Florida again

Off to Florida tomorrow. Father went into hospital yesterday - seems to be resting comfortably. Mother basically bed-ridden. Both sisters and one husband are going at the same time. How small can I make myself? Must have some images to hold on to. Wiz breathing on my neck will be one. Waves on the beach-

My pretend horse

I went to see him today. It was so nice. I groomed him and then we spent a long time pushing the ball back and forth to each other. No clicker or anything and no treats, but just playing!! He was very interested in it.

I petted all the other horses stabled around him. They are all so big and smooth and warm. They all have soft, kind eyes and soft noses. I love to watch them eat grass to see how they choose what to eat and what to skip over.

I gave Wiz a small apple, one bite of carrot and let him lick some crumbs out of my hand from the oat bar that I ate. I think about him a lot especially at the end of my yoga class when we are supposed to be relaxing. Horses are very peaceful.

Crash and Burn

I would like to just erase this month and the next right out of my life.

Riding

Great ride at Cypress Trails yesterday!

yoga

Will have a private yoga lesson tomorrow morning! I think this will be my only private lesson due to the cost but starting in November, a friend will be splitting it with me. I will be in FL next week so I will miss the Thursday class but make the monday morning.

Still no riding. I guess I will just let it go and take a break from it. It's hard not to think about it though.

ugh again

Soooo aggravated today. Yelled at OH, then cried and now am in a flurry of cleaning.

Woke up dreaming that I was on a Topp Cheff kind of show. We had to put hummus on crackers and then put on some toppings, choices were grapefruit, oranges and some kind of raw beef. We had four hours to get it together. wtf????

Yoga and things

Yoga class this morning - first time in a long while. My yoga teacher is now teaching private classes so I might do one or split with someone else. I love my yoga teacher!

And how did I get so fat? I have put on 6-7 pounds in the last 2 months. Just over-eating and not exercising. Now that the weather is cooler, I will walk and ride my bike. I have not been riding and quit my carriage driving classes so I need to find a substitute exercise.

I guess I will not be moving to CA any time soon so I need to find something to occupy my time in between trips. Yoga and a new needlepoint class and walking and bike riding. I miss my horse. I looked at all his pics last night. So I will go see him this week. I just don't have the heart to ride another horse right now.

Eaten today - one yogurt - 100 calories.

Ugh

Truck will cost at least $500 to fix.

And anyway, "ugh" in general.

Pool equipment also not working.

No horsie.

J had horrible trip to Florida.

Internet just came on after 3 days of not working.

Up reading and drinking milk for an hour in the middle of the night last night.

Other stuff

My mother's doctor is starting her on new meds. The one she was taking made her worse!! J is there now and had a birthday party for her - she was 91 on September 1st.

Went to see Wiz yesterday. I hope he was glad to see me - I think so. I walked him around a lot to get to see everything but he was just interested in shoving his nose into the grass. It's an hour drive from here. I listened to Car Talk on the way there and they were kidding each other about Boston accents. What does "flahwiz" spell? And "kakis"? haha

Minnie is moving into her new house! I love it. It has so much light and plenty of room. Plus close to come neat shops and restaurants.

There is a really cute house on redfin that I would totally buy over the internet if OH would just say yes. Will it still be for sale in 2 weeks when I get there????

Needlepoint progress

I took the needlepoint horse and the heart ornament in to be finished. Horse will be a wall hanging and ornament is for nephew. The sea scape for my BIL was taken to Jerry's Artorama for framing. It's got the Del's lemonade and the anchor but left off the Mr. Potato Head. Spent about 45 minutes talking to the framing guy about cars, trips, snow, etc. He wants to see my duck shoe needlepoint!! hehe

Today I need to swill out this house. I need a hose and a yard blower. Okay, if I just put all the needlepoint stuff away I will be doing great. With those 3 projects finished, I can get all the yarn and stuff from them out of the way. Next I am going to finish the duck shoe and make a plan to work on the new horse np. I have decided to put the lace background on the duck shoe so that will take some careful work. I so love this one that I may actually keep it for myself! I have given all my others away. Or if it comes out really nice, I will give it to someone special that I have in mind.

movie

Watched Three Coins in a Fountain last night. Predictable (no suspense), all ends well (no tragedy), made in 1954 (no violence, etc.). All three criteria for my liking a movie. I think I was a teenager the last time I saw it.

My grandmother used to babysit for us on Saturday nights when my parents went out with their friends and we always watched the Saturday night movie. It was always good!

While I was in Florida, the Netflix movie that came was Superman. My mother slept thru it but my father watched.
The beginning: he asked me if it was a foreign film. I explained the baby superman, the planet Krypton, the exploding planet and the baby sent off to earth.
Teenage Superman: he had no idea.
Regular Superman enters: my father does not have any idea who the Superman character is. He never heard of him.
The whole rest of the movie: well, he watched it at least.

So here's the net finished.



Purple flowers started.



Lighthouse finished. May add something which I will show if I do!

Needlepoint progress

Here's the net I am making. Instructions from np instructor were to lace all the strands one way and then the other and tie each intersection down. I tried it but didn't like it. I have an anchor that I want to have caught in the net. Then tried lacing the pattern on a card with the intention of cutting out the card and transferring the net to the canvas. Didn't take long to realize that would not work. Finally, I looked up "making a net" and found a perfect youtube video. It ended up being really simple and exactly like the plait I make in Wiz's mane!! It's almost done but I realize that it will not be quite perfect because I followed the pre-painted lines and now the sag of the net will be problematic.



Beaded fringe on the saddle pad. Almost made me have a nervous breakdown due to the tiny beads, the thin needle and the thread. Done now tho so :P:P


Will put a batting on the back and a black cloth back with tabs to make a wall hanging. Should I roust out my sewing machine that has never been unpacked from the 1998 move? I dont think I even remember how to thread it!

Quiet trail riding

A post in this blog, http://annablakeblog.wordpress.com/ , is about the similarities of trail riding and dressage. I particularly like this part:

"Perhaps there are as many obstacles in an arena as on a trail. If you don’t believe me, you might want to try experiencing the invisible obstacle course disguised as a dressage test. "

I have just started trail riding on a regular basis and I'm trying to be a quieter rider. I'm naturally a fidgety, quick-moving kind of person and get horribly annoyed at the slow-moving, deliberate people of the world. Why not do 2 or 3 things at once?? Why can't they think a few steps ahead?

Of course that is exactly the kind of person who makes a good horse person. A calm, relaxed person makes a calm, relaxed horse. Now my trail riding partner is one such person and her horse is just Miss Laid-Back. With her as an example riding in front of me, I am doing better at just being quieter as a rider and I'm watching my horse to see how he is feeling. Any head coming up makes me take a close look at why.

And my favorite doggie whispering guy - he says picture what you want and make it happen. Don't picture what you are afraid of hppening!

Awesome Bystander strikes again!

Awsome Bystander (see 6-20-10 post) is taking pity on me and helping me figure out when I am when we are out on the trails! I am always completely clueless. Plus, yesterday we saw our family of ducks, a diving duck of some kind catching fish and what I think is a small blue heron. This heron flew in hops along side of us for quite a way, both horses not scared at all.

trail riding and stuff

I am having lots of fun trail riding. It is not too hot at 7:30 in the morning. Wiz is enjoying it too and getting very brave and didn't even spook the other day when a hawk flew back and forth in front of us. He loves to slosh around in the water whenever we cross some or go the the little beach place in the woods. We have been riding around a retention pond by a newly cleared area where some housing will go up and he is cool with that. We saw mommy and daddy ducks swimming in the pond with several babies in between them. They were swimming in a very straight line. Super cute!! Today there were some ducks standing around on the edge. Also, some strange rustling off in the woods on one of the trails so we quickly turned off into another area - . Also working on going slowly up and down the banks of the creek we have to cross. He wants to just run at it! Nooooooooooooooo

Today, I also worked on getting W into the wash rack outside the front barn. It is out in the open and is a U shape. The object is for the horse to be tied in there and stand to be hosed off. Finally got W to walk in there and stand by me but would not be tied and would not be washed in there.

Yesterday, I took the neighbor's dogs in the pool with me. One at a time since neither will actually go in by themselves. Last year, they were frantic in the pool. After watching the dog physcology show on TV and copying what he did, I can now gently coax one of them in and hold her til she is calm and then she will quietly swim back to the steps. I think she finally realizes that she should go to the steps and not try to scramble up any old edge. The other one will get on the first step on her own but then I have to pick her up and carry her in the rest of the way. She, however, did completely relax in my arms and let me hold her belly out with her back up against me and her head resting off to the side on my shoulder!! Cutie! She has no idea yet about swimming to the steps to get out. lol

Have a brilliant (I hope) idea for my duck shoe needlepoint. I'm back to the lace idea for the background after messing with some alternatives. I think I can take some thin white crochet thread to form the pattern and then needlepoint over it in white floss! We shall see.

Going to Florida in two weeks. I'm going to take some knitting and let my mother watch. She taught me how to knit when I was about 9-10. The whole time I was growing up, she had and unfinished pair of mittens in her bureau. She had started them in college and I think they just needed the thumbs but she never finished them. I remimded her of this the other day on the phone and she said, "I love you very much." Oh dear, that is a long sentence for her and she hardly ever says anthing without some prompting. If I can't tell if she still has the phone to her ear and can hear me, I start saying, "10, 20, 30" and she starts counting by tens up to 100.

Who wouldhave thought?

that I was even slightly artistic??? When I was a senior in high school, I begged my mother (guidance director) to let me take art as an elective. But no, I was forces to take fucking Latin IV, where Frank J and I whiled away the year fooling around and being pains in the ass in class.

I still don't think I am particulary artistic, but all of a sudden, starting last year, I am drowning myself in needlepoint projects. Never again the already painted canvas. No Santa Clauses, hearts, flowers, etc. (not that I have ever done a Santa Clause or heart thank you), but I will be drawing my own designs. So far, I have just traced a couple of pictures onto canvas (duck shoe and kb's horses), but I have a couple more in mind.

The instructor in my np class can't stand me because I change so many things, even in the pre-painted canvases. OMG!!!, the sacred painted canvas!!!

The sea scape I am working on now has 5 different scences on one canvas. (pic when I get a chance). I'm so sorry I even bought this canvas from her. It is incredibly boring. So far, I am running the scences into each other and I have put a Del's lemonade and a Mr. Potato Head onto the table under the beach umbrella. This is because this project will eventually be the Christmas or birthday gift of my BIL in Rhode Island, and Del's lemonade and MPH are both based in RI and so it will be a bit personalized. There is a sailboat that may have either an anchor (on the RI state flag) or a crab or lobster. There will also be a needlepointed sign that says Rhode Island hanging from the gate somehow.

My running horses canvas is now stripped of all its previous threads and new ones are bought. The threads are like little colored jewels, waiting to be a finished picture. I can't wait to start it but I have to get rid of all this other crap first.

I found a new needlepoint shop. It's closer than the one I have been going to (at least I don't even have to go near 1960). Their prices are cheaper and the women who work there are really nice. They have better needlepoint supplies too. And they are not all stuck up . . .

I watched the Messiest Home tv show the other day. A woman had 4 kids and when they were young, they had each worn a lion costume for Halloween. They persuaded her to give it up. Nooooooooooooooooooooooo

finally going to ride!

I've been babying my sore back but I'm just sick of it. I'm going to ride today no matter what. Well, if it doesn't rain that is. And if I'm not asleep from getting up at 4 a.m. this morning.

I'm almost finished with one of my needlepoint projects.

I think this is it before I started it. I just have to finish some of the background and put in the beaded fringe on the saddle blanket. I'm not sure if I am going to frame it (too expensive) or put a backing on it with pocket tabs so it can hang on a rod. (lame) This has been very labor-intensive, mainly because my needlepoint instructor suggested little cross stitches for the background. It looks pretty but it is taking forever, uses a lot of thread and is hard to see.

After this one is done, I have to finish a sea scape I started for my BIL and then can work on my duck shoe and my running horses canvases. I just found another np shop and I'm going to take some of this stuff over there for suggestions. I know what I want to do and how I want it to look, but I'm just not sure how to actually get the effect I want.

yoga injuries

Okay, this is the third time this year that I have hurt myself doing yoga. The first time I tried to do that pose where you are on your hands and try to kneel on your elbows. Elbow still hurts. Second time, pulled hip flexor muscle doing pidgeon. This time, I hurt my lower right back muscle trying to do twisted pyramid pose. Does it sound like I will be 60 a week from today???

More work done. I haven't worked on this for quite a while due to working on 3 other projects!

Duck shoe

I just traced it on the canvas! Yarn is picked out and mostly bought- some of each color anyway. Need to figure out how I am going to do the lace. I'm eager to get started so may just start the shoe while figuring out how to do the lace.

where does my time go?

I need to take a couple of days off from going anyplace and: vacuum my house, catch up on paperwork, get some groceries. I have not been able to get any of this done this week. The trouble is that once 3 p.m. comes along, I just give up. I am full of energy and plans in the morning. I keep adding to my list of chores and not getting them done.

Not getting chores done and not getting any of my other activities worked on either.

Here are some pics of a new needlepoint project - not started yet of course. Duck shoe with lace background stitched on. Thank you Anthropologie.

ranch vacation

Okay, first, the new aides never happened so the old ones are still there and not happy with me.

We are going on a horseback riding vacation to Wyoming this summer!

http://www.bitterrootranch.com/videos/bitterroot-ranch-video-2.htm

New aides?

OH and I spent Christmas week in Florida with my parents. Both of the regular aides were on vacation so there were two new ones (one subs sometimes). I really liked them both! When I got home, I called them both and asked them if they would like to work for us on a permanent basis and they both said yes. So now comes the task of replacing the two who are there now. Some time in the next two weeks or so, I must make the switch.

OH was really super as usual. Every day, he got out his "Italian in 10 Minutes a Day" book and worked from it with my father. I read some French to my mother and she really enjoyed it. I also brought her into the kitchen with me and we made brownies and veggie soup. We found two parks close by. One had a cultural center with interesting art work, paved walking paths (wheelchairs) and a carousel. The center has various shows during the year - plays, concerts, etc. which I would love to take them to. At the other park, we watched wave boarding for quite a while while sitting in the shade of some trees. We did not get to the beach but maybe next time.

I went to a needlepoint shop and saw some awesome work done by the daughter of the owner. I also liked some of the canvases, done by Sandra Gilmore, but they were between $200 and $300 just for the canvases. I don't think so!!



The results of my mother's neurology tests are back. The doctor is thinking of putting her on one or two new meds but insists on a personal consultation with one of us first. So that means that it will have to wait until risis goes there at the end of January. My mother was making a real effort to talk while I was there.