Saturday afternoon, March 31

The male goldfinche's drab olive-green feathers are being replaced with bright yellow. Soon he will be a flash of gold.

Beautiful tail feathers, but he is still a bully.

The chipping sparrow, one of my favorites, just returned several days ago

While people in Delaware, Franklin and Licking counties were taking cover in basements last night, we enjoyed a beautiful sunset.

Been pretty lazy today. I fixed the dishwasher, it got pushed too far back when they were installing the floor so that the door would not close, moved a few boxes, vacuumed the carpet, baked bread for the shut in baskets, leveled out some mole holes in the yard and Molly and I went for a walk. Now I'm readying Hunger Games while we wait for the Ohio State game to come on. GO Bucks!!

Saturday, March 31

The yard looked pretty good after Andy finished his mowing.

There is something about the first spring flowers that gets me excited.

The Virginia Bluebelles seemed to come up overnight

We were so looking forward to seeing little Evelyn, guess we have to wait a little bit longer.

Mom and Dad enjoying the sunshine at the Courtyard.

What a week this has been. The weather has been a yo-yo with temperatures soaring to nearly 87 one day and dropping to below freezing the next. I was forced to do something I have never done before..... mowed my grass in March. It is unthinkable, I will be mowing for the next 6 months and with the price of gas nearing $4 that equates to a lot of money. We spent Sunday afternoon at the Madison County Hospital ER to find out what I suspected on Saturday, that Mr. B was suffering from a UTI. Nothing a good dose of antibiotic won't cure. The Buckeyes get a big win, the Tennessee Lady Vols lose to Baylor in what may have been Pat Summit's last game. Lily can't seem to shake her cold and ear infection and has not been able to get her final MIBG scan. In a week of ups and downs we didn't need to hear that Matt's leave to come home was rescinded 30 minutes after it was issued and he left yesterday morning on another deployment. Yes, it has been a week of ups and downs, but we will keep chugging along, counting our blessings and looking forward to a stress-free spring. Yea, right!

Saturday, March 24

I am actually writing this late Friday night as I watch the Indiana vs Kentucky game. Busy day today as I went to training classes at the zoo so I can work several animal contact areas. After that I picked up some lumber at Lowe's for Andy's greenhouse that we will be building as soon as I can get the energy to start a new project. Then I stopped at The Anderson's General store because we really like their meat and produce. My next stop was to go across the street to Ashley Furniture to pick up our new sofa and recliner. My goal was to get home before the rains got to Madison county. I couldn't pick up until 2 pm so I was cutting it pretty close. As I turned onto our road it began to sprinkle and I was able to get the groceries carried in and the truck put in the garage before the heavens opened up. Several hours later our helpers showed up to carry the furniture in and we are certainly thankful for such helpful and willing nephews. We had some great grilled apple brats from Anderson's, hamburgers, hot dogs, mac n cheese for the kids and cantelope. After supper we broke in the new sofa and chair by watching a little March Madness.

Thursday, March 22

Just had to put this picture in the post. This is Evelyn after a green beer dinner at the Dixie Grill on St. Patrick's Day! I love it!!

I am sure you are wondering "why don't she write?" to paraphrase from Dances With Wolves. Well to tell the truth, I've been really, really busy. I have been thinking about getting wood floors for awhile now and after some price comparisons and shopping, we finally decided on a laminate flooring from Lumber Liquidators. They gave us an estimate the following day and scheduled the installation five days later. Of course, to save money we decided to pull out all of the old carpet and the stone tile in front of the fireplace. It was a little more of a job than we anticipated but we saved nearly $475. Yesterday the installation crew was here and by 6 o'clock we had new flooring in the living room and kitchen. It looks really nice and tomorrow I will post pictures of the rooms once we get the furniture in. I had planned to rest up today but instead I cleaned the two Koi ponds in front of the house. If you are going to wade around in mucky cold water it is better to do it on a day when it is 85 degrees. We still have some unpacking to do inside and of course with this early warm weather the grass will have to mowed sooner than we would like but I feel like we have accomplished quite a lot in the last month. We are looking forward to Sara, Matt ad Evelyn's visit next month and Lily's birthday celebration in May. Hopefully we will have everything all caught up by then so we can finally relax! Getting ready to watch the Ohio State vs Cincy basketball game. Sorry Matt, but I have to cheer for the Buckeyes.

Wednesday, March 14

Spring has sprung, the grass is rizz, I wonder where the flowers is? Well I found a few as I was cleaning out my flower beds and it appears that spring is well on its way. It is so nice that it is really difficult to make myself work inside the house. We did get the rooms upstairs finished, Saturday we put the wainscot paneling up and Monday I painted and put the trim up. I am slowly getting the contents of those rooms unboxed and put back. I have been trying to purge some of the items and plan to have a spring yard sale and see if someone else might find that our junk could be their treasure. Afternoons I try to get outside and work a little in the yard so I can enjoy the wonderful weather. I'm thinking it is almost time to get the kayaks out. Last Sunday a group was leaving as I was getting home from church. I was pretty close to going with them.

Friday, March 9

Our pool side visitor wondering when the pool will be open.

Daddy with his happy little girl!

Evelyn's 14 week photo. She now weighs 12 lbs. 6 oz.

It has been a full week for me so I am ready for the week end. I worked two days at the zoo and the last two days were spent at doctor appointments for Mom and Dad. Yesterday morning Mr. B looked out the back door to see a Great Blue Heron perched on the railing of our swimming pool. Maybe he thought there would be a frog or two in the water on top of the pool cover. It is amazing how large these herons are. Standing 4 1/2 feet tall with a wing span of nearly 6 feet easily makes them one of the largest birds native to Ohio. Today Evelyn is 14 weeks old and getting cuter every picture we see. We can hardly wait for them to come visit. Hopefully it won't be much longer before Matt can get his leave approved. Have a nice week end, it's time to watch the Buckeyes play in the Big 10 tournament. Go Bucks!!

Midnight Musings

Gazing up into the midnight sky.

Don't even ask why I am still up at midnight because I really don't know. For two days I have been up at 5 a.m. to get to the zoo and prepare the aviary diet. I just took Molly out for her 11 p.m. potty walk and it was so pretty out. The full moon is so bright that there were shadows stretching across the yard that reminded me of the Christmas story, T'was the Night Before Christmas when the father springs out of bed and looks out the window to the lawn below, minus the snow. As Molly and I headed out into the pasture I noticed she was intently staring at the top of the hill near the pasture fence. After my eyes finally adjusted I could make out the silouette of a deer. We began walking and I noticed a second figure turning and then in an instant both figures appeared to leap straight into the air, clear the fence and disappear over the crest of the hill. There is something about walking late at night that I find very relaxing. The clouds tonight were sailing across the blackened sky at a pretty good clip and the moon was playing peek a boo like a child playing with the light switch. To the real reason I am still awake, I made a cup of hot chocolate and sat in the hot tub for about 30 minutes. I watched the clouds drifting to the east and I imagine that they are actually the precurser of the rains that are coming in tomorrow. As I closed up the hot tub I could hear a Killdeer high up in the clouds. A lot of people, including myself until recently, don't realize how many of our birds migrate at night. It is very eerie hearing that sound coming from the heavens. I will now try to get some sleep. Sweet dreams to everyone and a safe journey to our bird friends.

On a side note, Lily's MIBG scan has been postponed for 2 weeks because she has a cold.

Sunday Musings from the Hot Tub 3/4/2012

This morning's view from our hot tub. What a beautiful Sunday morning

A view of God's creation from our glacier hike out of McCarthy, Alaska.

The little Downy woodpecker that visits our feeder.

When I got up this morning I was determined to get everything done and get to church on time. And then I looked outside to see that it was snowing. Not the cold, wintery, yuck snow but the soft, fluffy silent snow that always appears to be dropping straight down from the heavens themselves. So I promptly changed my former plan and went outside and melted myself into the warm waters of our hot tub. Snowy nights are my very favorite time to sit in the hot tub but this morning was equally beautiful. As I sat there watching the large flakes falling into the water around me, I could hear the churring of the Red-bellied woodpecker and the "peet" retort of the Downy. In the background I could hear the nuthatch as he busily transported one seed at a time from the feeder to a crevice in the bark of the tree behind him. My thoughts turned to the Sunday school lesson that we would be discussing later this morning. It comes from a series by Adam Hamilton called "When Christians Get It Wrong". Today we would be talking about science and politics and how we as Christians often turn others away by being so closed minded. Even Galileo, a believer in God, was charged with heresy when he proposed his theory that the sun revolved around the earth and not the other way around, as the religious scholars believed from writings in the Bible. Christians sometimes get so hung up on how God created the world and all it's living things in 7 days that I believe they lose the wonder of the creation itself. Hamilton explains it this way. God didn't write Genesis to tell us exactly how he created, only that he did, and it was good. Why is it that some Christians feelso threatened by science? I like to think that science often magnifies and enhances God's handiwork. When I think about about the many wonders of nature and how over millions of years, one celled organisms could evolve into the living things that we know, it makes the creations of our God even more impressive. As I watch the snow flakes, I remember that someone, who must have had way too much time on his or her hands, determined that every snowflake is unique. Knowing this does not lessen the beauty of the snowflake, it makes it even more wonderous. You only need to see a double rainbow, a waterfall, the Grand Canyon or the miracle of a newborn to realize that God is indeed an awesome God. Even if God spent the time to explain the details to me, I'm sure I wouldn't understand. I am startled from my thoughts by the sound of a new bird. It appears that our resident Cooper's hawk has come visiting, prompting the song birds to dive for cover and I quickly see, by the time, that I really do need to start getting ready for church.