Thursday

Now playing on my iPod - Ian Tyson, "Navajo Rug"



This is a manipulated photo. I liked the scene, but the light was bad and the photo came out very blah. So I used Photoshop to wake it up. Maybe too much.



We were discussing gates the other day - how some are so hard to open, and how some of them are so tight you can't even close them. This one should be easy to open. Or maybe just go around it?

Some daisies I thought looked pretty in the tall grass. Some people call them Shasta daisies, but I'm pretty sure they are oxeye daisies, and considered a nuisance by ranchers. They're still pretty in my back yard, anyway.

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Art group was great yesterday. Conley is back from his fishing trip. I stayed for lunch and ate with Judi. We sat with Carl and Peggy.

I saw some people come in the dining room, and realized it was Bob and Charlene Ditton. It was so good to see them. They will be here about a week.

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My memory's gitten' so bad I don't know if I lost a horse or found a rope.

Hi spider, nice spider let me pet you . . . with my shoe . . . good spider.

Wednesday

Sunny sent me two pictures of the baby raccoons in their shed today. The fourth one is in the bottom of the hard hat. Aren't they cute? Thanks for sharing the pictures, Sunny.

Barrie worked late today, so I picked up Kasey from Julie's. When she saw me, she yelled "Grandma!" and ran to me with her arms out for a hug. Can't beat that!

When we drove home, she looked over at Beau's nursery and said "That's where we buy flowers." So guess what we did. Kasey had three quarters in her hand, and I held the real money. Claire was there, and we had a good visit. Kasey picked out some moss rose.

Claire said Kasey and Maria (Beau's little girl) need to get together for some play time.

When we got home, Kasey and I had some of the fruit leather I made, then came upstairs. She colored for a while, tried to play with Kat, then got some books.

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Ever seen this on Facebook?

Friends Online
No one is here.

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Saw this on the news last week:

Reuters - A drunk driver trapped after overturning his car cracked open another can of beer while he waited for emergency crews to rescue him, a New Zealand court was told.

Tuesday

(Now playing on my iPod -"Bad, Bad Leroy Brown, Jim Croce.)

Barrie and Kasey and I sat in camp chairs in Ridley's parking lot to watch the fireworks. Kasey loved them. We were next to some guys who kept saying things like "Hallelujah", "Awesome" and "God Bless America." Refreshing. And another positive thing - Ridley's actually turned off their huge floodlights on the front of the store. OK, I won't bash Ridleys today.

After the fireworks, we went up to Chuck's place to check on Lucky (the mustang). He was fine. Kasey and I were waiting in the pickup, and Sunny, Kathy and Chuck all came out. Sunny had her laptop computer. They had found four baby racoons in the shed, and Sunny had pictures of them on her computer. Maybe she'll send me some. Chuck said they were all trying to sleep together in a hard hat. They had kind of outgrown it, and he got a washtub for them.

Old pictures. At least it seems a long time ago. The top picture shows what my upstairs room looked like without a roof. It took a lot of tarps to cover that, and to me, it looked like I would never have a room up there.

But Dave worked wonders. The bottom photo was taken from almost the same location.

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I just got a 3 lb. roast sliced, marinated, and in the dehydrator for beef jerky. The first batch I sliced a little too thin. I'm afraid part of this is too thick. I even have an electric slicer in the basement, but didn't want to bother bringing it up.

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My sick sense of humor again, but this picture makes me giggle.

Sunday July 4th

Now playing on my iPod - "Superman 14" Kevin Coster and Modern West.

A picture from my past, W A Y past. I floated the Snake with some friends from Jackson. We are in the Lunch Counter Rapids here, and the photographer who is always there on the shore took this picture.

Leslie, my step daughter, sent me this picture she took of her living room with the quilt I made her. She has two of my drawings on the wall.

Hungry babies.

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I borrowed Barrie's break-up boots this morning and waded into the back yard to cut some rhubarb. As long as the dehydrator is out I thought I'd make some fruit leather. Barrie's Grandma Myrtle used to make it all the time in her oven. I don't even like it, so I've never made it before. I'm counting on Kasey to eat it.

I guess Barrie liked the beef jerky I made last week. She brought home a 3 lb. beef roast yesterday.

I e-mailed my niece in Arkansas yesterday. Tracy told me she was going to ask them for some of Tyler's jerky. (Teri's son). So I wrote and asked if Tyler shared his recipe. I't sure he used venison, but maybe he puts something special in the marinade I need to know about!

Saturday

I still have a few silly photos I downloaded from the Internet. As I don't have any new pictures, I might as well post them. The second two are "construction mistakes."

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Barrie has been looking for her phone since yesterday. She just now took a load of clothes out of the washer to put in the dryer, and sure enough, there it was. She said she checked the pockets of those clothes yesterday, and the phone wasn't there. Hmmm, I think maybe the "Bandysnatchers" did it. Well, the phone is clean, at least. Dead, maybe, but clean.

It was cool today. In fact, I finally closed most of the windows in my upstairs room.

I downloaded some more Sawyer Brown songs for my iPod today.

Now playing on XM radio: "That Ain't My Truck."

New book I am starting tonight, recommended by Stoney Vance, a former kindergarten student: "A Bride in the Bargain."

Friday

I noticed a couple of humming birds flitting around in the pine tree in front of my house. They were checking out the feeder, which hadn't been filled yet. I got one of them filled this morning, the one at my upstairs window. Still need to fill the one on the front porch.

Photo from a couple of years ago taken at the Fremont Lake Campground. I haven't even been up there yet this summer to see if they made all the changes they had planned.

I took this picture of columbine by my front porch a couple years ago and did a fancy frame for it in Photoshop. I don't have any columbine left. Don't know why it doesn't grow in my yard.

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I have everything out on the kitchen counter to make my biscuit mix. I mix up a big batch and keep it in the kitchen cupboard. Just like Bisquick. I'm going to make corn fritters today too. Feeling adventurous, I guess.

I had a pork roast the other day and was going to try to make pulled pork. I've never done that before.

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What happens when you play a country song backwards? You sober up, you get your wife back, you find your dog, your truck gets fixed, and you get rehired by the boss man.

Flowers

I discovered this in among the tall flowers in the flower bed. Many, many years ago, my Grandmother had a patch of iris. About ten years after she died, they were still trying to grow in the little hot dry bed in front of her old house. So my Mom felt sorry for them, and transplanted some to her garden. She later divided them and I brought some home. They sometimes don't bloom, but this one did. They are so pretty, kind of small and delicate.

Here are two new pots of flowers that Kasey picked out down at Beau's. Her petunias are blooming again after being hailed on and frosted, and the dahlias are looking healthier too. We might have to make another trip down the hill for more flowers.

Chloe has been here this morning. She wanted in the house and is busy rubbing on every wall and every piece of furniture, and my legs. I finally had to make her get off the desk. She was right in front of me rubbing on the monitor. Kat is not happy having her in here.

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Mary Lou is back for the summer from Colorado, and she was at art group yesterday. Several of us stayed for lunch at Rendezvous Pointe. It was fun. We should do that more often.

I worked on a piece I am trying to paint on watercolor canvas, which I have never used before. It got a buckle in it, which is still there this morning and it is dry. Maybe I don't like that surface.

Tuesday

I found this in the folder on my computer for scanned slides. It's Bitter Root, or at least that's what I thought it was back then. I'm glad I got so many of my slides scanned. Even though they've been stored properly, the colors have shifted.

This is a photo of the old outhouse that is still on the hillside by my house. It leans a little more every year. I had thought this was "Heavy's" outhouse. (That's the only name we ever knew him by.)

But in the old slides that I scanned, I found this, and I had written "Heavy's Outhouse" on the slide. They're not the same outhouse.

There's one more outhouse down the hill a ways. It was where Rex and Thelma Wardell lived, and later, Belle Carr lived there. There's also an old lilac bush and a crab apple tree there. I haven't even noticed if they leafed out this year.

Ever hear the songs of Kate Wolf? She is a folk singer, and has a song called "The Lilac Bush and the Apple Tree." Very nostalgic, about an abandoned place where the houses have been torn down and all the people gone.

Happy?

This is the Montana shirt I bought Kasey. She really was having a fun time playing in the yard, and Chloe had come up for her to pet. Don't know why she has this woebegone look on her face.

Getting sprayed for mosquitoes.

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I hope I finally got my Dishnet and Century Tel bills straightened out. Couldn't even begin to make any progress on Dishnet's website to update my billing information. So I finally called. Got a nice lady who was, of course, very hard to understand, but she got it done for me.

As for Century Tel, I was sure I got that autopay information, but I got a bill last week. I guess if my phone gets shut off, I will know it isn't.

Kind of lazy today, but I am seriously considering taking my sprayer with Roundup down to the driveway, and the rocks walk at the front of house.

Saturday

More yard, and more Yellowstone:


This is the patch of rhubarb in my back yard. It was there when I moved into this house about 35 years ago. It is growing on the hillside where the water runs out, so it is constantly soaked. It seems to like it.

In Gardiner, MT, I sat in the pickup while Barrie walked the dogs, and watched this sign at the entrance to Yellowstone. What a kick! Carloads of people would pull up, pose the family in front of the sign, and hand their camera to somone to take their picture. Then the other person would pose their family, and someone in the first group took their picture. I must have watched well over 100 people go through this routine while I sat there. Darn! Barrie and Kasey and I did not stop at the sign.

There were a bunch of cars stopped watching something in the park. We saw it was a coyote, and then noticed he was putting the sneak on a big old bull buffalo that was laying down there. Wonder what he had in mind?

Here are some tourists! Barrie had just taken Kasey up the path to Gibbon Falls. Across the highway was a marsh, and the frogs were extremely loud and happy sounding. Kasey is listening to the frogs.

My poppies are just beginning to bloom.

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My friend Mary Lou is back for the summer. She called last night. She plans on coming to art group again.

I'm dubbing the VCR tape "Earl Durand" for Rollie and Judi today. I really hate this VCR/DVD player recorder! I can never figure out what it will do next. Even Barrie admits it's tricky. Don't worry Judi. I can do this, I can do this, I can do this!