walkin' the dog

I don't know what's going on with blogger but I'm losing my patience. No matter how I design the page to look it re-sets everything with huge blank spaces and I can't seem to figure out how to stop it. Sorry for the way these posts are laid out but it just does it's own thing and becomes very very frustrating

Welcome to the fall on our property. Hundreds of trees insure a blanket of many colors. It's very beautiful but best not to ask my son about it right now. He's got the blower and the rake out and is tackling the big yard cleanup. He will growl at you when provoked. I'm really just kidding. He's always been the most important part of the fall yard work. He's the one with the best back and, for now, the best stamina. You can see some of what I have mentioned about the climb up to my house. This first picture is only half the climb up. There's about another 100 feet up to the back porch.

Here's Lucy wondering what there is to stop and fool around with when a walk is calling.

These shots are from Thursday while we were off on the wildlife hunt. We still have a huge amount of leaves on the trees and the weather is different every day. Hotish, cold, really cold, semi-hot. Weather lottery.

I am doing some shelf stocking tomorrow at the Pantry and helping with the children's groups remaining to be seen. We have such abundance at this time of year it's incredible to see what the shelves look like now as opposed to February and August. Not getting a lot of sewing done but I wanted to check in to say HI!

Aunt Chilada's for dinner...yum

Talk to you soon.

knew it would happen one day.

First, let me show you a photo of my faithful sentry. She is standing guard because, I kid you not, there's a buck with antlers and a lot of horns, outside on my property. I very nearly came face to face with it a while ago and we had a stare down which resulted in scaring the crap out of both of us. What I did see before moving inside was that he had a wound on his shoulder and it appears that someone tried to shoot him but was not successful except to graze him. He's over on the property next door right now and I'm trying to get a better shot but it's through a window and the screens are still on so everything I shoot comes out screened...rats. Anyway, I can't get blogger to let me move photos again so here is the only one I could get so far. He's the brown spot in between the two tree trunks about center. I'm hoping since he was moving in the direction of traffic that he will return to the relative peace of our property. Lots of places to hide. I guess I'm going to call town hall to let them know since I wouldn't want him to run into traffic and have anyone, including him, get hurt.

We've always known that we would encounter deer some time in the near future since the east end is covered with them. Out at the Lab where Roger worked they were on protected federal land and he would stop to photograph them in huge numbers of 100 or more. Trouble was they starved in the winter. As enormous as the land is out there it's not enough to sustain huge herds like that. There was a plan to allow hunting for a limited time but a great outcry from Peta people put the squash on that. Let me just say that those same people pulled up their tents and left the animals to die of starvation once they had their publicity finished. Not nice.

Anyway, Lucy and I have just come back from our walk where we went in search of the deer. No sign of him. Hope that wound wasn't worse than it looked. I see that the police are around looking for him. Don't want to know how that will turn out...

I'm kind of tired today since yesterday was spent at the Food Pantry with multiple visitations of Brownie Troops and Cub Scout Troops delivering food. One of the funniest parts is that the kids get so excited when you tell them that they can unpack their items and place them on the shelves. I bet if their Moms asked them to help unpack groceries they would run like the wind. We were so grateful for their enthusiasm since they had a couple of hundred bags of groceries and that would have meant a lot of bending and lifting for Sally and I. They had lots of good questions too. The Moms obviously had prepared them well and good for them. We've had kids who come in and stand like zombies. That's a touch audience. By the time we were finished late afternoon, I stopped for sushi and treated myself to dinner. Then I fell asleep. Those kids can really wear you out but all in all it was a lot of fun. The kids left telling us that they were going to bake pies and cookies for Thanksgiving and deliver them to us.

I am making potato, bacon and cheddar soup for James this evening. We have been having dinner on Thurs. evenings since Dani is in school until late. I'll send some home for Dani. Maybe we will have a chance to talk about our building project. I'm getting very excited at the prospect and hoping that it will make the winter less loathsome by anticipation of a spring build.

Anyway, if I get a better picture of the buck I'll post it. How I wish I had the camera on me when we came nearly face to face. He was beautiful.

Off to do some laundry. Talk soon.

Keeping busy

This is the material for the other baby quilt that's up next. It will be very simple. 5 in. squares with a couple of borders. Next to it is the new bag I got from Suzan "the reluctant quilter". That woman can really make a beautiful bag. I've had more people tell me how pretty it is. Her company is Hazelnut Deux and her bags are gorgeous and well made.

These days I am trying to be as busy as I can to avoid the thoughts that are clouding my head. Soon it will be a year that Roger has been gone. I am trying to fill the hours with good thoughts and there are many right now. We are planning a large addition to the house come spring. Getting our wish list together so we can talk with an architect who is going to help us with a design. We are, essentially, building another whole house on the property for James & Dani. This suits my BIL Bob and I very well since we adore them and it will be helpful to both of us since it is a large property to maintain and having help will be nice as we are not getting any younger or in any better shape. It's a lot of fun imagining the new house and it looks like we may just squeak by without having to get a variance since we may be able to make it fit into this large property without coming close to the neighbors. We have a good relationship with our neighbors-like to keep it that way. It looks like I will get a new and larger kitchen, possibly a small deck off my bedroom, and hardwood flooring. I also get the best thing of all. A house with family in it again. Oh! and Lucy-can't forget Miss Lucy!!. I must say it's very quiet and sort of lonely here. I can go the whole day without talking with anyone but myself. It's not good for me. Depression creeps up kind of fast and lingers. How funny and unusual for me to find at 63 that I need a life and people around me.

Last week I had a super week of friends with time. It seems that it was a good week for all of my friends to have time to do stuff. Yay! I went to dinner with Geri at Taormina, lunch with Dani's Mom, Cheryl, at the Greeks, Thursday night quilting with Terry and Pam and out shopping alone on Friday for some necessities from Macy's.

I still have my work at the Pantry and it is our very busy season. Seasonal workers are looking for help for their families for the winter and we have a large number of veterans who are needing help as well. The VA hospital is a few miles away and it breaks your heart to see what's happening to these people who are returning from service and having trouble dealing with memories of war and physical injuries. It makes all of us try doubly hard to get our donations and grocery gift cards in place so at least they can be assured of a meal when they are hungry.

I'm going to fire up the machine and get to work on the new baby quilt and then I don't want to hear about birthin' no babies for a while!! II have so much to catch up on sewing wise.

I'll keep you posted.