WISE MEN STILL SEEK HIM

I'm so grateful for this time of year.  I'm equally grateful for the knowledge of just how special it is.  It's not about getting or giving gifts, it's not about winter break, I have to say when I was a kid it was called Christmas break which is what it is and it irritates me that they changed it, anyway, it's not about the lights or any of the other fun stuff we do this time of year.  It's a celebration of our Savior's birth.  I was supposed to give a talk today but church got canceled due to weather, crazy!  Anyway my talk was on focusing on Christ during this season.  I thought we were doing pretty good but there are some things we could do better.  I'm really excited about the FHE I  found to help the family focus together.  In case you are interested it's called O Come All Ye Faithful and it's on LDS.org.   I hope that as we all go into this sometimes crazy holiday season that we all step back and remember the real reason for the season and focus on Christ and putting Christ back in Christmas. Instead of going to church today we are going to stay home and continue to watch BYU channel and rest and think about how blessed we are.  Especially today to be inside and out of the horrendous wind and blowing snow outside!

MY NEW ROBOTIC FINGER

So when I broke my finger in September I really did a doozy.  I actually tore the ligament on the diastal (last) joint of my middle finger.  Ligaments don't have a great blood supply so often don't heal and this one didn't either.   When it started pulling to the left I knew it was going to be surgery, I figured I'd just say no and have a crooked ugly finger forever but unfortunately, I couldn't.  It was going to keep going left and getting worse so I had to fix it.  I did it this week.  The surgeon started talking graft from my wrist.  I voted fusion instead.  Realistically, it was a difference of 18 months healing time and several thousand dollars, neither of which do I have.  Now instead I have a screw in my finger.  It hurts like the dickens but is already hurting less than it was yesterday, thankfully because I don't know how people can stand to take these drugs.  My head is foggy, my stomach is yucky and I'm worthless all the time.  Since I don't make a habit of taking pain meds and when I have to I end up throwing away most of the script, my body isn't used to drugs and I can feel these ones kick in, it's like a wave and I don't like it!  Surprisingly it doesn't even get rid of the pain, only dulls it so I'm goofy, useless and exhausted and I still hurt, it's just not right. But there is an end in sight now and for this I'm grateful.  Anyone who knows me won't be surprised that I asked the surgeon to take pics of the surgery. Equally not surprising, he said no, he said that the window was too small and I wouldn't be able to see anything, he did however  take these xrays for me.  Cool huh?

HELLO WINTER!

We are into our third ID season so far.  COLD!  We woke up yesterday to real snow.  We've had some a couple of times before but the longest it had lasted was a few hours. 

We woke up to about 3 inches yesterday and it snowed for most of the day.  Then today it started up again and we've easily got 8 inches on the ground now.

The boys were and still are in heaven.  Thank goodness for all those trips to Flag and Greer that have allowed us to accumulate snow gear over time.  I remember as a kid wanting to go out to play and then being ready to come right back in within 10 minutes because I was freezing!  Thanks to bibs and real snow gloves and boots, these guys are out as soon as they get up, I have to make them come in for breakfast and they are back out and I have to make them come in for lunch. 

Jazz was a little unsure at first but quickly discovered she loves it!  She is happy outside all day with the boys, running up the hills and all over.  Neptune on the other hand, has outgrown his love of playing in the snow and is perfectly happy curled up in front of the fire with me.  I must say, I appreciate the beauty and serenity alot more from the windows upstairs but I love that the boys are having so much fun outside!

I'M STARTING TO FREAK OUT

So my surgery is in 4 days and now I'm starting to freak out.  Not really about the surgery, although R's characteristic tactful comments didn't help with that.  Mostly about all the stuff I have to get done before the surgery.  My finger already hurts so until R started talking about how bad it was going to hurt, I was looking forward to it.  I have my preop appt tomorrow and I'm going to try to talk the surgeon into letting R come in and take some pics, if he says no I'll ask him to take some for me, I figure if I start high he'll be more likely to accomodate my request when I compromise, we'll see.  I'm interested to see just how much uglier my finger can get, I wonder if my fingernail will come off, probably I figure.  I expect I won't get much sleep before then but hopefully, my house will be clean and fridge stocked.  At least the boys are off school on Friday so I won't have to get up to get them going and they can do the pastures for me.  Thank goodness for strong boys with willing hearts, plus it helps that I took them to the movie on Saturday and bought them some candy after they promised to help out and not complain, AT ALL!  For now I guess I'd better get to bed so I can get started bright and early tomorrow.  They announced my surgery in RS today  (so embarrassing!) I had deliberately not said anything, it's really not that big of a deal, it's not like it's back surgery or anything!  Anyway now my friend is bringing dinner on Thursday, so sweet but I feel like a loser, it's just a finger after all, and really only one joint on that finger.  I do really want to see the gorey pics though, so cool, I wish I could watch them drill the bolt into my finger!  Anyway, goodnight!

TORTURE

We have a  couple of great mousers that we acquired soon after moving here.  They  were both dumped and were still fairly young and we had seen a couple of mice and a vole in the pantry  plus several more in the pastures and garage so cats sounded good.  Unfortunately since I'm allergic to them they are strictly outside cats which I feel bad about sometimes, especially when they are sitting in the window staring into the house and it's freezing outside.  Anyway back to the mousers, they caught their first mouse the first day here and sealed the deal, they stay.  Since then we have seen drastically less mice, they even catch and eat small snakes.  A couple of times I've watched Tig play with his food before he kills it.  Today was the worst though.  We have a sunken area on our porch and he brought his mouse into that square and then sat up on the step and watched the poor thing run around and try to hide under the leaves then he would tap it.   At one point he even was sitting facing it and touched his nose to the mouses nose, the mouse bit at his nose, I'm not sure if he connected or not but I'd never seen anything like that before.  Poor fat mouse.  He finally killed it and then played with it some more, throwing it up into the air and catching it.    I'm no fan of mice but I did feel bad about it being tortured.

HAPPY TRAILS BIG JOHN

 Big John was what the boys named our largest rooster. He was big and mean!  He chased them around the yard and pecked them more than once and yesterday he stranded Caleb in a tree while he pecked around on the ground below because Caleb remembered how bad it hurt last time he got pecked.  We'd been meaning to eat him for a few weeks but never seemed to have the time to actually get the dirty work over with.  Today R got up and decided today was the day.  The boys  were so excited and went with him to catch the bugger and do the deed.  Thankfully R sent them away while he actually did the deed.  Anyhow R found a blog with step by step instructions and even pics (very graphic ones) of how to do the entire thing from start to finish.  Here he is right after he was done.  R's first comment? "We need a cleaver, that was way too hard to do with a knife"  Before you start thinking he sawed the head off while John was alive he didn't, he killed him first.  His second comment, "you're not so bad now are ya buddy?"

Next you put him in hot water for a few seconds to loosen up the feathers.  I clarified w/ R before the adventure began that I would cook the fellow but he had to gut it.  I expected the boys to pluck it but R did it all.  Notice the groupies following his every move.  Even the dogs were fascinated.  I have to admit, I was a bit concerned that they were too fascinated by the whole thing, hopefully they don't become serial killers or anything.
   I decided to spare you the pic of him gutting him although it's not that bad, no blood really.  I was a bit worried after hearing about it from Mel on the trek.  The whole process went alot faster than I had feared and we weren't even late for church.  Right now he is sitting in the fridge in an oven bag ready to be roasted for dinner tomorrow night.  So one rooster down, 3 left so watch out and don't peck my kids or else!

WHAT A STUD

 R started taking riding lessons last week but yesterday was his first lesson on the horse.  Last week  he learned how to do the groundwork before riding and safety measures.  We thought it would be best for him to ride a different horse yesterday since his horse, Reno, has alot of fire and while he is a good horse, not so good to learn on.  So here is my stud on Snickerdoodle.  He was so awesome!  Sheena, the trainer (horse and human) says R is a natural, he automatically used his legs to communicate with the horse and she didn't need to remind him once.  He loped, he trotted and he walked.  He sidepassed and turned and even did some barrel work! 

The boys of course think he is super lucky and kept asking when they could ride.  This after they rode on Monday, just 2 days ago.  Isn't he such a stud sitting that horse.  Of course he is a stud without the horse but the horse makes it even better.

I think this is just a great pic.  Would have been better if I could have gotten them all in but Caleb is just to the right darn it.  What a life we live!  We are outside so much more now, the boys are so much healthier now and get into so much less trouble.  It's great having space to just be and work to do.

AUTUMN IS HERE!

Having lived in AZ for so long I ALMOST forgot that there are real seasons in other places.  Not really but it's been so long since we've had the actual  colors of fall that I'm really enjoying it so far this year.  I could do without the howling wind but since it doesn't blow everyday, and when it does it blows all the leaves out of our yard, it's not so bad, yet.  Our boys raked themselves a leaf pile on Saturday and had a great time doing it and then of course jumping into it.  It must be a naturally occuring event because they came up with the idea on their own.  It's so stinking cold in the mornings that there is ice in the horse's water and the grass is literally frozen with little icecicles hanging off of our fences but by afternoon it warms to the 50's or 60's today and yesterday R came out wearing shorts, I don't know why I was surprised but I was.  Look at my sweet Levi, so cute in his layers this morning!  He was actually mad because AJ and he were fighting over the tree swing but he loves having his pic taken so he was having a hard time staying mad.