Just Stuff

Lots of stuff on my mind today! And I might even remember it all. Yeah, right.

Puppies: They are parked beside me right now, Frasier is grooming Maggie. She will pester him until he starts playing, but what she really wants is to get him so riled up that he'll start grooming her to make her stop playing. Which works, because getting groomed seems to be her real agenda but Frasier hasn't figured it out yet. Which is a switch, usually he's the smart one.

Both doggies were in disgrace this morning. Seems that one of them figured out how to get into the trash bag and the contents of the bag were redistributed all over the kitchen. And even into the living room, where there was a dusting of coffee grounds on the carpet. Otter also noticed that one of them had taken some of the trash half-way out the dog door into the back yard. I have my suspicions as to which dog did what. And they are both guilty! Frasier would not even look at me this morning, he stayed on the opposite side of the room from me. Maggie would at least look at us, but she was a little less bouncy than she normally is.

Also on my mind: Otter. At the moment, she is at school. The try-outs for the school play are this afternoon. It's about 4:30 as I type, try-outs started at 3:00 and last until 5:00. If she gets out earlier, she'll call me. But since I haven't heard from her yet, I think I'll get the doggies leashed and loaded into the car then head up there about 20 minutes from now.

Simplification is next on my list. I'm still working on it. We have quit using paper napkins, I have a boatload of fabric napkins so we've started using them. They get tossed in the laundry and they don't make any more work. I have been cleaning out a lot of stuff, I took a trunkload to Goodwill to donate today. Still need to get my rain barrel set up, but it will need to be cleaned and scrubbed first.

Yard work! I am going to move a bunch more iris bulbs this fall, I'm just not quite sure where I'm going to move them to yet. I know where I'm moving them away from - around the trees. I think I'll probably put a third row behind the house, there are two rows already but they are farther out from the house than I would like them to be so I'll probably put a row closer to the house. There will still be quite a few around the trees, I just want to thin them out a little bit. Possibly I might put some of them beside the shed in the back yard. I'll figure that out a little closer to time to move them, it depends on how many I actually dig up. Also, I'm beginning to see bulbs in the stores so we need to start thinking about the tulip bed. I think Otter wants to plant a variety of colors, like we did last year.

Crafting. I have been in a crafting mood for a while now, and I generally always have several projects in various stages of completion. I have finished up quite a few lately. I still have several waiting to be worked on, and I spent a few hours on Saturday working on them. I love having the time on Saturdays to do things like that. Froggy, I'm nearly through with the ceramic tree. I thought I was finished with it, but I've discovered a few spots that I think need to be touched up again. Then when I'm satisfied that all the spots have been painted, I'll seal it. Also, Otter and I have a sock monkey waiting on us! It's mostly done, but the limbs need to be attached. Then I think we're going to redo the face, it doesn't look quite right.

Fall/Autumn. It's still August, but I kind of think we're in for an early Fall this year. I hope that we do not have to go through more bad ice situations like we did last year. We need to get the fireplace checked, when we had the chimney swept last year the guy said it was going to need some work. I need to get that scheduled, but it has to be on a day that Bill can be here so they can show him just what it's going to need.

Driving lessons. I have scheduled Otter's driving lessons through the driving school, she has four 1 1/2 hour sessions scheduled. Two the week after next and two the week after that. We are also going to continue to work with her and teach her, I had planned on that tonight but she's later due to the try-outs and then she'll have homework so it's probably not going to happen tonight.

Ok, that's it for today's installment! I will be posting my August book list in the next few days.