What's That...!!??

..Well..

If it isn't the Sun..

Haven't him in a few days...wonder how long he'll stick around...?

Happy New Year...!!

Be careful out there..

Back to Work.....

Hello morning....hello rain....hello little beetle bug making funny tracks on my window...

I got used to sleeping in....

That da*#  alarm clock went off much too early this AM....!

 

..Hope is Forever..

Ahhhhhh....

..the after Christmas nap..!!

..Hope is Forever..

Fom Our Front Porch...

..to Yours..

Merry Christmas!

Still Watching.....

Joyful Christmas Eve...!

..Hope is Forever..

Keeping Watch.....

Rumor has it..... a fat little man in a red suit has been spotted in the neighborhood...

The fur babies are taking turns keeping watch...

It's Misskitty's turn..

..Hope is Forever..

We're off....

to see Miss Heather the groomer....

Gott'a look good for Santa...!

Mom's mom is home from the hospital and all is well...

Just a few test after the Holidays to see if we can figure out what's causing her shortness of breath..

..Hope is Forever..

Red Sky...

Sunrise from the front porch yesterday....

Isn't there a poem about a sailor and a red sunrise...?

Mom is doing much better and may come home today...

Thanks for all your well wishes and prayers.

..Hope is Forever..

I'm Back.....

Things have been a bit crazy up here at the Twelve Acre Wood..

The female half of the parental units became very ill Sunday night and after 2 trips to the ER via ambulance the doctors finally admitted her to the hospital very early Wednesday morning..

I've been dividing my time between keeping the office running....keeping my household fed and running...and helping care for Mom..

 

All you wives and mothers know what i'm talking about.....right...?!

 

She is still in the hospital....resting....waiting for the fever to go away...maybe we'll get her home tomorrow....

....weather is gonna stop cooperating tomorrow night....nasty drizzle/snizzle is in the forecast..

Oyyyyyyyy...!!!

 

..Hope is Forever..

We Made It and He Did It...!!

Well the family jumped on the "Orange" bus bright and early Saturday morning...

We took about a 10 minute ride and arrived here....

Just a few small steps from the entrance....

There's only 400 of them....can you see him...?

I couldn't find him...!

There he is...!!

Look at that hair.....I'd pay big bucks to have hair like that....!

Gott'a have the picture with Dad...!

(this maybe the only picture of the two of them together I've got...)

It's Over.....It's Done....!

Now on to his Master's starting in Jan. 2015..

Oh Man...i just realized that means another ride on the bus...!!

..Hope is Forever..

Guided Tour....

the MaleChild decided that it would be better for us to ride the public buses to his graduation on Saturday....

Having never ridden anything other than a school bus I had questions...

So

Yesterday i met the kid at the park where he wants us to park and then we followed the "Orange" bus.

We stopped at the first stop at which the kid said..."Don't get off here"...and then

on to the next stop....."Don't get off here"...and on we went until we were somewhere in the deep heart of the ASU campus.  There was a large turn-a-round at which i got  "The bus waits here about 5 minutes.  Don't get off here."  Finally we reached the Communication Center where he uttered...."Pull the cord and get off here!"

Hummmmm.....

Not bad...a 10 minute ride and we were at the front door.

I think i can handle this bus thing....

and

Then i took him to lunch...

..Hope is Forever..

Front Porch

..this mornings view..

..Hope is Forever..

The Kids.....

This little girl finished her nurse practitioner/mid-wife classes and is waiting to take the boards....

This little boy is graduating this Saturday from Appalachian State with a BS in Phychology and a minor in Special Ed....

Been a busy year in this family..!!

..Hope is Forever..

Hey....

..I found the Thanksgiving pictures...!!

..Hope is Forever..

Mis-information.....

Yesterday i wrote there were 1000-1200 presents...

Wrong

There were 1000-1200 children on the list..!!

We wrapped and wrapped....

and had a great time..!!

..Hope is Forever..

CSL.....

..or in the vocabulary of a state employee...

"Community Service Leave"

The state gives us 12 hours a year to use on a community program....

so

today CityBoy and I are headed to a local gathering place and wrapping presents for 

"Project Child"

I've been told there are anywhere from 1000-1200 gifts waiting on our talented fingers...

so

barring any paper cuts or rouge tape is should be a fun day.

..Hope is Forever..

Hummmmm....

...wonder what he was doing...?

Maybe the outside Christmas lights....

Nawwwwww....!!

..Hope is Forever..

Finally....!

...a picture you can see Max's face...

Looks just like Daddy...same gray beard.

..Hope is Forever..

"On the Road Again"

The day after Thanksgiving.....and the trucks are hitting the roads again with thousands of Christmas trees....

Soon to be at tree lots near you...

Wonder if you'll get one from my little corner of the world...?

It's a sure sign of the Christmas Season when the big trucks pull in at the base of the Twelve Acre Wood...

..Hope is Forever..

Got half-way to work.....

and drove into a blizzard...

Guess who turned around and came home...!?

..Hope is Forever..

Nasty.....

It rained all day yesterday and things are a nasty...muddy....mess....

Can't even imagine what Buffalo will go thru today...

Prayers for northern New York..

..Hope is Forever..

Visitors.....

...their hiding on the mountain...!!

..Hope is Forever..

?????

Remember a few weeks ago when i wrote i was having internet connection issues...

And then..

Over the weekend we discovered that the parental units were having issues with a garage door opener and just decided to use a "spare" one.

Which for some reason also opened our garage doors....!!

Well....

The garage door man came by Tuesday afternoon and reprogramed our doors and fixed the parental units opener ..

My internet connections have been perfect ever since...

Go figure..!!

It's another mountain mystery...

..Hope is Forever..

Lula threw it out....

We bought Lulabell a new dog house....one of those that looks like an Igloo and has some insulation.   I thought a new dog house should have a new dog bed...

soooo...I found a nice comfy...snuggley...warm one and presented it to Lula with the new house...

She threw it out...!!

Not once but twice...!!

Now...

New bed in the people house....old bed in new dog house...

 it belongs to Mia in the mornings..

Max in the late morning to mid-afternoon...

and Misskitty from mid-afternoon till early evening....

 

They set their own schedule and so-far things are working fine...

So Far..!!

..Hope is Forever..

Frosty....

This was the scene outside my office door on Friday...

Frosty and cold.....we all got together and had potluck lunch at Ranger Tom's house and it was great..."wonderful chili Vicki!"

then the weekend was beautiful and now it's raining like crazy...!!

With a low of 16 predicted for tonight,

tomorrow should be icy.....or dicey.....which ever...!

I've been fighting an upper respiratory bug for the last few days thought i had it under control but it's trying to make a come back....

Yuck....nasty bugs...!!

Stay safe and warm Mother Nature is on a rampage..!

..Hope is Forever..

Brrrrr....

the temps are dropping as I write this..

We're in for a cold weekend 

but

very little snow...

Thank Goodness...

..Hope is Forever..

It's Been 40 Years....

...since CityBoy or I had been to a laundromat...

But, yesterday we made the venture into unknown territory...

When we build this cabin....since there was only the two of us...I decided that a smaller washer and dryer would be all we needed..

Never thought of those king/queen size comforters...

Now...

The dogs and the cat sleep on the beds during the day (and night) and those comforters begin to have a little doggie/kitty odor after awhile...

I used to drop the comforters off at a laundry on my way to work and then pick them up on the way home all nice a clean....

Not Anymore..!!

The laundry went up on price....they are now $20.00 a piece...!!

So we grabbed the soap...a roll of quarters...2 comforters and away we went...

Well...

$8.00 and 1 hour and 15 minutes later we were on our way home with fresh smelling clean comforters...

Not So Bad....We can do this....even at our advanced age...

..Hope is Forever..

Happy Veterans Day....

...Thank You...

Ferdinan the Bull.....

To you remember that children's book?

It was one of my favorites...

This picture reminds me of the cover on my copy...

This is Lula's Spot...

This is where she sits many hours in the day watching over the Twelve Acre Wood..

She can view the entire valley ... the roads... and both houses from this spot..

She always looks stoic and peaceful sitting there...

Under the large white pine tree keeping watch...

If it was a cork tree (or was it an olive tree in the story?)...

things would be next to perfect....

..Hope is Forever..

I Don't Care...

..if the calendar says we're still in Fall..

There's a lot of jockeying for "Sun Puddles" going on in the house and that's a sure sign of Winter...!

..Hope is Forever..

Yuck.....

This is what it looks like outside...

YUCK

and rumor has it that this will turn into snow by tonight...

double Yuck...!!

We did order Lula a new doghouse..

Maybe it will get here before Spring...

..Hope is Forever..

Hump Day....

and it looks like a beautiful one..!

My 25 year old radio alarm clock died..

I could no longer set the time and the radio control would no longer stay on our local farm reporting station...

Sooo...I pulled the battery back-up..tossed it in the trash and went to the local Wally World...

Do you know how many alarm clocks are now on the market....!!

Regular old clocks...ditigal clocks...clocks with radios....clocks with USB ports....clocks with a port to charge your cell phone....clocks with IPad ports....faces with large numbers....faces with numbers you can shine on the ceiling....

Whoa.....choices...!!

I just wanted one that would wake me at 6am Monday thru Friday and keep fairly good time.

Found One...!!

Brought it home...got it all set with the correct time...correct wake-up time....just the right distance from the bed...

This morning i woke with a school fire alarm going off next to me...

Who knew it had a volume control...!!??

..Hope is Forever..

TGI Tuesday

I don't talk politics very often....in fact almost never..

But

I'm so glad it's election day...

The political TV adds got sooooo bad up here in the high country that I voted for the Third Party candidate ..... 

The adds got soooo bad that in one commerical one party was comparing the other party to Nazis!

This election seems to have turned into a "Control issue"

 

We've got problems in this nation guys!!

Let's work together...

 

Maybe my ears will get a little rest before 2016 election season starts in 2015...

 

..Hope is Forever..

Nailed It....!!

This is what the front yard looked like at 7am Saturday morning...
Weather gurus got it right...!
4.5 inches......so much that some of the ski resorts opened 2-4 week early
and more snow to come this Friday..
It wasn't a light-fluffy-slowly drifting down from the sky snow...
NO
It was heavy - wet - blowing side-ways snow and looked like a blizzard most of the day.
By this afternoon it'll be gone...

..Hope is Forever..

By Tomorrow.....

..it should look like this...

One to three inches ... starting tonight and thru tomorrow...

It'll be gone by Sunday ... 'cause temps will be in the 50's again...

My kind'a snow fall....quick in ....quick out..!

..Hope is Forever..

Who's in Who's Space....

Mom.....Dad....!!

Tell Buku that i was here first...!!

..Hope is Forever..

Heading South....

...maybe that's where all the leaves are heading...

Beginning to look a little bare up here at the mountain park..

Still some color..but..not much..

..Hope is Forever..

That Word.....

...yes....that four letter word is being whispered by the weather gurus ..

something about a real cold cold front coming for this weekend and possible ____

flurries...

I'll keep you posted...!!

..Hope is Forever..

Guess..?

Guess who's hiding out at the park again this year...?

That's right..!!

It's almost time for the big feast...

sooooo

Their back..!!

..Hope is Forever..

Meet Bukukitty

Buku appeared several months ago..

first she came every 3-4 days...

munched a meal and then disappeared..

Then she came every other day...

Now i think she's living under Mom's front porch..

(in the old cat house)

and comes for breakfast and dinner...

She must have been someones pet...she looks well fed...is friendly.. and purrs a lot.

Lulabell is tolerating a new critter in her space...

maybe they'll become good buddies...

One more outside dog and we'll have a matched set...

2dogs and a cat inside...

&

2dogs and a cat outside..

 

Wonder if there's a tax break in there somewhere..

You know...... nonprofit animal sanctuary ?

..Hope is Forever..

Look Ma...!!

No Snow!!

We must be a lower higher elevation...

..Hope is Forever..

They said it....!!

Yes.....Bloggerland...

The weather gurus said it last night on the 6 o'clock news...

the horrible four letter word...

SNOW...!!

Seems it will get cold enough tonight for SNOW in the higher elevations.

Now my questions is..how high is higher in this part of the woods?!

We're at 3600 ft.....is that high enough..?

Guess i'll have to wait and see...

ps....the kids were in Paris now they're headed for Budapest...

..Hope is Forever..