@JamestoSandra
Dear JamestoSandra:
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I can do the chair challenge easily.  I think it is because I have a low center of gravity with my hips being wider than my chest.

Marion

Best way to have a burger. I'm going to order pizza. It's raining and no one want to cook really.

So I am a mature male now but in 1979 I was 18 and had just graduated HS and moved out of state.
I had been wearing my sisters things since I was 12. She had caught me twice wearing them. Around 17 she taught me how to put make up on.
I had just got a job and an appartment. I had a suit case full of my sisters old clothes and I decided it was time to dress up and go out. I was a late bloomer and even at 18 had very little body hair and I was snow white blonde. My hair was long because that was the thing at the time.
I put my hair up in a high pony tail and put on make up like she had showed me. Then I put on my panties and bra. I still remember the panties were a pair of pink bikini panties and matching bra. I used some gel bra inserts.
I was only 5'8" and 135lbs at the time.
I had this very cute sundress with sunflowers all over it. I put it on and a cute pair of sandles. Walking out the door of my place for the first time I felt a rush through my body of excitement and nervous. I swear my penis was shrunk up so small.
I got in my car and drove around a bit then stopped at a shopping mall and walked around and looked at girls things. I was nervous that people were going to say something or laugh but no one even noticed had a few people look at me and smile and say hi and it went well and I felt so comfortable.
It was easy to look like a girl at that time but as I got into my mid 20's I began to grow and get more masculine and it was harder to pass but I still dressed when I could. Now I am older I dont dress much but I wear panties under my clothes quite often.

As an Iowan, I don't have adequate words to describe how far downhill this state has fallen since I was a teenager. It used to be a pretty good state to live in. First in the nation for education and a decent standard of living. It has always had its problems, and even when I was a kid stuff like casual racism was common. But since KKKim Reynolds took over, it was a very fast descent into open bigotry and Christian Nationalism. Racism is more prominent now than I ever remember it being, as is hate toward LGBTQ people and immigrants of all varieties. On top of all that, our water quality has fallen to among the worst in the nation, we are low on the scale for education, and second in the nation for cancer rates. Now we've set a new low, by becoming the first in the nation to remove civil rights from people.

I've been seeing posts about certain things being changed in the big ugly bill, one of which was transgender care?

Do we know if changes specifically for trans care were made for the better in the bill before it was passed is actually true or not??

We should be safe everywhere, as much as non-transgender people would be at least.

I understand that some unaccepting people may believe "that absolutely no one could be without a mental problem and be transgender at the same time, something has to be wrong with them."  That is truly unfortunate.

Thankfully, most of the time we can just live as ourselves.

May you all be able to be yourselves and live safe and peacefully, have a good employment or income and health, and someone you have as a true friend. 

Hugs,

Chrissy

I love figs - fresh, dehydrated, any way I can have them. We have a fig tree that is *loaded* right now, probably between 250 and 300 figs. We eat them fresh in yogurt, oatmeal, salads, and then we dehydrate (in slices) them to last us through the year.

Figs are incredible. One of the most sensuous eating experiences there is.

Quote from: davina61 on Yesterday at 02:02:38 AMIts an old Victorian building with sash windows, not room for a window box.

I understand. Here we have community gardens where there's a shared space for people to plant a raised bed of their own. I've never known how one gets such a plot for themselves. I've seen some very impressive gardens in them, though.

Quote from: ChrissyRyan on Today at 07:01:47 AMPema,


How is your garden coming along?


Chrissy

Hi, Chrissy. Thank you for asking. It's a mixed bag, as it always is. The moles are having a heyday, just like always. They destroy the roots of plants and create air pockets in the soil beneath them, and that severely hampers their growth. I still have more wins than losses, so I try to focus on that. I have a couple of mole traps out but haven't yet caught one.

We've been eating huge salads for dinner every night for at least a month, which means that all of the salad greens are doing very well. But they're winding down in the summer heat. Same for the peas.

The garlic has all been harvested and is hanging in the garage to cure. We got an excellent supply of garlic scapes, half of which are still in the refrigerator and available for daily use. The garlic suffers worse than most due to the moles. I doubt I'll have enough this year to supply us for a year and replant next year's. So I'll probably have to buy more seed garlic this fall. That's OK. I just really need to do something about the moles.

The broccoli, cauliflower, and cabbage are always difficult due to the too-sandy soil, the moles, and the chipmunk and rabbit. It's a battlezone out here. Same with the kohlrabi and Brussels sprouts. I'd guess we get about a 75% success rate.

Peppers and eggplant are slowly growing as they do here. By the end of July, they should be large bushes and have unripe fruit on them. That's the hope anyway.

The beans are coming along. Like yours, we have small beans on the bush plants. The pole beans are climbing away and starting to develop flowers.

The delicata squashes are looking fantastic and already covered with fruits. They'll take a couple of months to grow and ripen. The summer squashes got off to a very slow start but are picking up steam - still smallish plants, but loaded with flowers and few small fruits.

After harvesting all of the garlic (probably 500 plants total), I replant those patches with daikon radishes, kohlrabi, basil, and mustard/arugula. The earlier-planted basils are doing well, but only about 20 plants survived (of about 50) our unexpected week away.

The flower side is just a riot of color and...everything.

So, in summary, it's pretty chaotic, but it always is, and it's wonderful.

You can see some of it here:
https://www.susans.org/index.php/topic,250897.msg2308434.html#msg2308434