Snow and more snow

Rusty has a place to get out of it, but she had been in the round pen until I showed up and she went to the pen. Then I went over to the other horses and was going to get some pictures of them, they all looked the same as Rusty but the battery in my camera went dead so no pictures of the pathetic looking critters. They had shelter too but instead they stood out in the snow. Yuma yelled at me wanting food. It was 1 in the afternoon. No supper yet.

I baked half of the sugar cookies today. Will do the rest of them tomorrow and I baked snicker doodles too. I put them in a secret place. I also baked 2 more loaves of zucchini bread. Tyler keeps telling me its almost as good as his mothers but not quite. I need to go get groceries tomorrow to finish cookies and to make some fudge. I guess I did not plan very well. I did not want to go this evening.

We have about 15 inches of fresh snow and we are having a heat wave. It is 14 degrees. The snow is really light and fluffy. From the looks on the news downtown Spokane was in a deadlock. All the roads leading from town are up hills unless you are going to the valley. Even north division was closed because a milk truck got stuck. I am glad we are out in the country and did not have to go anywhere.

Remember the Serenity Room blog that I mentioned yesterday. She is having another give away and I get extra entries for mentioning it. I love that blog even if I don't win. AND, Andrea your prize got here and we had pancakes and eggs for dinner last night. It was wonderful. Thank you so much.

Pepper has a new best friend.

I meant for the pictures to be in opposite order but OH well. I know there is a way to put them with what I write but don't know how. I need a computer guru to walk me thru it. I don't do from directions very well. Need to do it.

Pepper has a new very best friend. It is Bubba. I am glad its going to be a while till Bubba goes to freezer camp. We about split laughing at them. The hot wire obviously was not working. They stood there like that until we put him in the barn with the 2 mares. Maybe that is why we have never been able to chase cows on him. He just won't do it. I tried to move some bulls on him once and he just walked up to them and stood there and the bulls just stood there. LOL.

The top picture is our Maggie. She is a happy dog. We put her on a cable at night or if we leave but the rest of the time she has the run of the place. When it turned so cold we tried putting her in the barn. There are lots of places for her to curl up in and be comfortable, BUT she dug out the first 2 nights we tried it and went to her igloo up by the house so we just put her on the cable now and let her be where she wants to be. She has a good bed in there. We are afraid the coyotes will cause her to go looking away from here at night so we cable her.

The other picture is a fluffy quail sitting on the gate to next door. When we used to have the chickens free range and fed them outside the barn on the ground, they came and ate with the chickens. When we penned the chickens up because something was eating them they quit coming around. Also we have more barn cats at the moment. People keep dumping pregnant cats off out here. Some survive, some don't. We feed them but don't baby them like Trouble our house kitty.

My living room is now all spic and span and decorated for the holidays. I am done sewing and crafting until after New years. Then I have a quilt top to sew. Have a granddaughter waiting for hers.

One of our grandsons from in town was supposed to come out and stay for a couple of days but his mom didn't bring him. He needs to spend some time with his grandpa. He is nearly 13 and boys that age need a man sometimes. Will talk to his mom in the morning.

If you don't read Serenity Room blog, you should. She is so inspirational. I read several blogs but that one is high on my list.

A long day, still cold, and Christmas is getting close. Love the season despite all my whining earlier in the month. As I sit here at the computer, it is -2. More snow predicted for tomorrow. With this cold weather snow is a good insulator though and will help things out. At least that is what Bob told me. My masked marvel from yesterday.

Oh, the weather outside is frightful.........

I caught my favorite guy just before he started peeling off the layers. I am so grateful that he can go out and do things so I don't have to.

Tomorrow will start cookie baking. I will bake sugar cookies first. I think I will probably will frost them myself. My cookie decorators live in Marysville. Isaac and Lane frost cookies good. They won't be here this holiday. Actually, we usually go there but not this year. We just did not feel like we wanted to travel this year.

This evening we went in to Ryan's band concert. He is in the 6Th grade and plays the trombone. The orchestra played too. You haven't lived until you have sat thru 5Th. graders and 6Th. graders playing violins. LOL. The 6Th. grade band was not so off key but did well. Ryan plays well, I guess, a trombone is not a solo instrument. Just his little cheeks puffing out. And guess what I did? I forgot my camera. Ryan is the straight A boy. He made a deal with his dad that if he got straight A's he could wear his hair like he wanted. It really looks awful hanging in his face but he got the grades to do it.

So my day was not the most energetic, woke up with a headache that did not entirely leave all day. Bob had an appointment this AM then he came home and wondered why the laundry wasn't all done yet. Grrrrrrrrr. Did I say he was my favorite......well he is but sometimes I wonder.....

2nd Sunday of Advent

The Advent Wreath with 2 candles lit. The cupboard it is sitting on is a cherry wood cabinet that belonged originally to Bob's grandparents. Its a beautiful piece of furniture. It has a mirror in the middle behind the wreath.

What a nasty cold day. Well maybe not as nasty as yesterday but colder. We went to Walmart after church and I though my face was going to freeze between the car and the store. Its the wind. Not as bad as earlier but ANY is too much when the temperature is 0. It was -4 when we went to church thru Airway Heights this morning and according to the weatherman it is supposed to be colder tonight. Bob is doing the outdoor chores. I didn't even go out to help him this evening.

My sister has just begun writing a blog. It is called The Life and Times of Penny the Neighborhood dog. Its about their chocolate lab Penny. Go read it. She had trepidation about putting it on Blogspot. She was afraid it would mess her computer up. I told her it wouldn't. Sharon is much smarter on the computer than I am but I wanted her to put it on Blogspot rather than on My Space. I don't go there but rarely. She has been asked to write it and submit it to their newspaper. Hope she does. She has a real sense of humor and is able to put it down on paper (here). She took our mother to Key West, Florida a lot of years ago and her diary of their trip is a riot. Wish she would have it published. More - I hope she still has it. It was in the hippy era and poor mother, I am sure she was horrified. I was with mother in New Orleans once and I thought she was going to pass out on me. She clutched her purse to her chest and wanted out of the French Quarter. A funny memory.

Now that I have meandered around, the animals are doing well. The horses have heaters as do the cows. Heaters in the water I mean. Bob is carrying hot water to the chickens and goat 3x a day. He fed everything extra this evening.

First day of snow

Our first snow of this winter. Certainly not what they predicted and I am sorry I cancelled the party although it is very cold. 14 degrees at the moment at Fairchild and the wind is blowing about 25 MPH which makes it somewhere around -20. I am glad I don't have to go outside any more.

I did go help Bob with the chores tonight. I need new gloves. I put them on my Santa list. I was not cold except my hands and my cheeks. The horses have a good shelter to get out of the wind. They were running around doing their Arabian impersonation. Tails and manes flying. Ditto sailed out thru the gate. None of that playing around for the old lady. Dixie and Pepper had to run around when they came out of the gate. I yelled at them a couple of times and they thought I might throw something at them so they trotted obediently into the barn and into their stalls. We fed extra hay to the pasture horses and Rusty tonight. The wind is so bitter.

We put Maggie our big dog into the barn for the night. She has a dog house in the back yard but it faces north and we were afraid she would get cold. She does not like to be in the house at night. She goes to the barn to sleep when she gets loose and their is hay for her to burrow down in.

Am finishing up a few things and then I can devote all next week to baking/fudge making etc. I did bake the zucchini bread yesterday and put one loaf in the freezer so it will be around. The loaf I left out is gone. I did not eat it all either.

I lay my clothes out for church but Bob will have to be sure the car will start before I get dressed in the AM. Really want to go if we can. Ken Gaub is speaking. He is a very funny Evangelist.

12 Grandchildren

12 smiling grandchildren but there are five more. The top row are l to r - Dustin, Joel, Tyler, Bryant, Lane and Isaac. The belong to Nikki our oldest daughter. She also has a step son that she mostly raised Christopher. The second row are Ryan, Seth and Sheya. They belong to our youngest son Tom. The bottom row is Nicolette, Skyelor and Jadeyn. They belong to our youngest daughter Christyn. Our second son Scott (deceased) has 2 children Coreen and Robby and our oldest son Steve has 2 children, Artie and Deanna. Christopher, Joel and Deanna are parents of our Great grandchildren and Robby will be a daddy in Feb. The family grows. and grows.

So my song goes: (remember the tune now) On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me One Christmas Cactus bloom, two puppies playing, 3horses hanging, 4 stuffed horses, 5 colorful cowboy boots........6 horses eating, 7 baseball caps, 8 horse ornaments, 9 empty baskets, 10 Santa Clauses, 11 presents waiting and 12 grandchildren: That was kind of fun. For me anyway.

Well the snow is upon us and upon and upon. It has been snowing since about 10 this morning. I don't know how much is out there but everything is white. I will say it is kind of pretty. The heaviest snow is predicted for tonight and tomorrow along with wind. They say blizzard conditions. I did cancel the Christmas party for tomorrow night. The roads should be awful. Even if it was at my house, I was worried about my friends driving. Andrea had already said she could not drive up. She lives down in the Palouse. Maybe come February we will have an UnChristmas Party.

Bob went down to feed and all the horses were under the shelter except Ditto. She is low man and they had her out in the snow. Poor old girl. She got put in right away. When Tyler went down to the barn to do the morning chores, good old Dixie had gotten her stall open and had a good time. She got into the cat food but didn't eat any, just nosed it around but she did eat about half a bale of hay. So she got put in her stall with her vitamins and nothing more. Oh was she mad. Bob did not give her grain tonight either, just some grass hay and her vitamins. Naughty naughty girl. He put a small chain on the gate so Ms Lips can not get it open.

Tyler worked down at the neighbors today and got really cold. He was putting up a shelter for her goats. The big ole boy goat knocked it all down. I sent him to a warm bath when he came in.

I baked Zucchini bread today. Now if I just can not eat it all...................

Steens Mt Horses