This Weather is Nice but Weird!

Tweet

Here it is almost the last day of February, we've hardly had any snow to speak of and what we have had only stayed a few days then melted as the temps went back up in the 4o's!

This sure hasn't been our typical NE Ohio winter!

Today is 53!

Monk wonders where his snow went!

He loves the snow and the warmer it gets, the hotter he gets.

He's got a whole lot of fur to shed!!!!!

Shirley

P.S. I just noticed I've reached 200 members!! YIPPEE!

Hair Today

Tweet

Today was my haircut appointment.

I've been going here for years; ever since we moved to Medina 15 years ago. I think it was called Rometrics back then.

This is Kelly. She is the receptionist and reminds me with a call about my appointments. A good thing some months!! She has horses too.

I got her to take the rest of these photos with my iPhone.

I have been going to the same stylist for over 20 years! I started to go to her in a shop in Parma when we lived there then followed her to this shop in Strongsville. Markela actually went to high school with my daughter Michele but never knew each other then.

I've been with her through her wedding, her pregnancies, her kids growing, and her move to a new house. Through her first gardening experiences, her father's illness, and all the other things life has to bring.

She puts up with all my ideas about what I should do with my hair. She's cut it, colored it, frosted it and when I absolutely made her she permed it! That is never a good idea.

My hair takes curl really quick and for awhile (when I was younger) I looked like a sheep!

I've brought in pictures of all kinds of hair cuts and several of Meg Ryan's hair dos that she duplicated. Trouble is, I never looked like Meg Ryan otherwise!!

Bummer!

Oh well, maybe Meg will want my hair do when she gets to be my age!!

See you again in 6 or 7 weeks Markela.

Shirley

A Lot of Nothin' and a Little Somethin'

Tweet

I've spent the day at home today. Something I don't do but about once a week.

Although I did do some cleaning this morning and I made a good dinner of an herb rubbed roasted pork loin, I've spend much of the day on this computer just reading blogs, looking at Facebook and then there's my new addiction, Pinterest. For sure that's a time guzzler!!

I did find a couple good sites I want to share.

As I was looking at ways to get organized , I found a site that tells you:

25 Things To Throw Out Today!

It's here:

http://www.wisebread.com/25-things-to-throw-out-today

Now, I wrote them down but didn't do any of them yet. I'll start that my next full day at home

: ))

Then I found something I can do with my 3 old cell phones.

Cell Phones for Soldiers to use to call home.

This site shows drop off places in your zip code or if you have less than 4 phones you can put them in a mailing envelope and drop them in the mail. They provide you with a free mailing label that you can print out.

http://www.cellphonesforsoldiers.com/

Well, that's my knowledge for today, the rest I pinned on my boards. Check them out.

There's a Pinterest button to the right.

I have to go move around now, I can't feel my feet!!

Shirley

This is Ellie!

Tweet

Upcoming Move

Tweet

Moving Horses Soon

I'll be moving my two horses to a barn near Valley City within the next month.

Michele was told about a little arab for sale in this barn and we went to see him.

She has been leasing and taking lessons on him this past month. She's not sure if he's "the one" but he sure is cute with a wonderful personality. She will have to decide.

But:

We fell in love with the barn!

It is an arab training barn but also has some boarders and they are going to make room for us. We have to wait till the end of March.

This barn is so nice and very friendly. It has so many amenities that we have never experienced in a boarding barn before.

Best part is the super care they give all the horses.

I will tell more about it as the month goes on.

Sarah, the owner ,trainer and teacher is super and it will give Michele and I a chance to get back into riding together. That's what we got into horses for in the first place and haven't been able to do that where we are now. This new barn will be half the distance for Michele and the same for me, so it's perfect.

This is the white (grey) arab that brought us to the barn. He is a 10 year old gelding, a pure polish arabian with championship bloodlines. I'll tell you more about him if Michele decides to buy him.

His name is Arkahn.

Warning: Our Brains Are Mush!

Tweet

Brain Mush

I thought about this the other day as I was aimlessly driving to my new barn. I wasn't paying a bit of attention as to where I was going because the (wonderful) GPS on my iPhone was telling me every turn to make. If you somehow make a wrong turn it reroutes you and will get you to your destination no matter what!!

We don't have to look at maps or bother with directions. We just have to listen and do what the little GPS says!

We also don't ever have to remember anyone's phone numbers or addresses any more as all that info is stored in our phones or on our computers. Most of our phones will find the number of the person we want and dial it for us.

Watching our favorite TV programs no longer requires that we remember when they are on. We just set the DVR, it finds them and records them and we can watch them anytime.

Does anyone really write out things longhand anymore? With the computer and texting via your phone, we just type. We don't even have to know how to spell as the word processor corrects misspelled words as you go along. Of course you'd better read over the email before you press "send" because some times it picks a wrong word that could change the whole meaning to what you intended to say.

Anyway, don't get me wrong, I love all these conveniences. I think for my age I'm sort of "techy". But I have to say, it's harder for me to think of things anymore.

I'm blaming it on the above and not my age!!

I'm doing my little part to help. I have the app "Scrabble" on my iPhone and play it everyday!

It requires a little bit of thinking anyway.

OK, I'm going to go talk to Siri for awhile.

Goodnight : ))

Shirley

Freezer Jam

Tweet

It's not exactly canning season or strawberry season but I was out of freezer jam and found a sale on strawberries!

I got 4 quarts but only had enough sugar to use 2 quarts. I'll get more sugar tomorrow and make another 6 jars.

I cut the strawberries up in pieces.

You have to mash them but doing it this way was too hard.

So I cheated and used my little blender. Don't make soup though!

I like some hunks of strawberries in my jam.

I follow the directions in the SureJell box exactly.

This is after I added the sugar and the warm pectin.

Now stir, stir stir.

Pour into your jars and say a little prayer that it will set up in a few hours!

(Even if it's a soft set, it's still yummy!)

Now, if I could only get the bread making conquered!!!!!!!

Shirley

Cleaning, I Guess It's Me Now!

Tweet

I don't like to clean!

And when I don't and things get behind, it drives me nuts.

I especially don't like to do floors because I want them done by hand, not with a mop and my hip just doesn't tolerate that well.

I've had a cleaning lady or company off and on for a long time.

Well, yesterday I had enough of the company I had because they just weren't doing an adequate job for the money. I fired them!

Now it's up to me to keep up!

I thought if I just do one room a day, every day, it should be good.

Today I started on the library; one of the most cluttered rooms.

I moved furniture and found out the "company" had never moved anything to clean.

I washed floors and woodwork.

I also removed this stereo system that's been in there forever and never used.

I will have to decide who to give it to. It's too heavy to sell on eBay because no one wants to pay high shipping costs!

I still have to do a lot of de-cluttering of this room.

Where on earth did I get all this "stuff"!!!

This room may take a couple days!!

Shirley

Groom Day

Tweet

Monk got washed and groomed today. I forgot completely about taking pictures! There was so much hair flying around!! Since he has just started to shed in the last couple weeks, I will have to continue brushing him out every night. He loves it! At least he smells really good now : ))

A Catch-up Post!

Tweet

I've been lax on my blogging this past week so I'll just put on a few thoughts for the day here.

Monk is "actively" losing his winter undercoat. Oh My!! I can just easily pull big tuffs of hair out and he doesn't even feel it. When he shakes it's like a hair storm!

So Sunday he is getting groomed. The owner of the barn where my horses are, grooms dogs and is going to bathe and groom him and try to blow out some of the loose hair. I'm sure it will take a few groomings as the shedding has really just started.

I know, I'm a little late but I've just discovered these good little "Darling Clementines"!!!

I've always seen them in the store in the early winter but never got them.

They are so sweet and juicy and so easy to peel.

Yes those are dogs hairs on the matt. That's my life right now, what can I say!

I didn't let my horses out today, even though it was a beautiful day. I don't let them out in the mud and since we are having this warm winter so far, it is nothing but mud!

They go out in the arena for the day with a little hay. I'm sure they are just as bored there as in their stalls but they can move around some and are together.

They stand back by the gate in the sun when I'm not moving them around.

We've had a lot of rain and then a warm up so it's mud, mud, mud.

Some of the horses are out in the pastures but to get there, they must go down a long runway of mud then there's a dip that's like a pond of about 6 inch deep water. Once they go through all that, it's not bad! It's just getting there. The days I go to the barn, if they're out, they won't come in so it is a wasted trip. Tomorrow I'm staying home so maybe I'll have them turned out. It's supposed to be another nice day.

Shirley