Fall

It's "fall" here in Florida.

You can tell because the humidity is lower.

And the temps are a little cooler in the morning.

I love October in Florida.

It's still warm enough for me,

but with the drier air,

it just Feels good.

But.

Last week Kyle and I were able to

spend some time out in Utah together.

And it's FALL there.

Holy Beautiful Colors, Batman!

The trees were all turning and the colors

were totally amazing!

Such brilliance and vibrancy!

We have a maple tree out in the woods.

About every third year or so

it gets a touch of frost or a wild hair or something

and it's leaves will turn red.

But it's nothing you can count on.

And if you miss it?

Oh well...

But THIS!

Such beauty!

I guess it's what carries you over for the months

and months

and months

and months

of freezing and cold and white and snow and ice

and frost and cold and ick.

It's ok.

I'll take Florida.

I can fly to Utah for some color.

My Amazing Mom

I have been out of town for a couple of weeks.

And when I got home,

it was time to celebrate my Mom's birthday!

And now (better late than never)

it's time to honor her here.

(It's gotten to be sort of a tradition...)

This is my beautiful Mom.

I was thinking the other day about some of

my memories of my Mother.

My memory did a giant time skip and went back

to the EARLY days.

When we were in elementary school.

The teachers in Calgary went on strike,

right at the beginning of the school year.

So Mom kicked into gear,

set up a table in front of the fireplace in the basement,

set up her sewing machine,

invited a couple of girls from the neighborhood

(Moanna and Lani I think...)

and taught us to sew!

She has always been an amazing seamstress

and we were all taught how to sew and many of

us continue to make clothing today.

(I don't sew much now - but I DID sew lots of

clothes for my kids when they were small...

Such a blessing!)

It's a skill I'm grateful for.

And I especially appreciate her patience in teaching us.

I taught my Activity Day Girls how to sew a simple

straight seam (to make a t-shirt bag)

and BOY does that take patience!

That's a pretty typical story of my Mom.

She was always ready to jump in and help out.

No matter what the need might be,

she saw it, analyzed it, figured out a way to fix it,

and went into action.

She still does.

The greatest tribute will always be the giant

punch bowl full of cards and letters from all

the people she has helped in ways great and small

over the years.

When word got out she was battling cancer,

the letters and cards started pouring in.

Each with a personal note sharing a time she did

something to make their day / life brighter.

What a great example of selfless love and service.

She and her beautiful sister, Karen, are such great

examples to me and my beautiful sisters.

(although they are better at remembering to take pictures

than we are...  I was with two of my sisters last week.

None of us took a SINGLE picture of us together!)

(Yes, I know Mom - shame on us!!!!)

Guess we'll just have to get together again...

Oh the horrors!

(grin)

Happy Belated Birthday to my Loving Mother!

I love you dearly Mom!!

Slick Rock

Kyle and I are in Utah this week. 

I didn't bring my laptop. 

On purpose. 

But I have my tablet, 

so I'm trying a blog post on here. 

We drove out on Tuesday. 

OK, he drove and I read to him. 

And then I let my Kindle read to us. 

We stopped just past "Hole in the Rock"

And Kyle tried his hand at climbing. 

He is the speck about 3/4 of the way

up the picture.

He said it was a little sketchy coming

down since he was wearing OLD Chucks.

We are having a great time visiting

with Nancy and Reid (who left today)

And Sondra and Greg who are graciously

letting us stay at their vacation home

in the mountains. 

More to come. 

Stay tuned! 

Faaaallllliinggggg

Welcome to FALL!

Of course,

here in Florida,

the only thing falling

is

RAIN!

Kind of hard to tell,

We call this Liquid Sunshine.

It's POURING rain,

but the sun is shining.

(If you look close you can see the shadows...)

Fall brings shorter days,

cooler temperatures

(84 instead of 92)

and pumpkin spice EVERYTHING.

Because the days are shorter,

I now get to bring you

Sun RISES!

Sun.

Rising.

Over the Indian River.

Pretty, isn't it?

If I EVER see a colored leaf,

I'll be sure to take a picture.

(palm trees don't have leaves)

Random-ness

So...

I washed eggs last night.

The girls might be finished with their

fall moult.

I got an extra 10 eggs yesterday.

Fingers Crossed!

(They have been slacking lately...)

We generally get 60 eggs a day.

Lately we've been running around 40.

AND

I found another colored egg!

We are now getting 1 green

and 1 OLIVE!

It's a dark olive (when wet)

and quite pretty!

Anxious to see what colors the other

10 are going to give us...

We are planning to "harvest" more rabbits tonight.

We have 3 more males and one

useless female.

And then next week I want to do another

4+ females.  We have WAAAAAY

too many.

I'd like to keep 3 breeders and Bob.

But we'll see.

Meanwhile.

All is well.

Kyle is hoping to get on the road in two weeks.

He is getting anxious to move.

(He has been anxious to move for about 2 years.)

But now the time is getting short.

I'm just anxious.

(grin)

Make it a good Thursday!!!

Funday Monday

I guess I was busy.

Just realized I didn't blog AT ALL last week.

Oops!

But I'm here this morning.

(ok, technically it's afternoon...)

I taught the first weekend class of a

LONG marathon run.

I will be teaching every weekend

from now until Thanksgiving.

(unless something changes)

Class was GREAT - 9 students

and a re-train of a good friend of

mine who is coming back to the

teaching fold...)

I've been teaching at my new school

for about 4 months.

And we still don't have a locking cabinet

for all my junk.

There IS an older cabinet that belongs

to the school,

but it's full of random stuff

and it doesn't lock.

The guy who owns the office has promised

to empty it out and fix the lock.

For 4 months.

Sunday Rod was coming into town to

visit with his Dad, so Saturday night

I went to WalMart and bought a hasp

and a padlock.

On his way to visit Pops, Rod stopped

by and fixed my cabinet!!!

AWESOME GUY!

He showed up while we were at lunch,

so his noise wouldn't disturb us.

So thoughtful.

And he left me a present.

He made a sticker like this one for the back

window of my big black truck last year

for our 32nd anniversary.

Cute, eh?

It was pretty big!

I LOVED it!

(the students did too...)

Unfortunately, I had to erase it to finish the chapter.

What a guy.

On Monday, I took the day off to recharge from

the weekend of teaching/training.

Rod and I decided to start the day with a ride.

It was pretty hot, but PRETTY!

The trails are very overgrown.

This is what happens when we don't

get out there regularly.

I plan to get back out there and trim

this week.

The horses were both goofy.

They haven't been off the property

all summer long and forgot

everything they ever knew.

Sigh.

Rod has a TERRIBLE time getting CJ

to stand still while he tries to take pictures.

He did get a good picture of HIS view.

I love pictures with horse ears in them.

And then he got SNEAKY!

He just held his phone up over his head

and shot a picture going down the trail

behind him!

And it worked!!!

(Yup, Andy is SLOW...)

We enjoyed the ride.

Then Rod had a bunch of chores

he needed to do.

And I had a bunch of errands to run.

So we each went about our day.

Unfortunately, after running the

plumbers' snake 75' through the pipes,

making a trip into town to rent a

professional one,

nearly killing Kyle

(ladders, roofs, heavy machinery - not a good mix)

(thank goodness for the neighbor's tractor!)

they discovered they have no idea what is wrong.

Sigh.

And about that time, it was time to go get

the missionaries.  We had them over for dinner

last Monday.  As always, at the end of the meal

they asked if there was anything they could do to

help us out.

As always, we declined saying we had a good

handle on everything, except we need to butcher

some rabbits and get them in the freezer.

They immediately jumped on that and said they

would love to help out!

So we made arrangements,

and yesterday was the day.

We planned to butcher as many of the males

as we had time for (we have 7 or 8 males)

Ended up with 4 done.

The young men learned all about the process.

From shooting (they had to just watch since

they aren't allowed to handle firearms)

to hanging in the tree,

to skinning,

gutting,

butchering,

cooking,

eating.

It went better than I expected.

I was surprised which one butchered

and which one declined.

Which one ATE rabbit

and which one tasted, but opted for chicken.

All in all, it was a fun, entertaining, and

enlightening experience.

They both agreed its a skill they may need

in the future, and both said they COULD

do it if they needed to, now that they know how.

But neither are rushing out to start

a meat rabbit herd.

(everything on our property comes in herds...)

(We have herds 'o birds, herds of dogs,

herds of rabbits, and of course, a herd of horses.)

(and don't forget a HERD of buffaloes)

All in all, a good day off.

(And there are 2+ rabbits resting in the fridge

ready for the freezer...)  We will "do" the

rest of them Thursday evening.

4 seems to be my limit.

At that point my hands start to ache.

Hope YOU had a great Monday!

(We took pictures, well, the GUYS took pictures)

(I didn't)

(And don't normally put those on my blog anyway...)

Green Eggs, No Ham

On February 28, 12 little girl chicks were hatched.

The next day they were stuffed into a box

and mailed to me.

The little yellow puff balls were Jumbo Cornish.

The majority of whom are already eaten.

Although there are still some in the freezer.

YUM!

The little dark babies with stripes are Easter Eggers.

I have been very IMpatiently waiting for them to start laying.

And this week, ONE of them finally decided to start.

Aren't they cute???  They are kinda tiny

but definitely GREEN.

(My adult Easter Egger, Bunny, lays blue eggs,

but has been "on strike" for a month or so now...)

So, I'm anxiously awaiting the rest joining the fun.

Their eggs can range anywhere from light pink to blue,

green, or even brown.

One of my little black silkies started laying this week too.

Really funny torpedo shaped, almost white.

Didn't realize it was her until last night.

She was YELLING her head off when

I went in the coop to collect eggs.

There, on the floor behind the shavings bin

was that weird shaped egg, still warm.

Must be her's.

(Nobody else was in the coop...)

(They had all flown the coop...)

(Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha)

Yah.

I know.

So anyhow...  the girls are finally

growing up.

Whew!

About time!!!!!