Decorations

         Richard and I picked Jaime up from school on the 6th.  A few days later Jaime and I put up the tree and finally started decorating but left oodles of space on the tree so that Ally could also decorate.  She's been running a fever, learned that she has a kidney infection among the many health problems that she has already been blessed with.  She did manage to put up a few ornaments before she returned to bed.

        On Friday we did the yard.  Well, mostly Biff, Clair and Jaime.  Richard supervised - or at least said that is what he was doing.  Jaime wrapped lights around the pine tree.  She is a mountain goat and was able to step on the rocks and unbalanced ground without slipping.  She put up some ornaments and I put up some.  Still room on the outside tree for more ornaments but we've had rain and wind in addition to the near freezing temperatures.

        Biff and Claire (though mostly Claire) put lights up on the house.  I'll have to have Jaime send me some pictures as I have been having problems retrieving pictures off my phone since our return from Disneyland.  I text them to Jaime and she messages them back to me through facebook.  I do not nor ever will have internet on my phone.

Some Chickens Never Learn

                 Are chickens even teachable?  We have put up so many barricades to keep the chickens out.  The neighbors to the west of us have called the police about our backyard neighbors’ menagerie at least four times.  The chickens didn’t bother me when they were at the top of the hill.  I wasn’t even bothered about them venturing into our yard.  Taking over the front yard seemed a bit much.  I drew the line at their overtaking the deck . . . which in itself would have been no problem but their bowl movements were/are.  I don’t like that!

                I recall 3 Nephi 10 in which Christ compares himself to a mother hen.  He gathereth his children as a hen would gather her chickens.  I have personally never seen that happen.  There are several hens that will invade our yard – no peeps though.  The youngest I’ve seen were small in size but still able to identify it as rooster or hen.  The hens overall don’t seem protective – especially when we find eggs that have been pecked.  That is definitely NOT a motherly thing to do.

                The white chicken refuses leave our porch.  We have shooed her off more times than the neighbors have called the police.  She finds ways to get  back in but then has a problem figuring how to get back out.  She seems to look for the most obscure spot to lay her eggs.  There have been seven that I know of – though the most I have seen at one time was four.  That was yesterday and I found her on the porch again this morning.  Perhaps she does have maternal instincts and has chosen that particular spot in order to hide her eggs in hopes that they will become children.  Perhaps that was why she was trying to get back in – to make certain her eggs weren’t being  pecked or stolen. 

Unfortunately for her they will  never hatch.  They now live in our fridge or have long since been eaten.  It almost makes me feel sorry for her that we are not able to communicate with one another. I don’t want to be a threat to her but I don’t particularly wish to raise chickens either.  I don’t want them gone as badly as the neighbors to our west – but I do understand where they are coming from.  That is a lot of animals for that plot of land.  Again, I don’t mind sharing my yard but I should not have to deal with cleaning up their large mess from my own porch.   At the same time I would much rather deal with the chickens than to have the drug house in our neighborhood as we had in West Valley.

Day 5: More Pictures

On our fifth day was two weeks ago today.  We were at the house Randy put us to work.  Who doesn’t love doing yard work during their vacation?  Better than being cramped up in a plane or a car I suppose. Also his corner lot yard is much easier to manage than the wilds of our backyard. 

Devin doing dishes

Roland mowing lawn

Jenna looks overly thrilled in all of these pictures

happy to have recruited family to do chores

I was certainly not dressed for the part

"This is NOT how I wanted to spend my vacation"

holding the cord of the lawnmower

Me with my youngest grandson

This is how Roland and I would vacuum at the church. 
He would push the vacuum and I would hold the cord.

Nature Around the House

Today I took a walk - not to Millsite.  Not up the street.  The only place I walked was around the house.  My walk in nature (LOL) .  It's a pretty pathetic post folks.  But then so is our yard.

backyard near the shed

the back side of our house

the hill (not much of a yard)

this snowball bush has definitely seen better days

looks like the remains of a campground firepit

where we had our greenhouse before the
snow storm ruined it last year

taken May 2017

I don't know why these remainders haven't made
it to the garbage can.  I'm certain it's rotted now

shelves could still be useful

grass has gotten high and needs to be mowed

trench - or part of it
https://beneaththewraps.blogspot.com/2019/08/changing-yard.html

reminder of the pepper plants?  

find it interesting what fall lies beneath; for
the most part it does feel like autumn

decayed trees lying on the ground

it does get green this time of year

vines that gave us pumpkins; their very existence
was quite by accident - at least on our part

other side of shed (as opposed to top picture)

view from driveway

another fall/autumn leaf beneath the spring clover

I usually remove the dead flowers in November.
I missed doing that in 2019

This is what it normally looks like  in spring

and then we get blossoms

This is how our rosebush looks currently

this is how it looks during the summer

with two shades of yellow

This is the neighborhood cat.  We call him/her Salem

symbolic of hibernating due to Covid-19

Decorating Pics

As mentioned in the last post, the skies darkened before we were through:

Roland had purchased "candles" to place in our windows.  

They will turn off after six hours

Jenna fell twice.  I don't know why she finds that amusing

Cell phone does not have the same sophistocation

as does some of the cameras I have owned

I thought the reflection of the tree in our window looks cool

as it appears the tree is really inside of the house.

We stopped decorating not only because it was dark but

The three adjoining cities will put on a light parade each year

on the second Saturday in December.  

I've taken several pictures in the past; this is the best I could do this year.

This last one was taken yesterday when we put the balls on.

I will have to get a picture of our finished product later on

Next we have our non-traditional advent wreath which I thought we would decorate with Christmas festivities.  Jenna decided to go for a more unique approach adding things that may not have anything to do with Christmas but may find a use for later on.  And so here we are from Dec 1 to Dec 15.  First the naked wreath:

Day 1: plastic dinosaur

day 2: granny square stocking

day 3: a plastic "diamond" from YW excellence
Aladdin theme "Diamond in the Rough"

day 4: book lamp

we tried turning on but the picture did not turn out as well

day 5: Believe

day 6: deer head

day 7: plastic container and snowflack on the booklamp
(so that it doesn't blend in with the door)

day 8: fairy doll

day 9: rubber star

day 10: match box ice cream truck

day 11: orange sunglasses

day 12: whoops, the wreath had fallen. Some ornaments
rearranged.  and dust puppy added

day 13: fish shaped blush brush

day 14: owl covered hand sanatizer

day 15: Elmo

And here is my little elf ready for school this morning