Broken, Broken

 It's been a long six days.  There's the whole holiday weekend thing.  But there's also been some unexpected mentally exhausting things (not that the holiday and social gatherings aren't all ready mentally exhausting enough for me).

Last week, during the heat wave we had, DH and DD1 decided to go up north and go canoeing/kayaking with her two oldest (Faline and Buck) as well as DS1's two oldest (K3 and Toad). It was going to be a head up north one evening, spend the night at the family cabin, go float the next morning/part of the afternoon the next day, possibly spend another night depending on a number of factors, and then head home kind of trip.  DH wanted, since our truck is a 6-passenger kind, for all of them to ride together in one vehicle rather than taking two vehicles on a 400 mile round trip journey.  In terms of expense, it would cut fuel costs roughly in half.

Luckily, logistics (and DD1) prevailed, and she drove herself and her kids separately from DH, K3 and Toad.  This not only gave them a second vehicle to run the shuttle from put-in to take-out on the river with, but it avoided having three kids (two in car seats) crammed together in the backseat, with two overly large adults and a fourth kid (the unlucky skinniest teen/preteen) crammed together in the front seat for 200 miles of hot humid driving (even with air conditioning going) each way.  Not to mention gave them room to keep their clothing and bedding bags inside the vehicle rather than putting all baggage in the open bed of the truck and hoping they didn't encounter pop-up thunderstorms to get everything wet along the way.

Well, they didn't encounter any thunderstorms on the way there (they did almost immediately after getting off the river and loading boats onto the trailer the following day).  However, DH, along with K3 and Toad encountered a deer when they were about 45 minutes short of their destination the first night.

I got a phone call from DH about the time I expected him to be calling me with the "We're here" phone call he usually tries to give me when he's traveling without me, so that I know he's at his destination safely.  Instead of hearing "we're here" though, what he said to me was "We hit a deer."

OH F---!

The world came to a screeching halt.  My gut fell through the soles of my feet.  The pre-sunset daylight went black.

"We're all okay." Was the next thing he said.

The sun shone again, if not quite as bright as it had five seconds before.  My gut rose somewhere around my kneecaps.  Because I was expecting the next statement I heard to be "Get in my (company) truck and come get us please."  I knew that DD1 had left a few hours earlier than he had; they weren't caravaning, so wasn't there at the scene with him and the older two grandkids.  Plus, hers is only a five passenger vehicle.

Instead, I heard "The airbags went off, the side ones, I cut them off so we can see, the truck seems to be fine mechanically, and we're on our way again.  I called 911 but all the cops are busy elsewhere*, so they said it was okay to continue on and we'll do the police report in the morning."

*there aren't a whole lot of police officers in that rural part of northern Michigan, so it's not surprising that there wasn't one available to do a non-injury non-wrecked vehicle deer hit accident report.  Probably busy with other, more serious deer/car accidents, honestly.

The deer had hit them near the passenger side front tire, dented both the doors on the passenger side, as well as cracked the passenger side headlight area, and dented the fender too.  So, after describing to me the damage that DH had seen, he said aloud the thought that was in my head (which made my gut hit the ground again):

"The insurance company is probably going to total it, even though it looks like all somewhat minor cosmetic damage.  Because the airbags went off.  I think that's the policy these days; if the airbags deploy, the vehicle is too expensive to fix so they total it." 

For the record, it's a 2017 truck, we've been the only owners, and it has only about 85,000 miles on it.  It's in great condition--other than the current deer fiasco.  We were not looking to replace it (and have a vehicle loan in roughly the $900-$1k a month range) in the next several years.  

So that was one night last week.  The next day, I noticed that the blower on our (gas) water heater didn't seem to be shutting off even though I was using zero hot water all day.  With just me home, and not doing any laundry or running the dishwasher (or taking a shower, yet), there was no reason for the water heater to need to be firing and heating water constantly.  Weird.  I checked all that I knew to check on it, and couldn't find a reason.  

DH called shortly after that and said that they weren't staying another night, they'd finished canoeing/kayaking and gotten off the river, K3 and Toad were heading home in DD1's vehicle with her and her kids, and that he was headed over to the police station in the county where the deer had hit them the night before in order for the cop to look at the vehicle and file the accident report, then he would be heading home.  

Rather than burden him with my suspicion about something being wrong with the water heater--not only was the blower going constantly, there was absolutely no hot water (I'd checked)--I decided to just tell him about it when he got home.  I'd let him think about the truck and the police report and the insurance claim process on his drive and not further distract him with water heater issues.

But I did tell him about it within the first fifteen minutes he was home.  He checked all the same things I'd checked (proof that I'm not inept at home maintainence things):

• Getting air?  Seems to be.  Blower/fan has been running continuously afterall.
• Got spark?  Yep, can see the 'glowplugs' (not an open flame pilot light system) light up. 
• Got fuel?  Well, we have a recently filled propane tank outside, and the whole system had been checked (and pressure tested) by the fuel company just the day before.  (Hmmm, something in relation to that testing????)  Not to mention that both the (gas) dryer and the (gas) cooktop worked fine.

 and declared that we would have to call a plumber in the morning as it was all ready after business hours that day.

Which lead to the discussion that it is the original water heater to the house, circa 2003.  And, because it is dual chambered and supports both domestic hot water and our hydronic radiant heat system, (and 75 gallon capacity) was a damn expensive unit 23 years ago. Something like three thousand 2003 dollars. Also had to wait 3 weeks for it to come in after we ordered it, as they weren't a commonly stocked item at that time.  If it's dead and we have to replace it, because 23 years is way past the life expectancy of a water heater, how much is a similar one going to cost in 2026 and how available are they?

Ugh.  More money outlay in the near future.  Plus, we had cold showers that night and I had to heat water on the stove to hand-wash dishes with as the dishwasher wasn't going to get them clean and sanitary running only cold water.

Called a local (privately owned) plumbing company in the morning.  They could send someone out around 2 p.m. that afternoon to look at our water heater.

Except, DH had a 2 p.m. appointment with the Chevy dealer body shop to get an estimate on damage to our pick up for the insurance company, and I had an appointment at exactly that same time that had been made three weeks ago and I would definitely get a no-show fee if I canceled it only 5 hours before hand. Plus who knows how many more weeks out it would get rescheduled for?

So he told the plumber that wouldn't work, when was the next time slot they had?  It would be the following morning, and well, we could use the stove to heat whatever hot water we needed in the meantime, so not a life or death thing. He took that next time slot.  Partly because we'd rather support the little guy in our hometown than call the several other (corporately owned) plumbers around and see if they could come before 1:00 or after 3:30 that same day.

When the plumber(s)--two twenty-something guys early in their plumbing careers--came the next day and took a look at our water heater, they both were scratching their heads.  Ours was the oldest water heater they'd ever seen; possibly made in the same year they were, LOL.  But they bravely tried their best to diagnose the issue, then called in their boss (the company owner) to come have a look because they were stumped.

He checked everything they did, and narrowed down the issue to the most likely to be malfunctioning part based on his observations.  Then he proceeded to take that part off, take it apart, clean it off, stick in back together, put it back on the water heater, and voila!  The water heater worked immediately!

PHEW!  A $300 plumbing call is so much preferrable to who knows how many thousands of dollars for a new water heater.  Although I did joke to DH later that he should have asked for a discount, since it turned out to be an educational experience for the two young plumbers, and when the horse vet brings vet students out and the students work on your horse you usually get a discount on the service provided.

Turned out there was debris clogging the fuel line on the water heater.  Most likely related to the pressure testing done by the gas company as that day was the last day I know the water heater was working properly and I had hot water when I turned on the taps.  But kind of hard to prove three days later when the plumber found--and cleared--the clog.

Meanwhile. . . got the repair estimate from the dealer collision center.  It's a lot.  A few hundred over $15k.  That's the total on the list they gave DH of parts needing replacing.  Some parts on the list he is questioning as it was a side impact, not frontal, and the front/dash airbags were not deployed, so no damage to the dash or instrumentation there. . . 

This morning, he got a call from the insurance company; they had received an estimate too from that same dealer collision center.  And because the estimate sent to them was $16,800+, it exceeds the insurance company's repair threshhold of $15,800 for this particular vehicle, so therefore they have declared our truck totaled.

But wait a minute!  Did you notice the discrepancy between the written estimate given to DH and the estimate by the same collision center sent to the insurance company?  Yeah.  DH did too.  He mentioned this to the insurance person on the phone.  They are as confused by the differing amounts as we are, and have requested DH email them a copy of the estimate he was given.  There will be some comparison going on.  

Maybe the truck is not totaled afterall.  We wait in suspense, and possibly will be taking the truck to a different place to have a second estimate done. . . 

Partly because a $500 insurance deductible bill and a fully repaired truck is much better than truck shopping and signing on for a (near) $1k a month auto loan payment right now.  But mostly because those two estimates from the same place don't match and that's kinda hinky.  Not saying there's attempted fraud going on, but what other explanation is there?  Inquiring minds want to know.

And I Also Love This Guy

 After publishing Monday's post I Love The Sky, I realized how, if you read it out loud and didn't enunciate, it could sound like I Love This Guy.  Which could make you think that that post was about something totally different than it is.  It's not about a man.

And, since I have an old, partially thought out, post in my drafts folder that is about DH, I thought now would be the time to finish that one up and get it published.  

Because I do love this guy🡻🡻🡻🡻🡻

He doesn't really like to have his picture taken, so most of the ones I have of him were taken kind of on the sly.  Like this one where he has his back to me.  But it is a photo that I really like because he's not a horse person.  Or at least, he's always claimed that he's not (but, unbeknownst to him, they are growing on him and he's starting to show signs of growing towards being a horse person).

This photo was taken on a chilly rainy day last fall, one where the combination of air temperature and amount of water falling from the sky were too cold to put horses out into.  The kind of weather where they get soaked through and chilled.  

So, on that day (which I think was a Sunday), I had decided that horses would stay in the barn all day.  When I cleaned stalls after church, I put each horse, in turn, into the cross ties while its stall was being mucked out.

DH had been working in the tack room on some part of the finishing of it, and when I got to the Poetess's stall, he insisted that she didn't want to stand in the cross ties for those ten minutes while I cleaned.  She had been rather unhappy about the other horses being in the cross ties right outside her door while she was shut in the stall, and I knew that she would rather be outside (she has a rainsheet she can wear to keep dry, while the others didn't) even if it was raining.  

Unfortunately, even with her rainsheet, it wouldn't have worked for her to be the only horse out there because the others left in the barn would have been upset that I wasn't also turning them out and make a racket, which would have then caused her to get worried about being the only horse outdoors and upset and start running around.  I definitely did not want her racing around in the mud, slip, fall and get injured.  Which meant she had to stay inside all day like the rest of the horses.

Back to the photo. . .

When it was time for me to clean the Poetess's stall,  DH took her just out the front of the barn where she could munch grass (I believe the rain and wind were from the north that day, so the barn most blocked them from the rain in that spot). All on his own.

Not a horse person.  Ha!  If he wasn't a horse person, he wouldn't have cared if the Poetess preferred to be outside while I cleaned stalls.  And if he wasn't a horse person, he definitely wouldn't have volunteered to stand out there holding her lead rope while she grazed.

Yep, I love this guy.

The Sun Comes Up

 

And the sun goes down

What goes on in between?

This is kind of a deep thought type of post.  Soul searching?  Navel gazing?  What do you do with your day?  Day after day after day. . . 

We strive to put ourselves where we want to be, but then when we get there, is it actually where we want to be?  Is it what we thought it would be?  Do we want it afterall?

In my head, I can hear John Mellancamp singing Paper in Fire: 

"She had a dream
And boy it was a good one
So she chased after her dream
With much desire
But when she get too close
To her expectations
Well the dream burned up
Like paper in fire"

On the surface, I'm living my dream: Husband, Kids (and grandkids), Horse Farm. . .  

My big three goals I set way back in high school, and I've met them all.  Yes, I am living my dream.

Unless you look below the surface.  Then, well, they haven't been quite fulfilled in the way I had envisioned.  I never expected life to be easy.  I was choosing some lofty things, some unconventional (for the time) things, and I was not starting with a silver spoon.  I knew I was going to have to work and work hard.

In hindsight, I didn't know it was going to take so long to get to the 'work for myself, own my own horse farm, run my own boarding and training business' part.  When I decided to have children, and lots of them (as four was considered in the 1980s, and depending on who you talk to now still is) I knew I would have to put off a lot of the horse business part until my kids were grown up.  Having a husband whose career was our bread and butter, and whose career required a lot of travel on his part, meant that my career couldn't require me to be unavailable to my children on evenings and weekends (when childcare is difficult to get, let alone prohibitively expensive).  So, showing horses (as I had all through my teen years) was not going to be happening.  Which meant training horses for other people wasn't really going to be a viable option either.  Okay, I can deal with that.  I can wait; I'll do what I can in the interim and I'll hit the ground running when my kids are grown up.

And then, the kids were grown up.  The time I'd been waiting for, had watched with growing excitement draw nearer and near, had come.  At least, in my plans it had.  Not so much, apparently, in what other people had planned for me.  They loved me in my (almost) always available to them position.  Me, I was more than ready to shed that for phase 2: my life full time with horses.

In the ten plus years since DD2 graduated from high school--my original expected emancipation from people caretaking date--it seems like every time I try to take a step away from my past role and into my highly anticipated second career things come up to keep me from making the change.  Or, at least, make the change extremely difficult to keep up with.

So many times I have felt like shouting WTF People!?! Get with the program!  Get out of my way!  Behave!  Be mature!  Be responsible for yourself (and your offspring)!  Leave me alone; I've paid my mama dues, I faithfully raised all the ones I birthed to adulthood.  Go!  Go!  Get with the program, take care of yourself! It's my turn now!  My time is supposed to be my own and nobody is supposed to try to make me feel bad about wanting it.

I look at all the tasks that fall into the "Kris/Mom/Grandma basket", some I've willingly put there and others I wish other people hadn't assigned to me.  Which do I want to do?  Which am I needed to do?  Which should I do? Which won't cause the world to come to an end if I don't do them?

Boundaries.  Sometimes I want to erect them like a stockade fence around me.  Just because I'm trying to be self-employed, which in a way means I get to set my own schedule, doesn't mean I'm available whenever someone else wants something from me.  I know dang well that if I was punching a time clock at a business not owned by me, if I had to report for duty on certain hours on prescribed days to a location not at this little place here, people wouldn't even consider asking me to do things for them during 'work' hours Monday through Friday.  Just because I don't leave my own property to 'go to' work doesn't mean people should assume I can drop things at their whim, let alone expect me to do so.

All these things people want me to do for them.  A lot are things I did for them, have done for them, but really, that time has passed and they need to step up and take those tasks on for themselves.  Like finding themselves a list of non-emergency babysitters for their children (my grandkids) that doesn't begin and end with Grandma (me).  Or, in the case of DH, taking back some of the household tasks he used to do before his job got so demanding and took him away from home so much of his waking hours every week.  His job isn't like that anymore.  And while his household task skills are rusty and he has forgotten a lot of them, they are still there.  They need to be brought out, dusted off, oiled up and put back into practice.  Because I can't continue to do them all even though I have for a long, long time.  Not if I'm operating my own business.  Ie. working, having a career, like has been his excuse (and at times my grown up childrens' excuse) why I must be the one to carry that particular load that needs to be done in a timely fashion.

*Deep cleansing breath*

This, truly, falls into the 'training of people' category.  I love training horses, even though it takes time and requires lots of patience and repetition and, often, readjusting the timeline for your goals.  Training people, teaching them to honor my time and my boundaries, I  don't love so much.  I don't have the same tolerance and patience for repeating things over and over waiting for people to learn it as I do horses.  I mean, people, afterall, speak the same language and (for the most part) think the same way as I do.  It's not like with an animal, a horse, where you have to allow for the language barrier and the totally different way their brain works and know that you can't just say "this is the way we do it now" and expect the animal to understand and instantly follow the newly stated procedure.

Ugh.  Training people is a pain in the patootie.  Some days it feels like I'll be stuck doing ever more people training for the rest of my life and won't be able get to the amount of horse training I would rather spend my time at.

The sun comes up.

And the sun goes down.

The Rest List

 As per usual, things are busy again.  May is always a month that seems to ramp up quickly to the overwhelm stage.  The grass is growing and needs mowing once a week, if not sooner (thankfully, this is a task that DH prefers to own rather than it being in my group of assigned tasks).  The flowerbeds (totally my task) are blooming with perennials, but that, unfortunately, also includes weeds that need to be pulled sooner rather than later.  The garden (95% my task) needs to be planted, then weeded and watered and mulched. The LBM is back in training, and there's also the Poetess and Jedi who need to be worked frequently each week (Jedi needs me a lot right now as he gets a refresher course before I start sticking the rank beginner level grandkids on him).  Speaking of grandkids, they have a lot of sports going on in the evenings, and some Saturdays, that DH and I are trying to attend at least one competition of each grandkid before their current sport season is over.  And there's Faline's kindergarten graduation coming up next week too.

My head is swimming.  Sometimes I feel like I'm running around like a chicken with its head cut off.  I know I need to do some 'me time' in this hectic month, but I have trouble taking a break without feeling guilty for the things I'm not getting done during that time.

Such was the topic of conversation earlier this week with my therapist (I started taking advantage of our mental health benefit in January; I mean, if it's there why not utilize it?  Especially when I could tell I was heading for burnout /body breaking down to halt me again.)

I know, from past experience, that I have a tendency to people please and to take care of everyone (and everything) before taking care of myself.  Which, when done to excess, is a very unhealthy tendency indeed.  I also know that, when I do sit for a minute and take a break, that I later (sometimes later is 2 minutes after sitting down) feel guilty for taking that break.  For spending a little time on myself in a way that isn't showering, brushing my hair or teeth, or eating a proper meal (such has long been my definition of good self-care: I'm clean, groomed, and fed; more than that is selfish use of my time).  So I asked the therapist how I go about 'teaching' myself to do the self-care things that are restful.  How to retrain my brain, how to rephrase taking a break from selfish or unnecessary to appropriate and allowable?

She asked me a few questions, one of which was if I keep a To Do list of tasks.  Oh yes!  I have multiple lists of tasks, some are daily, some are weekly, some are long term, some are time consuming things, some are quick little things to fit in here or there as time allows (the quick little things is aptly titled A Million Little Things).

Then she asked if I have a Rest List: a list of things I like to do, find relaxing, and would do if I had more time.

Um, no.  No I do not have such a list.  It never occured to me to make a list like that.  Is that even something I'm allowed to think about when there's so many other things needing my time and attention?  I mean, look at my bajillion To Do lists. . . 

Her answer was YES!  YES YOU ARE ALLOWED to have a list like that! You are allowed to rest.  You need to rest, especially when your life is busy.

Huh.  Who woulda thunk it?  But when I did think about it, it made total sense.  I know horses need rest when they are in training, and that the harder the task (physically or mentally) you are asking them to do, the more important it is to give them rest breaks (hence the walking on a long rein thing in dressage).  I know that other people need (and deserve) rest breaks when their lives are crazy.  I've even filled in to give other people breaks from their life demands from time to time.  WHY?????? do I not think to allow myself the same?

So, between this session and the next therapy session, my task is to make a Rest List, and also to 'practice' resting.  In order to emphasize to myself the importance of rest, I'm going to actually schedule it as appointments with myself in the same way I schedule barn chores, meal prep, training sessions with the horses, grandkids sports games, appointments with other people (social, ew, not my default mode) etc.  When the scheduled rest appointment arrives, I will pull out my Rest List and choose something on it that fits the scheduled time slot and sounds appealing to me at that moment.  And then I will do it, without feeling guilty (ha, this is going to be the hard part) for taking that time to rest rather that plug away at yet another chore or social obligation that 'needs' my attention.

Some things I have written so far on my rudimentary Rest List:

• go for a walk
• sit on the porch swing and observe what's going on outside
• read a book
• do some counted cross stitch that isn't a present for someone
• do some sewing that isn't a present for someone
• work on a jigsaw puzzle
• do some knitting for myself (ie. not a present for someone)
• watch a movie/video (video meaning YouTube)
• color a picture
• read a magazine
• take a nap
• lay in the sun/stare at the clouds in the sky
• draw something (my goodness, it's been ages since I drew artistically and not Pictionary-esque)
• make candy of some sort (it's been years since I've made any candy just for the fun of it and not for Christmas gifts)

Do you have a Rest List?  What are some of the things on your list?

Nothing Says I Love You Like. . .

. . . Spending several hours on Valentine's Day working in the woods together.

At least, at this little place here it says "I Love You."  Spending a warm sunny winter afternoon cutting up blow downs for future firewood is about as frugal and loving as you can get.  LOL.

A nice maple tree, lying on the ground

That nice maple tree, cut into 8' lengths and stacked on the tractor forks.

After taking the logs from that maple tree up to the wood boiler area, we returned to the woods and cut up several more 'small' (ie. skinny-ish) trees to make a second load of logs.  Some I loaded, others DH had to carry from where they were cut to the tractor to put on the forks.

He's not just good looking, he's strong!

(No picture of me, but I can carry logs about 2/3 that diameter--note the ones all ready on the forks.  I'm strong too!)

Another tree we tackled together was a huge beech that came down in the big storm we had at the end of March last year.  (You can read about house/outbuilding damage here.)  The busted off stump is about as tall as I am.  Unlike me, it was quite rotten inside. 

It is also quite big around; neither DH nor I could get our arms around it.  Maybe if we'd tried joining our hands together we could have spanned it with our arms.  Maybe.

The stump end of that big old beech tree.

If you look close to the left side you'll see a bit of burgundy. That's DH in a t-shirt about 3/4 of the way to the top of that beech tree.  It was huge in life.  In death it will be several weeks' worth of firewood.

That one was too big to cut into logs and put on the forks.  Instead, DH cut each chunk into firewood lengths and we stacked them into a couple of piles right there in the woods.  They'll age out there for about a year before being hauled in and split to use in the 2027/28 heating season.

We didn't just work all of Valentine's Day.  Well, actually, we did, because cooking counts as work in my book (it's a daily chore so that's work, right?  Not like going out to eat and being served. . . )  For dinner I made a big salad and baked potatoes while DH grilled a big ribeye steak (from the 1/4 beef we bought last fall).  We had ice cream for dessert.

Not Your Typical Hay Weather

 I will save you the diatribe on why?????? we were putting hay up in February, and just say that due to not getting a second cutting at this little place here last summer, and having a not great yield on first cutting, I had to buy hay.  Which is something I've never needed to do since moving to this little place here in 2003.  I bought some second cutting in September (off someone else's field) from the farmers who cut and bale my hay for me, but knew I would need to get somewhere in the range of 100-150ish more bales of first cutting (fed year round to the 'easy keeper' horses) to make it through to the 2026 hay crop was available.  

Due to several factors, I didn't buy hay in the Fall.  Or in December, or in January as I had wanted to. And now, in February I pretty much looked at DH and said "I have to get hay.  And I have to have your help putting it up.  So, how's this coming weekend look for you?"  And then I searched around, found acceptable hay about 15 miles away, went to look at it in person, approved it as something the horses at this little place here would/could eat, and made an appointment to pick it up Sunday after church.

85 bales of hay

Barring some issues with snow and ice--like the elevator being iced up (and subsequently breaking when DH insisted he knew the best way to remove the ice), I have to say a cold February day was probably the best/most comfortable weather we've experienced for putting hay into the loft!  Zero humidity!  Zero sweat!  Zero bugs!

K3 and Toad had been asked if they would like to earn some cash by coming over and helping get the hay stacked in the loft.  They both (surprisingly) agreed, and Rascal wanted to come too.  Rascal is still too small to be able to lift a hay bale, but we figured why not let him try if he was willing?  He did drag a few a short distance, 'helping' DH get them from the trailer and stacked onto a pallet that was then lifted (using the tractor forks) up to where they could be grabbed off from the loft with hay hooks.

DH & Rascal loading hay onto the pallet.

K3, Toad and I were up in the loft, to unload and stack the hay.  Mainly K3 unloaded, Toad drug the bales to me and I stacked them.  

Toad and K3 in the loft, watching the pallet of hay being lifted, ready to unload it.

(Yes, he's two years younger and now a hair taller than she is.)

Although after a while, K3 would hand them to me, I would drag them and Toad would stack.  I was pleasantly surprised by how useful he was (historically he hasn't been much for anything 'hard' physically).

With their help, it didn't take long at all to get all the newly purchased hay stored in the loft. 

Will it be enough to get the horses through 4+ more months?  I doubt it, I really doubt it (unless the Spring grass comes on early and thick).  But at least it's up and done for now.  I'll wrangle with DH for putting up another trailer load after a while, when the weather is not so freezing, when he's in a better mood (and hopefully has the hay elevator fixed).  On things I can't do by myself--and therefore need his help-- I have to pick my battles and choose the right timing.

Friday Happy Things

1. About a week and a half ago, DH and I went out to eat.  It had been my idea, and a planned thing (typically going out to eat in 2025 was a result of a project taking way later in the day than planned and me not being available to cook at the right time, or the power was out and what I'd planned to cook wasn't an option any more due to not being able to use the oven).  

Why had I picked that day, more than a week before?  Because on that date, waaaaayyyyy back in 1991, DH and I met.  It's a significant date, as it altered my life (and his too, obviously!)  We're still trying to figure out if it was a for the better alteration or a for the worse; current consensus, despite recent frustrations, is still leaning for the better.

Anyway, we went out to eat at a (chain) steakhouse we had been to decades before in a different location at the invitation of a friend of his, and now there is a location about 15 miles from us.  I had (as I always do) looked at the menu ahead of time to see what I could eat (with all my food sensitivities), and we ended up splitting a 16 oz ribeye that was piled with grilled onions and gorgonzola cheese, came with an enormous baked sweet potato and equally large side salad as well as garlic bread.  I guess we're slowly becoming that old couple who goes out to eat and shares a meal, LOL. The food was delicious and more than enough for both of to be full for less than $40 including his beer (I always drink water with meals so I have more carbs to use for food).

2. While cold, we've had about the same number of sunny days lately as cloudy ones.  What a difference that sunshine makes!  And blue sky contrasts very nicely with white snow-covered ground.

3. This month, I've been adding yoga back into my week.  Also have managed to fit in a short (10-15 minute) strength training type of workout weekly.  I'm glad to find that, while I've lost some flexibility, I still have quite a bit of the balance I had back when I was doing yoga 3x/week last winter and spring.

4. Mid-month, I went to a used tack sale.  This one is held annually in the next town over, and I always try to go to it.  While I was dumbfounded at the prices of some things, mostly show-related, I was able to find some great deals on basics.  Details to come in a future post.

5. Making a concentrated effort to include fruit into my daily winter diet.  After a few months of not much in that department, it's a nice treat to the taste buds to add some fruit, usually to my breakfast, every day.

6. I finished knitting the sweater for Lucky's first birthday present with plenty of time to spare!  

This Time Last Year. . .

 Back in September 2024, DH and I took a vacation to Hawaii, a place we'd both been wanting to go for quite a while.  We did it in two parts: first, the Big Island, and second, Oahu--Honolulu specifically.  When we landed at the Kona airport the first night, we had no idea just how polar opposite those two parts of our Hawaiian vacation would be.

I should note that we did not plan to do most of the things that tourists think of when they think about going on a Hawaiian vacation:

• no luaus.  Partly because we didn't want a 'canned' cultural experience, and partly because for the cost of the luau (including meal) and my picky-eating combined with the things my body doesn't handle well (soy, pork in certain forms, additives, sea food/fish) neither of us felt that I'd get enough to eat in a balanced fashion.  So, rather than a big waste of food dollars and maybe me having diabetic issues or gut issues or a migraine later, we skipped the available luau experiences.
• no tour groups, including whale watching excursions on boats.
• no snorkeling (partly because I'm not a very coordinated swimmer and swimming excursions aren't big desires for me, but mostly because I broke my foot shortly before leaving on our trip and there was no way I was going to be able to wear flippers).

What we did was mostly geared towards our personal preference for self-guided and nature specific sightseeing.  Plus, we tried to 'eat local' although that ended up being challenging since I can't do anything fish or seafood (so much seafood and fish everywhere) plus I'm not a big fan of Asian (soy, vinegar, hot spices) and there was an unexpectedly (for us) prevalent Asian influence to the food at most eating establishments that weren't your chain fast food (also a no).

We flew from MI to Los Angeles, (long flight, but I managed my blood sugar well enough I didn't get sick), then from Los Angeles to Kona on the Big Island (also very long flight, and again pretty successful with the blood sugar regulation--had a really huge and really delicious Greek hummus wrap from a place in LAX during layover).  When we deplaned on the Big Island, it had just gotten dark, so we really didn't see anything on the drive from there to our hotel on the first night.  Waking up in the morning was somewhat like being a kid waking up on Christmas--the delights that awaited us right outside our room!

That room happened to be on the lagoon side of the hotel, and in the lagoon there were dolphins swimming!  From our balcony we could watch them, and even from our bed we could hear them! (Confession: we had the sliding door to the balcony open to let in the breeze and be able to not use the AC system--AC fan noises and blasts of cold air make it hard for me to sleep when traveling.) 

It was kind of wild to wake up in the night thinking I heard deer snorting in the back yard at home only to realize I wasn't home, that it wasn't deer, it actually was dolphins blowing.   Definitely not a sound you normally hear in Michigan!

For breakfast, we sprang for the hotel buffet, and boy, I was so glad we did!  The food was fresh and delicious and I could mix and match offerings to make sure I met my macronutrient requirements plus enjoy what I was eating!  Not only was the food some of the best we had the entire trip, the walk to and from the buffet area was gorgeous.  

We saw all kinds of tropical fish (which didn't take very good pictures), as well as some spotted rays, an eel and a green sea turtle in the lagoon while crossing the bridge that went over to the eating area.  Bonus was the statue of a hippocampus.  A horse-fish.  How could I not love it?!?

After breakfast, we checked out of that hotel, as we'd only booked the first night there (paying with hotel points--frugal!) so we wouldn't use up one of the four nights in our vacation package on the Big Island by sleeping off our long flight.  Leaving the hotel, we did some exploratory driving around to get a feel for the lay of the land.  What we found was mostly rural (HOORAY) and a huge variation in climate.  I think we actually ended up driving about half the island that day before heading to the resort we would be staying at for the next four nights.

Fun facts we learned:

• there are feral goats everywhere.  So many goats.  In fact, you can buy one hunting tag per day year round for goats they are so prevalent.  

Goat in the median at the entrance to the resort.

• There are also feral chickens in a lot of places.  

Chicken at the shopping center we went to for groceries.

• Likewise, mongoose were abundant too, although most of my attempts at getting a picture of one were blurry.  (Teaser, there will be a decent picture in Part 2 of our vacation).
• In addition to goats and chickens, there were also many feral sheep (Mouflon type with big thick curly horns) and feral cats.
• Many, many places had open air dining.  It was a big change from what we're used to in Michigan (where some, but not the majority of, restaurants have outdoor seating).  And part of that open air dining that nobody seemed to blink at were the birds.  Flying through, hopping on the floor, sometimes even on the tables and chairs themselves.  I have to confess that I often got distracted by the birds, especially trying to identify species I hadn't seen before.  Hence few pictures of food and many pictures of birds.

English sparrow who took DH's seat at breakfast when he went to the buffet for seconds.

Zebra dove at lunch by the waterfront in Kailua-Kona

Two big shout-outs on food from this portion of the trip:

1. The Tsunami Blue smash burger at the Big Kahuna Beach Grill.  I am not a burger person (unless they are grilled at home) and 99.999% of the time I eat out I do not order a burger.  That said, the menu's description of this burger sounded so delicious I decided to go waaaayyyy out on a limb and order a burger.  I was so very glad I did.  Without a doubt, this was the best burger I've had in my entire 50+ years of life.  Even better than venison burgers I make at home.
   
   
   
2. Hamakua  Macadamia Nut Company's Butter Rum Glazed Macadamia nuts.  YUM!  Found these on our first grocery store run and bought them as a vacation treat.  They were so delicious that after we got home I wished I'd bought a whole bunch more to bring back to Michigan.  I ended up looking them up online in November, happened upon a Black Friday sale, and ordered several bags for myself as well as smaller cans to give to the kids as Christmas gifts.

 If you've read this far, you're probably wondering what, other than going to the grocery store and also out to eat a few times, did DH and I actually do while we were vacationing on the Big Island.

We went to Volcanoes National Park.  Where I saw more birds I'd never encountered before, such as Kalij pheasants.  Like the chickens, goats, and sheep, these pheasants were long ago (hundreds of years) brought to Hawaii by voyagers and left to populate in the wild as a food source for return trips to the islands.

While at Volcanoes we viewed the Kilauea Caldera, which had quite a bit of steam activity while we were there.  The island was under an Orange Alert for eruptive activity, which apparently meant there was lots of steam.  DH had hoped to actually see magma/lava coming out, but that didn't happen while we were there (it did a few months later and is still happening).  One thing the eruptive activity did was mess up the Chain of Craters Road, making big fissures in it and closing the road the day before we were there.  That was another thing DH had hoped to see, and he was quite bummed out the the road was not open for us to drive.

We had hoped to do quite a bit of hiking while at the national park, but, due to an oversight, my hiking boots got left in the room at the resort instead of being packed into our rental Jeep, and I was only wearing (comfy for the hour+ car ride) sandals.  Which, being that my foot was less that a week into the healing process after being broken, were not supportive enough footwear for hiking.  So we mainly walked from the parking areas to the scenic viewing platforms.

The one 'hike' we did do at Volcanoes was to and through the Nahuku-Thurston lava tube, which was extremely cool (as in interest level, not as in temperature).

Entering the lava tube.

We did drive as far as you can up Mauna Loa, and contemplated attempting to hike to the summit, but, again, my broken foot--and left-behind hiking boots--was a damper on that idea.  So we took some pictures from the overlook at the trail head, and marked that hike as a 'next time' item.

View from Mauna Loa overlook.

While on the Big Island we couldn't very well drive up Mauna Loa without also driving up Mauna Kea.  The plan had been for us to drive all the way to the summit.  However, that got altered when, shortly after leaving our mandatory 30 minute acclimation time in the Visitor's Center (at 9,200 feet), my gut decided that whatever I had eaten that morning was not going to play nice with my digestive system (I suspect I got soy protein in something, as that is a major irritant for my intestines) and we had to turn around and return to the Visitor's Center and it's restrooms.  I ended up sending DH to the summit without me, and I sat at a picnic table at the visitor's center (very near the restroom just in case) and read a book while he continued all the way to the nearly 14,000 ft peak.  Having come equipped with hiking boots that day, it was a bummer that my gut wouldn't comply.

View from the visitor's center, above the cloud deck.

Also driving-rather-than-hiking scenery included lava flows

and distant viewing of Waipi'o Valley.

Back at the resort, we spent time at the end of the day relaxing on our lanai, being visited by the (begging, unsuccessfully as I don't feed wildlife people food) Nene geese.  

There were also lot of myna birds, which I thought looked like pissed off robins.

Why so angry, bird?

Early in the mornings, I enjoyed sitting on the lanai with my new friend the gold dust day gecko who basked in the sun.

We did get to do a bit of hiking, most of which we did at Kiholo Bay, after a local tipped us off that it was a good spot to see green sea turtles.

Before we saw the seat turtles, though, DH almost walked into a sleeping monk seal.  We'd come around a bend and were paying close attention to the loose, rocky footing when he looked up and saw the seal only about six feet away.  We backed up and took a wide berth around it, then continued on to the bay.

Once we saw the turtles, which was difficult at first, because they were in the water and not on or close to shore where they'd be much easier to pick out, we kept spotting more and more and more turtles!  Most of them were feeding, and so you'd see a back foot, or the side of a shell as they were diving and or turning to dive, rather than heads and big rounded backs.

There were also a few lava tubes that were filled with water .  Now illegal to go in, one native lady who was there with her husband and small child at the time we were walking back, said that when she was a small child it was a local ritual to bathe in the particular one in the photo below.

The last night we were on the Big Island, we tried to get a view of the sunset.  We found a not too crowded spot on a beach to sit and waited for the sun to lower into the ocean.  Unfortunately that spot turned out the be the area that the sunset cruises went to drop anchor, so by the time there was actually sunset-like colors it was impossible to get a photo without a boat in it.  

Still, it was nice to sit in Hawaii and watch the sun go down after a relaxing day.

The next day, we had an early afternoon flight from Kona to Honolulu.  Before checking out of our resort, we took another swim in the gorgeous multi-layered pool.  I could wade, but I couldn't really kick to swim, so in the deep parts, DH gave me a piggyback ride around to get to the waterslide, or another, shallower, attached pool where I could again touch bottom and breathe air at the same time.

Then, before heading to the airport for our flight to Oahu,  we did a little hiking at Petroglyph Park to see some ancient drawings.  During the first half of the hike, there would be an etching on a rock here, and another one there, or a cluster of three or four on rocks in another spot down the trail.  There was also a confusing section where the trail wasn't clearly marked and after several false starts that we figured out weren't the right trail, we almost just turned around and went back the way we'd come instead of continuing on to the end of the trail.

But, we persisted, found the correct path, and were very glad we did when we came upon a huge area that had an uncountable number of petroglyphs right there on the ground.  It was like looking at a giant newspaper, there was so much 'writing'.

Just one small part of the petroglyph rock.

After that it was time to head for the airport and board our flight to Oahu.  Little factoid: while bending over and sliding sideways to get into our seats on that small puddle-jumper type plane, DH accidentally stepped down right onto my broken foot.  So that is how part two of our Hawaiian vacation started: with my foot very sore again!

Hey, What, It's August?!?

 For the last several weeks, most days if you asked me what day it was I would tell you the wrong one.  Usually a day or two ahead of what it actually was.  This week, for example, Tuesday felt like Thursday all ready to me.  So on Thursday I was sure it was Saturday, and yesterday I almost put horses out an hour early so I could change my clothes and get ready for church.  Except it was Friday, not Sunday, and thank goodness I realized it in time before I got myself all gussied up. (Which, honestly isn't very gussied but does usually involve a dress or skirt, earrings, and not having my hair in a ponytail. LOL)

While yesterday may not have been Sunday, it was the first day of August.  All ready!  

Well, no wonder I'm starting to feel a) burnt out on gardening and b) like my house needs to be gutted and thoroughly cleaned and c) like I need to run away and go somewhere relaxing!  

As the sole caretaker of the animals and the garden as well as the person in charge of all things food at this little place here, summer is not a time when I laze around, take vacations, and generally wonder what to do with my time.  Summer is like full speed ahead, balls to the wall, hit the ground running every morning and don't sit down until dark every night.  Not that I don't hit the ground running every morning all year long (I suspect this is a habit I really should change to be a bit more relaxing and warm up to the new day kind of lifestyle), but in summer with it's long hours of daylight that's 14+ hours a day 7 days a week of not sitting down with the exception of eating meals (and church on Sunday).  And, like the hit the ground running morning ritual, meals typically are not a long time of sitting, more like the minimum seat time necessary for refueling and then I'm squealing tires out of pit row and back into the race.

You know, the fact that DH doesn't adhere to the same seasonal extra-work-can't-leave-home schedule and has been gone (*ahem* playing in the name of taking various family members on canoe and kayak float trips) most weekends since the middle of June probably doesn't help with my glut of work that keeps me from sitting and relaxing.  Or taking even a day off to recharge myself somewhere that I'm not responsible for making sure 36 mouths have enough to eat (20 young chickens, 9 adult chickens, 4 horses, 1 cat, DH and myself)  and that the garden isn't shriveling up from lack of rain/watering or getting overrun in weeds that smother my veggie crops and that the dishes get washed and laundry gets done and put away and bills are paid and the floors aren't too gritty or the furniture too dusty or the trash too stinky before it gets taken out to the bin. . .

I'm all for making hay while the sun shines, but you know, I need to include down time for enjoying while the sun shines, not months from now when it's chilly and damp and icky outside.  I like sunshine. I love sunshine.  That's part of why I practically live outside in the summer months; I can't pull myself indoors away from the sunshine so I go whole hog on outdoor work.  Do I need to raise our own meat birds?  Perhaps I could, in coming years, buy them from a local person raising them.  Do I need to grow as much as possible in a quarter-acre garden and tend it by myself?  And then be the only one harvesting and preserving the bounty?  While some of that is a yes because of my dietary needs (ie avoiding a lot of additives in food from the stores), maybe we should do some budget shuffling to procure the same good food from someone else.

And then there's the whole point b) gut the house thing. . . Housekeeping is not my favorite task.  And, when I'm outside all day, housekeeping is reduced to the bare minimums.  Which, by this time in the summer, means that the inside of my house is driving me nuts because no one else here takes care of it (lookin' at you, DH, who's idea of tidying is to every few weeks stack things in piles for me to take care of).  When the weather changes and I'm forced indoors in a few months, I really don't want to be in a cluttered mess of a place.  Housekeeping fairy, where are you? I could use a visit from your magic wand. . .

Which leads me to c) wanting to run away.  The urge to take a day trip is getting stronger.  I need to wait until after this week--broiler chickens are meeting their doom going to freezer camp--and find a farm care person who is willing to not just do feeding and turnouts but also clean stalls (DH adamantly refuses to help with stalls) and then I think I going to run a few hours away and do some beachside rockhounding.  Still outdoors, but no garden weeds or chores in sight, and while it's still August, i.e. summer, i.e. sun shining!

Meanwhile, let me offer you a sampling of photos of things going on at this little place here lately.  If it weren't for the fact that phones these days are practically never separate from our bodies, and that phones have cameras, I probably wouldn't have any pictures of my life to remember summers by.  Hence, this collection of things that caught my eye, or I thought about sharing as I've gone about my busy days.

the tomato patch, with grape arbor in the background

friendly neighborhood cat (not my cat, therefore not a mouth I feed)

visiting me while I was checking for pickle-sized cucumbers

the wild blackberries on the edge of the woods are getting ripe;

this was enough to enjoy with my yogurt and granola breakfast the next morning

Faline helping me hang laundry the day DD1 needed me to watch her for a while after VBS

blue swallowtail

reddish day lilies

little green frog

a brown garter? snake

(not sure, as I don't know if they come in brown; first brown one I've seen)

running some errands in Sweet Madame Blue and she rolled 3100 miles

(that lady lives a life of luxury and goes out in good weather only)

K3 having a riding lesson/helping me train the LBM

(owner wants 'anyone to be able to jump on and ride')