Cats and Kids (and Geese)

Before I walked out the door this morning I told my husband, "A house this big needs to be filled with cats and kids. Since we have neither here, it's time to go."

I think the geese agree. For two consecutive days as I've been packing the car I've been greeted by noisy Canadian Geese flying overhead.

Somehow I think they are telling me goodbye. 

Hidden Gem

Have you ever had the experience of seeing something, but not really seeing it? I've looked at this picture of ice on my rose bush before. Didn't even see the single snowflake hanging off of it.

Time to start opening my eyes.

The Joy in the Day

As I knelt on the hard floor I realized titanium knees and kneeling, at least in my case, don't mix. In that moment I realized stand up paddle boarding will probably never be part of my life.

Then I went and passed up the opportunity this weekend at the YMCA standup paddle boarding open house. I chickened out, plain and simple. 

Guess I'll find a new adventurous dream. It's not like I don't have a lot to choose from. Not just a lot right now, though. In the winter and the cold and the snow and the rain and the freezing rain and the clouds and fog not many options are presenting themselves right now. 

The brief moment of sunshine (you really have to look to see it) gave me a glimmer of hope for something popping up soon. A joyous moment. 

It's Time

I can't believe what I'm about to say.

It's time.

Time to start the blog up again. Surprised? I sure am. Never thought the day would come where I would find myself writing on a daily basis again. Picture taking, yes. Writing, no. 

But there have been a lot of changes in my life – our lives – and I need an outlet.

The changes, in no particular order:

*Kitty had to be put to sleep. 
*Hubby is no longer working and may wind up on disability. 
*We are making the move from our Marsing house to our Boise house – permanently. 
*I've just recently made the decision not to return to work next year. It was in the early days of this blog when I was so excited to go back to work. And now I'm excited to go the other direction.
*I am down almost 170 pounds.

Yet some things still stay the same.

*I still have rheumatoid arthritis. (No surprise there.) I still only have one lung working. (No surprise there either, but with the weight loss comes easier breathing.) 

*I still work on charity quilts for kids.
*My lust for travel continues. (Actually that should fall in the change list. I find now that I feel a little bit better about myself wanting to do more and go more places.)

It has been a wild ride. Let's see how much wilder it can get. So here I go again pouring out everything I see and do and think and feel.

Welcome back to us both.

First picture up, one of my focuses for the year.

x

Not Gone Yet

I now have Instagram which is linked to both Twitter and the blog. So whether you belong to those two or not, you can still see my pictures on the blog page. (They show up to the right on at the top of the blog.) I believe if you click on a picture it will take you to the picture and what I've written about the picture. So yeah, I'm still around - just in a different way.

I posted a couple pictures today. First, of the sunrise. Second, of a group of people from work getting buckets of ice dumped on them. Yeah, I'm one of those folks who had the pleasure of getting drenched for the ALS ice bucket challenge. You can click over to the right and see part of the video or the picture. If that doesn't work here's the best pic of us.