My How She Has Grown, and updates

The little puppy I brought home in November has almost doubled in weight, grown taller and turned into a mighty fine dog. She is calm and relaxed most of the time, she is learning well in obedience classes and, best of all, is very good at going out in the yard and  being off her leash without running off.

Lots of things are coming up for me. I will be going up to Indiana for a family quilting retreat. Yes, we have created our own retreat. Shortly after that I will be going to the SXSW interactive Festival in Austin. I feel a bit nervous about that one… as if all my geeky online friends will find out that I’m really not so geeky after all!

I’m having a dreadfully difficult time getting things done lately. My brain is slow to percolate ideas and put words together into sentences when I am writing and it is getting very frustrating. Sure, I can write stuff, but frequently I write something, read it back and it is so utterly boring there is no way it will work.  My creativity, it seems, has left the building for the moment. I hope it comes back soon.

I am enjoying participating in Paperback Swap lately but I fear I am using it as a way to avoid going out to find friends close by, at least for the moment. There is a local book club that meets through the group but they meet up an hour from where I live and the two books they have read so far seem less than appealing to me. So, on the one hand I’d like to be social. On the other, a book I’d not pick up on my own and an hours drive, not so much…

The wood stove has been working out wonderfully for the most part. We really need to install the second one to keep the bedrooms and my office warm. We have been out to cut firewood a few times as well and we’ve actually had fun doing it together. We took Daisy the first time and she played in and around a pond with another dog. She was filthy but really happy, so, I didn’t mind giving her a bath. We are hoping to get a hydraulic, hand operated wood splitter soon. It just uses hydraulics and manpower to operate so that seems good.

Busy day!

Do laundry Make hay while the sun shines… I was wondering when I would get laundry done this week as we had several days of rain predicted, following Ike. I wasn’t going to complain too much as we always need rain here in Texas. But today, the predicted rain didn’t come. So I did laundry!

Why was a non-rainy day important? So I could use my clothesline of course. I love the clothesline we have. In the picture it has four loads on it. I have since put one more out. It could hold 6 or 7 I think, but I don’t have that many clothespins. And really, it never needs to hold that much. Usually a load is dry by the time I go out to hang up the next one. I have just felt lazy today about bringing clothes in and putting them away. I’m kind of hoping I can snag my husband for some help on that once he gets home from work.

It was another very quiet day with him at work all day. I hope he gets to have a day off soon, or at least can work from home once or twice this week to make up for working almost 40 hours over Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Mostly I did laundry and worked on posts for Green Daily. I spent so much time grocery shopping and repackaging things on Friday that I did not do as much posting as I wanted to. So, I made up for it today. I think next I will go dig through some boxes of clothes I moved here from my apartment that have yet to be unpacked. Someday, the house will be clean again…

I was able to open all the windows and let some fresh air in today as well. It is in the mid 70s I’d say, with a bit of a breeze blowing. It’s probably 80 in the house but with the breeze and the ceiling fans on it really doesn’t feel too bad. I am enjoying my low energy usage day between the clothesline and turning off the air conditioner!

I’m tired and I’m hungry

So, I didn’t realize the cleaning lady was coming today. I was awakened by the doorbell when she arrived. Oops. And before you think I’m spoiled, it’s something my husband wants and she only comes every other week for stuff like mopping and cleaning the bathrooms. Anyway, it got me going earlier than normal this morning but also off to a bit of a disjointed start.

I think I forgot to eat breakfast. I had some coffee and started working on posts for Green Daily and Download Squad. I actually got a lot of work done today. I was working and taking breaks to stand up and walk around and declutter small areas, like my nightstand, or the coffee table. It went pretty well. I got a few areas cleaned up nicely.

I forgot to eat lunch until my tummy rumbled at me around 2:30. I had a small lunch sine Robert and I had talked about going out to dinner tonight.

After lunch I went outside to take some photos.

This is the view across the street from my house

People are frequently jealous of my view when they come to visit. Though I live on the fringes of suburbia, I have a horse pasture across the street. It’s nice. We enjoy sitting out on the front porch on nice evenings and watching the horses or listening to the crickets.

The chard I planted last weekend has sprouted!

In my tour around the yard I saw that all the seed varieties I planted last weekend have sprouted already. Must be the very warm and moist conditions. I hope the 4-6 inches of rain predicted for this weekend doesn’t drown the little ones.

I worked more after my break on both decluttering and blogging. I found a few items to post on eBay and/or Etsy.

A beautiful vintage bedspread

I’ve had this bedspread since I lived in Iowa in early 2000, 2001. It’s really pretty and in excellent shape. Really excellent shape. I looked at it. I thought about putting it into the guest room. But, I have already started that room in Americana/Texas decorating. I thought about saving it should I ever have a little girl. But, then I thought about all the stuff we have and saw how much things like this were going for. Cash that could go towards paying off my ankle surgery, building up our emergency fund, etc. So, I put it up for sale. We’ll see how it goes.

And now, my husband tells me it’s time to go get some dinner. Phew! I’m starved! And we’re having wings! Yahoo!