This Quiet Moment Brought to You by...

...Deb! Thank you for the surprise package of Labrador books for the kids.

Our little Mister is really proud to be reading a big-kid book (no pictures!). There are lots of big words that he stumbles over, but for a person who hasn't had a lick of schooling, I think he's doing exceedingly well.

Now if only they will stay put for awhile...

Picking Up the Pace

Over the weekend, I got a chance to get away with a friend to the quarterly antique show at the Expo Center. We kept finding ourselves, limited time window and all, meandering along, taking it in... sauntering. Then we would look at the clock, see that we had WAY too many rows of vendors to see before closing and pick up the pace... until we reached the next Vendor of Perfection and got lost in shopping.

I'm sure you know what I'm talking about.

It was nice.

No kids to console/feed/protect/usher. Just us girls and a kazillion old things to entertain and admire.

I didn't come home with many purchases (I regretfully left 3 lovely samplers behind) because our resources are tied up in the Labradors right now, but had a wonderfully relaxing time.

I was admiring these Johnson Bros. dishes, thinking that they were just about the perfect shade of my happy color, but didn't even bother looking at the price tag. A few minutes later, from across the space, I heard my friend say, "So this price is for all of them?" and the nice vendor lady said, "Yes, and they are half off today, so they would be nine dollars." To which my lovely friend called out, "Beth, I am buying these for you!"

So now I have the beginning of a collection, it would seem.

I also succumbed to two pair of little old scissors and a pressed pansy arrangement surrounded by tattered velvet.

Who wouldn't?

My only disappointment was not finding one single pincushion. Someone out there is hogging them up. It had better not be you!

Speaking of Picking Up the Pace...

We now have another litter of 8 puppies... Sierra's this time, including 6 Chocolates and 2 Yellows. We weren't expecting her to be the next, so we weren't watching her as closely.

Two nights ago, we were concerned for a few of Maggie's pups who are getting pushed aside by their much fatter siblings, so Matt had walked out for one last peek before bed. As soon as he stepped into the kennel, he heard a puppy from the other side of the row. How's that for timing?

He was able to get some heat lamps in Sierra's box, and spent much of the rest of the night keeping an eye on things and moving the pellet stove from his shop to the kennel.

Jazzi should be having her litter any day now. If I don't pick up my pace, I'm going to be swimming in dishes, toys, and dog food!

Frosty

An original name, yes? But that is what they insisted on calling the snowman their Daddy built for them.

I placed the hat and scarf, Daddy put in the stick arms, but all of the buttons and face elements were entirely the creation of our 5 year old.

And all throughout the day, he would run to replace carrot nose, button or eye, as the wet melting snow let them drop.

Finally, a mere 30 minutes after a tear-filled realization that, just as we had told him, Frosty would melt, we found him happily destroying his snowman, saying with a tough-kid growl in his voice, and an ear-to-ear grin, "Mama! I knocked Frosty's head off!" And one of our sweet weekend visitors (we had an open house for our Labrador customers) piped up, "I'm throwing his body at him!" as she scooped a snowball from his side and threw it at his belly.

Kids.

Picture of the Week

Pushing Back

I did something this week that I have rarely done in my life.

I bought flowers for myself.

Daffodils.

They are sitting on my kitchen windowsill so that they are the first thing I see, distracting me from the continual cycle of rain-snow-rain-snow-rain-snow that has turned my landscape into a gloomy mess of perpetually melting and sagging snow and mud.

I also bought strawberries. Not-organic, out-of-season, overgrown and barely-sweet strawberries. Yet they somehow still tasted good.

I am trying to push back Winter with all my might.

Someone else in this house has Spring Fever...


And here is another of my treasuries, which nicely fits the theme of this post. Its called "Craving Curry and Blue Skies"...

What a Day!

Back and forth, back and forth... kids and puppies... puppies and kids. Being pulled between the two and their needs. Eating nothing but toast and coffee because that's what's quick and easy.

Now I'm ravenous (my Dearest is coming to the rescue with a Giant Pizza for dinner), and there is a trench blazed from house to kennel, through the snow.

But mama Maggie is doing well, and seems to finally be done with her birthing. And we have 4 yellow, 2 chocolate, and 2 black bundles of (noisy!) cuteness.

My in-laws came up at the end, and the Mama who raised these 6 breeding dogs of ours got to be there for the last puppy's birth. Too bad she had to scramble out through the dog door and rescue it from the snow! She saved a puppy and saved the day. The outer kennel gates are shut fast because of the snow, and my taller frame would have never fit out through that dog door.

I am planting myself on the couch tonight, and won't be lifting a finger except to put my needle and thread through linen.

In Like a Lion

We got 14 inches of snow yesterday in a 10 hour time span.

This morning its raining, turning all of that snow into slippery goo, and there are puppies being born (that's the Mama Maggie, reaching out to grab my camera).

I'll pop back in here this afternoon to give you a more detailed update.

Not What I Expected

We had a doozy of a storm last night... high winds, torrential rain... I should have seen it coming... But still, somehow, waking to no power caught me unprepared. A storm like this in November would have had us filling the bathtub with water, getting the old corded phone plugged in, and getting our showers ahead of time. But on the last day of February, our hearts are set on Spring, I suppose, in denial of the wintery weather we have been getting.

I watched a big, beautiful, fir tree fall this morning, back along the treeline, accompanied by a *crackle* and a *CRASH*... and now, although the power is back on (only 5 hours without... not too bad), it is a blizzard out there, snow piling up faster than I've seen in months.

We made the best of our dark morning... never have I been more thankful for a woodstove to heat water, a collection of antiques, including a working burr grinder, and a ginormous french press hiding in the back of my cupboard.

The kids were full of questions, wanting to know how the grinder works, and can they please help? Exclaiming over and over about how much they LOVE grinding coffee.

Asking if, the next time the electricity goes out... can they PLEASE grind coffee again?

Then, we all enjoyed a spot of our special brew together. Can you tell which is mine?

The remainder of our morning was spent watching Dumbo on the portable DVD player and stitching by the fire.

Sometimes, embracing the unexpected leads to the best kind of happiness.

Picture of the Week