Bill

My brother went to the hospital Wednesday afternoon, it is Friday morning and they are still trying to figure out exactly what is wrong with him.  He was having seizures and had stopped breathing at one point.  He has water on the brain now.. which is a complication of neurological issues he already had from a blood clot that was removed when he was born.  He is having trouble moving and talking.  My sister and nephew are keeping us all updated.

 Here is a recent picture of him and his daughter Elizabeth, carving pumpkins this year.

She is really close in age to Esme, either a month before or behind I forget which.

Christmas morning 2017

 'calf'-inated Minecraft cows for Christmas?
Mark got Esme a 24-pack of Mountain Dew - she has been wondering for a month what this huge square present was. *heh*

 

They both got new fleecies, too.  I actually got Esme a lot of clothes - because she's getting to that age I thought - but got a few toys as well and the beading things she asked for.

Is her cow safe between these two carnivores?

/She has a robot kit and a new Dremel tool (the big gift) to get into.  I joked her she was displaying her Daddy's eyebrows again when she looked at the bath bombs and speculated what they would actually do in the bathtub.  Ha.  Mark and I had made a pact just to get a few things for each other - but he ended up getting me a portable clothes closet (something I do need) and some yarn and a stick blender we can both use in the kitchen on drinks.

Grandma came down and she liked her gifts.  We had pulled pork and peach cobbler and sides, along with Esme's jell-o.  We put together Esme's robot kit and it worked!  Our car battery is acting up again... we'll see if the charger makes it work well enough to go over to our friend's family for pie and coffee later.

I popped the lens out of my glasses and bent the frame again... but got the lens back in.

Christmas Eve

Esme made her orange jell-o for tomorrow.  I put the red plates in the dishes to be ready.  The red dishes are one pre-Christmas present I asked for.  There are presents wrapped up under the tree and Santa has to not forget the stocking tonight!

Sweet Jordans in Paris, yarn and the bits

We had an afternoon out, Grandma and Esme and I, at the new bakery/deli in Paris  TN.  It is called Sweet Jordan's, and was started with a lot of community involvement to help provide jobs for people with special needs.  The location and the building are awesome, large, spacious and very inviting.

We had their special, and I was really happy to get soup and sandwich together - that is hard to find at anything less than a traditional restaurant.  Sometimes, at a well established 'traditional restaurant', greasy spoon all the way up to 'family dining'... I feel like I'm invading someone's cherished space, some tradition what have you... and I'm not sure if we can 'attend'... but I didn't get that feeling - more like a chain restaurant that was not a chain, but had the same 'anyone can come in' atmosphere.  It felt like you could come and go or sit down and enjoy, there was so much space and a variety of different sitting arrangements for different groups.

 There is a children's playplace that has been lovingly created, as well, to resemble a downtown street with shops, and a separate place with chairs and couches that Grandma said looked 'perfect for book club meetings.'

Yarn.
The pink is for a cowl for Esme, to see if she likes that more than a scarf.
The other is 'REEF' color in Red Heart, for me.. I guess as sort of a Christmas present.  I'm not sure what I'll make with it yet.  But it caught me... so I guess I have to find a pattern or at least an inspiration to try to knit.

twin catahoulas

Sweetie on left, Spud on the right.  We call them our 'twins'.

and just the opposite, here...

bits list

I was playing the Sims 3 game we have.  I feel like I lost a day or more on something that had no effect on real life.  That is why I don't play games that often.

Things that have been done:
fixed the wool hat
repotted the plants
cleaned out the fridge
put up the Christmas Tree
Did a bit more Welsh
painted and printed photos for the Photo Cube that Esme bought me for Mother's Day
put away the books that came back - found the new ones to borrow out

Things in progress
dishcloths
Christmas cards (need envelopes)
Laundry
reading the library book before it expires
mural at work

Things to do
clean up the sewing area
reorganize craft supplies (see above)
I'm looking at you: yarn blanket I started three years ago (see above)
run a duster over the bookshelves (and the laptop, while I'm at it)
wash Lucy's bed (not part of regular laundry)
find an 11 by 14 frame for the zoo portrait
Look up fiction books for Esme : animal themes or ecology themes
re-read my novel and decide what to do with it again (every year about this time, last 3 years running)

 And about ten other small cleaning jobs....

I now have to work until Sunday.  And the temperature is going down.

Our family zoo portrait

From left (clockwise) Minion, Freckles, Minerva, Lucy, Nova, Sweetie, Spud, Kitty (the goat), Dox, Daphne, Pumpkin, Callie.

Mark says my style isn't cubist, it's trapezoidal.  Ha.  I wasn't sure I was going to get everyone in there- started with the dogs and Esme said I had to add the goat, and then I had to find places to put the cats.

bits

It had been a hard couple of days for me - the plumbing work we did that one night, then the stress and headache from Esme getting in trouble at school - then I spent four hours working on the mural at work.  I fell out about 7 pm last night... woke up 2 and a half hours later to a phone call that my father's mother had passed away.  I had believed she had passed away (I'm not sure how I thought this, maybe something MY mom had told me that I misinterpreted or...) more than twenty years ago.  I was surprised when my father and stepmother visited several years ago that they told me she was still alive then.  My cousin said she was 86 years old.  I'll pass it on to Esme today, even though she didn't know about her.

We were going to make holiday cards today, or tomorrow.
She's taking the 'no computers' pretty well, rereading her Minecraft books, playing with toys, skating and she is allowed to watch her videos on her DVD player.  She said she apologized to the teacher at school - I hope she did.  Although, what she 'did' wasn't as serious as it could have been the added aggravation of not bringing home the notes and having to contact the parents to prove your point etc...

And she brought home all A's on her report card.. hardly anything even in the small assignments under 85 (and they drop the lowest each term). 

big trouble

Had to have a lengthy discussion last night with Esme about trouble in school... she had been charged with bringing us a note and informing us about it at the BEGINNING of the week... and we had to find out with a phone call on Thursday.  So, bigger trouble than just being in trouble - and no computers until Monday.

I had a terrible headache from yesterday afternoon on after that - although it roared on to the scene while listening to a very long-winded customer in appliances on the phone... I still feel like my head was beat up some this morning, but I'm on my way to work.  I have the weekend off.  Our playdate was cancelled because of the grounding.  I did say we should make some holiday cards as an activity this weekend.

I have projects I need to do.  Fix my wool hat.  Finish my dishcloth.  Buy the gift for her teacher and wrap it up... probably will have to do two gifts now, because her homeroom teacher she loves.. but this is the teacher she has told me she has had trouble with since early in the year.. thinking if it requires an amends gift or not.

//I've probably gained about five pounds back... considering it is Holidays it isn't that surprising.  Cutting back a little (hard, free food at work this week) but it is still too cold to really cut back much or do a lot of exercise... this is hibernation season my body tells me.. sit still and be warm.

plumbing team

We had to do some plumbing today after I got home from work - luckily it was my short day, and it was above 60 degrees.. so we busted tail and got it done just after sunset.  It seems to be holding up and we have all the water back on again.  This was the pipe from our well to the house, and the other day we had noticed the ground was really wet all around where the pipe passed from the well to the house, right where we had taken out an old hydrant years ago.  That joint had failed after time - probably because it was so cold when we did it - and needed to be cut out and replaced.

Between Mark and I we got the hole dug, cleared out, the pipes cut, measured, glued and checked.  We each have our strengths and weaknesses.. but we get it done (and don't complain about it for years afterwards).  That 's a good team.

Christmas Tree 2017

This is the first year of Esme's life we have had a 'standing' Christmas tree.  Mark took this out of storage and we cleaned it up and put all of the handmade ornaments on it with some new lights.

bits of a Monday

 This is the purple hair dye.. it is red in the light and purple in the shadows.. and I didn't get it all the way worked to the ends in back so it has a two-tone effect.  It's not bad.. and it looks very different up than down.. so I'll keep this for a while and see how I like it.  I was connecting my 'math phase' with purple hair so I finally went through and did it.

  

Mark took the pictures for me out in the sunlight.

Esme had said it looked purple out in the sun at the bus stop this morning.

 

He also caught one of Daphne, our white dog, outside in the leaves being very cute at us.

 

We have some things to do in town.. I might need to look for a different shade of lipstick.  The one I have at work is a rose which will probably be okay but the only one I have at home now has too much orange in it.  We will have to look at a few other gifts and after she gets home Esme said she would help me clean up and put away the hamster's cage (since she died last week) and get that area ready for a Christmas display and to put the gifts there.

I also have new projects to think about, besides the mural at work.  I should knit some new dishcloths and make more patchwork placemats as ours have been put to use elsewhere and I missed having them at Thanksgiving.

purple hair dye

I had chickened out the past few times but this time I went through with it.. although it calls itself 'chocolate cherry' with three tones of highlights... it appears all coppery and sometimes-cherry sometimes-purple and brown at the same time (its a purple shade of 'cherry')...  I'll have to see what it  really looks like in the daylight tomorrow but in the house lights tonight I like it.  It doesn't look like 'What in the world did you DO to yourself?'.. which is a good thing.

right on through to the other side

Well Black Friday came and went, and we survived.  It wasn't half as bad as some years for craziness, yet the store made the number they asked for.  So, all is good.  No Christmas bonuses, this year, though, although that was decided before Black Friday. I think I've done about half the shopping I intend to do for the year, although we still need to knock the dust off the decorations.  I have Monday and Tuesday off this week, so maybe I'll spruce it up then.

Started back on my math account on Khan... picked right up with the complicated stuff but then couldn't add three and three to save my life at the same time... so tough to remember everything when you're looking at functions.  *ha*.

I think I turn to something like that to take my mind off of the big picture things like the holidays.  I know there are lots of things adding up to it, and that I'm already too busy so I really don't need to write a novel or do algebra on top of it all, but for some reason, it helps.  I've picked up my Welsh again after about a month hiatus, and sometimes I even do a French lesson or two.  I found the Welsh extremely easy to pick up except for some of the really long words (but they grew back on me) like gerdderaieth (music) or digwyddiad (event).  The French came back with only the gender of non-personal nouns (like bear, or apple) being the sticking point.

Esme and I made another Minecraft world with a shared house and then I was terrible and spent four 'nights' in a tiny house far away to get special tree saplings.  She kept asking me (in the game) when I was 'coming home'.  It felt awful.. like I was off at 'work' and just wasn't coming home - but now our house has exotic fruit tree saplings AND there is a a safehouse from monsters (oh yes, we were playing with monsters on) for when the sun goes down and you're too far from the original house.

Thanksgiving

Happy Thanksgiving!

I hope Grandma had a good time here today.  We went to visit with some friends and now I have to work semi-early tomorrow.

the up to date bits

We're back from town, bought the toy for the Christmas children at Lowes, and a few other gifts.  And we picked up a dessert to bring over to our friends' house tomorrow night.  I've still got to start to bake the apple crisp for tomorrow for our lunch dessert, and find something I want to wear tomorrow.

I've also been asked to do the Christmas murals at work again this year - for the third time (in a row, I think).  They gave me the theme - Christmas cartoons from our childhood.  That feels like it could be a monumental task.  I took a lot of extra time on it last year... we'll have to see how it turns out this year.

bits before Thanksgiving

A few bits.  Esme has no school the rest of this week after tomorrow.. that will be good.  I've started some Christmas shopping, taking advantage of a few offers I saw and using gift certificates I've collected.  I got Esme's big gift today using one of those, and paid less than half the sale price doing so.. which was amazing.  I hope she takes good care of it and uses it carefully, as it is a  tool and she will need to be careful, but she can make some awesome things with it, too.

I'm making apple crisp for  Thanksgiving, and I have Wednesday off, so that works out really well.  Mark says he has the meat covered, and a few potatoes and such for sides. 

I'm sharing my not large chair with a liquid gooey cat that is draped all over and around me... she's warm but still it makes it tough to move *heh*

My big chicken Wicket was gone - I found her feathers all over the back of the garden - something crawled up into the fence and took her, and fought with her all the way through the garden and over the back fence.  That was all that was left of her for me to see -- big handfuls of broken feathers.  Sad... maybe next year we will fence a bit better and a bigger place and try fresh with some friendly type chickens.  Maybe we'll just do something else.  She was a pretty Rock hen chicken... *sigh*

bits

Not sure if my Wicket chicken is gone... went out there and couldn't find her.  The wild one, Gennet, was still there, and she is the one who can fly.  Not sure.. we'll see.  Was talking with Esme about what to bring to the Thanksgiving food drive at work.

Reading a new series like Outlander - Timewalkers.  I'm enjoying it.

I had a dream that our home improvement store sold drawing kits and individual pencils and papers.  That would be so nice if it did... I should sit down and make another drawing some night but I just can't find the time to focus in.  I did a handmade Christmas card to send to a boy in the news.. and that took me a few days to get myself organized enough to sit down with paper and pens and do it.

I've been closing every night for the past two weeks (or almost every night), but this is the last night of that.  It's felt like we were all just ships passing.. coming home, falling into bed, getting Esme up for school -- go to work and don't see her again until night again.  Now we'll have the stress of Black Friday coming up but I have schedules with two or three days on and a day or two off.. which will bring back more sanity (read: introvert needs to recharge)  I hope.

I need that downtime to let my brain expand and branch out into the many things I've been shoving back for 'later' - like drawing, math, science, time.....   I try to remove all that to the background but it is a type of stress to do that time and time again in favor of only what is in front of you and must be done right now.  I'd never do well at an assembly line job.  These past two weeks I've felt like I was  getting that long-yard stare of the android that hasn't been charged properly....can function on some level but not as I should be.

bits

Our little hamster died today - she had a good life and was already a mother to a half-grown hamster that we knew of before we had her...  Put the straw out in the chicken yard and gave some to to the goat for winter preparedness, as well.  Other than that, it was cold and we just sat at home and played games and read books.   I have another time traveller series I'm reading and the Harvestcraft mod on Minecraft has kept me occuppied.

I was thinking about some of the historical breeds I might want to plant in the garden next year.  We've talked a bit about expanding the chicken yard and changing things around as to what is garden and what is not.

I took one of those aptitude tests and it said I should be a plant or soil scientist, or a nano systems engineer, or a biologist, or a creative writer.  Another one said I should be an electrician or an electrical engineer or an oil rig operator.  Ha.  I would like to do more with horticulture - there are things I could really let my brain go wild on if there wasn't so much else to do already.  In honor of that I bought another houseplant and started looking at seed catalogs for gardening season.

We saw that one of Esme's teeth is being blocked by her baby tooth that has a filling in it, and is trying to erupt through the gum instead.  We worried about that when they insisted on those fillings.  If that baby tooth does not come out in the week we need to schedule her a dentist appointment to see if they can fix it.

Menu not on a diet

I thought I'd do one of these while I was 'off' the near-ketogenic diet.. to show what I would eat normally.  I'm really not even measuring anythi9ng lately, or tracking it... I'm eating what I feel like I need, instead of planning it all out ahead of time.

Breakfast (5:30 am to 10 am)
an oatmeal cream cookie (very bad for me)
a pot of coffee with lots of milk
a handful of crackers
a small amount of pepitas
a few nuts

This is lunch and dinner - I graze out of it during my closing shift at work.
(noon to nine pm)
1/2 cup or so sweet potato (boiled, with salt and olive oil)
about  a 1/3 cup? of canned spinach
1 chicken patty
2 tbsp of tikka masala sauce
a big pat of real butter
a good sized handful of Salsa Verde chips
a small apple
A quart of coffee and some black tea
maybe a small candy bar

When I get home after nine-thirty probably a tortilla with peanut butter or cheese and some more milk and coffee before bed.

Yesterday I had the same thing -almost- with green olives instead of sweet potato and some rice krispie bar.

I was talked into pulling a dishwasher down at work yesterday from a very high place - and when I got there the machine didn't go up as far as needed... not knowing just how heavy this thing was (I've lifted some before, and they weren't anywhere close to this weight) I ended up setting it down very hard on the machine because I couldn't hold onto it.  My lower back didn't like that at all - but it would have been worse if I'd tried harder to hold onto it.

I did some specific yoga when I got home, and this morning... it feels better than it did.
They said next time I see that call someone else... but that is a hard thing to do when you're the one that was sent back there because everyone else was too busy and needed help...  To get there all the way to the item and say .. I'm not sure - maybe I need to wind this machine all the way back to the floor and find someone else who wants to try to do this hard thing?

Hoping for less stress at work tonight.. then a turnaround shift though, where I close tonight and come back twelve hours later for another shift... it could be worse, they could want me back eight hours later for another shift.. which those they are not allowed to do to us anymore unless we specifically agree.

Then I get Sunday off.  Esme wants to go to the duck park then.. if it isn't raining.

Green room

I'm having the white room feeling again... that one where I want everything to revert to something simple, orderly and unobstructed.. to exist without chaos.. in a totally white cube of space.  But today the feeling is more 'green room'...or a room of Summer... I'd like to have a room open unto summer, green fields, warm sunlight, bubbling water...and be able to spend time there in a warm Nature environment until my stress melts away.

Inventory at work is making this chaotic feeling - everything you do is futile, but you'd better do it all and do it fast and do it well so they can destroy it again a few minutes from now, okay?  Actually they aren't destroying it half as badly as a few years ago.  But there are still changes to the rules (don't downstock, okay downstock but only where there is no product...don't touch this, okay do... oh no this is totally wrong, no you didn't tell me about that (yes, we did), fix it fix it now.. oh, okay, it's alright, don't worry about it.  //this is stress  And I'm closing every night.  And it's cold.  And I just want to sleep the mornings away because it's warm in the bed and I'm not getting anything 'done'... which passes the 'futility' feeling to my home life and makes it worse.

It makes me feel like I really could be doing something better with my time, but what?
And being stressed out I can't really think of having MORE stress in trying to find something that fits my abilities better - because they fit this pretty good in all except the schedule and stress.. which, well, that adds up in waves over time.

Maybe I can just find a nice patch of sunlight tomorrow.
And not freeze to death while trying to enjoy it.

I really liked the Japanese garden at the museum - and that was such a warm day, if only we could bottle that and open a spa here in Paris that served up that on demand... or a holodeck.

Yea.. order me a holodeck for my next birthday ;) heh.

Discovery Park trip

 

The other thing Esme asked for this year was to go back to Discovery Park for her birthday.  So, we made an entire day of it and the Jones family traveled along with us.  The Japanese garden was a must-do on our list as when Esme was there with Mr. Jones and his daughter before it was something they had really liked.  I wanted to see the koi, too.

 

 

10 years old

 

We united Grandma down for eating cupcakes and opening presents.  She brought Esme a nice card and present, too.  Esme opened up the traditional potato gift and her face was priceless - but I didn't catch it on the camera.  She also received a sketchbook and animal drawing book from Mom, and a forest knife from Daddy (because she's finally old enough and has practiced this summer to our satisfaction).

She loved her Minecraft toys and a little Zoomer giraffe I picked up.
I bought her a  copy of 'What the Dinosaurs Did Last Night' by the Dinovember crew.

We made pepperoni pizza with chicken nuggets on top (and extra cheese), which was her request.
Tomorrow we have another big day planned!  We've also played a lot of Minecraft and watched her birthday movie 'Tad the Lost Explorer', which was recc. by a friend and very good.

I can hardly believe she is ten - the time has flown by.  And she is so tall, now!

Grandma has a permanent lap puppy :)

Lucy was very interested in the new toy - it makes noise, is it alive?  Is it going to get to eat cake?  Dogs eat cake, not giraffes!

10 bday cake

 We made the traditional cake :) and some cupcakes!
Esme picked out all the colors, strawberry frosting and blue and black gel decorations.
Tomorrow is the big day

Halloween costumes 2017

  Some Jurassic Park dinosaur hunting action

 I did Esme's makeup and it all came off really nicely afterwards, which was a worry!

Mark didn't carry all his accessories.. but the syringe was a big hit :)

The 'needle' was actually a bamboo skewer painted silver and the fluid was blue glow-sticks.

 A great picture of the group!

bits

We had enough stuff in the plumbing box of odds and ends to fix the shower head today - it fell off (on poor Esme) last night.  She was calm and cool, turned it off, shoved a towel on the worst of the over spray, and came to ask for help.  With some  vice grips and recycling we put together another thing that works pretty well.  We had some clearance 'missing pieces' things we had bought last year on closeout that we robbed pieces from to make an entire working apparatus.

Also made Rice Krispie treats last night (Some to bring for tonight) and worked on our costumes.  I would like her to have something warmer for hers, .. I think she'll freeze half to death tonight.  It's been 37 and 38 every morning and I'm wrapping her in blankets at the bus stop.

making rice krispie treats

costume posts later!  We have to make an emergency cheese and coffee run to town before we get sucked into all of the festivities tonight.  I feel a little bad because they wanted me to work today (someone got really sick) but since we had made all of these plans weeks in advance and have put so much effort into it I just couldn't agree ... and they didn't press really hard.  Hope it's all okay.  (glad also I didn't have to run there to fix the broken shower head)

Migraine, get up and dance

Another one of these.. not sure if it is because I ate so much sugar yesterday and then read for hours and napped in a warm bed  ... but it might just have been due.  I'd been pretty stressed out, and stress headaches happen.  So about 3:30 am I just couldn't sleep any more.  Had a hot bath.  Wish I could sometimes just immerse the top of my head in warm water for hours.. right up to my eyes.. but there are breathing problems with that once you relax.  Heh.  And the water heater runs out if I sit with my head under the faucet, which I do, until it runs out.

Anyway.  I had nausea, too.  Wasn't sure if I wanted to eat or throw up.  I hate that worse...  Cut my hair (have to clean it up later) but it didn't help enough.   My stomach finally decided it was empty, but I didn't want to eat anything.  Made some hot coffee and put on my music - as I can't read when the migraine gets this way, but I can listen.

After Summer and Let it Go by Great Big Sea I turned to Eye to the Telescope - and got up to move.. dance, slide etc.. the coffee might have been working or I just took some of the words to heart and decided to follow my instincts.  I felt so much better after a little while, made some food (biscuits with butter and maple syrup.. lots of carbs) and rocked out.  It's almost time to get Esme up for school now, and I'm feeling a lot better.  The pain is still there, but buried a bit.  My next instinct is to enjoy some sun instead of hot water.. whenever it comes up.  It's cold out there, but I would like to be outside for a while when it warms up. 

If it wasn't for the chance of poison ivy (which is getting much better, only a few blisters left here and there and most of the places I scratched my skin off have healed up to look like dry skin patches instead of a rash) I'd go out into the woods and down by the lake.

I'm enjoying the Magnus Chase book (Rick Riordan author).. it's funny. It kept me sitting in the bed (it's cold) reading it for a few hours yesterday after Esme got home from school.  Then the warmth of the bed sapped me down for an hour and a half.  Napping like that often throws me off.. but maybe I can get through it.  Cleaning up the bad haircut I gave myself is going to be a chore... not as bad as sometimes, but a bit shorter than I should have, too.

near ketogenic bits

I haven't been using the bike or doing yoga for more than a week - and I'm going to have to get back to it... I haven't gained any weight, either - but I haven't lost any more.  And even with cheating (Mark and Esme talked me into onion rings the other night) I've sort of stalled out at just ten pounds lost.  With the poison ivy - I really just wanted it to be over.  And it almost is.  So, I'm going to start back on the path to lose the other five pounds.  Mark says he'll chase down and destroy all poison ivy in the yard for me ;)

But I'm not sure if I want to continue with the near ketogenic diet in earnest - or just up the exercise.  I was already eating 45-50% fat before pushing the carbs down - that was my natural state, even with eating sugar and bread.  Maybe I can take these lessons learned - nuts and butter and avocadoes and such and apply them to a continued low calorie diet with heavily reduced sugar but not avoiding everything that contains starch.

I think if I up the exercise I'm going to need that.
Because its getting cold... and life just isn't slowing down.  We're going to be even busier these next few weeks.  Halloween, birthday party out at the museum... I can try it for a bit and see if I start to gain weight back or lose any.  At this point, I've already gotten more than halfway there and I have to learn the right way to keep it going.

bit

I lost my watch this morning somewhere between my bedside table and Esme's room -- found it later, in the washing machine.  I had stopped there along the way to put a load of towels in before I woke her up.  Luckily, it was waterproof - and it was okay.

Started reading 'Magnus Chase', a spinoff from the Percy Jackson series... seems good so far.

Both of my chickens were sitting on top of the fence when I went out there to feed them after work.  I just left them there - they'll either come down and get in the house or they won't.

Super Fox costume

 This is our cape pattern and the rest of the costume for 'Super Fox'.

I used a cape pattern I found online, out of plain cotton on one side and satin on the other.

 

And this is how the fox goes POUNCE!

A wire and rope hinge gate

 The finished gate - it's functional and it locks.

 We looked for metal hinges and couldn't find any - so we made a hinge out of a piece of wire and a hook, a board and some nylon rope.  I couldn't find this on the Internet anywhere, either - so we documented it.

 A very massive knot of rope through two holes drilled in the board.  Mark said its a nice piece of redneck engineering.

 Spud Dog decided it was all just too exciting for him and Esme got pictures of him vegging out in the leaves.

 The main purpose of the fence was to keep the goat from digging up the plants near the well house when we tie her string out longer in this area.  With it contained we can put some more Spring bulbs in here to add to the daffodils, rose bush and tulips that are already planted here.  I might even make a brick pathway inside here to keep everything easy to access...

 And there is a lot of sharp metal and glass in the area near the wellhouse, and we wanted to contain that as well behind a fence.  We intend to clean it up some more in the Spring and maybe build another set of stairs and a platform for the cats to have a lounging area out here.

Mark pointing out the hook wire mechanism and lock that he is proud of on the gate.