More Christmas Stuff!

These are pictures of Vanessa's cropped swing jacket and an example of the benches we made for mom and dad and Bruce and Susan for Christmas. Right now Baby Cat is "helping" me type by lying on my arm.

Saturday Adam and Vanessa stopped by on their whirl-wind Christmas tour of relatives! We were happy to see them, even if it had to be briefly. I'll have to add the picture of Vanessa in her cropped jacket and belly-dancing scarf (over jeans)! It was quite a combination! She was cute in both!

Had a fun final Christmas fling on Sunday with Bruce, Sue, Gavin, Ian, Keely, Evan, Josh, Anya, Steven, Mom and Dad. Had tons of food, presents and fun games. We have quite the competitive family!

Anya and I did yoga this morning and journeyed to JoAnn Fabrics to check out the sales. That was fun! Finished off a letter of recommendation for Ian (since one of the profs he had requested one from didn't follow through in time).

Christmas 2008

We had a lovely Christmas with Josh and Anya on Tuesday (Christmas Eve eve). Both kids gave us lovely, thoughtful gifts and I think they enjoyed what they received as well. We had salad and pizza and fun chatting.

Wednesday morning George and I left for Philadelphia and the kids went to spend Christmas with Dave and Heather in Fredonia. Thankfully the roads were good and it was just rainy during part of the 8 hour drive. We arrived around 5:00 to see the absolutely cutest baby girl in existence!!! My goodness, what a doll! Elizabeth is full of smiles most of the time and excellent at entertaining herself at just 6 months!! She was adorable in the little coat I made for her and she loved her new book as you can see from the pictures! What fun!

Lily, the dog, has been amazingly good and has not chewed up one toy yet!! She was much calmer than when we saw her in August. What a good dog! She occasionally gets a few licks in, but otherwise seems to know that Elizabeth and her toys are off limits.

On Christmas day Amy's family came over and we had a wonderful dinner. It was great to get a chance to get to know Amy's parents and brother and sister better, as well as Amanda's boyfriend, Adam. Amy has a very nice family.

We spent a delightful morning with Amy, Mike and Elizabeth this morning and headed back to Ohio. I'm sure Elizabeth will be so different next time we get the opportunity to see her. It may not happen until May! It's too bad we live so far away.

You can see more pictures from Christmas (and of Elizabeth and family) if you scroll down to the bottom of the page and click on the slide show. It will take you to our Flickr website full of pictures.

Anya's Home!

Anya arrived home despite the ice storm only an hour late. Which was vastly better than her boyfriend, Steven, who had his flight canceled yesterday out of Boston. Hopefully he will make it home today. Anya was dead tired and went to bed shortly after our dinner with Josh. She actually got up this morning and had breakfast with us at 7:30 am!!

Above are some of my Christmas creations! I just finished the fleece baby jacket today for Elizabeth that I created from an old baby dress pattern . I had to switch the opening to the front and redesign the collar and pockets and added a pleat to the back. It closes with snaps that I covered with ribbon rosebuds I had in my stash. I bought the pink flowered fleece as a remnant (along with lots of other beautiful colors of fleece in a moment of weakness!).

The flannel for the boxers as well as the boxer pattern I've had for a while. I changed the pattern slightly by substituting a jersey knit covered waist band which I think is more comfortable. They have flat-felled seams - which take a while to make, but are worth it in looks, durability and comfort.

I knit a lovely headband for fun and just to try out the pattern and am currently tackling knitting socks out of colorful wool yarn. I have one more Christmas sewing project I will hopefully start and finish tomorrow.....we'll see. I'm also making another red dishcloth to give to Amy's sister Amanda. I must have made 3 dozen of those dishclothes by now this year! I seem to have to have several projects to work on at once. At least I'm done with baking cookies for a while. The chocolate dipped cheesecake bites were a hit as were the almond toffee crescents half dipped in chocolate and the spiced chocolate crinkles. I sent a plate of the pumpkin spice cookies in to George's work which they all loved and wanted to the recipe. Our circle of ladies at work did a cookie exchange so I have several other kinds to add to all the cookie plates we'll need during the next week's events!

Made a great pumpkin soup the other day (from the pumpkin that graced our table as a fall decoration - the cookies used up the rest of the recycled pumpkin centerpiece!) and a yummy mushroom soup as well. I've been baking oatmeal bread frequently since its become our new favorite.

Snow covers the ground here but at least it isn't ice! We lost power for 2 1/2 hours yesterday and branches fell from the weight of the ice in the morning.

Make it a good day!

On to Christmas!

It's snowing again today! Wow! Non stop winter since the week before Thanksgiving! Had a nice Thanksgiving at Bruce and Susan's. It was Susan's birthday too so I made a carrot cake in addition to the pies Chris and I made. It was a very nice, relaxing Thanksgiving day. We had a house full with Adam, Vanessa, Chris and Anya staying for a few days. It was so nice to see them all and get a chance to visit a bit. I sure did a lot of cooking!

Visited George's other sisters in New York last Saturday.

Shampooed part of the livingroom rug this morning and washed and waxed several floors in preparation to tackling decorating for Christmas. I won a cute angel at the Finnish Ladies Luncheon that mom bought as table decorations. That has inspired me to get busy and decorate.

I'm about done with Christmas gifts although I have a few more things to make and a bunch more projects swirling around in my head to start just for the hell of it. I should be focusing on getting ready for next semester, but haven't gotten too excited about that yet.

And the snow continues....

We will have to retrieve our driveway since it looks like most of the stones have already been plowed up to the fringes of the parking area.....sigh. We were plowed 3 times in the past 24 hours! I'm glad we will be getting our monies worth! $200 was a bargain for snow plowing for the season if this keeps up!

I spent the most I've ever spent at a grocery store today - over $660!!!!!!! Of course that included gift cards and a Petsmart card and all the stuff for guests and our Thanksgiving contributions. I also spent over $100 on items to fill a tote container for a family (a mom and a 1 year old and 2 year old) that fled from an abusive situation with only the clothes on their backs. They need everything to start over. They are being sponsored by the Hiram community. I bought basic bathroom and kitchen items - stuff I thought you would need to set up a household with babies. I also got towels, hand towels, washcloths, scissors and a sewing kit and the 18 gallon tote at Kmart to add to the grocery store items. Whew! I'll take it all in on Monday. I understand they will be moving in to an apartment next weekend.

Snow kept us from traveling this weekend. We'll try again next weekend. I have a whole house to clean and get ready for Chris, Adam, Vanessa and Anya anyway. Plus I have several sewing projects and knitting projects competing for my attention! I also have the decorating urge....

George installed rigid plastic on the outside of the door to help insulate it (since we removed the storm door due to the doggie door). The insulation he installed in the attic seems to help keep the upstairs warmer. The snow isn't melting off the roof like it used too over that part of the house.

Watched a good movie last night I'd recommend : "Charlie Wilson's War". Historic, moving and funny all at once. Tom Hanks plays the main character.

Nasty White Stuff!

The only negative thing about snow is driving in it....and it's cold....and it lasts for far to many months! Yikes! We have had snow all week and this is occurring before Thanksgiving! I didn't enjoy brushing off my car to drive home from work today and the ride home was a bit harrowing as the semi-truck in front of me kept sliding sideways when it tried to stop. The several cars off the road along the way home were rather unnerving too.

Everything else I have to say is positive. I'm so thankful that we have jobs and aren't in any danger of losing them with all the financial fiascoes occurring daily. I'm also thrilled that today was my last day of teaching for the year. Hurrah! I have only one more folder to finish grading and I AM DONE TEACHING FOR THE YEAR!!!!! Of course, I'll need to go to work to prepare for the next onslaught in January, but it is much more flexible and I can even work at home. I'm looking forward to welcoming Chris, George's sister, and Anya and Adam and Vanessa next week for Thanksgiving. I'm also happy with myself for exercising regularly this past 2 weeks at the gym at school with my work friends and with George doing yoga almost every day. I'm also looking forward to visiting George's other sisters in New York this Saturday. We (Sue, Gayle, George and I) are all going to visit, Peggy (George's sister who is profoundly handicapped at the 18 month level and is unable to speak or walk due to a bad reaction to the small pox vaccine when she was a baby) and then we will all visit one of our favorite wineries in the area. Hopefully the snow will let up by then. I've got all their Christmas presents ready and wrapped to give so we won't have to mail them.

All the pets have moved back in the house for the winter and each has their favorite spot to snooze. There are usually 2 dogs, 2 people and 3 cats distributed around the living room in the evening.

Make it a good day!

YaaaaaaaaHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!

I am so proud of my country right now. I had tears flowing down my cheeks as I read that Obama has won! Yeah for Ohio!!

I am much more optimistic about the potential for positive change. We did it! We showed the world that we aren't all bigoted, ugly Americans who can't see that we are ALL people despite our differences. Just think what we could do if we all worked together instead of constantly just thinking about "me". What I liked best about Obama was his even-keeled, unflappable, level-headed approach to his whole campaign. He has guts and perseverance. He didn't always succeed at staying on the high road, but he sure did the best job of avoiding the mud slinging that I've seen in a long time.

I respected Senator McCain also. It wouldn't have been a tragedy if he had been elected, although the unfortunate selection of Palin as his running mate made me seriously question his ability to make good decisions. Electing Palin as vice president WOULD have been a serious set back for America for many reasons. For one, it would have empowered those that promote teaching "intelligent design"! Good grief! I can't believe she was even considered as a possibility!

Obama certainly has his work cut out for him. I certainly wouldn't want the job. He has a tough road to follow with the huge problems created over the last 8 years. It will be an interesting time. But at least there is now hope and energy and optimism. My hope is that that can be built upon instead of wearing away. There will be so many problems, obstacles and distractions.

I loved this comment I found and totally agree with it:

Morris Wills (Morrie) wrote:

Congratulations President-Elect Obama on your sweeping victory. Thank you Senator McCain for your very gracious concession speech. Following the example of these two great men, it is now time to move forward and to repair all of the damage that has been done over the last 8 years.

We need to unite as a nation over themes and ideas that are important to us all.

Themes like the supremacy of the rule of law in our constitutional democracy.

Respecting fundamental human rights as a global principle, not just an American one.

Renouncing torture and the suspension of habeus corpus.

Renouncing extraordinary rendition and prisons like Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib.

Respecting civil rights for all people, whether they be white, black, brown, yellow or polka dot. Whether they be gay, straight or anything in between. Whether they be young or old, rich or poor, natural born or foreign born. We are all just one race, one people, sharing one planet.

Moving from an oil based economy to a renewable energy based economy. Becoming a world leader in the creation of a green infrastructure which will support green jobs and green technologies.

Mending fences with our neighbors for all of the damages caused by the Iraq war.

And finally, leading the world in the slowing of global warming, and finding solutions that will allow us to share the planet equitably with all life.

Wednesday, November 05, 2008 3:59:59 AM

IT IS A GOOD DAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Sewing and gardening

Finished a cute fleece jacket for part of Jill's Christmas present. I was pleased with how it turned out! It's a "swing" jacket with a pleat down the back and a seam down the middle of the top of the sleeve. It wasn't meant to be a fleece pattern, but I adapted it. I had a good time searching through my button collection to find the right buttons. It's good to refresh your memory on what you have in your "stash". I have lots of interesting buttons. I made George make the ultimate decision from about 5 different possible sets. I may make a few more of these jackets. There is a cropped version of this jacket with 1/2 length sleeves.

I bought a nifty vintage Vogue pattern for a jacket that looks like a cape but it has sleeves, so I need to try that one out too. I may make it in this interesting "fur" that I found in the discounted fabric bins. I wasn't sure what I wanted to make out of it, but I couldn't pass it up. I just hope 2 yards will be enough to make something....

The weather turned gorgeous this weekend after last week's dismal, cold and snowy weather. Cleaned out all the front garden beds, except for the leaves which are still falling. Started on the back yard, but actually got too warm!

George insulated about half of the upper attic yesterday. We also went out to dinner with Evan, Josh, mom, dad, Bruce and Susan in honor of Evan's birthday which is 11/03. He's 23! We went to River Walk in time for the live music. Josh is going to Las Vegas again on 11/11 with his friend Andy.

SNOW!!

Awoke to the white stuff this morning. We had a few teaser flakes on Tuesday, but today it actually stuck around. Fortunately not much fell since many of the trees still have their leaves. We lost one fairly large branch in the front yard, but that is it.

I'm home today waiting for the second visit of the washing machine repairman. Hopefully I will shortly have a functioning washer. The dirty clothes hamper is over flowing! This sure has been an expensive year: a new high efficiency gas furnace/air conditioner, new water softener, new tankless water heater, new Honda Civic Hybrid, new electric grass trimmer, new sump pump, new insulation and several expensive dog and cat vet bills! The good news is that many of these qualify for tax credits because of their energy efficiency and because they are cheaper to run (filled up the empty Honda for $28 the other day!) that will help eventually pay for them all.

I've been very busy being a Christmas elf and my workshop is overflowing with "creations". Fun! I only have 3 1/2 weeks left of this semester and the remaining labs aren't too taxing fortunately. I've begun preping for next semester too, so I can take off most of December with a clear conscience.

Make it a good day!

Beautiful Ride

We rode 17 miles today on the Maple Highlands trail from Headwaters Park in Middlefield to Chardon and back. Ate at Bass Lake Inn outside in their patio. Lovely! Talked to someone I used to work with at Laurel and another couple interested in the bike trail. A lovely day and I did make that batch of applesauce too! I still have 1/2 a bucket of apples left....

Apple Crisp, Apple butter! Yum!!!

Mom and dad brought over a huge bucket of apples from their trees last weekend. This was a great year for fruit production of all kinds. So far I've turned them into two batches of apple crisp (Mmmmmm, warm with vanilla ice cream.....) and one batch of apple butter, which I canned today. Boy is it good!! I made it in my crock pot. It took all day to cook it down. I still have about 2/3 of a bucket of apples left!!! Yikes! I guess applesauce is in my future tomorrow!

The leaves are getting spectacular now. The beautiful blue skies we've had over the last couple of days really sets them off to their best advantage. I just love all the oranges, golds and reds. They inspire me to be creative! I just love leaves. Every year at this time I start designing quilts in my head. Maybe someday I'll make one. Hopefully we will be going on the Maple Highlands bike trail between Middlefield and Chardon tomorrow for a bike ride. Its gorgeous this time of year and only about 17 miles round trip. Either that or we'll go golfing, which would be fun too.

Its so nice to be done with all the 90+ lab reports to grade. I worked on making Christmas gifts today and planted about 44 bulbs in the front garden beds as well as all the apple cooking. I still have a lot left to plant! Oh well, I'll be happy that I did it in the Spring. Roasted hot dogs over a fire made from all the twigs and branches that fell during the remnants of Hurricane Ike. George got all the finishing touches done on the tankless waterheater installation. It was trash day in South Russell, so we hauled the old water heater and several other large misc. pieces of trash over to City Hall. It so nice that they offer this twice a year. They certainly get a lot of stuff by the end of the day.

Make it a good day!

So, Anya got hit by a car....

....however, she is okay except for a few bruises and scrapes. She was riding her bicycle on the sidewalk in Baltimore and someone pulling out of a parking lot hit her, knocked her off her bike and ran over the back tire. They didn't even get out of their car to help her but left her there to fend for herself. She was too afraid to ask for any identification and didn't think to get a license plate number so there is no way she can get compensation for her ruined bicycle. What an awful phone message to get on my cell phone! I'm just glad she is okay. I'm also kind of glad that she now doesn't have a bicycle in Baltimore. I was worried about that. She's had a very difficult semester so far with her computer hard drive crashing and now this!

George spent the day cheerfully (really!) installing our new tankless gas water heater. It works! It's really tiny and is attached to the wall. We discovered that the leaking electric water heater is still under warranty for about a week longer, so we may call that in and see if they will honor it. Yesterday George took half a day off work to begin to install the new water heater instead of going to his Academy golf tournament! The day before he had to install a new sump pump since the old one wouldn't shut off in the morning. He did get the old one to work again, so we will save it as a backup. He discovered the back flow valve was shot in the piping and fixed that too.

I've been buried in a pile of 90+ lab reports and other papers to grade for the last two weeks. Hopefully I'll get them all done by this coming Wednesday. This is the worst time of the semester. Of course, all the spring bulbs I ordered got delivered last week too! I planted about 40 bulbs today for about an hour as a break from grading.

Biking from Akron to Independence!

Boarded the Cuyahoga Valley Scenic Railway train with our bikes at 9:00 am for a 1 1/2 hour train ride to North Akron station. A very pleasant ride with beautiful scenery on a gorgeous prefall day in the 70's. It was rather cool early on but quickly warmed up. By the time we got to Akron I stripped down to my sleeveless T-shirt and bike shorts. After getting our bikes off the train, pumping up George's tire a bit and taking a slight detour in trying to find the trail head we were on our way. What a gorgeous day and tow path trail! I'm so glad that some smart people had the foresight to preserve all this and convert it to this use. The conductor said they had a record day for ridership on the train yesterday, and since they started the "Train your bike" program (only $2.00 to ride to Akron with your bike!) ridership has tripled from last year.

We had never ridden most of the trail south of Penninsula. It was beautiful. I took pictures of the Heron, carp and beaver dam and lock's along the way. We stopped after ~ 14.5 miles in Penninsula to eat at Fischer's Cafe. The thought of Caravel's ice cream at the end of our trip kept us going the rest of the 29 miles we biked today! A nap in the hammock was a nice finish to a beautiful day once we got back. We'll sleep well tonight!

Life Off the Grid a.k.a. Camping In the House

So, the hot water heater allowed us to take lukewarm showers up through Wednesday (although the shower Wednesday was rather invigorating!). Otherwise, we are doing rather well without electricity. It dawned on me Tuesday after we went to bed, that we COULD plug in a lamp and have REAL LIGHT!! We laughed a lot about that! We are gradually adapting. The biggest issue is the shower thing. So yesterday I went out and bought a solar camp shower thingy. We heated water on the camp stove and mixed it with room temperature water to fill the 5 gallon bag. However, the tubing and stopcock are rather wimpy so this will take some tinkering. All I can say is I'm sort of clean enough to teach today....

Later!

Hurricane Ike Hits Ohio!

Hurricane Ike wasn't content with messing up Texas, but decided Ohioans needed a taste of the fun! The winds were in the 70's mph in gusts. It was weird, all wind and no rain or lightning. We'd fortunately battened down the hatches and eaten dinner before the silver maple lost the large limb from the top of one of the trees in the front yard as seen in the picture above. It managed to land on the power lines going to our house and ripped the lines off the side of our house along with a little siding. There was a huge noise and a shower of sparks as it crashed to the ground. We are basically screwed for probably at least a week since thousands are without power and many line crews were sent to Texas. Fortunately our generator is working well, we have lots of propane for our camp stove and lots of candles and flashlights. We may be showering at the neighbors, however!

Hiram lost power too, so there weren't any classes today. George's plant was also without power.

What's for dinner? Yummmmmmmm

Foccaccia

2 1/2 tsp. active dry yeast (or one envelope)
1 cup minus 1 tablespoon very warm water
2 cups + 2 tablespoons flour (I substituted one TBLS flour for 1 TBLS ground flax seed)
2 tablespoons whole-wheat flour
1 tsp. salt

Either add all these to a bread maker and then set it on the "dough" cycle (which is what I do!) where it will mix and rise for 1 1/2 hours or mix and knead by hand and place in a greased bowl and let it rise for 1 hour in a warm place covered loosely.

Spray a baking sheet with nonstick spray and spread the dough out in approximately a 10 inch circle. Cover loosely and let rise for 20-30 minutes. Make dimples all over the surface, cover with the topping of your choice and bake at 425 F. for 15 minutes.

Topping I used:

2.5 oz. of shredded Asiago cheese
2 diced green onions
3 minced garlic cloves
1/4 - 1/3 cup olive oil
parsley
oregano
about 1/4 tsp pepper

Crumbled feta cheese and black olives are also wonderful toppings!

Enjoy!

Peaches!

The last peach harvest from our deceased peach tree. The weight of all the peaches broke the tree in half and led to its ultimate demise today. Now I have to make lots of pies!

Finished Trip, School Starts, Planning Trip...

What a busy past 6 days! Thursday night we packed the van with all Anya's belongings and we headed out Friday morning bright and early only to turn around at the end of our street as we realized we had forgotten Anya's bicycle. We listened to a cd to pass the 8 hour trip detailing various early American scandals of the high and mighty - good grief I think we have actually improved over the years! It was interesting history, but rather depressing at the same time.

Arrived in Philly around 4:40 after circling Adam and Vanessa's area (they put the street signs way up in the air behind tree branches!) we finally made it. Had a delightful dinner with Adam and Vanessa at a restaurant in walking distance ( I had mussels - delicious!). They had an amazing choice of beers and wines. We'll have to eat there again sometime. It was a short but fun visit. I'm glad Vanessa has a new job.

Arrived at Amy and Mike's later in the evening. Elizabeth sure has gotten bigger and happier! My only disappointment was that I really didn't get to hold her more than a very few minutes. Oh well. Got a few cute pictures anyway.

Our drive to Baltimore wasn't bad at all and we made it in a little more than 2 hours. We didn't even get lost this time! We're becoming pros at navigating around MICA. Anya's new dorm is nice although her portion of the suite is small. At least she has her own room and her suite mates are all close friends who seem very nice. Its all brand new too! I got locked in the stairwell which was rather unnerving. We moved some of her suite mates' belongings too, of course, out of the storage unit - twice- since we missed some the first trip. That was rather a challenge since a street parade/event was taking place half a block down the street from the storage facility! We were sure looking forward to relaxing at Chris's house in the evening by the end of countless trips to the 6th floor! The college didn't have any dining facilities open (planning is not the forte of artists evidently), so we located a tiny gourmet sandwich shop and had a very good late lunch. Kissed Anya goodbye (she wasn't all worried this time!) and headed for Chris's house who had a party going on!

Chris was having a surprise birthday bash for a friend, who we had met before when we went tubing down the Potomac. Ate my fill of delicious blue crab,mmmmmmmmmmmm and thoroughly enjoyed the evening - including the slow motion tipping over of the picnic table with Chris and Anne sitting on one side! Fortunately no one was hurt. All the cats, dogs, hummingbirds, squirrels, fountains and flowers entertained us in the morning as we had a leisurely brunch on Chris's back porch. Made it back to our house in record time listening to old George Carlin and Bill Cosby cds . When Andy and Cindy get back in the states we'll have add them to our visiting swing!

We booked our train tickets for our trip out West on the Empire Builder for next July. I'm really getting excited! !!!! We will leave July 3 @ 2:45 am from Cleveland and arrive in Chicago around 9:00 am. We'll board the Empire Builder around 2:15 pm headed for East Glacier National Park in a sleeping car called a "roomette." We'll arrive in East Glacier around 7:00 pm on July 4 and walk to the Glacier Park Lodge which was built in the early 1900's. We'll spend about 5 days exploring Glacier National Park - we are thinking of staying at least one night in Sperry Lodge which you can only get to by horseback or by hiking 5 + hours. There are lots of interesting places to stay and, of course, a lot to see. We will leave West Glacier for Seattle July 9 in another roomette car at around 9:00 in the evening and arrive in Seattle around 10:00 am July 10. We are hoping Jill will join us for at least a day visit sometime that weekend while we are touring Seattle. We will probably take some bus trips to Mt. Rainer, etc. Maybe some boat trips too. Lots to see here too! Lastly, we will take a short train ride ~ 4 hours - to Vancouver, British Columbia and visit there a couple of days before heading back to Seattle to fly home on July 18. We still have quite a few details to work out.

School started with a bang. My first class can only be described as a comedy - although everything worked out well in the end. I managed to lose one group of students on the way from the lab to the vans for our field trip to a primary headwater stream. One of the girls forgot her boots (I think she was the same one that went to the wrong classroom first) and all three of them in the group went back to get them and didn't pay attention to where we were headed for the vans. For some reason they went to the Kennedy Center where they thought the vans would be! They eventually made it out to our study site and did well. Then the bees attacked!

The other lab instructor (who is a Mr. Mom) arrived to observe after we were busily collecting from the stream with his 2 and 4 year old sons. The 4 year old, Evan, climbed out on a tree that was leaning over the stream and the bees at the base of the tree decided they'd had enough of us humans (we'd tromped over their nest at least 6 times) and stung him. I was wildly trying to brush the bee away from little Evan and his dad and then it turned its attention on me and kept getting trapped in my hair. I yelled for Rob to take his kids and leave the area and asked the girls to please smack me in the head with their notebook as I was tossing my head back and forth brushing at the persistent bee. (Its not often that your teacher asks you to smack them in the head!!!!!!!!!!!!!). They weren't very good at smacking the bee, but the darn thing finally retreated long enough for me to tell the girls that they had collected enough data and needed to get out of there NOW! Fortunately no one else got stung and I always carry Benadryl with me out in the field - I even had Benadryl cream for the poor little guy. I was rather flustered after that but we actually did get very good data despite the lost boots, lost line level and general confusion. Fortunately, the afternoon class was very smooth without so much drama.

I get to do it all again tomorrow!

WaaaaaaaaaHOOOOOOOO !

I did it! I rode my bicycle in to work at Hiram and back today (and even managed to actually do some work once I got to work!) ~ 40 miles round trip and I'm still alive and mostly mobile! If I don't lose at least one pound after this I will be horribly po'd. I had to walk up a couple of the large hills but was very happy overall with my performance. In some ways I think I was stronger than the first time I did it 4 years ago. Not bad for a 52 1/2 year old person! It was a beautiful day to do it and just the right temperature. My only regret was that I didn't have my camera with me and that my bicycle computer only seemed to feel like working intermittently. I think once a year is plenty since the large trucks on the small stretches of busy roads I had to venture out on make me nervous. I was mostly on the backroads fortunately. Saw 3 squashed snakes...

Anya and George ordered Chinese for dinner and took care of the rest of the chores all evening. I took a long, hot bath in Calgon! We'll see how well I do out in the field tomorrow setting up and marking the stream reach zones for our lab classes. I hope I can move!

Spreading Wings

Josh got an apartment with his former room/house mate! He began moving in tonight. I have mixed emotions over this.....

New Car!

OMG! We were so lucky. We went out to test drive a Honda Civic Hybrid Thursday and bought one that night and picked it up the next day! Usually the wait is 3-4 months, but someone hadn't picked up the one they had ordered and it was available the very night we decided to go shopping. Its a very sweet car. Only 10 miles on the odometer - and we put 5 of those miles on it test driving it! We may have a buyer for George's old car too.

It has been 1 and 1/2 months since I started following the protocol for curing my migraines and it has been such an amazing change. I love not being foggy brained or headachy every morning. So many other minor symptoms have improved too! Wow! I always suspected that hormones were the problem, but the doctor didn't think there was anything to be done about that. When I go in for my 'well woman' check up in a few weeks I will have lots to talk about with her! I also am happy with myself for exercising every day for the past month. I either do my walk/running program, yoga or ride my bicycle once a day or more.

We went sailing yesterday on the Snowbird! I think it has been about 25 years since I'd been sailing. It was George's first time. He got to man the tiller and enjoyed the whole experience. It was fun to give our new car its first outing too. It rides very smoothly and quietly. Very responsive too. After making blueberry pies for 3 weekends in a row, I decided to make blueberry tarts with blancmange instead this weekend! The blueberries are still being amazingly productive! George and I picked 3 large bowl fulls Sunday morning and there were still more to be picked.

We will host a birthday party for mom next Saturday.

A Great Visit and All Kinds of Blue

Had a great time visiting with Andy, Cindy, Grant and Erin. No rest for the wicked as you can see by Andy's full hammock!

The chocolate fondue feeding frenzy was also an awesome sight!

We are overrun with blueberries and now I have a blue-haired daughter! Erin decided to try out the new hair color too - only less permanently!

Our Fountain Is Up And Running!

We installed an electric pump this year instead of our solar one which died. I love the sound. Very peaceful. Still need to tweak the stone arrangement a bit and get some more discipline in that part of the garden, but its moving along! I'm beating back entropy one weed at a time..l.

Make it a good day!

Canoeing & Clematis

Busy Times!

Last week/weekend Jill was visiting and we went to a wedding in Toledo and this weekend we met Elizabeth Jean Schrlau in person for the first time in Philadelphia. What a sweetheart. The "Recent Pictures" at the bottom of the blog show her off. We had a wonderful visit. Flying turned out to be a mistake I think, however! We were delayed in both directions by weather and it would have been cheaper and just about as fast to have driven. We didn't get in our own bed until 1:30 AM last night.

Miska seems to be feeling much better and will live it seems! All the vet fees were worth it this time. Poor Josh got the pleasure of cleaning up baby rabbit remains left as a present from a cat while we were gone.

My new "medicine" regime seems to be working for my migraines, as they seem to be getting better. I'll give it a couple of months with me as guinea pig before I start broadcasting this regime as a possible cure! I feel better anyway! I even ran 1 mile today! Something I've never been able to do before! Whoop! Whoop!

Rewards for Hard Work

The clematis is outdoing itself this year! We have 3 splendid plants in bloom. The plants near the mail box are about to bloom and the newest little clematis climbing the dog fence is beginning to bloom too. I'm very happy with the plants I picked this year for the hanging baskets and driveway planters. The garden beds have really filled out splendidly too. My newest garden bed is taking shape and I think the last plants I add will be some pink and lavender Astilbe. I'll add a bunch of bulbs to the new bed this Fall too. Now if I could just tame my old garden beds! The lupine is gorgeous this year and I added two more plants today. I need to transplant some daylilies and beat back the daisies! I need to order and spread lots and lots of mulch too. Good exercise!

We're Grandparents ! ! ! ! !

Introducing Baby Elizabeth Jean Schrlau born June 3, 2008 to Mike and Amy Schrlau! Can't wait to hold her!