On the last day of winter...

Yes, the last day of winter! We've survived another one. OH, I accidentally spelled that "won", erased it and re-wrote it, but now I wonder if it wasn't really correct the first way! I feel like I won something! I was looking out my window at the silver sky, feeling a bit bleak about the bleakness, and I look down to my front garden. I was feeling bad about the poor garden, as last week I barely had time to do much more than rake off some of the leaf-blanket I put on last fall. It got so cold again last Sunday and has stayed cold, that I never went out to finish the job...when to my amazement, I see these two purple spears poking up...my giant crocus, just waiting for the temps to go over 35 so they can open! O!
Then I knew we were on the other side...it may well snow again. Frankly I might be disappointed if it didn't snow at least one more good one before the good weather comes to stay. But it won't last. The push and struggle of life will suddenly burst forth, and nothing Old Winter can do will work, and it will retreat north, north and north! And the proof is in those crocii. Hope, wearing deep purple, poking up from the darkness of cold soil, will not be denied. Welcome Spring! Farewell Winter!

A family hike

It was a lovely day here in Mass. with temps over 60 for the first time in....forever, practically! So we went on a hike at our local Audubon sanctuary. Robbie comes here once a week to attend a homeschooling class, and is really getting into nature, which is a wonderful transformation for him. KC has discovered the fun of running in the fields from these sojourns, and today was totally enraptured to hike in the woods. Except for .10 of a mile where the trail was very muddy and he was in his carrier, he hiked nearly all of the 1.5 mile trail through woods and fields! He is such a sturdy lad, which just amazes me. He is so short, but he is tough! I can't believe he'll be 2 next month! Anyway, these are some pictures of Lee and the boys. I kept running ahead, yelling stuff like "be natural" and "don't look like you're posing, Robbie, just stare at that tree, would ya?". Lee told me it was like hiking with the paparazzi!! Despite the constant annoyance of me whipping out my camera, the hike was wonderful, everyone had a good time, and we're hoping that tomorrow will be warm and sunny like today!

Okay, so this is different....

Top: yesterday, and below: today. O what a difference a day makes! Well, it is very different. After flirting with blonde a few years ago, and growing up blonde, and living as a redhead for, hmmm, 18 years or so, I went to my hairdresser yesterday, had the brown stripped out, and blonde put back in. It is very, very blonde! I think when I go back in a 6 weeks, I'll have some "lowlights" put in, if I don't even go down a shade or two. Wow! I've never been this blonde before. Awhile ago I walked into the bathroom to get stuff out of the dryer, turned on the light and gasped....I'd forgotten, you see. I've been living with that kinda drab brown, which was supposed to turn my hair a lovely ash blonde, btw, for about 2 weeks, and had gotten used to it. As I suppose I will get used to this too! At least when I walk at dusk, I won't need a reflective vest, eh?!

Stopping by washer on a cold Sunday morning

So, it's in the 5 a.m. hour on a perfectly good Sunday morning and here I am on the computer instead of my nice warm bed, with my nice, warm family! I had to let the dog out, who's bladder alarm can never distinguish Saturdays or Sundays, just "it's 5 a.m. pul-eeze let me out, mom" and I had to run down cellar and get the diaper wash I put in last night and the cold air was so invigorating that I am now too jazzed to go back to bed. And I got to thinking, as I loaded the diapers in the dryer, that in January, I used my clothesline for diaper drying for at least 2/3 of the month, and here it is, March, and I've barely been able to convince myself to go outside to put in or take out the wash, it's been that cold.

A friend of mine was talking the other day, and mentioned how we would all be whining come mid-July, about how hot it was out....

....I don't know if I'd be whining............okay, I probably will ! But right now summer heat seems an awfully long way away. Don't get me wrong, I love New England and the changeable weather, but January spoiled us, and, I think, delayed our cabin fever by a few weeks. We've been able to be out and about, not very much snow to hinder us all winter, excepting December, but it's not the same, being out and about when the windchill hovers in the single-degree range.

On a positive note, another flock of robins landed on the hill about 3/4 of a mile from here. We had a mini-flock in our yard Friday, they blew in with the wind, and blew right back out again in an hour. The poor things are looking for worms which are frozen deep in the soil...I sure hope it warms up fast before they starve.

What I've been doing...

This is my wife Lee, and our wee lad, KC at my surprise birthday party a few weeks ago. Lee and my best pal Wendy surprised Wendy's husband Greg, and me, with a joint birthday party, as Greg's birthday is a few days after mine. KC is wearing his first ever birthday hat, and learned how to blow those roll-out noisemaker-thingies. What do they call those, anyway? *****

I can hardly believe that KC will be two in just 6 weeks! Sometimes I try to picture him when he was the "wee worm", he was just so tiny. He is still such a short little fellow, but sturdy and determined, two very important traits, I think. He sticks with something until he is satisfied, whether it is putting blocks just so, or shaking milk from his sippie cup into the top recess of his baby gate, creating a fetid milk mini-lake if you don't catch him doing it!

We are adopting another baby, are on the waiting list, and will likely be receiving an infant from the same agency that placed KC. The wait could be as long as 18 months which would be next summer. It's a worry, as I creep ever closer to 50...next summer I'll be 48...but having this second generation of children has made my spirit young. And I have an excuse for napping midday, to boot!

Whine, pizzle.

Have you ever been such a grump that you wanted to just slap yourself and holler "fer crissakes, jest get OVER it already"?? That pretty much sums up today. I ate icecream for lunch, which ordinarily would not be a bad thing, but I'm on a diet for goshsakes, and the boys have been trolls, and the sky is cloudy and we're just this close )( to having a snowstorm, missing it, and having the cloudy dreary skies, but no sparking snow to make it all worthwhile. I can see the dark clouds on the horizon, and if that is not a metaphor for how my mood is, I can't think of what is!

I know I didn't get a good nights sleep, because the baby kept kicking me out of the bed, as he loves to sleep sideways and I'm in the way. The dog woke up at midnight because his schedule got screwed up by being at the groomers, and the groomer could not get all the tangles off of him, so he got all his long hair whacked off, and is a "shorthaired" Irish Setter at the moment. Except for his ears and tail, and that, somehow, makes it worse! It will take some time before he grows his "feathers" back and I am currently vowing to groom him daily so I am in the habit as the hair grows back.

My hair color sucks big time. I tried to go blonde from red and it came out brown. Now, I'm obviously not a chemist, but someone please explain how blonde turns brown for gosh sakes. And it's growing out and looks doggie....except the dog is currently near bald. And I'm not. Bald, that is.

Sigh, I guess I will go have a cuppa, keep my appointment with the chiropractor, and see how the rest of the day shakes out. It's 4 pm eastern time, so the day is nearly over, whether it gets better or not. That should be a comfort, right?