Funday Monday

  

It's been a long day...started off with an early physical therapy appointment. The place I'm going is staffed with some really nice people and today I did enough new stuff to make me very sore tonight.  I don't go back until Wednesday and it's a good thing...I might be ready by then.  Maybe. lol

Picked up the young Prince and headed for IHOP for lunch then came home to be amazed by all the new kitties and chicks. It's been a good day, full of the blessings of family and pets and lots of love.  

He's going to stay for several days as it's spring break. Trying to figure out what wonderful stuff we can do tomorrow. Should be lots of fun.

This morning when I went to clean up the area under my desk where the kittens were born, I discovered that sometime during the night, Blaze gave birth to one more kitten, so we now have 6. They are all so adorable and mewling like crazy, every time she shifts or leaves them.  They are so tiny...they look like little gophers. lol  The chicks are doing well in their cage in the spare bedroom. I can't stop myself from going in and picking them up all the time and loving on them.  They are adorable, and it doesn't take long for them to outgrow that stage. lol  I want to handle them as much as I can to keep them used to me and to know that I am their caretaker. That way they'll be much more user friendly when they get grown.

Nice weather today and predicted for the rest of the week. It's rather warm tonight and supposed to stay this way, I hope. I so want to get out and start planting some stuff in the garden,  Get some lettuce started maybe and some tomatoes. Hoping to sit down with the Irishman and figure out just what we're planting soon. Lots of things blooming around these parts, and the fruit trees are budding out too. Spring fever--I got it, baby!!

Gonna hit the hay...tired to the bone tonight. Looking forward to another day of sunshine and blue skies tomorrow.

Namaste.

Sunday at the races...

That's how it's felt all day.  Got up late and kinda ran the rest of the day trying to catch up.

  Here are the 5 new babies that joined our family on the avian front 

Black Australorp

Buff Orpington

Little darlins at the feeder

The Australorps will be almost solid black with a greenish iridesence  on the wings, and the orpingtons will be a gorgeous golden reddish color. Both are great egg layers and on the nearly recovered list of once endangered chicken breeds.

  One of the cats also had a litter of 5 kittens today under my desk. Sigh....

All in all...a day of miracles and love and lots of magic.  But I'm tired....

Namaste

Saturday night...

 

The crazy factor the past few days has been quite remarkable.  Suffice it to say that my world has been going 180 miles per hour  and I have somehow managed to make it through intact. For this I am incredibly grateful.

We have had a few days in a row of pretty cool temperatures again , and I wish spring would make up it's mind to just stay. We've had some rain and thunderstorms, and so the grass is greening up nicely at least.  Today's high made it to 60 degrees, but it didn't stay there long. Got chilly and overcast and is supposed to storm some more tonight.  Yuck.

Tomorrow we are going to the farm store and buy some baby chicks.  I am very excited about this endeavor and cannot wait to ave those little babies to play with.  We keep them in a cage in the guest room...the cheeping and chirping drives the cats crazy, lol.  Not sure what breed we're going to get, but we might mix 'em up. Just getting a few, for eggs, and are still talking about the possibility of raising meat birds. The jury is still out as to whether or not we could manage to do the butchering process.

  I'm very tired tonight. I got up at 6 AM so I could cook and clean and get ready for a small family gathering today My youngest brother, wife and daughter, my sister and my son and grandson. And us. We ate fried chicken and potato salad and baked beans and deviled eggs.  And we laughed and played and talked and had a ball. I had people here from 11 AM til after 6:30. I am a happy camper and a tired old woman....all rolled into one.

Earlier this week  I spent the evening with a great bunch of women and we ate and watched The Secret and had a great time. I didn't get home that night until almost midnight.  Thursday night I attended a women's meeting and we moved all our stuff out of the place and will set up shop next week at our new location. It's a really good move for us on a whole lot of levels..  Friday night I attended a meeting as well, after spending most of the day doing household chores. We are also the proud caretakers of 4 new kittens. They are gorgeous little creatures and their mama is very relieved to have birthed them. We've already found homes for them.

I didn't realize that I hadn't posted in so many days until I logged in here tonight.  Wow.  It's good to have a full and busy life today.  I am especially blessed indeed.

Alright, it's creeping up on the midnight hour and I am going to rest my weary head.  Sweet dreams.

Namaste.

A Two-derful Tuesday (That's One-derful times two...)

 This is Merlin. Or, as he is affectionately known,  Merrman the Purrman.  It's the little jazz kitty, all grown up... He is by far one of the most laid back cats we have ever had, and that's saying a LOT!  lol  He's quite a literary cat, and anytime he sees a book or magazine laying on a table, he's all over it. Literally.

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  Ah...it was a gorgeous day here on the Prairie. About 70 degrees and sunny and I had a girlfriend over for lunch and made quiche and salads. Afterwards we sat out on the front porch in the big green rocking chairs and soaked up the sunshine. It was a delightful day. I got up real early this morning and got the office finished up, cleaned house a little and mopped the wood floors. I spruced things up a bit...new tablecloth on the table, burned some sandalwood incense, and opened the windows all up again. I took care of the neighbors dogs for the last time (they came home today) and even found time for some meditation and prayer here in my newly organized and born again office. lol

  My friend and I walked around the yard and took note of all the greening up that is going on.  Even the Japanese maple has  buds on it already. Typically, she oohed and ahhed over everything and all I could see was all the work I haven't done yet and need to get busy on. I'm really looking forward to my yards this year, even though it is a lot of work,. it's good work.  Soul food.

  It must be spring...I have ants in the bathroom!!!!  lol

  Oh yeah, DJan.  ES&H is Experience, Strength and Hope. I forgot that you had asked!

I'm ready to hit the hay. Tomorrow we are carpooling up to the recovery house for the womens meeting, and then I have to be back and at physical therapy by 3:45. After that, a bunch of women are gathering at one's house to watch The Secret.  I've told the Irishman that I will likely be gone before he gets home from work, so he's on his own. I'm really looking forward to meeting some new friends and catching up with old ones.  And of course, we'll be eating.  lol

  I'm planning to get some baby chicks this week...Will keep them in the house until they're big enough to hold their own out there in the henhouse.  I'm excited. I love baby chicks...no rooster this time though...he was way more hassle than he was worth.

   Count your blessings...and make gratitude a gift you choose every day!!

Namaste.


 

Mondays Moments

This is a new Goodwill find...caught my eye and spoke to me, so I ponied up the 2  dollars for it.

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  An interesting day today around here. I went shopping for a few groceries as a girlfriend is coming for lunch tomorrow. Bought some things like fresh asparagus and artichoke hearts and mushrooms to make a yummy quiche. Found fresh mozzarella and some lovely spring lettuce mix with raddichio and arugula and all the good stuff in it. Bought a cantaloupe and some more pineapple as well, as the price was right.Some butter and some half and half and my fridge is stocked !

  I made a couple of decisions today concerning some things that were important to my well being and unfortunately pissed a couple of people off.  One was very snotty to me on the telephone and practically hung up on me. She doesn't have a lot of social skills anyway...so it's hard to tell if she was hanging up on me forcefully or simply being her usual self.  The other had asked me to do something that was uncomfortable to me, and I declined.  She wasn't very happy either.  It's funny how people will expect you to fulfill their requests without ever thinking that maybe you won't.  lol  I'm not exactly a yes-man...you'd think the people in my circle would know me by now.  The most interesting part of all this, was that I really wanted to call the first one back and give her my opinion of HER and her behavior.  I picked that phone up twice...and put it back down. I called my sponsor instead. (And she hasn't, BTW, returned my call.)  But like most of the rash things I think about doing, when I let it lay for long enough to try to call my sponsor, I changed my mind about calling her. It wouldn't have accomplished a thing and I would have felt bad about it later. Maybe much later, but still...*grin. Sometimes I can actually take the time to ask myself..."How important is it, anyway? Will it matter in a month, or a year or 5 years?"  Most of the time I can lay it down and leave it there.

  I've been feeling like a change of venue may be in order. I live in an area where there are lots of meetings in different areas that are all about the same distance from me, travel wise. Each areas meetings are about as different as they could possibly be. To the north of me is rural and things are much  calmer and peaceful.  To the south of me is a college town, and the meetings there have their own flavor, I hesitate to say intellectual, but they are in a way, a different class of people. To the west of me, which is where I have been going the majority of the time,  it's more working class, and hard core.  I'm feeling a bit burned out and wanting to isolate. And I'm thinking maybe I need to get out and about a little more and switch my recovery neighborhoods around a bit.  Just feeling like maybe things need a little shaking up.

  It was a gorgeous sunny and warm day today. I opened up the house and let the breezes carry out the staleness of winter.   I think it's supposed to be like this the rest of the week.  I hope so. It was nice. I walked around the yard and checked on the plants. The forsythia are just on the verge of bursting into their magnificent yellow blooms. The lilies are all coming up like gangbusters and the sedum is looking good, in fact it's so interesting looking that I think I'll get out there tomorrow and get a picture of it.  My Egyptian Walking Onions (remember them from last year??) are up and looking good at about 6-8 inches high. And they have spread out nicely in the little plot I planted them in, looks like there will be a nice patch of them this year.  The shasta daisies are coming up too, little green mounds of leaves.  I forgot to go look at the asparagus patch. It should be showing some signs of life as well.

  It got me all fired up to start planning the gardens. 

  But, first things first. I have to get up early to get things ready for my lunch.  Which means I have to go to bed. Now. I'm making a concerted effort to get to bed earlier and get more sleep. And believe it or not...midnight IS an improvement (for me!).

  Happy Spring, everyone.  We have an equinox plan for Saturday and a potluck at the CSA gardens for Thursday. Life is good...

Namaste.

Sunday night at home....

 This is a picture of my backyard, the first day of spring, 2006.  They were predicting snow for today too, but thankfully, it didn't materialize.  Yippee !!!!!!

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  WHEW!  This week is finally over. It was long and packed full to the hilt. It was a good week...but it pretty much used me up.  Today was long-left the house around 11 to stop at the Walcrap and pick up snacks and rice milk...that latter for the Irishman and the former for the workshop.  Met hubby for lunch at 1 and went off to the District Mtg. at 2. When it was over, I set up for the workshop. It was a dismal day...raining and cold. Light turnout for the meetings...only a dozen for the workshop, so went to Plan B. Plan B was: IN the event of a small turnout, we had just a round robin sharing session instead of the panel.  It was actually quite nice and everyone shared a lot of ES&H...so, all's well that ends well.

  Didn't get home until after 6 PM...luckily I had the forethought to put a pork roast in the crockpot this morning.  Put some red potatoes and carrots and onion in with it and it cooked to perfection while we were gone.  SO supper was pretty much ready when we walked in the door.Good thing-I was starved! lol

  I made iced tea the other day, and when I poured a glass of it tonight and took a drink, I was momentarily disturbed at the taste of it. It wasn't bad...just different.  I had forgotten that I made it with 3 Earl Grey teabags thrown into the mix...Bergamot is one of those flavors that tastes like nothing else you can identify...I feel the Altzheimers slipping over me...I love Earl Grey tea and I especially love Earl Grey green tea. I am a big tea drinker...for being a coffee drinker. I adore Lapsong Souchong. Rooiboos is one of my favorites. I love most herb teas. I have peppermint teas and spearmint teas that I have grown and dried myself.  There's just something about a nice cup of tea in the evening that does something for me that nothing else can.

  I have a tea pot collection. I rarely use pots, because I am usually making tea just for myself. But I have a lovely collection, many with sentimental value, and a few that are actually quite valuable.  I am not sure how that collection got started, but it sits proudly above my kitchen cabinets, gathering dust.  lol

  I'm heading to bed soon. It's a chilly night and all my chores are done and that big sleigh bed with the beautiful quilts on it is calling my name. Not to mention my personal Irish heatmaster...lol

   Stay warm and dry, my friends. I'm reading all over the news of flooding and more cold...but spring is almost here. My neighbors daffodils and crocus are up and flowering...I need to go out and check the forsythia bushes...not tonight though....lol

    Namaste.

Saturday rides again...

 Here's one corner of the newly painted office...(notice how I've  artfully edited out the clutter that still sits in the center of the room??) This is one corner...man-that light bulb sure shines through that shade....

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   I was so tired and it was so late by the time I got to the computer that I couldn't even post. Yesterday was a full day. Housekeeping and laundry and sponslings and doctors. And then hubby and I watched Zodiac..about the killings in San Francisco in the early 70's..the whole decade actually from 67-78, I guess. It was a very well done, very LONG movie, starring Robert Downey, Jr  and Jake Gyllenhall  and a great cast of charaters.Scary stuff, serial killers...

  Today was an up and at 'em early morning. Filled with animals and peoples and a friend came by for coffee and I made buttermilk apple cinnamon pecan muffins to go with the Starbucks coffee...It's 1 PM now...the Irishman is out for his Saturday hike in the woods with his friend Jerry and we are going to another corned beef and cabbage feed tonight to hear a speaker  (a married couple, actually).  It will be a good time, and relaxing to boot.

   Just wanted to drop in and say good morning. Not a lot to report, but I need my blog fix!

    I have to get the sponsorship workshop stuff together today as well, it follows on the heels of the district meeting .  Just called down there--the pamphlets I ordered didn't come in...sigh....so I need to improvise some stuff...Also need to get some cookies and munchies and things for the crowd. lol  Have no idea how many to expect. That makes it hard as well. OH well--I'm always up for a good challenge...Need to call my panel  speakers too and make sure they haven't forgotten. 

  Here's another picture, little different angle, just to prove I haven't been lying about this office, lol.  More to follow, as I finish her up.

It's a little dark...oh well...

  Later taters...I'm off to search cyberspace for some workshop help!!

Namaste.