Unbelievable!!! Everything was going so well..... a beautiful Fall season was gong along just fine, with lots of opportunity to get out on the bike, be outdoors doing things, enjoying the splendors that God has given us... and THEN......
A sudden Arctic Blast comes upon us all at once, seemingly out of nowhere, and rocks our world into frigid coldness!!! It all started on Friday, and hasn't let up yet at all. In fact, it has gotten worse... though no snow since Friday, the temps have dropped, and the winds have continued, making it absolutely bitter cold here.... difficult to even keep the house warm right now!!!
Outside this morning it is currently 23 degrees, but with the winds blowing as they are, the wind chill has the actual temperature down to -1 degree as of right now!!! We haven't even had Thanksgiving yet!!! This is NOT how it is supposed to be!!!
I have been planning for some time to work with Evan this week to put up our Christmas lights... but there is NO WAY we are going to be out there doing it in this weather!!! It is bad enough that I have to suffer in it an hour each morning and again each evening, just to take care of chickens and goats and cattle!!!
So, everything here has been thrown off, and we are out of sorts right now. So much to do this week to prepare for the arrival of family for Thanksgiving, and all we can do is try to stay warm!!!
Don't get me wrong... I love snow, and lots of it! However, I love it in the Winter time.... NOT the Fall. I am supposed to be out riding my bike and logging more miles this tie of year. For crying out loud, I don't even have my supply of wood pellet fuel purchased yet!!!
Have I mentioned lately just how much I wish we didn't live here anymore!!! :-(
Monday, November 22, 2010
Monday, November 15, 2010
I will return shortly, thank you for you patience!!!
Indeed, life has been fast-paced, busy and crazy for us lately. Just returned from a whirlwind tour in Portland, helping Grammy & Papa to prepare for their upcoming move to their new home, and new chapter of their lives.
Home yesterday afternoon, lots of unloading and unpacking, as well as re-loading and packing of Brad's stuff into a big steel box. Then a little bit of rest, and off and running like crazy again all day today.....
We are dealing with beef and pork this week, and had to purchase new freezers today to store it all in!!!
I have next year's vacation picks coming up this Wednesday, and must get a calendar all worked out, so we can come up with my list of wants for V-days.
Evan starts basketball practice this Thursday and Friday.
Tracie is starting full time boot camp workouts on Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings at Homestead Fitness Center.
Sierra is back at dance class on Monday afternoons.
I start playing ice hockey again this Wednesday night.
Evan's football end-of-year banquet is Wednesday evening.
We have a bunch of stuff to still organize and put away, laundry to be done, grocery shopping to get to, and general clean-up to work on as well.
It is also Christmas light season, and we need to start working on that as well.
So, please be patient with me for just a while, as I will get back to regular posting really soon :-)
Home yesterday afternoon, lots of unloading and unpacking, as well as re-loading and packing of Brad's stuff into a big steel box. Then a little bit of rest, and off and running like crazy again all day today.....
We are dealing with beef and pork this week, and had to purchase new freezers today to store it all in!!!
I have next year's vacation picks coming up this Wednesday, and must get a calendar all worked out, so we can come up with my list of wants for V-days.
Evan starts basketball practice this Thursday and Friday.
Tracie is starting full time boot camp workouts on Monday, Wednesday and Friday evenings at Homestead Fitness Center.
Sierra is back at dance class on Monday afternoons.
I start playing ice hockey again this Wednesday night.
Evan's football end-of-year banquet is Wednesday evening.
We have a bunch of stuff to still organize and put away, laundry to be done, grocery shopping to get to, and general clean-up to work on as well.
It is also Christmas light season, and we need to start working on that as well.
So, please be patient with me for just a while, as I will get back to regular posting really soon :-)
Tuesday, November 9, 2010
Portland, Oregon Bound...
On Thursday morning at 6am, we will be heading to Portland, OR. Grammy & Papa have sold their home, and are downsizing into their "Golden" years. We are heading down to get all of Brad's belongings that have been stored there in their shop since he moved out this way from IL. As well, we will be bringing some of Grammy & Papa's stuff back here, that they will no longer need and that will work for us. It will be a very busy weekend, but it will be good to see the old Pumpkin Ridge place one last time, to say our good-byes, and also to go and see their new home, where we hope to be visiting them a bunch in the future.
This all said, it makes for a short and very busy week for us. Tracie is busy working as a sub at the kids' school, and I have been trying to get the Suburban all mechanically sound and ready for the trip. We still have to get packed and loaded tomorrow, and also deal with Lynden Meat and customers for our beef and our pork.
All of this, and I have been dealing with a very painful infected toe on my right foot, which has kept me from doing a lot, and unable to put shoes on my feet until just today finally. I do believe today is a breakthrough day as far as healing goes with the toe, and am hopeful that it will be feeling a lot better come tomorrow.
For now, time to go and work on dinner, then sit back with the family for a while, and then finish off the night with "The Biggest Loser", my favorite 'reality' TV show!!! :-)
Lots to do, time is running short, but God is in control.... time for me to hand the reigns over and relax a bit more! :-)
This all said, it makes for a short and very busy week for us. Tracie is busy working as a sub at the kids' school, and I have been trying to get the Suburban all mechanically sound and ready for the trip. We still have to get packed and loaded tomorrow, and also deal with Lynden Meat and customers for our beef and our pork.
All of this, and I have been dealing with a very painful infected toe on my right foot, which has kept me from doing a lot, and unable to put shoes on my feet until just today finally. I do believe today is a breakthrough day as far as healing goes with the toe, and am hopeful that it will be feeling a lot better come tomorrow.
For now, time to go and work on dinner, then sit back with the family for a while, and then finish off the night with "The Biggest Loser", my favorite 'reality' TV show!!! :-)
Lots to do, time is running short, but God is in control.... time for me to hand the reigns over and relax a bit more! :-)
Sunday, November 7, 2010
"Fall"ing Back...
Good Morning! For some of you it is currently 6:40am. For the rest of us, who have remembered to "Fall" back for the end of Daylight Savings Time, it is now 5:40am instead. :-)
There is no doubt about it these days, Fall is most definitely upon us. We have been enjoying some amazingly wonderful Fall days of weather, along with shorter days, with dark mornings and dark afternoons. I have been able to enjoy some fantastic Fall weather bicycle riding this year, and am still hopeful that I may finish off this year with 3,500 miles logged on my bike!
So, Evan's first season of tackle football has ended. He did really well, but has a lot to learn still as far as building his confidence in himself and his abilities. It will be fun to watch him make the connection with just how really good he is, and how fast he can be.... and hopefully next year his whole team will just get better and better. With football over, we expected to take the winter off from sports and just relax a bit, but not so be the case... Evan has decided to give basketball another try! SO, we are right back into the busy sports schedule once again.
Sierra is busy with her dance class, which is a much easier schedule for us to follow, thankfully. She has not yet really shown any interest in playing sports at this time, and prefers to concentrate on her dancing. She also would like to give gymnastics a try, but we haven't been able to find anything close to us, or reasonably priced as of yet.
This next Thursday we are heading to Portland to help Grammy & Papa with their packing and preparing to move to their new home next month. We will be busy loading all of Brad's belongings to bring them up here and place them in a steel container box for storage on our property for now. In addition, Grammy & Papa have many things that they would like for us to have, as they will be downsizing quite substantially with this move. So, we will be going through things and loading our enclosed trailer to bring those things home with us as well. For sure, this is a bittersweet time for us all. We all love the home that Grammy & Papa have lived in now for the past 13+ years. In fact, it is the only home that Evan and Sierra have ever known for them. On the other hand, it will be so good for them both to have a smaller home, with less work and upkeep, and a place much closer to family and friends. In addition, they will be in community environment, where they will hopefully meet many new friends, and begin to grow their social lives more. I think we are all hoping and praying that this will be a very good transition in both of their lives! :-)
On a personal note, I am frustrated with my physical health right now. I have not been able to get my fitness kicked into high gear for some time now, due to all kinds of things. Recently, though, I have suffered from a couple of different injuries, which have set me back. I really want to get back to working out hard again, and to get rid of another 10 pounds of unwanted fat from my body. I am coming up on the two year mark since I started my "new" life of health and fitness, in January, and I really want to be weighing in at around 190 pounds, with around 12% body fat. With the way things have gone for me this past month, that goal is getting hard to reach. Right now I am suffering from an infected toe on my right foot that is hurting me very badly. I need to get it taken care of, so I can get back into my groove once again. I am starting to get down on myself about how things are going... it affects my mental and spiritual health, and I don't want that to happen anymore.
I know everyone ( my family and close friends) all get tired of hearing me talk about bicycling all of the time. I have heard a fair amount about it lately, and realize that not everyone wants to hear about it so much. Trouble is, bicycling has become a passion for me. I love it, and love how it makes me feel, and what it does for me physically and mentally and spiritually. Cycling has helped me get my life back. So, I need to just remember that although I am passionate about cycling, most everyone else close to me are not. I need to find a group of people, or even just a few, who share the love of cycling that I have, who I can talk to about it all of the time... something to work on for me. In the mean time, I just need to work on talking more about others' interests, and less of mine.
Well, it's time for more coffee, and something to eat. Today we will go to church, and then I will spend the day trying to allow my infected toe to get better, since I am supposed to be working again tomorrow.
The mantra I am trying to remember each day to live by is this......
"Life isn't a problem to be solved, it's an adventure to be lived" :-)
There is no doubt about it these days, Fall is most definitely upon us. We have been enjoying some amazingly wonderful Fall days of weather, along with shorter days, with dark mornings and dark afternoons. I have been able to enjoy some fantastic Fall weather bicycle riding this year, and am still hopeful that I may finish off this year with 3,500 miles logged on my bike!
So, Evan's first season of tackle football has ended. He did really well, but has a lot to learn still as far as building his confidence in himself and his abilities. It will be fun to watch him make the connection with just how really good he is, and how fast he can be.... and hopefully next year his whole team will just get better and better. With football over, we expected to take the winter off from sports and just relax a bit, but not so be the case... Evan has decided to give basketball another try! SO, we are right back into the busy sports schedule once again.
Sierra is busy with her dance class, which is a much easier schedule for us to follow, thankfully. She has not yet really shown any interest in playing sports at this time, and prefers to concentrate on her dancing. She also would like to give gymnastics a try, but we haven't been able to find anything close to us, or reasonably priced as of yet.
This next Thursday we are heading to Portland to help Grammy & Papa with their packing and preparing to move to their new home next month. We will be busy loading all of Brad's belongings to bring them up here and place them in a steel container box for storage on our property for now. In addition, Grammy & Papa have many things that they would like for us to have, as they will be downsizing quite substantially with this move. So, we will be going through things and loading our enclosed trailer to bring those things home with us as well. For sure, this is a bittersweet time for us all. We all love the home that Grammy & Papa have lived in now for the past 13+ years. In fact, it is the only home that Evan and Sierra have ever known for them. On the other hand, it will be so good for them both to have a smaller home, with less work and upkeep, and a place much closer to family and friends. In addition, they will be in community environment, where they will hopefully meet many new friends, and begin to grow their social lives more. I think we are all hoping and praying that this will be a very good transition in both of their lives! :-)
On a personal note, I am frustrated with my physical health right now. I have not been able to get my fitness kicked into high gear for some time now, due to all kinds of things. Recently, though, I have suffered from a couple of different injuries, which have set me back. I really want to get back to working out hard again, and to get rid of another 10 pounds of unwanted fat from my body. I am coming up on the two year mark since I started my "new" life of health and fitness, in January, and I really want to be weighing in at around 190 pounds, with around 12% body fat. With the way things have gone for me this past month, that goal is getting hard to reach. Right now I am suffering from an infected toe on my right foot that is hurting me very badly. I need to get it taken care of, so I can get back into my groove once again. I am starting to get down on myself about how things are going... it affects my mental and spiritual health, and I don't want that to happen anymore.
I know everyone ( my family and close friends) all get tired of hearing me talk about bicycling all of the time. I have heard a fair amount about it lately, and realize that not everyone wants to hear about it so much. Trouble is, bicycling has become a passion for me. I love it, and love how it makes me feel, and what it does for me physically and mentally and spiritually. Cycling has helped me get my life back. So, I need to just remember that although I am passionate about cycling, most everyone else close to me are not. I need to find a group of people, or even just a few, who share the love of cycling that I have, who I can talk to about it all of the time... something to work on for me. In the mean time, I just need to work on talking more about others' interests, and less of mine.
Well, it's time for more coffee, and something to eat. Today we will go to church, and then I will spend the day trying to allow my infected toe to get better, since I am supposed to be working again tomorrow.
The mantra I am trying to remember each day to live by is this......
"Life isn't a problem to be solved, it's an adventure to be lived" :-)
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