Would he or would he not?

Instead turn that in to
Woody

or Woody Knot

Make that Mr. Woody Knot


Duke thanks you all for your well wishes and wants you to know that he did feel just a wee bit better yesterday. We were able to hide his pill in some food last night so we were both happy about that.

A request

A small request today that you keep Duke in your thoughts. He hasn't been feeling well and had to go to the vet yesterday

His breathing is very fast, he hasn't been eating and in general just not acting like himself. The vet took x-rays, blood work and a few other tests and believes that it could be pneumonia. She put him on a steroid and antibiotic to start with. He goes back on Friday for a follow up to see if the medication is helping at all. Giving him pills is usually quite easy since I just wrap it in some food and give it to him. Not so easy when he's not interested in eating. We have to do it the hard way. No fun for either of us. He's not totally out of it but you can tell he's not himself.  He didn't even lift his leg one single time while we were at the vets and we were there for over 2 hours. Being the nice little guy he is, he did greet the other dogs in the waiting room and shared friendly sniffs with them.

Should have, could have, would have

I should have prepared a post for today

I could have if I hadn't been doing other things

I would have but I've run out of time.

Look what's coming

Hey look over there, right around the corner.

It's getting closer can you see it yet? Do you know what it is?

It's the weekend rolling in fast and that's got mom whistling a happy tune. Of course she still has to make it through today but we're thinking positive here and it's going to fly on by

What would you think

I was looking out the back door one day to see if there were any bird on the feeder. At first I thought I must be seeing things

Was I really seeing an arm sticking up from the ground in my neighbors yard?

Why yes, that's exactly what I'm seeing.  This was part of the work done in our back yards to relieve the flooding problem we had for years. There is a grate in my neighbors yard for access to the pipe and there is also one in my yard. The one in my yard is round and thankfully it's of to the side and not right in the middleof my yard like this one is.

I'm not sure what he was doing down there but it made for kind of a creepy looking scene so I couldn't resist taking the pictures.

I'm happy to report that all this work paid off. We have not had one river running through our back yard this year. It's been wonderful. Of course we don't have much of a lawn but hopefully next year we will again. It took them forever to get back to put down grass seed because of all the rain we had earlier in the year. We have some grass now but it's not looking so good and we're most likely going to have to reseed. Then we also did an additional drain for the lowest part of the yard which is right by our basement door. That dug up some of the grass that started to grow. Oh well, a temporary inconvenience for a permanent solution

A freebie

Years ago I had a swing. It had two padded seats with an arm rest in the center. After years of sitting in the sun the fabric was less than attractive and would fall apart just by touching it. The swing ended up in the trash but we kept the frame that it was hung on.
I've been wanting to buy a new swing for some time now but this time I wanted a wood one. It would be more durable and I could always add cushions for a little more comfort.
A couple weeks ago one of Wade's friends gave us an old wood swing. He had it in his shed and wanted to get rid of it and we were willing to help him out.

It can use a coat of paint and definitely some cushions but otherwise it's in pretty good shape. I'll be swinging again in no time.

How to build a better mouse trap

When you want to build a better mouse trap, what's the first thing you think it needs? Most people would say it needs to be more effective at catching mice.
I on the other hand don't need my mouse trap to catch mice. I need it to look cute, stick to my refrigerator and hold notes.

I started by taking them apart, discarding some of the pieces that weren't necessary for my purposes and giving them a coat of paint. Then I glued on scrapbook paper and assorted other doodads and put them back together. I finished them off with a magnet on the back.

Random Junk

My little disappearing act was totally unintentional. It started with coming home from work last Thursday and hitting the couch as soon as I got in the door. I was so wiped out I slept until dinner time then took naps until it was time to go to bed.
Friday I was filled with far too much energy to sit in front of the computer and it just sort of carried on through the weekend.

During the week, after I finish getting ready for work I have time to sit and have my coffee and read some blogs before I head out the door. Last Friday I grabbed my cup of coffee, sat down at the computer and before I could read one single blog post I clicked on the wrong part of the page and wiped out every single post that was in my news feed. Sorry if you were one of those that I trashed. I really didn't mean to.

Last Friday we also got that cement poured finally. Now the guy who built the deck can come back and finish up that side of the deck. He stopped by Friday evening and said he won't be able to get to it until the end of the week. No biggie. We've waited this long what's a few more days.

Yesterday I baked 2 loaves of zucchini bread and gave one of them to the guy who has been loading us up with zucchini from his garden. I'm going to try out another recipe that someone else told me about. He cooks zucchini with italian sausage, green and red peppers and some tomatoes. Says he lets it simmer for an hour or so.
I've also done zucchini on the grill. I drizzle it with olive oil and sprinkle with assorted spices. YUM!!!

Anyone have any favorite zucchini recipes to share? I still have 5 big zucchini to get rid of.

What's in your oven

I've been baking bells.

Yes, you read that right. I've been baking bells.

Cheap dollar store jingle bells to be exact. I took those brand new shiny bells and made them look old and grubby.

A tray just coming out of the oven. This is actually the second batch. The first ones I did were an antique white with cinnamon sprinkled on.

You mix glue with the paint color of your choice, sprinkle on some cinnamon and then pop them in the oven until they're dry, flip them over and do the other side

The cinnamon makes them look a bit rusty. Now I know not everyone is fond of the look of rust but it works for primitive and rustic crafting.

These will eventually be used in various other projects.

Decked

I seem to be getting very good at telling you about things and then never following up with pictures. How long ago was it that I told you about getting a new deck put on the house?  It really isn't finished yet, we're still waiting for the second set of steps to go on but before that can happen we have to have the cement poured for the patio section. Trying to get someone here to pour a cement slab has been like pulling teeth. 

Any way, I've got a couple pictures, taken at two different times of day

When they built this I said I didn't really care too much about details but the only thing I insisted on was that we had to have gates on the steps to keep Duke in. The guy who built it said that they had gone back and forth trying to decide how to do the gate and they finally opted for what you see here. I wasn't sure about them at the time but now that they've been there a while I really do like it. There is also one in front of the pool so Mr Duke can't swim unless we tell him he can swim.

This is a bit smaller than the old deck but it's still plenty big enough for us. Pay no attention to the filthy pool. It hasn't been a good year for swimming and an even worse year for pool maintenance.

Hopefully all will be completed soon. They were here Monday some time to set up their forms but then the rains came. No if we can get it to stop raining they'll be able to come back and pour the cement.

Trying something new

I've seen a lot of pictures of paper piecing and had been wanting to give it a try. This was about a month ago but here's what I did.

I can't remember where I found this pattern but if I find it I'll come back and link to it. This is as far as I got with this because I can't decide what I want to do with him now. I suppose he should be appliqued on to something but applique is another technique that I have yet to try. For now he just sits there and looks cute.

An old one

This is an old post that I know went live a long time ago but somehow reverted to draft back when blogger was having all those problems and posts were disappearing. Since I don't have anything else ready and you all love Duke here it is as written back in 2011

Hello everyone. Today is my day just like the title says. So here's a picture of me inspecting the back yard.

Today was also the day my mom was supposed to have jury duty. When she checked last night though, her number was dismissed so she didn't have to go. She got to stay home with me all day long. She said that even though it was nice to have the day off it kind of sucked because she won't get paid for today now. She only gets paid for the day if she actually goes.

Any way, since it's my day to post whatever I want, I found a really funny video to show you. I hope you like it as much as I did.

Birds and Blooms

Don't you just love weekends when you can sit back and listen to the birds and watch the flowers grow?

I'm cleaning out the folder today and I found a few more pictures I had from the birds nest that we were keeping an eye on earlier this year.

And how about a bloom to go with those birds.

Hope everyone's weekend is off to a great start.

Selfies

You may (or may not) have noticed that I have a new profile picture. A month or so ago I decided that the one I was using was a bit outdated and I didn't really like it all that much. It was time to get the camera out and work on taking some selfies and get a new profile pic.

I can't believe I'm going to show these to you because some of them are really hideous but what the heck, it's all in fun.

I of course ended up using this one

Duke said it looked pretty good and he liked my hair and wished he could try it on. So I let him

It's all I've got

I have yet to work with any more of the hundreds of pictures that await my attention before they can appear on the blog. Not to worry though, I do have a few old ones that are standing in the wings ready to make their blog debut.

How about another page from the art journal? Page 2 

After taking this picture it occurred to me that there was no actual sparkle on the page. I did add some but didn't take another picture so just pretend like the word sparkle looks a bit glittery. 

Andover show highlights

I've got a little bit more about the craft show today and some closer looks at a few of the things I made.

The first item sold on Saturday was my stick wreath that I blogged about last October. I sold it for a mere $5. I probably should have made a couple more of them.

This is a jelly jar that I coated with my home made modeling paste, painted with my glue/coffee mixture then when it was dry I wrapped some burlap around it and tied a circle of fabric on the top with jute and plopped in a tea light. I think the tag on it said simplify. I sold that for $3. Someone also bought the little stuffed pumpkin sitting next to it

A closer look at the table.

Marble magnets for a quarter and cinnamon pumpkins in the bowl next to the magnets.

Recycled tin cans that were decorated and I put dollar store silk flowers in them. I sold 2 of those.

Before the rains came on Saturday it was very hot. We listened to the couple next to us argue and then when the storms started oh boy did they start arguing.  

The lady on the other side of us sells jewelry and this year she also had scarves. I saw one I really liked but told Debbie I probably wouldn't wear it and she told me to make myself wear it so I bought it. When I got it home Wade thought it was stupid so I think that's going to make me want to wear it even more. I can't even describe it so eventually I'll get around to posting a picture of it.

Where to begin

Part of yesterday I spent sifting through pictures. When I plugged the memory card into my computer I discovered there were 357 pictures on it. I knew it had been a while since I'd moved pictures to the computer but I hadn't realized there were that many on there. A bit overwhelming but oh well.

I'll just give you a few from the craft show for today.

Our booth once we were all set up on Saturday morning

My side. I sure do have a cluttered looking table.

I guess I'm a bit of a booth hog since I took up more than half of the back table.

And this is Debbie's side

I'm back

I made it through the weekend and today is recovery day. All in all it was a good weekend. Our day was cut very short on Saturday due to some unruly weather but we didn't let that dampen our spirits (much). I didn't sell nearly as much as I had hoped but I'm blaming that on the rain.

Today it's going to be  cleaning everything out of the car and putting it away and catching up on blogging and emails. I've also got a ton of pictures I need to get off the camera and resize for the blog. For now I'll leave you with raindrops on leaves.

Happy Monday!

Finch in the house

Or make that House Finch on the feeder