Quick catch up

Windshield time. I've been spending a huge amount of it lately. 9,000 miles in two months. That's a big fat UGH. But at least on this day the sky was pretty. This is somewhere inbetween Buttcrack, OK and Armpit, OK - otherwise known as Anywhere, OK. OK sucks.

Bubba. What is there to say about Bubba? He is furry. He like everybody. He is a helper. He is Andy's dog. His rapper name is Tu Pak Poo Cap. Ask Andy about that one.

Stinky. Aka Mr. Grumpy Pants. Stinky is a grumpalumpus lately. But I still completely heart him. Cause he is Stinky.

I do. As big as my butt. I also heart drawing on the sidewalks, driveway and street in chalk. It's fun!!!

These remind me so much of home in California. We had them all the time. I also miss California weather. Because AR weather sucks a lot sometimes. As big as my butt and that's big according to Andy.

Hah! God this child of mine just drives me nuts in good ways and bad ways but always, always, always and in all ways the boy just makes me heart swell up with laughter and love. He is due home in a couple of days from a 3 and 1/2 week safari to Africa with my mom and dad. Lucky boy. I can't wait for him to be home.

Me and Tad, or at least our shadows. I loved this picture.

Back before our town turned into the Sahara. I don't know that Andy ever saw this because it just kept snowing. I love the snow. Andy hates it but I love it.

Tad just goofing off.

Tad's new truck. It's a 1986 Chevy with a 350 V8 shortblock, 4 barrel holly carberator, aluminum intakes, glass paks, 33" tires and 4" lift and blah blah blah. I have no idea what any of that means. It's loud and looks neato. It has enough power to see him through but no acceleration to kill him. This was before we had it painted.

This is after we had it painted. It still needs some work but it will get there. Tad hasn't seen it yet and boy is he going to lose his mind. My mom will also lose her mind but not in the same way Tad will. We'll cope with both.

I had to stay the night in sucky OK and was trying to send Andy a cellshot the next morning to let him see I was wearing my new favorite t-shirt but it never would send. The shirt is a cupcake (pretty pink one) saying "Muffins are just ugly cupcakes" to a muffin (ugly brown one) and the muffin responding with, "Cupcakes are haters." I freaking heartheartheart this shirt. Plus! Plusplusplusplusplus! OMG it's scratch and sniff! That part just makes me laugh out loud in delight. I may have to go back and buy a duplicate!

Tad and Smelly Cheeto Kitty. Not a good shot but oh well. Smelly Cheeto Kitty is Tad's cat/my cat. He is a total little miniature version of Stinky. Stinky hates Smelly. Smelly loves Stinky. Bubba loves them both. It's a zoo.

I had the big ugly tree in front of tad's window cut down. What a huge difference it makes in how the house looks. I should have had it felled a year ago.

That's it. All I have time for right now. I'm way backed up on reports and estimates because I took a couple of much needed days off after my dad's death a couple of weeks ago. Now it's time to put the nose back to the grindstone.

Love on!

Fireworks

Morgan likes to blow things up, so Independence Day is one of her most favorite holidays. "I wish it were the Fourth of July every day," she said.

The idea of that is frightening, to be honest. We had quite the war zone over the house the past two days.


Laddie, Morgan's horse, is a big old boy. He seems thrilled about his new digs, too. There's grass to eat, for one. He doesn't pay much attention the two mares that are in his pasture with him, but he's all about the grass.


Over my vacation, I hauled two tons of topsoil and another half-ton of compost to nearly finish the beds along our eastern fence in the back yard. We're undecided about what to plant here, but I'm thinking oak-leafed hydrangea with a row of day lilies along the front edge. We'll see. Either way, it's better than the poison ivy that was there before.


I've also been trying to rectify the soil in the garden as the plants become spent. The area where the potatoes were is nearly free of the larger rocks and I've added compost in. Hopefully, after a fall of this, we'll have a better garden next year.

Andy loves me as big as my butt

So the other day Andy and I were walking back to the car after having gotten lunch down on Dickston Street. I asked him how much he loved me. He replied, "I love you as big as your butt." I instantly fell in love with him all over again. Then later that day I decided to try out the video camera on my new phone. And thus a new project was born! I am now taking a one minute video everyday for a year of Andy. It's massively fun (at least as big as my butt!) and what strikes me the most is how in every one of them we are just cracking up like five year olds. I heart Andy. All the time. More news and updates later. Right now I just wanted to get this video up. Because it makes me laugh. The volumn is a little low because Andy is soft spoken but you can hear him if you turn it up and listen closely. Love on!

Furry Friend Time

Stinky and Bubba have become good friends over the last few months. They have a sort of daily throw-down that lets Bubba play and lets Stinky beat the crap out of Bubba and everyone leaves happy. We call it Furry Friend Time.

Behind the two furry dummy heads you can see how much the flower garden in front of the door has grown. Morgan added a set of solar lights to the walkway that is really cool.

We really need to paint that door.



The garden gets very little sunlight during the day, but we're still giving it a try. I planted beans, garlic, cucumber, peas, hot peppers and corn to go with the herbs, tomatoes, onions, potatoes and even more peas that Morgan planted. Yesterday, I staked the beans and the peas and we caged two of the tomato plants.

So far it's clear that we'll have all the rocks that we can eat.



Probably my biggest accomplishment today was changing out the front tires on the lawn mower. This was no easy task, but with the help from the guys at the local lawn mower shop, I was able to do it myself. It steers so much easier now that it has inflated tires and grease in the steering sector.

I finally sorted out the float situation and have it running pretty well now. The Briggs & Stratton engine employs a gas tank that is lower than the carburetor. That's the source of our problems now. If we mow on an incline and have the tank lower than it already is, it runs out of gas and dies. Not sure how to fix this, but it does better when the gas tank is full.



Morgan also picked up a set of cushions for the redwood chairs. Now we can sit and watch the sun go down, at least until the mosquitoes take over. They were tested out today by a couple who was walking by. The woman had just had surgery and tired out halfway home so they asked to stop. I brought them water and they stayed for a bit before leaving.



The pump in the pond started to poop out, so I rigged up the larger pump that we got with the pond. The water was getting rather murky with just a little pump, but with this big one it has started to clear up. The waterfall is so much nicer now, too.

We added a fern or two and a few flowering plants that I'm not too sure about. The toads have set up shop in our pond which is delightful.

Morgan and her horses

Morgan has befriended a couple who operate a draft horse rescue out of their Greenland home and has made herself useful around their place. The couple work full-time jobs and welcome accomplished help that Morgan can give. Here she is brushing out a horse that she has been given responsibility for.



These two are meant for one another.



She also checks on the other horses there at the rescue and takes care of a horse that has been adopted by Cheryl Best, Morgan's best friend. These two are lucky to have Morgan and Cheryl. After a long while as work horses, they are totally spoiled now.


These are two of the other horses there at the rescue. Their hooves are as big as dinner plates.

Buttercup

Morgan is wanting a horse.

She's wanted one for quite some time now; 40 years or so. (The fact that she told me she is 29 makes this hard to believe, but I decided not to point that out.) We are looking at horses and places to put them.

The above is taken amongst a field of buttercups on a piece of land north of West Fork that is for lease.

Lazy bones

It's been a long time since I have posted any progress that we have made with the house, long enough to have to put up 10 photos.

Morgan contracted with a lawn care service which has sprayed a herbicide to kill the myriad weeds that have set up shop in our front lawn and a fertilizer for what little grass remains. We need to start overseeding once this cold snap moves through.



The plants that we put in during the fall have come up and we have added scores more in the front flower garden. It's starting to fill in, but we haven't had many days warm enough to get things going.



There are now fish in our fish pond and a very understated waterfall to keep them with enough air. The lily of the valley, Vinca and the ferns that we planted are quite happy. I'm not sure if we want to plant the Hosta and the coral bells here, though, since it gets a bit more sun in the middle of the day than I think they would like.



Morgan is not happy that there are ants on her peonies, and telling her that ants are always on peony buds hasn't helped much.



The pansies from the fall are still hanging around and the tulips didn't amount to much, but the peonies that we planted have come up and are doing well.



The shade garden along the east side of the house is coming along nicely, too. The first Hosta on the left side was tiny before we planted it in the nice soil that we made and now look at it!



Morgan's garden is slow to get going, but it's early yet. She has tomato, bean spinach and a bunch of stuff that we haven't put out yet.


We have been working on making a bed along the east fence in the back yard. I got a bad case of poison ivy after pulling all of the poison ivy out of the bed, but it's coming along. We're not sure what to plant in here once we get it filled with some topsoil, but I'm thinking some daylilies and burning bush.



We have bamboo that sprouts up overnight and grows so quickly. This has grown this much in a week.

Creepy.


The 2009 ice storm knocked down several trees in the back yard, this one included. I smoothed the ground around it and it's ready to be ground up.