Happy Turkey day!

Happy Thanksgiving wherever you are. No matter what country we should spend time being thankful for whatever we have. It can always be worse and there are always many people in this world who are worse off than you. I am so grateful for a loving Saviour, a loving family (even the 14 yr old who refuses to say that), a warm home, my pets, my job and my husbands job, and my church family. Even though any of these things can be taken away at a moments notice, (except for God), I still choose to be thankful for what I have now, even in the less than perfect times.

Today we had snow. I am not a fan, but am thankful for the photo op., and the fact we have a fireplace to keep us warm. Now it's raining and may come in the front door as usual, but hey, we HAVE a front door! Here's some pics...

This is our backyard pond and bird feeder. Doesn't snow look so pretty at the beginning? When it's white and fluffy and clean? This is also where Mr Squirrel comes and actually opens the snap lid plastic tub that we store the food in. Mr Chipmunk climbs the pole and gets inside the feeder (sometimes getting stuck) and makes a mess. I don't think the birds appreciate it.

On the knitting front, the hat and headband are done, one sleeve from the forever sweater is done, and the little felted tote bag is knitted. Maybe tomorrow I'll felt it. I am also working on a felted purse for a friends birthday. I'd "like" to finish up all my projects by the new year but.... this is what I end up doing. They have the right idea.

Tilly is the black and white on the left, sam is the orange tiger in the middle and our newest little gal is Luci, the white and grey on the right. Sam and Luci are great friends. Tilly holds much suspicion for this new intruder but is getting better. At least she'll be in the same room now.

May everyone have a wonderful thanksgiving!

It shouldn't be this hard

It's just a hat, it's just a headband... It shouldn't be this hard. It shouldn't take 15 starts to get going on either of these items yet it did. Hat too big, hat too small come on people! Finally get the gauge right, hat done and then the same darn thing happens with the headband. Changed the needles 5 times to find out the headband is just plain too wide, so I drop some stitches to accomadate and then it's too narrow, change needle size up, and then add some stitches back. Argh! But now it's setttled in and coming along so I am reasonably happy. Also happy that I'm on the sleeves of my sweater. I only started it in the spring. :<>

And Luci? Well no one told us she was addicted to the computer. I caught Luci doing some online shopping.. where's my wallet? I wanted to add an image here but now it won't do that. Blogs are so much better with pictures. Yay! I fixed it. Was a small oversight on my part, operator error. Sorry blogger that I besmirched your character.

Sam and Luci relax in front of the fire. Who can resist a crackling fire on a rainy day? Certinaly not us. My cats reflect my love of all things warm. Sam had been in the bed till it got too hot, but he still wants to be in the bed. Luci is still low man on the totem pole so she won't dare enter.

Well, enough of this fun. It's time to go paint more trim. This house will never be done.

There's a new sheriff in town

I know she looks tough, but in the shelter of 60 cats she was the low cat on the totem pole. Her name is Luci with an "I" and she would sign with a heart as the dot on the I if she could. She loves Sam, wants to be friends with the bunny (who wants no part of this touchy feely creature) and would like to be friends with Tilly (no dice).

"The Old Sheriff"

So, that was the big thing for the weekend. The other big thing I found out on Friday is I have a torn disk in my back. Yes! How exciting! 3 visits with the chiropractor in a week! Seriously, I have no idea how it happened, just one night it was there. Pain all the way down to my foot from my "behind" and sometimes a numbness. He's helped it some, but it needs to be iced alot. So of course now I want to do all the things around the yard which require lifting. Must Learn Patience.

A few random thoughts on blessings.

1. We have more than we realize. Even though there is pain and sickness we have Insurance.

2. Jerry has a good job so we can pay the insurance co pay.

3. Though we complain about the cost, we can pay the utilities.

4. There are 3 warm furry bodies in our bed at night to cuddle with.

5. I am no longer considered allergic to animals.

6. Our children and grandchildren are happy and healthy.

7. A fantastic church family to worship and play with.

8. Super great friends both near and far.

9. Salvation! Should be #1 Praise God for loving me with all my failures and insecurities.

The list could go on and on but it's time to ice my back again. Just want to introduce our newest little lady. Peace!

what IS going on??

Well, I usually like the idea of something interesting for you all (all 3 of you) to read but really, isn't there an easier way without making me nervous?

First the good part of my day, my friend Nancy Elizabeth came to visit with her two adorable baby girls. All the way from Colorado! Here are the two babies, who we lovingly call our fake grandchildren. This is Charlotte on left. She only stopped smiling when she took time to scream because something was not to her liking.

Then we have Maddy who was very talkative

about our fish. And ate lots of pasta. And talked

some more. According to her we have "balloon fish" and "those are quite some bubbles" (little glass balls in the bottom to look like bubbles). I swear this child talks like an adult. It's quite amazing. we really have to figure some way to go visit Boulder this summer. Aren't they beautiful?

So then they left and Hannah came home from school and a state police car arrived. Nothing weird, sometimes they sit next to our house and slow the speeders down. However, after about an hour Hannah and I hear a helicopter hovering. I finally got up to look and it seems to be landing behind our house just out of sight. Even the cop got out of his car and ran toward where it landed. All Very Interesting in the light of day. Now it's Dark, and he is still here and the helicopter keeps coming back and hovering from time to time. Now it is Not Interesting anymore but a bit Unnerving. This was my view from my living room window.

Almost time to go get Hannah from drama club at school. I will lock my doors. What a time for Jerry to be gone overnight...

Here's my watch cat however, but what is she watching for?

Rain rain go away... really GO AWAY!

Yes, I know it's been over a month despite my good intentions. Let it go..

So, now we have the rain. First the drought, which though bad, doesn't usually cause me any extra work. The rain however.. yes, front door needs fixing so water leaks under it. Another reason besides cost that I don't have carpet in the living room. Right now it has a beautiful array of towels festooning the edges. Some are wet, some not. The basement however.. oh shall we speak of the basement? I did not want to go down to the soggy bottom of my house and make squisshy noises walking across the carpet. Yet I did. When you're the only adult in the house you have to put on the big girl pants and do what you don't like. I am and I did.

Understand our basment has flooded ever since we decided to put furniture down there and an access from the inside. Used to be worse as the carpet was directly on the concrete. Good thing I vetoed the padding idea. After about the 5th flood we bit the bullet and invested in these wood tiles that have plastic feet under them. The plastic feet keep the carpet up off the concrete about a half inch so you can be flooded without wet. Normally. Todays consistantly heavy rain has caused the edges of the carpet to get wet and the water to rise over the lip to the unfinished side of the basement. Now comes the shop vac. Yes, sucking water into the shop vac and out to the running path behind my house is gads of fun. Every hour or so I go down and try to get the water sucked out from under the wood tiles at my only access point, the doorway. I can only hope my house has some slope to that edge.

Oddly this is a better week even with this, than the last 2 weeks. A few weeks ago my daughter in law Sara's outside feral colony started dwindling. Some dissapeared, some were hit by cars and one lone little guy, Lambert, was left. We'd been doing the trap nueter release program to lower the numbers and it was working well. Well, poor Lambert hasn't looked well for the past few months, but the beginning of Sept. it was worse. He was skin and bones and had such a snotty stuffed nose that even grass got caught in it. Finally I couldn't take it anymore and took him to the TNR vet to see what they could do. He needed force feeding and antibiotics but we thought we could make him better. Not so much. After about a week he went further downhill and I took him to the regular vet. Ka ching!

Almost dead, with a temp of 91, they whisked him away and did bloodwork. WBC of 56K, but they thought with force feeding, IV antibiotics, heating tent and all he'd be better. So he spent the weekend at the vets. Their estimate was 360.00. Pricey but okay. By Monday afternoon the bill was over 1,200.00 and my balance was 962.00. Cat was no better except a lower WBC of 24K. among much tears I made the awful decision to have him put to sleep. It's like gambling. How many more $$ can I throw at this to make it better? Sometimes you have to cut your losses but still it feels awful.

That was a Monday. By Wed. I was at my DIL's house with her 11 yr old cat Max gasping for breath. He had asthma for several years, and beat kidney blockages a few times. This time wasn't to be. I ended up at another vet having him put down for her. More tears. The Friday was the highlight with a root canal done on one of my front uppers. So, you see the flood isn't the worst of my life right now though it surely stinks.

Oh yes, add to that last weekend in the ER with my son who had a kidney stone. Thank God I haven't had one of those yet. Good news, while waiting with him I finished the sleeve of a sweater I was working on. Here's a picture to cheer us all up.

Miss innocent Tilly, just posing? No, she had just finished a light snack on those flowers. She is one of the feral colony at it's height last Nov. Paul and Sara snatched her up as my Christmas present and boy was she not happy!

She's still very skittish and you have to be fast to get her for nail clipping, but she's a gorgeous cat. Someday she'll settle. Her friend Sam loves her and she loves him so it's all worthwhile. Speaking of Sam, here he's relaxing as usual.

Time to go back to the basement! See ya on the other side!

last post July '08!!!

Wow, 2 years since I posted? Not that anyone reads blogs anymore with facebook and twitter. I like a nice long blog, not a sentence "I'm drinking coffee on the patio". I get frustrated when people don't update enough... NEB? And then here I am the worst of them all! So much has happened over the past 2 years, births, deaths, cats! Yes! I found out last year I am no longer allergic so promptly went and got one. A rescue 4 yr old from the shelter. His name is Samuel and I love him down to his tootsie toes. Lets see if I remember how to add a pic. Well, there he is. Not where I wanted the pic but okay....

After I got him in Sept. My son Paul found kittens in his backyard. As a Christmas gift he caught (actually his wife caught, he transported) one that I particuarly liked. The other one was snatched away by people in the night. This is Matilda or Tilly. She will be a year very soon as far as we can tell. Still very skittish and hides in the basement when strangers are here. Yes, she isn't where I want her to be either. Sam is on the left, the orange tiger and Tilly is the beautiful black and white girl.

Oh well, I moved them a bit. Tilly is sitting on our kitchen "tiled" floor. Yes! Tile! which means the kitchen is finished! Alot of the house is finished except there are no pics. Why you ask? Because we were burgeld burgled? whatever. Robbed means we were at home which we were not. Thankfully. Also thankfully the burglers closed the door after them. No one was hurt and no animals escaped. Bad news is between depreciation and deductibles we only got one computer and a lesser tv. Jerry fixed the screen they cut himself. Also thankfully a good friend (Thanks Elaine!) let me have her netbook computer. I love this thing!!!! Too cute! So, basically all is well.

We are going on vacation this weekend too! Yipee! Sand Dune motel in wildwood Crest NJ. Hmmm I wonder if I can get an image from the internet.... let's try shall we? I'm feeling adventurous. Ok, that doesn't work at all. Probably illegal or immoral anyway. So to see where we will be google Sanddunemotel.com Cheap and nice and right across from the beach with a grassy park in between so there is no blockage of scenery.

So, time for the Duggars. I will be heading off now. At least this post is something. Will I continue? I hope so. Judy

last post July '08!!!