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Nothing is Cooking

One of my readers once said they enjoy my little quizzes or guessing games. So here’s one for you…

Any idea what this is?

Did you guess?

I’ll give you a hint. Look at this next picture.

Our concrete counter in 2007.

The kitchen counter at the WV place was the one thing we did that really didn’t work out very well. Hubby and I are NOT concrete finishers. We’ve never liked it, but we’ve lived with it.

Until now.

Our concrete counter in 2011.

Hubby spent last weekend in WV alone, using a jackhammer to dismantle the concrete counter. Then he removed the rest of the cabinets. (I’d helped him remove the wall cabinets the weekend before last.)

Here's what is left of the old kitchen.

He spent most of last week there, alone, so he could work on installing cabinets in the evenings. (A wife and three dogs would have totally been in the way.)

He actually got a heck of a lot done all by himself. But that’s my Hubby. He’s quite handy and way more motivated than anyone else I know.

The kitchen on Saturday morning.

Hubby loaded all of the boxes of unassembled cabinets and hardware onto the trailer by himself. He drove it to the WV place. Well, almost. He drove it to the community, but the roads were VERY icy. After a small incident where the truck and trailer jacknifed on the very first steep hill, blocking all traffic into and out  of the community for a couple of hours, he had to park the trailer. He wasn’t injured. In fact, it was over the course of the next two days that he had to make multiple trips back to the trailer, transfer the cabinet stuff into the truck, drive to the house, unload the cabinet stuff, and then repeat a couple of times. There were appliances, too.

I tell you, he’s awesome.

My amazing Hubby.

While he continued doing the hard stuff like building a small wall, assembling and installing more cabinets, hooking the appliances up to the electricity, etc., I once again assumed my customary unskilled laborer role. I got to do drywall finishing and painting.

This is what the kitchen looks like now.

There’s quite a bit left to be done, but that’s not too shabby for one guy over a week’s time.

The weekend wasn’t ALL work and no play. The girls were there after all. And they had a visitor.

Their friend, Buddy, came a calling.

I was happy to see a couple of bluebirds.

A bluebird!

I took the girls for their walks as usual. This is one of the two bluebirds I saw. He was sitting on the power line above our driveway.

Meg waiting for me to walk up the hill.

It’ll probably take a few weekends to get the kitchen completely finished. But it will be SOOOOO nice to have a dishwasher, new cabinets, and nice cooktop.

Belle and K waiting in the truck as we prepare to leave.

All in all, it was a pretty productive weekend.

Can you believe how much work Hubby got done all by himself?

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Ephemera

This weekend, for the most part, was uneventful. We went to the WV place, but it was cold all weekend. The dogs and I did go outside, but everything is brown. So I didn’t have much to photograph.

I did take a few pics, which I’ll share later. But first, I wanted to explain my title. In case you were wondering.

You were wondering, right? Did that awesome image at least pique your interest?

That image is directly related to my title.

It is just one of many, many FREE clipart images shared by The Graphics Fairy, aka Karen, a woman who collects vintage paper and uses it to create interesting clipart. She then shares it for free with the big ole blog world. Cool, eh?

Some of it is a bit too flowery for me. And some of it is quite strange. Like that sledding picture. But that’s what makes it interesting, right?

There’s a Search Page on her site to help you find stuff. If you go to that page, click on the word that describes the category of interest, not the little thumbnail.

“Ephemera” is one of her image categories.

I first heard that word when I discovered the company, Ephemera, Inc. My guess is you’ve probably seen some of their products at least once. They sell buttons, refrigerator magnets, mouse pads, you name it, with funny slogans on them.

That mouse pad image on the right is only one of their many products.

I guess I should warn you that their merchandise isn’t exactly PC.

But it’s fun. At least, I think it’s fun. And this is my space so I’m allowed to say so, right?

Can you tell I’m sort of grasping for material here?

Oh wait, I do have something new to talk about.

Can you guess what this is? It’s quite colorful, isn’t it?

Colorful Mystery Object

I could be mean and NOT tell you. I could just wait and see how many people leave comments guessing. But I’ll just be nice and show you…

"Thanks, Mama."

I FINALLY got around to making K a new bed for the WV place. The first one I made, over a year ago, is too skinny. This one is actually a bit too square. I didn’t put a whole lot of thought into its design.

Meg hogging the bed.

All of the dogs seem to like it, so I must have done something right.

Before I stop for the day, I will offer a bit of a cliffhanger. I took this next picture yesterday right before we left the WV place.

What's happening?

It’s the beginning stage of Hubby’s latest project. That Hubby of mine can really be a busy little bee. More to follow on that one. One of these days…

Don't Forget Your Free Graphics
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Cold January Weekend

Our first visit to the WV place in 2011 has been a cold one. Thank goodness for reliable electricity and propane gas delivery. Not to mention the heating system, designed and implemented by Hubby, that really works. I don’t think it got out of the 20s yesterday.

Friday night into Saturday morning we got a couple inches of snow, too. Which is always a plus for me.

Other than that, it’s been a relatively uneventful weekend. The girls are happy as can be, of course. This is their favorite place in the whole world. That excitement is a little less than thrilling when they insist on dragging me out of bed at 6:00 AM. But that left me plenty of time to wake up, don sufficient outerwear, and get out to enjoy a pretty sunrise in the woods.

We’re not on top of a mountain or anything so we don’t get to see the classic sunrise/sunsets over the horizon, but I still enjoy seeing the colors paint the sky.

Pretty, isn’t it?

If you’re wondering where K was, she was back at the house. We’re starting to think she’s part cat. I have never seen a dog so obsessed with catching rodents.

That’s where K spent a good, solid four hours on Saturday. She never did catch anything, but it wasn’t for lack of trying.

These next two shots are from a bit later in the day.

Even with just an inch or two of snow, it’s still a pretty Winter scene. And yes, it was as cold as it looks.

Our little house in Winter. Not bad for a DIY house, is it? If you don’t know the story behind the building of the WV place, click on that link image in the left sidebar that says “The House We Built Ourselves.”

Hubby’s outside strapping the motorcycles into the trailer. We’re taking them back to Maryland. 🙂

More on the why behind that one later…

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My Grand Weekend

I did end up spending this past weekend alone with our oldest grandson, Gaige, in West Virginia. Hubby was down with the same bug I had last week (which is STILL lingering in both of us by the way) and was really not up to that sort of outing. So Gaige and I loaded the dogs into the truck and off we went. We missed having Hubby around, of course, but we managed to have a bit of fun anyway.

As you can probably imagine, I took a few pictures.

Gaige was VERY proud of his new bicycle helmet.

Gaige is a bit of a character, so we shared quite a few laughs over the weekend. Starting with our visit to Target in Winchester, Virginia. He’d outgrown his bicycle helmet, so we stopped to buy one for him. He was super-excited about the cool helmet I let him pick out and insisted on wearing it as soon as the cashier finished scanning the thing, cardboard tag and all. Can you tell how excited he was?

The morning dog walk.

Saturday dawned bright and early, thanks to my crazy dogs. Gaige watched The Wizard of OZ while I woke up. Then we took the dogs for a walk. We turned that everyday dog walk into a hiking adventure.

"Mountain" climbing.

Gaige is a very active 7-year-old boy. He climbs on pretty much everything. He was super-excited to get a chance to do some mountain climbing.

At the mountain summit.

I’m not sure what he enjoyed more, going up or coming back down…

Sliding down the mountain.

He would’ve gone up and down that thing all day if I’d let him.

Running after Belle.

When he wasn’t climbing, he was running.

Making a wish.

He was quite tickled to discover one, lone dandelion seed head that was just screaming to be picked.

"G, I'll race you to the top!"

As we were heading back to the house, we got to a spot where the hill is VERY steep. Note how steep in the picture above. It only got worse higher up. I decided to back-track a bit and take the easier route. Gaige, of course, wanted to scale the steepest spot. And he wanted to make it a race. Knowing how steep that hill is, I knew I’d beat him.

"Can you believe that I beat you?"

I was wrong. I wasn’t going slow or anything. He just went really fast, which is why he’s gasping for breath in that photo above. Look behind him and you can see how steep and BIG the hill is.

Climbing a "broken" tree.

I did say he climbed pretty much everything there was to climb, right? This downed tree, which he referred to as broken, was no exception.

Gaige and Belle were playing together in the leaves.

Gaige really likes Belle and she likes him right back. Belle’s first family, who she lived with from 8 weeks to 18 months of age,  had a couple of kids. So she actually likes hanging out with Gaige.

"You are NOT leaving me behind, Mama."

After our hiking adventure, I opened the back of the truck to load my bike. Belle, not wanting to get left behind (note the sad puppy expression on her face), hopped right in and immediately made herself comfortable. Gaige thought it would be fun to hang out there with her.

Moo!

I couldn’t resist including this cow picture. It was the first critter we encountered along the C&O Canal bike path.

Puddles!

Gaige very obediently rode through as many puddles as he could, just like I instructed. Until he went through one that was particularly long and deep and got soaked.

The coolest dude on the towpath.

He really likes his new helmet.

Puddle aftermath.

Riding through all of those puddles made him a little dirty.

Movie moment.

Gaige’s new favorite movie is Dante’s Peak (I love disaster flicks). He watched it on Sunday morning, with Belle, while I straightened the place up.

"Look, G! More broken trees!"

Later in the morning, he and I explored the yard a bit. There’s no shortage of stuff to climb on back there, that’s for sure.

One happy boy.

He really had a good time letting loose over the weekend. Yes, there were a number of pictures where I made him smile for the camera, but there were also lots of candid smile shots like this one, too.

I’m posting this last picture against my better judgment (I am in DESPERATE need of a haircut). I had to get a shot of the two of us together after our fun weekend.

Gaige and G on their Double G Weekend.

We need to take him back out there soon so we can build a tree fort. I wanted to do that this past weekend, but I didn’t have the proper tools with me. Next time, I’ll be more prepared.

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Relative Normalcy

It’s never a good sign when you wake up with a headache. I mean, what a crappy way to start a day. Hoping to get rid of the ache, I took some naproxen and then made myself a big plate of blueberry pancakes. No luck so far, but I am still hopeful. At least the pancakes tasted good.

While I ate, I caught up on my blog reading. That’s when I realized I haven’t posted anything for five days. I’ve been collecting various pics to share. But it’s an eclectic collection. So there was nothing driving me to do a posting. Now, however, I think it is time to catch up.

The first couple of shots are from Sunday morning at the WV place. It was in the low 30s when we woke up.

Frosty Window

Doesn’t that just make you want to say, “Brrr?”

Lingering Green

Most of the trees are bare already. Except for the oaks. We have lots of oaks. And they hold on to their leaves for a long time. Apparently some are late in the color-change department, too.

Nakedness

See what I mean about the trees being bare?

Morning in the Woods

This is one of my favorite spots at the WV place. Back before we had Belle and K, we had CeCe and Meg. CeCe was a lot like Belle in that she liked to hang close to Mama during our morning walks. She and I would wait here at the top of the hill on Turkey Hollow Road for Meg to return. Quite a few of CeCe’s cremains were scattered here for that very reason. It’s been almost two years since we lost CeCe and we still miss her.

A Hint of Green

The colors on this green leaf caught my eye. There’s not really anything special about that picture except I thought the leaf was cool. So I am sharing it here.

Cool Colors

Speaking of colors catching my eye, I really liked the way these frosty leaves looked.

Frost

You can see the frost more clearly on these leaves. Quite a few bushes are still green, so the woods aren’t completely colorless.

Belle racing around the corner.

Right before snapping this picture, I’d started walking back toward the house. When Belle realized she couldn’t see me, she came running.

Belle

Here’s one where Belle was waiting with me for the other two girls to come back. As for the other two…

Napping while Mama works.

They did reappear shortly after that picture of Belle was taken. I snapped the above image while I was working. The camera was sitting next to me on the windowsill. My girls always like to be close to Mama. Notice K and Belle sharing that small bed?

K

K is more into sharing than Belle. In this shot, although you can’t see her (the zoom lens was on the camera and I couldn’t fit her into the frame), Belle is pretty much hogging the entire bed. K found a corner to sit on and gave me this look as if to say, “Mama, she won’t share.”

K is truly a Mama's girl.

Belle sits with me in the mornings. It’s rare to see Belle on my lap in the evenings. K on the other hand is all about her evening Mama-time. She’ll come over and give me this certain look. That’s when I say, “You need some Mama love?” Immediately she climbs into my lap.

We did have a bit of excitement on Sunday. Are you ready for this?

The new refrigerator.

We bought a new refrigerator! Now we just need to buy some more food. 🙂

Our kitchen is very small. We never really planned the kitchen. I bought a whole kitchen full of old cabinets and we put them into place. It all works okay, except the door placements are very awkward in a couple of spots. We only had room for an under-the-counter refrigerator. And no room for a dishwasher.

Because Hubby really hates doing dishes, we need a dishwasher. We can’t have a dishwasher unless we re-do the kitchen.

Oh yeah, we have a really cheap, crappy cook top, too. It works, but it is a huge PIA. The burners are super hard to regulate properly. If you turn them back too low, they go out. And they won’t relight unless you put a match to them first. It’s annoying.

Our Little House in the Woods

This is not a great picture since the trailer is sitting in front of the garage. But someone was asking me what our house looks like, so there it is.

Going "down the hill."

The dogs just love it when we walk them down the driveway. They’re all three in the picture, K is just hard to see because she is so far ahead. The girl runs like a Greyhound.

Going back up the hill.

You know what they say… what goes down, must come up. Right? 🙂

And now, for the last picture of the day, we have K.

"Mama, she's not sharing AGAIN."

K is looking a bit pissed off. Is it because Belle is hogging the bed? Or because Mama has no room on her lap at the moment. Or both?

For the record, Belle is wide awake, but she hates having her picture taken. Really. She squints or blinks in most shots unless I catch her off guard.

I hope you enjoyed the mish-mash of photos!

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Meg the Bag Lady

One of the things I love about having dogs around is that they make me laugh.

Really. Sometimes they just do the goofiest things.

They can do gross stuff, too. Take my Meg as an example. She eats pretty much anything. Poo included. And used Kleenex. She just loves used facial tissue.

Meg’s penchant for eating just about anything got her into a bit of a predicament today.

I was out walking with the girls. K and Belle were in the driveway. Meg walked down toward her friend’s house.

A little while later, Meg came running back out of the woods. She ran past Belle, who immediately started following her. When those two ran past K, she decided to run along, too.

They were all making a beeline for me.

"Mama! Mama! There's something wrong with Meg!" (Ignore the glowing eyes, okay?)

I could see something was amiss, I just wasn’t sure what.

Belle looks on as Meg tries to rid herself of the newly acquired accessory.

When they reached me and I saw what the problem was, I started cracking up.

Somehow or other, Meg had managed to get a plastic shopping back stuck around her neck. She was off digging in someone’s trash no doubt.

She was really quite embarrassed.

How do I know she was embarrassed? She didn’t want to let me take her picture. I had to make her sit three different times before I got this shot…

Meg not even a little bit thrilled to be photographed at that particular moment.

First, she gave me that evil eye you see in the above shot. Then she just refused to look at the camera.

"I am NOT going to look. And quit laughing at me."

Finally, I removed the bag.  I felt sorry for her because I know she felt pretty stupid. And maybe I shouldn’t have laughed at her, but she looked pretty stupid, too.

Meg’s a good sport.

Meg looking a bit more regal.

Since she did actually sit still to let me take that picture, I figured I’d post a nice picture of her, too. So you could see that she’s not just a big ole doofus. She’s really very pretty. She is a bit of a character. But that’s part of her charm.