Plea for help

Some of you may know that my husband owns a State Farm agency. Well, we have a client that just lost her husband. She is 65, and doesn't even have the $4,000 to bury him. She will be moving into Section 8 housing a a couple months.

I know there isn't anything we can do about the housing situation, realistically. But, I do think that she should not have the stress of wondering how to pay for her husband's burial. There are no children involved. She has 8 step-children, and I don't know the entire situation about why they're not helping, I just know they are not involved with the funeral expenses, and will not be helping her.

So, I have set up a fund for her at the Paw Paw State Bank. I don't want to use her name, because there are alot of assholes out there, so the fund is named "Funeral Fund" with me as the custodian. I am aware that her husband will be buried before I can find all the money, but I can at least try to present her with a "reimbursement" type of gift.

Here's the address:

Paw Paw State Bank
Funeral Fund
235 Chicago Road
Paw Paw, IL 61353

I'm going there first thing tomorrow to tell them about this post. I came up with $200, so let's try to come up with $3800 more. If more comes in than expected, maybe this would be a good thing to keep going for other needy widows.

Picture time!

Here's a couple pics of the kids, aren't they cute?

Some quiet time...

Well, the appraiser has come and gone, and we've ejoyed a 30% increase in our property value over two years. Not too shabby, and a 50% increase over the original purchase price of the home. SO, I'm happy with that. It gives us a good idea about what our work is adding to a rural property, since rural areas have a hard time increasing in value.

The family and I have taken some time to relax. I've planted a bunch of perennials, including a banana tree. Ya, can you believe there is a variety that is hardy to zone 5? Weird! Also, I wanted to attract some birds to my newfound garden, so I put up an oriole feeder, and a hummingbird feeder, in the garden, next to our fountain. It didn't even take two days, and I had Baltimore orioles galore.



While taking photos (I took them on the "real" camera, with my zoom lens, so I have to get them developed), two came and started fighting over the feeder. I've never seen them before around here! I also have rose-breasted grosbeaks, indigo buntings, thrashers, and many other unusual birds. All of which I haven't seen before in my life before I moved here! I have to keep my birding book and camera ready at all times!

The weather's been great, so in the early mornings, Karl and I have snuck out onto the newly redone front porch to enjoy some coffee and watch the orioles come to the feeder. How relaxing!

We may cool it for a while on any further remodeling, just to let our wallets recover, lololol.