TGIF!! If I have my days of the week correct, then it’s time to share 5 random things about our week! Here’s mine:

1. Maggie is in the dog house! So her stitches are fine, and if you ask her, she’s 100% and has no clue what all the fuss is about or why I’m taking her on fake walks only to the end of the street and back. So I was outside working with my plants, and I got a new plant — chives — which I transplanted and gave some plant food. Maggie tried to eat the plant food <<insert eye roll >> and I told her to leave it. Then I decided to wash out my standing planter and put all the herbs on the ground on the side of the house. When I went back a couple hours later to move the plants — Maggie had dug out half the soil in my chives, probably eating the plant food or maybe the chives just smelled interesting, I don’t know. I was so mad at her! But it does show that A) She’s feeling good enough to be mischievous enough to get into something I’ve never seen her do before, and B) I’m leaving her out in the back unsupervised so I’m not worried about her.  I am worried about the poor chive plant! We’ll see if he survives.
2. Wizard told me yesterday I couldn’t wash the floors because I’d done too much already. I just looked at him. He goes, “What? You say that to me and I listen.” Ha! Sometimes, he listens. Also, I washed half the floors only because I ran out of time and energy to do the rest. So I guess we both won? (Yes, I do listen…sometimes.)
3. Wizard started clearing rocks and raking out the soil on the long side of the hill (with the retaining wall) where we haven’t planted anything yet and I helped in between making sourdough bread, which was as crazy as it sounds, LOL! I moved tons of rock. Well okay maybe it was pounds rather than tons, but I was happy I could do it without hurting myself. It’s so nice to see Wizard feeling better! We’re going to put my tomato and bell pepper plants there as we don’t think there’s enough sunshine on the other side where I originally wanted them. I’m not even sure I can keep the plants alive and get them to produce, but I’m gonna try!
4. Last week I hit 10 miles of walking on my tracking app. I was pretty happy with that since I only track when I go out for long walks. This week will be much sadder. I think I got one or two 2-mile walks since I feel guilty going without Maggie. I’m trying to save the last couple hours of the audio book HARD DAY FOR A HANGOVER because if I don’t have Maggie with me, I love listening to it while walking. I just need the time in the morning when I tend to be busiest!
5. I made and froze four layers of 8 inch found cake so I can decorate them for fun when I get the inspiration and chunk of time. It’s nice to have the cake layers in the freezer, ready to go when I am.

That’s my five (I know, I’m soooo bring these days!), now I’d love to hear yours!

HAPPY FATHER’S DAY to all the Dad’s!

Before I get into the blog, I need to say I heard Monday night that Julie Garwood died. It feels like the world has lost a truely original talent. I loved her books! I want to thank her for sharing her sweet, funny and sassy romances with the world. I adored her heroines!

Now I want to share a conversation I had yesterday. I was standing in line at the grocery store while clerk was trying to stalk the point-of-sale racks there — you know the ones with the candy bars and snacks — and I was trying to stay out of her way. She stopped stocking, turned to me and shyly asked, “I see you in here all the time, I wonder how you stay so in shape?”

I was caught by surprise, and said something I think was polite and nice, but what I remember is away she said next. “I try so hard…” and she went on to describe her workout and how hard she works to eat right and she said she was 55. I would have guessed her to be late 30s, maybe early 40s! I told her how floored I was because that she looked much, much younger and that I thought she was lovely.

She was very gracious, but the weight bothered her and she told me some “old friends” had commented on her weight. I could feel that in my heart. This beautiful woman, who also appears to be kind and hardworking from what I could see, was really distressed by a few extra pounds. And I’m not only sad for her, but pissed.

For the life of me, I can’t understand why people would focus on something as unimportant as putting on a few pounds when this woman appears to have so much more to offer? I’m just mad, sad and disgusted about it.  I’ve had people say things to me over the years too, we probably all have. Sometimes, it’s just people with foot-in-mouth disease and say stupid things and I try to give them a pass. God knows, I’ve occassionally suffered from that disease myself and I’m always mortified.

But others? I think they are looking to bring us down to make themselves feel better. Which is utterly pathetic. Given that this women looked so young, maybe that triggered others’ insecurities, who knows?

What I really wanted to end with today is that each and every one of you have a special kind of beauty. Let’s all try to listen to our friends and family who recognize our positive beautiful qualities and ignore the mean idiots who find our insecurity and comment on it. They are the pathetic ones who don’t deserve our attention.

P.S. I’m not in any particular “good shape.” I think this women just needed to talk to someone and I’m glad I was there at the right moment.

Happy Monday!

So first Maggie; the lipoma on her belly turned out to be a hernia, but now it’s repaired and she’s healing great so far. Our biggest issue is limiting her activity as she thinks she’s just fine. She is being very good about wearing the shirts I have for her to keep her from annoying the wound. One story; for two nights, I had her sleep on the floor by me so I could watch her. I didn’t get much sleep because I reacted to every sigh. So the third night I put her in her onsie (a shirt with snaps to keep her from getting to the wound) and told her to go in her kennel. She did that willingly, but I didn’t want to be too far away from her so I slept in the guest room. I shut the door but figured I’d hear her.

I didn’t hear something about 4:30 a.m. but it wasn’t crying or barking, it was movement in the house. I told myself I was dreaming or Wizard was up early and tried to go back to sleep.

Twenty minutes later, Wizard opened the door and told me Maggie got out of her kennel. Maggie bounded in, soooo proud of herself! Since the closed door prevented her from seeing me, she happily woke up Wizard. The first time he pet her, turned over and went back to sleep, thinking I was up. But she woke him again and he knew something was up.

Long story short, I didn’t latch the kennel right, and she must have turned around in her kennel and inadvertently pushed the door open. This isn’t really a surprise as I had noticed it didn’t really catch, but I thought it was partly latched and didn’t worry. I was obviously really tired.

Anyhow, Maggie thought she was an amazing magician for this incredible feat of escaping her kennel, LOL. I’ll make sure a latch catches tonight, only because we want her to sleep as much as she can and she rests better in her kennel.

Otherwise the weekend was fairly quiet. We bought and planted four plants (limiting it to be careful of Wizards back, which is improving steadily!). Saturday night we went to a neighbors to celebrate their sons high school graduation. We only stayed an hour as we aren’t leaving Maggie alone for long stretches until we know the stitches are healed enough to keep her from opening them, but we had a great time. And twice I went out for long walks without Maggie. I feel weird and guilty doing it, but I do take Maggie out front on a leash or slow-walk a few houses down to the mailbox before I go. I’m reading a non-fiction book that would probably bore you all since it’s by a gastroenterologist, but I’m consistently and slowly trying to teach my stomach to handle a bigger variety of foods. To stay on track, I do a mind-numbing amount of research.  On the lighter side, I’m listening to a book by Darynda Jones, it’s the third book in a trilogy (or is it a series?) — A HARD DAY FOR A HANGOVER. I’d listened to to the first two books a year or two ago and forgot about the third I’m enjoying it.

How was your weekend?

TGIF!! I would sure love to know where all the time goes! Okay, enough whining, let’s dive into sharing five random things about our week. Here’s mine:

1. It’s Thursday afternoon as I write this, and Maggie is at the vets getting her teeth cleaned, her tummy mass removed (we are pretty sure it’s a harmless lipoma), and they’ll check her ears. This week she suddenly developed itching and misery in one ear, so we’ll see. Could be anything including allergies, AND she was a boarding just about two weeks ago so she could have picked up something or other.
2. I’m sure Maggie will be fine, they’ll call me when she’s ready to come home. But I’ve kept myself crazy busy so I don’t have time to fret and worry I cleaned the carpets in the front of the house, did the laundry, went to Trader Joes and did a ton of other tasks. Now I’m moving a bit more slowly, LOL.
3. So in the front hard, we have the pretty stone planter with flowers which we love, but we’ve been stymied on what to do with the rest of the yard. It’s just dirt and bark right now (we ripped out the plants the housing track put it because, in our opinion, they looked like dying weeds). So I printed a picture of the front yard, and began searching. I lost three hours of my life looking at pictures and coming up with very little to show for it. I showed Wizard the picture of our house that I’d printed and told him I didn’t find many ideas. Then he printed five copies of the picture and drew up five designs. I tried to get away with just picking one of his designs, but he was all mean and bullied me into making five designs of my own. I whined for a day then grudgingly did it, and now we have two designs, one from each of us, that we both really like. I’m sort of annoyed that he was right to nag me into doing it. Soon we’ll get estimates but right now we’re just happy to have some solid ideas.
4. Wizard’s back is improving but he’s on the bench until I say otherwise. He’s cooperating (with the pretty much the same attitude I had about the front yard designs, LOL) because while he’s healing, I can see he’s about one sudden sneeze away from reinjuring it. He flat out overdid things for a long time while ignoring warning twinges and aches. But he’s steadily improving so no worries. The fact that he’s only putting up a token fight tells me his back really needs the rest.
5. While Wizard is dealing with the frustration of being sidelined, I keep outlining all my ideas like my secret container garden down the long narrow side of the house. This poor man! First, there’s no time for that this year, and I know it. Second, there’s no money. Third, we have to get rain gutters on that side because we didn’t do it when we should have (we were idiots!), and we’re having some minor soil erosion there. Then once the rain gutters are in, that area will need to be leveled and maybe more soil brought in, rake and prepared. It’s a next Spring (if ever!) project, but I’m researching it now and excitedly babbling to him, and he’s rolling his eyes so hard, LOL! Honestly, I’m just proud of developing a vision for an area that we though was relatively useless and I’m having fun. It really will be like a secret garden because no one will know it’s there unless we show them.

So that’s my five, now I’d love to hear yours! I hope everyone has a great weekend!

Happy Wednesday! You all know Maggie is a bit obsessed with lizards. Here she is showing her tenacity:

Wizard and I cracked up. She was tracking two lizards: One was on the side on the house next door. Now Maggie’s an optimist, so it took her about five minutes of studying the situation before accepting there was no way for her to get to the that lizard. And the other one was the one you see her trying to get in the pic. She tried both sides of the wall, but as far as I know, never got him. Usually we find the…uh…evidence if she gets them. She loses interest once they stop moving (aka are no longer compatible with life, otherwise known as dead). Remember, I never said she was normal

So that’s my Wednesday Smile — what’s yours?

Happy Monday! We pretty much spent the weekend at home, or around home.

Saturday I went to a Farmer’s Market (I wasn’t impressed with this one), and Wizard overdid it while unsupervised That’s literally true, but I can’t fault him because I’d have done the same thing of pushing through to finish a project. Anyway, he pulled a muscle in his back. By Sunday was already doing much better so we know it’s just a muscle and he’ll be fine. But because schedules didn’t match up and Wizard could use a rest, we stayed close to home. Youngest came by  to deliver some wood for us (Wizard has many projects going!) and we did other stuff that wasn’t particularly noteworthy. Oh I made more sourdough, but that’s something I do every other week now, so it’s almost routine.

Sunday, I took Maggie for a two mile walk in the fog after which I admitted I need new running shoes. I took a deep breath and ordered an expensive new-to-me brand and we’ll see if they fit. It’s kind of weird that I spend the most on the shoes I walk in dirt with! Then I did a yoga practice and some gardening. After lunch I took Maggie to Home Depot where I was happy to see they have the dwarf Meyer lemon try in stock that I hope to get soon. It depends when Wizard can get ready that part of the hill where we are going to put it. I nearly bought my tomato and pepper plants but wisely held off since Wizards wants to rake out and put down some bark before I put potted plants on it. He’s been all logical and deliberate about it, but whatever….  The most important part of the Home Depot trip was that Maggie got about four people to pet her and tell her she’s pretty or sweet. She was quite pleased with her admirers.

Today I need to stay home for a warranty repair on a faucet and Wizard needs to go take his mom to a doctor. That usually takes half a day at the least for him, so pretty much shoots his day. But it will keep him for bending and lifting for one more day so that’s a bonus. While I’m stuck home, I hope to plan to fun cakes to decorate, and organize ingredients to bake and freeze layers. Lately, I just haven’t made the time to do it, and I miss it!

How was your weekend?? I’m guessing it more exciting that ours!

TGIF and Happy June! Can you believe we’re nearly half way through 2023? Okay, time to share five random things about our week. (I always blank on the entire week right about now, LOL).

1. It’s been gloomy and overcast here for days. In an unusual twist, it’s getting to Wizard more than me, although I’m tired of it too. But when the heat comes, we’ll probably miss these days
2. I joined two new FB groups: One on women walking which is kind of cool. It’s for mature women who log their walks, show pics and share tips. I love the age bracket and the positivity so far. But I haven’t posted (I’m like to observe first to get a feel for groups). I also joined a gluten free one, but that one may not be for me. Just trying different things I might find a gardening club for clueless amateurs — but first I have to learn to spell amateur. I couldn’t even get close enough for spell check to guess what word I was trying to write!
3. I downloaded a walking app that I’m just trying out and like so far. To my surprise, Wizard is trying it too. Walking is not something he’s ever really enjoyed, but who knows? I think it’s cool he’s willing to try on his own time and terms. What I also like is I believe I can add him to mine so he can check where I am for safety reasons.
4. On Thursday, I got my hair done — my bangs are growing out! I’ve had bangs for decades so this is a fun change for me. Then I worked on making another batch of sourdough bread that will eventually become two loaves. That process is getting a lot easier for me now. And we have a gift card to a restaurant, so we plan to go out to dinner, which we’re looking forward too.  I’m writing this blog before dinner, because I’ll need to shape the dough into the bannetons (baskets) for long fermentation in the fridge and forget to write the blog
5. This weekend, we might go see Turbo and his family, depending on their schedule. Otherwise, we’ll just see what happens! I’ll leave you with this pic with our son and daughter-in-law from last weekend at the Kramer Arch (I’m the shortest one, second from the right):

That’s my five and now I’d love to hear yours! I hope everyone has a terrific weekend!