Quick Photo of Table Rock Lake

I didn't want anyone to think I fell off the planet since I started posting here more frequently.  When I came across this nice shot of Table Rock Lake I saw for a property listing on Murney, I wanted to share it as it's such a lovely shot.  I'll be talking more about the lake, you can count on that.

Vintage Butternut Delivery Truck

I don't know the year of this old Butternut Truck.  I saw it on my grocery trip to Walmart in Branson West this afternoon.  I just had to take a picture.

If anyone knows the year or more about this truck, let us know.  Also, there seems to be a total lack of history on Butternut.  I didn't even know whether it still existed or not.  I guess it's part of Hostess and does exist, but other than that, I couldn't locate any cool history on the brand.  If anyone has anything to share about Butternut in the past or has any fun Butternut stories to tell, please do.

A-Frame Paradise

I don't know how many A-Frames I have posted about, but I like them so much, I'll always be putting them here when they come on the market.  I'm going to have to go back and do a count of my A-Frame posts because now I'm curious how many I have.

I particularly like this one.  It has a very good feeling and I like the look of it.  It appears that a coat of interior paint would do the trick.  I wouldn't be surprised one bit if I end up living in an A-Frame when I go to buy my home.  I'm starting to wonder if it's fate with the amount of A-Frames I've come across.  It sure is nice to return to my habit of posting on real estate, especially now that I'm down here and up close and personal.  It makes it so much more real that I'll be owning a home in the Ozarks someday.

Is that countertop in the kitchen not to die for.  I love it!  It is so long, you could do so much prep for cooking and baking on it.  That is fantastic.  I like the outside too being nestled in the forest as it is.

I found this via BidSelect, which is a HUD site.  I don't typically find rural properties there as they tend to offer more city properties.  It is 663 square feet, which is the ideal size for me, and two bedrooms with one bath for a mere $27,000.  It is located near Lake Taneycomo in Merriam Woods Village which is right next to Rockaway Beach, not far from Branson.

Here's the listing broker's contact information:

RE/MAX Associated Brokers
109 North 6th Street
Branson, MO  65616
Phone: (417) 334-1374
Fax: (417) 334-5959
Email: Kelly Grisham

As usual, if you buy it, invite me over.

A Typical Family Scene

Here's what life looks like when nearly all the dogs decide to show up downstairs.

 

This is Sarah and she's very sweet.  This is the first time she's jumped up on the couch.  Luckily, I'm prepared because I have my Ozarks Crescent Mural blanket covering it up.  Gee, everything looks so cluttered and I promise it's not.  I'm pretty minimalist.  I only keep the things I love and use.  You can see the recliner I sit in with my sweater sitting there and my laptop.  I grab the laptop and set it on the arm of the chair and get my work done.

 

This is my dog, Kansas.  She is also very sweet.  You can see a birthday present on the coffee table.  The girl owner has a birthday coming up.  I do need to come up with names for both of the people I rent from, since I won't divulge their actual names here.  I just need to create some cute pseudonyms for them.

This is Samson, the little guy.  He is so cute.  I love his walk and the fur that sticks up on the end of his paws.  He loves road trips, so any excuse to hop in the car and go for a ride and he'll be right there.

You saw Maguire in the last post and he's here in the room too.  So only one dog is missing and that's Weezer, a girl.  I have my Saint Bernard and the owners' four dogs include two boys and two girls.  There's also four cats of theirs, but they are all older, so they never venture downstairs.  I am currently cat-free.

They're a fun bunch and make life a joy.

Early Morning Pictures

I'm a night owl, so I'm up all night.  I work at home, so I just have the TV on in the background and I get my work done.  This morning, I noticed a lot of pretty pink in the sky, so I grabbed my Handycam and took some shots.  I need to learn how to adjust the settings on it because it sure didn't capture the pinks and oranges in the sky.

In the last one, you can see part of the house.  I took these from the lower porch, since that's right out the door of where I live.  I did have one shot that captured the pink better than any of the others, but unfortunately it's too blurry to post.  I'm looking into getting a tripod.

Here's a cool one I got of the treetops in the sky.

Then Maguire came around.  He's hilarious and he's one of the four dogs that belongs to the owners.  He kept moving around so much that I got these shots and a bunch of ones with just various body parts or blur.

The shot right before he decides to stroll off and do his own thing is reminiscent of his night.  The story is that his sweet owner said he got her up in the middle of the night to go outside.  He had heard or sensed some deer because he immediately took off running after them.  Maguire looks like he's still sensing something in that particular picture, but apparently not.  He hangs around and his slow mosey a few moments later means not much is up.

Branson Pic

I took a quick spin through Branson today with the woman who lives upstairs that I rent from.  I saw the quaint downtown and I will definitely be doing some pictures there later.  I jumped out long enough to grab a few shots of the waterfront.

Branson is situated on Lake Taneycomo.  It is about 20 miles east of where I live.  Today I used my Sony Handycam, which takes much better photos than my iPad 2.  It looks a bit fuzzy, but that's probably because the sun was shining so bright, I couldn't see what I was shooting.

I want to offer a bit of background on why I was spending so much time with my series of property posts.  I was helping my Mom out in Kansas, so I wasn't in the Ozarks to be up close and personal to do any photos myself or to talk about life here.  Plus, since I'm sincerely looking for a home, it just made sense.  It kept me connected to the area and that felt good.

My Mom doesn't drive anymore and so she needs someone to pick up groceries for her.  I also enjoyed cooking for her and doing household chores.  She's not in any medical need and she can do everything herself, but she likes being pampered as much as I like doing it, so it worked out.  But being an adult, of course, I wanted to get back to my life and so here I am.  Another sibling is doing her shopping and looking out for her now.

I just felt the need to put a perspective on why all of my posts may have seemed like they were long-distance.  It's because they were!  After I left my place in Douglas County, Missouri, I went to Kansas.

Branson today was a sweet reminder of my lovely parents who honeymooned there in the late 1940s.  My dear Father who I love very, very much passed on in 1990 and I know my Mom misses me a great deal since I've come back here.  I miss her too.  I am very blessed with wonderful parents and I am grateful for everything they do and have done.

Here's Home

I love my new home.  This is where I will be for the next few years.  As you can see from my ticker at the bottom, I'm still in the savings process for my own house.  I want to buy outright, so I'll incur no debt, which means I have to save every penny.  That's no problem.  There's a lot of satisfaction in buying things that way.  That's what I did with my New Beetle Sport and my car means so much to me because of doing that.

So I know I said initially I'd be staying in a resort, but it turned out someone responded to my ad on Craigslist and now I live in the lower level of a beautiful home.  The folks upstairs who own the house are super sweet and I get on with them just fine.  I love the layout downstairs and it's not a basement at all as the house is built on a slope, so I'm actually very far off the ground.  All of my things look so pretty here and I know my Saint Bernard is thrilled to return to her typical life.

Here's some photos of the little bit of Table Rock Lake that peers out between the trees.  I hear in the wintertime that the lake is so clearly visible that it's like being right next to it.  We aren't far at all from it, just up on the hill above it.

So the first three views are from the deck out toward the lake showing the transition from late afternoon to dusk to sunset.  The pretty pink in the sky is nice.  The last two are of the deck and you can see part of the house and how pretty it is.  You'll have to excuse the quality of the photos.  I used my iPad 2 because it is so easy to take pictures with it and I enjoy it.  Unfortunately, the iPad doesn't have a great reputation for quality photos, but it gets the job done.