Last December: the loss of the ZIgman and the Arrival of Bella

 I started writing this in July, obviously I never finished. So, let's see how far I get this rime.

My first post this year. I haven't been feeling like writing much, obviously, I'm having trouble being motivated. But I will plow on through on the warm, hazy July evening. (Now a damp September morning.)

Christmas was fun, as usual, maybe a little less hectic, we toned down the cookie baking although the void seemed to be filled in with pies and cakes. The usual trio arrived from Massachusetts for 3 weeks. Ember and Kaylee had a blast playing constantly. Ziggy just laid about and ate goodies and stuck close to me on our walks. 

Jan 5, 2025, 2 days before I lost him

I lost Ziggy in January, on the 7th. On the 4th we discovered he had a mass on his spleen, and it was bleeding internally as he had become anemic. Three days later it had to have burst, he couldn't even stand up on his own, so I had to take him to the vet the day my sister left for home. I miss that little guy, it was a really tough loss, but I couldn't let him suffer and being practically 14, (I celebrated his birthday on the 8th) surgery would have been iffy, though I still find myself regretting not trying more.

Kaylee became depressed with me. I took her with me to the vet so she could sniff his body afterward. They were best buddies. Because the ground was frozen, I had him cremated. His ashes are sitting ijust outside my bedroom.

In happier times last year, I'm sure a lot of other stuff happened, it's just whether I can remember. I know in December while my sister and M were here with Ember, M and Hal retrieved the old semi-trailer refrigerator truck from the farm, a mile down the road and towed it with the farm tractor and dropped in off behind the pole barn. Hal is planning to use it as storage for things like the excess steel siding pieces from the house build and other crap from the garage so he can finally use it for his truck.

Hal was ill most of December through April. He had all kinds of tests, saw all kinds of specialists. He was lethargic, coping with muscle pain, had a cough that still hasn't gone away completely. In the end he finally was given 3 weeks of antibiotics after we suggested Lyme disease. He also tested positive for Mono. We're still not sure what he had but he's definitely better.

After 2 months without Ziggy, I finally looked online a little for another dog. The first couple of times I gave up, my heart wasn't in it, but eventually a couple dogs caught my eye. I meant to visit a few at some more distant shelters but then I saw a small photo at the shelter in Lincoln. It wasn't a good photo but she was only 10 miles away along with Siberian Husky that had been in and out there for 5 years. Hal wanted my next dog to be smaller like Ziggy was, (Zig was half beagle, hence his smaller size), so I wasn't even considering looking for a labrador, no matter how much I love the breed.

So here is that photo of Bella at the shelter. I'll post better photos in a later post.

As I've said before, I hope to make more posts sooner than later.

Merry Christmas

 Our first Christmas in our new home. It's not done yet, but we had fun today.

Took this photo a couple nights ago, before the blizzard that gave us only 4 inches of snow, (mostly we got rain and ice on this side of the state) but you get the idea. 

Christmas 2020

Despite the pandemic and certain idiot politicians, Hal and I and the pups celebrated the holidays with my sister K and her boyfriend/fiancé M and their dog Lyra, We had a great time. K and I baked a lot of cookies while the men had a good old time hunting deer. (I usually only hunt during the November season).

Neither I nor my sis became sick, one of us if not both usually get some type of flu. I cannot attribute to robust immune systems so much as to the fact people who were actually sick with whatever stayed home! 

But back to Christmas. We had 2 guests for Christmas dinner, my friends from Barton City, John and Tom, we had ham and lots of sides and of course, pies for dessert. No one went hungry and everyone seemed pleased. 

Looking forward to the next Christmas, hopefully at our new home.

Christmas 2018

Christmas was AWESOME. The 4 of us humans had absolutely nothing to complain about and the 3 dogs seemed to have had a good time too. Here are a few photos.

Hal got lots of flannel

There was venison roasted over an open fire, caveman style

Kaylee and her best friend Seaums on top of Seamus' dad

6 month old Kaylee is as big as 10 year old Lyra

little sis enjoying unwrapping her big present

me and my gift box from big sis

wrestling with Kaylee, Ziggy and Seamus

My neighbor John and Seamus, his furry friend, joined us for dinner with was a ham with pineapple stuffing on the side and , green beans, asparagus and mashed potatoes with a pinot noir and a late harvest riesling.

What's Been Happening?

This is sort a catch up post, probably won't be that detailed but more of a list of things that have happened or are going on etc., whatever I can think of in the next half hour before I go to bed.

In no particular order.

Tonight one of my upper right molars, one that had a root canal and that broke a year ago and was rebuilt and recrowned by my dentist the first time it broke, fell out. Knew it would happen, just didn't know when. I have opted to get an implant because I refuse to need dentures some day. Have to pay fot this whole thing myself as we don't have dental insurance. Ah well, it's a lot of money.

Bought a used small camera last month from a guy on dpreview.com who at first had offered to just give me the same camera I already had because he saw my post about mine have dust on the senosr. Instead I got the Panasonic ZS-50 for a very good price. I haven't been able to do too much with the camera outside because of extremely lousy weather in th month I've owned it but I'll keep trying. Here's a photo I took with it.

metal chicken on the plastic tree

My younger sister and her BF and Lyra were here for 2 weeks at Christmas. We had a very good time. There was food and the men hunted and there was more food. Looking forward to their next visit.

I bought another camera Sunday night and it was delivered yesterday. This one is the Panasonic FZ300. It's almost one  f-stop faster than what I had, 2.8, is weather sealed and has been getting very good reviews. I've seen lots of excellent photos. It's not perfect but for a fixed lens camera with a 600mm zoom for the price I got it for, I'm pretty happy. The weather has been lousy of course, but I managed to go outside with it and take a few photos but they're still in the camera so there won't be any here tonight.

We're dumping DISH as our internet service provider and switching to Exede. Ever since we both got Windows 10 installed on our laptops, the only reason I can think of, we run out of bandwidth less than a week into each month and end up with our download speeds throttled down to somewhere around 128 kbps. It's ridiculous. Five, 5, GB a month? We can't watch you tubes, photo heavy sites are killers. I take photos I am a member of a photo heavy site, both Hal and I are on Facebook. Exede claims we will get 150 GB a month for barely much more. So hopefully, they come tomorrow and internet will be fun to use again.

I bought a shock collar for Ziggy. He has been bad. I won't go into the things he has done but I determined in mid December it was the only thing left to try. It is my second brand, the first was dead in the water when I got it. The new one works great. It has a beep mode, a vibration and the shock. I have not used the shock once. not once! The beep works. I've used the vibration a couple of times and now it's just hit the beep and he comes running. No more screaming my head off for him to come. He's such a well behaved boy now. I hardly even use the beep. I blame the stubborn beagle half of him for having to resort to this but it works. Now Luna is less well behave on our walks.

Okay, it's possible the satellite person could be here at 8 am so I must head to bed.

Good night and Happy New Year!

Merry Christmas

Hal and I, my younger sister (YS) and her significant other (SO) had a pretty great day today. We started with some Pillsbury danish for breakfast, orange and cinnamon, coffee and tea. Then YS and I brought out the stockings and mine was quite the surprise as SO had his mom knit me a new stocking to replace the one that one of my aunts made me when I was a baby. I now have a stocking bigger than Hal's which is very large indeed as it was the first one I ever knitted modelling it on my old one. All I have made since are 20 stitches narrower.

Then we opened the presents under the tree. The tree with presents photos are still in my camera, for now here are the empty tree photos.

No flash

with flash

YS mostly decorated it for me. I usually leave it till she arrives. Call me lazy but I thought it looked great with just the lights and garland.

Dinner was made by SO, a venison tenderloin experiment using bitter chocolate whisked into the au jus. Mashed potatoes mashed with leeks and my green beans made with garlic and oyster sauce.  And dang it! I just remembered we forgot to cook the rolls!

Now we are watching a DVD of Led Zeppelin, Celebration Day. Then we will have chocolate cream pie for dessert.

Yes, a pretty good time. And so did the dogs. Lots of goodies for them, too.

Photos from Christmas 2015 and Early 2016

I have been so busy I haven't been posting. I know I play too many Facebook games and am trying to wean myself off those. I get so much more done not wasting time doing stupid things!

While looking at my photos I and past blog posts I realized I haven't posted any of the dogs during the holidays or really any other time. So, here are a few from then and later in January.

The Christmas tree

I had bought Luna a nice Serta dog bed from Sam's Club because it was a great deal, it has great cushioning for the arthritic older dog, and also cooling gel. I should have bought 2 because Ziggy decided he wanted it for himself.

My wonderful sister-in-law, Hal's sister, went and got me another at a different SC, when the first store no longer had any. Now they are content.

 Although, occasionally, Ziggy still wants to be wherever Luna is. Especially if she is eating something.

 Lyra came to visit at Christmas, of course.

  Ziggy snoozing happily on his bed.

For some reason I can't remember, Luna panicked Christmas morning and just had to climb onto my lap to be rescued. Poor thing is such a nervous Nellie!

Luna in my lap

A Lobster Dinner

Hal and I gave his parents their Christmas gift tonight. A lobster dinner. I bought the live lobsters at the Meijer in Alpena, MI at the end of the shopping trip I needed to get all the other side dishes. I took Hal's mom along and she got a little shopping in for herself.

I got calamata and feta stuffed olives, macaroni salad, mustard potato salad, a lemon we forgot to use, pumpernickel bread we also did not use as his dad had hot bread fresh out of the oven. There was a pinot grigio to drink and dad's usual red. Oh and there was homemade creamed corn my mother-in-law and I made last summer with a little shucking help from FIL.

Dinner was very messy but was thoroughly enjoyed by everyone. The lobsters, for those who may wonder, were first chilled and then killed before being boiled. I refuse to boil a creature alive.

I Made a Sock, and then Another Sock

More accurately, I made a Christmas stocking for one of my sisters who said her old one had holes in it from moths or mice, or some such critter. I can post this now because it's after Christmas.

I also made one for my future niece at the request of her future mother-in-law and her fiance. It may be hard to see but yes, there is a crocheted purple bunny sitting under the tree. I am told she loves it. Makes me glad. These are the first stockings I have made in a very, very long time. I suspect as babies are now being born into the family that there will be more. I already bought more yarn, just in case.

Happy New Year

Yes, the title isn't very original but it is another year, though if you think about it, whomever came up with this particular calendar the Greeks or Egyptians, I don't remember which, it's all arbitrary. Why can't the first of the year be on the winter solstice, or summer? or an equinox? But as it stands we are now into the evening (maybe it was Gregorian?) of the sixth day of the new year and baby, it's cold outside. At the moment it's 23.9 F but 2 nights ago it dropped to -5.3, yes winter is upon us, and has been for about a week.

We had a green Christmas, the temperatures all December had been in the mid 30's to low 40's. Snow didn't really show up till several days later and that brought an unexpected 8 inches with rain on top which turned everything icy as the temperatures finally dropped into the 20s. The forecasters couldn't make up their minds whether we were getting 1-4 inches, 2-5, or 8-12. And the winds were so crazy we really had no idea what we were getting till it was all over the next day.

Speaking of winds though, the night before Christmas Eve the winds really picked up within a rainstorm we were getting while the southern part of the country was getting hit with deadly tornadoes. While we didn't get hit by tornadoes, the winds gusted up to 60 mph all over the state and at 3:10 am Christmas Eve morning, our power went out. As the day went on more and more power outages occurred, trees were down all over the northern part of the state. Estimated restoration of power was Monday night the 28th at 11:30 pm. Yikes. More than 100,000 were without power and all but 2 crews were sent home for the long holiday weekend. Consumer's Energy had to hire crews from out of state.

But unlike the majority of people around here, we had a generator.

the generator that saved Christmas

We bought it one summer when a longer than a day outage happened before. With my sister and her boyfriend (BF) visiting, it wasn't the best time for this to happen, and on a holiday weekend! But Hal and BF went out and got 10 gallons of gas, borrowed his parent's old small generator to set up at Mrs J's next door and we just rolled with it. Ours was big enough that we only had to trip some breakers when it came to using the shower (which ran the well pump). If the chest freezers came on at the same time, the whole house would shut off. Unfortunately, for Mrs J, the small generator meant she could have either heat and a few lights, or the well pump and running water. I went over a couple times a day to flip breakers for her to flush toilets, get drinking water to make coffee, etc. It is definitely a Christmas we will remember.

The power was actually restored about 3 pm on Sunday, the 27th. We were running on generator a total of 3 days, 11 hours, and 55 minutes. The numbers are courtesy of the power company.

I will post more photos over the next few days. We didn't take a lot being as we were running about with generators, etc, but there are a few. But for now, I am off to bed to read.

The Power is Out

Went out at approximately 3:10 am. Hal got up about 6:30 and started the generator. After much messing around we determined that we cannot run the shower while the freezers are running (there are 3 of those and 3 old refrigerators, most holding venison). So if I want to take a shower we have to flip some breakers. Still, we have it better than a lot of people around here who don't have or can't afford a generator. The other fun news is the power company, Consumer's Energy, has now estimated power restoration for 11:30 pm Monday night. This is Thursday. Oh Joy.

After Hal got us set up he went to check his parent's house and found that they have power, as does the farm, his hunting camp does not. The temperature outside has been much higher than normal, 57.3 last night. Records are being smashed thanks to El Nino this year. Unfortunately, the high winds that caused this mayhem are bringing in temps that are more normal, as in cold, and many do not have heat. However, as his parent's do not need their old generator he borrowed it and he, and I, and little sister's BF spent 3 hours this afternoon trying to set it up to run Mrs J's house next door. Her house wiring is very screwed up, in the end he got her wood pellet stove, a few lights and her refrigerator and freezer running. Can't run her well pump without flipping those breakers off. But at least she has heat. Now I have to bring her over some hot dinner as her stove cannot run, being electric. At least mine can being propane.

Merry Christmas.

What Have I Been Up To?

Lots of things.

Luna went lame on her left rear leg, her hock was swollen, one emergency vet trip later and she probably jut wrenched it. Ten days of pills and she seemed to be doing fine, then she is limping again, then fine, and yesterday limping on that leg and the usual front leg. No walkies for her for a bit. I tried to leave her home yesterday afternoon but halfway around the trail I hear her usual heavy panting that sounds like a steam locomotive behind me and here she comes. (I had left her in the house but forgot about the jury-rigged doggie door I had set up!) We get back home and this is when she is limping on the 2 legs. *sigh*

My sewing projects got waylaid for a bit, but I did cut out one item before my brother left, hopefully I'll get back to it soon. I started a small knitting project that will also hopefully be done soon, did at least 4 inches of it the first day but haven't gotten back to it. Then I have to finish the shawl I started in spring for Hal's favorite sister. Plus Hal wants a terry cloth bathrobe since his old one failed a while back. Only mannish color I could get in enough quantity in either of the Joann stores I tried was brown. He's going to look like a monk as he wants a hood.

After I dropped off my brother at the airport I hung around with aforementioned SIL and we went shopping. I got some things I really didn't need, but the sales were so good, and there were coupons! (I did donate some clothes to St Vincent de Paul when I got home, (something in, something out, must be my new motto!) Though while at SVdP, aka the Mikado Mall around here, I acquired a cork screw, the kind with the lever arms, a Christmas music cd and a purple embroidered jacket (Coldwater Creek) for the huge cost of $3.19 including tax. But the money is for a good cause.

I also ended up at Kohl's and got a pair of sandals and short boots and a wallet that were on sale, the sandals on clearance, and then I opened a charge account because there was an additional 25% off so I scored. And yes I needed the boots, been looking for a short pair for a few years now, my old wallet was shedding plastic, and the sandals fit my narrow feet. Narrow shoes are hard to find without paying through the nose. Including going out to lunch and dinner in the 2 days I stayed with SIL, we had a pretty good time.

I only gained a couple of pounds while brother was visiting, and those are gone again, I seem to be stuck at a loss of 21 pounds still. I've been having motivation troubles and I've been tired. Don't know if it's the shorter, darker days, the low temps in the 40s, the non-stop stuff I've been doing since last week, or a combination. Probably the latter.

I've taken Mrs Butch shopping, taken my MIL shopping a day or two later, then there was the cutting up of 96 ears of corn for making "Sinful Corn", a homemade artery busting concoction of corn, butter and half and half that tastes so much better than the store bought canned creamed corn but is so much work, even with FIL shucking all the ears and MIL doing the first 22 of them before I got there. And all that work for only about 18 quarts of finished product stuffed into 30 baggies. It may sound like a lot but it really isn't.

I also had located and dug up the septic tank which I decided really needed to be cleaned as it hadn't been in the 15 years we've lived here. The cleaner guy came out within 45 minutes of calling for a quote, either he had nothing else to do, obviously, or feared for our safety. He exclaimed that ours was buried way deeper than normal. Lucky me. I got to rebury it the next day, too. And of course, it seemed most of the dirt wouldn't go back into the hole, should have dumped it onto a tarp when I first dug it out. However, in case we ever do want to pump it out again, this time we put a plastic barrel over the hatch, put rocks on top of that and stuck the bird feeder next to it. Many years ago when we found it the first time I put rocks on top and planted flowers, but the flowers spread and the rocks disappeared under the soil. I reused those rocks and some bigger ones. It isn't disappearing any more.

The septic cleaning happened on Hal's birthday. However, he got other presents than that one and lo and behold, he liked them/they fit! Nothing like a nice new pair of camouflage sweat pants, socks and coffee. I also made him his favorite dinner of a roast chicken with sage and onion stuffing and an apple pie. His birthday will also be the only time he gets an apple pie as I don't particularly care for them. He had the majority of it and seemed quite pleased.

We picked the apples for that pie the previous week at his parent's farm. A good year for apples it seems, much less wormy than last year. (they don't spray for bugs). I cut some up the other day to can some for future pies. Took 3 hours for only 5 quarts, and I think it will take more than 1 quart per pie. I can see why buying apple pie filling is so popular. I also made 6 pints of pickled zucchini as I finally had a year where my zucchini did not fail. (can't say the same for the cucumbers again!). I have more very large zukes but those I think will be shredded for bread. I don't need lots and lots of zuke pickles. I do have an older sister who will enjoy these pickles, however.

I mowed the lawn finally, too the other day. Had a lot of rain for a few days and it was either too wet or I was too busy. Had to mow it twice it had gotten so long.

I suppose I should take Ziggy out for the morning walk now. Poor Luna will be so disappointed but she has to rest.

Toodles.

Oh no, It's a Bombogenesis! aka Juno

When my sister and her boyfriend came out for Christmas, she decided to stay a couple extra weeks with Lyra while he went home to go to work. Last week I drove her back to Massachusetts, with our 3 dogs and our luggage all stuffed into the my little Equinox, Rory. Had beautiful weather for the 2 day drive across Ontario, Canada and New York and have been having a nice time hanging out with our other sister for the past few days.

Two days ago it snowed about 6 inches combined with a little sleet. But today dawned sunny and fairly warm, about 34 F for a high and we went to dinner at Ye Olde Tavern in West Brookfield, MA. Had pizza and chocolate cake, and beers, and 5 of us had an excellent time.

One of the main topics of conversation was the approaching snowstorm, nicknamed Juno by the Weather Channel that we knew was coming and even a couple days ago was not considered to be very impressive. However, my older sister had heard of a new word that none of us knew called "bombogenesis". To put it simply, the small, storm we were expecting is supposed to morph into an "explosive" possibly historic blizzard size "bomb" of weather that is about to engulf New York City and New England. Lucky me to actually be here to enjoy the chaos. I may not be able to start back for Michigan on Thursday as I had planned.

I will take lots of photos even if it's only of the yard because we can't get out the door!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Had a wonderful day. Slept well the night before, too as sis and I had everything done just before 11 and I was able to relax with a glass of wine while watching The Ref with Hal and family. I never have relaxing Christmas Eves!

Here are some photos of the past 2 days.

The home on Christmas eve and then Christmas morning. Notice the difference? Less than an inch, but Bing would be pleased.

Ziggy under the tree

A few gifts from my oldest sister. Is that a Vera Bradley backpack?!

Luna, Ziggy and Lyra being serious on their Christmas morning walk

 A little yule log enjoyment, thank you Hallmark.

Really has been a wonderful holiday. Merry Christmas to all.

The 2014 Christmas Tree!

not quite finished

Little sis and boy friend and Lyra arrived last Friday night. Saturday sis and I went out to the woods to the balsam Hal and I selected and cut it down. It would have been shading the apple tree behind it by the end of summer so it had to go. Turned out to be about 14 feet tall and I had to cut it down a bit which I did about a foot at a time. It's now about 8.5 feet tall. We decorated it the next day and finished Monday morning.

Here are a few more photos.

just needs a heavenly light shining on it

That's me sawing the trunk

Still sawing the trunk

spending the night in a bucket

adding the garland

SQUIRREL!!!

Finished tree

in the dark

It's Snowing, Sort of...

We're under a winter weather advisory or 4-6 inches of snow along and north of the M-72 corridor. Hey, that's me! But so far it's been pretty wimpy and what's on the radar is even wimpier. The center of this storm seems to still be hanging out over in northern Wisconsin. I suppose it's possible it will move this way and swirl around overhead after I go to bed, but at this point, I'm not seeing even the 4 inches happening here. I guess I'll find out in the morning.

But since I haven't much else to say, how about a photo of my 2 pups that I neglected to post back in December?

Luna, Santa and Ziggy

Edited to add: Barely 2 inches of new snow. Barely enough to shovel! YAY!

The Walking was Mushy Today

Had a bit of a warm up starting yesterday when it hit about 32 during the day, then it rained all night and today it actually hit 41.5 f. I took the pups through the usual trail around the swamp and though I planned 3 trips around by the time I got half way around I dropped that to 2 and by the end of round one had had enough. The effort to keep my feet from sliding left and right felt as much as if I was trudging through 3 feet of snow. Next walk we went up the driveway and back and while that was better it still wasn't much fun.

But I took this opportunity to see if I could get the Christmas lights off the gutter since the icicles had all melted. I succeeded though I had to leave a lot of the hangers which were still encased in ice. Got drenched in the process between the water dripping from the roof and the rain which had restarted but it felt good to have that done and not having to stare at unlit lights till March.

They're calling this the January Thaw though after weeks of tens and sub zero nights anything in the 20s felt warmer, but you don't know how cold it's been till it gets above freezing. What a difference.  Felt good but I'm actually looking forward to the ground freezing solid again so I can walk the dogs and enjoy it without worrying about falling. And it looks like that will be in a couple of days.

Packing up Christmas

First I'll mention that the intrepid travelers from Massachusetts made it home without incident yesterday.

Meanwhile, back at the swamp I am slowly taking down decorations and packing them up for storage. Yesterday Hal tossed the tree onto the front deck and I dragged it down the yard to the pile of tree limbs and remnants of previous Christmas trees at the edge of the woods. I have emptied the tree stand and put it with the others acquired over the years in the basement. I filled up one big box with the "good" ornaments, those that have special meaning or are just rather nice to look at. Lights went into a separate box, the LEDs and C-7 strings that my brother and I put up for that nostalgia. I bought 2 more strings of those after Christmas at Home Depot just in case we want to do it again. Those types of strings are getting harder to find. (And I always made sure the lights were off if we were going out,)

Old, meaningless ornaments went into another box with the nice garland on top. While pulling the box out of the loft to put the wreathes away I found an entire box of decorations for the table that I didn't even think of using. I really need to go through what I've got and get rid of some of this stuff. I've got way too much of it.

I also took the decorations off the driveway tree. It is really hard to see though. I am hoping a better tree will sprout up for next Christmas.

A little more than halfway up the driveway.