Wednesday, November 28, 2012

That smell...

This morning when I went out to feed the animals, I steped out onto the porch as was about bowled over by that crazy feeling of deja vu.
Something about the smell of my somewhat musty cold weather gear and the crisp cold air is what triggered it.
The deja vu/memory was of skiing in AK when I was a kid.
For a second there I could almost feel the icy wind on my chapped cheeks as I raced down the mountain.
Was an incredible feeling!
Probably the last time I went skiing was the year before Colton was born, so about 22 years ago.
I remember going to Arctic Valley most when I was a kid.
 In elementary school we took classes there and learned to ski.
Ride the bus to school, they'd do a head count and we'd get on another bus and ride to the mountain to spend all day skiing. 
It was great!
The most fun was going to Alyeska to ski!
Last time I went to Alyeska was with six friends for night skiing - incredible.
Course I've been thinking about skiing all day.
There is a place not too far from here that we could go skiing at.
Course we currently have no snow.
Looks like this place Christie Mountain makes their own though and is planning on a December 7th opening.
Interesting.
Have to think on this for a bit.
Also wouldn't mind getting some crosscountry skis too.
Would be fun to cruise the snowmachine trails, not to mention great exercise.
In other news...
 I'm back to work and the work is piled up high.
No OT for me this week though since I had monday off and would have to do 8 straight time extra hours befor they'd pay OT wages.
Nope, not for me.
I might on Sunday since that is the beginning of the new pay period.
Yes, I've got this figured out lol
Picture of Casper.
Poor guy had some diareaah last weekend.
I think he was eating junk he shouldn't have been.
Like trees, fences and nibbling on the side of the barn.
It was hard to get his back side cleaned up and dry with it being so cold out.
Glad he is over whatever it was that gave him the runs.

Nov282012horsescows005


Happy Humpday :)

Monday, November 26, 2012

Last day


Shoot!
I can't believe how fast these last six days have flown.
I sincerely hate to have to go back to work tomorrow.
uhg.



It's cold here this morning. 
About 18*.
We could sure use some moisture.
Snow, rain, sleet - whatever as long as it's wet.

Caden hanging out while I was brushing the fuzzy horses last week.

Nov16182012catshorsesgreentruckkids014

 Have you put your Christmas tree up yet?
We haven't.
Probably wont for another week or two either.
I've got no holiday spirit - yet.

Although I did mess around with our Christmas picture some yesterday.
Thought I had it just right, when Chyann declares that I can't use that picture because her arms look strange.
I'm like what? are you kidding me!?!
Fine.
I told her to find one that she liked then and of course she can't. 
Great. 
Christmas picture saga to be continued...

I'm off.
Going to go enjoy the rest of my day.
Think I'll take Gypsy out for a ride. 

Have a good one :)

Saturday, November 24, 2012

4 of 6


Saturday.

I must say how good it is not to have to sit on my ass for 8+ hours a day.
Back, hips, knees and hands are feeling like new!

Potato's to be pealed? Pass'em my way - these hands are ready.
Sit and watch a movie with the kids and not be in agony? Yep, hit play.
Browse the internet and goof with the new photo thing? Yep, kinda fun again when you aren't chained to the machine.

I'm liking this sleeping in too. 

Didn't do much that I didn't want to do today.

Cooked, did laundry and read my book - Buried Prey by John Sandford.

Went out and took pictures of they guys doing wood. 
Yes, for the first time in a long while I did not participate in that exciting activity.


This photo editing thing is pretty neat.
 I've not bothered with it previously (you are probably saying no kidding - it's about time). 

Fiddled a bit with this picture I took of Colton.
Not much really. 
Just cropped, a border and auto correct for the color. 
Sure was a gray and gloomy day.


Colton edited


And this one of Chyann, Scotch and Jenny - I just cropped and hit auto correct for color.

Chyann just can't go a day without riding.
I didn't feel like riding cuz damn it was cold, only about 24* and a bit breezy. 
Read my book instead.
So her big idea was to pony Jenny with Scotch to work them both.

chyna edited

Pretty cool all the facets of a picture you can manipulate with the touch of a button.


Caden has a friend over and they have discovered Batman for the WII. 
Suppose they'll be occupied all night with that. 


Back to my book.
Have a nice evening.




Friday, November 23, 2012

Day 3 - Check that out!

fog.2

I did it!

Figured out how to move photos from the new place to here FOR FREE!
HA!

Incredible how foggy it was the other morning.
Reminds me of when I lived in AK and worked for PenAir. 
St. George Island (think Deadliest Catch) was one of our destinations and the agent there always said the fog was like "soup".
I think this is the kind of fog she was talking about - thick and heavy.
For more pictures of St George Island , go here.

We had a very nice Thanksgiving.
Second year in a row that I've hung laundry out, if you can believe that.
Tons of food, drink and games - football too.

Left the house at 630a this today for a little black Friday shopping.
We'd never went before and to be honest, probably wont go again.
Sure there were some good deals, but nothing I/we really needed.
We hit Kohls, Target, the mall - Sears, Yonkers, JCPennys, Old Navy, Macy's and all the little shops in between. Then KMart, Farm Fleet, Aldi and Walmart. 
The crowds weren't too bad.
The longest lines were for the bathrooms.

One of Chyann's friends started shopping last night at 8p and stated heading for home 9a.
What in the world they were doing for all that time I have no idea.
Because I'm sure we went to the same stores they did and it sure didn't take us that long. 

If you can possibly imagine yesterday's high temp was 64*.
Today's high temp was 25*!!
HOLY COW what a change!
BURRRRRRR!!
Windy and snowy too!
Winter has definitely announced I'M HERE!

Alright, I'm off to heat up some leftovers.

Until tomorrow :)







Thursday, November 22, 2012

Day 2 - Happy Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope you and your family enjoy a wonderful day together and some good food of course!






It's a beautiful day here today.
It was a little foggy earlier though.
I took some pictures of the the front trees looking eerie, but alas I have not fixed my picture problem yet.
Thank you Ladies who commented and gave advice on how to maneuver around the google issue. 
That is my plan this afternoon, after the meal and all is quiet, I will investigate the solutions and hopefully get it taken care of.

If I am understanding correctly - instead of uploading my pictures directly from my to computer to blogger, I will have to create an account in a different photo storage area (snapfish/photobucket) and upload my pictures/copy the url from there to my blog.
Or suck it up and pay about $3 bucks a month - which seems like such a rip off to me. 
So, I will figure the new way out!



Yesterday Chyann and I rode in the field next door for about an hour.
 It was a lot of fun until we started hearing gun shots close by.

It's incredible how many hunting accidents there are around here. 
The latest wacky one I heard on the news,  was a man shot at a deer, missed and the bullet traveled (I don't remember how far, but it was a bit of a distance) to another man in his hunting party and shot him in the hand, blowing off two fingers!

The horses aren't bothered by the gun shots any more, but Shasta and Tater got freaked out and tried to hide under Jenny's legs - which as you can imagine freaked her out some lol


Do you make any new recipes for your Thanksgiving feast? 
Or do you stick with the tried and true recipes that your family has made for eons?

I usually make at least one new recipe and it was going to be for prime rib, but since Mom and Gerry aren't coming we are going to do a ham.
No other new recipes to try out, but I may put a spin on my Boston Market Squash casserole.



Have a good one, eat lots :)

Until tomorrow...







Wednesday, November 21, 2012

Day 1 of 6 - MY Thanksgiving vacation

 Y'all almost got a real treat last night. 

I'd had on of those days and decided to do a little drunk blogging.
 (ok I wasn't really drunk, maybe tipsy, but it sounds ever so much more dramatic to say drunk)

Below is an excerpt of what, in the cold light of day I decided was alright to say:

I've had rotten shitty ass day and decided to do a little drunk blogging and like
 drunk texting I normally frown upon this, cuz you always seem to regret the shit you might say (not that i've ever done that, cuz im a lousy texter), but I'm going to make a special exception for tonight.


My shitty ass day is mostly a result of hormones, but there are other factors as well.

Between the terrible headache, being overly emotional (which I don't think I ever am) and teary as hell - I've had a few glasses of wine and that miserable headache finally went away!
IT'S A MIRACLE!
This must mean another glass of wine is in order, to celebrate of course!

As for the hormones - Peri-menopause or menopause whatever the hell you want to call it - rip job of the century.

I used to be the "normal" one.
Now I'm the "hormonal" one.

What kind of a cosmic joke is this?!!!

Enough of that.
 EESH.
 I'm ever so glad at the last moment some common sense prevailed and I hit save instead of publish.

 My Mother and Gerry are not coming for Thanksgiving.
I can deal with that - mostly.
They would really like to come, but are unable to due to circumstances out of their control. 
 (a story I will not tell as it is not mine to tell, but irritating just the same)



So, I've got six days off.
With not a lot planned.

I've decided to blog everyday, even if I've got nothing to say. 


I was going to upload photos from this last week

and

guess what?

Google says I am over my damn limit of photos!

 And they want me to pay $$ on a monthly basis to upload more.
WTH kind of a scam is this?
How can I avoid this?
Because I'm cheap!
Any advice would be greatly appreciated!


Below are the pictures I managed to get uploaded before google put the kabosh on uploading more.

Proof that Pumpkin Pie is really ok.
She is a pretty laid back kitty cat.
Can you see where I cut her hair?



An interesting picture of my girl and her horse.
Something about it that I really like. 




Our weather is wonderfully mild!
High 60's for the next few days.
Too bad it's still gun deer season, today would be a great day for a long ride.
I think we'll probably do a little riding around our place though.

Colton is home for the week too.
It's very nice to have him here.
Hope he plans on spending a little time with his siblings, they miss him very very much - especially Caden.

Basketball with Caden has really been a blast!
I've enjoyed every practice! 
You wouldn't believe how much the boys have improved, it's amazing!
Getting to know the other two assistant coaches better has been a bonus I sure didn't expect either.
We are actually thinking about trying to get a few more ladies interested and playing our own games.



Happy Birthday to my sister-in-law Elizabeth!
Hope you have a great day!
xoxo


Until tomorrow :)








Thursday, November 15, 2012

Crazy story for the day

I'm in my office on a conference call when the dogs start barking their fool heads off.

Figure they are barking at those imaginary bunnies or big-foot is at the back door.

After a bit they settle down.

I got off my call and continued working.

Few minutes later I hear the strangest sound. I can't even describe it.
 Just a weird urgeling/wheezing kind of thing.

So I look around

and

find to my surprise

poor 

Pumpkin Pie.


She has two fly sticky tape strips wrapped around her body!
From the tips of her ears to the tip of her tail.

OMG!


She was actually pretty calm as I try to peel this incredibly sticky shit off of her.

Course her fur is caked with this gunk.

Time for a kitty cat bath break.

Off to the tub for her first bath, which was another first that I do not wish to ever repeat.

Soaping up a freaking out cat is no easy feat, but in the end she went docile and hung cupped in my hand like she was boneless. 

Apparently this sticky shit is water proof so the traumatic bath was all for naught.

Wrapped in a towel she sat in my lap and dozed while I worked.

Every so often I'd use my scissors to cut a chunk of that gunk out of her hair.  

Going to take a few days to cut it all out.
Jeez.

 Are you wondering where those sticky fly tape things came from?
The Hubby had two of them hanging down in the wood room.
Since we moved all that wood in and it warmed all up, sometimes you'll get bugs coming out of the wood so he hung them up in hopes of catching any that might be around.

I am assuming Pumpkin came up from the basement thrashing like a manic which is what got the dogs barking. 
How she managed to make it up two different flights of stairs, traverse four dogs who probably thought she was wanting to play and up to my office is beyond me. 
Definitely a tough little thing.

No pictures available of this crazy event as I was home alone and needed both hands lol


Anyhow....

We had a great time at my friend Sherri's party on Saturday nite.
She is the BEST party planner.
We played Friendly Feud - think Family Feud and all the questions were about her.
What a riot!
Mr Freeze had a us all laughing so hard!
A great time for sure!
Stayed up waaaay too late though, by the time we got home and had a snack it was 3am before I got to bed and was up waaaay too early at 8a.
Which meant I took my Sunday football nap from 1230 till almost 6p!
Damn, what a waste of the day. Hate it when that happens.

It's been a busy week with basketball practice and working as much OT as I can squeeze in.
For whatever reason my ass doesn't hurt quite so bad this week, must be developing some good ol' trucker ass - able to sit for amazing long periods of time.

Working in the office tomorrow, which I am dreading. 
Not just the drive in, but hey I've also got to find something to wear that is not a holey sweatshirt and worn out jeans. 


Have a good one and beware of fly sticky tape and cats :)

Saturday, November 10, 2012

Saturday at last


I said to hell with working today.
Planned on sleeping in, but was up at my usual time.

Need to clean the house, but here I sit (on my mega sore ass).
No motivation to do anything.

Went through my picture archives to find a few random pictures to post for today since I haven't taken any new ones in a while and ended up spending about an hour enjoying a walk down memory lane. 

It's amazing how fast life changes and we don't even realize it.

Caden took over the three wheeler.


Chyann with Lucky and Shasta, after she got the fixator off. 
We still miss ol' Lucky.

   
Colton and Sparky watering the cows one cold winter day.


This was too funny!


I suppose I should get moving.
Do a little cleaning, hit the store and take a nap because
today is my good friend Sherri's birthday and we are going to help her celebrate tonight!
Happy Birthday Sherri xoxo

Toodles :)

Wednesday, November 7, 2012

Hump day!

We got all that wood in the basement on Sunday in record time.
Only took about three hours with all hands on deck.
Decided to call it a day after that - had to get in my Sunday afternoon football nap after all. 

Had a little Birthday celebration for Colton.
(because I've been bugging him to let me give him a hair cut he had the girlfriend straighten his hair, hence the strange hair - the kid has the best curly hair ever and doesn't appreciate it)


Basketball started too.
There are about 20 boys that signed up.
Only about a quarter of them have any clue about basketball, so me and two other Mothers got recruited to be assistant coaches. 
Imagine that!

Like I've got much experience though.
I played in fourth and fifth grade, which was about a hundred years ago.
The other two ladies were super stars in High School so at least they know what the hell they are doing. 
I'll just watch them and pretend that I know what to do!

The boys doing laps.
They even did some basic exercises.



One of the other Ladies was wearing jeans like me and said she'd have to buy new sweatpants if she was going to be an assistant. I told her I had sweatpants, but none that I'd wear in public. 
The other gal chimes in and says we could wear shorts you know and both of us said that would require shaving our legs, so nope lol



The rain woke me up yesterday morning.
It was just pouring.

I didn't realize that when it quit pouring, the rain turned to snow.
I looked out my office window and was quite surprised to see the white.

It flurried off and on all morning, but was gone by the time the kids got home from school.


Cute picture of the day.
Caden and Shasta Breeze.


Happy Hump day :)


Sunday, November 4, 2012

Falling back

Daylight savings.
Did you remember to turn your clocks back?
I didn't.
When I woke up at 5a the Hubby informed me it was only 4a and to go back to bed. 
Which I happily did and slept in till a whopping 7a!

Do you get all excited about turning the clocks back an hour?
I was talking to a friend and she was telling me how much she looked forward to turning the clocks back an hour so she could have an extra hour of sleep every night and how that extra hour really made a difference in her life.
OK.

I can see how that extra hour can benefit you on the first day, but after that? I don't see it.

So, in the spirit of falling back - my week in rewind:

This morning I am able to sit here at the computer with only a minimum of aches and pains.
Aches and pains you ask?
Yes - 28 hrs of OT will make you the sorest, achiest, cranky person EVER.
(and make you totally avoid all other computer related activities like blogging, catching up on my invisible friends blogs and checking email)

The Hubby says it's not a wonder it took me so damn long to get to feeling better. 
Which I must say, so far this weekend I'm starting to feel like my old self again. 


Today's big plan is to put all this wood we cut and split yesterday in the basement.



After the truck and trailer are unloaded we will finish cutting the little that is left and get it stacked.


 Course it was Halloween too.
Our 21st Anniversary and Colton's 20th Birthday.
For the Anniversary we did what we always do - took the kids trick or treating.
Our group this year was pretty big as a bunch of Caden's friends from football/baseball and four other parents were with us.
We toughed out the chilly temps and walked the town with the kids around from 5p to 730p. 



Colton apparently didn't do much for his Birthday - or so he says. 
Soon as I'm done here I'm going to make him a cake.

Tuesday night we went to the High School Fall concert.
I forgot my damn camera. 
I've NEVER forgotten my camera.
Good thing Caden brought his Ipod thing.
(which he bought with his own bday money)
I was able to record the concerts, but haven't yet figured out how to download the videos to my computer.

The band was AWESOME!!! 
They played some great tunes!
Classics like Paranoid by Black Sabbath
and more modern music like Moves like Jagger by Maroon 5.

Chyann and I did take a little ride in the freshly harvested field next door on Sunday as well.
Don't ya just love the orange?
Still hunting season around here.


Saw some amazing clouds.


It was a beautiful day for a ride.



Jennifer kept trying to snag leftover stalks of corn and discarded cobs, so Chyann kept her on a short rein. 
I told Chyann to make Jenny move her feet every time she attempted to go down for a bite.
That worked until Jenny tripped and about fell.
Scared us all lol


 Chyann has been working on getting Jenny to just stand.
A proposition that is much harder than you'd think.
Backing up is also a work in process.


I suppose we'd both be more successful riders if we actually took some lessons to polish our techniques. 
(figure out what the hell we are doing)

About a mile South of town two women have had their horses attacked by cougars.
Tore a few of them up pretty good I heard.
The attacks happened at night as that is usually when cougars are active, hunting for food.
The DNR - dept of natural resources, thinks the cougars wont stay around long since they usually travel between five and seven miles a day hunting, but might stay in the area longer if they've found a good source of food, like an abundant deer herd. 
There have also been recent sightings of bobcats and Canadian lynx in the area.
How's that for scary?
And we though we only had to worry about bears.

Alright I'm making a cake then doing wood.

Enjoy your day :)