thought it was fun what can I say? Dad didn’t agree of course, since it wasn’t the wisest of moves in safety. It was better to wait until we had our houses to go stargazing on the roof, try it sometime because it’s really exciting fun.

I  think I better keep it to myself about any more of the Twinnies examples of how we do have given it a whirl quite often, this marching to the beat of our very own drummer thing. Lest you kind readers start worrying about our sanity, unique ways and all. Yeah, right…Like that’s ever stopped me before! How many of you kind readers have fun and exciting things you have done when doing your own thing? Please do share, but only if you’d like to! It was just a passing thought today and I just had to write a little post about marching to the beat of our drummer. I just couldn’t resist, it seemed a pretty awesome topic to chat about. I do hope all of you have a grand time marching to the beat of your own drummer.

Please, please…Do not let anyone stop you! March on is what Autumn and I have to say! 🙂 🙂

Advertisement

Remembering Dad on Father’s Day

This is a day for Autumn and me to honor and celebrate our Dad‘s life. He is no longer with us and every Father’s Day is somewhat difficult for us. We lost our Dad to evil cancer almost 9 years ago, as most of you kind readers know. This year we decided just some thoughts about our Dad and sharing some Father’s Day quotes would be a good thing. We were blessed with the most awesome and loving Dad, he was also our friend. Dad was so loved by our big family, countless friends and he just had that way of including everyone in the love and caring. Being Italian, he looked after all 6 of his daughters and if the guys had intentions of marriage…Dad made sure they were in it with love and total commitment. He was the best Husband to our Mom and Father to all 6 of us, as well as being the best Grandpa! I’m not bragging and trumping any of this up, honestly because it is the absolute truth. One thing that made Dad special is we all just knew whatever bad or sad thing that was going on in our lives he would sure do his level best to fix. He made us laugh, he loved us joining in singing and our house was filled with music. We all learned to love nature and being out-of-doors with camping, hiking, swimming, and the list goes on! He was just the best, we all miss him very much. He knows this of course, Dad is busy watching over all of us from Heaven. As long as his memory is kept alive, he will always be with us…Happy Father’s Dad, we love you!

1.Any man can be a father. It takes someone special to be a Dad~Anne Geddes

2.He didn’t tell me how to live; he lived, and let me watch him do it~Clarence Buddington Kellard

3.Old as she was, she still missed her Daddy sometimes~Gloria Naylor

4.There’s something like a line of gold thread running through a man’s words when he talks to his daughter, and gradually over the years it gets to be long enough for you to pick it up in your hand and weave into a cloth that feels like love itself~John Gregory Brown

5.My father gave me the greatest gift anyone could give another person, he believed in me~Jim Valvano

6.What a dreadful thing it must be to have a dull father~Mary Mapes Dodge

7.It is a wise father who knows his own child~William Shakespeare

8.They say from the instant he lays eyes on her, a father adores his daughter. Whoever she grows up to be, she is always to him that little girl in pigtails. She makes him feel like Christmas. In exchange, he makes a secret promise not to see the awkwardness of her teenage years, the mistakes she makes or the secrets she keeps~Author Unknown

9.I cannot think of any need in childhood as strong as the need for a father’s protection~Sigmund Freud

10.A father is always making his baby into a little woman. And when she is a woman he turns her back again~Enid Bagnold

I Still Believe in Miracles

Yes I do, I really do still believe…Miracles can happen!  What a very odd title you may be thinking. Well, probably not if you are among the kind readers who know this part of the twinship of Gabby and Autumn. I’m the Gabby part of the twins, I am perhaps the quirky one with posts having some very unusual titles from time to time.. Autumn is the weaver of magic, love and just awesome poetry.Oops, I have to interrupt myself with a newsflash from Autumn… That Twinnie insists I label her as quirky, too! Well, she insisted so nicely, there you have it!

I digress so easily, and no Autumn doesn’t do it as nearly as often as I do. Back to the miracle thing, I still believe in miracles even after all that life has handed me so far. A few miracles I was hoping and praying for weren’t meant to be, but I can honestly say I still believe and that’s a positive thing.

The kind readers who know this story already,  I will make this short as not to be a bit of a bore. Evil cancer, in the form of Multiple Myeloma hit both my husband Dave and our Dad. The same exact cancer, the Multiple Myeloma Foundation said it was a first of this sort of thing. They died 40 days apart, was I wanting and praying for a miracle for both of them? Of course I was, along with tons of family and friends, etc. Did it shake my faith, did I turn my back on God? NO, that’s all as strong as ever and with the Divine Order of things, it was all meant to be and I don’t question these things. They each had their small miracles, Dad and Dave both lived longer than doctors predicted and they both bounced back from several horrible setbacks. It sounds strange, but yes, they were miracles. I survived the horrendous grief from the loss of them both, I stayed sane. So did our Mom, our family, that is also a miracle.

I looked out my window on this lovely spring day and saw the miracle of sun shining brightly, birds chirping among my trees. It had been raining and dreary the last few days and Wow! Just an all around beautiful sight, I look for simple things as my miracles and blessings. I will keep looking for miracles, I have already been a witness to several of them. How about all of you kind readers, do you look for miracles? I hope so, they are all over the place…Just look closely, very closely! Even the smallest, tiniest thing can turn out to be a miracle for you, keep believing I say and never stop looking…You don’t want to miss it! 🙂

The Twinnies and the Canoe Trip

I happened upon a picture of a canoe in a magazine I was reading. That’s all it took and my mind was going back to a wonderful and treasured memory. Autumn’s and my very first canoe trip when we were very young Twinnies. We must have been maybe about 7 years old and the trip was with our Dad and beloved Uncle Tony. It was such an anticipated trip and Autumn and I had been told a couple weeks in advance. Dad was probably sorry he shared the happy upcoming event too early, we about drove him crazy with questions! When was the day we were going? He patiently pointed out the day on the calendar and marked it with a big red star for us, too.

Still, Autumn and I had other questions, did anyone doubt it? Needless to say, when the big day arrived the pair of us were just literally jumping for joy! Yay, off we went to pick up Uncle Tony and on our way to our much loved Pine Creek for our canoe ride! It was maybe a half hour drive from our house, enough of a car ride to have both of us Twinnies being overly chatty.

I know, that sure never changed kind readers…Autumn and I always have plenty to say it seems. We also loved singing with our Dad, so we had a song or two with Uncle Tony joining in also. Autumn and I only bugged them a couple times about when we would get there, how much longer? Anyway, we arrived at where the canoe was docked and got on our life jackets with Dad’s and Uncle Tony’s help of course.

We Twinnies got another going over about water safety, we were taught quite early about it all. But Dad went over it all one more time, just to be safe and sound he explained. Wow, the sights and sounds when floating along on the water! The water so clear, you could see all the underwater treasures! The birds singing happily, those beautiful and awesome mountains surrounding us. Autumn and I were being well behaved for us, we only got a warning about trailing our hands in the water.

Oh yeah, we had made up a song about the water, the canoe and after singing the same couple verses for too long…Well, Dad asked us nicely to give it a rest. The canoe trip was truly such a magical experience and so wonderous to us Twinnies we weren’t going to do anything dumb to mess it up for ourselves! We might have our moments, but we were no fools! The ride ended much too soon for Autumn and me of course because we would happily have ridden for hours. It was a magic day, one that sticks in my mind as so special and happy. Dad and Uncle Tony are both in Heaven now, so the memories are a joy to have.

Do any of you kind readers have any memories of an adventure like this one? If you would like to share, it would be great hearing all about it! 🙂 PS The only small mishap of this perfect day was after docking the canoe Autumn and I got our socks and sneakers wet stepping into the very shallow water. Never fear, our Mom had packed extras! 😉 🙂

Smile…

It’s the song I am referring to, does everybody know the song I mean? “Smile“, yes it’s a beautiful song and it just pops into my head…Which is fine, but I  couldn’t shake it! Me, being the sort of person I am what do I do? I  played a much loved CD  to zap the song away. After the CD stopped the song “Smile” popped itself right back into my head, I kid you not! So, what to do…I simply can’t have this song stuck in my head. That’s when I decided, I will indeed write a post about it, why not? Surely that’s why the song popped itself into my head, right? 😉 Maybe, maybe not…It’s possible I was supposed to share this song “Smile” and my thoughts with you kind readers.

By the way, did you all know there really is a word for the stuck song syndrome? A hard to shake melody or a haunting melody… It’s called an Earworm. I know what you may be thinking, but it has nothing to do with worms trust me! It seems this happens to 98% of people, so I am in good company aren’t I? Sorry, I digressed just a tiny bit. Back to the song “Smile”…

The first person I recall singing it was my Dad. He sang a lot and often, Autumn’s and my Dad…He had a very beautiful voice. His philosophy always was it’s better to smile than cry, too so it’s no wonder Dad liked this song. I hadn’t been thinking of our Dad in particular when the song popped into my head. I was feeling just a bit sad, for a number of reasons… I don’t think I need to go into any of that for here and now. “Smile”,it really is a nice song with a nice message with it, too and I hadn’t thought of this song for quite some time.

There were many, many famous singers who sang this song…Nat King Cole, Tony Bennett, Judy Garland, more recent Josh Groban just to name a very few of them. It was said to be Michael Jackson’s favorite song, too.

This song and it’s lyrics…”Smile though your heart is aching/Smile even though your heart is breaking/While there are clouds in the sky, you’ll get by/If you smile through your fear and sorrow, smile and maybe tomorrow/You’ll see the sun come shining through for you/Light up your face with gladness/Hide every trace of sadness/Although a tear may be ever so near/That’s the time you must keep on trying/Smile what’s the use of crying/You’ll find that life is worthwhile/ If you just smile.” They are lovely words, with such a wonderful train of thought to have rolling…I suppose I did need to have the song become stuck in my head.

The earworm thing had to happen… I am guessing to share this important thought today  with you kind readers. “Smile”, because tomorrow really will be a better day if you are or have been having some not so good days…It’s a good thought worth sharing, isn’t it? That’s all from me today, so hey everybody who needs to hear it…SMILE!! 🙂 🙂

Valentine’s Day ~ by Gabby

It’s here, February 14th has arrived! It does that every single year and Valentine’s Day is here once again. How is everyone celebrating? Any plans or thoughts on the day? It is a day to celebrate love, so of course the Twinnie is on board with this one. Autumn is just glowing everyday with the love and she doesn’t need a special day. How do I feel on this day? As some of you kind readers already know…My husband Dave is in Heaven. Well, I am of course missing him as always but I do celebrate the day. Dave wouldn’t want me to spend the day being sad. I had a good many Valentine’s Days that are very cherished memories we spent together.

I won’t be sad, after all I do have two very special Valentines! Who are they? My two youngest and very special nephews, they make sure to give me a valentine and a special drawing and sometimes other little surprises. How sweet is that I ask? 🙂

When Autumn and I were young, but old enough to understand Valentines Day we learned how it was done! Our Dad gave us Valentine cards along with a little heart-shaped box filled with chocolates or some other little treat, right along with our Mom. 🙂 That is such a treasured memory, it started with Dad giving us twinnies the special Valentine gifts. It continued with each new sister that came along, too. Six sisters and Mom, Dad was handing out lots of special Valentines through the years!

Well, didn’t we all get a head start on what to expect from the boyfriends and husbands to come? Yes, we sure did and if they were slackers woe on to them! The either got a good talking to or…Yes, Autumn once dumped a boyfriend over the Valentine’s Day neglect. That Twinnie sure didn’t fool around…Thankfully she won’t have to worry this year with such things. Her darling man is quite the romantic and also a very nice guy, he asked me for hints over a month ago concerning special gift choices for her. 🙂 I know, Wow he is a keeper for the Twinnie! In case he didn’t give her the special gift, I just better keep his gift choice to myself. Maybe she will share with us though! 🙂

Well, how about you kind readers? Anyone care to share their plans or perhaps some thoughts? Sharing is always fun I say! Aso we twinnies are wishing all of you a very special and Happy Valentine’s Day!! 🙂 🙂

Pasta Comes in All Shapes and Sizes, What’s Your Fave? by Gabby Angel

I know, what a weird question for me to be pondering on. These are the random thoughts that go through my mind. I never seem to run out of those thoughts it seems. Does anyone else get these thoughts? Would anyone care to leave their opinion, thoughts and all? Come on, let’s talk pasta! As usual inquiring twinnies are wanting to know your favorite pasta shape.

There are so many different shapes of pasta…The possibilities are endless. What got me pondering and wondering was making dinner earlier. My dinner was angel hair pasta with a tomato sauce laced with lots of mushrooms. Angel hair pasta’s real Italian name is capellini and does mean literally angel hair, isn’t that interesting? Angel hair is one of my favorite shapes of pasta, being half Italian Autumn and I were raised on pasta. 🙂 Not that this makes either of us experts, but our favorite shapes are pretty much the same. It may be a “twin thing”, but we both adore angel hair pasta.

So many choices, and no we don’t make our own pasta from scratch anymore by the way. I know, shame on us 😉 Other favorite shapes of pasta, let me just name a few. Lasagna, that’s always fun (and we both make a regular version and also a vegetarian version), spagetti (naturally since that is an original), farfalle (which in Italian means butterfly) the bow tie shaped pasta.

One of our Dad‘s favorite recipe he created was made with farfalle. Sorry to say, it’s a family secret so I won’t be sharing. 😉 Just a few of some of our family’s favorites are also tortellini, cavatelli, fiori (which is a flower-shaped pasta and means flowers), manicotti either stuffed with a ricotta cheese mixture or stuffed with meat. I am always intrigued with what the Italian meaning of some of the pastas are.
One of the more interesting pasta is gemelli, it’s a single S-shaped pasta. Guess what it means in Italian? Twins, that is just the coolest thing and just one of those things I just had to toss into this blog. Because of course as everyone knows (or hopefully does know by now) Autumn and I are twins! 🙂

Oh my goodness, so many pasta shapes…There really are just a multitude of them! Twinnie and I both also favor the spinach flavored pasta once in awhile, it’s very good but of course not for everyone. I could never get my husband Dave to like it, believe me I did try. His favorite was my very own lasagna.
So many years have gone by since helping our Mom make homemade ravioli, it really is fun to make. Mom always makes the homemade version. Again shame on the twinnies, we get ours out of the freezer section. Our Italian Grandma would never have dreamed of strolling to the freezer section! The homemade version was “just the only way” for her. Being a good sport, she never scolded Autumn, me or any other sisters for racing to the freezer section. 🙂 So, as I’ve been rambling on here about different pastas, and I know many, many shapes I never mentioned.
Is this making anyone hungry at all? 😉 Anyone wanting to or care to share your thoughts on favorite pasta shapes? Please do, the twinnies would love to know! 🙂 🙂

Driving Lessons ~ by Gabby Angel

I was driving earlier today, nothing new there…Something I do everyday, right? Out of nowhere, I could have sworn I heard my Dad’s voice. I was approaching a stop sign when I believed I heard Dad’s voice. He said “remember to come to a complete stop.” I came to a complete stop and waited to see if I would hear Dad’s voice again…Nothing.

Some of you might think I was by chance on my cell phone…I wasn’t. I wouldn’t be chatting and driving, that is such a pet peeve of mine. It probably is to a lot of you, too. Not to mention illegal in most states and even using “hands free devices”, in my humble opinion it still isn’t safe. Here I am digressing as I so often do. Back to the subject, hearing Dad’s voice…It would have been an out of this world call. Autumn and my Dad is in Heaven, as some of you already know.We sadly lost him to cancer 8& 1/2 years ago.

Anyway, I continue driving to my destination and nothing out of the normal happened. I think it was a reminder of my learning to drive days, what a flashback of thoughts! I really and unfortunately did make Dad a nervous wreck when he had me out driving at 16 years old with my learner’s permit.

Autumn didn’t have the same effect on Dad…Why you ask? Well, I will spill the dirt on the twinnie! 😉 With her permission of course…Her boyfriend at the time was giving her driving lessons! I didn’t meet Dave until several months later or he could have taught me. Anyway, she did so well driving with Dad and he was calm as could be… Twinnie finally did fess up and told both Dad and Mom. Her secret motive, so she could take her drivers test and get her license right away…So not fair. 😦 I am kidding of course, I got mine a month or so later and it was fine with me. 🙂

With Dad taking me out driving a little over a handful of times…I heard quite a few “Come to a COMPLETE stop at the stop sign!”  Poor Dad, he was gripping onto the armrest most of the while, too. Way too many stop signs I guess. He wasn’t yelling, being mean or anything…But oh my goodness, he was being tortured the whole time. There were some other things I wasn’t getting quite right, but let’s not get into those, OK? 😉 Finally after my 6th or 7th time out, Dad and I walked in the house and guess what? He tossed Mom the car keys and admited defeat with me…How embarassing. Oddly enough Mom really did very well with my driving lessons, and I got my license…Yay!

I did have to quiz  Dad about who was going to be teaching the younger sisters who to drive. He looked troubled for a minute, but laughed and said “We have 4 years to worry about that.” The next sister to get her permit was L. and she was only 12 years old.  I know it sticks in my head though, the stop sign thing and Dad’s warnings…So did I hear his voice today while driving? Maybe I did, maybe not…It doesn’t matter, right? I learned the stop sign thing very well, didn’t I? 🙂 😉

Christmas Songs…Everyone’s Got a Favorite ~by Gabby Angel

Or do they? It really is hard to narrow the choices down and actually pick a favorite. My other thought is…Some people actually dislike all Christmas songs. At least I have heard that one from several diffent people in my travels through life.

When you work with the public, you just get told things. Sometimes whether you want to or even when you really don’t. I found it quite sad the first time someone actually said…I hate them all! While you’re at it, turn off that stuff (not the word they really used) you’re playing. How Grinchy was that? Anyway, I just said it was on the store’s sound system and couldn’t do that. About that time Autumn strolled over, she had heard the exchange. Yay, twinnie to the rescue! Autumn nicely told the unpleasant shopper, “It’s Christmas time, what were you expecting to hear when you walked in?” I loved how she presented her best smile as she said this, too! Said shopper just kind of did a growly noise but did proceed to shop, guess it was the twinnie’s smile? 😉

Anyway, this time of year either brings out the best or worst in people it seems. Back to Christmas songs…I like so many but will try to narrow it down to only a few. Autumn is the same way, maybe nobody can narrow it down to one! Who has only one favorite? Is it really possible? If (shudder) anyone reading this dislikes Christmas songs, do feel free to say so….If you dare. 😉

One of my favorite and Autumn’s is “Happy Christmas”, John Lennon with Yoko. My other few faves are “Silent Night“, “Hark the Herald Angels Sing”, “White Christmas” ( Memories of our Dad singing it), as well as others. There really are so many, too many to mention here! Autumn when asked named off “Walking in A Winter Wonderland“, “Jingle Bell Rock” and then the twinnie went on…”Merry Christmas Darling“, “Merry Christmas Baby”,” All I Want for Christmas is You” and I had to stop her there. Does anyone besides me see a theme developing? 😉

So, now it’s any of you kind readers turns! Only if you feel like particapating…Tell us twinnies your favorites, please? 🙂 Come on, don’t be shy…It will be fun! 🙂

Happy Birthday… ~By Gabby Angel

I just had to write this one and dedicate it to youngest little sister and Dad. Having talked this over with Autumn, we both agreed we needed to acknowledge this special date. Which would be December 7th, first our beloved Dad’s birthday and also our youngest little sister.

They loved sharing the same birthday. Dad always teased M. by saying she was the best birthday gift he could have asked for. When we lost Dad to cancer 8 years ago it was so sad to hear littlest sister M. say she hated her birthday now. Thankfully the last couple years has been better and she seems to be able to enjoy her birthday.

M. is the sweetest and so loving, gentle, spunky and she has the best sense of humor. Yes, she is the baby sister of the bunch, but she truly still looks so much like a little girl. It’s easy to want to shelter her from hurting, she is so gentle and loving. M. was born when Autumn and I were almost 13 years old. So, she did grow up with the both of us always wanting to protect her and look after her.

There are way more positives than negatives I could ever say about M. She is happily married now and has two adorable little boys, the cutest and most amusing nephews they are, too. Anyway, M. was so used to sharing her birthday for years with our Dad so of course things are very different. But like I said she is doing OK, although it’s difficult not worrying about her.

Mom would make Dad his favorite cake, German Chocolate and M her favorite chocolate cake with peanut butter icing each and every year. M. loved it when they each got to blow out their birthday candles. She always insisted they blew out those candles and made their own wish at the same time. They opened birthday gifts together, again because M. insisted it was the way. Dad was such a sweetheart always going along with her wishes, because he was just that kind of awesome type Dad. He is so very missed and always will be…He loved Mom all six of us darling daughters and we all loved him back.

Dad was the kind of man who everyone liked immediately, he had a sense of joy and magic around him. His love and zest for life, making sure each day was lived to the fullest. Always encouraging, gently nuding and so good at helping others. He was a blessing to all of us and any life he touched, we all hold those memories close.

Dad would encourage M. to have a wonderful birthday…He will be watching from heaven to make sure she does have a beautifull day. I know M. knows this, so we will all make sure little baby sister has the most Happy Birthday…After all, Dad is watching and we don’t want to disappoint him.