A great Agility Day

I thought this day started off to be a good day, spent half an hour writing up a really interested (i thought) blog, and the @#$% thing shut down on me… and as much as i love the “window live writer”, it doesn’t save itself automatically , so here we go again…

Denise and I had a great agility weekend.. left Merritt about 2 pm on Friday… took her little ‘Pip’ over to Christina (our groomer who just moved over to Kelowna), had a very nice Chinese dinner and head out to the camping spot next to the arena.. a nice quiet spot, other than the coyote howling and the pheasant calling in the wee hours of the morning.. and our little ‘Jesse’ thinks she is a watch dog and she has to bark..so we had a terrible night sleep… and were worn out on Saturday, plus it was hot…Jesse and I did okay, we ran our ‘Standard’ course..which consists of jumps, tunnels, chutes, A frames and a dog walk…(about 18 obstacles) to ‘Qualify’, or ‘Q’, you both have to run the course with no mistakes, and with-in a set time frame… First run, we ran clean and with-in the time.. I was delighted as i have been struggling with this part for a year now…Denise didn’t do as well, as the heat really bothers Pip..(he is Jet Black)..at day’s end we went looking for a camp ground..found one, was a little tough but clean, we were able to shower, which was the best part…  Sunday we went to a 2nd trial.. right in the park by the lake in Kelowna… beautiful park, so we parked under some lovely Maple trees.. so stayed in the shade all day… Denise did better on Sunday, and ‘Q’ in one of the games, as did Jesse and i… ours was ‘Jumpers’… it is a series of jumps and tunnels, and you have a set time to run the course… which in this case was 48 seconds..again there were about 18 obstacles.. and we ran the course in 46.35 seconds, so for those of you who know me.. that was a grand run.. this is “Jesse” coming thru the tunnel.. don’t ya love the grin.. this is the finished Chicken house from 2 angles, pretty fancy for a chicken house.. there are two inside pictures.. this side is for the meat birds and laying hen chicks and the other is for the turkeys, can’t believe it is all ready to go and the chicks won’t be here for 10 days… that man deserves a medal.. these are two 45 gallon barrels of manure tea… can’t wait till they start to stink

this is Jackson.. his feelings have been hurt lately.. not getting the attention he used too.. this picture is of  my currant bushes,(about half of them) mostly black, with about 2 or 3 bushes of red..

Levi and I are off to agility classes tonight.. sure glad we don’t do much in the beginners class… he was sure glad to see me last night.. you would have thought i had been gone for a month instead of 2 days… We are off again on Friday to a 2 day trial in Kamloops, on the road to ‘SunPeaks’… I have a friend who lives up there, so i called her this morning and begged a shower for Saturday night, and she very kindly said we could…

The Fall retreat is FULL already… seems to get full faster every year.. i am sure there will be some cancellation as there usually is… oophs… better go, it is our coffee time.. i go out and spend a half an hour with that man of mine… have a great day…

Belated Mother’s Day gift

One disadvantage of living so far away from one’s Mother is that you can’t spend the day with her… my friend Glenys has the same problem, so we decided to make a flying trip down to the coast on Tuesday last week, pick up her Mom, and then my Mom, and take them out for lunch, which we did… we ended up at the Olive Garden in Langley, had a good visit and a great lunch…Olive, Glenys’ mom is a real character, 91 years old and a real sweetie.. very bright and intelligent… she has a hard time getting around, but is very easy to talk to… her and my Mom Violet got along really well… i had to laugh at Olive she told Mom, that Mom had a happy face… I have never thought about Mom that way before..they both seemed to like each other..Glenys never did find the shoes she was looking for…but we had a good trip, although it did tire me out..i left home at 8 am, and got home at 7… and most of that time was driving.. in traffic that i am not used to… but it was a good trip..

Took Levi to our first agility beginners class on Monday, and he didn’t do too bad…considering that i have only had him 3 weeks, he was interested in the other dogs, and didn’t want to pay too much attention to me… but he finally relaxed, and wanted to play with his toy..he did want to bite my hands as we were going over the jumps, but i got the water pistol out and gave him a shot or two, and he quit biting..I figured out why he has had so many homes… we must be his 4 or 5th..he POOPS in the house…and has very bad gas…i feed him about 2.5 cups of food every nite, and i think the other night i must have cleaned up about 5 cups of poop, so he is not getting anything out of his feed… my son Matt feeds his little Min Pin ‘Orijen’ and he says she poops like a rabbit now… so i bite the bullet(the stuff is expensive) and bought him a bag, and started feeding him a cup in the morning and one at night… no mess last night, and NO GAS.  Have Jesse this week too as we had classes for her yesterday, and then we are off to two trials on Saturday and Sunday in Kelowna..she is always good, DIL told me that Jesse was sick for 2 days after our last trial, which explains why she did so poorly that weekend…i have put her on the ‘Orijen’ too, as she has bad breath..

Hopefully Denise my agility partner will be feeling better, she has very high blood pressure, and it was ‘stroke’ high for the last couple of days, she ran out of meds, and was having a tough time getting it back down..will call her later to day to see how she is feeling…

We have a huge flock of “Evening Grosbeaks’ this spring… there must be at least 50 of the little noisy birds..they are even using the bird bath..I fill up the bird feeders every other day… the humming bird feeders get filled every night… we must have at least 20 of those little darlings..

Larry has the chicken house finished, will get pictures of it today..and so ahead of schedule, he has two weeks left before the chicks come on the 11of June.. I have been thinking that he should build one for a little guest house..Mom might come more often if she had more room..and Toni and Isabel could come up before the retreats..and I think Matt would like to have his own cabin… will get Larry thinking about it…  although we would also like to put an addition on this mobile…just enlarge the living room..to make it a dining area and living room… and add more cupboards to the kitchen… I am so short on storage space..I don’t think i will ever win the LOTTORY..sure would have loved to win the 49 million..I am great at sharing…

I have been working slowly on the ‘stole’ for my friend and vet Liz, must not have been paying attention as i screwed up some where and had to ‘frog’ it back a couple of rows… also got the BFL superwash dyed… originally dyed it Magenta, but it was way too bright, so i added a bit of blue, and it is much better now… will also get pictures of it and the green merino and silk (from Isabel)(this one is for me… a lovely little jacket the pattern being the feather and fan) ..I am also taking the alpaca shawl i am working on for Heather to the trials, as it is just a plain knit so i don’t have to think about patterns..

I am off to Kamloops tomorrow, Dr appt and a bit of shopping… I was terribly upset yesterday, was out checking on my fruit trees, and my Ambrosia apple(loaded with blossoms) lay dead on the ground..Larry looked at it, and said it had heart rot..and we had had a terrible wind..or the dogs might have hit it… so i am going to look for a new one tomorrow…i love that apple… my Granny Smith apple tree is very scrawny, but is loaded with blossoms… will pick off some little apples when they show up…the weight will break the tree…. better go and get packed for the weekend… take care…

 

For my friends with a really weird sense of humor

Larry says that i don’t have much of a sense of humour..he laughs at silly things, i laugh at funny things..Him and the boys must have watched “Lampoons Christmas Vacation” every year for 10 years..in fact i bought each of them a copy when they left home, but Larry loves it when they are home for Christmas so they can watch it together…

So anyway i had a very good giggle yesterday… here’s where my weird sense of humour comes in…I emailed my agility instructor “Maureen” on Monday, she emailed me right back, saying her Mother in Law had just died…and that she would get back to me when she could… then Tuesday morning there was a email from her… Her M i L was still alive..  the Intermediate care facility had called Monday morning and said that Rob’s mom had passed away, but when they arrived, the head nurse was waiting for them, telling them that she had come back to life, she had a heart attack and was dead for 5 minutes, then she started breathing again..on her own… well i guess she had several heart attacks all day Monday and her heart had stopped over and over..but she kept coming back..so they didn’t think she would make it thru the day, but she was still alive Tuesday morning, so Maureen asked me to email everyone to let them know… I emailed her back, and apologized as i had really giggled.. when i got home from town yesterday, there was another email, saying that she had passed away, FOR REAL this time…and that the family figured she didn’t like the other side, so kept coming back.. I know some of you won’t think that this was funny, but it gave me a good giggle…

Weather is still pretty crappy… only 1.7 degrees this morning… and it is May 13… also my baby Brother’s 60th birthday…I have a picture of him somewhere in my photos, but i just can’t remember where i put it… I changed the screen saver and now it is a slide show… and some of the funniest pictures come up..one picture was a chewed up brussel sprout that Matt’s little dog chewed up after i dropped it Christmas day..and a picture of him and i taken about 5 years ago, but i can’t find it… guess i should go thru them all… some of them are so out of focus..but others bring a few laughs..

I got all my BFL spun up.. went and dug out my dyeing pot…so will soak the yarn, and get it dyed.. will have to go through all the dyes to see what colour grabs me… i want a soft pink or blue or mauve..as those are the colours that my friend wears..also got one pound of the merino and silk (glacier green) all spun and plied.. now have to get a few projects off the needles before i start on that one for ME… a jacket done in the Feather and fan pattern…

The retreat invites went out this week… and have had lots of emails…Put me on the list… which i can do for a week or so, until i received the $$, i am sure we will be fully booked quickly this fall… 4 new girls are sending their cheques this week…so if you are reading this.. get the lead out and send your money…. talk to ya soon…. Silk

HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY

A very happy Mother’s day to all my friends who are mothers, grandmothers, stepmothers, and guardians of the Husbands..which i think are way worse than the kids.. I have a friend with 2 boys who always tells everyone she has 3 boys… (the husband who never grew up)…

A beautiful day today, 20 degrees today.. Larry is out working on the Fancy chicken house.. he is moving right along.. will take more pictures of it when my batteries charge up, boy they sure don’t last do they..

Jesse and I were in Armstrong last weekend with our agility partners, Denise and Pip..Denise got a new to her, Dodge camperized van… for us to live in… it was a little cramped, but we had a good time, Denise and Pip did really well, while Jesse and I did terrible..i don’t think she was feeling well, she didn’t eat the whole weekend.. and then to top it off, she pooped in the ring.. automatic dis qualification.. how embarrassing, and then we missed qualifying in Gamblers by 1 second..and then in our final run of the day, she peed in the ring… another disqualification..if i had had a bag, i would have put it over my head… brought me to tears..  but we had fun.. lots of laughs…and the weather was good.. Then i took Jesse to classes yesterday, and she ran like a hot damn…no mistakes, and as fast as she could go… for some reason she doesn’t like different dog walks or teeters…I also took Levi with me yesterday, to get him used to the other dogs, and handlers..of course he listens so good at home, but away from home, he doesn’t listen and i have to get angry at him to get his attention… we start our beginner classes with him last week of May..hope there are other handlers who know how to train their dogs… if they are beginner handlers and beginner dogs, it will be a long process..

Went out to supper and cards last night… we had oysters, potatoes salad, and Caesar salad… the oysters were very mild.. too big but nice and mild..the guys whipped our butts in canasta, then we played a silly rummy game, that has no name other ‘”that dumb Saskatchewan game”  I have looked for a similar game on the ‘net’ but can’t find anything close..it is my turn to cook next weekend, and seeing it is the long weekend we might do it Sunday…maybe we will have deep fried turkey…hmmm… 

Oldest son and DIL brought me out a Gift certificate to Canadian Tire… think i will go buy some plants… not too keen on gardening this year… better go and start thinking about supper… will write soon…

Where has the time gone

Hi, where has the last two weeks gone.. I have been busy, but didn’t accomplish much..trying to remember what happened of importance..lots of lovely emails regarding the Spring Retreat… it is so easy to organize as everyone is so much fun… and understands when we ask for something a little difficult… the room we meet in has a hard twist nylon rug, and the fiber glues itself to the floor, so we asked everyone to bring something to put under their wheels,..and almost everyone does… the first year, someone picked up their covering and shook it on to the floor…i just shook my head… this year only one person won’t put anything under her wheel… and it did leave a mess…oh well….

Good news… we got another dog.. i know the last thing i need is another dog… well i took Dixie to an agility class, hoping to be able to take her to an agility trial the end of May.. one class at one trial.., but she showed absolutely no interest, and she had been away from it for 2 months… so she is OFFICALLY RETIRED..several friends had mentioned that a young couple(druggies) had a nice 18 month old Australian Cattle Dog, also know as a Heeler to give away…i had thought about it a lot, as i was also looking at a rescue pup in Prince George..Denise and I went and looked at the Red Heeler, and i decided to give it a weekend try… so i picked him up last Saturday… his name is Levi… my biggest concern was that he and Jackson won’t get along, but i introduced them thru the crate, and then got Larry to hold Jackson on the leash while i held Levi..and they sniffed all the right parts, so we kept Levi on a long line for the weekend, I went to town on Monday and when i got home, Larry had let Levi off the long line, and he was running and playing with Dixie and Jackson..they really get along great… although Dixie tries her darnest to get him into trouble… she has shown him how to get into the sheep pen, and they get carried away… so now only one at a time are allowed loose…I do have a picture of him on my camera that i haven’t down loaded yet…we will start agility beginners classes beginning of June… I have been putting him over jumps and thru the weave poles.. he has the most god awful bark i have ever heard… Heelers originally were a cross between a dingo and a border collie, and he has the dingo bark… we have to make sure he doesn’t use it often.. 

We (Larry and I) also gave Jackson a hair cut, as our groomer moved to Kelowna, and we did a pretty fair job..i have pictures of him too, it took us 2 days to get him finished.  I finally went out and finished the pictures of poor Jackson and some of Levi and just downloaded them… Jackson before his hair cut Jackson with half a hair cut…he got tired Jackson after his hair cut… this is Levi with Denise before we brought him home Levi looking pretty Dixie and Levi snuggling this is the 3 of them chewing on each other… the building in the back ground is my new chicken house… Larry has to get it finished by June 11… our 50 meat birds, 25 laying hens and 10 turkeys are arriving that day… he is working on it all by himself…it is going to be a pretty fancy chicken house…he is a very talented man that man of mine…see ya soon…

Desert Mesa Spring 2009

Another great retreat under our belts…Toni and Isabel came up a day early and spent the night with us…they finally got to met Larry, who they were sure did not really exist…and of course Toni, who is a real dog lover, fell in love with DIXIE… and of course Dixie fell in love with Toni..but then Dixie likes anyone who pays attention to her… We had Ben staying with us for the week, so he got lots of attention and slept with Toni that night…we had a great visit..headed off to the retreat early so had a few hours to waste when we got there..stopped at Coyote corners, and the Jade Shop…didn’t buy much..but love to look…Everyone showed up nice and early so we had a great visit..Jan from AB was a little late, so we were very glad when she finally showed up..i always worry when someone is late…was finally able to give Lynn her shawl..she was very pleasantly surprised, and pleased… this is Bev modeling the shawl at our last guild meeting, it was alpaca and merino.. and very soft and cozy… this is a more detailed picture of the little bit of lace… i had to use stitch markers as you start from the top and work down… so of course when you get to the pattern row, you are working with 163 stitches on each side of the centre panel.. the first couple of tries i ended up with the wrong amount of stitches left over… thanks to the wonder of stitch markers i finally got it right… This is Isabel and her friend Helen from Hazelton.. Beth Johnson reading her gift from the gift exchange… Beth has moved into the interior, and we are so pleased that she loves it here.. Trixie, Heather and Mary, the goofy girls from Vernon..always worth a good laugh when we get together.. This one is Diane, Rosalie, Julia, and Gudie..hard at work.. Renata and Sue concentrating very hard..

We really enjoy our weekend together… I had a real ah haw moment this weekend… I was raised as an “Army Brat”, (dad was in the service), so I don’t have any childhood friends, we all went different directions, as our dads were transferred..I only have one friend left from Highschool and she was my bridemaid..and of course we have gone our separate ways… but i decided this weekend, that my spinning friends have taken the place of my missing childhood friends… and i love seeing them.. it is like old home week when we get together… lots of hugs and plenty of laughs and giggles..

We were all out of there by 1:30, and i was home by 3… i was really tired, but managed to stay awake till bedtime, and by then the wind was really blowing and i couldn’t get to sleep, must have been after midnight before i finally got to sleep..and the wind is really blowing again today, Dixie hates the wind, and spends most of her time in the shop..Jackson barked a lot last night, i think cuz the gate was rattling in the wind..got laundry caught up today, so will go swimming tomorrow… it was great to see ya all………… hugs

Technorati Tags: Desert Mesa,shawl,gift,dogs

Young Parents

We went out for supper at friends’ place last night…had a good supper, turkey burgers, and all kinds of salads…  company was good, a strange mix though… L and I were the oldest, then several other couples in their 40 and 50’s, and then 2 young couples with little ones… the kids were good, but the adults a little strange… i guess they bothered me, as they had such different ideas about raising kids… I raised two grubby, fighting, laughing  boys, and enjoyed every minute of it… the little 3 year old girl, was cute, and well behaved, but her mom drove me nuts… I have never liked whispering…with anyone.. this young Mom whispered to her little girl all the time, instead of just saying “thank Denise for supper” she whispers it to the child, as if the child could think of something like that on her own..Mom was very attractive, but doesn’t like dirt, farm eggs, food that doesn’t come off Styrofoam , food that touches on her plate..and her child getting dirty… they are also working on the child’s potty training, but Mom put her in blue jeans, with a zipper, and a scarf for a belt… looked cute, but the child couldn’t go to the bathroom with out help..it was almost like the child had to be all dolled up, instead of being practical..I guess that is the problem, i am too practical…the other couple were very nice also, but they were vegetarians, and they were (baby included) very pale, I know i am weird, but if i can’t complain to you all, i will fret about it for a while…

Only 5 days to Desert Mesa… not a full house, but we really enjoyed it last year with the same amount of guests..  although i do miss an agility class on Saturday, but one does have priorities… and spinning will always come first.. will take lots of pictures and get them up on here, seeing it is so easy…watching the “masters” out of the corner of my eye… what a beautiful place, i don’t care for golf, but i do appreciate a good shot..Larry is off having a nap as we are off for supper out again to nite… and then again tomorrow nite again for me… going way party for an agility buddy…going out for Chinese, and i do love their ‘ginger beef’… Happy Easter to ya all………. S