Flirty Thirties, Sporty Forties

Lawn Surgery Photos from when Jonathan and the boys came over to help me put in a dry well/french drain.  Mom was over and was able to talk to the boys into sitting inside where they could watch.  Apparently watching me shoveling was the funniest thing they'd seen -- they'd throw their little heads back and giggle and giggle.  I can't wait til they get bigger and can help! haha  So far so good though - no more water in the basement! We also read Doctor Dan the Bandaid Man several times and I was conned into giving them new bandaids every time we read it.   They conned me into a number of things, come to think of it! Bowdrie's getting so big - he packed for himself and probably for Carson too.  He did pretty good -- the only thing he forgot was jammies so that's why they are wearing my sweatshirts and pj tops.  They looked so funny!

Yay, I passed my scuba final! Now I'm just trying to decide whether I should go with yellow mask, yellow snorkel, and black & yellow fins or if I can go all crazy and get the hot pink & black fins even though they don't match the yellow stuff. Oh these decisions can be so hard sometimes!

Just some pictures of my recent landscaping activities.   Mount Beauty Bark thankfully has disappeared and is now spread out all over my flower beds.  The photo is just to prove that I was doing some of the work and didn't make Dad do it all.  I really love geraniums, especially red ones, so I've planted a few of them, and then finally, my cute new polka dot door mat. Doesn't that just make you feel welcomed?!  Too bad I don't use that door myself - it would make me really happy every time I saw it.

Sorry to those of you who already saw these pictures on facebook, but it makes me so happy I just have to share it on here too.  I just love those two pictures of Dad & Bowdrie.  Bowdrie wanted his hair like Grandpa's.  I wasn't sure what he meant, so I clarified ... you want a combover?  Yeaaaaah!  So that's what we did to his hair and here he is with his hair style role model! I just love the fact that he loves his Grandpa so much and that he is so goofy happy in these pictures - enough that it rubbed off on Dad and even he is smiling. Here's also a picture of dad with Cassidy.  He sure likes her and even talks to her and calls here little names :-)  Maybe that's what he needed all along -- not meds, not shock treatment -- just a granddaughter!

Oh my goodness I am in awe of moms of little babies and little kids! I applaud you for even bothering to get dressed or comb your hair in the morning/afternoon! I've been hanging out with mom and velva at Jon & Jen's watching the 3 kids while Jen works on moving to the new spa. My once perfectly nice white t-shirt is covered in yellowing baby spit up, juice stains, and green marker marks & smudges. My hair has been yanked and pulled every which way by Cassidy, who is getting really good gripping (yeow). Thank goodness I get to leave all this behind in 2 days! My sympathy and pity to those of you who can't just leave!! No photos this post because at least some shreds of vanity are still intact!

Homeownership is getting to be an expensive little hobby! I had a few days off last week and two off in the middle of this week (today being one of them) so I've been outside working on the yard. Landscaping, you might call it. My aunt and I got all the dead leaves and gunk cleared out that has been hanging out in the flower beds and under/in/around the current plants. Then I decided the hosta needed to go, so I yanked them out and then used what was left of my back muscles to dig out all their roots. Uff da! I've been having a lot of fun going to check on my tulips every couple of hours. What a difference a couple of warm days can make! They opened up more and more throughout the day so I'm getting to see the spring blooming bulbs that I inherited with the house. Today, I ordered my very first load of beauty bark. Did you know that the bark comes in more than one size? And when they ask you how many yards you want, "Just my own" is not a sufficient answ...

Somehow I put this on the wrong blog! Oops. I am on my way back from some wonderful days and nights in Arizona~ I drove down to Tucson to see my friend Heather and to see Tucson. It hardly seemed right that Cassidy had been there and I hadn't, so I had to correct that! We went to the botanical gardens (different than some of the others that I've seen) there and saw their butterfly exhibit. There were some funky plants that maybe even I could grow... hmm. I think my favorite cactus was the baseball cactus. It's round and but doesn't resemble baseball stitching at all. And I would know, because I got one at the Giants vs Diamondbacks spring training game this afternoon! :-) So Tucson- we went up to Mount Lemmon to catch some great views, ate some good food, and went to her study party. A bunch of masters and doctoral students in choral conducting - -- talk about a different language! I went down the hall with my calculator and ruler and did my own studying, marvelling at ...

Another month has gone by! I can't believe how bad I've been about posting on here. I started the month in Arizona, enjoying the sunshine and wonderful warm weather. It was divine to just simply lay by the pool and not talk to anyone, not be paged by anyone, etc! I did send out a few text messages with a picture of the sunshine and palm trees to friends back home :-) Shame on me, I'm sure! A total highlight was getting to watch Randy Johnson pitch at spring training! I was a bit confused about the start time of the game so I got there 2 hrs early, so I got to watch them stretch, practice batting, and I got to watch Randy warm up too! I guess I still have a bit of a crush on him! I came home and drove right into a snowstorm and couldn't even make it home that night! Ugh! I don't recall a month when there have been so many deaths of people I know -- 3 men and now 3 women, all within the month of March. So there have been several funerals and lots of shopping f...

What a busy week! I had a great trip to Montana to see my little Valentines.  My super shopper brother spied some skis that he thought were what I was looking for, so he and the guy measured how tall they were, and all that, I did some research (mostly to see what colors they came in) and bought them over the phone.  It was a great deal and so I could hardly wait to get to MT to go skiing. We (mom,dad, and I) got off the train bright and early and went out for breakfast.  The looks of glee on the boys' faces once they saw we were standing there was priceless/precious.  Oh they were excited and came running at us, full blast!  We had a quick breakfast - heart-shaped strawberry pancakes for me and the boys, Jen had some lemon-filled french toast with raspberry stuff, and I didn't really pay attention to what the others ate, and then Jonathan and I headed for the mountain. The skis were just amazing - it was so much easier to ski on them and Jonathan even told me I looked 10 times...

Oops, I've been so busy flirting that I haven't taken the time to update this!  As if I could compete with this little cutie! Mostly I've just been working a ton and that's never a thriller to hear about, so moving on... For Valentine's Day, I'm going to Montana to see my little Valentines from last year, plus an extra one for good measure :-)  Mom, Dad, and I are going up there on the train and will spend the long weekend up there.  I can't wait!   I also bought some new skis. I can't wait to go pick them up - they were up in Montana.  Jonathan spotted them and called me - what a shopper, huh!?!  I don't have the link to what they look like but they're blue and white and there might be some swirls in the design.  Fun fun! Tomorrow I'll be busy making cupcakes once again - whee - I'm not sure why I like to do that so much but oh well, it's fun and it makes people happy.  Maybe I should've been an elementary school teacher instead...

Oops, I've been neglecting this! I had a wonderful trip to Montana recently to meet little Miss Cassidy - oh what a little doll!  I guess I forget how teeny little babies are when they start out -- her little legs and wrists just crack me up.  She's got the cutest clothes, including a darling little denim skirt which is probably 6 inches long, and lots of little dresses.  Awww. The boys were super good - they play together and have so much fun, and they are really into books right now so I was more than happy to read to them, book after book after book.  I'm, as always, so impressed with their little brains and how smart they are already. Bowdrie's learning some Spanish at his preschool so I taught him some new words and songs.  His favorite word to say is rojo, which comes out sounding more like RowHoe.  I taught him Amarillo (yellow) and verde (green) but he seems to think verde is pronounced "band-aid".  /:-)   Jonathan was sick so we didn't go skiing b...

Ho ho ho, Merry Christmas! I'm probably breaking some sort of etiquette rule but I'm going to skip the christmas letter and do a christmas blog instead.  This way I can write, delete, write, delete, save drafts, etc and no one will be any the wiser!  It is, after all, pretty hard to sum up a year and every year I tell myself I'll keep a running list of all the good memories, and every year at this time, I wish I would've listened to myself!  Fortunately my wise friend Jessica introduced me to journaling, so I might be able to piece something together.... January:  My resolution was to stop chewing my nails.  I was successful at times, but failed other times.  As the year draws to a close, they're actually a decent length (translation: long enough to show white but short enough that I don't draw my own blood with them), so I'll consider it a success. February:   My Valentines Day was spent with my two little sweethearts, Bowdrie & Carson, up in Coeur d...

More pictures of my sweet little niece and her loving brothers... 

According to Bowdrie, Jen's still at the hospital on the 'doctor board' (bed) and the doctor cut her tummy with scissors and took the baby out.  :-)  I'm utterly biased, no doubt, but isn't she just precious?  I just wonder what she's thinking.   I wish these people would go home? Why does that guy keep taking pictures? Well yes, as a matter of fact, I WAS born yesterday!

Hooray Hooray!  I got a little niece today! Cassidy Jane Krack 6 pounds 14 ounces 20 inches long Lots of dark hair, and already totally nosey and looking around at everything! I'm sooo in love.

I love Thanksgiving! This year, I am thankful for a lot of things. 1. Health-related things ... like the fact that I still have my mind and my memory, I have a fully functional nervous system and messages get from my brain to my toes. I don't have nerve pain, I don't have Shingles or Post-shingles pain, I don't really have any pain at all.  Aside from the occasional cold or headache, I haven't been sick at all.  No hanta virus, no septic shock, no flesh-eating bacteria, no major traumas involving broken bones, etc.  I'm guilty of not liking my body because my stomach isn't totally toned or I may have gained an extra pound here and there, but ultimately, it's functioning perfectly and I need to be more thankful for that!  After seeing several young, previously healthy people die this year due to freakish things ... it just makes you feel more thankful for good health.  So I am thankful for my good health :) 2. Home.  I found the most perfect house ever -- it...

You've simply gotta love a guy named Gus.   (That's the name of Mom's neurosurgeon) Mom had her surgery this morning, so we got to the hospital bright and early ... well, dark and early (5:30) and got her all checked in.  She got to put on the lovely gown and tin foil shower cap, get an IV and her vitals done, and then once she was pretty much squared away, I headed upstairs to work.  I told her it was somewhat like a trip to the dayspa --- you put on their robe, put your clothes and belongings in a bag that will be locked up while you're on your excursion, you start out in "the sanctuary" (snort) and they gave her nice warm blankets! Fast forward to 11:30 AM.  I was done with ICU stuff and so I headed upstairs to see if she was back yet.  I pulled a couple strings in the morning with a friend who was the shift coordinator on the floor Mom was going to, so she got a private room with a lovely room and a wonderful nurse. I got there just after she was wheeled i...

Mom update: She's scheduled for surgery on Wednesday with Dr. Varnavas here in Yakima.  It will be a resection of the L5/S1 area of her spine.  He thinks he can help her by doing some more of that rotor-rooting in there to give her nerves more room, and maybe work some magic with those discs in there too.  She's lost pretty much all feeling in her left foot and leg plus some on the right side.  It's pretty scary watching how little she can do and how unstable she is on her feet, due to not being able to feel the floor.   I wish I could get a better handle on her mood but I think it's one of resignation.  Now that it's a reality, perhaps it's making her more nervous ... wondering how she'll feel this time when she wakes up.  Last time she wasn't very nervous and things didn't go so well, so ... I just hope hope hope things go well.  I have complete faith in this surgeon and his PA so I'm actually planning to go ahead and work that morning rather t...

A disappointing epiphany or two.... So are these post-30 blues normal or are they a result of a recent visit from my brother?!  Nice of him to get right down to the heart of the matter and have me wind up admitting that indeed, nobody (young male and single) is interested in me.  I've been having a great week as I'm sure you can imagine, self-reflecting and being all introspective.  I've come to a couple conclusions and they're not all that fun. One of them is that I can't control love/relationships/male-people and that's very frustrating for me.  I can't force things to happen nor put it into a tidy little equation to get my head around it, nor can I put my mind to making it happen.  I can find solutions to so many things and solve countless problems in every other aspect of my life except this one.  Aargh.  I guess I am a control freak after all :-) The second one- I haven't figured out how to put it into words just yet.  I'm trying to keep it blan...

Ok never mind, I'll just keep my blog here since I've already got mom's bookmark tab set up for this one, and I don't feel like remaking all those gadgets. :-) So for those of you who have already reached and passed this milestone and still remember it --- did anyone have the blues shortly after the high? That's where I'm at right now. According to CNN, all major organ systems in the body start to decline after 30, and I'll start losing muscle mass. I think I'm even detecting vertical ridges in my fingernails! I bought a book called "How Not To Be A Little Old Lady" and was horrified to see that I am already do several of the things they say to avoid! Aaack!