My husband and I are petting each other on the head because we just finished changing the regular tires on the truck for our snow tires.
No bad words, no tears were shed, no one was hurt, and high fives for all. We even had an easier time of it than we did last time, when two of the tires did NOT want to line up with the wheel studs.
The tires are on now safely, aired up to the proper pressure, and the truck is back in the garage. The shop has been straightened up and we’re having a cold drink and a good rest.
The trees are NOT colorful here in this part of Arkansas this year. We’ve lost a TON of leaves already. So I was amazed when I looked out the back door two nights ago just before sunset and saw all the COLOR all the way across our valley. I’ve never seen it this way before, like the trees were bursting with light. I tried to get some pics, but most of them didn’t come out right. These two were the best I could do at the time.
I’m always happy when autumn/fall finally settles in, taking away the stiflingly hot summer temperatures and humidity that sap my strength and burn up my plants.
The wonderfully cool breezes make me rush to open front and back doors so the house can be aired out, the air conditioning turned off, bringing the outside in.
Unless it’s raining, my energy increases and I come to life again, enjoying working in the yard, cleaning things up for the winter, even enjoying all the leaves to gather.
My big project this autumn is plotting to grind up the leaves to HEAVILY mulch my elephant ear plants once I have to cut the leaves off. Last year I dug them up, put them in our garage in peat moss, as directed. That was a dismal failure, causing me to have to order new plants. This year I’m hoping that I can put a heavy enough mulch in the planter that the ears will happily go through our winter and bloom again in the spring.
Meanwhile, I’ll look forward to fires in the fireplace when we’re cozily in for the evening, coffee, or maybe hot chocolate, music or a good book, maybe an art project.
I melted into a puddle when I saw this puppy. I couldn’t resist giving him whatever he wanted. Those eyes. :0)
We had lots of severe weather last night. It was all around us, but mostly went just north of us, with tornadoes, really high gusty winds, hail, lightning, heavy rain, flooding, and flying hairballs. Lots of people lost power, had damage, etc. A semi was blown onto its side on one of the main highways through Fort Smith. Trees were down, some on homes, and more. Several of the public schools in our area of Arkansas went back to Zoom learning due to damage and lack of power. I don’t think any lives were lost.
We lucked out. We walked around checking our roof and yard. I checked my veggie plants. We had some leaves and branches in the yard, but just little stuff.
We did our errands this morning, taking our trash down to the bottom of our driveway (650 feet steeply down to the street in front of our home). No damage on the driveway. We didn’t notice any damage in Greenwood as we did our errands.
We are home now, hoping for a quiet day. I finished getting things back in place yesterday after our new carpet and porch flooring project. I’m determined to keep getting rid of STUFF. I’m trying to get into a ruthless state of mind. Hopefully I can make some significant progress – AFTER I rest from moving all the stuff OUT and then back IN to our office, living room, foyer, and porch!
I hope that you are safe and well, enjoying a quiet Tuesday.
We’re due for possible severe storms this evening, so I went out to get some pictures, just in case, so I could share them with you.
Our rose bushes were in awful shape – with straggly branches way up over my head – so I cut them back by a good 2/3. I figured that either they would be happy about it or we needed to start over. Happily, you can see that this one is already blooming with a bunch of buds. :0)
This sweet bunch of flowers tries to bloom each year. Usually, we have a bad storm just at the time these need a bit of protection. I try to get a picture or two, because they don’t usually make it through the storm.
It raises my spirits to walk around the yard, seeing HOPE in the planters.
This wonderful .gif isn’t from OUR deck, but my husband saw our first hummingbird this morning while we were sitting at the dining area trying to wake up.
We didn’t have a feeder out there yet, so we jumped up, ran up the ladder in the garage, grabbed one of the feeders. I made some hummingbird food quickly and my husband took it out to hang on the deck.
Nothing could have lifted my spirits more. (Well, learning that we won the Publisher’s Clearinghouse Sweepstakes would have certainly raised them, too.) :0)
I have always enjoyed the month of April. “Ray and Sarah” make it an even better month. :0)
It is only the third of April and already it’s shaping up to be a much better month for us.
My husband and I both received our second COVID vaccinations last Monday.
My spring veggie garden is in and seems to be doing well so far. I have planted Butter Crunch Leaf Lettuce, head lettuce, spinach, crookneck yellow squash, zucchini, cabbage, and broccoli. I will be adding radishes and celery starts to the main garden in the next day or two. We also have two planters with tomato plants.
We have a nice group of contractors replacing the back porch ceiling, installing some new shutters to replace some that fell off the front of the house two stories up, and sealing the place in the roof soffit squirrels had gotten inside and raised havoc. The combined project should be finished Monday by the end of the day. They are on Home Advisor and the name of the company is Safe Elite Transformations.
Continuing our fight with the gremlins that have been plaguing us – my husband was able to fix the riding mower – twice, due to two different problems – and got the lawn mowed. He also was able to get the push around weed whacker running and did some of the heavier weed whacking.
I weed whacked in the front and then used the leaf blower to clean things up. I’ll do the back today.
I will use the opportunity of the fluorescent light fixtures and ceiling fan being down from the back porch ceiling and see if I can clean them up a bunch before it’s time to put them back up.
Either the guys will paint the rest of the wood on the back porch or I will do it myself once this project is finished.
Today would have been my parents’ 79th wedding anniversary. (My dad would have been 103 this year and my mom 100). I think of them often. I was very lucky in my choice of parents. I have so many wonderful memories. :0)
So things are definitely improving around here since April started. I hope that a new leaf has been turned over and that we can continue making progress on what seemed like an endless list of things that HAVE to be done ASAP.
This is one section of our yard I love to watch. Right now, the red bud tree behind the yellow forsythia make a nice picture. Later our wisteria in this same area will make a nice display.
Our tulip tree is starting to lose its blooms, but it’s glorious right now.
I’ve counted 8 red bud trees on our property this year. Some are very small, but the lovely color shows up very nicely whether large large or small. Our land is too rocky to plant things in the ground much; hence all our brick planters and our raised bed, square foot veggie garden, but we treasure the things that come up naturally here.
In town there are some people who have a red bud with a white dogwood tree close by – a really stunning combination.
Things are ‘springing’ around here – bringing up my spirits and filling me with hope.
Daffodils and Tulip TreeForsythiaRed Bud TreeAnother Red Bud Tree
We actually have 7 Red Bud Trees blooming right now. Iris greenery is spearing out of the ground and in some of the planters around the yard. Today the sun is shining and the high is supposed to get to 70!
Much of the rest of the week will be rainy, bringing life to more and more.
After Lunch Bunch yesterday, we went to the co-op and bought a bunch of veggie plants.
This is the way my raised bed square foot garden has looked all winter. I did an experiment this year. Hoping to avoid having to spend a day or two weeding the boxes before I could plant, I cleaned out the boxes when the growing season was over, filled up the boxes with Mel’s Mix (soil alternative), put a pail in the middle of each box and covered each box with a tarp, held in place by bungee cords. I really wasn’t sure what to expect.
Happily, this is what I found!
I planted Buttercrunch Leaf Lettuce, Head Lettuce, Spinach, cabbage, yellow crookneck squash, zucchini, and red onions. I will add radish seeds and some celery I’m starting in the kitchen.
We discovered we needed to replace a section of the hose. Then we discovered that the sprinklers’ pressure setting parts in the center of each were broken from being in the weather too long, so we have ordered new sprinklers.
Today I need to weed the two brick planters we converted to square foot gardening and plant the tomato plants we bought yesterday.
I can’t tell you how MUCH my spirits lifted to be outside in the sunshine digging in the dirt, planting my spring garden!
I hope that you are enjoying some nice weather, too.
It’s 37 degrees, gray and rainy here today. UGH. I know that ‘spring’ doesn’t begin officially until Saturday, but I’ve been more than ready for a LONG time now.
I was HOPING to go to the local co-op today to get veggie plants for my garden, but I felt like I was freezing to death just putting out fresh bird seed and suet this morning.
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I feel guilty griping about our weather. We dodged a bullet of possible severe stuff yesterday, and that system has now moved east, threatening other good people today. I hope everyone stays safe.
Although our last spring frost is technically April 5th here, there are signs of spring everywhere I look outside! I couldn’t be more ready.
Yesterday I planted the elephant ear bulbs I’ve had in our garage in a trash can of Mel’s Mix (soil alternative). The bulbs were ‘slimy’ on the outside (ICK!) but I dug the deepest holes I could in the planter and planted them. I have no clue what will happen – if anything – now. If they DON’T sprout new growth, we’ll look around and see if we can get replacement bulbs. We really enjoyed the display last year.
Our tulip tree is blooming!
It’s hard to be down when Mother Nature’s beauty is blooming its heart out all around you.
I received this from my SIL yesterday and I’m still smiling. I love it. I had a pretty good, quite birthday yesterday. Apparently I’m a bad one to hold grudges because I still resent being described by ANYONE as “elderly,” no matter how sweetly is it said. If I am with them when they say it, I will bite them in a leg, and I have NOT had my rabies shot.
Our weather is iffy, but I’m trying to replant my elephant ear bulbs. What I’ve read,though, says to wait until all chance of frost is past, and that is April 5th here, so I guess I need to wait a bit longer.
A lot of my daffodils froze, but I have bunches blooming their heads off around the yard. Even my husband remarked about them when we left to go to town yesterday.
This is the group I call “Debbye’s Bouquet.” I had a good friend who died of breast cancer several years ago. True to her nature, at her funeral two barrels were set up at the door of the church. We were asked to grab a handful of daffodil bulbs as we left and to plant them in her memory. I thought that was a truly wonderful idea. Every spring her bouquet comes up, giving me hope.
I’m re-reading “Now and Then” # 35 of 40 in Robert B. Parker’s Spenser series. I have thoroughly enjoyed re-immersing myself in the amazing world he created. I will be a bit sad when I get to the end of the series. Several good, well meaning writers have tried to continue his legacy, but they seem just a shadow, so I don’t try to read them anymore. I’m just feeling very lucky I found the original and have a collection to treasure.
We walked down the driveway right after lunch today to get to our truck my husband had to abandon yesterday, not being able to come back up our driveway. We cautiously backed down a seemingly endless amount, sliding a lot, before we were on the street in front of our house. We were delighted to find that our driveway was the only bad spot between our house and town.
We were able to get a microwave that was almost exactly the same as the one we loved that died. It’s a 2.2 cubic foot Panasonic with turbo defroster, genius sensor, etc. The only difference is that the new one has 100 watts less power than the old one. We are beyond delighted. My husband celebrated by warming up a cup of coffee. :0)
The only other excitement in our trip was trying to get back up our driveway. The first time we made it up about 1/3 of the way, but then started sliding around, losing traction. My husband had to carefully back all the way down to the bottom to give it another try. I thought we would end up stuck in the deep ditch on one side of the driveway or the other.
The second time he ‘went for broke.’ We started sliding about half way up, but managed to gain some traction and got over the middle, really steep part of the driveway. I had been holding my breath and firmly keeping my big mouth shut, so it took me a minute or two to calm down. My husband is a much gutsier driver than I, and gutsy is what it took today.
So the truck is in the garage safely now. Hopefully, by the end of the day tomorrow our ice and snow on the driveway will be only a memory.
My sweet daffodils which shot spears of green up around the well house in anticipation of glorious blooming are now dull and frozen-looking. I don’t know if the plants will bounce back now that temperatures are warming and the snow is melting, but I hope so.
I am trying to get some seeds started for my raised bed, square foot garden. I have read a bunch, but really have no clue what I’m doing. I used a seed tray starter kit, filling it with seed starter medium, planting some seeds and marking them, sprinkling some fertilizer, spraying them carefully with water and covering them with a transparent cover. They have been sitting on the dining area table, the best place for getting whatever sun there is.
I planted spinach, lettuce, broccoli, yellow squash, zucchini, tomatoes, and green peppers. When I saw that some had sprouted, I took the transparent lid off. I have been turning the tray each day, trying to provide equal sun and encourage the sweet little sprouts to grow up straight. Some sprouting has been good. Some of the seeds haven’t done anything.
I would love it if I end up with some nice plants to put out in the garden when the time is right, but the biggest thing for me at this point is the HOPE. The PROMISE of spring. The CHANCE of new life, The ANTICIPATION of being able to play in the dirt again sometime reasonably soon.
I hope that you are seeing – or creating – some signs of spring wherever you are.
This gives you a bit of an idea of our driveway. This isn’t ours. Ours is graveled, 650 feet +, and STEEP. We had no choice about it being on the north side of our property.
My husband insisted he was going out yesterday to get some sugary treats at the local grocery store. I told him he really should wait – that we could go together Sunday afternoon after more melting occurred. He scoffed and went anyway.
He came back about an hour later with the sugary treats, but without the truck. He was unable to get back up our driveway and left the truck about 3/4 of the way down. He later tried to retrieve the truck, but had to leave it down there.
Today we will walk down the driveway, trying to NOT fall on our heads, hopefully back the truck down to the road, go to town and replenish supplies (my husband said the roads are pretty clear now – our driveway is probably the worst place in town) and then hopefully be able to drive back up and put the truck in the garage.
I’m still amazed that my husband told me I was RIGHT. Right about yesterday being too soon to go to town, and right about the fact that I thought we should put the snow tires on the truck at the end of the fall as we usually do. My mouth is still hanging open.
It’s 41 degrees F. out there now, so we should have ‘a whole lot of meltin’ goin’ on’ (thanks to my smart SIL – and Elvis, of course – for the title.) The forecast for today is RAIN. I won’t complain – even if we drown.
The forecast shows a slow warming trend here, so maybe we’ll be able to find our driveway in the coming days! I am hoping that I can convince my husband to wait at least until tomorrow afternoon before trying to negotiate our way down to the street that runs in front of our house.
Our microwave finally gave up the ghost, so this spoiled lady has been having to get off her duff and do some cooking, rather than simply heating up delicious, healthy frozen meals from REAL FOOD and STU’S CLEAN COOKIN’ in Greenwood.
Yesterday I cooked a chuck roast in the crock pot all afternoon. We had some of that, plus some rice, gravy, and peas. I am planning to spoon out some of the leftovers into oven containers to heat up for tonight.
I am learning to be careful what I gripe about! Not long ago I was griping because I wanted some comfort food to help us through the ice and snow we’ve had for about 3 weeks now. At that point I was taking my microwave for granted. NOW that has all changed.
In times like these, we learn what a great life we have and how VERY much we have to be thankful for. We cancelled Lunch Bunch for today. Yesterday I talked to one of my Lunch Bunch friends. Not only was she snowed in, but her main water pipe had burst and she was waiting for the plumber to come and try to repair it. Plus my heart truly goes out to the people suffering in Texas. I gripe about small annoyances while they try to get warm and find SOMETHING to eat.
Diets, extra lardage, and inconveniences, such as the lack of a microwave don’t even get on the bottom rung of what is important right now. May we all get through this winter so we can enjoy the promise of spring.
The saga of small annoyances vs real problems continues in the Lewis household.
A month or so ago, the dish inside the microwave that turns when the food is cooking to ensure even heating quit working. I looked up our records and the microwave was purchased in 2005. We have certainly gotten our money’s worth.
My husband is really good at fixing things. He figured out a way to fix the microwave so the plate turned again. Things went fine until yesterday, when the plate stopped turning again. My husband immediately squashed ideas of getting a new one – assuming we will EVER be able to negotiate our steep driveway and the roads between our home and town again. (We are into our second week of being completely stuck up on top of our ridge line – the first week due to ice and this week due to snow. We still have about 8 inches on the ground, so we MAY be able to get out by NEXT week some time if the sun stays out and the temperatures warm up from the current 15 degrees F.)
My husband went to work on the microwave again and we tested it this morning. It ran – and the plastic ‘thingie’ in the center of the floor of the microwave turned – for about 3 seconds and then the whole microwave shut off. It is now clear that the microwave is completely dead this time, no matter how smart or inventive he is.
I explain all this because we have been thoroughly enjoying frozen dinners from two new places in town – Real Food, and Stu’s Clean Cookin.’ These are individual dinners, portion controlled, healthy, and delicious. We have quickly become spoiled.
“I” will need to get inventive now on defrosting these on the counter, then transferring them to oven dishes, then figuring out how long – and at what temperature – to heat them up. In the meantime, I’ll cook a roast for tonight in the crock pot.
As I began when I started this post, this is a small annoyance vs the very real and dangerous problems many good people in the United States are facing right now. I feel a bit guilty even mentioning something as small as this. The pandemic, cabin fever, and the trying to diet have all combined to make me a rather gripe-y lady.
In about 1977 we moved from Tulsa OK to Greenwood AR so my husband could take a job here. We like the idea of living in Arkansas because of the mild winters and unusual occurrence of snow and ice. HAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! About 20 years ago we had a truly awful ice storm from which the whole area has never really recovered. We lost a BUNCH of wonderful trees, changing the landscape and causing people a lot of grief. My husband had mentioned that it was about time for another ice storm…
All of last wee we were iced in. We had some broken limbs and fallen trees, but they didn’t fall across the driveway, so we were very grateful. We had enough melting that last Saturday we were finally able to get out. We emptied our mailbox, filled up with gas, and got some food and supplies. By Saturday night, it was snowing.
Look at this sweet cardinal in our bottle bird feeder from this morning. Usually, only the smaller birds use this feeder. I checked a while ago, and the cardinal found his way out of the bottle. I will make my way out to the main feeder and fill it up soon. We have a double dose of suet hanging, so the birds will be taken care of as well as possible.
I’m not sure how much snow we have on the ground now. Maybe 6 to 8 inches, which is a LOT for Arkansas. By Friday, the temperatures MAY cause it to start melting.
I have stayed inside, mostly, because it is WAAAAAY too cold and slippery for an old broad to be sliding around.
It’s hard to see that we have STEPS down to a concrete pad in front of the porch! Did I happen to mention how ready I am for SPRING?
This cute video could be our dog, Amber, running across our front yard. I just let her in again. She is having a great time in our snow. We can’t tell we even HAVE sidewalks or a driveway. All demarcation lines have been thoroughly buried. The new snow we got (5″) actually helped me stay on my feet while I cautiously made my way across the deck to our bird feeder and filled it this morning. It is -6 degrees right now. The sun is shining, but we’ll be lucky if the temperature makes it to 20 today. We have ‘heavy snow’ predicted for this-evening-into-tomorrow. It’s all pretty, but I really don’t like being snowed in. We MAY start to thaw by Friday.
All this whining done, I’m VERY grateful we have power and water. Our home is warm and dry on the inside. Our animals are inside with us. Abby, our very independent cat, prefers to sleep outside in our garage in her ‘cat cube.’ We brought it in last night and kept her in the utility room bathroom, along with her litter box. I’m pleased that she did fine.
I’m also grateful to be thoroughly spoiled, drinking a cup of coffee while enjoying having Internet service and being able to type this note to you.
I hope you are safe, dry, and happy today. Eventually, February will be over for another year!
We have been stuck at home due to the weather the whole past week. It’s 9 degrees F. right now, with a biting wind, but nothing is falling from the sky at the moment. With the forecast of snow and more snow starting later today, we’re going to try to gather our mail from our mailbox at the bottom of our driveway (hopefully not ice-covered now, as it is 650+ feet down and STEEP.) We’re also going to try to get supplies before holing in again – probably until the end of NEXT week.
I am starting a petition to do away with February – completely. Just go straight from January to March. If you’re in, please let me know and I’ll add you to the list. (I’m not sure where I will send the petition, or how many we would need to make this change, but we have to start somewhere…
I continue to HOPE things get better regarding the pandemic, our country, and the people living in it. I HOPE that qualities such as love, understanding, compassion, kindness, and courtesy are not becoming things of the past, gathering dust due to disuse. Much like I tell myself on keeping moving and exercising, “If you don’t USE it, you LOSE it.” We never really know what’s happening to the people we care about. Let’s give everyone some extra slack.
I hope that you are able to stay safe and warm today. It’s a wonderful day to have a warm, dry home.
We are iced in on top of our ridge line in Greenwood, Arkansas today. Our deck is like a skating rink. I almost landed on my head yesterday – filling up our bird feeders and hanging a double container of suet – and so threatened my husband with death if he tried to go out there. I haven’t been out enough to know if we have broken branches yet.
Our forecast reminds me of a gathering my parents had at their house years ago. My dad had his own advertising agency in Tulsa, OK, and the gathering was a business one, full of people who had to do with radio and TV advertising. The talk turned to the weather, and weather forecasts. Someone laughed and said their very FAVORITE forecast was a local one, where the weather forecaster predicted, “FLEEZING DIZZLE.” Someone else held their head and said, “Oh, no! That was me!”
So “Fleezing Dizzle” is forecast to continue here, with the addition of probably snow over the weekend and even worse Monday. It’s 18 degrees F. right now. A GREAT day to have a warm, dry house.
We did have things scheduled, but I rescheduled a doctor appointment, so I don’t have to get a blood test this morning, plus we cancelled Lunch Bunch for tomorrow. The Greenwood Public Schools have gone to “Online Learning” today, and I suspect, also tomorrow.
Amber, our 95 pound yellow lab, discovered the hard way that ice is slippery this morning. She went rushing out, barking, as she does routinely, and ended up sliding all the way down the sidewalk behind our house. I didn’t see the look on her face, but I know she was shocked.
“Do not be angry with the rain; it simply does not know how to fall upwards.” ~ Vladimir Nabokov
Clouds, drizzle, rain, gusty wind, hail, flooding, flying hair balls – all on tap for us today, overnight, and into the day tomorrow if the weather forecasters have it right. UGH.
We live on top of a ridge line, so we don’t have a large concern about flooding around our house, but we DO have some concern about lightning and hail, plus gusty winds. In the past several months we have had several more serious storms- resulting in several trees breaking and falling down on either side of the driveway. Happily, they fell AWAY from the driveway, rather than into it or across it, so we are simply ignoring it for right now.
This is a wonderful day to enjoy a warm, dry house.
PandaLifeHacks
“And when it rains on your parade, look up rather than down. Without the rain, there would be no rainbow.” ~ Gilbert K. Chesterton
Mother Nature is laughing at us again. Today is a miracle for a day in January in Arkansas – bright and sun-shine-y and 58 degrees F. It is simply gorgeous.
Tomorrow a cold front with heavy rain, plunging temperature, possible sleet and snow, plus flying hairballs is forecast.
All we can do is hang on and try to enjoy the ride!
THING ONE:FOOD-DIET-EXERCISE – I raked myself over the coals about stuffing too much food into my face and not exercising enough. My sister-in-law kindly told me to give myself a break and make little changes on a regular basis to get back to my better habits. My husband is determined wait to go back on our diet on the 6th – or maybe 7th – we haven’t completely hashed that out yet. I don’t know why we’re waiting. I guess it’s because we still have some wonderfully delicious bad stuff to eat our way through, though I am determined not to buy any MORE of it for myself. I got the makings of beef stew in the slow cooker this morning. We’ll have a bowl of that with a roll this evening. I will do my yoga stretches this afternoon.
THING TWO:WEATHER – Arkansas ran the gamut on weather this past week. We had sunshine and spring-like weather, as we’re having today, with sunshine and low 50’s. We had sleet and rain and gusty wind. We had drizzles and gloomy gray days. We had a PERFECT snow – with HUGE fluffy flakes coming down while we fixed lunch, making us feel we were in the middle of our own, private snow globe. (This was perfect because that gorgeous snow, though heavy, melted as it hit the ground and caused no trouble. :0) )
THING THREE: PLAYING IN MY ART ROOM – I discovered an art form that is new to me – bleeding tissue paper art. The effect is watercolor. The sky is the limit on what you can do with it. I found it on YouTube and watched some demonstrations, drooling. I found some people who do mouth-watering art with it, giving me some really high goals to try to reach as I practice. My sister-in-law sent me a package of large sheets of the special tissue paper to get me started. I ordered some pre-cut shapes in different sizes today that will be delivered in the coming week so I can concentrate on playing, saving the sheets for larger, more complicated shapes. I’m having a BLAST experimenting. :0)
Another thing for which I am setting up is painting some wooden fridge magnets. I can play with my Unicorn Spit paint for these. I can also see what happens with my alcohol inks, my new bleeding tissue paper, and more. I have the magnets, and my wooden circles should be delivered sometime next week.
THING FOUR:SUNDAY CHORES – I don’t have a lot to do today (translated to mean that I CHOOSE to do), but I WILL spend some time cleaning my aquarium so my fish can start the new year with sparkling clean water and some different decorations, just for giggles. I wish I knew what they THOUGHT about the decorations they have. I really wouldn’t mind it if the two of them held their noses when I started to put something in the aquarium they really don’t care for. They don’t say anything one way or the other. The only thing they DO that shows me they are really interested is both of them get into the corner of the tank, wriggling their bodies and opening and closing their mouths to HINT that they would like to be fed yet again. (Seems like they, too, are on a SPLURGE eating push until the 6th or 7th…. )
As it happens, we are having a lovely day today – sunny with highs in the 60’s today. :0) I’m planning to at LEAST walk around in our yard today, telling Mother Nature what a great day she produced, if not do some actual work out there.
USPS emailed me this morning that two packages I mailed recently are out for delivery. I really enjoy making things and sending them to people, no matter what time of the year. I love reminding people that they mean so much to me.
Amber
Amber thinks she is a lapdog. She weighs around 95 lbs. She comes up to my chair in our office with a gleam in her eye. She stuffs her wet nose under my arm as I type. I look at her, stop and pet her, speak to her, maybe kiss her on the head, and then go back to typing.
The next thing I know, as reliable as clockwork, the front half of Amber is up in my chair with me. I have the bruises on my legs to prove it! I have to stop everything and watch out, being very careful. She whips her head around, trying to be everywhere at once. If I don’t watch out, she clocks me in the face with her head. We love, with me laughing every morning before she will back off and climb down. We usually do this 5 or 6 times each morning.
I found the picture below on BoredPanda and wanted to share it with you. Amber isn’t THIS large, but you can certainly share the feeling.
My whole day thus far has been spent trying to get my computer updated.
I updated to the newest version of Windows, and then made a system disk, just in case my computer crashes with no warning. That took from 9:00 this morning until about 20 minutes ago. I was beginning to think I would die of old age before it finally finished.
I am not a computer or technical person. It’s all magic to me. I love my computer when it’s working and am ready to toss it out the window when it isn’t. Happily, it seems to be working okay now, except for a folder of images I’ve gathered for my blogs. They have names under an icon for a picture, all looking the same. Arrrrgh!
SO. I will limp along, hoping that if I can’t figure out what to do to fix it, it will miraculously heal by itself. (One can HOPE…)
Clipart Library
On a happier note, our weather is nice now, although it’s still a bit brisk outside. There is lots of glorious sunshine and the temperature is now 46! We will probably get rain Saturday, but no more forecasts of snow/sleet, and flying hairballs in the near future. I’ll take it. :0)
Pinterest
We will celebrate Christmas with the Lunch Bunch tomorrow, exchanging gifts, eating, laughing, and catching up. The next Friday is Christmas, and the following Friday is New Year’s Day, so we probably won’t meet again until January 8th. We’ll have to make it last.
This is ALMOST my favorite kind of snow. We had flakes that kept getting larger and larger as time passed. We ended up getting about 3 inches, I think. It fell softly, coating each branch of our trees so that they were outlined, almost as if they were painted by some careful hand.
My favorite kind of snow is just like this, except that it’s perfect for making snow critters and then GONE off streets and driveways by the end of the day. We are snowed in today, since we haven’t put snow tires on our truck yet and our driveway is over 650 feet long and STEEP. We can just admire the beauty and stay home.
I’m trying to convince my husband that we’re a bit ‘long-in-the-tooth’ to change from regular tires to the snow tires ourselves, but he won’t listen. If our driveway isn’t clear by tomorrow, we will probably start our day changing tires in the shop before our doctor’s appointment and other errands.
We have bright sunshine right now, so maybe I’ll catch a break.
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