Clouds

Howdy. Have taken a few days off and probably won't get to anything tomorrow due to Joanna needing to spend the day doing homework (on my computer--of course!). Wanted to let you know that we're all alive and well if slightly off our proverbial rockers (but that's to be expected).

An October Day

Good morning! Obviously, I did not write yesterday. I decided to take the day off from such endeavors. Was it worth it? I’m not sure.

I had an appointment with the nurse practitioner yesterday and ended up seeing the doctor instead; not sure why. She says that my ankles are still swollen. If so, they are in a constant state of being that way. Actually, I still do have a couple of knots on my left ankle and they do still swell up a bit distally but otherwise, we’re good. She should have seen them when I went in the first time. Anyway, she said that because my rheumatoid factor was up, she wanted to retest it. She also said to limit my salt intake to 2 grams or less. Seriously? Contrary to popular belief, I do not overly salt my food. I am not going to change my diet to restrict the amount of sodium I am eating. Hmmm, just did a quick check because I wasn’t sure if she said salt or sodium because they are not the same. One teaspoon of salt, which is about 5 grams, contains about 2 grams of sodium. So, in order to limit my intake to 2 grams of salt per day, that would be less than half a teaspoon and I’m pretty sure if I ate a completely raw food diet, I would probably get more than that. Just doing a very little bit of research on the amounts of sodium in the various raw foods that I have on hand and would be most likely to eat confirms that I would indeed be consuming more than the allotted amount. What does this mean? I’m going to pretty much do what I do.

Back to the retesting of my blood. I went straight from the doctor to the lab. I shouldn’t have done that; I should have gone home (or to Armstrong’s but that’s another story) and loaded up on the water for a day or so and then gone to have my blood drawn. Anyway, I went straight to the lab. I got poked in the right arm. Nothing. I got poked in the left arm. Nothing. I could feel veins there (I felt after she applied the tourniquet and before she did the alcohol). I guess she could too, but between the time she felt and the time the needle got there, there was nothing. She even used a butterfly on the left arm and told me a semi-fallacy in that it’s a smaller needle. The length of the needle is indeed smaller but the diameter is not. I learned that from Joe at Reliant. Anyway, she used a butterfly on the back of my right hand and finally got something. Butterflies are a lot slower than regular needles so she got about the bare minimum needed for the test and called it good. I would have done the same thing. Anyway, that was my blood drawing experience for the day.

After that, I went to the Armstrong’s to get the letter that Margaret had for me for the doula program at Heywood. I needed two letters of reference and was told Tuesday that I needed them by Thursday. That’s not a lot of time so I did what I could. By the way, Diane, you wrote one for me as well. Modern technology is a wonderful thing and I know that you would have had I had known sooner; I just hope you don’t mind that I did it without talking to you about it first. 

When I got home, it was time for lunch. I did some dishes and washed another shelf from the refrigerator. I think there are two left and then the door. Zack was here and because he has a truck, Paul asked if he might help Joanna get the wood from the bottom of the hill where he cut some a week or two ago. They didn’t do it. I guess getting food for lunch and watching a movie was more important to Joanna. It’s a pain not having the truck here and a pain that the back hoe won’t go forward. Kind of makes life difficult in some ways. Joanna did go pick Seth and Joseph up from school.

Seth and Joseph had soccer practice yesterday. I made soup for supper before we left so that it would be ready when we got home. We dropped Cedric off at Ryan’s house on the way to practice. Seth’s practice starts at 5:00 so between then and the time Joseph’s started at 5:30, I walked around the trail three times. Then I walked another three times while their practices overlapped. Then I walked another three during the last half hour of Joseph’s. Worked out pretty well, I think. Nine times around is approximately 4.05 miles. It took an hour and a half but I had to take a break to get Joseph up to the right field for his practice and at the end of Seth’s I had a few words with him. Straight through would have taken probably an hour and 15 minutes which is not bad considering I used to do 4 miles in an hour at the gym. I think I’ve already mentioned that it’s easier to do that when you can set the speed to what you want because it just goes.

This morning I have an appointment with the chiropractor. That is at 9:00 so I need to leave by 8:30. A bit earlier would probably be better; we’ll see how it goes. I am going to forgo a shower before I go because I need to do some things when I get back that will probably require getting dirty and I don’t want more than one shower although I have to admit that the warm water does feel nice sometimes. Today likely will be some of those times because it’s not terribly warm in the house.

I forgot to mention the wonderful day that yesterday got off to. I went out to milk and fed Kitty like a normally do. Before that, I had gotten Amena a lunch ready. When I got back in, it was 6:25 and she was still upstairs doing whatever. Five minutes later, she was still upstairs and the bus was at the end of the driveway. She still didn’t appear. The bus makes another stop not far beyond the other end of the driveway but she didn’t make it out in time for that either. She missed the bus. She almost missed it once before but yesterday she well and truly accomplished it. I had to get lunches ready for the boys and make sure they were up and getting ready before I could take her, nevermind that school starts at 7:05. It takes almost half an hour to get there, a few minutes to drop off and another almost half an hour to get back home. That does not leave any time for supervising boys and getting lunches ready. Joanna did jump in to the rescue and took her. That was great because I was able to do what needed to be done.

That was the beginning. The ending was similar in a different way. I don’t think Seth had a particularly great time at practice; he was grumpy afterward. His behavior during prayer and scripture reading was not good but neither was Joseph’s particularly stellar. They got to bed, Cedric finished the homework that he had almost none of but still should have finished before going to Ryan’s and went to bed. Amena went to her room but not bed. Paul got home and must not have had a very good day at work because he wasn’t in the greatest mood and complained about the tires on Laura’s car and the wood not getting done as well as a few other things. I bit my tongue because nothing I had to say would have improved the situation. He went up to his office for a while before going to bed and I went up to bed to work on a talk for Sunday. That was my salvation; working on it kind of melted away all of my irritation and my mood was greatly improved by the time I turned out the light. I even read two chapters of Revelation before.

And now for another day. I hope that you all have a fantabulous one

Really?!?

Good morning! Amena made it on the bus. Barely. The boys made it on the bus. Almost barely. What a morning.

This is one of the shirts Paul got me. Pretty cool, eh?

When I got home after Seth’s soccer practice, I beheld three children in the living room watching a movie. As it turns out, they all had homework that hadn’t been done.

Wow. Let’s backtrack a bit.

Yesterday day was pretty noneventful . I didn’t get any sewing done but I made two lime pies in the morning. I did more laundry; that was pretty exciting.

And this is the other. I really wanted to wear this one yesterday but thought it might not be that great for an interview.

At 3:00 I had an interview at the hospital for their doula program. Having taking the training from toLabor twice, I’m not excited about paying $250 for Haywood’s program but at the end of a year if you’ve done everything you need to do, they give you $100 back and it would get me working as a doula which is a step in the right direction. I hope the interview went well; I never know about these things. I need to get to them a resume and two letters of reference. By tomorrow.

On the way home from that, I stopped at John’s in Gardner to get some patches for Cub Scout uniforms. Now we’ve got everything we need for the general stuff; I need to figure out exactly where they are and what they need to do in order to be caught up and then we need to get to work. Because Joseph is just starting out, he’s in good shape. Cedric and Seth are both very behind where they would have been had they stayed in Hubbardston.

On the way home from that, I stopped at Agway and got some sweet grain and alfalfa pellets for the goats.

When I got home, Cedric was gone to Ryan Trottier’s house. He lives over on Ragged Hill and has cute little twin sisters. He and Cedric are on the same soccer team. I don’t mind Cedric going over at all. If he has his homework done. He didn’t but I didn’t find out about that until later.

I had enough time to get peppers and onions cut up and sausages cooked and cut up and get everything cooked and together in a pan on the stove. I left it simmering and took Seth to practice. While he was practicing, I walked around the path five or six times. I think it was six but I kind of lost count and it might have only been five. 2.25 miles isn’t quite as good as 2.7. If I can get up to nine times around I’ll be doing four miles plus a bit which would be nice. I was walking four miles in an hour at the gym but it’s a lot easier to keep a steady pace when you have a machine doing it for you and all you have to do is keep up.

When Seth and I got home, I found an Amena, a Cedric and a Joseph sitting in the living room watching a movie. None of them had done their homework but I didn’t even ask about that because I needed to get supper finished and on the table in 20 minutes. They stopped the movie or it was over, I don’t remember which, and cleared off the table and then got it ready. I did a salad, cooked pasta, and turned some hoagie rolls into garlic bread. It took 30 minutes instead of 20 but still, not bad. Then Paul got home; he didn’t have any missionaries with him. We were already sitting down and dishing up because it was getting late and some people needed to get to bed and...what is this?...do their homework? What? It wasn’t done?

Paul called the missionaries and they said they thought they weren’t coming over tonight because the calendars were blank. What? I signed up for the English speaking on the 1^st, 15^th, and 29^th and the Spanish speaking the 8^th and 22^nd. Paul saw the calendars and took note that we were signed up. Someone really needs to get a grip on these calendars. They get filled up and then something happens and they start over again. Irritation, man. Irritation. We have a ton of this food that is quite edible and not too bad but is no one’s favorite so it’s going to take forever to eat it all. Not excited. At all.

In other news, the state of our political affairs is almost enough to warrant using, as my children call it, swears. What a bunch of freaking idiots. I haven’t looked at any news this morning so maybe things have changed but given the general climate of things, I kind of doubt it.

This is what I saw last night (at 10:10 if you can read that in the bottom right corner) when I was looking for some information. This is whitehouse.gov.

So. My opinion. The Affordable Care Act and Obamacare seem to be the same bloody thing worded differently. They were passed legally. Great (please read the huge gargantuan amount of sarcasm dripping from that word)! They were passed legally by politicians doing what they do best—lying to the general public to make us (as a whole—not speaking for myself or a lot of people I know) think we want them. Never mind that they (the lawmakers) won’t be subject to them. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander, people. Suck it up. Either live with what you passed or get rid of the monster. Better yet, get rid of yourself.

This is where the one above took me. Pretty cool, eh?

My opinion. If memorials and forests are going to be shut down for the citizens of this country to whom they belong, then they need to be shut down for everyone. Did you catch that? EVERYONE. Did you hear about the rally in DC about immigration reform? They opened up the mall for that. What a bunch of political hypocrites. Actually, since politicians are hypocrites, I guess they weren’t being hypocrites, they were just being what they normally are. Do they really think it is okay? Never mind that question; obviously it is ‘yes.’

In spite of the political turmoil, it is a beautiful day outside and I hope you have a splentacular day!

Weather

Good morning! Beautiful day today! Some clouds, some blue sky, some wind. The goat is milked, the goats are out. Kitty has been fed. The boys have lunches ready to go. Amena didn’t miss the bus in spite of cutting it really close. Cedric and Joseph both like vanilla yogurt with blueberry jam (they both say that they like blueberry yogurt but Paul will only buy Market Basket brand and they only have plain, vanilla, strawberry and peach); Joseph is even having seconds. Seth finished the container of strawberry and is now going to have cereal.

Today marks two years for me and Paul. It’s been an interesting two years, for certain.

Yesterday afternoon/evening our schedule looked like this:

4:30-5:30 soccer practice for Joseph

6:30-7:30 cub scouts for Seth at Pitney’s

6:30-7:30 cub scouts for Cedric at Carignan’s

What it looked like is this:

Soccer practice for Joseph cancelled due to weather. I got an email but not until after 6:00. I decided about 3:30 that we just weren’t going to go because it was rather blustery and wet out.

Scouts for Seth cancelled due to weather. I got an email sometime in the afternoon and Seth was disappointed.

Scouts for Cedric was cancelled due to weather but only because it caused a power outage in the part of Hubbardston where Carignan’s live. Cedric and I drove over and met Nia at the end of their driveway so I was at least able to give her the registration forms for the boys.

I wanted to go to Walmart but Cedric didn’t so I took him home. On the way home, we had to stop for a train. First time in Massachusetts I’ve had to do that; nothing like in Idaho when we often had to stop for one or more where it was an odd week when we didn’t have to stop at least a few times in our comings and goings. I dropped Cedric off and went to Walmart where I got a couple of anniversary cards and a York peppermint patty. The cards are for Paul, the York was for me.

Cedric’s 1770’s shirt is done other than buttons and buttonholes. I am going to work on Seth’s today. It would be nice to get it done since Halloween is fast approaching.

Other than that, I did a bunch of laundry yesterday. Pretty darn exciting if you ask me.

Today Seth has soccer practice and we are feeding missionaries. I guess I’m going to give sausage caccitore (sp?) a try. I am not excited because all it is is sausage, peppers, onions, canned tomatoes, and spices served on noodles but Paul has been suggesting it for weeks so I guess it’s time to give it a go. I juiced a bunch of limes last night and the plan is to turn the juice into pies today. Paul brought home some romaine lettuce last night so the plan is to turn that into salad. I kind of think Italian food just doesn’t excite me right now. Or maybe it’s the noodle aspect.

Well, have a fantabulous day!

First Offering

It is a drizzly day out this morn. Kitty left her first offering of a mouse on the porch as well. I took her out with me to bring in the two buckets that were left in the field so I would have something to feed Snowflake out of while I milked and told her that she was a good girl and gave her lots of kitty love. She went out with me to milk also but bailed ship as I was sitting down. I wanted to teach her about drinking milk as I squirt it at her but so far all that has happened is she’s gotten it all over her and she doesn’t like that. Not sure she’s going to learn at this point.

We are having no end of problems today. Seth is being a pill to Joseph and wearing a shirt of Cedric’s that has bleach spots on it. Cedric didn’t have any clean underwear because he didn’t empty out his bags from Nature’s Classroom like I told him to last night. Joseph can’t find his toothbrush. I can’t think of a whole lot to say today. Seth doesn’t have any other clothes to wear other than what he has on which is the previously mentioned shirt of Cedric’s and a pair of shorts that he wears every day and to bed last night. He says he has no clean shorts. Well, if they would have brought me dirty clothes yesterday like I told them to, we wouldn’t have this problem, would we?

There were some good talks in conference yesterday. I know that many of them would not be popular with current social mindsets but that doesn’t really matter. I absolutely agree that what God has decreed, man cannot justify and no laws that men make will make it okay to disobey God’s law. I am happy to note that political correctness was mentioned as something we ought not to strive for. I’ve already given my opinions on that so I will spare you at the moment.

Up for today is a lot of I-don’t-know. I do need to get grain and alfalfa pellets for the goats. I’m not sure if I will go all the way to Hardwick. I don’t know that I even want to go as far as Winchendon. I might just go to Agway in Gardner. Yikes, what a scary thought. I guess I’ll be doing some laundry as well. I’ve actually got a load on washing right now that is mostly Cedric’s which means I won’t have to fold much of it. I like that. I don’t mind the washing or the drying, even when I hang stuff up outside to dry. But folding, that is entirely another matter altogether.

Cedric can be such a good older brother. He likes to make sure that the younger boys don’t miss the bus which they surely were working toward by just sitting up in the bedroom talking. I already informed them that I am not giving rides to boys who miss the bus—they would have to wait until Paul left for work today.

And Joseph almost got to. We have cubby holes on the front porch for people (mainly boys) to put their shoes. If they put their shoes there, they don’t get lost. But a couple of little boys insist on forgetting to do that simple task and end up not being able to find their shoes. Joseph, for example. This morning he could find two shoes in his room, but they are not a pair. There was a pair of sandals on the porch but he didn’t want to wear them. He went to his room to find shoes, found one but not the other, heard the bus, ran outside, took the time hide the sandals, the bus arrived at the end of the driveway and I went outside with another shoe (not a match for the one he’d found) and he magically found his sandals and put them on his feet before running down the driveway to catch the bus. All of this stress could have been avoided had he just done one simple thing—put his shoes in a cubby hole on the porch.

Sigh.

Have a fantastic day!

Post title

Good morning! It is a lovely rainy day here. It has also been windy which has caused many of the leaves to fall out of the trees which will cause the trees to not be quite so lovely when the sun comes out but it will be ready for the coming winter. Oh, yeah!

My day yesterday didn’t turn out quite how I was expecting. Paul took Joseph to his game and Amena went along. Cedric went with me and Seth to Seth’s game. It was nice being able to watch his whole game even though he wasn’t in a whole lot. Still, he did a good job and they won 7 to 4. I think. I’d have to check my phone to be certain but they did win and the game was good.

I didn't get many pictures because the battery was really low in the camera and those I did get weren't that great.

Because I didn’t go to Joseph’s game, I didn’t get to the coop and of course neglected to ask Paul to get the grain that I would have gotten. Therefore, we are currently out of sweet grain, almost out of alfalfa pellets and getting low on crimped oats. I foresee a trip to a feed store tomorrow.

I had to 'borrow' this one from Serena LaFreniere.

Other than that, things were pretty much as expected. Our YW leadership meeting was almost twice as long as I was hoping for but not any longer than I really expected as there was a lot to cover. Realistically, we could have gone longer because there were other things we could have discussed but they will lend themselves better to the next meeting which will be here before we know it.

I was perusing Facebook earlier and ran across a picture of guards guarding a veteran’s memorial. Really? They can’t pay people to have it open but they can pay people to keep people out. Really? Are you kidding me? Talk about government waste. It reminds me of when we lived in California and Brent told me about waste committed by the Forest Service. Piles of logs put to fire rather than letting people go in and cut it up for firewood. Flagrant waste. The logs don’t belong to the government; they belong to the people, if you can say they belong to anything other than the earth and their creator. Reminds me of Al Gore telling everyone they need to buckle down and use less energy in order to have a smaller carbon footprint when the reality is he used (or at least used and I can’t see him changing much) more in a month than most people use in a year. Buckle down. Ha. A typical politician expecting the masses to do without while he can do whatever the heck he wants.

On that cheerful thought, I am going to go shower and all that fun stuff. Have a spectacular day!

Autum Has Arrived

Friday

October 4, 2013

7:26 pm

I’m going to start this even though I expect Paul to arrive any moment at which time I will be out of here.

Monday afternoon Trista moved from the driveway to the old tractor parked by the garden to be in the shade. When I checked next she’d moved under the screen house. When I left with Joseph for his soccer practice, I didn’t see her anywhere and when we got home, I couldn’t find her anywhere. I told Paul when he got home and he said she was back in the driveway. In the morning, she was on the top step outside and she moved to right in front of the door. She died sometime around 8 in the morning. Paul buried her in front of the garden because it’s a good place and because the backhoe happens to be there. I miss her sad eyes but she’s definitely feeling better now than she was.

While Joseph and I were at his practice, Seth decided to go for a bike ride.  He didn’t tell anyone where he was going, he didn’t wear a helmet, and he was alone. Those are the three no-no’s. When Joseph and I got back, I went out looking for Seth. I went down Pitcherville to Birches and then Ragged Hill to 68, to the park in case he’d gone there, and home again. I didn’t see him anywhere. When I got home, Joseph said he’d been to the house and had taken off in the direction I’d gone. I don’t know what he was thinking.

Saturday

October 5, 2013

6:55 am

But what ended up happening is that he was grounded from riding his bike for a week and he didn’t get to go to his den meeting because I spent the time and fuel it would have taken to take him to look for him. Not a happy camper but he has to learn that he can’t just take off like that.

Tuesday was a rather uneventful day. Seth had practice and we had lasagna for supper.

Wednesday was a half day for school. I went to Boston in the morning and had the boys ride the bus home because I wasn’t sure if I’d be home in time to pick them up from school. I wasn’t. When I did get home, which wasn’t long after they did, we had lunch and then Seth, Joseph and I went for a walk down Pitcherville Road to take pictures of the leaves and pick up acorns. Picking up acorns wasn’t part of the original plan or we would have taken bags with us. We did get two pocketsful and lots of good pictures and just generally had a nice walk. It was nice because there was time to go for a walk, there wasn’t any homework, and we had lots of time to eat supper and for me and Amena to get ready for church. Joanna was home to stay with the boys so they didn’t have to tag along and everything was cool. Nice day. I would love to have more of them.

Japanese lanterns. We have lots of these in the yard.

Thursday during the day was fairly uneventful. I got a bit of sewing done on Cedric’s shirt for the boys outfits. I need to get to work on them and get them done. After school Joseph had scouts at the library at 4:00. Seth had practice at 5:00. Joseph had practice at 5:30. So, we left for scouts at about 3:50 and got home from the last practice about 6:45. It was a beautiful day.

This is near the house.

Yesterday morning I went to Boston again. I took Ruth Britt and Laurie. As we were leaving Gardner it began to rain and I wondered if the goats would be alright outside. We needed to be to Boston by about 9:45 so I technically did have time to run home and let them in because we arrived at 9:15 but when driving to Boston, the traffic is never a given and you don’t know what you’ll run into, sometime quite literally, so I thought it best to just go and let the goats be out in the rain. They usually don’t want to go in just because of a little rain anyway. We stayed for lunch and then came home. I got back in time to continue on to Hubbardston and pick up the boys. When we got home, I changed and then went to pick up Cedric from school. I called the school Thursday to be sure what time the Nature’s Classroom students would be back and was told 4:00. I got there at 4:00 and most of them had already been picked up. I think I should have been there at 3:30. Cedric said that they were in Holden at 3:36 so 3:30 would have been a good time to be there because I would have been able to get a parking spot. Actually, it probably would have been fine to just stay at the school with Seth and Joseph and let them play on the playground while we waited.

I love the color.

Today we have soccer games in Barre (Seth’s) and Hardwick (Joseph’s). I’m going to take Seth to his in Barre and then take Joseph to his in Hardwick. Then I’m going to pick up grain at the coop. After the first half, I am going to take Joseph and return to Barre to watch the last 15 minutes of Seth’s game and then we will come home. I am grateful to Riley’s mom for taking Seth to and from games the last couple of weeks but I am tired of not being able to watch any of his games. I haven’t watched one of his in its entirety yet. After soccer, I need to go to church to have a Young Women’s meeting between sessions of conference. Then I’ll come home again and watch the second session at home. And I think that will pretty much be the day.

I never thought I'd be happy to live near a swam but they do make for interesting pictures.

Tomorrow I’ll let you know how close to right I am about today’s scheduling. I have decided that Joanna’s needed to use my laptop for school on Tuesday and Thursday mornings as well as an occasional other day or two for homework is for the birds. It has really thrown off my groove in writing every morning and I feel like I’m slacking. I don’t really want to get into another groove because I like writing in the morning as opposed to later in the day so we’ll see how the rest of the semester goes. It only lasts until the middle of December.

See?

I have to apologize for no interesting comments about anything as of late. What do you think of the government shutdown? Quite interesting. I think we tend to make too big a deal about almost anything anymore and I really think that we are proving to the rest of the world how inept and stupid and idiotic we are as a nation. I do not by any means think that we all are but by and far it appears that the majority of our population is. In reality, I think we are little better than the North Koreans who are so brainwashed that they believe anything their government tells them (I’ve read a couple of interesting articles about that lately). We believe anything we see/read/watch on the internet or in the news even though it tends to be far from the truth. We have become so politically correct that we cannot express our true thoughts. Our rights are being eroded at a terrifying rate. And, if Obama and the Democrats have their way, we are going to have Obamacare in spite of the majority of our population not wanting it. Since when is 40% a majority? If only 40% of the nation wants it, why are they even considering passing it? Not a single one of them has read the darn bill (who would want to read 2,000 pages of political double-speak?). I’ve read some pretty long books in my time but none of them were 2,000 pages and they were interesting as I’m sure this bill is not. It probably is sickening. One of my Roper cousins said, “Democrats say it's the Republicans' fault. Republicans say it's the Democrats' fault. I say they are probably both correct about that.” I agree.

This is about as far as we went. A couple of cute boys in there with the trees.

Have a spectacular day!