Here's a picture of part of the side porch. Behind me in the picture is the porch swing. As you look towards the woods you can see a deer.

I haven't posted in a week. Pat worked the weekend but came home Saturday night. Tim went to school Monday but came home with a fever and has been sick with this cold/flu thing again all week. Stephen has had a bad cold but was getting better but he's been pretty sick today with the same thing, this cold/flu. I'm pretty much better except that I still have the cough so it seems like every minute of the day one of us is coughing. When I've had some time 'I've been reading I know this much is true' which my dad loaned me a few years ago and I never did read until I was doing a bunch of cleaning out recently and found it.

The weather has been somewhat nice the last couple days, at least for here, it's warmer in Seattle. I really kind of wasted the nice weather though. Oh well, this is the start of Spring, I'm sure there will be many nice days. The chickens sure look better! They've been able to take their dirt baths (I'll never understand that) and they don't look so awful like they did when it rained constantly.

Next week Tim will have Spring break. I'm going to Seattle at the least for Tuesday night to make very sure I make my drs appt on Wednesday. Not sure what I'm doing beyond that but I'm going to try and get over to the Puget Sound area early enough on Tuesday to spend some time at Country Village, one of my favorite places.

Here's a picture of me with Missy when we first got her a couple summers ago. I was going through some pictures today and found this one. Sure do miss when my porch looked like that, or at the very least to even be able to sit out on the steps without freezing!

I'm on my 2nd round of antibiotics but I do feel like I'm starting to get better. I had a little more energy this afternoon, good thing because there are alot of things that haven't been getting done.

Here's the Amish sampler I was talking about. It's actually just the pattern, no thread or material. The picture isn't real clear, or maybe it's my eyes, but it says "Walk Humbly With Thy God". Mikki Jo has said she'd like it so Mikki, if you'd email me your address I'll send it to you. I also have the recipe for Amish Butter Cookies. I don't know where I got the recipe, I've had it for years, almost thinking I got it from my older sister, Charlotte. Here's the recipe:

1 cup butter or margarine, softened
1 cup oil
4 1/2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1 cup powdered sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
Beat butter and oil together on low speed. Add flour, sugar, powdered sugar, eggs, vanilla, baking soda, and cream of tartar. Drop by spoonsfull onto a lightly greased cookie sheet (I actually don't grease the cookie sheet but that's up to whoever is making these). Bake at 350 for 11-12 minutes or very light brown. (With my oven it takes a little longer and I always take them out when the edges just begin to get brown).

We have a family website on MyFamily.com that my dad and all my brothers and sisters and my son and his wife check in on and/or post something everyday. When it's someone's birthday we post a picture of them on the cover picture of the site, usually a baby picture. On Monday it was my grandson, Joey's, 9th birthday and his Mom, Melissa, posted this baby picture of Joey. I took care of him from when he was a little baby until he was about 1 1/2 when Melissa was working and so got to spend alot of time with him. Seeing his baby picture makes me miss him so much!!! I miss when he was a baby and I just miss him anyway since him and his brother, Aaron, and his Mom went to live in Savannah, Georgia where my son Shane is stationed in the Army.

On the farmgirl site we were talking about what we would do if we could do anything we wanted and whether or how it would impact someone else's life and I had mentioned that I had thought many times how it would be nice if I could have space here for like a community garden for people in town who didn't have room for a garden or for the food bank. This picture is from 2 yrs ago when we had alot of clearing done on the property and this was the area that I was thinking of for the garden. I've heard that the woman who lived here before had beautiful gardens here and the man who did our clearing said that the soil was real good in this area. There is grass and weeds that have grown there now and alot of those trees on the left fell down in the windstorms this past winter but nothing that can't be cleaned up pretty quickly. I kind of wonder whether this is a do-able idea. The only thing is that we share a well and driveway with the neighbor but maybe it can be worked out. I've seen community gardens before in other areas and people always took pride in taking care of them. I don't know, maybe I've had too much caffeine (or cough syrup) today but it's a thought.

Here's one of our Silkies, one of the roosters I think, when it was younger. We found one of the Silkie roosters dead today in their yard. Very sad. It didn't look like anything got in there. Stephen said he heard them fighting last night but they do sometimes so he didn't think much of it but that must have been when it happened. I really think they've gotten along pretty well and haven't seen much fighting at all or I would have found homes for a couple of the roosters. I gave one of the Silkie roosters to my dad recently but my dad's 3 hens are being mean to the rooster so my dad asked me to take one of the Silkie hens over there to keep the rooster company and maybe hatch some eggs. Those Silkie hens sure do like setting on eggs so I bet that will work out good. I've been wanting to go over and see Mom and Dad anyway, if I could ever get over this cold thing!

We got a progress report for Tim today and it was great! Three of his teachers mentioned him working slowly but he does process information slowly. I'm hoping that as he goes to school that it will get easier for him to process information faster. Other than that he got all positive comments like "Exlemplary conduct" and "Pleasant and conscientious student". I hope the rest of his school years go as well as this year is going for him. I went back to sleep for a couple hours this morning and now it's time to get ready and pick Tim up already. I feel like I haven't gotten much done at all today but until I'm over this bug I'd better take it easy.

A sign of Spring... There are a few crocus' around the big cedar tree next to the driveway. I love things like that, gives you hope when it's still so cold out that it will be warm again soon. Yesterday there was actually a little snow on the deck in the morning! Today after I took Tim to his bus I noticed there was fresh snow in the lower hills around. Very pretty! It's hard for me to get used to getting up so early but the early mornings can be so beautiful and lately I've noticed more and more animal sounds in the distance. I just hope the woodpeckers don't come back this year. I think it was about 2 yrs ago that we had an awful problem with the woodpeckers on the gutters of the house, especially right over my bedroom window. I read up on getting rid of them and it sounded like the woodpeckers have more rights than we do! We did hang alot of shiny things on the house and it seemed to help a little.

I've still got this cough pretty bad but the dr said on Saturday that he didn't think it was pneumonia. He did put me on antibiotics though for the sinus infection. Last night I went to sleep at 11:30 or so and woke up about 2, had to take some cough medicine and it still took me awhile to go back to sleep, got to sleep all the way till 6am! Yesterday morning I ended up sleeping in because I had set the alarm to 6pm! That hopefully will teach me to wear my glasses when I set the alarm. Speaking of sleep, I will feed the dogs and then hopefully go back to sleep for awhile. I set up my cutting table so I could cut out more of the cotton batting for the rag quilts I'm making and I would love to work on that but if I don't get some sleep I'll just be a zombie all day.

There is a long, thin piece of land that goes out from Port Angeles. At the end is a Coast Guard Station but all along this piece of land before that is places where you can park along there and look out either towards town like this picture where the Olympic Mountains tower over the town or turn the other way and look across the Strait of Juan de Fuca at Victoria B.C. (British Columbia). We love to go to this piece of land, called Ediz Hook, during the summer and watch the sunsets or sometimes I just go there and relax. On 4th of July we usually park along Ediz Hook along with many other people and watch the fireworks over the town.

These are some of the patriotic flannel squares that I'm using to make my next rag quilts. I really like the one that's 2nd from the left, the freedom bears. I have collected alot of patriotic flannel and am just making as many squares as I can and will make as many quilts out of it as I can, hopefully enough for each of my kids and one for cuddling up on the couch. I should have put these on a plain background. They're on the kitchen table which has a laminated US map taped to it. We also have a big laminated world map that we sometimes put on the table, especially when Shane was stationed in South Korea but now he's in Georgia.

This is a rag quilt that I made for my nephew in Michigan when he had major back surgery a couple years ago. I've got alot of patriotic themed flannel squares cut out, some sewn, some not yet, and would love to get the energy to work on more patriotic rag quilts. Doesn't seem like that big a deal when you think about it but this cold or whatever I have has drained every ounce of energy I have. I want to make one of these for each of the boys and one to cuddle up with on these cold nights. I don't have the couch shown, I have a dark blue sleeper sofa. I have alot of cute patriotic flannels, took a picture of a few of the squares but I need to find the cord to upload the picture onto here. I also am in the mood to start working on a grandmothers flower garden quilt I started long ago, something I could bring with me to Tim's Tuesday school. He starts the 3rd trimester this next Tuesday, one cooking class and then 5 computer classes so we'll be there 6 1/2 hrs instead of 5 1/2. I tried to talk him into starting classes at 10 instead of 9 but he wants the whole day so....

I have so many things I'd like to work on and am so sick of laying around this past week! It reminds me of when I was on bedrest almost my whole pregnancy with Stephen and I was bored out of my mind! I did manage to get on the treadmill last night for a whole 15 minutes, better than nothing I guess. Drs appt on Monday so I'll try to hold out till then to ask why I can't seem to kick this. What worries me is that I had a bad case of pneumonia in my late 20's and now I'm I tad bit older than that and I have this awful cough. Laid around today watching tear-jerker movies like Sleepless in Seattle and The Other Sister. Finally brought the laptop back down to the kitchen just to get myself out of that bed. It's almost 5pm and I'm going to get Stephen to help me try and get the tarp back on this old Suburban that's sticking out of the carport and since the back window is open it's getting rained in and I guess we're in for some stormy weather this weekend. Pat's coming home for the night tonight and then going back to Seattle tomorrow and working the weekend. I was going to go over there this weekend but just don't feel up to it.

This picture is of Pat and I. We were on vacation in Michigan in summer of 05 visiting all his family. I actually posted this last summer when I started this blog, was trying to repost it, surprised that it worked. I'm not much different than this except that I gained 10 to 15lbs since then and can't seem to get that off. It probably doesn't help that I have some girl scout cookies sitting here that I can't stay out of. I didn't bring myself any lunch when I went to spend the day at Tim's school yesterday and so when I saw that somebody was selling off the rest of their girl scout cookies I bought 3 boxes! What can I say, I was weak. When I'm sick it's my time to baby myself. Now that Stephen knows about these cookies they won't be here for long. I have a drs appt next Monday, I wonder if I can lose the 10 to 15lbs by then???

One of our windstorms this winter snapped this old apple tree right off, just hanging by a thread now. I want to go outside and cut up all these trees that fell but I feel so rotten still, besides I got out my chainsaw a day or two ago and it needs oil. From the looks of it I have a feeling Pat took it over to where he stays and used it a bunch. This was my favorite of our fruit trees, such a shame. It was sure a rough winter. It's been sunny out for a few hours today and I'm loving it but I took my last Actifed a bit ago and have a feeling I'll be heading for a nap soon.

Can it really be almost Spring?? I have daffodils coming up in places where I swear there were none last year but I'm sure I say that every year.

It's been really nice out for a couple days then back to rain last night but awhile ago this morning it's sunny again! I'd love to walk up to Tim's bus stop but my cold is still horrible. I took a few more pictures outside when I ventured outside a bit ago, will post more soon. I need to take more Actifed but it knocks me out. What a waste of a beautiful day!

Here's a more close-up view of the tea towel that Aunt Jenny sent me. It is so cute!! There is another picture of it that I just posted but it wasn't a very good close-up. It meant so much to me for her to send me this!!!

I don't think this is the greatest picture of it but here is my 3rd apron I made. The other 2 are more country with roosters, etc but this one seemed more Spring-like with apples, etc. Well, I guess now that I think about it apples would be for Fall but with the colors it reminds me of Spring. Next to it is the most adorable tea towel that I got in the mail yesterday from Aunt Jenny. I need to take a more close-up picture in a sec and post it. It meant so much to me that she sent that and it was tied up with a piece of lace and smelled so good!! My kids and husband aren't very nurturing and it means so much to me to get something "from the heart" and also on a day when I was feeling so rotten! Jenny, you are just the sweetest!!!

This was one of those days of seeing something in the clouds. It looked like an angel to me. It's nice to think we have guardian angels with us. I think I'm a little delirious today, combination of this severe virus and lack of sleep. I talked to Pat last night till almost 12:30am, thinking I didn't have to set an alarm for a change and could sleep in.... wrong!! I woke up at 6am from my head hurting and my raw throat. I'm sort of known for my loud sneezes "for a girl" but not much louder than a squeak today. I had to laugh at myself this morning when I sneezed. Where the heck did I pick this up at? Last weekend there was a home show in town that I wanted to go to but I heard about the bad flu going around and decided it would be better to stay home. I guess not. Neither dog has even wanted to wake up yet but I'd better take them out anyway and go lay back down and hopefully sleep this off. Can't wait till this peaks!!

I took Thunder to the vet today and really don't know any more than I did. She ran blood tests which I thought would show something but it all came back ok. She also did an EKG, for some reason she thought this might involve his heart but it came out ok. I walked out of there with $170 less... ouch!! She said if he has a brain tumor then the seizures will get worse and then we could take him to Seattle to a specialist. I sure hope it doesn't come to that. I don't want to think we have to choose between a badly needed new roof or medical care for our dog. She said sometimes a dog will have a seizure and then never have one again. Hopefully that is the case. As for me I can barely talk now. I called Pat awhile ago and he kept laughing at me, didn't help at all!!! Looks like he's working the weekend. He was going to come home for a night but he's leary of being around me and I don't blame him at all. I was going to go to bed early and read and sleep but I built a fire in the woodstove and have been watching King of Queens dvds. Nothing like a good comedy to take your mind off your troubles.

I've been coming down with something the last couple days and now it's official, I'm sick. Ticks me off, no time for sickness. I've been trying to do the positive thinking thing, something I try to do anyway, but today- What positive statements do you make when you woke up after 4hrs of sleep to your dog having a seizure and you feel awful? I'm trying not to enforce it by saying "I'm having the worst day". I've been taking some Aireborne since I felt some bug trying to sneak in and attack me but it might not have been soon enough. I tried to nap this morning off and on but life interrupts sometimes. Now I have 30 minutes to get in the shower and try and get the dip stick stuck back in the tube in my car before I go pick up Tim and then take Thunder to the vet at 4. (my car leaks oil but ever since we bought this car last summer the tube where you check the oil is bent and you're having a very good day if you can get the dip stick back in there after you check it. Last night I checked it when I got gas and had to drive home without the dipstick in there, still can't get it in there) What I need is a big bowl of chicken soup. Maybe I'll stop at Safeway deli because I sure don't feel like cooking.

Thunder (our boxer on the left) gave me quite a scare this morning. Last night when I came home from getting groceries Stephen said that Thunder was acting like he was going to throw up. I don't think he did but he was very whiny all night. I woke up at 4am to him thrashing around in the living room, went down there and he was having a seizure. I finally got him calmed down but for a bit he seemed to be staring into space and then laid there breathing heavily and wouldn't or couldn't get up when I was calling to him, then seemed pretty shaky. After awhile I got him to drink some water and later he did eat some breakfast. Tim and I were supposed to go on a field trip to the Seattle Aquarium today and we were going to Pike Place Market too but I explained to Tim this morning that I need to take Thunder to the vet and he was very understanding. He decided he'd go ahead and go to his regular school today and he wanted to get ready 1/2hr early so he could take the bus. Thunder and Missy are both napping right now. I only got 4hrs of sleep so I think I'll take a little nap and then take him to the vet. Sure hope he's ok, he's 5yrs old and boxers aren't known for living long lives. We would be crushed if something happened to him.