Friday, March 27, 2009

A Darby update

Darby had to go the vet this morning. I asked her if she was ready and she said yes.


We were called into the exam room and she looked around. There are all kinds of scary looking things in here.


She was told that she had to get a shot. This made her kinda sad.


She hears the door open.


G sits in the chair to wait till its all over.

She was a very good girl. She didnt even cry. Now we are on our way to the feed store to get her some more puppy kibble.

We arent as lucky as Wendy...who has a drive thru feed store where they wear their good hats AND give you chocolates. So, I had to bring my own help. The bag is almost as big as him.

But hes got it all under control.

On our way home she was all tuckered out.

Sigh. Home sweet home.


Monday, March 23, 2009

Was it the tooth fairy?

This morning I was going about my routine and spotted this when I was back in my bedroom.


Did the tooth fairy visit me? Or maybe it was a secret admirer....ohhhhh...do I have a secret admirer? Lets look closer.


Even better. Its from K. How exciting! A little box from my K. Lets open it.


Ohhhhhh....Ahhhhhhhh.....How pretty. She made me a necklace. AND its in my favorite colors ever.


And up against a white backdrop. Still PRETTY!


Lets put it on my llama. What? They like to look fancy sometimes, too.


Oh, I know. My hen would love to wear it. It matches her quite well, I think.


And if Im gonna let them try it on its only fair that I let Darby try it on, too.


Okay, okay. Im done sharing now. I wanna try it on.


My K is the sweetest girl ever.

Friday, March 20, 2009

Seedlings

Several weeks ago, S and I set out to get our garden beds all planned out. We have decided that we will do some raised beds this year. So, we needed to work out a few more numbers than usual.


Having all that part done, then we just sat back and waited till it was time to get busy. (Planting seedlings, that is). And after I procrastinated as much as I possibly could...well, then Ang had to go and get her planting groove on....So, not to be left in her dust...I had to get going as well.

We gathered all of our supplies.


You may have seen these little tomato seed packets surfacing on other blogs. I have to pay my thanks to Danni who alerted me to the great program that Wintersown was providing and Im pretty sure that Danni was thanking Chiot's Run for telling her....Im not sure how much farther back then that it goes....but Im saying a huge thanks for everyone. Thank You, everyone.


We got all our little peat pellets in their trays.


The we added some warm water which causes them to soften and puff up so that you can put your little seeds in there.


And look. I even have my pants rolled up in celebration of garden season. (and you guys thought it was just because I was short, didnt you?)


About now was the time that G decided to have a full blown meltdown. It was time for his scrubbin and he made it very clear that he was not done helping plant seeds.


J trying to make him feel better.


K made all the little labels for us.


While J and S and I did all the planting.


Tomato seeds just make me happy.

As you can tell, Darby wasnt much help with the planting. But she did manage to stay out of trouble so we could get it all done.


Once we got it all done we put our custom made labels in to identify the different varieties.

We popped the lids on.


And then they got moved to the seedling station downstairs. Where they will be for several weeks. The lids will stay on till they begin to sprout. Once that happens then the lids come off and the lights get turned on above them. (Im getting smarter about all this stuff now since I have the best mentor ever. Thank you for ever and ever, Ang.)


Monday, March 16, 2009

The drama of it all

A few days ago K was having a sleepover at a friends house. She called home that evening all distraught and fretting over a huge disaster that had just happened. WHAT?, WHAT?, I say, after listening to her voice and hearing all the sadness and concern hovering there. (In the back of my mind I am listing off all the terrible things that must have happened) She says, I brought my beads over here to M's house and on the way something terrible happened. The container got turned on its side and ALL my seed beads spilled ALL over. (Oh for cryin out loud)(I say this in my head) Oh, okay, well have you tried picking them up perhaps? Well, they didnt actually spill on the floor. They all just spilled into each other in the container and now the colors are all mixed up and its going to be impossible to sort them all out and its just awful, mom. Okay, well, it sounds like you have a couple options. Sort them out. Or not. Everything will be fine. Just find something else to do for now and we will figure it all out when you get home.

Fast forward to yesterday. We finally had time to assess the situation and this is what we found. Every single color has now merged with another becoming what they sell as rainbow mix.


This is the size of a single seed bead.

This is the size of many seed beads.


This is going to call for some serious specialty tools.

The spoon allows us to remove the beads from the little cubbies.


The card? Yeah, I had to ask, too. S said, well, I was thinking I could use it like you see the pharmacists counting out the pills.....So, what begins as a pile then gets moved around with the card in hopes of some actual sorting going on.

There was A LOT of discussion on how this was all going to work out. Would it work out? What would be the best way? Was there a BEST way?


And of course, strict supervision is required.


And everyone knows that supervisors require snacks.


And when the supervising is over, well, then he needs busy work. Or we would have have had an even larger seed bead mess. So, what began as this.


Got turned into this.


He really made quick work of that entire bag.


After what felt like many hours of sorting and led to several original cases of "a pain in the neck":


We salvaged what we could and they went into this new container that has separate locking cubbies. So as to avoid another seed bead disaster.


And then, we threw in the towel and declared these unsorted beads, the recyclers. The dreaded, dig thru the tub looking for a few spares....

But, shhhhhhhh. Dont tell K. They had all these for 50% off at the craft store.


I think it should be more than enough to get her going again. They will wait for her here, on the counter, until she arrives home from school.