All About Me!!!

Well my friends...It's not every day that I choose to post pictur es of me and tell my own story, but this time it is necessary and amazing.  I got an email from a newspaper correspondent who said he wanted to write a column about "Photoschmoozer extraodinaire" and yesterday we talked!  Sunday the article and some of these photos wil be in the Gloucester County Times with Jim Six's byline!  Usually I share what I affirm and recognize about others - and rightly so but this time, the  glory is mine and I will accept it!!  It's funny to think about what life in RETIREMENT is all about?!?!?  Can't seem to find the rocking chair and the tv clicker to watch the day time shows because life is too full and this collage offers snippets of a 60 something person going out to MEET LIFE!!  Life is tenuous and short in some ways, so for Photoschmoozer/Martie, this is an imperative!!  We go sailing on a schooner, make art cards and prints, appreciate the beauty of nature, study nutrition and eat healthy foods, do yoga and water class for arthritis and read and study and learn in between.  Oh, lest we forget, there is the Uptown Pitman Farm Market that I am coordinating and what a bang up season this will be!!  Phew...time for one of those 'senior specials' a mid afternoon nap before I am off to Philadelphia for a show, Motherhood the Musical!!  Just remember always to live life in the present moment and always look for the schmoozing and synchronicities!!  Love life - love yourself!  It's the only way to go!!

The Gift of Love: Our Garden and Famer Bill

It's Spring in NJ temperature wise and by the calendar so "Farmer Bill" has begun his activity in the garden - he's gotten zillions of trailer loads of leaves for mulch and the greenhouse on the back deck has all varieties of vegetables and flowers beginning to sprout.  To move forward just a tad faster, I was at Whole Foods the other day and came home with a Butterhead lettuce and some arugula - so these have found a home with us too - with wire so we don't have to share with the rabbits!!

To our joy and wonder, we can already harvest theses collard greens that are with us from last season.  Just shows what a mild season we had - and that Bill had created a plastic green house to protect them as well.  Had to make a decision about breakfast yesterday, and off I went to the garden to bring in the collards to steam - totally tasty and tender!  Add a sprinkle of umeboshi plum vinegar and it's a total treat to start the day!!

Now I am talking about greens and our garden, so why have I added a picture of Christina and Robert Pirello?!?!?  It's a simple answer - whenever I have been in their presence, the subject of healthy foods and GREENS comes up.  Christina says this, "Eat your Greens - and when you think you have eaten enough, EAT MORE!"   The exciting thing is that Christina is coming to the Pitman Farm Market on June 2 as our special guest for the grand opening!  She will gather food from the farmers and talk about it right there!!  There is excitement generating?  Why not join in the Farm Market fever?!?

  Everyday I experience synchronicities related to it all - I can't even conceive of how it will finally look - but as my buddy Jim says, "It will be the best damned market around!!"

Spring at "My Lake"!!

Adventures at New Dodge Market!!!

Photography Friends!!

Reflections from a Peaceful Place

It's been a month now that I have been going to the Virtua health club - water class for arthritis.  It is warm and wonderful and mesmerizing.  Remember I always say to stop and look around you and reflect on what you see?  This is no exception.  We are there mid afternoon when the sun has come around to the west and shines in so brightly.  I get in the water and just am still because I watch the dances going on - the beautiful relatioinships between the sun and the water and the movement - I cause some of it by moving my body, but some just happens naturally .  It is a special time.  Though I hurt at times, I would not miss the warmth of the water that envelopes me!!  Then as an aside, there is the warmth of the people in the class - many older than I and phenomenal role models but that is a discussion for another time!!

Everything is a picture and everything is a story - fascinating to look at the shadows of the railings with the light and the water.  Such joy in life from the simple pleasures!  Don't go looking for the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow - see the treasures that are all around you.  Reading a book now about Aging as a Spiritual Practice by Lewis Richmond and in it he talks about ATTENTION.  In the Chinese characters for the word, it is about being still and being in the here and now.  This is what the water, the warmth and the pool do for me - maybe it is time for more than once a week?!?!/

A Long Story with Many Chapters: Connections

It's a long story with many twists and turns in the road - we could say it has a happy ending, but the chapters are still being written!!  More than 25 years ago, Bill has a sign business and Bev Benson, for the Glassboro Cerebral Palsy Center, contacted him to make signs for a gold tournament at Ron Jaworski's Eagles Nest - then in Sewell, NJ.  About three years ago, Bill and I were in the Bus Stop Music Cafe and we saw a woman who looked totally familiar.  Yes, I asked her who she was and how we knew one another.  We got to the tournament and the signs and then began to catch up!  Well, somehow we got to talking about family and I mentioned that I had a niece, Rebecca Rother, who was a student at Goucher College (yes, was because she has now graduated!!  You go Becca!!)   She said she did too - Jen Schollin.   We talked abour small worlds and then the world got smaller when we each talked to our respective nieces and found out that they were really good friends!  From that time on, we have been planning a niece/aunt visit to Pitman and yesterday that happened.  We all met at Carolina Blue for a St. Paddy's dinner and a meet and greet!!  What total fun and Bev's daughter Amanda joined us. The world got smaller and more connected when Amanda told me where she lived and we discovered that her father in law is Bill Datz - an old ham radio buddy of Bill's!!  Talk to everyone...hear their stories...and know that more and more Kevin Bacon is right with his six degrees of connection!!   Happy days for all and more to come!! 
PS:  Becca and Jen have a friend Maggie who lives in Absecon, NJ.  She came to Pitman and joined us!!  Maggie and Becca spent a semester abroad in England last year.

WOW!! Women of Wonder!!

Yesterday was St. Patrick's Day but at the Garden Patch Quilt Show at Wheaton Arts in Milville, I kept seeing women wearing PURPLE!!  I knew they weren't the Red Hat Society because it was only purple that I saw!  Finally, in my usualy Photoschmoozer way, I knew I could not satisfy my curiosity until I asked what was going on?!?!  I found this spry young woman and asked "Why purple on St. Patrick's Day?"  The color had to do with their church group. They have a group called WOW - and my new friend had a button on to show that!  It is just a group that they began at their church and it doesn't go any further than that.  They were so excited and proud when I noticed that WOW from my viewpoint - sort of upside down - is MOM!  Now that is a true fact now that every MOM is a WOW!  It is a warming thought.  Interesting memory - maybe someone can help me - years ago I bought a book about WOW and women from a national organization and can't find it anywhere?!?  HELP???

Completion...Satisfaction and Crazy Quilt Projects!!

This weekend is the Quilts in the Village show coordinated by Garden Patch Quilters at Wheaton Arts in Milville.  Our group, South Jersey Crazy Quilters (see more quilts on our facebook page   SouthJersey Crazy Quilts) had a double booth display at the show and it is the best ever!  We spent hours and hours on Friday between drama and display to get it right!!   I am so excited because the photographer from the Vineland News Journey was there to showcase the quilts and quilters and two very special photos were in his gallery on line...my favorite - me and my crazy quilt drum!!  You know we make sonotube drums, but I decided to do a crazy quilt one for the show!  It looks and sounds great (though the more traditional folks thought is was a hat box?!?!??!)   Then as I looked at the pictures, I saw the other  one of the crazy quilt vests that Martha Gullo and I had made and the woman in the picture is pointing to mine!!  What a proud moment!!  Always a grand time to be out among people, schmooze and learn and do new things!!

Daylight Savings Time - the Gift of Sunrise

Bus Stop Music Cafe Buddies

Philadelphia Flower Show

At The Reading Terminal Market

Baltimore Adventures with Becca

Hot Rod Diner Live at leannas in Deepwater