I say Hello, you say Goodby.

I'm at the point with my mental backlog that it not worth trying to do a long journal entry detailing everything that has happen last.  SO, I'll just ramble till I find a flow and go from there like I always do.

  2016 is starting off on a more promising note then we've had in years.  We have the garden tilled and prepped. We've CLEANED the massive amount of junk and such we've let build up over the years. Now, instead of spread all around the house ts contained into one field. But still. It contained, organized, and AWAY FROM THE HOUSE.  I no longer feel embarrassed when people come to visit. This is coming of the repair of the one of the roof in the shop last fall.  It is amazing how DOING huge projects you've talked about for years is so... rewarding.

We cleared brush and shrubs  away from the living area too. It's one thing to live in a forest. its another to let the forest invaded your living area.  We've put lime down in the garden and in the worst of the cow fields. I'm really excited to see the results from that.

 

  I'm  keeping busy sewing. Or I'm trying to. I'm trying really hard this year to Keep Doing Things. I'm not always succeeding at it (and some night my exhaustion is too much to combat)  I should at least do a post about that some time.

On a less positive note, the last few months have been marked by Deaths. Not just celebrity death (which are all in the same age bracket as my parents) but of the personal kind.  My mother's sister died this past November. Cancer, apparently. 

Crat the Rat Cat died last fall right at the beginning of October of last year.  My dad found two black female kittens, and now we have Trick and Treat.

Cookie the dog passed away just last week. She was 17 years old.

 It's strange having pet that were around when you were still "a kid" pass away.  I turned 32 this week.  I was 14 when we got Crat. I'm still having trouble processing this.  Sometimes I feel like I didn't get my card , or badge, or pin that says "you are an Adult". *le sigh* 

I got a new camera from Inkibus for Christmas. It's a CoolPix L840 and I love it.

Just look at the photos!

Yes, I'm rather delighted with it. :3

Dad  knees are giving out rapidly.  He can barley get up and down the stairs now. It appears that he have to get knee surgery soon, and the right knee is now bone on bone. It's horrible watching hi move around, when we use to call him "the ferret" and he was know to walk and walk and walk.  Hopefully we'll know soon.
In the good new, it apreas  mom dose not have rheumatoid arthritis, but osteoarthritis, which is much more treatable and less life threatening (dad has that as well, in his back, so something to worry about as I get older) 

I still remember my first time...

A resent trip town had us driving in on a cool spring day with the windows open and the sweet breeze blowing in. The air was wet and smelled  strongly of spring rot and  growing foliage. I was enjoying the ride, and the cool air since the air condition is shot in the pickup.  Then I smelled it. Honeysuckle, the bane of my existence. Boy does that bring back memories. Painful, itchy memories. I was about 5 years old when we first discovered I was allergic to poison ivy. I didn't just one itchy patch as a warning.  I had to go for the full body out break.
     We use to live in a little house in town (if you want to call the small collation  of houses and one church a town). It was up on a hill, with woods to the back and a road out front. There was a wall of shrubs along the road, providing some measure of privacy. There was tiger lilies in the ditch and a snowball tree down at the far end of the yard.  And out back there was the shallow puddled that existed over the septic  tank after  it got dug up one exciting month (Visiting family and freezing weather were involved.)
     I remember that spring was wet, and for some reason it cause a wall of  vine that hadn't done any thing for year to erupted in to the most intoxicating wall of honeysuckles I've ever seen. Me and my sister spent all day playing in the wall of flowers... Unfortunately that wasn't the only veining plant growing there.  The details of how fast it took for the blisters to form  are lost to me, but the next few weeks I was covered in chalky pink calamine and oozy sores. I'm sure there are photos of me a swollen up and blistered somewhere in a box.
After that I was banned from going anywhere near the honeysuckles, or anything that had three leaves and  grew on a vine.  Over the years I've had plenty of run ins with the horrid stuff,  some almost as bad as that first day.  Still, forever in my mind  honeysuckles  will be tied in with poison ivy. I haven't picked a honeysuckle since that day.

Thanks for the memory

2014 is gone, and I couldn't even be bothered to see it leave. 

I'm not gonna say 2014 was the worst year, ever, that isn't  true.  But it sure felt like all we did this year was break even or keep our heads above water.There were some good. my mom got the foot surgery she so badly needed to stay on her feet, we have two lovely healthy calves,  we got the new kitchen up and started.  But we setbacks. The one cow we've been trying to get bred won't bred, and the vet finally told us he thought she was a lost cause.  The rabbits are stressing me greatly with their healthy and breeding.  We need to get the shop cranking up more.  Ling to replace, here, there, unexpected expenses. The bull we bought died. It goes on and  on, little thing like that. 

 It was a depressing year death wise too (thankfully for me none close, but).  For artist and entertainers. For equality and right. And for death of the trust and respect some of those people commanded before their true self came to light. Death of the people my parents called friends growing up, 4 or 5 in a row.   One could argue this was the year of many little deaths.

I never really found a gear work wise with my craft this year, and that is depressing me. I haven't been as motivated to DO what I need to do, which is a poor excuse not to do it. But a covente one if you're looking for one.  

Perhaps it's fitting then that we spent the last month of 2014 locked in to clouds and sick.  Not the flu, but damn it, I hope this isn't going to be a tradition of  me spending Dec 26th in bed sick and puking.  Thankfully I was the only one who got that, everyone one else just got achy and tired and choughs. 

I will probably do my yearly "the year in photos" blog in a few days. 

Any way, 2015... Just be gentle. I'm not gonna ask for the moon, not for the stars, not richs.  Just enough to breath. 

So.  So much has happened.  We've blast straight into spring, and are racing off towards summer at a breakneck speed, with barely a chance to settle in.  I'm still choking on the fact that the year is almost half over.  We just got half the garden in, had the tiller blow up, slaughtered about 20 pigs and one goat, had 7 more baby goats since I last posted. To top the stress off, tomorrow mom goes to surgery to fix her terribly arthritic feet. She'll be in bed rest for two weeks, then she'll get the other foot done in six weeks. Just another layer of stress to throw in there. mom will be off her feet, which means one less hand to help on the farm, which is madding right now, but if she doesn't get it don't she'll be in constant pain, so it's a must do.  I know, I'm whining.

 In the good news, my buns started having babies. Thank god. anyway, I hope to get a real update here, it's been a bit. 

Chill out.

Meh.  Right, this post will probably seem a little emo, but I just need to  type. 

I am ready for winter to be over.  I'm physically and mentally exhausted form it.  Yeah, yeah, I know I was complaining about summer last year, now I'm complaining about winter. It been very three very long three months, basically starting right after Thanksgiving.  

2013, in brief, still glimpses

I've desised to do a "year in photos" post.  Probably will do better at summing up the year then I can in words, if my last post is anything to go by. 

Warning, VERY photo heavy.

a slight reflection .............

Time for the year in review post.   The year isn't *quite* over, but it close enough to start reflecting on it.  It wasn't a horrible year. But it definitely had it moments.  We literally  started this year with the traumatic event of our new Dexter  heifer  going into labor with a full term bulldog calf ....  Plus side is we had wonderful fresh milks for 10 months.  We got goats, and Tamworth pigs, we had a beautiful dun calf..... which we lost severely month later heartbreakingly. The garden was..... Underwhelming at best.  I lost a very dear friend, (Still getting use to that one.  It's funny how small thing will remind you of someone when they are gone).   I got to meet some new friends, and got to meet the team from TheOneRing.net  (THAT was fun!) this year.  We had the strangest Spring weather wise I've ever seen .

Still, looking back, the theme this year was hectic, barely keeping up.  We'd finish one thing, and then plow in to another with barely any time in between to catch our breath.  It was exhausting, and frankly I feel like I've aged a lot this year mentally (and physically).  Dear gods, please let the next year be less...hectic.  

Rock falls, everyone dies!

I should have know last night when I couldn't sleep that today would be shitty.  And that thud wasn't ice falling off the roof, cuse the cat never flew off my bed at the sound of ice falling before. Well, life is never boring around here, that's for sure.  Let's see... last time I posted here, I was worried we'd lose power. Thank goodness that never happened, but we did get an inch of sleet and 7 inch of snow. And it been COLD.  No melting all week. and no getting of the Mountain either. At least, not with the vehicles we have.  Yesterday dad and bro attempted to meet the FedEX man to drop off some pagajest...And promptly went in to the ditch half way down the Mountain which then took all day and the bulldozer to get out of. Yeah, that sucked. But today was even better!  

  

That is the chimney. Chimney aren't suppose to go like.  That is bad. VERY bad. 

And there was 5 inchs of frozen ice on the roof (It use to be snow, but due to some rain we got yesterday it all froze into one big sheet of ice) 

All that ice had to come off for us to get up there and fix it. That  took most of the morning.  It was slow, it was dangerous, and nerves were shot by the time it was over.
 

Thankfully, there was a quite fix at hand, or we'd be VERY cold in the house tonight.


Yay, quick chimney! The chimney also dented the roof coming down. That's a problem we haven't dealt with yet. >.>

So, the is liek a ton of ice and rubble sitting on the front door that has to be dealt with at some point, a dent in the roof and a temprory chimney rigged up out of the discarded corpses of other chimneys.

 

And tonight at midnight, the dead rise and walk the earth.

Halloween is tomorrow. I'm finding that hard to believe, though I don't know why. It finally looks like Fall out there (though  a touch warm), wish leaves changing color and overcast skies. There is a call for rain tomorrow. I like rain, cloudy Halloweens. Sunny ones just don't seem right. 

   

The meager decoration I have are up. 

      

And, since tomorrow is mum and dads wedding anniversary, I got them a bottle of wine while I was out


I know NOTHING about wine, but the art on the front just seemed so appropriate! Owls! Spooky Tree!  That how one picks wine, right? Cool art?
Right.... Well, I'll hear back tomorrow how the wine was, they stole the bottle away and I doubt it will make it through the night.
I have my costume mostly finish. As finished as it can be. Pic will come, I promise.
Meh. I wish Halloween was further away. After the is Christmas. I don't want to deal with Christmas. 

In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on.

Internet credits the blog title to Robert Frost, I have no idea if that is true. Fits my frame of mind right now, so there.

 I need some mental sunshine right now.   Ever since my last "life" post back in the beginning of September  It seem like life has been a series of small kicks in the gut.  Follow cut to read on about tales of little tragedies and insignificant woes. 

August was like a fog in my brain, but the road goes ever on.

EDIT: Started this post yesterday, got too tried, finishing it today. 

 Good by August, you were an interesting month. I've been meaning to do a real blog post since.... the beginning of the month.  That didn't happen, obviously.  So, I'll do a rough outline highlighting the good and bad. 

First, the bad.

Cleanse them!Cleanse the world of their ignorance and sin. Bathe them in the crimson of!.............. Am I on speakerphone?

Tonight I am procrastinating on getting back to Very Important e-mail, and Other Very Important Thing because I can't keep my head about me.  Nothing major, but it's been a VERY stressful  24 hours in lot of minor little ways. So instead, I'm going to write about Horror. I get asked a lot if I like horror, and I always say "yes!. I'm finding that isn't the right answer though. See, my idea of horror isn't Saw or Halloween the Remake (even with Brad Dourif in it.).... No, I have a love for the bump in the night, things that go boo! horror.         

  NOTE: SPOILERS PAST THIS POINT.