April's Update

Ah life in our household.

It's been a weird winter, hardly any snow.   Jim didn't much care for it since he wanted to go skiing.   he was unable to do so all winter, I never even cracked out the snow shoes.   We managed to get out once for some sledding.   Disappointing that way, but on a positive note it meant less shovelling of snow, and less use of crocks in the rabbitry!  YEAH!!!    One Sunday afternoon we had a layer of snow so the lad and I had a good deal of fun drawing pictures in the snow.  :) 

It's been hard in the rabbitry this spring.. I've had some sick babies this spring.  I suppose I shouldn't be too surprised as I've had healthy bunnies for a while now, so I was due for some trouble I suppose. Still doesn't mean I like it, and I'd love to get to the bottom of it.

I took a tumble fixing the tarp and ended up with some badly pulled muscles over my left rib cage.  Put a bit of a dampener of my activity levels, but.. Hey.. I survived!  :)

what else...

My dad went for a bit without any pain which was a good thing.  Unfortunately the pain has returned and he's feeling a bit demoralized by it.   Makes it harder for my mom.   Please pray for them both.

Jim has a bad cold/sinus thing going on this week and with his blood pressure pills can't take anything to relieve that.

Justin is having TONS of fun playing pirates with our lego lately.   It's a good way to practice the language pirates used, and to pretend to be some of the pirates that we read about.  :)

I've started digging in the gardens again.  Getting them ready for spring planting.   I was stupid last week.  I decided to dig up and move dirt so I could get my bunny garden planted... and well.. let's just say my poor pulled muscles didn't much like me doing that.    We do learn from being stupid though.  :)  

Last night I went to London to a church that has a used book sale.   it was good to go.  Met people there that I've met on other occasions so was able to chat with them for a bit.  Picked up a few supplies and sold a guinea pig.

uh, what else... hard to remember.  I really need to update this blog at least once a month, makes it easier.

I have a couple friends whose husbands are between jobs.  Please pray that both find jobs so they can continue to support their families.

Anyways, until next time.  Keep well and live for God.!  :)

 

A tired Saturday morning

Ever have a day when you are pretty sure you are supposed to be doing something but you can't figure out what it is? well... today is one of those days. All week Jim and I have been saying to each other... what is it we're supposed to do Saturday? but for the life of me.... can't remember.

Ah well.. what can one do?

Anyways, it's been a pretty good week overall. had a bad moment when a doe I bought last Saturday had to be culled. Really was bothered by that. I bought her, noticed she was a bit thin, found out she had a bad foot infection and tried to treat it. But then she started to bleed copious amount and so we let her go. I'll be getting another rabbit sometime from her breeder and see what happens down the road a bit.

But we had fun with week going to Dufflebag theatre with Justin. We had a hoot. Dufflebag theatre is four individuals who with a local orchestra (in this case Orchestra London) put on plays for children. They are interactive ... as in they choose children and occasionally adults, to help play certain roles in the play. They encourage audience participation. Justin kept wondering if they would choose him. :) It's a lot of fun and they teach children to enjoy theatre. The play was "the three musketeers".

Working hard this week on cleaning the bookroom. Not nearly as far along as I had hoped to be by this time...but WAY better than last week. Perhaps I'll get her done today? yeah...right...I do disparage of it at times.

Winter 2011

We've had a good winter here in small town Ontario.

It's been COLD.
The rabbits have done well. The cats are healthy though Sparks is starting to show his age.

The boy child has done well...he's learning how to ski and skate this year, much to his protestion! it's hard mommy! yeah, well...sometimes you have to do things that are difficult.

Jim is having fun skiing.
I've taken up snowshoeing.

We've had a ton of snow...enough that I'm tired of shovelling it.

Sometime I'll put up pics. :)

wow, it's been a while....

So it's been a while since I last wrote anything here, so why don't I slip up the letter that I wrote various people this past week.
-----------------
Hi folks,

Yes, it's been a while since I wrote a letter. For those of you who don't like bulk letters, just want to reassure you that if I've had an email or written letter from you, this won't all be the same as I'll modify for the person getting it. :)

Not saying that some won't be the same as there are only so and so many ways of saying the same thing.

1. Jim... had a stroke, and is in process of recuperating from that. Tires more easily. Takes longer to do things that require mental effort. But he's back to muddling with the vehicles again. The van has had it's badly needed oil change, and has new shocks on it. And he's eyeing the Mazda lately...keep it, repair it, trade it in???

The meds Jim is on cause him to be cold frequently. Imagine this... sometimes he is colder than I am! Means when he is working on the van he has to pick a good temperature at which to do it. He is hopeful with his blood pressure remaining low that he can get off some of the meds he is on. Would be very nice if he could. We don't argue about the temperature as much as before. :) that's a nice side benefit. :)

He is back to working full-time. But his sermons are shorter (makes them more poignant). He still can't read books out-loud with Justin in the evenings very well yet, but it's improving. Time is our friend right now.

2. Justin...is very proud that he can spell HI and CAT! Does he know all his letters yet? no... but that will come with time. Likes to learn most anything as long as I can tie it to his loves in life...cats, trains or bunnies. Not always so easily done, but we try.

   He is a very busy, cautious type lad. Often doesn't do things until he knows he can. We are hopeful to convince him to ride a small bike this summer. And I want to get him into swimming lessons.

He goes to nursery school 2 hours/week. Enjoys his time there but wishes mommy could stay with him.

He likes to dig! We've been working on extending our patio and he is having a hoot digging out there with me. Right now it's a muddy mess as we've had rain for the past couple of days.

Overall I find he is a good mix between Jim and I. Sometimes a good thing, sometimes a shake your head and ponder thing. :)

2. Milo and Sparks. Sparks is getting old. He is developing growths, and is getting thinner looking (not such a horrid thing for this very solid cat). Just signs that he's getting older. I expect by year end he'll be no longer with us. Milo remains the best cat we could have gotten for a cat crazy boy. He is starting to mature and act less kitteny, but usually where you see the boy, you see the cat.

3. The bunnies are doing well. I've sold a lot over the Easter season. I currently raise Harlequins (a smaller meat breed), Mini rex (my favourite breed), Polish (a tiny, sweet breed), and Holland lops. (everyone wants Hollands nowadays so they are easy sellers). This year I plan to show my polish, one harlequin buck, and if my lop doe who just kindled this morning produces what I think she did, possibly a young loppie as well. :)

4. Guinea pigs. Justin likes his piggies. We have two sows, one boar, and one visiting boar. And soon we'll have a few babies to sell as well.

5. As for myself. I'm doing okay. I've had some health issues that haven't quite resolved themselves. I have a test to undergo at the end of May. I am hopeful that might produce some answers. I am very much looking forward to yard sale and gardening season. I've started going for walks in the evening after Justin goes to bed. It's a nice quiet time for me.

6. Mice. Yes, I still raise mice. I've dramatically reduced my population of my breeder females though. I”m starting to get my long hairs which I am quite pleased with.

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There, that gives an overall update quite nicely. :)

Beginning of February

So it's the second day of February...ground hog day I think. (do I really care???) :)

Spent most of the night sleeping last night, interspersed with the noise of Justin coughing (to me is seemed like coughing his lungs out). Don't like the cough, but overall he doesn't seem rattlely in his breathing so I'm not too concerned yet...but if he's still coughing really hard by mid-week I'll probably take him to the doctor just for a once over.

Jim is getting a sore throat...here's praying that it doesn't become a full-blown cold. he's been running a bit short on sleep lately so we're letting him sleep in a bit this morning.

Justin's been enjoying watching LOTS of movies lately. Mostly on Thomas the train. :) he likes Thomas that boy does. :)

we watched ratatouille the other night...that was fun. Nice movie. We'll need to watch Wall-E this morning because it has to go back to the video store this afternoon and there's no point in renting a movie without watching it!

Lots of fun yesterday afternoon playing out in the snow. we even dug out the sand-box since Justin needed a truck to carry snow with. it was SO nice out. :)

Jesse came over with his doe Bailey to get her bred to Baskin. That was an experience in itself! He was willing..she was a bit more....reticient shall we say. BUT he got the job done. I had a disappointment this week with losing a litter of baby rabbits. Hopefully won't have that happen again.

Anyways, I think that's about it. Talk more another time.

This weekend Past

This past weekend Justin went to visit his gramma.
She offered to have him as she didn't have to work on Monday this week so could have him for an extended period of time.

He's apparently had a very good time. Playing out in the snow, going to her church (lots of children), playing with Thomas, watching TV, helping gramma work on her things and so forth. They've had a great deal of fun.

Jim and I went to a movie on Saturday afternoon...Inkheart. It was a good show. Have to admit, some things seemed silly to me...like what was the point of dressing the girl up in some old greyish dress? That just seemed odd. But overall, not a bad show. Good triumphs over evil.

Yesterday I found it very relaxing to just be able to go to church and LISTEN to a sermon. To not have to mind a toddler who either wiggles and makes noise (which gets people tsking) or that I need to take out to the quiet room (so we can have sunday school). Both make it difficult to heed the sermon. So that was rather nice.

January Updates

January has been A COLD month!

I am slowly getting better from the bug that inflicted me in one way or the other throughout December. Doctor tests revealed nothing. I find I still need to focus on blander foods lest my digestive system react negatively.

Jim is doing well.

Justin is starting to figure out the whole toileting thing at night. Sometimes he gets up and goes back to sleep, other times he's up at 230 and raring to go. Jim and I tend to disagree with him at those times and then it's just a matter of trying to keep him quiet enough that SOMEONE can get some sleep. :)

I've managed to sell most of our baby guinea pigs. Justin has requested that we keep one of the Rainbow ones, so we've done so. Just three left to sell, two are spoken for.

One of Jim's cichlids has a mouthful of babies. He caught her today and put her in a net holder for live bearers. She's unimpressed, but hopefully those babies will survive. :)

My guppies are starting to multiply well. My hope is to sell them, but if for some reason I cannot, they will make good supplemental food for the cichlids.

Hmm...now what else?
Not a whole lot. We're having snow tonight. Kinda pretty, but rather miserable to work in. :)

This Christmas Week

Snow, snow and more snow.

Sick boy child.

Two adults with head colds.

Snow, snow and more snow.

But hopefully selling another bunny today. :)

okay...It's November 10

My knee is starting to do pretty good.
LOTS of work to get done outside...we have snow coming this week and next.
BOY that knee of mine put a kibosh on things..

Anyways, part of life.

Now...what can I say for an update....not a whole lot!

Had fun at the Rockton Rabbit Show with Jesse this past Saturday. Stopped into visit with Judy for a little while as well. Justin had fun at Aunt Judy's until he bonked his head into her elbow. (that's straight from his mouth, then they both had oowies). :)

Jim's discovered rust of more of an issue on Jamie (the mazda) than he thought it was.
He's continuing to work on Benny (the sunrunner, he's looking for a new body for it instead he thinks).
Quinn (the van) needs new pins in the doors. Somehow he thinks I can help him with this. I think those doors will be awfully heavy. But we'll see. yes...I can be a supportive wife in this too..I THINK!

What else...I've sold a whack of bunnies lately. We need to find a big tarp to go over the tent and part of the shed. Will probably need to find some more bungee cords as well.

Not a whole lot else I can think about.
Oh...Justin likes doing this at night before he goes to bed.
who loves you....oh let's see .. mommy loves you, daddy loves you, grammer loves you, oma and papa love you, your cousins love and your aunties and uncles love you and your church family loves you... but most of all...who loves you? GOD loves you.
He smiles. says it back to me with a grin on his face.
we say good night.
he falls asleep.
Life is quiet. :)

Oh...that comes from this book by Noel Piper. It's a nice book.

September is closing soon

Life in the past two weeks ....

Things of Justin I want to remember
1. there's a song that has a line Come sail away, come sail away with me. Come sail away come sail away with me.... I had that line running through my head the other day and was singing it. What do I hear Justin singing in the sandbox while he's moving dirt? Come dig away, come dig away wif me. Dig away, dig away. Just belting it out. :) Was fun. Made me and Jim laugh.

2. We were singing songs ... twinkle twinkle little star....and I changed the words to it "twinkle twinkle little bat, how i wonder where you're at". He listened and then looked at me quizzically... "Mom! That's not my favourite song! You're teasing me!"... then he started to sing "twinkle, twinkle little star." he got stuck and "mom, help!" so together we sang twinkle twinkle. :)

3. His emerging sense of humour..and he's got the strangest giggle. :) Reading books at night, he'll change the story on purpose and then laugh hysterically. So we make a game of it rather than getting frustrated with it. It's funny. Though....a bit repetitive at times. The other night he did it with the foot book from Dr. Seuss. Everytime it said foot, he'd say Head. and then giggle away. :) He's a silly boy.

he also just LOVES the duck feet book. Chortles away, makes up stories about it. And I have to be the mad mommy sending the duck foot boy away. :)

I've learned why he doesn't like me singing.... It's TOO loud. If I sing quietly, for the most part he doesn't mind. Or if I'm singing loudly when caring for the bunnies he's cool with that too. He's a boy who at this stage in his life, does not like loud noises.

Momma rabbits who die leaving 11 babies behind helps one develop a bit more patience. It also is funny how full of happiness a person can get when a baby bunny figures out the bottle and goes into a deep sucking mode of "GIVE ME THAT MILK NOW!". I can get, 9 of the eleven to suck the bottle, one to drink milk from a saucer lid, and one, well...it nibbles on the nipple and slowly get milk into it's tummy.

What else....Jim had a nasty cold last week. Wiped him out. Justin is almost over his cold. Yesterday I fought dizzy spells all day...who knows what was up with that. I think I have two more bunnies sold. My little quiet holland lops...if I had eight of them I could probably have them all sold and picking which one I'm keeping would be so very easy.

I've gotten one garden put to bed for the winter, another few zillion to go. :) I've learned that having a dedicated onion bed doesn't work for me and how I garden. So I"ll need to figure out how to do that better. My tomatoes have done well this year. Had a fellow coming by to purchase my yellow tomatoes from me. Nice to make some cash.

Oh...I've reorganized the book room and Justin's room. A great many of his toys are upstairs now, I'm moving his craft stuff upstairs which means I"ll be able to tidy the kitchen up more, and oh...it's all coming together. Slowly...but it's coming together. :) yeah!!!!!

My Birthday 2008

What a lovely day for the most part this turned out to be.

nice walk with Sassy in the morning. Weeded front gardens and gave weeds to the rabbits.

Canned peaches, chatted with Jim's mom who came up to play with Justin and to visit for my birthday. I'm 43 years old today. I have 13 jars of peaches and 4 jars of cherries. We had planned to do a picnic lunch with Eva but Justin fell asleep on her lap. He slept from 10-330. (seeing as he was awake at 230 in the a.m. I figured letting him sleep was a good idea!)

Got the lawn mowed and the main floor fairly well cleaned. Not perfect, but then again, it never is. :) I'm getting more proficient at it though!

Had a shower, got things organized for supper and then mom and dad arrived for supper. We had a lovely meal. Mom and Dad gave us this really nice picture of Justin. It's just a superb picture. :) Sausage on a bun with cucumber salad for supper. Conversation and laughter.

Then after supper I showed off my bunnies. They are sick right now so I"m treating them with meds. NOT FUN to have sick bunnies. Some of my bunnies are angry because I'm not letting them out to do "their thing" at all. Nor am I petting them much since I want them to GET BETTER!

Oh...My sister gave me Chicken cannisters! They are wonderful! Okay...she gave one to me and one to Jim. But they are MINE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! They will fit in well in my chicken kitchen. :) We have an animal book room, a chicken kitchen and a duck bathroom, though Justin commandeered the ducks from the bathroom to be momma duck and baby duck. Some day they will be rehung in the bathroom. :)

Judy and Henry arrived bringing dessert of cheesecake (the unbaked type), very yummy. Had more conversation and laughter. it was a very pleasant evening. A great way to spend a birthday. :) A nice day it was. :)

End of July, our life continues

So Today Jim, Justin and I are running up to Trail's End Market to ship out some bunnies. Hoping to get there early so that we can get bunnies into early cages as opposed to late ones since I don't wish to be in London almost all day waiting for bunnies to sell.

To read up on our vacation go here.
To read up on what happened after our vacation go here.

Um what else......raccoons have been visiting the backyard. Scared one of the bunnies bad enough that it heart-attacked on me.

Sassy's been feeling spunky some evenings. When she's like that we chase balls in the backyard. :) Good to see her feeling spunky.

My squash plants are definitely well on their way to taking over the backyard. Wish they had stayed the bush plants they were supposed to be. ARGH!!!!! Makes it difficult to manage the gardens well when one has squash growing out everywhere.

Justin has learned he likes gooseberries. Raspberries I think are still his favourite. But gooseberries....they are good too.

Jim fixed the O2 sensor and the muffler on the car. YEAH!! my man is good! :)

That's it for now...gotta run.

A cold, long days, and gardening

In the last two days I've sold 7 bunnies. Did cut people deals a bit, but overall, still made more than if I sell them as meat rabbits. :)

What else...oh..as you can tell from the header...we've had colds in this house. Jim started it all off last week, Justin caught it this week. It's one of those nasty sit in your sinuses type of colds.

Justin was a bit better today but his breathe has been simply atrocious so I'm thinking tonsils are also involved. So despite his eating today, I'm taking him to the doc tomorrow to see if needs to be medicated to help his tonsils heal up a bit.

Rod DeKoter and his boys are coming up for a visit tomorrow. They'll arrive mid-afternoon and stay for supper. Should be fun. Rod and Jim have been best friends for years. Good people. His wife is visiting her parents who are not doing very well unfortunately.

Justin helped mommy pull weeds this morning in the garden. Well...okay...he didn't really help. Tagu tried to help...but mommy often sent Tagu flying through the air to escape the bad weeds (Really...he was escaping...really!) :)

Rabbits enjoyed those weeds too! Well..except for Moss who's a bit on the picky side for greens eating as of yet.

Got the kitchen and living room cleaned today! YEAH!!! tough job but we got'her done. Had prayer meeting at the house and Jim's office is way too overflowing with books...we need a bigger office I'm a thinking! Too many books...can one ever have too many books????? So we needed to have the rest of the house livable. Found more toys to put out in the garage sale.

Oh...had a garage sale last week. It rained. I still have lots to get rid of. Thinking, if the weather holds nice, I'll sell again on Saturday morning. See if I can't get rid of more "stuff" that I just don't be needing in my house any more. Made a 1/3 of what I am hoping to make overall, but we'll see how it all goes.

Anyways, think that's about it. Talk more again I'm sure in another two weeks or so. :) Cheers!

A boon and a blessing

So yesterday Eva (Jim's mom was here). She had promised Justin she would sleep over at our place when he got back from Oma and Papa's. She's very good at keeping promises to little boys.

Anyways, she said she'd stay with him while Jim and I stopped at the Doc's office to get my hand checked out. Saw the Practical Nurse who works for them. She thought that my hand should be doing pretty good by the middle of the week, but I'm to keep it wrapped until it's all healed up and to continue watching for infection. She said that I need to monitor that longer than I might think I need to. So...I'll keep a close eye on things. She wrapped it up again for me, used a new to me dressing (some antibiotic treated non-stick dressing) and it well...suffice it to say I tolerated it as long as I could and then I ripped it off. The heat generated by it caused all my healing blisters to flair up again. We stopped at shoppers' drug mart to pick up some new stuff and I washed my hand well and redressed it. That pain I'm not to desirous of repeating. I'll stick with the Melaluca triple antibiotic for sure (that and unmedicated non-stick pads)!

We continued on our way to London. Picked up a couple of mini rex bunnies from a fellow who had thought he might donate them as pet food. I figured I could give them a better home than that! One I think will end up being blind in the one eye, he mentioned that eye had been bad since birth and recently had been worse again. he'd been treating it with eye drops and I'm continuing the same.

BUT I ALSO got some clothes. God was good to us. We stopped at Pennington's. I really, really wanted to find some dress pants to replace the ones that got burnt in the fire. I found some. Also found some other pants, and some undies (yes, a number of them burnt too!). Then we scratched the scratch and win ticket and got 50% off! Go figure that! So I picked up a couple of shirts as well! We got $200 worth of clothing for $100....and much of what we purchased was on sale already. :) Pretty cool God's providence in that ain't it? :)

Got some clothes at Wal-mart too. I'll want my mom to shop with me sometime this spring to see if I can find another shirt to go with these pants I got, I don't have much that goes it them and they are really nice light pants to just wear to church or out and about and so forth. But a "NICE" shirt will make it work well for church.

Anyways, Jim and I were chatting about how much I had wanted to build 2-3 rabbit hutches this week and couldn't because of my hand. And I decided I would ask mom (eva) if she would stay over and help me...I figured the worst that could happen is she'd say no, she'd rather go home. She said yes! We got two cages built (Jim and Justin helped a bit as well). We discovered that we can work together rather well. (my lessons with Jim have paid off). I have a happy buck (lop-hop) who is simply delighted to be in a cage where he can hop around and being a crazy buck! :) Scruffy didn't much care as he'd been in a fairly big cage for a while already (originally Lop-hop's but Scruffy didn't try to escape from it and a smaller cage was easier to lop-hop proof!).

Grammer (Justin's word) stayed for a bit in the afternoon and just played with Justin. He had a blast. She wanted to stay to do the dishes up and said Mom...go home. Leave the dishes, they'll get done sometime.

This weekend has proven to be a boon and blessing to me in many ways, God's providence clearly seen in many ways. And I've learned a bit more about the fine art of patience when healing. Should stand me in good stead as my life continues! :)