Boyz and their Toyz

All he wanted for his birthday was a power washer. He got other gifts and he liked them (like the rose bushes, etc), but he bought the power washer for himself. He's been pouring over the book.

And today was the day. He assembled it. He needs to be taken seriously when he's in a bad mood now, because Y'all,

He's armed.

And he has formally begun Summer Project 2007A:















Cleaning, repairing and repainting the fence.

Not to be confused with Summer Project 2007B, which is a complete remodeling of the Dogz Bathroom (read that, backyard) into a smooth, healthy, green, well-fertilized, weed-free, beautiful lawn. This will involve much soil preparation and plugging of various areas with sod, and much watering, etc.















He's going to be pretty busy!

Morning

I have a lot of humming birds that visit my feeder, but one little hummer that visits every morning, without fail, sits on the same spot on the oriole feeder and watches me inbetween sips. Scuze the screen, I have no choice but to shoot the picture through it.....she has such a graceful profile as she sips away....















And I've been enjoying visits from a hooded oriole in the last few days. Today I tried once again to get his picture before he took his skittish self right outa here....














And failed again. He is way too fast.

And look what is growing in the yard......I finally broke down and cut a few and brought them inside.














They smell sooooo nice!

It may be Monday, and Monday is my Challenging Day, but the birds and flowers make it worth while!

Sniff, sniff! We're on fire, again?

This morning, Bestest Buddy Karene informed me that she smelled smoke from in the direction of my house. I stuck my snoz out the door and inhaled deeply, since smoke isn't something I take lightly this time of year. Nuttin', honey. I decided all was well....but it turned out to be A Prediction.

This afternoon Mr. B. announced "we're on fire again! want to go for a ride?" And being the superlative lookie-loos that we are, we hopped in the car and headed in the direction of the fast growing plume of smoke. (I'm easily distracted after a long day of transcribing!)















Actually, he remarked that since it was such a hot day, he was just looking for an excuse to get in The Freighter which has fantastic airconditioning. He had a good idea with that one. It is roasty today. Hot Santa Ana winds, which of course, made for perfect conditions for a fire.

I had grabbed the camera as we dashed out the door, and we climbed a hill and I decided to take a picture. Remember that predisposition for senility? No memory stick.

To his credit, he didn't even tease me. Back home, grabbed the stick, and tennis shoes this time, instead of flip flops (ya think??!!) and we scampered up the hill again, stomping down sage brush and dried weeds...














Here's the 91 East, which looks just about normal for this time of day, meaning, barely moving.






























Scary stuff. I missed a great shot of the plane that drops the chemical, by being in the wrong place at the wrong time, but if you look closely here, you can see the helicopter dropping another load of water where it is needed. (clicking on pix makes them bigger too.)

I'll be anxious to see what the news says is the cause of this fire. Mr. B. is betting on a cigarette tossed out of a car on the freeway. I hope not. It takes so little to ignite us at this time of year. This fire is in the area of a small campground and it would be so sad if someone's carelessness cost this family their livelihood.

Edit: Don't know how long the link will work, but better pictures and article regarding cause of fire can be found here: http://www.ocregister.com/ocregister/homepage/abox/article_1683218.php

Happy Birthday Mr. B!!

Yep.....Mr. B. celebrated his birthday on Sunday. I grabbed a quick pic of him all dressed up, since dressed up for us usually means "a clean shirt and jeans".

It is the general consensus that he will blow away soon, given his extraordinary success at losing weight. Either he will blow away, or we will blow him away, because the women in this house are jealous of his "determination" and "single-mindedness", as his boss so politely put it. If I ate as little as he has eaten lately, I wouldn't be thinner. I'd be dead. Sigh. Its not fair that men can lose weight more quickly than women, but its a proven fact.

We celebrated with a dinner at Black Angus, and then returned home for presents and cake....

I had a golden opportunity to "get even" with him for reversing the candles on my cake, but in the end, my predisposition towards senility caused me to have a "5" and a "6" candle on hand, which I planned to reverse to 65. (heh-heh!)















Only he's 57 now. So much for that. We "rounded up" and we put a candle on the cake for each decade (almost) and he successfully blew out six of them. His favorite gift, I think, was the rose bushes the girls and I got him. His face lit up when he saw them, and we will hopefully plant them tomorrow. We both like roses, so we love having them in the yard.















And despite all I hear about roses being picky, and needing to be pruned precisely, they are pretty forgiving. The two we have out back now have survived my whacking them occasionally to bring a few stems inside to savor. We should have them constantly now!















Happy Birthday Mr. B!!

Roommates and Fairs

Just a quick couple of pix for family/friends to see....

Laurie and Amber, who will (June 1) embark on the adventure of "Living on Our Own", sharing a beautiful condo down in Costa Mesa, working hard at several jobs and enjoying the satisfaction of independence and their own place:






























Karen is participating in Renaissance Faire 2007 http://www.renfair.com/socal/ today in Los Angeles and then turning 180 degrees this evening and meeting friends who share her Eastern hemisphere interests (all things Japanese, with a bit of Chinese and Korean thrown in for good measure) for an evening in Korea Town, yummy food and good times! (Yes, she's taking other clothes for the second part of her day!)




















Michael is helping me load a computer for a fellow transcriptionist to help serve as a back up for her, in case her main "workhorse" goes down for any reason....Thank you Michael!!

Me? I'm typing frantically, finishing up my quota of transcription for today and then I'm going to spend some much anticipated time in my craft room.....pix about that later!

:)

Grosbeak convention

Thank you Mr. Google. I found the following blurb about the bird Karene had identified as a grosbeak which has been visiting my feeder lately. I had noticed the feeder was emptying in record time. Well, here's why:

Grosbeaks are slow-moving birds, deliberate in their motions and show little fear of humans. Boldly colored males are a treat to watch at your feeders even though their appetites can match their body size.

Yup. The feeder empties even faster when there is more than one. Hearing a ruckus at my office window this morning, I turned around to investigate. I grabbed the camera and you'll have to excuse the lousy focusing job. It was 6:30 a.m. and I was only one extra-large mug of the Brown Elixir of Life into my day.

My feeder was being visited by what I thought were two male grosbeaks....at the same time. They were very vocal but remarkably well-behaved, what with them both being boyz, and you know, starving!















I noticed one was reading the riot act to something/someone just out of camera range......and there was another male on the bar to the left of the feeder!
















Later, one of the gentlemen brought his missus back to the feeder and they struck a pose for their fans.

It is a bird convention. I think I better get another bag of niger thistle. Soon.















Enough of my Wild Kingdom. Its Friday. With any luck at all, I will get caught up today and can spend some time tomorrow in my craft room. (Crosses fingers) Bestest Buddy might even be able to join me for a bit.

But before I post this, here's a classic from one of my physicians dictating a History and Physical for a patient having cataract surgery:

FAMILY HISTORY:
Noncontributory.

PERSONAL AND SOCIAL HISTORY:
She is a nonsmoker. She has eleven children. (Editorial note: In a tone of reverence and wonder, he then stated the following.) Amazingly, she is a nondrinker and does not use street drugs.

'Scuze me while I go clean my monitor. Slight spraying accident here, what with me slurping from my mug when I heard him dictate that....

A few more of my favorite things....

Dinner with the family....that I didn't have to cook, or clean up after! We went to Chevy's for Mexican, and it was really tasty.

We headed home for a thoughtful alternative to a traditional cake: Michael and Laurie picked out a "no sugar added" cherry pie, low carb ice cream and whipped cream for those who wanted it, and Michael put candles on it....as if it were a cake.

However, with his usual sense of humor, he added LOTS of candles. I mentioned that I didn't need a "bazillion" candles and he corrected me, reminding me that "of course I did" because I'm "a bazillion years old!"














His shenanigans continued with his reversing the 5 and 2, and making me 25 again. Lighting them caused a small inferno....














And at one point he gave me a huge cannister of cashews (my favorites!) and pointed out the label on the top, heralding that the company had been producing them for 100 years. "You're almost as old as the nut company!" he crowed. Apparently he had been waiting THREE DAYS to point that out.

But he managed to save his head from getting "bonked" by giving me a gorgeous set of wind chimes. It is so pretty, has a leaf theme with glass leaves throughout, and it is hand-tuned to a D chord. I will take a picture tomorrow when I get it properly hung on the porch. The sound is just amazing!

He also gave me a pedometer and we pounded 5000 steps (2.2 miles) around the neighborhood to work off our dinner and dessert indiscretions. And he found a cute store that had a new welcome sign to replace my sun-damaged tired-looking one - I will put it with my flowers out front tomorrow. Thank you, Michael! (he's almost forgiven for the candles and the age jokes......almost!)















And my girls gave me a beautiful and very meaningful card (with craft dollars inside to get supplies for my new sewing/embroidery toys!!) Thank you Karen and Laurie!!

It was a fun day. :)

("25!!!" she sputters as she wanders off to bed......)

Happy Birthday to me! And Jacque!

My birthday started early......what with my elderly peanut-sized bladder and evening (diabetes-induced) thirst.......At 1:06 a.m. I found these in the kitchen (grin)....... from Michael :)




















And when I was coherent this morning and it was easier to see.....I noticed some additional signs of a birthday....literally.....




















I've had phone calls, instant messages and even a post on my seldom-used MySpace.....

Its only 8:00 a.m. and it is already a good day.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JACQUE!!!! Hope you're having a good day too!

Pre-Birthday Celebrations!

There are some things about birthdays that are totally worthwhile.....


















Birthday lunches with "bestest friends", and flowers too....
These are a few of my favorite things! Thank you, Karene!

And I'm looking forward to dinner with my family tomorrow night!

I share my birthday (which is tomorrow) with my sister Jacque who is three years younger than me, and a sister is the best birthday present a girl can get!! We shared cakes for years and now that we are 3000 miles apart geographically - I truly miss seeing her name on the cake with mine!

Happy Birthday Jacque!! Happy Birthday to Us!!

Kennel alert!

See anything wrong with this picture? (you can click on pic to enlarge it)




















Yeah. Me too!
I happen to LOVE kitties - but this one is going to get chased off by my dog posse so that the birds can eat in peace!!

A room with a view......

A view of my quilting projects and good lighting to boot!! Michael and I negotiated for the loft! I cleared out a few closets/cabinets/shelves in other places throughout the house, and he cleared out the loft.....almost completely! There is one set of shelves that remains which may yet be rehoused elsewhere, but right now, the remainder of the loft is a craft/sewing/quilting area!


I give you the "before":






























And now, the "After!!"

(I don't need the TV, we just have nowhere else to put it.....although maybe I can get some quilting shows on it?)
(the pink/black item in the foreground is a hand-hooked rug made by my grandmother, waiting for me to make a supportive frame so I can hang it on a wall.....no way I will put it on the ground for the use of the general population of this house.....its sooooo pretty!!)

I am so stoked about the room. More details on the construction later.

I finally got serious about picking out a quilting frame to house a short-arm quilting machine.....settled on the HandiQuilter frame with Handi-Handles, and the Janome 1600PBX to go in it!

I also ordered a Janome 9500 embroidery machine!

The two machines arrive Monday, the HandiQuilter frame follows within a week or so. I shopped around a LOT, and read a LOT, and have drooled over Janome's for a long time.....compared them with Brother and Viking Husqvarna and Singer......I kept coming back to the Janomes. After narrowing down which ones I wanted, I ebayed for them, looking for a authorized dealer with lots of positive feedback etc. Once the transaction is complete, I will definitely blog about the dealer - because at this point I am tremendously impressed with her. If that feeling continues, I will give a link for anyone else interested.


I. Can't. Wait.


And here's your cuteness allottment for the day......Sadi and Laurie sharing a moment....

Traffic control needed.....

Here's the view at the bird feeder hanging right outside my office window......Heavy traffic pattern around the niger thistle!! To the right is a hummingbird feeder which is getting frequent visits also, but wouldn't show well in a picture because of the window screen. I love the sound they make while I'm working. I can hear them over the dictation I'm listening to as I transcribe.

Why Did The Chicken Cross The Road?

A friend sent me this......some of these are too funny.....especially the last one!

Why did the chicken cross the road?

DR. PHIL: The problem we have here is that this chicken won't realize that he must first deal with the problem on 'THIS' side of the road before it goes after the problem on the 'OTHER SIDE' of the road.What we need to do is help him realize how stupid he's acting by not taking on his 'CURRENT' problems before adding 'NEW' problems.

OPRAH: Well I understand that the chicken is having problems, which is why he wants to cross this road so bad. So instead of having the chicken learn from his mistakes and take falls, which is a part of life, I'm going to give this chicken a car so that he can just drive across the road and not live his life like the rest of the chickens.

GEORGE W. BUSH: We don't really care why the chicken crossed the road. We just want to know if the chicken is on our side of the road, or not. The chicken is either against us, or for us. There is no middle ground here.

COLIN POWELL: Now to the left of the screen, you can clearly see the satellite image of the chicken crossing the road.

ANDERSON COOPER/CNN: We have reason to believe there is a chicken, but we have not yet been allowed to have access to the other side of the road.

JOHN KERRY: Although I voted to let the chicken cross the road, I am now against it! It was the wrong road to cross, and I was misled about the chicken's intentions. I am for it now, and will remain against it.

NANCY GRACE: That chicken crossed the road because he's GUILTY!You can see it in his eyes and the way he walks.

PAT BUCHANAN: To steal the job of a decent, hardworking American.

MARTHA STEWART: No one called me to warn me which way that chicken was going. I had a standing order at the Farmer's Market to sell my eggs when the price dropped to a certain level. No little bird gave me any insider information.

DR SEUSS:
Did the chicken cross the road? Did he cross it with a toad?
Yes, the chicken crossed the road, but why it crossed I've not been told.

ERNEST HEMINGWAY: Why? To die in the rain. Alone.

JERRY FALWELL: Because the chicken was gay! Can't you people seethe plain truth in front of your face? The chicken was going to the 'other side.' That's why they call it the 'other side. Yes, my friends, that chicken is gay. And if you eat that chicken, you will become gay too. I say we boycott all chickens until we sort out this abomination that the liberalmedia whitewashes with seemingly harmless phrases like 'the otherside.' That chicken should not be free to cross the road. It's as plain and simple as that!

GRANDPA: In my day we didn't ask why the chicken crossed the road. Somebody told us the chicken crossed the road, and that was good enough.

BARBARA WALTERS: Isn't that interesting? In a few moments, we will be listening to the chicken tell, for the first time, the heart warming story of how it experienced a serious case of molting, and went on to accomplish its life-long dream of crossing the road.

JOHN LENNON: Imagine all the chickens in the world crossing roadstogether - in peace.

ARISTOTLE: It is the nature of chickens to cross the road.

BILL GATES: I have just released eChicken2007, which will not onlycross roads, but will lay eggs, file your important documents, andbalance your check book. Internet explorer is an integral part of eChicken.The Platform is much more stable and will never cra...#@&&^( C =EF=BF?.... reboot.

ALBERT EINSTEIN: Did the chicken really cross the road, or did the road move beneath the chicken?

BILL CLINTON: I did not cross the road with THAT chicken. What is your definition of chicken?

AL GORE: I invented the chicken!

COLONEL SANDERS: Did I miss one?

Sadi loves icecream!

There are times when the dogs around here provide some comic relief to the otherwise mundane workday....

I was moving something in the freezer and the ice cream container seemed really light. Sure enough, there was only a spoonful in it. Seems like that happens a lot around here. I think people are trying to avoid being yelled at for finishing something off. We can't say "Who the heck finished the ice cream!?" Instead its "Who almost finished the ice cream??!!"

Anyway, it was sugar-free, so I felt justified in grabbing a spoon and going after that last bite. I scooped about half the little lump that was left into a spoon and started savoring it, and Sadi eyed me, as if to say, "You share peanuts with me, but not ice cream??"

So I magnanimously put the container on the ground in front of her so she could lick it. Hey, dogs get hot too, and its a scorcher here today!

Cute, huh?

"uh....Sadi?"
















I must go close the windows now so the neighbors don't hear me cackling like a mad woman every time I look at this last picture:















"Hey, whatchu lookin' at??!!"

More pix!

Its mostly over, 80% contained today....went up to my favorite hike at the Anaheim Hills reservoir yesterday, and took pix of the water copters and then went lookie-looing at the fire....

http://new.photos.yahoo.com/quiltnmt@sbcglobal.net/albums/

Behind our neighborhood, there is an equestrian trail and we walked it and got to watch the firemen do their thing.....Those guys are so great! They were nailing it with incredible accuracy from above with water and flame retardant, and on the ground, just beating it back...

We watched them create a line of fire retardant right in front of us, several hundred yards out, and then watched the fire roar up to it - big tall flames......all across the canyon dozens of orange dots (the firefighters) were stationed, poised.....and it raced up to that line......and pretty much fizzled into lots of smoke and almost no flames!

Behind us on the other side of the trail were the homeowners who had been watching with a lot more vested interest in the outcome! If I had been them, I'd have been cheering at the top of my lungs......

We lost two houses in Anaheim Hills (and a couple of out buildings, I believe). Michael thinks they were exactly where we were looking earlier in the day. He thinks he's delivered to one of the houses - a really nice guy with dogs (and two little children, but it was the dogs that he spent quite a bit of time talking to, and their owner!) the day he delivered to their house.....So sad.....

I truly feel that its all "stuff" and if I made it out with my family, I'd be so grateful, but it would be devastating, all the same!

Enough rambling.....back to work for me.

And so it begins.....

Another Wild Fire Season.......

It was nice and cool last night. I relished the cool sheets, snuggling into them and thinking my days to sleep comfortably were numbered.......the furnace temps are likely right around the corner here in SoCal. I got up very early, working in the dark, sipping my coffee....cool breeze blowing in my office window. A sudden blast of warmer air......sounds of the wind picking up......

"Sheesh.....Santa Ana winds......We'll be hearing about wild fires any day now", I think. Laurie leaves for an early shift at CoCo's and the rest of the house continues to slumber. Two hours later, the house line rings......Laurie's voice cuts across the wires sharply and with a touch of concern....."Are you guys evacuating yet!!??"

Wh- huh?

"Look outside Mom, I can see the flames from CoCo's......", she says.

Oh.

So I reassure her that they are faaaaaaar away and that indeed, I would not think of leaving the neighborhood without letting her know, etc., etc. Taking the camera outside, this is what I see:















So Michael and I pile in The Freighter and mosey out for a Sunday morning drive......we initially go way past the fire, thinking we'd get a nice vew looking back up into the canyon.....















Then Mr. B's FedEx skills kick in and he takes me to a neighborhood with a skinny, narrow single lane trail that runs under the huge power lines and hugs the edge of the aforementioned canyon. Steep, steep slopes and no guard rails and Santa Ana winds blowing like crazy and he's nonchalantly blathering on about how there's nothing to worry about and he drove his "high cube" in here last week to make a delivery with no problem.....(Apparently a "high cube" is even bigger than our van and I should be reassured.) Only I'm dissolving into a chicken and clutching the sissy bar and he parks in a tiny little turnaround, after blithely BACKING UP, to position The Freighter "just so", and yes, we had a great view.....















Of course, he admitted he almost blew over after he got back into the van after he snapped the pictures..... (Ya think?!)

Pooh-poohing my concerns, we lumbered back up the same teeensy trail in the same oversized van, and approached our neighborhood again......This time we hit pay dirt......we found one of the fires, up close and personal......at the top of the first hill behind our neighborhood.....
















Oh well.....looks far less scary in the picture than it was in real life. Two helicopters scooping water from the resevoir I hike around, dumping it on the fire.....one regular fire plane dumping the flame retardant dust stuff all over the place.....

But really, there is likely no cause for concern.....we're just going to have itchy eyes, and the smell of smoke to contend with - the likelihood of it taking out the neighborhood is slim. There are groups of firetrucks at each entrance to the neighborhood and lined along the back streets overlooking the canyon. I can hear the water helicopter doing its thing.....

I will skip quilting class because there is the outside chance that if they start "evacuating" because they sometimes get overly cautious that way, they might not let folks back into the neighborhood.....so I will just hunker down with the dogz and work a bit.















Sadi could care less! She's got a bone.....Life is Good!















Update: Karen says the fire looks "angrier"......Right after I took this picture, we saw huge rapid piles of black smoke......ex-volunteer fireman Michael said "might be hitting some houses now....." Another group of sirens went by......We're going to go take a closer look....another post will follow....

More Project Linus.....and the Dreadmill

A sweet friend of mine read my blog and sent me the following email message:

Hello Dear Heart,
I looked up Project Linus on the Internet, and there is a local chapter, so as soon as I finish the project I have underway right now, which will be in a couple of days, I am going to get in touch with the contact in my area and hopefully help out. I don't do quilting, but I can crochet and knit like crazy, and I LOVE to make baby blankets. Crazy thing, that very morning before I read your blog, I thought, "I wish there were some babies in my family or among my friends, because I like to make baby blankets." Also, I have closets full of yarn left over from other projects, and lots of it is in colors that children would love. I am not into dull, uninteresting colors myself, so don't use them much. Baby blankets go fast, so maybe I can get rid of some of the stuff that it cluttering my closets and be useful at the same time.
Love, H

How cool is that!!?? I sent a pamphlet to my dad also, as he sometimes plays with yarn too and I think he's kind of tired of knitting hats!! Maybe he'll think about crocheting a little baby blanket! I'm going to be going through the stash of quilting materials, and cutting some of the ones that neither Karene nor I will use into 6" or 7" squares, and start putting different color combinations together when I have time between projects. (Shut up. Maybe I'll manage to do it! Better to have tried and only managed a few, than not to have tried at all, right??!!)

And lookie! Here's a picture of the quilt that Karene made for Project Linus - I bugged her until she shared the picture with me.....it was soooooooooo cute. Some little one somewhere is going to love the cheerful colors and the coziness of this quilt!! (and it will last forever - she constructed it sturdily, and machine quilted it herself going around all the animals to make them stand out more, and she put the binding on using a decorative stitch on her machine!)
















Is that not the cutest thing? I love it!

Got back on the horse treadmill today......and the bike also..... 5 miles (2 miles walked, 1 mile run, 2 miles biked). I am Le Tired.