A Gray Day Brightened Up

Park Place RV Park

On Friday, Mar. 14th I woke up at 6:45, rolled over and found Gibbs stretched out beside me sound asleep. Usually, as soon as I move the tiniest bit, he is right there ready to 'pounce'. Well, not really pounce, but ready to at least give me hugs and kisses. 💕 I rolled over and had completed a couple of my stretches before he even noticed. The second surprising thing was how good I felt, right from the get-go. No pain whatsoever! Ssssh.

Good morning!

I got up and made the bed before joining Bill downstairs. It was another chilly morning so Bill turned the furnace on to warm the Suite and mainly the floors. We've packed the Blue Flame heater away so had the extra blanket pulled up last night. I slept incredibly well! We had our cereal and hot drinks together before I harnessed up the little bum and off we went. Wow! Was that wind ever cold. Not chilly, cold! I needed my hood up and the hoody zipped right up to my neck. It was a south wind so I was surprised it wasn't warmer. The 41F/8C didn't help either.

the colours are better in person
but I'm just winging it with what I have on hand.

This morning, I worked on my cross stitch and gee, I guess not much else. I did call our Mexican dentist to confirm our appointments and to change the nature of mine. What they had me down for, I decided not to have done. No big deal - but I did not want another 'deep-cleaning' this trip. We go on Monday, early in the morning. I still need a cleaning and an extraction (yikes!) so it's still a visit. We also need to pick up more of my shingles pills, that will be the hilight. 😀

For lunch, we had bacon and eggs and then we went right back to what we were doing earlier. I did not feel the need or desire to go to work on the puzzle today. The weather was not even conducive to being outdoors for very long. If it wasn't raining, it was just too darn windy. Not as bad as yesterday but under the cloudy skies, not a comfortable outdoor Arizona day at all. So we stayed inside.

Another hot lunch

It was really nice to welcome Ken and Kim for an indoor Happy Hour today. We all wanted to discuss the whole 'Canadian border crossing' requirements and put some of our (Bill's and mine mostly) panic to rest. The 2 1/2 hour discussion did just that. We feel so much better. With rumours flying around plus helpful tips from outside avenues, we now feel we know what to expect and how to handle it all. Thank you, guys, that was a great visit. Plus, it gave me an excuse to use up the last of my pina colada mix - with whiskey! Yummy! 

I don't often credit my own photography ability
BUT
after Kim being away for a week, I think I captured
a really sweet picture here. 💗

For supper, we had fish and chips (broccoli for me), and it was perfectly cooked. Sometimes, the timing is off for one item or the other. We both are responsible for part of this meal and today we did good! 

Easy Friday night supper
It was good!

After cleanup, I managed a couple of pictures of the sunset out our window but didn't bother running out. Gibbs was such a good little guy today, not bothering our guests tooo much. 💖 He just loves everybody!

This is the best I could get from the window.

We watched some tv and during the evening I relished how well I felt ALL day. Have I finally beaten this sciatica 'thing'? Maybe not completely, but each day I notice such improvements. If it hadn't been so cold this morning, I would have gone for the big walk. I'm so grateful. We only reached a high of 54F/12C but expect a big jump tomorrow in our temperature. Yes! We were almost equal to Priceville's high by mid day. I'm sure it felt great for them. I still say it was a great day, turned from a gray one to a bright spot this afternoon with our company.

Does anyone recognize this place?
We have a month for this to disappear.
Good night!

Thank you for your visit!

 

Overcast, Early Cash, Swapping Out Garden Tools, Puttering

I heard Bill get up with Clemson at 5:30 to go out for his piddle on Saturday, May 19^th and then heard them crawl back in. We all dropped off again immediately. I think it was 10 when Bill woke me up in my chair last night and said “Let’s go to bed”. That doesn’t happen often, I am usually fully aware of when I can’t keep my eyes open and go myself.

Bill backed up to the hill and loaded the chipper using wood plank ramps

I dozed a lot yesterday and today I’m already, at noon feeling draggy. I slept for almost 9 solid hours last night. I’ve come to the conclusion that the Benadryl is drowse-inducing but I’m not about to stop taking them right now until the itch eases. It’s no toss up for me, it is the lesser of two evils to take the meds. As Bill and I were at the table having our morning brew, my phone rang. ‘Lucy’ was interested in coming to see my food processor. Yay!

We arrived at Cedarhaven (Gayle and John's)

Going up their beautiful cedar and periwinkle line driveway

After giving her directions, she arrived within 20 minutes. Checked it out and the cash was in our pocket before 9:30. We loaded the wood chipper and Clemson in the truck and drove to Chatsworth, to Gayle and John’s. Bill unloaded their chipper and loaded the rotor tiller, easy! We chatted with my sister for a bit and scooted home.

Back home, backed up to the hill again to unload the tiller

We’d had very few spatters of rain early morning but nothing to deter anything we wanted to do. The sky would lighten up and then darken again and drop a few more sprinkles. The temperature is bouncing around 59F/15C and there is a bit of a breeze today. Back home, Bill offloaded the machine and started on my garden. The earth looks really good, nice for planting.

unloading the tiller

Before finishing he asked if I’d like to make my garden bigger, “Now is the time”. “Yes!” So, he added an extra 3’ to the area east of the present plot. The rest is up to me and I’ll rake the grass out and remove the big rocks that he dug up. I’m excited now to start getting things in the ground. I made breakfast, bacon, eggs and croissants before we returned the tiller to John. Now they can take the time they need to do their garden.

We drove home through Hanover, stopping at the Bread Depot and Home Hardware. 

This was the size of my original garden

Bill purchased a bracket hanger for my weed trimmer in the shed and I perused the birdseed aisle and the packets of seeds. I think I’ll also try planting some carrots this year. It is something I use often and hate running out. They take just over 2 months until I can harvest them, so I’ll get them in the ground this weekend for sure. I might also try cutting off and planting the tops of the carrots I have in my fridge now. That is another technique for growing the orange vegetable.

Here he is moving into the grassy area and extended it
back to that long pole you see

We stopped briefly at the Acreage to see if Bill could help light Donna and Gerry's new Weber Q. Unfortunately, we gave them a bum hose, so that was the problem but we’re glad it isn’t a problem with the barbecue. He’ll pick up a hose and they’ll be set! Back home, I made myself another tea and sat inside with Clemson. Once again, I felt drowsy.

I’ve already planned supper so with that out of my head, I decided to make some cream cheese icing for the banana cake that I made the other day. There is some left in the fridge and I think it will taste better with this addition. My freezer is too full to pop it in there so we need to eat it up. Out of sight, out of mind so when Bill wants a snack, he doesn’t see the cake. This is a healthy cake with no flour and no sugar so even I can help clean it up.

Just a couple more runs back and forth and it is ready for me
to get in there and clean it up

Bill is in working mode so he went back out to the storage shed to putter around. He has small jobs that he can work away at. After I made the icing and covered the cake pieces, Bill stuck his head in to inform me that he had to go into town for some longer screws to reapply the brackets for the sewer hose storage. He worked away at that for the rest of the afternoon. Gerry popped over briefly to pick up a new barbecue hose that Bill picked up in town for him. He’s a happy guy now!

We each had some cake tonight and it is so moist
The icing made it much nicer too

I was inside with Clemson and my book and once more fell into a snooze. Good grief! It wasn’t until Bill came in just after 5:30 that I snapped to attention and started to get out the deep fryer and to cut potatoes for supper. It wasn’t until after I melted the lard and poured it into our fryer that I noticed it wasn’t heating up. I tried a different outlet but no, it was the fryer that had given up the ghost, so to speak. Hmm, what to do, what to do.

We bought Bella in the States for only $25 so weren't interested about going through
the warranty process of returning it

 Grumbling a bit over another thing gone wrong, I resorted to using my electric frypan and poured the grease into it. The potatoes fried up fine and when they were close to being done, I began frying 2 haddock filets in a pan on the stove. I do love my new T-fal fry pans, they cook so fast and before long we were eating fish and chips. The problem was when we poured the lard from the fry pan into my grease jar. What a mess, there is just no easy way to do that without a spout.

French fries in an electric frypan

Leaving the ‘what to do’ decision for another day, we cleaned up dishes and settled in for the evening. I went out with Clemson, who will soon be getting a new name and put on his long rope from now on. After chasing him down the lane again, I noticed how warm it felt outside. It was 64F/18C and that is with NO sun all day. We didn’t get the 80% rains today but the day is not over (it is 7:30) and the sky to the northwest is getting dark.

Bill moved our sewer hose casing

He has another plan in his head so he had to change the position

 I hope you’ve had a fun day today. We have! We made some $, semi-prepared a garden, saw a few family members, completed a couple of jobs and I even got a few chapters read in my book.

Supper was good
I like my fries at home with butter, sour cream and salt & pepper
It is like a baked potato taste for me

I love it when you stop in to see what we’re up to! I enjoy reading your comments if you wish to leave one.