See Jayne Go

See Jayne. See Jayne and Frank. Jayne and Frank have had a crazy summer. Jayne and Frank need a vacation. See Jayne and Frank get on an airplane and go to San Diego. Jayne and Frank will be eating lots of real mexican food and seeing animals at the zoo. Jayne and Frank will have five lovely days together in the southern California sun! Bye!

All that silliness aside, I just wanted to do a quick update to the blog because I won't be posting now for at least a week. Everything is fine here. The little chicks have integrated well into the big girl's coop and one is even trying to crow already. I got the running boards installed on my truck, but while they were doing it they dented the door a little. Of course they'll fix it, but not until I get back and get an appointment with the body shop. Frank and I are BOTH busy gearing up for our on-line teaching jobs; Frank with math and I in English (American Literature).

While we are gone a good friend is staying in the house and taking good care of everybody, and our regular animal sitter will be helping out as well, so people will be in and out here more than when it's only us here at home. It is very comforting to know we've got such good help taking care of all our precious animals here at home. See you in a week or so!

Truck's First Bath by Guest Blogger Frank

For years Jayne has wanted a new truck, and last month, she found the PERFECT truck, a 2009 GMC Sierra that had EVERY option that she was looking for, including being a two wheel drive, which is important because with me at 51, and Jayne at well, I really shouldn't share her age - suffice it to say that right now I am four years older than her and on November 7th I will be three - are a tad bit long in the tooth to go mudding, so a two wheel drive is perfect for us. "Why don't we buy it," I queried. And Jayne, having found the truck of her dreams gave me a totally logical answer as to why we shouldn't buy it: because it's white. Of course. Pass on the truck of your dreams because it's white. That, of course, made little sense to me, and so we purchased Truck and he is indeed a most excellent addition to our family.


So, we actually used Truck as a working truck yesterday and hauled some hay. Jayne, having fallen deeply in love with Truck suggested that I bathe him. And look how dirty he is! I can tell you with absolute certainty that everything I own, including my own body, has been 10 times dirtier than Truck is in this picture and I still didn't wash it. Oh, well, if Jayne wants me to wash Truck, wash Truck I will do.


Actually, here is a close up of the HUGE mess that Truck got into. Bad, bad Truck; no wonder you need a complete and total detail job both inside and out!


So, of course, we can't just wash Truck with any old swill that is out there, so we laid out for some fancy materials to make sure that the old boy was completely comfortable while being bathed. I especially like the micro fiber mitt that is so soft it could be used to pat your baby's bottom.


This is the old swill that we have used on every vehicle we have ever owned. And as for the Dawn, biologists used it to get the oil off of birds that have stumbled into a spill. It's obviously very good stuff, but not good enough for Truck!


So, we're driving home yesterday and Jayne noticed three specks of dust on the dashboard. "When you clean Truck tomorrow, will you please wipe down the dashboard with something besides water?" "Like Armor All?" I ask helpfully. "Absolutely not! That stuff destroys the vinyl, eventually. We'll never use that stuff on Truck!" And so imagine my surprise when Jayne shows up with Armor All. "Hey, Jayne, didn't you say..." "I was talking about the spray, not the wipes. The wipes will be fine." Now, I'm not a chemist, but I kinda think that the liquid on the wipes is the same as the liquid that you spray on, so if one will destroy your dash, then there is a real good possibility that other will too. Oh, well, I'll see my friend Deanna Vaughan - who IS a chemist - in about three weeks and ask her all about this.


And here is Truck, all nice and clean! Please compare this to the second picture in this blog to see what a difference a nice bath makes.


More evidence that Truck did indeed get a bath.


So, here's the deal with Truck and the lessons he can teach us. Jayne, who really is the love of my life and completes me in all ways despite the fact that I have had a whole lot of fun teasing her in this blog, has always wanted a truck; she's also always wanted horses. She's waited, well 51 minus 4 years for this to happen, but it finally did happen. Moral of the story? Don't give up on your dreams. Ever. I love Truck because my wife loves Truck, but also love him because he will remind me for a good long time that I should never give up on a dream, no matter how out of reach it seems. You shouldn't either.

Fun on the farm!

Boy, has it been a whirl-wind summer! Seems like Frank and I are always coming or going! We just ended a lovely visit with Frank's brother Jim and his bride Mary. We got to spend some quality time with them (I had never met Mary before), part of which was during a short trip to Victoria, which was beautiful and enchanting as always. Back here on the farm, we introduced those city folks to the joys of rural living. This included giving the watermelon rinds to the horses and donkeys. They love to see us coming with that green plate full of sweet treats for them!


A big milestone on the farm today was that the little white chicks ventured outside for the first time at the ripe age of 5 weeks old. I had been letting them out to roam the barn the last few days, but frankly, I was getting tired of them leaving little chick poopies all over the place, so I'm ready for them to move out of the barn. Here they are being fascinated by food that actually moves (a bug!). They figured out quite quickly that moving food is tasty!


I could not have asked for a better momma hen. She has been so good at teaching them all they need to know and they are surprisingly obedient when she calls or warns them. Here she became alert to something in the yard and one of the chicks made sure to look too.


The chicks kind of crept out of the barn in little groups today, so I wanted to show you that there are indeed still 5 chicks. I THINK there are two roosters and three pullets, so I'm keeping my fingers crossed for that outcome. One of the little roosters sounded like he was choking this morning so I looked at him to see if he was OK, and he was actually trying to crow! What a funny little guy! So far our resident rooster, Colonel Sanders, has made contact with the chicks and he has not shown any signs of aggression at all. Let's hope it stays that way for a while and until I decide what to do with these two unnecessary boys.


Two of my neighbor kids came over today (the girl is also my excellent farm sitter) to just hang out, so we got to work shredding some of the excess zucchini from my garden. My friend Ange told me that if I froze them in three cup bags, that once they thawed and the water is poured out, that would leave me with the two cups of shredded zucchini that most recipes call for. So that's what we did. We got 6 packages to freeze and with the two cups left over we quick whipped up a chocolate zucchini cake that we took to a cookout at their house the same evening. They had fun getting their friends and neighbors to try the chocolate cake they made but didn't tell them it had zucchini in it. It's a good cake and I managed to save one piece for Frank when he gets home from Boise this evening.


I'm having so much fun with my new truck! It actually sent me an email the other day telling me I had only 32 pounds of pressure in one tire when it should be 35. Too funny! It also has a voice activated phone in there: I just say DIAL and then the number and it takes care of it! Talk about hand's free. So now I can still say I don't have a cell phone, but I do have a cell truck!

We have one more get-away (to San Diego) this summer before we hunker down and get to work at our respective jobs. The same on-line high school that Frank works for hired me to teach two classes of English. (This should eliminate the need for me to substitute teach for anyone except my favorites.) Gotta love a job you can do in your jammies! Needless to say, there won't be any pictures of that!

Visitors and Anniversary!!

We are having a wonderful time with our visitors from Illinios...Frank's brother and sister in law, Jim and Mary. One of the things our guests wanted to see was some mountains up close, and since Frank and I hadn't yet been up to Mount Baker, we drove up there yesterday. Wow, was that a beautiful drive and the scenery was breathtaking!! The Mount Baker Highway actually takes you around to the east side of Mount Baker, which is an approach we had not ever seen as our views of the mountain had always been from the south or west.


There were other snowy peaks around this area, as well as many green meadows and majestic pines below the tree line. We think we even spotted a small herd of mountain goats in the distance. It was a beautiful day and it was even a little warm after doing some hiking around Artists Point.


On a side note, this coming Saturday is our 17th Anniversary and Frank bought me a really big present. We drove it up to Mount Baker as we weren't sure our old van would be up to the task. It performed great and we enjoyed playing with all the toys in there. Thanks, Honey, for 17 wonderful years and for my new truck!

Today we're sticking fairly close to home with a tour through Frank's school and a drive to a cute nearby town followed by lunch at our favorite Mexican restaurant. Tomorrow is a Seattle day, and then we're off to Victoria for a few days. We're having a great time but it seems like time is going by way too fast. I'll update again this weekend.