Mom and Dad

I'm really excited about Mom and Dad coming for a visit next week. When we moved from Seattle to San Francisco a couple of years ago, we moved away from my parents. We pretty much always got together for all the holidays and birthdays and family barbeques and games in between all of the above, so I miss them a lot sometimes.

It will be fun to show them around our new place and have them exclaim their approval on everything we have done with our remodel. Mom and Dad are nice that way!

Raining Cats and Dogs

Speaking of dogs, Blackjack is naughty about not going out to do his business when it is raining. I usually find a mess somewhere. How could such an innocent face be so sneaky?

Sophie

My sweet little Sophie had doggie breast cancer. At least I hope that it is past tense. The vet said the "margins" on the sample that he sent to the lab were clear, so hopefully he got all of it.

I love Sophie so very much! She is 13 years old now and I sometimes wonder how much time we have left together and then I can't bear to think about that. She is getting hard of hearing and can't see very well anymore, but she is just as cuddly and sweet and precious and devoted as ever.

There is a profound poem for anyone who has ever dealt with pet grief or just want to treasure the short time they know is a reality when a pets' life-span is shorter than our own.

"We who choose to surround ourselves

with lives even more fragile than our own,

live within a fragile circle,

 easily and often breached.

 Unable to accept its awful gaps

 We still would live no other way."

Irving Townsend

In the meantime, Sophie is sleeping softly on my lap and I am enjoying every moment that I am blessed to have this special little gift. I think it might be mutual!

Donna and Sophie

Top Ten Book List

This has been a popular blogosphere topic right now. It is kinda hard to do... It is supposed to be a list of the top ten books that have influenced you the most. The blog challenge is to make the list out of your first thoughts. In other words, don't get hung up on second guessing yourself and don't worry about putting the titles into any particular order. I think you can tell a lot about a person from a list like this, so here goes...

1. The Bible by God
2. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
3. In His Steps by Charles Sheldon
4. The Saving Life of Christ by Major Ian Thomas
5. My Utmost for His Highest by Oswald Chabers
6. The Screwtape Letters by C.S. Lewis
7. Seeds of Contemplation by Thomas Merton
8. A Town Like Alice by Nevil Shute
9. Through Gates of Splendor and its sequel The End of the Spear
10. Anything by Jill Briscoe or Anne Graham Lotz

I think this is the guy that got this all started...
books-which-have-influenced-me-most

Fishing

I love fishing! It is one of those few activities that I can become totally absorbed in the moment and be totally focused.

Here is a clip from last Saturday. Steve and I took our Hobie kayaks to Lake Del Valle near Livermore, California - just over the hill from us via Niles Canyon. It was a perfect Spring day - well, except that I didn't catch any fish. But it is about the journey - the experience - the memory, fun!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7MQLI2mXmQo

Happy fishing!

some more house pix

My latest projects have been painting the outside of the house and prepping the garden plot with raised beds for Spring planting.

We have had a fairly rainy, la nina, winter this year in the San Francisco Bay area. I haven't been able to get outside as much and the weeds are going crazy. There is a type of clover weed that is especially prolific and thick in some areas.

I once asked Steve if he thought it was sexy when I used the power tools - he said, "no, just convenient." Oh well! I have become more self-proficient with my projects, but I think he still gets nervous when I get going on something, thinking he is going to have to get involved and bail me out when I get in over my head.

Come on Spring and warmer, drier weather!

Our House

Steve said to me the other day, "I just really like this house." It has certainly been a labor of love for us - it was a fixer-upper in more than one sense of the word. The couple selling it were going through a divorce, it had been gutted for a remodel that they never finished, and they were terrible hoarders - junk was everywhere - in fact, a couple of rooms were just piled high with clutter.


Oh, and there was taxidermy everywhere - nothing against stuffed animals and hunting trophies, but just not my idea of interior decorating!


So, we had to look with creative eyes and hearts and see the potential for the house. We started in last June and worked through the summer remodeling from top to bottom. It was a great team effort with my artistic eye and Steve's attention to detail. Steve kept a tight punch-list and we made it just in time with the essentials - literally the oak flooring was laid right before we moved on August 15th.


We have had some continuing projects once we were in the house but they have been more leasurely. Now we are enjoying our little family life here. The doggies love the back yard and the doggie door we put into the family room for them to go in and out. It is a nice home built with love.

(Blackjack is sniffing some critter on the edge of the sidewalk)

Here are some more before and after photos:

(Steve put in a skylight over the front entry and it really
brightens up the whole place.)

(The family room sliding glass door is the common reference
point between the above two photos.)

(The Master Bedroom/Bathroom vanity)

So, yes, I echo Steve's statement, "I really like this house!"

Donna