The farrier and his wife were out a few weeks ago to trim up the miniature horses and mentioned a nice park that they thought we'd enjoy so we got in the car and went exploring. They allow horseback riding in the park and it was fun to see people on horses near the trails. We'll be back for sure!
Easter this year was another low key one. I haven't been back to church yet as they are just starting to lift restrictions around here. We hid a bunch of eggs in the front and back yard and the kids had fun finding them all. We've reached the age where it's more about finding the most candy than the joy of finding the brightly colored eggs. Notice the plastic grocery bags instead of the baskets too. They sure are growing up!
Wesley has been moving up the ranks in his karate class. Earlier in the year he belt tested and passed so he's now an orange belt. I'm proud of him for keeping with it!
When we bought the Jeep Wrangler it had half doors on it. I wasn't too sure what to think of half doors but after driving it several months I've made the decision that half doors are not too pleasant. It's more about the windows than the doors. The lack of rolling windows and the noises that come with them made driving a hassle so I started my search for full doors with windows that actually roll down. I had to contact several salvage yards before finding the perfect white pair of doors with the inside panel to match my car. They had to ship them from Nevada which wasn't cheap but I'm sure happy with the end result.
Kevin is getting to be an adult dog. He's holding his own with Cooper and they play for hours each day. I had to clean the floors and I put all the dog toys onto the dog bed. Kevin thought this was great and proceeded to take a nap on his toys.
One of the big projects for fifth graders is the wax museum. They each get to pick a favorite person from the past and research that person. Then they get to dress up and recite a memorized speech about that person.
Greta picked Lucile Ball and had a lot of fun portraying her. In years past they did this presentation inside of the gymnasium and invited the whole school and parents. But because of Covid they didn't allow parents to come see this year. I understand and was lucky enough to have a few teachers send me a video of Greta being Lucile Ball. The video has some background noise since it was done inside of a classroom with a few other students, but I think you can hear her. Good job Greta.....I mean Lucile!
Our daily driver, Sean's Taurus Police Interceptor, decided to bite the bullet. It went in for some recall work to the dealership and they informed us that the water pump went out. It's quite the job to replace the water pump in that particular engine and Sean was on the fence as to whether he even wanted to do the job himself. He started taking the engine apart and found that the turbos were also failing and would need to be replaced. He then started poking around the catalytic converters and discovered they were there but the honeycomb interiors had been removed and thus we were left with just the shell. It was strange but all of this explained the unburnt fuel smell that the car had been giving off.
After a few weeks of working on it, Sean decided he wasn't up for the job and sold the car to a guy that was willing to put the work and money into it. We are happy to be out from under that project. It did leave us without our main kid hauler. We take our kids plus Jessica's two oldest kids to school each day and bring them home. We started using the Toyota Tundra as our daily driver and quickly realized it too big and too much of a gas guzzler for that job so we started our hunt for a new (used) car.
We thought an electric car would be perfect for the 5 mile drive back and forth to school and the random trip to town each week. We spent several weeks car shopping and finally decided a Nissan LEAF would be just about perfect for our needs. One showed up several hours away so we hopped in the truck (with the three dogs) and drove up with the trailer to retrieve it last Saturday.
The dogs haven't all been in the car together for a long drive and were quite anxious. I'm pretty sure they thought they were going to the vet or groomer and never really calmed down until the drive home. Beanie, the littlest Boston Terrier, had horrendous gas the entire drive and then to top it all off she threw up. Poor girl is not a very good travel dog. It was a memorable experience though.
We are excited to putter around town and not use any gasoline!
We have a new member of the family. I haven't written about it because the reason behind why we got a new puppy is too difficult to write. We lost our sweet four year old Winston this past November. He somehow broke his back and was unable to use his front legs. He was found like that on the couch and to this day we don't know what happened. I think what happened was our very puppy like 30 pound Cooper jumped from the back of the couch down on top of Winston. They would play pretty rough. The vet said that particular break had a very poor prognosis. Even if we did find a vet school willing to try, there was a high chance it wouldn't work. We made the very difficult decision to put him to sleep.
We were left with a giant hole in our family. The dogs were sad. The kids were sad. It was a sad time. Winston was the glue that brought Cooper and Bean together, without him they didn't know how to play. I made the decision to look for another Boston Terrier puppy to fill the void.
We picked up eight week old Kevin the end of November and he's now nearly six months old. He's such a sweet little guy. He fits right in and plays well with both Cooper and Bean. We are keeping an eye on Cooper and making sure he's not too rough with the new little guy. Cooper just turned one year old and is just a big puppy himself. I never thought I'd be potty training puppies for a year.
Welcome to the menagerie Kevin (can you tell we just watched Home Alone when we brought him home?).
Miss Greta wanted a major hair change and decided on a pixie cut. She loves it and we don't have to battle the curls any longer! It's a win!
One of the reasons we like where we live is because the winters are fairly mild. We might get down into the teens at night for a week or two but that's about it. Our summers are pretty miserable so it's nice to have mild winters. Well the past two weeks have been anything but mild! Nearly the entire country has been dunked into the deep freeze and it's been quite miserable. The saying goes "I love winter, said no farmer ever." It's true. Keeping animals alive outside in -15 degrees is tough. We have farmers down the road that are in the middle of calving season. The calves freeze to the ground before the cow can even dry them off. It's heartbreaking.
I'm lucky to have cozy houses for the horses and goats that are bedded down in deep hay but they are still shivering when I go to feed in the morning. It takes about an hour to feed, bring fresh water and hay to all the critters. The hoses are frozen so buckets of warm water must be brought out to fill the stock tank. It's quite the work out. I don't know how the northern states do this every winter. Pretty sure I'd move.
Our area has been dealing with rolling black outs now due to the power grid unable to keep up. We haven't been effected by this luckily. This coming weekend is supposed to be in the 40's and next week in the 50s (and SUNNY!). I feel like it's one day at a time around here. I have to really work myself up to put on the four layers and trek out to feed all the critters. This too shall pass.
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| They line up on the south side and soak up the sun. |
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| Wesley got a work out clearing the driveway and sidewalk. |
I love.....sunny days when the dogs curl up in the warm sunny window......hugs from my big kids as they leave for school (5th grader and 8th grader).......working stock tank heaters......wearable blankets.....lunch dates with my work from home hubby, even if they are take out in the car.......evenings with all three dogs piled on my lap.......puppy kisses.......peppermint mocha coffee each morning, Greta loves this too........the hope of warmer days ahead, it's currently -15 actual temperature......morning soaks in the hot tub with my hubby......the fact that more vaccines mean lower infection rates, can't wait to get mine......making big lunches and eating them with Sean while watching our shows (just finished The Expanse-so good-and now watching Lucifer).....the hope of brighter days ahead after a long pandemic year....Happy Valentine's Day!
We don't normally get much snow in our winters. We're lucky to have two or three inches all winter so you can imagine the delight when we woke up to 6 inches of snow on the ground. It was during Christmas break so the kids didn't get a snow day, although I'm sure they would have if they were in school.
The kids played in our yard for a day and then I remember my folks have a great hill that my sister and I used to slide down in our youth. There wasn't a whole lot of snow left by the time we remembered but still enough to have fun.
We celebrated Sean's birthday last month. I try to find something that he wants but hasn't already purchased for himself (which can be difficult). He told me how neat this paint spray can holder was a few months ago and I was able to get one ordered. He can hang it in his shop and clear off all the spray cans of paint that use up one whole table.
It's always a challenge to get exercise and sunlight during the winter. We are a family who hibernates in the winter but we've been trying to go for a walk regularly and Bean sure enjoys it!
I wanted to make something for family this year to commemorate 2020. I thought about toilet paper ornaments or dumpsters on fire that I could make with clay but settled on this idea to do a cartoonish caricature of each person with a mask and toilet paper. Some were turned into ornaments for the Christmas tree and others were little shelf sitters. Sure was fun to make and a much needed change from dog sculptures.
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| This is the last one I did, luckily they got a little better as I did more. |
As for hibernating all winter.....I do love a good blanket and video game. The blankets never covered all of me so I had to make sure to wear a warm sweater. That is until I found this wearable blanket. It's so warm! The dogs all swarm to me when I have it on. Most evenings you can find me under this blanket with three dogs sleeping on me while I sculpt.
