First Steps Are Always A Little Wobbly.....Getting Our Balance by Holding on to One Another.

The 'Judy' side of the 'Okie Sisters' received bad news very recently. 

Her mother-in-law (for 46 years now), Hazel, has been diagnosed with advanced Leukemia and given only a short time to live. Hazel is approaching the age of 90 years old and does not want to receive any treatments or any attempts to prolong her live.   Judy's husband, Jim,  is Hazel's only son, along with two daughters.  After getting past the sad news, now Jim and Judy have to figure out how they can manage spending these last days, weeks, months..(no one knows) with Hazel where she lives in central California and they live in northern Arizona.

Their first concern about leaving, was their two little dogs. 

A friend agreed to watch 'Pepper', the black Cocker, and I have agreed to watch 'Bella', a chocolate colored Miniature Schnauzer.

 

(My husband and I also have two dogs, a Chihuahua (Max) and a Min Pin (Mona)....of the four dogs, all but Max have 'bobbed' tails.....and little Bella is FASCINATED by Max's tail and is always 'attacking' it)  It's actually cute to watch...but Max does not think it's cute...he's very defensive of his tail, so lots of growling goes on whenever  those two dogs are together.  





Another concern (unashamedly, I hope) is financial.  Their main source of income is social security.  Their only residence is a travel trailer.  The travel trailer does have 2 slide-outs and is 30 or 35' long.  It is set-up on a friends property at the edge of town and is very picturesque location....plus the friend only charges them for the electric, space rental fee is $0, in exchange for them helping him around his house and 2 rental's located on same property.  (Sorry, no pictures yet!)  But, getting to California and staying an indefinite period of time is causing angst for both of them. 

Speaking of the travel trailer.....
When I started this blog, my initial intention was to chronicle the remodeling and decorating that Judy has done.  That is what is behind the 'Title' of this post.  First steps are always a little wobbly, and usually requires not only 'falling down' and getting back up a few dozen times, but also a change of direction....know what I mean?

The situation for now is that the sister who is the 'artist' and talented home designer will be absent from this blogging endeavor.  Yours truly, Muuah, Brenda, is the geeky sister who will be blogging 'by the seat of her pants' for a period of  (?) time.  I'm not 'horrible' at decorating or crafts, but not sure how impressive my projects will be held up against all the FABULOUS projects in the blogs that I am now 'following'!  Additionally, my husband and I are renters.  I am allowed to paint and do minor revisions, but no way are we going to invest in 'remodeling'.  We do currently reside in a pretty cool 'dwelling' (since September 2010).  It's old...Vintage sounds better....probably built in the 30's or 40's...has a large covered front porch and a picket fence.  I'm pretty sure I'll be able to 'deliver' some interesting blog content from within these walls of vintage charm.

With this knowledge in mind about the 'Okie Sisters' aka 'Thrifty Nifty Sisters', I hope, our friends, family and hopefully, fellow bloggers will follow us, comment on our blog post and 'hold on to us' until we are beyond the first steps and 'have balance and stride in our blog journey'.