Loving it here! 3-31

This still being a year of firsts for us here we are loving this spring weather...now that it is here.  We were outside by 9:30 working in the garden.  It was shady still but not cold.  I planted 10 dahlia tubers, 10 daylily tubers, and 52 gladioli and 6 calla lillies.  Larry turned the compost into the dirt of the flower beds while I was planting and then he got out the lawn mower and got busy on the weeds around the house, and down the hill.

Plants are amazing...well all of nature is to me, but knowing that I just put these clematis vines in the ground yesterday, laid them against the fence and held them up with a couple of twist ties.  This morning their leaves had already wound themselves around the wire of the fence and we could see that the top most tendrils had straightened out and were reaching for the next crosswire.  Daily we'll be able to see changes which is why gardening is never boring.

After cleaning up I made a killer dinner and then we spent time just sitting outside on the deck enjoying the peaceful green tranquility.  Larry said something about have I given any thought to making oatmeal cookies...so I made a yummy batch from the recipe under the lid of the oatmeal box...our day was complete!

View from the bench above the house tonight

I enjoyed the sunset while munching on fresh oatmeal raisin cookies outside on the hill

What a Beautiful, beautiful day! 3-30

A stunning day.  I went to town to get big bags of compost for the planter boxes and then to the nursery to get a few more rose bushes and two clematis vines.

One of the new roses all leafed out.

Larry got the fencing strung between the poles in the one planter box for my vines.  I got a white one and a red one and then across the center I am going to plant sweet peas this year.  I am using the fence to help support gladiolus too, which I will hopefully get planted tomorrow.  I turned one of those big bags of compost into the soil first and then got the clematis planted...

The bare root roses need to catch up.

It was in the mid 70's today and we had the house open until dark...woo hoo!  We had a laugh at the turkeys today...three females were sauntering through and then we saw the male following along and the girls kicked it up to a jog and then a run...they were soon out of sight....I don't think the gobbling is working for the boy.

The white is on the left and the red on the right...can't wait for them to grow and bloom!

The pear tree popped in the sunny warmth today.

Ahhhhhhhh, 3-29

Well you can cancel the flower orders...Larry is going to live!  He's much better.

Today was a lovely sunny day and we spent quite a bit of it on the deck enjoying the sun, the breeze through the pine trees, bird song and the gobble of the male turkey looking for his lady friends.  It was lovely having the windows open and the sun-warmed breeze wisping through the house.

While we were on the deck I was telling Larry I needed to transplant the big clump of violas in the pot next to us on the deck into the fenced deerproof yard.  Later I was walking through the house, into the front room and was shocked to see this big, moth-eaten looking, hoofed, Hoover munching away on aforementioned violas!  Half the clump had been dead headed...she just looked at me looking at her until I tapped on the glass and then she turned and trotted off the deck.  The rest all stood there looking innocent like they weren't about to follow Hoover onto the deck and start on the primroses.  A squirrel on the deck is cute...a deer, not so much!

 

Sunshine! 3-28

It was a beautiful sunny, not a cloud in the sky morning.  There had been another shower just before daybreak.  I walked around outside with my coffee and stood in the sun first thing...the deck chairs were still wet.

Larry is a teeny bit better, but I see a trip to the doctor in his very near future...we should have gone this evening.  He was out of bed all day....soaked up some sun on the deck this morning and drank buckets, but not able to eat much and still generally miserable.  The chills had stopped, but tonight I think his fever is back and seems to be an infection and not a flu bug.  He wanted to be outside doing stuff today and like most people detests being sick.

I spent the day cleaning, washing sheets, towels etc.  I took several walks around outside though getting my sun fix and smelling the clean fresh air.  The rose bushes are pushing out their leaves...all seem to be doing pretty well, a couple seem to be a little behind but they are still alive and I think they'll catch up.  I caught the male turkey strutting his stuff with his feathers all fanned out...the girls ignored him.  Clouds built up and floated around and caused the sun to play hide and seek, but it was mostly sunny...YAY.

Efficient Grandma 3-27

HA!  Neither of my daughters thought I would get on the road by 7:30 with the boys....HA.  I had gotten everything packed and organized for loading this morning and had a game plan for getting the boys ready.  I got up at 6:30, got myself ready.....now I will say that Larry, as sick as he is loaded the stuff into the truck, he wasn't dead so he would insist on helping of course...so I might have been off my mark a bit without his help. 

I had turned the light on in the boys room, which of course didn't phase them one bit....I wish I had a video of when I started pulling the covers back and like little crabs they just followed them down to the end of the bed and tried to burrow back under.  Rather than fight and scream at them, I used putting on their socks and stuffing them into shirts as part of the wake-up method.  Then I just drug the oldest off the bed and told him to hit the bathroom and put his pants on when he was done....ditto with the youngest and Ta-Da!  Bribery with a box of chocolate donuts helped them to get busy getting their shoes on...a good bye to sick Grandpa and we were in the truck. 

Now another thing....we were in the truck but it took us another 15 minutes to actually pull out because I had to figure out the freaking DVD player (Seth's that Michelle sent along with us)....those things are the most amazing thing to travel with...nary a peep from the back seat ....I felt like a pilot in an airplane....but it took two phone calls to Michelle to get the thing running.

We met up with Andrea in Williams and she rode up with me to Weed....Michelle hit Yreka way early and decided to drive on down to Weed....the weather was bad in Weed...horizontal blowing snow, but worse up in Yreka.  She was driving into a grueling headwind and used half a tank of gas from Grants Pass to Yreka.  Having Andrea to visit with made the trip go by quicker and easier for me...so thanks again Andrea.  We fed the kids, transferred all Seth's stuff to his Mom's car and we headed back home. 

Now we were in the head wind and bad rains a few times....but a good trip.  Dropped Andrea and Ian back at Andrea's car in Williams and after buying a large, bad for me, but keep me running Mocha at the golden arches I headed on home. 

I'm trying to remember if I've ever driven that many miles in a day before....I've been a passenger for more, but not driving that far.  My left arm and shoulder is really sore all the way up into my head...in spite of my changing and moving my hold on the steering wheel.  I pulled back into our driveway at 6:30p.m.

Larry freaked me out for a few minutes...the house was closed up and dark...our bed was empty and I couldn't find him and he never answered...I was about ready to head out to his shop when I went towards the family room and hollered his name and I heard him finally.  He was holed up in the guest room...the bed has an electric blanket and his fever ran back up today and he was freezing so he was in there with blankets piled on and the blanket on.  He managed to eat a bit today...so hopefully tomorrow he will start feeling better.

I am humming still....which is why this post got done and hopefully I made sense....I decided to do it before I crashed....off to a hot shower and jammies......

Tired 3-26

I am tired....they wore me down today.  Larry was in bed most of the day in pain, misery and sickness...he made an appearance late in the day, but only because he was tired of being in bed....he disappeared again after a couple of hours.  The two boys got to argueing, had a tiff or two....I threw them outside twice.....so it was cold and misting...hahahaha...they needed to run off some energy.  I've gotten all their stuff seperated and packed back up and ready to load up in the morning....I am going solo...my chauffeur is out on sick leave.

It poured rain again all night and off and on all day...another couple of inches.  It has been so long since we've seen the sun it is now setting in a different place and it made a very short appearance just in time for it to disappear.

A Great Day 3-25

Ian and Seth....oops, these are the other turkeys hanging around!

Wow...tonight my man was H O T.....on fire......burning up...........with fever....people...what were you thinking?!  Larry is sick...one of those achy...even his hair hurts, freezing, but burning up things.  I gave him a hug before he went to bed tonight and he was burning hot.  Poor baby.  I should have known when it was 8:45 before he got up this morning...he is never in bed that late...I slept right along, I had no idea what time it was...I usually look at the clock when he gets up.  I had to get going...had a hair appointment...ah an hour of peace...hahaha. 

The boys started the day with video games again, but after I got back and got the groceries put away I hustled them outside.  They played and ran all over the place and explored the deer trails, but then it started raining...they got about 45 minutes outside...better than nothing.  We had multiple down pours off and on all afternoon and evening and its cold but at least it hasn't snowed again.

More of the same tomorrow I expect...it is pouring rain now as I type...by dark there was another half inch or so of rain in our bucket.

3D movie night

More and more...........stop!!!!! 3-24

Another night and day of big wind and big rain...another three inches.  Yesterday and today we just hung out with Seth.  This afternoon Larry drove over to Williams to meet Andrea and bring Ian back for a few days.  It is disheartening that fuel prices now take such a huge chunk out of budgets...ridiculous how much these little trips cost.  Andrea is just going to have to get out of bed early Sunday to meet us for dropping off Ian and then its on to Yreka to drop off Seth. 

The boys are crazy tonight until the new wears off about mid-way tomorrow and we'll probably have to start reffing...hahaha. 

The weather is back to cold and they are threatening us with snow again...just glad we don't live in Chester any longer...they got over 9 feet of snow these past days with this last storm.  The turkeys and the deer are looking pretty waterlogged...I bet they are hoping to dry out soon.

I am pooped and I didn't even have to drive in the horrible wind and rain today.  We hadn't told the boys that the other was going to be here...but Larry let Ian say hi to me over the radio which of course Seth heard and then it was an hour and a half of excited Seth counting down the minutes...  Which lucky for me I figured right and Larry didn't stop for anything...hahahaha.  Oh...it is past my bedtime and those silly boys are of course still goofing off...could be awhile yet....  

Sunshine!!! 3-22

Lovely, lovely sunshine today.  It was cold and breezy but we didn't care.  We took a walk while Seth rode his bike.  Later Larry walked with Seth up to our neighbors property to show Seth where the water came out of the ground that fed the big pond up the hill that fed our little stream.  I walked around to assess the damage from the hail.  The daffy's were shredded and an iris plant was broken by a small fallen oak branch, I was happy to see that the rose leaf buds were okay, but the underneath of the pear tree was littered with blooms and buds...boo hoo.  Time will tell if we'll get any fruit, Larry and the squirrels will be keeping an eye on it.

Poor pummeled pear blossoms

It was another video game day...but I must say I was improved over yesterday...hahaha.  Larry and I actually made it alive through a couple of levels.  Seth is pretty good as giving us instructions.  Sure works the brain and the hand bones...neither Larry or I ever think to play video games when the kids aren't here.

I made some killer brownies tonight...it was an ooey-gooey chocolatey kind of day...I held off as long as I could!

Larry talked to a few locals in the past week and this is the worst winter in about 25 years.  We've experienced a lot of worsts since we left Chester in '04.  Here we've gotten over 30 inches of rain so far this winter...and it isn't done yet

Busy 3-21

Seth kept us busy most all day of course.  He played video games all day and insists that we play with him.  We spend most the time watching him because we or I should say I die pretty quickly and do not have a handle on the controls.  Larry has caught on quicker, but it is funny listening to a 6 year old and a 53 year old child argue over the game...makes me laugh. 

We got him outside like twice, but each time the sky would open up with more torrential rain. 

We had quite the storm this afternoon...thunder storms that stalled out over us with their thunder, lightning and heavy rain, winds and then really large hail...larger than pea size...like garbanzo bean size.  That stuff comes down so very hard and bounces so very high I just can not imagine the golf ball and larger sized hail I have heard of...no wonder it does such incredible damage.  Seth and I also got in 45 minutes of reading...one was pretty funny...about underpants causing the dinosaurs extinction!

The deer are across the drive in that green patch...a truck heading up the hill to the left took three tries before he made it up!

Scary storm! 3-20

Spring blew in on a wicked scary storm!  We hardly got any sleep....the wind whipped and screamed hard for a better part of the night...not surprising I woke up to no power in the wee hours of the morning.  Having had the alarm set for 6 meant I was going to keep waking up to check the time on the cell phone...but like I said not sleeping going on.  The rain we got sounded heavier than it was being driven against the windows by the wind...I think I energetically made sure the big pine trees above us stayed in tact because my arms were sore in the morning...hahahaha.

The power still wasn't on when we got up and as it was dark we got ready to go by flashlight....applying make-up with a flashlight was kind of scary...I was afraid the results might look like one of Carol Burnett's characters...going without wasn't an option either....it turned out okay.  We finally got on the road by 7:30 and it was still windy, but it had settled down to a regular wind.  A tree had come down across 49 at some point over night but it was already cleared out...nice.

So we were trekking up to Yreka to meet up with Michelle to bring Seth back with us for this week of his spring vacation.  It is half way for both of us and makes it easier on all of us to get our Grandson fix and for Seth to hang with us.  We had lunch together...transferred what seemed like his entire bedroom to our truck from their car and back we came.

The Yolo causeway area in Sacramento was full of water and it had whitecaps on it on our way up but was calm on our way back.  We were happy to see Lake Shasta full (these pictures are of Lake Shasta) and even though it snowed on us around Dunsmuir the roads weren't slick or frozen.  Coming back we hit a few heavy downpours of rain that slowed everyone down until we drove out of it.  We even saw a teeny sun ray and a couple of rainbows at some point.

We were back at home by 6:30 and the power was back on.  It was 294 miles up and so 294 back...and the FUEL!  One hundred and thirty bucks...shocking!!!!!  We are starting to think that the 5th wheel might not move very often again.  Wow, we thought the price of diesel was ridiculous back in 04 when we hit the road full-timing...now we are glad we have landed.  Seems that soon we will have to start shopping for an car with mega mileage.

Sleepy Seth

Breaking News!!!! 3-19

Today!  During the windstorm of the CENTURY, one storm after another has swept through the area and in a massive, HUGE gust of wind a brown, old, crunchy leave of indeterminate age was spun around and around in a funnel of wind, swooped across the road until the wind released it from its turbulent clutches and it drifted once more to the ground many, many, MANY FEET from where it was swept up!!!!!

These weather and media people have got to get lives and quit this talking about nothing just to stay on the air!  Come on...one stood in a puddle in Auburn to talk about the torrential rains a few days ago...and filmed a waterfall that is always along 49 when the rains get bad like it was an event!  The day of the tsunami they stood on the beaches and one reported that the water came in and the water went out...REALLY?  The ocean did THAT...really?!  Another reported that the tracks in the sand were swept away by the waves...come on people!!!  The local helicopter was up over the coast and instead of shots of the water and perhaps a BIG wave they were focused on a great brown hill...like they feared that the hill was going to be washed away by a 100 foot wave.  People are silly...and buying iodine stuff in New York in case of nuclear fall out from Japan.  They keep us in fear because fear means more money spent on ridiculousness...always stripped down to money and control.  I could go on, but I'll save that for another time...ha ha ha ha.

Any way when that really big gust of wind came up I decided it needed a story.

Over night we got another inch and a quarter of rain...only about a half inch today, was mostly really windy and that one humongous gust of wind was really something...I sat there watching and listening and wouldn't have been at all surprised to see the roof lift up or a tree fall over.  Larry was in Auburn at the libray learning about some geneaology stuff and I did some housework, neither of which have anything to do with the weather...just thought I would throw that in :).

The band tailed pigeon came back the morning...he just is such a standout amongst the other birds...to me...but maybe that is because I have never seen one before...though I just think he looked distinguished.  It is quite a bit larger than his cousins the mourning dove.  I also saw two turkeys wander through today...I heard the other day that they have been around about 10 million years, explains their odd appearance...if you squint they do resemble a dinosaur...hahaha.

It has such bright feet and beak.

These I plucked from the yard before they were flattened by the wind and rain.

What the @#%& ? 3-18

Yesterday was a sunny, cool day and we decided we should take advantage of the pleasant break in the weather and have a little exploration.  We drove to old downtown Auburn, parked and walked around aquainting ourselves with the local shops and restaurants.  A few buildings were 100 years old and we enjoyed the old pharmacy with the old marble ice cream counter.  It was fun to wander up and down the street and poke around in the different stores.  We decided to have lunch at the Monkey Cat...another old building but really great modern food.  Then to get back to the truck we had to walk past the candy store so we each picked out a little chocolate dessert.

With all the rain and runoff the rivers were raging and little creeks had appeared on every hill.  Caltrans was busy clearing up little mudslides along 49.

Today was back to nasty weather...windy and then during the afternoon the rains started again...we got almost an inch again in a couple of hours, but then we started noticing some of the drops looking mushy.  What the heck?!  Then the temperature really started dropping and it started snowing...big time...so much for snow levels at 4,500 feet...apparently our little hill grew again.  I hate for the snow to get on the fruit tree flowers and on my rosebush leaf buds...the daffodils were weighed down too. 

We did see a turkey cruise through, and the jack bunny and I saw a bird I have never seen before...a band tailed pigeon...bigger than the mourning doves, but I didn't get its picture and of course the deer and quail.  With the snow on the dish we didn't have internet or television for a few hours...so I had to find something to do...so I baked my Sweetie his favorite cookies...Snickerdoodles.