Spring Nesting Season

I had a strange visitor to my backyard picnic table last week.  Perhaps migrating back from a warmer climate? Maybe Irene and Jan gave him a heads up on a good place to camp out for the summer. He's very trusting. Cubby thought we should help him build a nest and went around finding twigs and leaves in the yard while carefully avoiding the Gennie land mines. I wonder when the Mrs will arrive at her summer home?

We go on 'CATION?

This week was Spring Break at LCC.  It would have been fun to travel to some exotic, warm, tropical climate but alas that was not to be.  We did make an overnight excursion to Shipshewana, IN, where we spent the night at Splash Universe. Cubby had an absolute ball! The blue area in the front of the picture is the entrance to the toddler pool - 8" deep. Not for Cubby! He wanted to go down the yellow, blue and orange slides. Even the blue slide being a closed tunnel didn't phase him. Claire would go with him to the top, make sure the slide was clear and send him down. I'd be at the bottom and pull him out. Then we would wait for mom to come down. After awhile, he wanted mom and gamma gamma to change places. Yes, another one of those things you only do for your grandkids. Gamma gamma went down the slides too.

The next morning we spent another couple of hours at the pool and then on to Yoder's and Lolly's. I found some new Ricky Tim's fabric that I hadn't seen before and a $5.00 bag of really nice batik scraps. I kept telling myself to exercise restraint because Chicago was only a month away.

Friday was also my dad's birthday so we stopped in Kzoo for presents and Happy Birthday Quality Dairy doughnuts. Now it's back job hunting and homework but it was a good mini vacation

Fifty Degrees Tomorrow!!!

Can you guess what this is?

A doggie snow angel of course!

Gennie and I are certainly enjoying this break in the winter weather. This week is also going to be Spring Break at LCC. Not exactly Florida or Mexico but Lansing shouldn't be too bad this week. Enjoying the sunshine but it sure shows the dirt on the windows.

Sledding - Who me?

This morning Claire and Cubby came over to help me shovel and brave the winter snow. Yesterday, I waded through knee-deep snow to make sure that the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle plastic sleds were still out in the shed. First we sledded down the hill in my front yard and then all (including Gennie) piled into the car to go to the BIG hill at Post Oak. We had a really great time.  I almost got Gennie to sit on my lap on the sled but I was worried that she would try to bail out half way down and we'd end up in a tumbled mess.  More pictures on Claire's Facebook page.

Yes, gamma gamma, I AM the king of the mountain. Hi Ya!

Mea Culpa

OK. I admit it. I hope I don't find a burning "Q" in my front yard. To all of you on fabric fasts and all of you ex - Country Stitches employees, I have strayed and signed up for the $6.00 quilt. There were 75 people at the first meeting - can you believe it? You get the first block for 6 bucks and as long as you bring the completed block in the next month, the next block kit is free. The idea is that you will also find something you can't live without when you come in to pick up your kit. So far I have spent an extra $3. I'm trying to hold my own on the impulse buying...

 
Here is the February block #2. Of course it uses dark colors. What else would you expect? There was also a second, pastel floral choice but that didn't appeal to me at all.

Have you ever tried to get a poinsettia to "rebloom"? It takes so many hours of daylight, so many hours of darkness. So much heat, so much cold, etc.  This little trooper is from Christmas 2008. He spent all summer on my sun porch and I brought him in a little too late, I thought. Apparently, whatever it is that I screwed up was just what he needed and I have been rewarded with a little tiny "bloom". (The flower of the poinsettia is actually its yellow center. The red “petals” surrounding those flowers are modified leaves, called bracts.) Smile for today.

February in Michigan

Last night we got dumped on again. But look on the bright side, it's only half of what they got on the East Coast. I came home from class Tuesday night about 7:30 and tried twice to make it up my driveway. No go. So I had to shovel before I could put my car away.  This morning the driveway didn't even look like I had shoveled at all.

But look at it now!  It took about an hour this morning to get it cleared. The sun is out and it actually felt warm. I have a hard time agreeing that it's pretty since I'm not a fan of winter but it's "OK".

While I was out, the neighbor's garage door opened and I heard, "Oh yeah, this is what I'm talkin' about!". The two little kids next door (4 & 6?) were home from school and much happier about the snow than I.

Is that a polar bear in a snowstorm? No, just Gennie.

Her opinions of snow run right along with mine.

DRAT!!! While I have been writing this post, the snowplow has filled the bottom of my driveway with backwash. Here we go again!

Milestone Birthday

My Aunt Eva in Pennsylvania is celebrating her 75th birthday this week. She has always been one of my favorite relatives and is now my only remaining Aunt. (Unfortunately, that happens as you get older - did I just have another birthday recently? - oh well.) I wanted to send a little surprise in her birthday card so I made this little heart (4"x 4") to let her know how much I love her. The center heart is beaded cross stitch on perforated paper and the rest is wool felt with more beads. I hope she has a wonderful celebration!

Last night I finally finished Lord John and the Brotherhood of the Blade. (Linda, see you at Foster on Wednesday.) It's basically a murder mystery with other stuff - war, politics, a little hot gay romance, thrown in. Not as good as the Outlander Series but Lord John is one of the story lines in the latest Outlander - An Echo in the Bone - so I wanted to catch up on his character before I started reading Echo.

One of the Coffee Jam quilters loaned me a Sharyn McCrumb novel - The Songcatcher. A long time ago, I read She Walks These Hills also by McCrumb and just loved it.  I can't decide if I'll take a break from the 18th century and read that or go on to Lord John and the Hand of Devils.