Monthly Archives: December 2017
Towel Critter Art – Take 21
Renee Swartz, Topsy Turvy Diaper Cake via youcanmakethis.com
Renee Swartz, Topsy Turvy Creations via youcanmakethis.com
Filed under Creativity, Towel Critter Art
Doing Better
We have two sweet members of our doggie family, Amber (above) and Molly (below.) I was seeing ads for doggie dental care and felt like a slob because all we’ve ever done is buy dental chews. In an effort to start being a better caregiver, I ordered some TruDog “Spray Me” Doggy Dental Spray. The idea is to peel back your dog’s lips on one side and spray into the mouth, and then do the same on the other side.
I talked to my SIL who said that her husband actually physically brushed their dogs’ teeth three times a week! (Can you see me hanging my head in shame?) The other thing she told me, though, was that they use a product you mix with their drinking water. It’s called Oxyfresh Pet Oral Hygiene Solution. I love this idea because it’s good for whatever pet you have and they get a dose each time they drink. Since everyone uses the same water dish when they’re in the house, this protects the cats, too. (It doesn’t mention fish, so I’ll refrain from putting any in the aquarium :0) ). The bottle says the additive is odorless and tasteless.
We’ve been using the solution in the water for two days now. No one seems to notice any difference, and the water is slurped up just as quickly as always. I got the spray today and used it on both doggies. Neither dog was especially helpful or cooperative, but I managed to get a couple of sprays into each side of each animal’s mouth. Molly didn’t say anything, but headed for the office as soon as I let her go. Amber fought me a bit, and then was dramatically trying to spit it out. I’m glad that we don’t have TWO highly-dramatic dogs…
Between the two of these products (plus the normal dental chews we’ve always gotten) our animals will be getting much better dental care than before.
Filed under Amazing Animals, Family, Health Alert
“Imperial Lily 1”
“Imperial Lily 1” – Paul Militaru Photography
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
Beautiful Friday Morning
cottonwoodclinic.ca
We’re having a cool start to the day, but it’s supposed to warm up nicely by the afternoon. Taking the doggies out this morning was a brisk experience, to say the least. :0)
We’re having a quiet day, with Lunch Bunch and a few errands. I’m going to spread my afternoon between –
- checking on my plants in the greenhouse
- making sausage balls for lunches for the next few days
- cleaning off my desk in the office
and HOPEFULLY, making some time to play in my artroom.
I LOVE a day when there isn’t a lot of drama. No huge list of things to accomplish – not a lot of ‘have-to’s – the day not whizzing past my head in a blur.
I hope you’re having a quiet day, too.
Filed under Cherishing the Quiet Day
Juggling to Get the Lard Off
I’ve been doing well the last couple of days on my latest effort to lose the lard. This is my 3rd day of doing 15 minutes on my elliptical trainer in the garage (MUCH easier when I can get my music to play.) I’m also folding myself into a paper airplane – doing 30 minutes of deep stretching yoga for old broads – slowly and carefully, as I’ve apparently tied myself in knots over the period I didn’t practice. I’ve done really well on my low-carb eating plan of 40 carbs per day and 1200 calories per day. Actually, I’ve had an easy time of staying under the calorie limit, but I’ve really had to juggle to get my carbs in line!
My laxness lately and the on-again-off-again cold weather here has caused my usually reasonable judgment to nosedive. My husband and I really like the fried catfish sold for lunch at one of the local deli’s. I’m getting two pieces of fish. (My husband gets the full dinner.) Today I can make us a nice big salad for dinner with kielbasa leftovers from a recent grill outside. Several times, though, I’ve wanted to serve our leftover beef stew with low carb garlic bread. It’s obvious that any time we go to the deli that idea is out!
The thing that is really helping me adjust my thinking, portions, and meals is MyFitnessPal.com.
I usually eat the same thing for breakfast every day except Friday, when we go to Lunch Bunch (brunch for us.) I can add things as I go, and then figure out the rest of the day thanks to their really superior, easy-to-use database of foods. I can hunt for something, find it and add it to my personal list, or I can add something if I can’t find it. I can keep changing and juggling until the numbers add up the way I want them to. I’ve tried several other record-your-eating-and-exercise websites, and I find this is the best one for me.
It makes me feel good to be giving healthier eating and exercise my best efforts again.
Filed under Acting Like a Grownup, Challenges, Changes, DIET!, exercise, getting the lard off, Healthy Eating
Red
“Ornamental Flowers” – Paul Militaru Photography
“Poppies” – Paul Militaru Photography
“Red Dahlia 1” – Paul Militaru Photography
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
Project of the Day Update
Before
After
Ahhh. There was actually a place for most everything that was on the desk. I did bring a pile of recipes that need to have holes punched so that they can go into the recipe book, but everything else found a home.
Caution: Look quickly – I’ve had a LOT of practice in piling things up….
Filed under Housekeeping - Maintenance, I'm a slob, Lewis projects
Project for the Day
Sassy Senior Lady via Doreen Adamson-Liber
If I haven’t admitted it before, now you know what a slob I am.
Despite my efforts here and there – I’ve never been a great housekeeper – things ‘accumulate’ and, then, I think, reproduce like rabbits, causing the jumble you see before you. My husband and i both contribute to it. On any given day there are other priorities, so it gets lost in transit.
Well, today is the day THIS will be the focus.
I’ll take everything off and TRY to organize this so that it’s not a catchall. I’m planning to move some of my cookbooks here to get them off the other counter space in the kitchen.
I’ll report back to you later on my efforts.
Filed under Housekeeping - Maintenance, I'm a slob, Lewis projects
Towel Critter Art – Take 20
vivadiapercakes
yandex.ua
This is technically ‘just a cute critter – not made from a towel – but I wanted to include him anyway.
youcanmakethis.com
Filed under Creativity, Towel Critter Art
“Dambovita River”
“Dambovita River” – Paul Militaru Photography
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
Lap Dog – His and Hers
We love Amber, our 9 month old yellow labrador retriever we brought home to be part of our family in May, when she was 10 weeks old and weighed 16 lbs. I laboriously got her into my lap in my recliner, since she really seemed to enjoy the closeness. As she grew, though, I decided she was definitely not in the lap dog category.
Now, at 9 months old, she weighs around 81 pounds. She still considers herself a lap dog, insisting that my husband allow her up in his lap in the evenings. As you can see, she’s quite a handful.
I watch her out of the corner of my eye when she’s in my husband’s lap. She will suddenly sit up very straight and look at me with a gleam in her eye. I leap out of my chair – not wanting to even THINK about her leaping from his chair to mine – and sit on one end of the couch.
Here I am with our ‘lap dog’ on the couch. My husband snapped this pic for the rare moment Amber was quiet. She’s usually busy lapping my face and making me laugh until I have trouble catching my breath. She’s a great addition to our family.
Filed under Amazing Animals, Family
Trampoline?
ll-werk-Pinterest
I’m trying, once again, to control my eating and increase my movement. This image above describes my efforts to date. I have just started recording my food intake and exercise on MyFitnessPal.com in an effort to –
- acknowledge that I need to (I lie to myself a lot)
- plead with my husband not to show me he loves me with a buttered muffin from the microwave
- come to terms that my meals are okay, but the combinations are above my 1200 calories and 40 grams of carbs limit
- focus my efforts to keep my mouth shut and my body active
I had my usual breakfast. We’re planning to stop at the deli to bring lunch home (I will either get fish or chicken ONLY – no ‘meal.’) I was going to have leftover beef stew and some garlic bread for dinner, but NO! That puts me way over my limit, so we’ll have a large salad, instead. I’ve built in my orange dream bar for desert. This combo will bring me in under on calories and at my limit on carbs for the day. I’m also going to do 15 minutes on my elliptical machine and 30 minutes in yoga stretches this afternoon.
I’m doing pretty well until after lunch. Then I go nuts for some reason. I have no clue why, but instead of continuing to be disgusted with myself, I’m changing what I’m doing. If I can do this for a week or so, I can get back on track. We’re not planning to have or go to any holiday parties. My biggest ‘enemies’ are my husband and myself.
I’ll make it a point to fix some things that are on my diet to eat as snacks, in case I think I’m starving to death. :0)
Today is Tuesday. I’ll plan to get back to you about my progress NEXT Tuesday. Hopefully, I can report that I’m being good and making progress.
graphics
Filed under Acting Like a Grownup, DIET!, exercise, Healthy Eating
Towel Critter Art – Take 19
vivadiapercakes
vivadiapercakes.com
trusper.com
Filed under Creativity, Towel Critter Art
Cleaning Up
Our raised bed square foot garden is now completely cleaned out. I was hoping the lettuces would survive, but the recent week of hard freezes did them in. All is now ready for more Mel’s Mix in the spring.
I’m reading the new book I got about using my greenhouse most effectively. Since it’s WAAAAAY too expensive to provide heat or cooling to the greenhouse, I’m concentrating on extending my spring planting season, figuring out when the best time is to start seeds so that I’ll have good plants to put out in the garden when danger of frost is past. Since I’m new at this, I’m making lots of notes, trying to get my act together.
In the meantime, I’ll start getting my greenhouse better organized. Right now I just have things ‘in’ the greenhouse with no particular thought to where and how I’ll start seeds later. I’m going to see if I can find some information on the net and will start moving things around.
The only plants I have in the greenhouse right now are the elephant ear plant and the purple passion plant I dug up before all the hard freezes started. Of course, NOW it’s getting up into the 50s in the afternoon, so with my luck, they’ll probably die in there from getting too hot! :0(
I found some old pictures of the greenhouse as we built it –
The dimensions are about 10 x 14. It has a dirt floor covered with two layers of weed barrier. The corners have steel rod welded to plates that we drilled holes and pounded into the ground with a sledge hammer. The plates were screwed into the wood. The ribs are pvc pipe. At first we held them to the wood with plastic pieces, but we’ve replaced several that couldn’t handle the strain with metal ones.
You’re looking at the north end of the greenhouse from the inside. We made tables from plywood and they go around both sides and across the north end. We left a spot in the northwest corner to hold a trash can filled with Mel’s Mix, plus brooms, and other tall stuff.
This is still the north end of the greenhouse, with the addition of an exhaust fan. When it’s hooked up to electricity, it opens when the temperature reaches a preset mark to draw air through the greenhouse for cooling.
This is the inside of the east side of the greenhouse. It will hold lots of supplies, though I’ll store as much of this as possible off the tables to give myself as much room to spread out planting trays and pots as possible.
Outside of the north end of the greenhouse. If you’ve been following the blog, you know that we had a break in the pvc pipe right at the top where it was attached to the wood. We ended up screwing large screws with rings onto the upright pieces of wood and arranging for guy wires to pull the end out, attached to a stake in the ground.
This seems like a really old picture, since there is now a 45 foot ham radio tower very close to the door on the south end of the greenhouse. You can see pieces of it in the left front of the picture.
This is the inside west side of the greenhouse. I’ll show you more pics as I get the greenhouse in some kind of order (I hope). I’m hoping I can find good ideas for how to arrange things. Wish me luck?
Filed under Gardening, greenhouse, Square Foot Gardening - Raised Beds
“Refinement and Delicacy”
“Refinement and Delicacy” – Paul Militaru Photography
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
Snow People – Take 1
1027kord.com
I love it that there is no longer any ‘typical’ snowman. Wherever there is snow, people try to build a snow person, using what they have, a lot of ingenuity, and good humor. As I find ones I thing are great, I’ll share them so that YOU will smile, too. :0)
Filed under Creativity, snow people
Towel Critter Art – Take 18
google.com.mx
googlr
mycruisestories.com
nuno-runo.blogspot.com
Filed under Creativity, Towel Critter Art
Thread Art – Take 9
Filed under Creativity, String Art
Seagulls and Sailing
“Sailing” – Paul Militaru Photography
“Seagull” – Paul Militaru Photography
Filed under Paul Militaru Photography
creativeartworksblog 