Today Nancy and Dian came over to visit A Bend in the Road Gallery.  Then the three of us and Donna went to Forest Hill for lunch at Mi Tierra.

The restaurant was pretty busy since the Nursery Festival was going on, so we had about a twenty minute wait on the porch.  That was fine, because it was a beautiful day and the company was great.

Later on the boys came over so that Josh and Nikki could do some shopping.

They were still wearing their home school shirts.

For some reason, Denton was wearing his backwards. He did it on purpose.

We fed the goats

and hung out in the barn for a while.  After that, we checked out the baby worms that I had traded Mr. Roland Monk a bucket of chicken manure for.

Hudson said that they looked like crawling boogers. We went to the chicken pen

to gather the eggs.  They then proceeded to corral the chickens

while Hudson said, “Girls, calm down, calm down. (Like that was going to happen.)

It was now time to go to Leebo’s,

But first,

they had to air up the golf cart tires.

They watched the bees work the blueberry blooms, and then

made a king cake with their daddy’s daylily scraps. Joel joined us

and the three of them looked for four leaf clovers while I made a clover necklace.

They found three, but lost one. I brought the other two in the house and pressed them

in a book called Freedom of Simplicity.  I thought that would be appropriate.

Time to move on to other projects, so yesterday Donna and I went to the scrap iron yard for art supplies.

Sometimes you can find some really interesting stuff if you dig around enough.  I found some gears that I wanted, but they were attached to pipes and had to be cut off.

The nice guys that work the yard loaded up the pipes

and cut the gears off for me. They were going to have to do that anyway in order to sell the pipe.

While they were doing that,

I relaxed in the comfort of their outdoor lounge.

I’m not sure how I’m going to use the things…..they just had fun written all over them.

I also got some square tubing, which was new, and I picked up a few other pieces

and piled them on the scale.  So, now its time to cut and paste.  Isn’t it funny how one man’s trash is another woman’s treasure?

The woods are starting to look and smell like spring.  On the Azalea Trail,

the wild azaleas are beginning to pop open, and violets

are peeking out from under the straw that covers the forest floor.  Saturday,

Tommy and Donna and

Joel and I decided to take advantage of those sights and smells and take a little hike.

We ended up walking seven miles.  Then today, Joel, Donna and I went back

and walked four more.  It was a beautiful afternoon, and the temperature was perfect. There is a poem that some guy named Richard LeGalliene wrote.  It goes like this:

I meant to do my work today…
But a brown bird sang in the apple tree.
And a butterfly flitted across the field,
And all the leaves were calling me.
And the wind went sighing over the land,
Tossing the grasses to and fro,
And a rainbow held out its shining hand…
So what could I do but laugh and go?

That pretty much describes how I felt.

Last night was quite an adventure, though, not one I care to repeat.  About sevenish, my  heart rate suddenly elevated.  This has happened before and usually corrects on its own, so I wasn’t too worried.  There was one time a couple of years ago that it did not correct on its own and I paid a visit to the ER. Everything turned out fine even though they  put me in room 13 and gave me a tech named Vladimir.  I figured that either God had a sense of humor, or I was really in trouble.  It turned out to be the first one. Well anyway, last night after a couple of hours,

I got Donna to take me to the ER. (Joel was out of town.)  Now, if you have to go to the ER, it is best to go for something heart related, because you don’t have to wait in line.

They quickly give you a piece of paper jewelry

followed by a lot of stickers of various shapes and sizes.  And, you get to wear all that home.  If and when you get them off, they leave glue boogers and red shapes, that resemble crop circles, all over you chest and abdomen.

They put me in exam room  eight.

After this guy got me settled

and hooked up to everything he could find, they called for Donna to be with me.  When she walked into the room, her eyes were big and she was wearing a strange grin. You see, when she found exam room eight,

this was marking the entrance.  She said that being assigned to a room with that kind of label would be enough to give a person a heart attack.

They ran all kinds of tests.  Everything was normal, except my heart rate, which wasn’t wanting to come down.  So the cardiologist suggested that they give me adenosine. The doctor said that it would make me feel funny.  I said, “What do you mean, funny?”  He said he didn’t know because it had never been given to him, but that the funny feeling would only last a minute.  He was right!  And, they gave me a double dose, which meant that I felt funny for two minutes.

I wasn’t the only one who felt funny.  About the time that they were about to shoot me up with that stuff, Donna and I happened to look at the television.  Guess what was on?

It was a show called One Thousand Ways to Die.  What are the chances?

Donna chose to watch that show instead of the show going on in and around my bed.

Anyway, the double dose of that stuff that stuff that starts with an “a” did the trick and they turned me loose at 2:45.  Boy, were we happy to get out of that place!

I have only one guinea left, thanks to the coyotes, and it has been pacing around the hen house looking for a way to get in.

This has been going on for weeks, and for weeks we have been trying to let the goofy thing in there with the chickens.  She’s not much of a people guinea, so when we would try to lend a helping hand she would run.  I thought that maybe I could catch her at night after she had gone to roost, but she had moved to different sleeping quarters.  I could not find where she was roosting…that is, until today.

Lately, she has been roosting on the roof of the hen house.  I never saw her up there, but she finally produced enough evidence to for me to figure it out…AND,  I came

this close to stepping in it. That’s when I decided that tonight she would be sleeping with the chickens.

So, I propped the gate open with a cage, and to it I connected one of those portable, collapsible  small animal fences.  Then I got her between all that and the hen house.  Instead of going through the hen house gate, she went into the cage.  She was not happy, but I managed to capture her in the cage and turn her loose in the hen house. I don’t know why I didn’t think of all that sooner.  But never the less, tonight…

she’s sleeping with the chickens.

Things are really coming together at A Bend in the Road Gallery.

The paintings have been framed and hung, and I’m now tending to some last minute details.  If you live nearby and like watercolors, or are just curious about what goes on around here, give me a call…I’ll meet you at A Bend in the Road.

Saturday afternoon after we took the boys to Leebo’s (where Hudson shared our family business with the clerk) I took them for a walk out back.  This time we weren’t secret agents, we were ninjas.

Denton and I carried guns, (which I thought was unninjalike) but Hudson did not carry one.  He announced that the one without a gun was the leader.  And, he said he was sorry, but those were the rules of the game. We were searching for the enemy’s castle lair…or at least that’s what Hudson said. Our search took us down trails,

past the trillium,

to the creek bank,

across logs and finally

to this piece of railroad wreckage where they accused whoever was behind there of killing the Ninja Queen. After that line of business was dealt with, we were no longer ninjas…just that quick.

They headed down a moss covered path where they discovered a coyote carcass, and before I realized what was happening,

they were carrying around about half of it.  I made them put it down and told them that we had to go back home to wash their hands.  But on the way,

they couldn’t resist stopping for a moment to look for four leaf clovers. They went from ninjas to naturalists – just that quick.

Yesterday was a very nice day…not hot, not cold.

There was even a hint of spring in the air.  Some of us decided to go for a walk.  Well, five of us to be exact; Tommy, Eddie, Kerry, Joel and I went out to Kincaid Lake to walk part of the trail there that begins at the boat landing.

We thoroughly enjoyed the trail and its ups and downs as it danced along the lake shore.  And, we enjoyed each other.

We only went in a couple of miles before we stopped for a water break, and then headed back.  We did, however, come upon someone we think was related to the Duck Commander.  Although it was a little thin, he did have a ‘full grown man beard’.

You just never know, do ya?

Thursday morning I decided to install a perch for Phil and Kay.  What I had in mind was a nice big limb, or some part of a tree.  I drove around the property on the golf cart to see what was available.  Down by the old pond, I spied this small tree that was growing all wompy-jawed.  It just grew up about six feet and then made a right turn (or left turn depending on which way you were looking at it).  It was perfect for what I was thinking of doing.

Now, to cut the thing down.  I couldn’t find the limb saw.  The chain saw that I found was bigger than the one I learned on in Alaska, and since I have not met my deductible, I thought it best to use the ax.  The ax, though dull, would have been fine had I been able to hit the same spot twice in a row.

I chopped until I was worn out.  Then, I just threw the ax down, yelled, “Timber!” and pushed on the tree until it broke.  The tree, though small, was much heavier than I had anticipated, but I got on the golf cart and managed to drag the thing to the chicken coop.

Once I got it through the door, I stood it in a corner

and tie-wrapped it to some two by fours.  Its not going anywhere.

I even attached a feeder.  I believe that Phil and Kay will really enjoy their new perch…

that is, if I can ever get them to try it out.

As you know, I spent the last week in January at the Grouchy Old Woman Bed and Breakfast in Nikiski, Alaska.  It had been twenty years since I had worked with watercolors, and this was a woodshedding adventure to resurrect my skills. I now have a body of work together, and my first exhibit at A Bend in the Road Gallery opens in nine days.  The featured paintings are a result of that woodshedding adventure.  I would love for you to come by and see them.

                          CONSIDER YOURSELF INVITED!