10th day of spring, tra la

Look, we have brave little crocus buds:

 

Sadly, they will be under 12 inches of snow tomorrow if the weather forecast is accurate. 

We have been trying to get the painting done in the bedroom so Ameranth can move in before she moves out for her trip. We sanded the floor lightly, just to remove dirt, vacuumed and rinsed it off. Then it got two coats of paint, which turned out to be a shade very close to that in the other two rooms in the house that had old floor paint. We finally decided on the color for the drawers and nightstand and did those  last night. They need a second coat, then we need to do all the touchups where little spatters and drips have landed. 

 

The true color is darker, like the frame in the background. The nightstand is from a bedroom set that was J's aunt's in the 60's and was a horrible aged French Empire yellow. Much better now.

Last big thing to be painted was an old brass bed. It was rusted in places and worn in others. So we used Rustoleum spray paint to give it new life, and I think the gray hammered metal will go nicely with the other colors in the room.

It's killing me that I only bought 2 cans and will have to get another to add a second coat to this. And if J doesn't get into work tomorrow, I'll have to wait until Saturday to finish the paint. Then 48 hours before we can put it together.

I shake my fist at you, possible April snowstorm!  And yes, I bite my thumb at you as well.

Nature vs Nurture

I am once again using my family emails as a source of fun. I do enjoy our sense of humor and have to believe a lot of it is in our genes, reinforced by family interactions. Our first reaction to just about any situation is a joke and a laugh, which is not a bad thing, I think.  So here we go, starting off with my father's email earlier this week.

Grampa Bob: Surprising. Several days ago Ma fished out five dead frogs from the pond, laid them in the garden nearby. Picked them up yesterday; they were flat, black and dry. Took them out back and laid them out on some firewood; thought they were too neat to throw away.. She desires to tack them up on trees, whether as trophies or as a warning, I do not know.

Me: LOL- And I wouldn't buy the leprechaun tree face yesterday for J because I thought it was too much!  Reminds me of the time Sectaurs found a hen head and foot after a weasel raid and kept that for awhile. (not indoors)

#2: How about making dead frog wind chimes?

Griz (Montana cousin) : Use the frogs and get Sectaur's chicken head and foot. Call it a native american spirit chime and it could be worth a lot of money.

Grampa Bob: Post Script

   Ma and I have been outside, our pickup duties we were doing and have done.
    I got my first glimpse of her 'saved' frog bodies just moments ago.
    Naw....they wouldn't make good chimes - even with a chicken head and leg.
    Be lucky to get a husky rasp out of them.
    Any other bright ideas??
    But thanks, anyway!


Me: I don't know- if you added a few more bones/feet for the noise and used the frogs as the part hanging down to catch the wind?  Or frog whirligigs!


#5 : Okay, here are the frogs we are talking about - it is a little macabre to say the least... but if you put little bells on their feet maybe some wind chimes.....

 

Me: I think the worst part would be sticking holes to hang them up. Yuck.

FLAyankee (aunt in FL) : we're at chat and your father just said they are empty shells...........I think a burial is in order..................

#2: If you had another you could arrange them on toadstools like they were playing cards.

#3: OK I say just reconstitute them! you know like instant frog soup or something!
actually a little bright colored paint and they would be objects de art.

Ok big news for me (or I am terribly excited about it!-and dead frogs leads me right into it!!)
M and I attended a fund raiser for nursing scholarships last night and I bid and won a gator hunt in Tx!  I am soooo excited about this- it is on my birthday weekend to boot- which leads me into-hmmm- purse, shoes or if big enough? boots? and then what color?

so anyways- I also get the head and feet- and also plan on bringing meat home too-so if we can combine the gator and frogs- well I think- jeez- no wait Gumbo!

#3 again:  ya know I am also seriously regretting that last year when I had 5-6 big dead frogs that I, too, did not save and dry them. Oh well.
         ....................................................................................

Patience, Young Grasshopper

Friday was a wonderful day. The temp was in the mid-50s and the snow visibly disappeared, hour by hour. Saturday morning it snowed a little, and was raw and windy. No problem, Spring was starting Sunday and that was one last mess.

Sunday was another nice day, and the hens were let out of their coop to get their feet in the dirt. Their yard is still snow covered, so we opened the big door on the other side.

 

Oops, you can see our Christmas tree now too!  Doing the dishes later, I glanced out to see a mound of brown at the edge of the yard. It took a few seconds to realize it was hens dustbathing, not a dead bear or deer! I know, I know, but it was one of those brain-clicking-into-gear moments. 

I tried to get a picture, but by then hens were up and jockeying for position.

 

So that was Sunday. Winter is done.  Another season over and a new one begun. Monday it snowed.

Tuesday, it was still snowing, just a little more to top off the 5 inches we now have on the ground.

 The hen dirt bath is in the center of the photo above. Oh well, spring snow disappears quickly. It better because I will not get the snowblower out again. (Unless we have a freak storm in April like we did that one year) As I was taking these pictures, I heard the snow sliding off the roof (not onto the step I had just shoveled and was standing on, thank goodness) and tried to snap a photo in time. You can see chunks going by the chicken coop window if you look closely. Metal roofs are why we have  had those massive heaps of snow along the house-they really are 3 feet shorter now, since the snow used to cover that nearest window.

Since our neighbors are still snowcovered right along with us, I wouldn't really mind knowing we get spring a little later up north here if I could pretend everyone was in the same boat. But thanks to our family emails, I know Texas has been dry and in the 70s, as has Florida. My aunt has been weeding (!) and my brother has been figuring out how to calibrate his spreader for the proper chicken manure distribution. Colorado has had warm weather too, though Shoeshine has been too busy to appreciate it. A cousin in Montana went camping this past weekend, but at least had the grace to also have snow out there. Connecticut did get a little snow, and so did Rhode Island, but it was very little. My parents have been out cleaning up the lawn and installing a new pump in their little stream!  And my poor little 2 inch tall daffodil sprouts are back to hibernating. As am I.

      Can't forget this- Happy Birthday, Grampa Bob!

It's the laughter we will remember

I've been busy cleaning out a file cabinet and a desk, both of which have had papers stuffed in them for years with minimal sorting. Three bags of 20 year old tax returns, partial-year report cards and repair records for cars long gone were taken to the dump today. I now have overstuffed neat folders for each of us with papers and memorabilia that I wasn't ready to throw out yet. The kids will each be presented with theirs and they can decide to keep it to show their children or dump it now. (Well, the two that have houses - I'll hold on to the others for a bit)

I saved the notes and pictures to the Easter Bunny and Santa and the homemade birthday cards, or course. It was fun looking through the school reports, with the notes from the teachers about each child.  Not so much fun with some of the later notes, when some started having trouble, or causing trouble. Reading the "Needs Improvement" categories now just screams ADD- why didn't we pick up on it then? (Though I did bring it up, believe me. At the time it seemed if your child didn't have the H for hyperactive, he/she didn't qualify, though both were diagnosed later when they were in their 20s).

The best stuff was the notes and letters we have- a birthday poem for J from Ms M when she was in the Peace Corps, letters from Shoeshine written from his post in Kosovo, and the newsletters my father used to mail out before the transition to the family emails. 

When Ameranth was in elementary school she had to take medicine, which started as a liquid since she had trouble swallowing pills. A few years later the prescription changed and she had to start with the capsules. What drama! I was impatient with her and she was stubborn- not a good combination for success. (Later a new dentist told us that she has "tongue thrust" or infantile swallowing- some kids never grow out of it and she was one- she still needs to wear her retainer to keep her teeth from moving forward) Anyway, Grampa Bob sent a helpful note: