In Which Ms. Bean Is An Accessory After The Fact, Maybe

October 9, 2018 / Ally Bean / 64 Comments

TECHNICALLY I am guilty.

That’s what Zen-Den, Esq, tells me.

That by not reporting what I saw to the authorities I aided in, but was not an accomplice with, someone who stole something; that I am an accessory after the fact.

Well, so be it, says I.

Sometimes the entertainment value of not doing what you’re supposed to do is worth risking the wrath of the law. As if this situation would ever involve the police.

You see, I was in the Self-Scan lane at the grocery checking out when I noticed a mother with a baby and a 5 y.o. boy. The Mom was showing/supervising/focusing on Young Boy as he learned how to use the scanner.

🛒 → 😇 → 👶 ← 😇←🛒

MEANWHILE Baby Brother was sitting like a sweet angelic cherub in the seat part of the basket cart.

Mom had placed on the basket cart one of those quilted blanket-y thingies that attach to the seat part of the cart so that the baby never touches the basket cart itself. [I have no idea what to call those things.]

Baby Brother, after looking at Mom to make sure she wasn’t paying attention to him, in a calculated and deliberate move, used his pudgy little paw to grab a toothbrush from the basket part of the cart.

I’m assuming that Mom had put the toothbrush in the cart as she was shopping in the store, planning on buying the toothbrush.

🛒→ 😁 → 👶 ← 😁 ←🛒

HOWEVER Baby Brother with the sticky fingers was planning to do something different.

His plan involved him hiding the toothbrush, where no one would see it, in front of himself in the folds of the puffy fabric that surrounded him.

Mine, mine, mine, his smile said!

This was a brazen theft right under everyone’s nose, except me who happened to see what Baby Brother swiped. I could have, of course, squealed on him to Mr. Man who was in charge of the Self-Scan lane, but I chose not to.

And I cannot for sure say that Mom didn’t find & pay for the toothbrush before she left the store because I was out the door long before she and Young Boy finished scanning their purchases.

But I can say that I don’t know when I’ve laughed so hard leaving a grocery store, my cart filled with items, legally purchased, and my heart filled with the joy that comes from watching babies do what babies do.

The One About The Broken Bowls & The Price You Have To Pay

October 4, 2018August 5, 2020 / Ally Bean / 123 Comments

I broke 3 dessert bowls last week. It’s a personal best.

One bowl I placed in the dishwasher wrong and it got chipped.

Mea culpa.

The second bowl I dropped while taking it down from the cabinet shelf. The bowl slipped out of my hand, falling to the floor where, with a sense of drama that reminded me of a 3 y.o. having a meltdown over the way his PB&J sammie was cut, the bowl circled around the floor eventually crashing into the bottom of a cabinet where it broke.

The third bowl, like the other ones, was bone china, a notoriously sturdy substance when not around me. It was part of the now discontinued Lenox Poppies on Blue that was our china when we got hitched. I liked fussier things back then.

This third bowl cracked, then melted/broke, while in the microwave. I don’t know if there was a slight crack in it before I put it in there, but while it was twirling around in the microwave I heard a loud pop.

When I went to take the damaged bowl out of the microwave, unaware that the bowl was damaged, I grabbed it with my right hand and the ceramic was so hot that it burned the fingerprint off my index finger.

Only sort of kidding.

*ouch*

So here’s where I find myself today: I’m a wise, slightly klutzy, woman who realizes, and accepts, that I will probably live the rest of my life a few dessert bowls short of 8 formal dinner place settings, as one does when one is too cheap to replace the broken bowls.

$19.99 a piece? I don’t think so.

Ain’t gonna happen.

#ThursdayDoors | Visiting A Northeast Ohio Store, Finding A Unique Chapel

August 9, 2018July 1, 2025 / Ally Bean / 73 Comments

Today I’m joining Thursday Doors, hosted by Norm Frampton, so that I can share with you photos of the following doors + a bit more.

I took these photos when we decided, on a whim, to stop at P. Graham Dunn, a factory + retail store + chapel in Dalton, OH.

P. Graham Dunn makes inspirational home and wall decor, often in the form of wooden signs. Above the factory there’s a humongous retail store in which you can lost looking at all the merchandise.

Interesting barn adjacent to retail store.

Outside the store is a beautiful pond with a path around it that leads to a small narrow chapel, named Anna’s Chapel.

The chapel is by the side of the pond and is like none other that I’ve seen. Inside the chapel the raw wooden walls are almost entirely covered with graffiti that praises Christianity + a few personal messages as well.

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DOOR into Anna’s Chapel.

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Graffiti on inside chapel walls.

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Example of P. Graham Dunn’s merchandise as seen inside chapel.

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More graffiti on inside chapel walls.

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DOOR as seen while standing inside Anna’s Chapel.

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One last look at graffiti on inside chapel walls.

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View of pond as seen from within Anna’s Chapel.

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Regarding Goats: Some People Wouldn’t, But I Did

July 19, 2018July 1, 2025 / Ally Bean / 117 Comments

This is a Goat Chow Dispenser, obviously.

ANTICIPATING LOUSY TRAFFIC THAT I didn’t encounter, I was early for an appointment on the other side of nowhere.

I remembered a fancy garden nursery in the area, so instead of sitting in my car staring at my phone for half an hour I went to the garden nursery to walk around.

To look at the pretty flowers.

COME TO FIND OUT, far back on the property past the perennials on the way to the trees there was a shed and enclosure with miniature goats in it.

Friendly goats. With a propensity to make their will known to any hapless person who wandered upon their enclosure.

Yes, once they saw me they were more than happy to show me the way to the goat chow dispenser– wherein a person can snag a handful of free goat chow, then allow them eat it off the palm of your hand.

With their little nibble-y goat lips❣

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