Thanks a whole heaping lot Dad!

Thanks alot Dad! You know this is all your fault. Don't pretend to not know what I'm talking about. You know very well what the problem is.

When I went to do my hair for church today I thought instead of curling my hair under, I'd try the doo the gal had in the picture I took to the hair dresser for her to mimick the cut.
It was flipped out so carefree and cute and I wanted that image. Never mind what the heair dresser said, "My, don't you have straight hair!", as she was staring at something not even in the ball park of the picture.

But that was her, this was me, the lady who'd lived with this mop on top for 50 years and who'd had a rollercoaster ride all week with my elecetrolytes. If anyone could get it to do it, I could. And oh, how I mentally needed that look today. So I took a deep breath and told myself, "Act the part until you feel the part." First thing was to get into costume, T-shirt, casual pink feminine sweater, and a denim skirt. Second, the hair.
So I showered and put this gobbly goop in. I've never put any hair product in my hair as its rather sensitive to such things but I put er in and fired up the hair dryier and curling iron. We were pulling out all the stops today. Voila!! Not too bad on this 50 year old. Looks pretty carefree to me.Then----- thirty minutes later it looked like this. Didn't that hair gel say strong? Now I'm not wise in the ways of hair products but come on. So this is how I had to go to church. The clock was ticking and there was no time to redo since I'm the chorister for church and the meeting starts with me leading a hymn. Well I wanted a carefree look I guess just not one that said I'd slept on my hair wrong and just got out of bed.


So Dad (you knew I was coming to him) thanks a whole heaping lot. You've had a butch hair cut almost all of your 79 years and it looks nice but what am I suppose to do with this thing you gave me on top? When you were handing out genes did you have to give that one to me? Mom had a lovely one to give me, body with a lovely tendency to curl lightly. It would have made my life a dream. Okay, maybe that was a little thick but easier at least. I wonder if you ever questioned who gave you your straight straight hair?




Now staring at these pictures I wondering who gave me that lopsided grin. No really, go back and look at my pictures. The right side of my mouth tips down and the other side goes straight. I just noticed it today. You see I spend very little time looking at myself in the mirror and I'm the one always behind the camera, so there's not many pictures of me.





I could see if I was grouchy why my mouth tipped down but little kids in the grocery store frequently giggle and laugh at me from their carts and mother's arms. Some even throw their cute chubby arms in the air and fling themselves at me - the total stranger. So how come my mouth turns down on one side? Feeling a bit nervous after all the health issues I've had I began to wonder. Since our oldest daughter once had Bell Palsy was I getting too. I grinned, lifted my eyebrows and contorted my face in the mirror. Nope no paralysis starting in, both sides respond equally except for the droop mouth thing. Hm... who gave me that little quirk I wonder?

Brenda's Photo Challenge

Yup, it's time again for Brenda's photo challenge and the theme is Bedtime.
A couple photos are not new but the top one took place last week. Have a wonderful weekend.

Plans Change

We need warm sunshine badly as the plants are frost bit and turning yellow. The squash here still in pots looks particularly bad and even the sage looks a bit peaked. Hopefully, this weekend I'll be able to get the squash area rototilled and done. I've given up and decided that I'm just not going to get nearly as much planted as I'd like and what makes it makes it. No babying things year.
Our plan for the summer have dramatically changed. No expanding increase of projects except preparing the garden for enlargement so we can plant more than ever next summer.

Everything else is a scale down. We want to clean up the yard and go through all our belongings. Some of the projects planned for this summer will just be preparation work like the garden where we'll get things set up to do it next summer. That is if all goes well. One of those is the temporary window frames out of the new fire hall. I still plan to put hinges on them. Hopefully paint them and stack them for use next summer. The raspberries and asparagus will get moved and an addition on the garden put into buckwheat.

That means we've been prioritizing what is the most important things that will benefit us the most and we've decided in our self-sufficient plans the garden needs to take a huge priority. The livestock will come in second with the laying hens and goats being a priority.

The meat animals will have to come in third and since we'd usually have pigs and a calf next year that plan will have to be re-evaluated for need and time allowance when next spring arrives.

I've my eye on a greenhouse frame that isn't in use and probably won't be. I'm planning on asking how much they want for it and how soon they'd need paid. Our rebar framed greenhouse has been used many years but we haven't put a cover on it the past four years. It can be a pain since the sides are low and it isn't wide enough. But with the summers growing colder again were going to need it for warm weather crops and to extend the season on others.

This weekend hopefully after we say goodbye to the old does, I'll get to work on another good sized section of garden we've fence. It needs tilled under, manured, and buckwheat planted to prepare it for next summer. Whacking the weeds down and tilling will be all I hope to accomplish right now.

Sheds need painted, pens cleaned, and fences fixed. The chicken coop run has a hole in it that's being blocked by wood and its rotting around the bottom. It won't last one more year. That was put off from last summer but has moved up the ladder on priorities.

If we've learned anything this spring it's that you can plan all you want but life has a way of changing those plans to wishes necessitating a whole new blueprint.

One of those plans for this spring was to build the new small chicken coop and though we have part of the materials, the time just wasn't available. Because of the lack of it we lost a number of little chickens when we had to put them in with the hens. The decision wasn't hard to make between taking care of emotionally damaged and relocated grand children or build a small chicken coop and run. That doesn't mean the consequences have been easy to take. So next year we'll scale back and we plan on just raising new laying hens. The rootsers of course we'll butcher but we're not raising chickens to eat. That means filling the incubator only once, not twice. Then we'll see where were at. The decision was further cemented when we discovered that our walls on the basement are starting to tilt in a little. Improper construction 29 years ago has taken its tole so that will be fixed and along with that the drainage problem around the house. That means lots of dirt work to elevate the ground around the house and rock brought in to replace the lawn all around the basement.
When we're done we want less lawn, more garden. So though I'm thrilled that the garden is finally starting to peak through the ground, I'm also singing Caesura serra what ever will be will be, the future's not I to see, caesura serra, what will be will be.

If Only I had My Lenses!

Like it? That's going to be me today, minus the beautiful face. I am going to get my hair cut into something a little less frumpy. Think it will motivate me to work on loosing weight? Though why I haven't is way beyond me since I only get snatches of food as I'm playing servant to three little munchkins and running my legs off consoling boo boos and picking up toys. I think its stress but then maybe that's just an excuse but today as I'm gone to the next town over for a variety of medical tests I decided to throw in something fun, a haircut.
When my sister stopped by yesterday on her way back home, I asked her isn't it an oxymoron to grow your hair out to have it cut, for that is just what I've been doing?

But for today I thought I'd do a little photo lessons since I've been taking scads of shots. I took my camera with me obviously to Thermopolis but my husband limited me to one lens since it was raining and we had to take the pickup and put everything in plastic garbage bags in the back, in the weather all but my camera and lone lens. Ouch! that hurt and as we traveled over the mountain I kept thinking 'Oh, if only I had my macro lens those flowers are beautiful!' I knew with the kids we could not stop ever little while for their patience was being stretched as it was and oh how I ached to have my telephoto lens and sit by the beaver ponds to wait for them to surface and, and, and, but alas I only captured a few shots and some of them were with the window rolled down as Kirk drove. The ache was so bad to photograph. One example was this shot of it snowing. Yes, I heard South Pass over on the western side of the state received 2 feet of snow and it closed the roads. Winter is long in passing in Wyoming this year.

Then when we saw Rocky mountain elk for the second time I lamented, "Oh! if only I had my telephoto lens you could actually see the Rocky Mountain elk instead of just brown dots on a hillside." Needless to say the trip without my full gear, which doesn't amount to much, was a painful experience.
But I did take a brief moment outside the truck to snap photos of the boiling waters rushing down the once placid creek. Since I'm going to be all poked and prodded today and you won't want pictures of that I thought I'd give you a little photo session time. The following pictures were take a few feet from each other or I just turned by body a little, yet the focuses are different.
Note how differently that changes the photo.

Above the water is rushing horizontally across the photo. This makes for a flat scene. Also the focus is the remnants of a wooden bridge in the dead center. In scenic photography that is almost always a BIG no no to put your focus in the dead center. Between these two, the water going horizontally across the picture and the bridge in the dead center your eye goes to the center of the picture and stops and you miss the details in the picture.

In this one, the creek is running at an angle so your eye travels with it through the scene and stops for a moment at the bridge before moving on, making it the focus of the picture.Here the bridge is just a dark shape on the left and your eyes freely travel up the creek. The creek is the main focus. Note how the rocks on the right nicely frame the picture and add complexity to the scene.
In this last one the bridge is more prominent but doesn't distract from the over all scene but adds complexity. It also helps to frame in the water. Naturally our eyes will go toward the light and since the water is the lightest thing in the frame, it is a good resource to use to assist our eye in moving it across the picture. Also note the nice changes in texture between the bridge, rocks, water and foliage. Also the difference in colors.
In this flat scene once more the water is going across the frame horizontally in a flat angle. Though I tried to capture a little diversity with the difference in textures by capturing the grass in the fore front, the camera just picked up suttle shade differences in the green. Keep that in mind when photographing something. It might be a spectaculiar sene with the naked eye but go flat on digital or film. If that weren't bad enough the picture has no focal point. Without one what are you trying to show someone?

This scene is better because of the angles that allow your eye to travel. There is also a more definite color difference and texture change but alas, no real focal point.

Did this tutorial help? Let me know. If so I'll give photography pointers now and then in my blog. It definitely won't be much gardening until the weather warms up. My garden hasn't surfaced yet. I hope it isn't dead.

But for now I must go and milk that sweet thing at the corrals and get ready for a long day of poking and prodding.

Yeah! I'm Milking Again

You probably thought I'd gotten rid of the goats. But the truth of the matter is, I've been distancing myself from them as we are going to have to put down the two old girls. We have a lot of history together and I needed to remove the emotions from the equation as much as possible by distancing myself. They never did take and I'm beginning to suspect they've contracted CAE. I've put them in a different pen from Chicory as crotchety doesn't begin to describe their behavior and they just aren't worth dealing with. You can't even lead them anymore without your arm being tore off or their shoving you around. Their nice sweet manners went out the gate the past few months. That isn't at all like my girls and besides the cranky attitude, they lay down all the time so it has to be goodbye.

With the so long comes in a new era for us. We now have two Nubians, yes, Nubians. I never thought I'd ever get rid of my Saanens but lots of things have had to change lately. Nubian buck service is much easier to come by and it just works out better for us at this time to have floppy eared girls. So with that introduction, let me introduce you to our latest addition, Zozi. Now there is no way I'm going to be able to keep her name. It just won't roll off my tongue so I want to first apologize to Michelle but I'm thinking of modifying it to Zoey.

She was the sweetest thing this morning on the milk stand. She stood still and not a bit of a fuss milking her, pretty good for a yearling. Then I trimmed her hooves a little. They'll need a better job here soon but I didn't want to make her too nervous being that she has been shifted to a new home.
Pretty little thing isn't she? She was bawling a bit for home as Chicory wasn't exactly laying out the welcome mat for her but nothing bad, just dirty looks.

But then this is what Moana is looking like now days.

Alright, her real name is Chicory but I've started calling her Moana because she moans all the time. Poor girl, she is either carrying a big set of twins or triplets.

Tomorrow is 145 days but her tail head hasn't started to loosen much so it could still be a while. Our original plan was for the Saanens to kid first and Chicory late so we'd have a steady supply of milk through out the year. Unfortunately since the Saanens have always been easy to settle into pregnancy I dried them up in anticipation. That has left us a long time without my precious milk. You see my doctor says my option is either several horse sized pills a day for minerals or fresh goats milk. Aa... gee, after swollowing those powdery things for a while now it's a no-brainer especially seeing that my bone density is excellent in an osteoporosis family. So in a couple weeks I'll quit taking the pills and just drink, drink, drink. Aa... won't that be nice.

I guess we'll have to get Zoey and Chicory on different freshening schedules so I won't be without milk next year. Oh I just don't know how to tell you how excited I am to have REAL milk again, yum! My mind is at work thinking of all the things I can make now.
I've avoided anything creamy as store milk makes them taste so ho hum bland. You know Alfredo, oyster soup, Pollo Con Creme etc.Earlier this morning as the fog was burning off, I was photographing Pedro here

and Bess, I thought how our color scheme had changed at the corrals. Funny where my brain will go. Now everything is black or a deep chocolate brown. Don't ask me why that comes to mind but I like things to coordinate. I don't plan it that way. It just happens. Now that I have hopes of a slightly, and I mean slightly quieter life, this mare and I are going to go for a ride. Right now it is pretty muddy but maybe by tomorrow evening if the rain showers predicted don't move in, then we will go for a nice stroll. That will be a little bit of heaven.

A Couple Old Dinasaurs

By the time we made it to the dinosaur museum, I could really relate to the piles of bones that surrounded us, except they were organized. Kirk and I were feeling really old and tired. We had reached a state of cranky chaos. The result of too much fun. Which for a 5, 3 and a 17 month old that is 3/4 th's of a day. The cute smiles you see above are deceiving. They were about the only ones we saw until they had all had a morning nap, the one they took going home. But, I had better go back to the beginning of this tale because you are probably confused at this point.

We had our family reunion this past weekend. Not very many could show up but then the clan that just started out as a few kids has mushroomed greatly making coordinating schedules almost impossible. The fewer numbers meant for a more intimate time. It rained the whole weekend and we were blessed to be able to use the church rec-room as we cooked meals and played games. My sister, the food expert who knows everything yummy that comes from a store, like dark chocolate covered blueberries, brought some clever inexpensive games. They all had a common theme of moving objects from one end of the table to the other in the most difficult manner possible. This one you suck on a straw and lift up what I think were skittles but M& M's might be lighter. I had to run back and forth from the kitchen to photograph and then dash back to do dishes, so my powers of observation weren't turned up too high. My sister's cooked, I figured the least I could do was the dishes. The entertainment for those watching was high as one game involved smearing protroleum jelly on your nose, pressing your gooey sniffer into the pile of cotton balls on the plate at one end of the table, and when one stuck, running to the other end where you could use your hands to place it on a paper plate. The fuzzy hand in the air has a Q-tip for reapplying Vaseline to the nose.Our oldest grand daughter's favorite game was the ping pong ball toss into the cups half full of water.

Then when we'd exhausted the games, it was off to the world's largest hot spring where you soon learn, if you don't know already, that swimming in warm warm water wears one out in a hurry especially old dinosaurs like us chasing children. For me it wasn't the heat but walking back and forth and back and forth from the kid's slide to the edge of the pool with grandchildren in my arms. There I lifted them up out of the water so I could yell, "Walk! don't run." fifty zillion times as they raced to the top of the water slide.

It was a revolving door as the kids refused to paddle around in the water having found an adrenaline rushing past time for which they repeated it at least a hundred times a piece. Think I'm exaggerating? The energizer bunny, the middle child, got to the point where she couldn't have gotten out of the pool if her life depended on it, and I had to lift all 47 pounds of her with no assistance, then steady her swaying frame before she could hold her balance to propel her exhausted body up the slope AGAIN to go down one more time like a bullet, shooting off the end of the slide at an alarming rate. So you can see why the following day the Museum, though spectacular, was just too much of a good thing. The biggest hit ended up being the rocking dinosaurs in the corner.
We tried to get the kids to pose by these dinosaurs since it seemed quite
appropriate at the moment. Alas, we couldn't even manage that.

When I spied this Tortoise, I could really relate. If there ever was a sculpture done of me at that moment, it would have looked like this.

Then I saw this ole gal a moment later and envied her. Who said dinosaurs weren't smart. They invented the first play pen to corral their youngsters.

It was our oldest grand daughter's favorite exhibit. She kept coming back to it. Before she got kicked out of the museum by her mom - for bad attitude problems. Of course that cut our tour short as no one was having fun by that time. But first let me give you a quick look see at what wonders await you if you come to visit Thermopolis, Wyoming,
like this rock packing dinasaurs. Okay, actually the rock was just positioned right to make a two-dimensional photo look like he was picking up the rock to hurdle at a predator.

Can you blame him when above looms a monster of this size? Because of wall constraints, I couldn't get back far enough to get the rest of its long neck and head into the photograph. Yes, diansaur experts, I think this one was from the plant eating family but don't spoil my imaginative fun.

As for names of these magnificent creatures.
I haven't a clue.

You see to bring you that, it would have required the cooperation of the munchkins and that wasn't happening. Or... I was just thinking, I could of taken along little boys, not girls, for though I know ALL about Disney's princesses, ( I've been force - I mean privileged to read all about them.), I can't remember what I ever learned about dinosaurs. I guess I'll just have to wait for grandsons. That would rid me of one torment with girls, "Whew hoo!, no Barbies with warped shaped bodies to squeeze clothes on to." I admit it, I once liked Barbies, then I became a Mom and I now think it was a conspiracy forcing Moms everywhere to spend there hard earned money buying replacement shoes and accessories since there sized to be lost or sucked up by the vacuum cleaner. (Sh...don't tell the girls I accidentally sucked one silvery slipper up this morning. You learn to use those kinds of words, you know silvery slipper, when your dealing with grand daughters who love princesses. I didn't mean to, I promise, it was a mistake. I thought it was a tiny piece of foil off a fruit snack wrapper.

I was tired, really tired being up all night making deposits from all the food my body isn't use to consuming. Anyway, I think not only is the inventor greedy but he's a dirty old man. Who else would have thought up a doll to emulate a women with a size 88 D cup set of hooters and a 22 size waisted. Now if any of you reading this blog love Barbies, I'm sorry if my opinion has wounded you. Please be consoled that I think you have the patience of Job for taking the time to dress Barbie time after time in clothes a hooker wouldn't even where because she couldn't get out of them in a timely fashion. Sorry, if I'm shocking you today. Remember, I've had very little sleep for a very long time and I was a really really big Tom Boy. But where were we? Oh yeah dinosaurs. Other than the gal who had her brood corralled, I liked Charlie here the best. A bit prickly for sure but once you get underneath those bony plates, I'm sure he has a heart of goal. No, I haven't been watching Beauty and the Beast today.

Loaded Down and Ready For Fun

I was loaded down today as I strolled around the pond.

Slung around my neck were two cameras, the Nikon for close ups until the macro lens I've been saving for arrives for my Cannon and my beloved Cannon with a 75 to 300 telephoto lens. In my left hand I carried my fly fishing pole as at first there were only two Canadian geese by the pond and I didn't want to miss the moment when the fish started jumping out of the water. Not that the pond is very big and the pickup very far away but I live by the Boy Scout motto "Be Prepared." Today, the threatening clouds hung low and a heavy dew was in the air but, I did cast my line a while catching one fish and had a number of bites. Alas, the fish just weren't jumping like they had been the two previous days. You know, those days where I didn't have my fishing licence. So both camers got a workout. The flowers I photographed as I searched through the tall grass away from the pond for a pair of resident Mallard ducks. They are elusive little beggars making them a real challenge to photograph. Nothing good yet has become of my efforts.
But I'm not done yet trying.

A lone rabbit was trying to fill its belly and I thought it quite skinny for all the lush green grass. But the main attraction as usual were the Canadian geese. This time they were over by the cat-tails making for a lovely back drop.You think I'll ever tire of photographing them? I did stop to watch the ants try and move this big beetle. For their size I don't think anything can match their strength. They are amazing.Okay, it doesn't take much to entertain me as even the growth on the pine trees had me enthralled.

But the most entertaining event was the male red-wing blackbird that kept dive bombing the Canadian geese. I don't mean just swooping down and threatening, I mean landing on the geese pecking aand pulling feathers. One goose in particuliar encountered its rath repeatedly. Awe, I do love my early mornings. It's the late nights that are beating me up.