Mid May

It's been an all over the place couple of weeks. The Most traumatic part being the passing of my Pogo friend Jeanette. We knew that she was ill with COPD but since she was a person who never complained we were not aware of just how serious it was. Jeanette was the glue that kept our little online group together. She reminded us of birthdays and kept us up with each other lives, she even made a web page with all our pictures. Pictures of our pets, Grand kids, what ever caught her eye. Her emails to us were a daily event full of chatter, pictures and laughs. Just an all around good friend, trying to describe how much she will be missed is almost impossible. Of course as we get older this will happen more and more, not any easier though. Please, any of you who smoke, please quit. The illnesses caused by this nasty habit are devastating, to you and to all those who love you. Take the money you spend on cigarettes, save it and go take a cruise with loved ones or buy yourself something neat. What ever it takes, please quit.

On another note, the goats have a new play yard. My neighbor helped me put up electric fence to make them a place to run, play and eat weeds. It only took about 3 hours and since it uses a string type and fiberglass poles I was able to do quite a bit of it. He helped with the insulators, and wiring which I was not comfortable doing. The girls had a nice afternoon. In the pictures you can just see the wire and pink tape, they dove right in eating the weeds. Star is putting Valentine in her place, and then taking a snooze. They are so funny.

Jim is actually going to be home for 4 days, hard to believe. He only had a day and a half this past weekend and worked every minute, got 2 cars working. Poor guy has to go back to work to rest. With Jim home we will be able to fence in at least one more area for the goats so they will have plenty of space to eat and play. I feel so much better with them having more space and being able to exercise. I found the barn kitties kittens, they are so cute. Now I have to work at getting friendly with them, I got mama so she will let me pet her. I am hoping that Jim will be able to drill the holes for the blown in insulation, with those done we will be able to buy the insulation, get the machine and ta da. I imagine the first stage will be the down stairs, not quite sure how much 10 bags covers. Ten bags are the minimum for getting the use of the machine that blows in the insulation, I am learning all these cool things,lol.

The apple trees are starting to bloom and so are the strawberry plants. More tulips have come up and so have daffodils and narcissus. More and more plants are showing signs of life which makes my day. A few of the plants I ordered showed up and many more should be on their way. Like a drawn out Christmas.

I wish the best to all, enjoy what is important. We spend so much time pursuing the glitter we miss the real gems in life. Barbara

I have flowers yea

I finally have some flowers which brightens my day.

I had hoped they would all come up at once, but they seem to be on their own schedule. I will just enjoy and weed as I can, the grass and dandelions came through the winter in fine fettle.

These pictures are for violet lady, I have violets all over the place. Some time when I have the energy I am going to condense as many of them as I can or move them further out in the woods. They grow where I need to mow and I always feel bad running over them, since they like the shade they should do well amongst the trees. One of my pogo friends said she has some yellow violets, that sounds like a contradiction doesn't it. I am going to have to get some from her to mix in with mine. The bleeding heart she gave me has popped up, I thought I killed it last year as it died down. I guess it just needed a rest because it looks fine now, wonder if it will bloom this year?

The man came this morning to look at my fridge, says it needs a new fan and motor. I am so disappointed with this refrigerator, it is the second one in less then a year. The first one did not work from day one and this one started acting up a couple of months ago. At first Jim said it was just defrosting, I did not think so because it just seemed too warm for too long. I bought a thermometer for it and lo and behold it stays at a balmy 55! It took me over a week to finally get in touch with the right person to get it looked at. During that week I checked on line and was dismayed to find that there are many pages of people with Maytag fridges with the same problem. The posts go back several years, oh super, another lemon. I was able to get the warranty extended for an extra 6 months but am now wondering if I should just push for a new fridge?? It is so disheartening to see how shoddy things are made now. I had a lady tell me she has an old Philco that is 30 years old and still working fine. When I was calling around trying to get the right department one of the people I talked to said she has the same fridge and has the same problem. She works for Maytag!! I had even gone the Consumer reports route and decided on the fridge with the top freezer because the article said they had the least problems. Well, we see how good that advice was!

At least things around here are never dull! The best to you and talk to you again soon,

Barbara