Ladies Day Out

We had a great time in Bozeman today, Jill, Jeane, Nancy and myself—Nancy picked me up and was gracious enough to humor my memory loss by taking me by the clinic and waiting while I had blood drawn. The clinic was having its twice yearly health fair type blood draw—it’s an inexpensive way to get a major amount of information at a low cost—$90 for a complete blood screening plus a vitamin D test.  The clinic won’t file insurance claims for these tests—cash only-- but do give you the form for submission to your insurance company.

Meeting at Jill’s we all piled into Jeane’s new Highlander and off we went to the big city of Bozeman for a fun day of shopping/laughing/lunch/shopping/eating/talking.  It was such a relaxed day—we are an extremely compatible group—no hurry, no worries.  I managed to do some Christmas shopping and lots of window shopping.  Bozeman is such a great town for browsing, lunching, and special gift buying.  I am almost finished with my Christmas shopping!!

I had the privilege of driving Jeane’s new car home—what a nice driving rig—at one time I was VERY glad there wasn’t a policeman around when I looked at the speedometer!!  We arrived at Jill’s, sorted out the bags, said goodbye and headed up the Boulder. 

Michael and Emmi had a good day—they went to Big Timber for truck parts, stopped at Granddad’s and ate some Cheetoes—I usually frown on Michael’s eating Cheetoes—that’s his “when the wife is not around” snack!

A very good day in Montana.

A Cold Thursday

Wow, it was minus 1 degree this morning when Michael got up, never got above 25 degrees all day in spite of bright blue skies and as I type this it is 9 degrees—gonna be another cold one tonight!

We geared up and took a walk—before we left I replaced the zipper in my “walking” coat and made Emmi a new set (four) socks!  Industrious I would say before 8am!  Let me tell you, we walked fast!

It was frosty, frosty—the snow crunched as we walked and our cheeks quickly became rosy!

Off to yoga for me and we had a full house—eight of us.  Lesley brought a friend, Mary, who with her husband is a private pilot—what a cool job!  Julia led us through a fabulous workout and had us all groaning by the end!

We sold our enclosed trailer—the one we hauled the jeep in behind the motorhome and I used for my quilting while we were in Texas.  We would like to take our ATV’s and the jeep with us when we head south—that trailer was just a tad too narrow and short.  It is also our plan to install solar on top of the trailer and Michael felt that trailer wasn’t heavy duty enough to carry our toys and the solar system.  So, the cowboy is living on Craigslist these days searching for a new trailer.   We sold it to friends and delivered it to Big Timber this afternoon.  Wow—the roads were treacherous as were the streets in Big Timber—I almost bit the dust outside Ace Hardware or shall we say bit the ice!!

Our little town still has a grain elevator/feed store/ranch supply store—I’ve always loved to go there and drive up and under/next to the grain elevator.  I go in, tell them what I want, they make out a ticket, I sign my name and off I go—someone comes out and puts my sunflower seeds in the truck.  At the end of the month, we get a bill.  Small town and I love it!

On the way to and from town we saw 5 bald eagles—we occasionally see eagles this time of year but five in one day is a lot!  I only had the Canon point and shoot, thus my distance photos are not the greatest.

Such majestic birds!

I made the Pioneer Woman Spicy Dr. Pepper Shredded Pork recipe again today—that stuff is delicious!!!  A 5 pound pork butt roast, one can of chipotle peppers, 2 cans of Dr. Pepper and 2 tablespoons of brown sugar.  Oh, and an onion cut into wedges—put the pork on top of the onion wedges, pour the chipotle peppers on top of the roast, pour in the Dr. Pepper and lastly, stir in the brown sugar.  Cover with a lid and  bake for about 5-6 hours at 300 degrees.  Check and if the meat is not falling apart, cook longer.  I make this recipe, we eat it for lunch one day then I freeze the rest in one meal size portions for Michael and I.  Makes a good meal to fix while traveling in the motorhome. 

Life is good! 

Just A Little Extreme

It was 62 degrees yesterday afternoon in Billings, today our temps took a little dip--

yep, 13 degrees at 5pm.  It snowed much of the day and we have about 5 inches on the ground—ole man winter came back with a vengeance!!

Before the heavy snow started Michael hauled  firewood down to the house—a good thing!  For lunch I made pizza and I think I’ve finally, after dozens of pizzas, made the perfect pizza—at least for us.  Somewhere (Facebook/blog???) I read about a free Craftsy class featuring Peter Reinhart—Perfect Pizza At Home.  Reinhart is a chef and has written several books on the art of baking bread.  It was an awesome class—I learned some great tips and today the class paid off—lunch was delicious!!

This afternoon I finished Jeane’s quilt and started getting another customer quilt for Donna ready for the frame. 

About 4:30 we all suited up, including Emmi and headed out for a cold, cold walk!  Slogging up the hill in five inches of new snow is a breath taker too!!  Emmi has homemade boots for when the temps are really cold, otherwise the snow sticks up inside the pads of her feet making her stop and hold her foot up with a pathetic, “help me” look on her face. 

Winter Visitors, Doctors and Dentists, Happy Birthday

A couple times lately Michael has noticed these evening grosbeaks at our house—it isn’t a bird we usually see this time of year and not very often even in summer.  There are about seven of the birds and they sit in the tree over our sunflower seed feeder then fly off.  Today I spread sunflower seeds along the deck rail—when I came back later they were all on the railing eating—cool!!

Today is my sweet Mom’s birthday—Happy Birthday Mom, glad you made it home to Arkansas in time to celebrate in style with the family!!!

Today was Michael’s day to visit the dermatologist—Michael is as prone to skin cancers as is his Dad so we visit the dermatologist about twice a year.  Dr. Williams used the nitrogen to freeze multiple lesions leaving Michael looking as if he has chicken pox! 

The doctor also sent us to Costco with a prescription for the Carac cream—a chemotherapy type cream which targets pre-cancerous lesions.  Michael has used this cream in the past and when we purchased the stuff a year or so ago, we almost had a heart attack at $250 for a small tube of the stuff—liquid gold!!!  Today when I went to pick up the prescription I just about fainted—$478 for the same size tube—is it now made from platinum???!!!!!  I told the young woman helping me to keep the cream, I wasn’t purchasing it, period.  I will try and find it through other sources. 

Lunch, Wal Mart, Costco and then it was off to the dentist for me—seems I had a cavity which needed filling.  A brief, painless session, out the door and we were heading home.  Visited with Nat a while, retrieved Ms. Emmi and now we are sitting with out feet up.

For a November day it sure was nice, 62 degrees and sunny—all that is to change tomorrow with a predicted low of 5 above!!!  BRRRR

iPad Mini Deals

Did anyone notice the blog Chris over at Technomadia posted over the weekend about “Millenicom’s ridiculously awesome iPad Mini deals”????  The cowboy and I are diehard Millenicom and Straight Talk fans—we favor these easy to use cell phone and internet companies over traditional ones such as Verizon due to our circumstances.  We live miles and miles from the nearest cell tower—no cell service at our house, zip, nada, unless you want to hike up the hill into the hay field to what Gina and Rollie refer to as the “phone booth”.  The views from the phone booth are to die for but with a foot of snow on the ground and a howling wind—not so pleasant!!!

Millenicom and Straight Talk have what we need which is internet only when we are traveling and an affordable cell phone which we can use when we are out and about away from the ranch.   Our home internet is DSL provided by our local telephone co-op.  Our Straight Talk Samsung smart phone costs us about $45 per month—no contract, month to month billing and unlimited talk, text and 2G data.  We did have to buy the phone which cost about $150 if I remember correctly.

Millenicom has plans which include a 20GB data plan for $70 per month and an unlimited data plan for $80 per month.  Millenicom allows you to activate and disconnect service at will—we activate our plan when traveling, shut it down when we get home and back to our land line DSL. 

So, with all that said, check out Chris’ post—the deals on iPads were too good to pass up and rumor has it Santa has placed his order for this household.  Can you believe it Rollie????

Talk about coincidence—4 years ago today we were a two man Demolition Crew, removing most of the windows and doors from Lonnie and LoraLee’s house before the rest of the structure was destroyed.  Those windows were hauled home in our gooseneck stock trailer where they have resided ever since—guess we don’t need to haul horses very often.  Today we unloaded the windows, doors and partially unloaded the five garage doors we also had hauled home—everything went in Michael’s new shed—with room to spare.  That was a hard afternoons’ work!!!  

Michael was reading an online article on Market Watch and saw this photo:

The rig going out to sea in the foreground of the photo is Olympus, the rig in the background is Jack St. Malo—Rollie’s rig.  Great photo! 

Another productive day in Montana.

It’s Getting To Be A Habit

Swimming at Chico that is—Sarge and Sarah live near Chico and invited us over this afternoon for a swim and dinner—so off we go over the hill and through the woods dropping off the wood splitter at Lonnie’s on the way. 

Nat came for lunch—I made another big ole pot of beef vegetable soup and some more homemade bread.  I worry about inviting him for lunch when we have snow on the ground and the wind is blowing that snow around.  He drives really, really slow and everyone knows it’s him—he is never late and if he should be, I will send Michael out to look for him. 

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Amendment—just about 10 minutes before 12pm when Nat should have arrived our phone rang and caller ID showed his number in town.  Seems he started up the Boulder and about the nine mile marker hit a patch of ice—he decided it would be best “for an old man to turn around and go back home.” 

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While I am sorry Nat didn’t get here for lunch, I am glad he made a good decision!

Nasty weather for walking this morning, a little snow on the ground and a cold, gusty wind.  We made good time on our walk—being cold makes you walk faster!

My phone rang yesterday morning and it was Jill—“I’m at a flea market and these people talk like you!”  She and her daughter Kerri are visiting Jill’s son Fritz in Memphis, TN—I think she is making fun of my southern accent—but in a good way!

Thought you folks might like to see a photo of our gorgeous granddaughters, Laci on the left, Katie on the right, looks like they are dressed up for a night on the town.

 

Katie and her husband Michael.

Our friends Jane and Rich are out in California welcoming their newest grandchild—a boy, Anders Jonathan.  He’s a cutie—full head of hair—wonder what his sister Tegan is thinking about him??

Mom and Chuck left Aransas Pass, Texas yesterday and are now safely home in Arkansas—they are very glad to be home!

Life is good!

Hard To Fool The Cowboy

Yesterday for lunch I decided to serve some cauliflower—you see, the cowboy doesn’t like cauliflower in any shape or form.  So, I thought I would fool him and mash the cauliflower like Ms. Pat does for Mike!  I added some garlic and one very small potato to the boiling cauliflower, mashing it all together with some butter and milk when it was done.  The cowboy took one bite, then another, then said, “is there any chance you got cauliflower mixed in with the potatoes???”  I lost it, laughing until tears ran down my face—needless to say, he didn’t eat any more of it but I loved it!!! 

Remember our two feet of snow in early October—it was a heavy, wet snow and the leaves were still on the trees.  We lost lots of branches and tree tops in that storm—today was clean-up day.  Michael cut--

while I used the Kawasaki mule to haul 12 loads to the burn pile and to the firewood pile.  By lunch time we were both about done in!  Chicken fajitas for lunch then Michael went out to the motorhome and dismantled our reclining loveseat to see if he could add some foam to the cushions.  We purchased that loveseat in Louisiana while visiting Gina and Rollie one Christmas.  The foam in the seats didn’t last very long and my handy cowboy thought he could replace the seat foam—he’s right and he can, he’s on the internet as I type this blog searching for foam!  

I hauled a few more loads to the burn pile and then started in on more fun projects—quilting Jeane’s quilt.  I love it when the thread color choice is perfect, the tension is perfect and the design I chose is perfect—everything is perfect. 

Wow—did our weather ever deteriorate!!!  About 4pm it started snowing horizontally and the temps dropped—winter is back!

I bet Al knew this but I didn’t—when you take a photo with the flash on in a snowstorm, the snowflakes show up—I was thrilled when I started working with these photos in Picasa!