Oh, where to start, where to start...?

Ohhhh~Lah!  That's suthern for "hola".  Just sayin'.

There have been many things happening, many things happened, and a few have yet to happen.  So I know that I am making huge major glossing swipes here and will attempt to include all the biggies, but will probably miss something super~obvious; cuz sometimes I miss the trees for the forest, or the forest for the trees, but most of the times, I hit a nice balance where I can focus on both the forest AND the trees.  Why?  Not cuz I'm super~woman, no.  Cuz I have a great supportive husband, great supportive friends, and great supportive family.  Oh!  And did I mention that I have a great supportive mother?  She's been living here in Mississippi, just down the road now, for about a year.  Yea!!  It's been the first time we've lived in the same state since I was 24, let alone the same town, or the same property.  It's not that we didn't get along, we always have.  It's just life can take you places, if you let it.

So, this past year has been extremely difficult pet~wise for us.  We adopted a lil tiny ten week old puppy last October who had major congenital issues.  CoCo was with us for a month and then slipped into a coma induced by hypothermia {which apparently happens with small breed puppies very quickly}.  I did get her to the vet within fifteen minutes but she had a very traumatic day and passed during the night at the vet's home.  It was unreal how much she meant to us within such a short period of time.

Then we adopted Ginger, who was most likely six to nine months old.  So we decided her birthday would be St Paddy's day.  She was full~grown but still puppyish and weighed about 13 pounds when we brought her home.  She and Sophie played and played and played.  Ginger was definitely a daddy's~girl, for sure!  We had her for a few months and then, she was either hit by a car or beaten.  We searched for her and then that night she showed up on the front porch but we rushed her to the ER at the Vet School here at MSU cuz she was banged up pretty badly with lots of internal damage, tho not easily apparent from the outside.  Turns out her spine was separated from her shattered pelvis.  I have no idea how she managed to make it home at 3a.  She died just before what we'd been hoping would be her first birthday.

It was horrible.  So we decided that we shouldn't even think about another addition to our home for awhile.  I felt bad, but I swear that Jerry was crushed to the core.  So we just need to give ourselves some time and just enjoy the girls we have.

Shaddow is going to be twelve in August!  She is not in the best of health, several large tumors {systematic}; but she seems to be enjoying life still and not in undue pain.  She is loving her bed and during the day, she loves to either bask on the concrete apron in front of the house or stretch out in the field next to our place.

Sophie is two and a half and has mellowed somewhat tho she is very much a puppy still!  She has her favorite spots, usually Jerry's recliner during the day.  She has taken to stretching out in my lap {cuz Ginger was in Jerry's} as long as I put a blanket over her so that the passing yarn wouldn't tickle her while she was sleeping.  Otherwise, she fidgets and glares at me.

One of Jerry's students is graduating.  She has been our house and doggie sitter for us for the past four years.  She got married over Christmas.  So the other night, Jerry grilled chicken and corn on the cob, served up with his mashed potato salad {omg, so good!} for "The Smiths".  She brought her lil tiny eight pound poodle over and Sophie welcomed the lil fuzzy curly five year old rescue like an old long lost buddy.  They even sat on the chair together, watching us eat and keeping an eye out for morsels that might make it their way.

Summer is well on its way!  We've hosted two cook~outs already with more planned.  Here it is almost May!  That means that Mother's Day is just around the corner.

Speaking of mothers, mine has been teaching basket~weaving on Wednesdays at a local center.  More on that later, it deserves its own entry.  And my husband's mother joined me in physical therapy for awhile.  I've been going for months now, but now that the Cotton District Arts Festival is over, I've reduced to once per week, rather than twice.  It's amazing how much of an improvement in general I have noticed!

Also, Jerry's youngest son and his wife are expecting their first in mid~September!  So we have a new mama in the family, since I'm focused on mothers, thought this would be an excellent time to mention that.  The lil girl is tremendously treasured already, at week 18 or so in~utero.  I am amazed at how detailed these sonograms can be!  I usually smile and nod vaguely when I look at these grey white and black scans of blobs when I am presented with a gushing mother~to~be and her shots.  But this imagining now is so detailed that it's almost like seeing a sleeping newborn.  And she isn't even at midTerm yet!  Almost, not quite.

This spring was crammed with all sorts of community events that I was involved with.  Starkville Writers had a second annual Celtic Celebration.  In addition to readings of selections, essays, autobiographies, poems, and fairy~tales; we also had dancing; and announced the winners of the Starkville Memories essay contest.  The BookMart DownTown's Cafe had Rubens, Irish Stew, Irish Soda Bread, shamrock sugar cookies, and one of the writers brought in a wonderful lime sherbert punch and some cake.  It was quite successful and we had pictures with the Mayor and the sixth graders who won, along with their teachers.  I think it will be well~remembered for years to come.

Especially since we will be placing the essays in to the Time~Capsule as Starkville concludes its year~long celebration of its 175th birthday.  We intend for the Time~Capsule to be opened when Starkville celebrates its 200th in 2037.  I'll be 66.  Suddenly, that doesn't seem so far away.  My mom turns 66 this October.  Just to put it all into perspective.

This year was the first year that I co~chaired the Writers' Village for the Cotton District Arts Festival here in Starkville.  It was really cool and I'd love to do it again.  I think that this was a great group of folks to learn the ropes from and they all work well together, so I'm looking forward to seeing what the future brings.  This too deserves its own entry, so more on that later.

I met some fantastic folks these last few months, in several different venues.  I've been getting some knitting and crochet done.  But most everything got put on hold til May, when the spring's events were completed.  Now I have more than enough to do for the next few months!

So I think that brings the general over view up to date.  I will be writing more, more often.  That's a promise!

"...imma git ta ya,"

says the manic one~armed monkey with Tourette's Syndrome.

The Girls

The really cool thing about our girls is that they all get along swimmingly.  Shaddow even shares her bed with the two lil ones and they all gnaw on their treats together, as pictured here.  Shaddow is the black lab, with the aged~white hair on her face.  She'll be twelve this year!  Sophie is the black & tan stout lil chiweenie in the back on the right.  She resembles a short~haired dachshund more so then a chihuahua.  Sophie is two now.

Ginger is the latest addition to our household.  She's the long~legged thirteen pound Italian~GreyHound/Chihuahua mix above and to the right, pictured with Jerry.  Due to some camera trickery, it appears that Ginger has a green eye and a red one; she doesn't.  Her eyes are the most unusual of our three girls.  She has light golden eyes that can appear to be very deep like the rich Lion Syrup that we used to get in cans when I was little.  Ginger and Sophie are best buds; but when Jerry is home, Ginger throws Sophie over to snuggle with Jerry.  She gets all comfy and noodly, that super relaxed state of bliss and safe security.  She presses her lithe body into his chest, and sighs with such content, that I swear her lil doggie smile is one of pure joy!

I know how she feels.  He's a good guy, a sweetieheart, and you can't help but feel calm when with him.

Punxsutawney Phil's hobby

Hair, light and fluffy entry

The picture to the left was within hours of having my hair done.  The picture on the right is after five weeks.  This in my natural hair {not extensions}; altho I had bleached it last fall, so that is why it appears darker at the roots, while the ends are all light and fluffy.

It appears to be thicker and fuller in the picture to the right, because my hair grows quickly; so the roots are not so neat as when it is first done.  Also, the ends are curly cuz we had to actually replace quite a few elastics; so we'd put the bands higher so they wouldn't slip off the ends of the braids so easily.  Hence the curls. 

Jerry's been touching up some of the braids.  So that adds a lil difference in the texture and I think that is a good thing.  My hair is different lengths, cuz a year ago it was shaven and this is how it grew in, I've not had it cut since then.  Oh!  And I did have a very tight curly perm last September, which adds to the fullness and the curl somewhat.

I'm planning to do something with it in a week or so, as the braids are getting fuzzy and my roots need to be addressed.  So all the braids are coming out, which will be a job and a half, I think.  Everything combed thru and a good scrub, then we'll see what's next.

this lil piggy went "wee, wee, wee" all the way home

These braids are lasting, we're working on five weeks now.  I say "we" because my husband helps me maintain them.  Since my hair is somewhat silky, the bands tend to slip off; so then the braid begins to undo and that won't do.  So Jerry checks them off and replaces elastics.  He's getting quite good at rebraiding these tiney things.  I cannot hold my arms in that sorta awkward position to get the ones in the back of my head, so I'm really glad he is is willing to do this for me.

This picture was taken the evening I got home from them being done, just a few days before Christmas.  I won't relate the entire friggen saga of finding someone to do them for me, other than to say that tenacity is becoming my strong suit.  So after my hair was done, I actually did squeal, frequently, with excitement.

I actually weight about fifteen pounds less than what I was here in this picture.  It's not that I didn't fully enjoy the holiday dinners, cuz I truly did.  It's more that I had a shock when I realized I had to take several breaks when just WALKING from the parking lot to the cutter {pinning ceremony} or the stadium {Gator Bowl}.  Then I gave some serious thought to how 270 pounds can wear and tear on my joints, place extra burden on my heart and circulatory system, and contribute to diabetes, high blood pressure, etc.

It's not that I didn't know this stuff before.  It's just that it become more...pressing.  So I gotta actually do something {exercise} and not do something {cut down on my intake of foods} and be more mindful.  I haven't gotten with the exercise component yet.  But I think that I've been cutting down on huge ass portions with multiple helpings.  And I've begun to eat more fresh veggies, less sweet fatty treats that are oh so common at the holidays.

I'm not impatient yet, cuz I know that it took an amazing amount of time to get in this condition, and so it probably will take awhile to get down on it, ya know?

What, what?!?

Two months?!?  Holee~Bat~Babee!  Two months since I last posted...wow.  Altho, this last year has been pretty scanty post~wise as a whole.  Let's see if I can't do better this year, what say, hey?

So here's a picture of our two lil girls {Shaddow is our big girl and she is not in this picture, if I am not mistaken, at the time I was holding the camera, she was outside on the concrete park pad sunning herself and soaking up the warm rays even tho the day was not exactly warm}.

Sophie is the darker zaftig chiweenie while Ginger is the skinny blonde model.  Ginger has been with us for almost three months now, tho we are considering mid~March to be her birthday because no one is sure how old she is.  She has gained one whole pound since being with us, so she is now thirteen pounds and I think she is her full grown adult size.  Sophie, like me, needs to lose weight.  For Sophie, it is mere ounces, but I think she is finding it to be a chore also.  Relatively speaking, three or four pounds from the 22 she weighs is roughly like me losing forty to fifty at this point.  Poor thing, she can't even jump up on the bed and her stocky lil legs and long spine are not meant to handle any excess.  So we need to stop giving her so many treats and now that the holidays are over, there are not quite so many tasty dishes...for either of us.

Well, I've settled into the new year.  Wrote a short short for the writers' group here, keeping track of assignments, activities, and goals.  So that's good.  I started off the year with catching up on several to~do lists of stuff that I'd put on hold during the holidays, including getting organized in general and transferring birthdays, anniversaries, and appts to the new calendars.

This means that several of the meetings that I'd been meaning to get to, but had been lax on attending; well, now they are fresh in my mind and so I have no excuse for not getting to the various committees, writing groups, knitting groups, etc.  None.  Sigh.

Unless you count the odd weather we had this past week.  That provided an excellent excuse for me to stay indoors, out of the chilly wet slushy snow that actually stuck to the ground, which is a big huge thing for Mississippi.  I can drive in that, but many others can not so why would I want to risk an accident in several tons in order to show at a meeting?  Besides, I kept warm and toasty and dry and comfy in my jammies.  Cuddling with the pups and a pile of yarn, tho not always at the same time.  Lots of folks don't want items with pet hair, not even short lil matching hair.  Especially if it isn't their pet.  Can you imagine?

There are some after~holiday yarn sales at a few of the tried and true places.  One of the places, Herrschners is having a pretty decent series of sales because they are starting their own yarn company which I think they plan to sell exclusively their own brand {Willow} instead of what had been the house brand {Herrschner} and other yarns like Red Heart, Lion's Brand, Caron, TLC, Village Yarn, Nob Hill, Sundance, Northland, Universal, Dept 71, Bernat, and others.  The last few times I dealt with Herrschner, it was a pain in the ass and there were all sorts of SNAFUs.  But this might be worth it, cuz the sales are pretty tempting.

I brought home an afghan I had made several years back from my husband's youngest son's house.  I'd made 120 hexagons and joined them into a king~sized afghan.  The problem was that I didn't join the full width of the hex seam cuz I was probably thinking that I would need those corner stitches to seam the strip together.  Sillee mee!!

So I had this gaping hole at the juncture of the three adjoining hexes and I thought, "oh I'll take the quilt theme one step further", cuz it was basically like a Grandma's Country Flower Garden pattern in that the hexagons are used in both.  So I tied knots at those junctures, thinking about the lovely knotted quilts.

This experiment? FAILED.  The yarn is meant to have nice drape, and it does.  So nice that the knotted areas drape too.  Which is so not what I wanted to happen.  So I'm going to take the seams out and rejoin all the hexes again.  Completely, this time.  No knots that might fray or come apart and no big ole gaping holes.

I'm also doing some hats and scarves for St Anne's in B'ham.  I want to get those done and out to them so that they can use them while it is still cold enough to need them!  Otherwise, what's the point of hats and scarves?  I'll probably send them a few lapghans too, later in the year, cuz you can always use those.

As far as news in the family, my husband's eldest daughter graduated with her associate's while his youngest daughter just enrolled in college.  His middle daughter is doing great in school, 4.0, go girl, go!  His older son just was promoted at work and is making it thru his New Jersey winter {bit of a difference from Mississippi, doncha know}.  His younger son made chief in the coast guard last month and so will be attending school for awhile this spring.  He also got his next assignment and it was exactly what he wanted.  Yea!  So it seems everyone is doing well, working hard, and for the most part happy.

So I think that my husband is happy.  He is enjoying his last few weeks of football, and is off work tomorrow as it is a holiday at the university.  In fact, I hear him urging one of his teams to get it together right now.  I mean, they do hear him, don't they?

Hope every one stays healthy, avoids the flu, and is landing on their feet ok post~holiday!