Love Thy Neighbor as Thy Self

When people see, for the first time, how everyone else on the planet is just another version of themselves - the same spark of God except for the pressures and desires unique to each life - some laugh, some cry, and some laugh until they cry.

May you live your life so that when this day dawns for you, you're among those who laugh and laugh and laugh.

This quote from my daily messages from The Universe (www.tut.com)

Ally and Pinta

We enjoyed Pinta's company a few times over the Christmas break and look forward to being able to ride in this mild January weather. We're inside the big barn, which has no improved footing, which results in shelter from the wind and precipitation, but makes us eat dust and all pictures are full of it ... not a bad trade really.

In these first two pictures, Pinta is showing off her amazing flexibility. Her favorite activity is bending back to accept treats from her rider. Ally is learning to lean down and steady herself enough to give the treat herself. They're both having a great time.




Here we are working on backing up. Our current practice is to do a few in-hand communication when we first get into the barn, and then Ally gets in the saddle and learns to just be a passenger and feel Pinta below her, while Pinta and I continue to work on whatever our current objectives are. Backing in a straight line is an ongoing objective-in-progress.




Here's one of Merri and Ally :)

GE Profile Double Oven

Check it out!! Our 2009 Christmas present ... after 9 months of pondering the idea, Skip decided it was time to act on the plan and we went and got the stove I had researched and selected. We're all very happy with it. Double-oven with the smaller one-rack oven on top and a large two-rack below. My thought is to use the top oven for most of my cooking and then have the larger one for the occasional times when I need more than one rack, which will likely just be holiday gatherings.

The main reason for the change was to upgrade to the fat kind of door seals which really help to keep the heat from the oven in the oven rather than in the house. This isn't such a big deal in the winter, but is killing our electricity bills in the summer (i.e. air-conditioning for the pampered beings who live in the 68 degree house). I'm expecting to see a big change in those bills next summer.

Before they brought it I was a bit worried it would overwhelm the looks of our kitchen, but I'm quite happy it looks wonderful. I have three pot-racks in progress on the welding bench in the shop. Yes, I did know the stove would be delivered Tuesday, and I did start the racks before that, but as usual I miscalculated the length of time needed to complete the racks with my sadly lacking welding skills. I'll get it done though ... I'll be posting pics whenever those are finished :)

Going to Bed

I check the locks on the front door
and the side door,
make sure the windows are closed
and the heat dialed down.
I switch off the computer,
turn off the living room lights.

I let in the cats.

Reverently, I unplug the Christmas tree,
leaving Christ and the little animals
in the dark.

The last thing I do
is step out to the back yard
for a quick look at the Milky Way.

The stars are halogen-blue.
The constellations, whose names
I have long since forgotten,
look down anonymously,
and the whole galaxy
is cartwheeling in silence through the night.

Everything seems to be ok.
         ~ George Bilgere

Molly the Katrina Survivor Pony

Meet Molly. She's a grey speckled POA pony who was abandoned by her owners when Hurricane Katrina hit southern Louisiana . She spent weeks on her own before finally being rescued and taken to a farm where abandoned animals were stockpiled. While there, she was attacked by a pit bull terrier and almost died. Her gnawed right front leg became infected, and her vet went to LSU for help, but LSU was overwhelmed, and this pony was a welfare case. You know how that goes. But after surgeon Rustin Moore met Molly, he changed his mind. He saw how the pony was careful to lie down on different sides so she didn't seem to get sores, and how she allowed people to handle her. She protected her injured leg. She constantly shifted her weight and didn't overload her good leg. She was a smart pony with a serious survival ethic. Moore agreed to remove her leg below the knee, and a temporary artificial limb was built. Molly walked out of the clinic and her story really begins there. 'This was the right horse and the right owner,' Moore insists. Molly happened to be a one-in-a-million patient. She's tough as nails, but sweet, and she was willing to cope with pain. She made it obvious she understood that she was in trouble. The other important factor, according to Moore, is having a truly committed and compliant owner who is dedicated to providing the daily care required over the lifetime of the horse. Molly's story turns into a parable for life in Post-Katrina Louisiana . The little pony gained weight, and her mane finally felt a comb. A human prosthesis designer built her a leg.. The prosthetic has given Molly a whole new life, Allison Barca DVM, Molly's regular vet, reports. And she asks for it. She will put her little limb out, and come to you and let you know that she wants you to put it on. Sometimes she wants you to take it off too. And sometimes, Molly gets away from Barca. 'It can be pretty bad when you can't catch a three-legged horse,' she laughs. Most important of all, Molly has a job now. Kay, the rescue farm owner, started taking Molly to shelters, hospitals, nursing homes, and rehabilitation centers. Anywhere she thought that people needed hope. Wherever Molly went, she showed people her pluck. She inspired people, and she had a good time doing it. 'It's obvious to me that Molly had a bigger role to play in life, Moore said. She survived the hurricane, she survived a horrible injury, and now she is giving hope to others.' Barca concluded, 'She's not back to normal, but she's going to be better. To me, she could be a symbol for New Orleans itself.'

This is Molly's most recent prosthesis. The bottom photo shows the ground surface that she stands on, which has a smiley face embossed in it. Wherever Molly goes, she leaves a smiley hoof print behind.

Here's a link to a book about this amazing pony, with proceeds going to the Kids & Ponies fund which supports her. MOLLY THE PONY By Pam Kaster Published April 2008 This book is an oversized, square "laminated" (so it wipes clean) hard cover book with all color photos. Pricing is $16 plus $6 per book shipping to USA addresses; $10 to Canada; $15 to other countries. Non-USA orders should be paid by Visa or Mastercard. http://www.hoofcare.com/mollythepony.html

Dogs Make Nice Rugs

Keeping warm together is important in 10 degree winter !!!

Shi and the Australian

OMG look! look! Shi has climbed onto the couch and is trying to get into my saddle! This has to be a sign, right?? Rob says I should calm down, she's just playing with whatever is handy and interesting, but I'm certain it is a sign from God that we need a pony! ... lol...

Generations of Hands

Big Sister Shiloh

-----Original Message-----
From: Rob Martinson [mailto:rob@limelyte.com]
Sent: Thursday, November 19, 2009 11:59 AM
To: Rob Martinson
Subject: It's official (so far)

Hey everyone!

So, we had a doc appointment yesterday afternoon to confirm and I thought even though it's early I better let everyone know.

Shiloh will be a big sister sometime in mid-July! Wasn't planned but we weren't exactly avoiding it either.

Shi was in the sink when we told her. She's excited!

Building With Whole Trees

ROALD GUNDERSEN, an architect who may revolutionize the building industry, shinnied up a slender white ash near his house here on a recent afternoon, hoisting himself higher and higher until the limber trunk began to bend slowly toward the forest floor. “Look at Papa!” his life and business partner, Amelia Baxter, 31, called to their 3-year-old daughter, Estella, who was crouching in the leaves, reaching for a mushroom. Their son, Cameron, 9 months, was nestled in a sling across Ms. Baxter’s chest. Wild mushrooms and watercress are among the treasures of this 134-acre forest, but its greatest resource is its small-diameter trees — thousands like the one Mr. Gundersen, 49, was hugging like a monkey. “Whooh!” he said, jumping to the ground and gingerly rubbing his back. “This isn’t as easy as it used to be. But see how the tree holds the memory of the weight?” The ash, no more than five inches thick, was still bent toward the ground. Mr. Gundersen will continue to work on it, bending and pruning it over the next few years in this forest which lies about 10 miles east of the Mississippi River and 150 miles northwest of Madison. Loggers pass over such trees because they are too small to mill, but this forester-architect, who founded Gundersen Design in 1991 and built his first house here two years later, has made a career of working with them. “Curves are stronger than straight lines,” he explained. “A single arch supporting a roof can laterally brace the building in all directions.” The firm, recently renamed Whole Tree Architecture and Construction, is also owned by Ms. Baxter, a onetime urban farmer and community organizer with a knack for administration and fundraising. She also manages a community forest project modeled after a community-supported agriculture project, in which paying members harvest sustainable riches like mushrooms, firewood and watercress from these woods, and those who want to build a house can select from about 1,000 trees, inventoried according to species, size and shape, and located with global positioning system coordinates, a living inventory that was paid for with a $150,000 grant from the United States Department of Agriculture. According to research by the Forest Products Laboratory in Madison, run by the USDA, a whole, unmilled tree can support 50 percent more weight than the largest piece of lumber milled from the same tree. So Mr. Gundersen uses small-diameter trees as rafters and framing in his airy structures, and big trees felled by wind, disease or insects as powerful columns and curving beams. Taking small trees from a crowded stand in the forest is much like thinning carrots in a row: the remaining plants get more light, air and nutrients. Carrots grow longer and straighter; trees get bigger and healthier. And when the trees are left whole, they sequester carbon. “For every ton of wood, a ton and a half of carbon dioxide is locked up,” he said, whereas producing a ton of steel releases two to five tons of carbon. So the more whole wood is used in place of steel, the less carbon is pumped into the air. These passive solar structures also need very little or no supplemental heat. Tom Spaulding, the executive director of Angelic Organics Learning Center, near Rockford, Ill., northwest of Chicago, knows about this because he commissioned Mr. Gundersen to build a 1,600-square-foot training center in 2003. He said: “In the middle of winter, on a 20-below day, we’re in shorts, with the windows and doors open. And we don’t burn a bit of petroleum.” “It’s eminently more frugal and sustainable than milling trees,” he added. “These are weed trees, so when you take them out, you improve the forest stand and get a building out of it. You haven’t stripped an entire hillside out west to build it, or used a lot of oil to transport the lumber.”

Mr. Gundersen had a rough feeling for all of this 16 years ago, when he started building a simple A-frame house here for his first wife and their son, Ian, now 15. He wanted to encourage local farmers to use materials like wood and straw from their own farms to build low-cost, energy-efficient structures. So he used small aspens that were crowding out young oaks nearby. “I would just carry them home and peel them,” said Mr. Gundersen, who later realized he could peel them while they were standing, making them “a lot lighter to haul and not so dangerous to fell.” Mr. Gundersen, who built most of the house singlehandedly, also recognized the beauty of large trees downed by disease or wind, and used the peeled trunks, shorn of their central branches a few feet from the crook, as supporting columns in the house. “I thought they were beautiful, but I didn’t think how strong they were,” he said. "In architecture, how materials come together and how they are connected is really the god in the details," he continued."The connection is where things will fall apart," he said, adding that the crook of a tree"has been time-tested by environmental conditions for 200 million years." He refers to that first house -- which cost $15,000 (for plumbing, electrical, septic and other basic amenities, as well as $4,000 in paid labor) and a year of his own labor -- as his master’s degree in architecture. Divorced in 1997, he now lives there with Ms. Baxter and their two children. After finishing the A-frame, Mr. Gundersen built a 100-by-20-foot solar greenhouse next door with thick straw-bale walls on three sides, banked into the north slope. He used small-diameter, rot-resistant black locust trees for the timber framing.

A wall of double-paned glass, positioned to optimize the low-angle winter light, faces south. Growing beds angled slightly toward the sun are planted with rows of mustard greens, kale, chard, arugula, lettuces and herbs. Hanging trays of micro-greens and a fig and bay tree promise fresh food for the fall and winter. But it is the Book End -- the little house attached to the greenhouse, which is home to the firm’s project manager and his wife -- that quietly vibrates with the spirit of the forest. "We used a lot of standing dead elm here," Mr. Gundersen said, pointing out the delicate trails, or galleries, left by the beetles that killed the tree. Peeled of their bark and satiny smooth, these trees have a presence that seems to draw one’s arm around their trunks and invite a viewer to lean into them, to soak up strength from these powerful old souls. In this quiet farming community, where people may not have a lot of money to spend, but do have plenty of wood and straw, word of the beauty and practicality of Mr. Gundersen’s structures has spread. Solar greenhouses made of local materials can extend the growing season through winter, even in a place where temperatures can drop to 30 or 40 below. In the last 18 years, Whole Trees has built 25 of them here. It’s part of a vision Mr. Gundersen developed after spending three years as a project architect on Biosphere 2, the three-acre glass-enclosed miniature world constructed near Tucson in the 1980s, which tried to replicate the earth’s systems, but foundered on carbon dioxide, acidic seas, failed crops and internal intrigues. After that experience, he wanted to build something more basic to human needs. Mr. Gundersen grew up in nearby LaCrosse, where his Norwegian great-grandfather, a doctor, founded a local institution, the Gundersen Clinic; he comes from a clan of doctors and tree lovers."There are 23 doctors in the family," he said, including his father and uncle and four great-uncles, but he seems to be wired more like his great-grandmother Helga, whose family still owns a tree farm in Norway. He and his grandmother would often picnic on this piece of wild land, where he remembers picking watercress and wildflowers and building tree forts. Now, to be in his buildings is to be among the trees.

"It almost feels like we’re in a forest, the trees have such a presence," said Marcia Halligan, a client who is a farmer and Reiki instructor, standing among the birch posts of her airy bedroom. She and her partner, Steven Adams, who grows seed for organic seed companies, worked with Mr. Gundersen on a design that uses 22 different kinds of wood, most of it from their own land outside Viroqua, southeast of Stoddard. The economic downturn has put commissions for several large buildings for nonprofits and a 4,600-square-foot residence on hold, Mr. Gundersen and Ms. Baxter say, but the demand for small houses like theirs is up. "It’s remarkable how many people have called this last year asking for 1,000-square-foot houses," Ms. Baxter said."People are downsizing for their retirement homes, and even younger folks are thinking about energy costs, environmental awareness and simplicity." Whole Trees can keep construction costs as low as $100 a square foot, not including site preparation, if the client is willing to shop for secondhand fixtures and the like. As people begin to see forests as a resource, they may begin to take care of them rather than cutting them down to make room for cornfields or pastures. And the forests keep giving back. "I’ve taken 20 trees per year off one acre, for 12 buildings," Mr. Gundersen said."You can never tell that we’ve taken out that much wood."

Good Dog, Smart Dog

I found this fascinating and wanted to share >> ----------------------- Life as a Labradoodle may sound free and easy, but if you’re Jet, who lives in New Jersey, there is a lot of work to be done. He is both a seizure alert dog and a psychiatric service dog whose owner has epilepsy, severe anxiety, depression, various phobias and hypoglycemia. Jet has been trained to anticipate seizures, panic attacks and plunging blood sugar and will alert his owner to these things by staring intently at her until she does something about the problem. He will drop a toy in her lap to snap her out of a dissociative state. If she has a seizure, he will position himself so that his body is under her head to cushion a fall. Jet seems like a genius, but is he really so smart? In fact, is any of it in his brain, or is it mostly in his sniff? The matter of what exactly goes on in the mind of a dog is a tricky one, and until recently much of the research on canine intelligence has been met with large doses of skepticism. But over the last several years a growing body of evidence, culled from small scientific studies of dogs’ abilities to do things like detect cancer or seizures, solve complex problems (complex for a dog, anyway), and learn language suggests that they may know more than we thought they did. Their apparent ability to tune in to the needs of psychiatric patients, turning on lights for trauma victims afraid of the dark, reminding their owners to take medication and interrupting behaviors like suicide attempts and self-mutilation, for example, has lately attracted the attention of researchers. In September, the Army announced that it would spend $300,000 to study the impact of pairing psychiatric service dogs like Jet with soldiers returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with post-traumatic stress disorder. Both the House and Senate have recently passed bills that would finance the training and placement of these dogs with veterans. Hungarian researchers reported in a study last year that a guide dog for a blind and epileptic person became anxious before its master suffered a seizure and was taught to bark and lick the owner’s face and upper arm when it detected an onset, three to five minutes before the seizure. It is still somewhat mysterious how exactly dogs detect seizures, whether it’s by picking up on behavioral changes or smelling something awry, but several small studies have shown that a powerful sense of smell can detect lung and other types of cancer, as the dogs sniff out odors emitted by the disease. Beyond these perceptual abilities, in which trainers can use the dogs’ natural instincts, some research has examined dogs’ actual cognitive ability, and found not just good doggie, but smart doggie. “I believe that so much research has come out lately suggesting that we may have underestimated certain aspects of the mental ability of dogs that even the most hardened cynic has to think twice before rejecting the possibilities,” said Stanley Coren, a psychology professor at the University of British Columbia and an author of several books on dogs. Dr. Coren’s work on intelligence, along with other research suggesting that the canine brain processes information something like the way people do, has drawn criticism. And there is good reason. For most of the last century the specter of a horse named Clever Hans hung over anyone who tried to prove that dogs were acting in thoughtful ways — not merely mimicking or manipulating people into believing that they in fact grasped human concepts. Clever Hans was said to be able to count, make change and tell time by tapping his hoof, until investigators in the early 1900s learned that Hans was merely responding to his trainer’s body language, tapping when the trainer nodded his head. This provided an enduring example for those who believed thought was the exclusive domain of humans. But in 2004, German researchers reported that a border collie named Rico could learn the name of an object in one try, had 200 objects in his repertoire and remembered them all a month later, all very human. Even skeptical animal behavior researchers found the Rico results impressive and sound. Is it possible that Rico turned the tide on the Clever Hans problem, even though there is debate about how we can reliably measure what dogs know? By giving dogs language learning and other tests devised for infants and toddlers, Dr. Coren has come up with an intelligence ranking of 100 breeds, with border collies at No. 1. He says the most intelligent breeds (poodles, retrievers, Labradors and shepherds) can learn as many as 250 words, signs and signals, while the others can learn 165. The average dog is about as intellectually advanced as a 2- to 2-and-a-half-year-old child, he has concluded, with an ability to understand some abstract concepts. For example, the animal can get “the idea of being a dog” by differentiating photographs with dogs in them from photographs without dogs. But Clive D. L. Wynne, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Florida who specializes in canine cognition and has himself said he met a border collie who knew 1,500 words, takes issue with efforts to compare human and canine brains. He argues that it is dogs’ deep sensitivity to the humans around them, their obedience under rigorous training, and their desire to please that can explain most of these capabilities. They may be deft at reading human cues — and teachable — but that doesn’t mean they are thinking like people, he says. A dog’s entire world revolves around its primary owner, and it will respond to that person to get what it wants, usually food, treats or affection. “I take the view that dogs have their own unique way of thinking,” Dr. Wynne said. “It’s a happy accident that doggie thinking and human thinking overlap enough that we can have these relationships with dogs, but we shouldn’t kid ourselves that dogs are viewing the world the way we do.” And my opinion is … of course dogs are way smarter than we give them credit for, this is true of most situations where we consider ourselves ‘superior.’ And I’m thinking they view the world from a dogs’ view, which is no doubt not the same as the humans’ view. Of course, our view is the correct one … lol.

Shi and her Cookies

Yesterday being Friday, Rob and Shiloh came over in the morning. As I did my usual padding around behind her while she roamed through our house I realized I haven't written to this blog in quite some time, AND, she is adorable and I really needed to take some pictures and share a recipe or two :). Last week we made snickerdoodles ... and Shi was not happy about her fingers being all sticky with the cinnamon/sugar mix that the dough is rolled in before cooking. She did understand how to take a pinch off of the prepared ones on the cookie sheet. She sampled several :)

Snickerdoodles Ingredients 1 1/2 c Sugar 1/2 c Butter softened 1 tsp Vanilla 2 Eggs 2 3/4 c Flour 1 tsp Cream of tartar 1/2 tsp Baking soda 1/4 tsp Salt 2 tbsp Sugar 2 tsp Cinnamon Preparation Heat oven to 400. In large bowl combine first 4 ingredients; blend well. Stir in flour, cream of tartar, soda and salt. Blend well. Shape dough into 1-inch balls. Combine 2 Tbsp sugar and cinnamon. Roll balls in sugar mixture. Place 2 inches apart on cookie sheet. Bake 8-10 min or until set. Immediately remove from cookie sheet.

This week I made oatmeal cookies and had them ready to cook when they arrived. Although last week was thoroughly enjoyable, I decided that having the dough prepared before she showed up might be easier ... lol. She got on her stool in the kitchen and watched/helped while I added chocolate chips to the tops of the cookies, but her FAVORITE part was using three different spatulas to pick them up and move them around once they were out of the oven on the butcher paper cooling sheet.

My Favorite Oatmeal Cookies Ingredients 2 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/2 pound (2 sticks) butter or margarine, softened 1 cup firmly packed brown sugar 1/2 cup granulated sugar 2 eggs 1 teaspoon vanilla 3 cups Quaker® Oats (quick or old fashioned, uncooked) 1 cup raisins or semi-sweet chocolate chips (optional) Preparation Heat oven to 350°F. In medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt; mix well. In large bowl, beat butter and sugars with electric mixer until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well. Add flour mixture; mix well. Stir in oats and, if desired, raisins; mix well. Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake 10 to 12 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool 1 minute on cookie sheets; remove to butcher paper. Cool completely. Sometimes I do this following dipping part, it makes a very "pretty" cookie. For Shiloh, we prefer just 'plain' ... lol 2 cups (12 ounces) semi-sweet chocolate chips 3/4 cup chopped nuts Melt chocolate chips according to package directions. Dip half of one cookie in chocolate; gently shake to remove excess. Sprinkle with chopped nuts. Place on waxed paper until set. Repeat with remaining cookies. If chocolate thickens, microwave at 15-second intervals until fluid. Store cookies with waxed paper between layers in tightly covered container.

The remainder of the visit was taken up with various inspections of one piece or another of fascinating household paraphernalia ... such as her favorite spot ... Ryan's bedside table :)

Most things she has a word for and she goes from one to the next speaking their word. On Ryan's bedside table is a tiny skateboard, which is called a deck-something ... anyway, I get the biggest kick out of watching Shi, every week, go into his room and take the tiny skateboard off his table, put it on the floor, and step on it. She knows what it is, recognizes it as a skateboard. I'm not sure what word it is that she calls it, it is not yet "skateboard." This particular item she is fascinated with because she does not have a name for it. It is a chain breaker for a bicycle chain and that is too complicated a description for her just yet. She thinks it is something to look through, although it does not have a hollow tube. It is quite heavy, but she carefully picks it up every week and studies it. I am captivated....

And here we are, at the end of the morning, with Shi playing underneath the kitchen table with Pippi while Rob and I are chatting.

Summer 2009 >> we're very busy :)

On July 3rd we all participated in the Stateline Speedway Demolition Derby event. This had both a racing segment and the crash-up portion, plus a contest for best-looking-car. Skip is quite fond of his trophy collection and was anticipating adding something, preferably three (winning everything ...) We had worked for six months leading up to this event and it really was something. We took pictures of the car, Photoshop-ed it to condense the colors down to five, and collectively created a cartoon-ey version for screenprinting. Just the t-shirt planning took almost 4 months. Ike drew the cartoon version of Thunder (Sponge) Bob over a period of about three weeks of carrying it around to work and home, trying to get happy with it ... ha ha ha. In the end, there were a bit more than 50 people in the stands with the shirt on cheering Skip on. Mike Busby took his awesome photos and there is a great 2 minute quick slideshow with some of his favorites here >>

Ike and Jade flew in on their little mini-vacation on Monday and left Wednesday night. Ike made an awesome birthday dinner for Rob and Rob and Nomi and Shiloh came out and sat around for lamb stuffed with plums, almonds, cherries and walnuts with watermelon and lemon cake for dessert. Wednesday morning Ike gave me my first-ever small plane ride, which I requested be lift-off, circle and land. It went well (meaning I did not have a panic attack from the height). Now I'm thinking I'll be fine for the next round whenever he ends up back up here with another plane. Skip and Ryan went over Hayden Lake and Coeur d'Alene and took a few great pics up there. This next picture is Rick and Sandi's place while they were flying over Hayden Lake, Idaho.

On July 15th we had a birthday/Thunder Bob celebration party here for Skip's Mom. We had 33 people and it was quite enjoyable. We ate cake and ice cream about 6pm outside in the lawn and it was the perfect time of day. Everyone had a great time, including piling into the living room together to watch some Thunder Bob videos and Mike's slideshow. The lemon cake was spectacular, although I could have done a better job on the decorations. I tried to write freehand and I'm no where near as good as Skip at it. He would go out and write something on the demo car in paint and it would come out perfect. Me ... I'm trying to write a simple cake message and I run myself out of space. Ah well, Helen was happy :)

The deck isn't finished yet, but I'm going out NOW to work on it again. Skip helped me put up the top of the front rail and I'm not feeling overwhelmed any longer. Ms. Math could NOT figure out the logistics of how to get my pieces to fit together. And thankfully it is much stronger than he was thinking it would be ... We'll keep you posted :)

Ramblings 2009

Life is great ... busy as ever ... and I've been informed I am getting behind in keeping up the pics and newsy notes ... here's some of the latest. Shiloh is walking and busy learning words. Its like watching Rosetta Stone without the need for software intervention. She points, someone identifies, she repeats. And repeats. Its awesome. They are a threesome now ... Rob, Nomi and Shiloh ... they are enjoying and reveling in every detail of whatever activity ... which I love watching and hearing about. Here is Shiloh in her motocross outfit >>

Over Memorial Day the boxer girls stayed out here and Rob, et al drove over to Seattle to relax and be tourists for a few days. They took the usual one million photos, but these are some of my favorites >>

Those of you who knew Dad ... is this last one Rob looking like my Dad, or what??? It made me smile when I found it in the stack. Just a casual photo of Rob driving the Lexus as they're travelling across the state. Periodically I am struck by this wheel of life where we all turn round-and-round. What is that line of the opening of the detective show ??? .... "the names have been changed ..." Skip loves watching drama TV shows and I have always turned my nose up contemptously at these shows. What I'm learning is this >>>      names change      years change      life is the same over and over      clothing changes      humans are blissfully consistent          it is a wonderful thing.

I'm looking forward to keeping my younger sister Merri's two children this summer every week once a week. The mere idea is getting me edgy about what else I'll manage. I intend to run my version of boot camp :) My niece Ally (11?) is interested in sewing ... she's helped me a few times before with fairly large things ... she did quite a bit of work on the blocks for Ryan's new quilt ... so I'm going to teach her to sew. She's gotten a sewing machine and I want her to be sewing Hot Pads for Hunger because they are small, artistic, and count-able.

My nephew Christian, who is about 8, is crazy about Ryan (and Skip whenever he gets the chance). I'm going to teach him guy-skills ... such as, we're going to install my new outside sink (plumbing), going to make some new steps down to the mailbox (concrete work / hammer, etc.), going to expand the front deck to twice its current size and add a ramp, replace the heating elements in the hot water heater, etc. etc. ... you get the idea :)

I'm going to try to confine my projects to the days they are here ... because in case you didn't realize it, I tend to drop all money-making work and get completely engrossed in wonderful home-improvement projects every opportunity / excuse I get. So ... none of that!!! If I know I'll have at least one full day a week for them, I'm going to push my projects there.

My business is very busy --- I’m so blessed that things have not taken a downturn with the economic issues. I have more work than I take time to do.

Rob and grandbaby Shiloh continue their Friday morning Nana visits. That has been such a great scheduling plan for Rob and I both. We sit around the yard, enjoying lattes and some treat I bake, and watch Shiloh explore and play with the dogs while we talk internet/development/techy talk. What a blessing!

The demo derby project is coming along nicely. Skip is still posting videos of the progress almost every week at www.skipcook.com ... we're having a good time with it but it is LOADS of work. I'm finishing the last of the artwork on the t-shirt today and going to send out a mass email for pre-orders so we get enough the first time around.

Our yard is gorgeous -- I added another expanded bed at the base of the front pine tree and the dogs were playing in it till I started putting on the grass clipping mulch I usually use everywhere. Once that covered the bare dirt they have left it alone and things are finally settling in and starting to take hold. The plants weren’t stressing, but they were getting uprooted every single day! Sass was burying regular dog-bones out there -- I mean the VitaBone kind.

This raised bed we put in last year on the west side of the house is really taking shape. I put a climbing Mr. Lincoln rose in this year next to the trumpet vine. The trumpet is just starting to wake up now -- small at the bottom and bushy, and Mr. Lincoln looks settled in and healthy. I’m looking for FRAGRANCE! ... unfortunately, the fish in the pond did not survive the winter ... we found them at the bottom of the pond in mud. Happily, the new ones are quite lively and seem content.

These are my favorite perky early geraniums surrounding a peony that opened just yesterday. Everyone else in the neighborhood has had peonies in bloom for weeks, but this is the first of ours that has opened. We have them in several different locations, but they're all running a bit late.

Our raised beds are looking awesome and we should have enough beet greens to feed most of the neighborhood. Skip went nuts on those. We like them though, so its all good.

This rose has moved four times !!! It was a home-grown transplant I started from the mother plant which climbed the wall next to our chicken house on Bonnie Drive. It is the old-fashioned strongly scented yellow climber. So nice to see that its happy this year :)

Asparagus we planted in a 15" deep trench last year has dirt piling almost back up to ground level. The stalks are tall and ferny, very healthy and looking good. I did lose one rose bush that was planted on the side of a small rise. That was the only plant gone through the winter though.

Ryan has stepped up and become an A student these last 3 weeks and we have all thoroughly enjoyed the process. No idea how much he will remain here -- but no matter, it is wonderful however it works out. I love it when he’s not here and I so enjoy his presence when he is :)