The Annual President's Day Shootout

We had a busy day today. We shopped at WalMart and Iguana Imports this morning, and purchased this table and chair set for 40% off! I love our old table, but the chairs were getting unstable and these chairs just didn't go with our old table, so we splurged and got the whole set!

John hosted the annual Presidents Day shootout in the afternoon. Jessie even joined them and had a great time target shooting and throwing darts. There was only one near disaster, when one of the pellets went through the target and dented the furnace! They put up more barriers and all was okay. The winners of the shootout were: Chuck 1st place in the rifle division and Trent 1st place in the pistol division. John is making traveling trophies that will go to each year's winners. Carl was the winner in the dart division, hope his arm isn't too sore tomorrow!

Can Music Make Exercising Easier?

Yesterday, I finally remembered to take my mp3 player with me to listen to while exercising. I went 3 miles on the Elliptical for the first time and it seemed so easy! Today, I forgot it and had a hard time. I made myself go 2 miles, then gave up. So was it the music or just coincidence? I think this theory needs more testing!

Tax day, we have an appointment today to get ours done. Hope we get some $$ back and don't have to send them $$$!! A plus to tax day is getting to eat chili at El Camino!

More Snow

We got a bit more snow last night. Not much, less than an inch here. Vernon got more than we did, they delayed school by 2 hours, so they could clear the parking lot to get the buses out. I'll bet Jessie hated that, LOL!

Orange You Glad It's Lunch Time!

I made it to exercise this morning! I haven't gone since last Thursday, I've been having some joint pain, I think I was overdoing it. I felt better this morning so braved the cold and the frosty windshield to be there early.

John wondered what had happened to me when I served him this for lunch. Don't know why, but I felt like fancying up the plate a bit and added orange slices.

ADSR Has Started

I am participating in a digi scrapping race again this year. This is the 5th season for the NDISB ADSR and my 4th time to participate. I'm also helping out with the race behind the scenes, checking in racers. It's a lot of work, but I have a good time every year. We got our first challenge on Sunday and I have almost completed it, I'm just waiting on a photo from my partner to add to my layout. We got our second challenge this morning. I need 5 photos of things I love, one photo has to have a 5 in it. Still thinking on this one. How's this for a 5, my computer with a 5 on the screen!

During the winter we don't eat as much fruit, don't know why. We stocked up on oranges and bananas today and they look so yummy.

Quiet Day

My tummy woke me up early this morning, I think it was telling me it had too many cookies yesterday!

Jessie and Andy left me the movies she brought over for us to watch while she was visiting and I watched movies today. I usually love Nicholas Cage movies and thought I'd like this one, but I decided it wasn't one of his best.

For my birthday last year, Charles and Nikki gave me a grow your own palm tree kit. They gathered up seeds and put together a cute kit of all I'd need to grow the seeds. I never could get them to sprout, so Charles dug up some sprouts from his front yard and brought them to me. They look good and have grown a lot!

Guess What We Got This Morning?

Jessie happened to look out the window this morning after the movie we were watching ended and discovered it was snowing! Her Dad called a bit later and they were having blizzard conditions at the time! Jessie and I hoped for enough snow that she would get a snow day off school tomorrow, so she could stay an extra day, but no such luck. We braved the cold and went out in our PJ's and played in the snow for a while, then we baked cookies, ate at Subway, went shopping, held some adorable Jack Russell puppies, helped feed the horses, baked more cookies, and made necklaces. We had a busy day, we always have so much to pack into too short a time!

Misty's eye, I love horses eyes! Look at those long eyelashes!

Jessie, trying to catch a snowflake.

Humm, which one should I get Gma?

Helping Shane feed Misty and Santana.

Hearts

Jessie called me this morning, she said she was just too lonely for me and wanted to come over and visit. Her Dad brought her over and I enjoyed a visit with the two of them this afternoon. They saw a huge herd of Elk and two herds of Antelope on the way over and of course didn't have a camera with them! Jessie brought me some gifts, this heart that goes with my egg and tree was one of them. She said she's collecting me ceramic opening boxes, how cute of her!! Andy fixed the driver problem with John's laptop, when we updated to SP3, it installed a driver that wouldn't work with the hardware in the computer and it lost the sound. Dumb Microsoft! He had a hard time getting rid of the wrong driver, like a bad penny, it kept coming back, but finally he got rid of it!! Yea!

When John got home we all went out to eat, then Andy went home and Jessie stayed and spent the night with us.

Oh Nuts!

Trish and Sam gifted us with a huge bag of pistachios this Christmas. We both love them and enjoy savoring a nutty moment in our day!

We've Got Snow! Again!

We got 2 or 3 inches of snow last night. It was beautiful when we got up! I went out and snapped this picture of our evergreen bush. It looked so pretty with pink light showing up behind it.

My pond has been frozen for a long time now, I hope my fish are okay down there. I hope the ice is protecting them and not freezing them!


We glued down the flooring in the middle of the camper today. Now we just need to paint and add trim along the edges. When we start adding the things we are going to store, we'll need to add some tie downs and shelves, but the inside is mostly finished. We need to get jacks for the outside so we can raise and lower it to get it in the pickup and then I think it will be finished!

Snow Day

We watched a storm roll down off the hills and into the valley this morning as we went to the dump and returned. It's been snowing lightly for a while now, but not much on the ground.

John and I cut and glued most of the flooring in the art camper today. Only the middle floor is left, we put it in the granny's attic, as John calls it and on both benches. It's getting close to finished! The flooring on the bench needs to be trimmed and aluminum trim added and we're going to paint the wood that's beneath the shelf. This bench will be used to store our Pro Panels and we'll build a shelf above for the canopy.

Have you ever tried a grilled peanut butter and banana sandwich? We had them for lunch today. The bananas kind of melt into the peanut butter, I could taste them, but not feel their texture. John really liked his sandwich but I'm not sure, it was kind of too sweet. I heard somewhere that they were one of Elvis' favorite sandwiches and John has been eating them not grilled for a while so we decided to try them the Elvis way today.

Today is my sister's birthday, hope you have a wonderful day, Trish!!

Electricity

I don't realize how used to having electricity I am until I don't have it. This morning our lights suddenly went off, leaving us with no electricity for a few hours. I found myself repeatedly switching on lights as I entered a room, even though I knew the lights were off, my hand wasn't paying any attention to my brain!

The cause was a car accident, someone ran into a power pole and it shut off the power to our area while crews repaired the damage. I hope no one was seriously injured in the accident!

A New Month

Wow, where did January go, it flew by! John and I ate lunch at the Sunny Side to celebrate the end of night shifts, then worked on cleaning up the pontoon boat. With Lyman closing and no time to drive to far away lakes, we've decided to sell it so we can put the money into finishing up our art camper. We've been accepted back in the barn for the coming summer, so we've got to get busy and get ready!

I couldn't start the truck today, the battery was dead, so after hooking it up to the charger for a while, we went for a ride to finish charging it up. We turned around at Nelson Reservoir and I took a few pictures of the frozen lake. I could see footprints out on the lake, looked pretty scary to me, I wouldn't want to walk out there!

I've always loved this view of town from on top of the hill coming back from Nelson Reservoir.

Jessie's Sculpture

Jessie gathered up the pieces for this sculpture and designed it and showed her Pa just how she wanted them to go together and got him to weld it for her. Then she gave it to us. I put it on the top of the fence just outside my door so when I look out I can see it. Makes me smile every time I see it! She also designed one for her Dad that was so cute!


LOL, I wondered if anyone would notice the lack of photos on my last few posts before I got a chance to download them off the camera, and Charles did!

Beautiful Sunset

Cold and clear today. Most of the snow is melted from the yard, but the water from the roof melt formed a sheet of ice outside the kitchen door last night. Slippery going!

I noticed the eastern sky was colored at sunset time, and knowing that meant the western sky would have brilliant color, I grabbed my camera and went out to check it out and caught this view of the sunset and the pond below our house.

From Fog to Blue Skies

The day started out overcast and foggy. The photo is looking south down our street.


By mid morning the fog was gone and for the first time in a while, I could see blue sky! Not just a bit of blue peeking through the clouds, but big beautiful patches of blue! Lots of melting going on today, the yard is almost bare of snow! This photo was taken on the way to the library
.

More Snow

It snowed again during the night, we got about 3 inches. I enjoyed watching the horses play this morning, they love to run and frolic in the snow. Or maybe they're just freezing and that's the only way they have to warm up.

I had to laugh when I saw this. It looks like a giant ice cream cone!

And here's our yard all covered in powdered sugar again.

Gorgeous Sunrise

The sunrise this morning was spectacular! The photo doesn't do it justice, but here it is.

It was sunny today and we had a lot of snow melt going on. The north side of our house by the fence has been a frozen mess since it snowed before Christmas and we scraped and shoveled 3 wheelbarrows full and cleared it out.

The clouds rolled in this afternoon and it's looking like another storm is on the way.

The Becker Building

I saw Tawny this afternoon and she helped my back pain and headache a bunch! Took this photo of the old Becker building and garage on my way home. The building is empty now, the last business that was in it, closed down. The building was sold, but so far, no one has opened up a new business. I just love old buildings!

After accompanying me to the Dentist yesterday, and having to sit and breathe the strong candle smell, John decided he wasn't going back there, so I got him an appointment with the new dentist in town today. He liked him, and they don't burn candles in their office, so I think I'm going to switch, too. I'm tired of the strong smell and the headaches it gives me! Another case of strong smells giving me weird reactions!

Drip, Drip, Drip

The sun is out, the skies are blue and we're hearing the sound of water dripping off the roof. Still lots of snow around and I saw some cute snowmen on the way to the dentist's office this morning. It was so strange seeing all the huge piles of snow that were bladed up while clearing parking lots, that's not a common sight here!

This cute couple looks ready for some fun in the sun! And the fellow below is ready to serve up some nice cold drinks!

Bright and Cold

The sky was clear today and we had lots of sun. It seemed colder than yesterday and we didn't get much melting. The eves are covered in icicles, some of them are getting really long!

Overcast, But Not Much More Snow

We were supposed to get snow until midday today, but we didn't get much. I feel sorry for MIsty and Santana, the two horses that live across the street from us, they look cold and miserable today.

Snow and More Snow!

The big storm has hit us! We measured 6 inches at 6 am and it was still snowing! It was a good day to stay home, sorry exercise, we didn't want to venture out this morning. There are lots of roads in the area shut down, no mail because the highway is closed and schools are having a snow day, the roof on the Pinetop Fire Station collapsed, the snow is wet and heavy! Flagstaff got about 54 inches, Pinetop about 51 inches and we measured 7 1/2 inches at our house, but there was probably more because some melting was taking place while it was snowing.

2", 4", 6" or 4 feet, What Will We Get?

We've been checking the weather predictions for our area and we get a different amount of snow coming in the next storm depending on which site we check. We went shopping, filled the cars with gas, and a can for the generator, just in case. So, I guess we're as ready as one can be. The Rainbow Lake area is already without power, ice brought down lines and they haven't been able to restore power to the area yet. If we get another big storm I wonder if they will be able to in the near future? Some of the houses have electric heat, so they are without any heat! They have closed roads in the Flagstaff area, they already have over 3 feet of snow from the last storm! Global Warming, where are you when we need you!!!

One of John's rock and metal snakes slithering through the snow, burr, he looks cold!

What A Day!

After a night of terrible winds, we woke up to a white world. We got about 2 or 3 inches of snow during the night. Beautiful, but cold!

I've had a not so fun couple of days! Yesterday, after the new elements were installed in our ETS heater, I noticed a strong smell coming from them. A couple hours later my vision started being weird, I was seeing a black zigzag and things were blurry. I took a nap and felt better, then that evening it happened again, and this time I had a headache along with it. We made a trip to the ER, where they examined me and had a CT scan done and didn't find any sign of a stroke, tumor or bleeding in the brain. They released me and told me to go see Dr. Miles, an ophthalmologist in the near future. After another episode this morning, I called and got in to see him this afternoon. He didn't find any problems with my eyes, but said my symptoms are classic migraine symptoms and he thinks that's what I'm having. Not fun! I am hoping that the cause is a chemical given off by the heater elements and once we get that out of the air, I won't have any more problems! The roads had mostly cleared up by the time we left, just a few spots where blowing snow had covered the road. We enjoyed the view along the highway of a winter wonderland, so pretty! Wow, looking at this picture, it doesn't look like we're on a paved highway, but we were!

The ETS Heater is Back Up and Running!

The guys came to fix our ETS heater today. They discovered that only one of the elements was working! When they started taking out the bricks we could see why, some of the elements were in tiny pieces, they'd melted apart! Hope the new ones will last longer than the 2 years these have! They've gone through the afternoon heating cycle now and I didn't hear them vibrating like the old ones did, so maybe these will last longer. I hope so!

We got a bit of snow this morning. John went out to start the cars and he said there wasn't any snow on the ground, but by the time I left for exercise, just a few minutes later, the ground was lightly covered, just like yesterday. We never did get much snow, just a light skiff. I did see a snowplow coming back into town, so there must have been some up Alpine way. I took this photo about 7:30 this morning. The snow had stopped and this is all we got.

Gifts

Last Sunday, when we were visiting, Jessie filled a bag with gifts for us to take home. She is one of the most generous people I have ever known and is always giving us something. Here's a picture of our gifts, a little tree that opens, like the egg she gave me last year, a pine cone tree, a candle and 4 stuffed animals, two for me and two for John. Such a sweet girl!

The weather forecasters keep saying we are going to get snow, well they got the 100% part right, but we didn't get much and it melted right away. Glad they were wrong on the amount we were going to get! Still more predicted for this week, so we'll see what we end up with!

My Little Breath of Spring

Just before Christmas I planted several bulbs. They are blooming now and have brightened up the cold winter! Red, white and pink, they are gorgeous!

I finished up the photo project for John. I put them all together and made a poster. It turned out pretty good.

Deer and Antelope Oh My!

We saw two groups of deer grazing close to the road on our way out of town this morning and a big herd of antelope close to the spot we saw some last week. Kind of scary driving around here at night, you never know when one is going to jump out in front of you! Stopped to take pictures of the antelope, but we didn't see the deer soon enough to get any pictures.

As we got close to Vernon we went through an area of heavy smoke; prescribed burning, whew, the smell was strong!

There is still lots of snow on the ground in the Show Low area and as we went up the road to Pinetop, it got heavier. So good for our forests, hope the trees are soaking up the moisture!

Quiet Day

I didn't make it to the gym this morning, I woke up early this morning with a horrible muscle cramp in my leg. It hurt so bad, I thought I was going to pass out! It's been sore and painful all day. I spent most of the day on the computer, sorting and organizing my layouts and working on John's project. I'm almost finished with it.

We found the Bob's Biscuit and gravy mix at Bashas that we haven't been able to find up here! We asked them to order it and they finally got it. We've had it at Charles' and love it. Yea, Bashas! We had biscuits and gravy and eggs for supper, yumm.