Terrible the Cat

This is Terrible Twin, one of the two brothers I had at Big Gulch. I loved those two boys. They live up near Baker's Peak now.

Adam and Rebecca

Parade of Lights

Our very own Santa and Mrs. Claus, George and Anne Kidder. George drives the mail truck when he is not being Santa. The beard is all his own.



Terry's sister's daughter-in-law and granddaughter. Ava is the apple of her parent's ey and Grandma Laura and Grandpa Dick adore her. This was the taken at the annual Lion's Club Parade of Lights.

Our orthopedic ward

Terry and I note, with some amusement, our version of Animal Hospital. We have a geriatric ward where the two old-lady cats live. When they come out of their apartment, we have to be very careful where we walk as they are slow moving around the floor.

We have an oncology ward, where Sadie lives--on a pile of straw outside my ground-level office.

And, finally, the orthopaedic ward with Charlie, who is doing quite well. It has not been fun for any of us, especially Charlie. He has a cast on his right back leg and is terribly off balance. His fractured left pelvis has knitted together enough that he puts weight on that leg (at first, he just pulled himself along with his front legs). We, or Charlie to be more exact, have had considerable challenges as he figures out how to pee and poop. I have rarely, since my babies were little, had to worry about poop. First, we worried that he couldn't poop. He can, he just doesn't, thus requiring a trip to the doc who irrigated little Charlie until he did.



As you can see, aside from the cast still on his leg, Charlie is doing well. He actually took the time to bite and scratch me today, which means he is feeling much better.

The cast may come off in four days.

Thanksgiving

I am thankful for my sons, AJ, Adam, Isaac, and for Rebecca, who will soon become my daughter-in-law.
I am thankful for my husband, who makes all things possible.
I am thankful for my old dog, Sadie, who has been a remarkable companion.
I am thankful for my friends (you know who you are) and my family.
Blessings on Thanksgiving 2008.
Carol

Cranberry Relish

Every year for the last 10 or 15 or 20 years, I've made this relish. I love it. Most people don't quite know what to do with it, but it is delicious on turkey and on pork. It looks like ice cream with a horseradish kick, Yum!

Mama Stamberg's Cranberry Relish Recipe
2 cups raw cranberries
1 small onion
1/2 cup sugar
3/4 cup sour cream
2 tablespoons horseradish

Grind together the cranberries and onion, add the remaining ingredients and mix. Put in a plastic container and freeze. On Thanksgiving morning, move the mixture to the refrigerator to thaw.
Makes 1 1/2 pints.

Serviceberry Homestead

November 2008
(Text will follow)

Red Shoes

These are my red shoes. I thought this was a cute picture.

A little test...

This came from my Aunt Valera.

Count every ' F ' in the following text:

FINISHED FILES ARE THE RE
SULT OF YEARS OF SCIENTI
FIC STUDY COMBINED WITH
THE EXPERIENCE OF YEARS...

HOW MANY ?

WRONG, THERE ARE 6 -- no joke.
READ IT AGAIN !
Really, go back and try to find the 6 F's before you scroll down.

The reasoning behind this:

The brain cannot process 'OF'.

Sadie

Sadie with her toenails painted blue.
The groomer did it.

Sadie and Suz

Suz and I share a birthday, including the year! There but for my father being in the service, we would have been born in the same hospital.

In July, we took a drive up to Freeman Reservoir just north of Craig. The reservoir sits at the base of Black Mountain. Sadie is very interested in Suz's trout.

Howdy Davis 2008

Howdy is one of the students in my memoir class. He has had an amazing life. In this picture, he is dressed in his mountain man clothing (some of which he made himself) at a rendevous in Craig. I loved his glasses; they fold up.

Finally, a picture of Natasha

Natasha is one of Terry's old lady cats.

Comment

Caroline sent this to me after she saw the MCR3 blog.
I love this girl.

I love how you are in tune with the land.
You know the mountains and the prairies.
I hope to have that kind of time some day.

Care

An idea for poems:

Andrea Watson, a member of IWWG is issuing a call for submissions: Anthology on Collecting/Poems about Collecting . . .:

“Muse with us about the why and how of what we collect. Proposed anthology looking for POEMS that draw us out of the expected and into the anthropology of collecting. Take us from the universe of small things to universal themes. Dazzle us.

Think:
bottle of dress buttons
religious objetcs
microscopes and maps
basket of mushrooms
pioneer diaries
spongeware bowls
heirloom seeds
dreams and stars

Please send up to 3 poems, each no longer than 32 lines, with a 3-5 line bio and SASA to: A. Watson, P.O. Box 370627, Denver, CO 80237. Deadline: March 31, 2009.
PSC: December 2008

Lee K. Abbott to his son...

...Kelly, who has decided to be a writer.

"Don't write drunk . . . or stoned.
Get a reader . . . be a reader.
Write fan letters.
Show up for readings.
Fret not about fame or fortune.
Take every opportunity to write well.
Rewrite.
Rewrite again.
Pay your bills promptly.
Say "please' and 'thank you.'
Change your oil every three thousand miles.
Write it all down.
The hopes and fears . . . the hand
and head and heart of us.
Write it all goddam down."

I liked this quote a lot. Alana Noell Voth sent it to me, several years ago.

MCR 3 and Fortification Rocks

Today, Terry and I drove up Moffat County Road 3 through the wheat and hay fields that contribute to our rural well-being.

MCR 3 passes John Allen’s ranch and runs through McStay Brothers' property,jogging through the sagebrush and dropping into and out of the gulleys.

The first photo is of three lovely, dancing trees on a bright November morning. I had seen these same trees several years ago. I loved them then and still do.

Then a single tree across the reservoir from the dancing girls.

The long view from the three dancing trees, looking toward Baker’s Peak and Black Mountain.


Great distances separate the families; distance is measured in thousands of acres. This photo shows the land’s contour and human’s efforts to mitigate wind and snow with trees.

My crew: Terry (driving) and Sadie (drooling)


Sadie with her head out the window, lips flapping in the wind.


Compression station in front of Fortification Rocks, known for their sharp edges and lots of rattlesnakes.
div>

Back side of Fortification Rocks: a plowed field with a muddy road. You can almost see a truck full of hunters who had just passed us.
div>

Sweet History--Election 2008

Barbara Hoepp, my friend of many years, wrote this lovely piece to celebrate the recent presidential election. I loved it so much that I'm adding it to my blog.

Sweet History
By Barbara Hoepp
November 2008

As I watched last night,
I pictured a plump, shiny,
bing cherry.

Not the ones that I bought the first week.
Rather, the ones I found the second week.
Bigger, darker and full of promise.

When I bit in, the juice was sweet
and trickled off my lip.
It pleased me.
I wanted to eat every one
right then and there.
I knew that there were more;
I would have my fill!

Congratulations to all of us.
We have taken a chance
to step outside the box,
take this journey together
with a young man who
will make mistakes but
I believe that he will learn,
and we will all be the wiser.

It is time to breathe again.

Our house in Craig

This is an ariel view of our house (middle structure) with our huge crabapple tree on the right. My garden is in the middle of the back yard. July 2008

Mule deer family

I try to carry my camera with me all the time, because I hope to catch a good picture of our town deer. This was taken in winter 2008.

Cedar Mountain

Cedar Mountain is reflected in the pond at Loudy-Simpson Park. The Yampa River runs swift and lovely beyond the pond. Taken in late summer by my friend, Suz Syvertson.

Hunting Season in Moffat County

Coyotes

By Carol Valera Jacobson
2005

On that slow dirt road
is a dead coyote.
Still grinning face lying
by the side of the track.
Carrion birds obliterated
the lamb a bit further down,
but they did not disturb the coyote,
nor have any humans stopped to move it.
A warning.

Town Deer

Craig has a resident deer population of about 200 bucks, does, and fawns. They eat gardens, hang out in deserted yards and rarely get run into. I thought was an interesting picture of a fawn crossing the street near East Elementary.

Working Dogs

I like this picture of the Meeker Sheep Dog trails in early September: the sheep, the border collie, the fence, the mountain.

Origami Haiku

By Carol Valera Jacobson in 2004 while teaching 4th grade students in Fort Collins.

Origami is
fingers, too many thumbs tumbled
in piles of paper.

Juxtaposition,
mountain fold, valley fold, turn
point to delicate bird.

2008 Elections are over, over, over

Wahoo!!

History is made; we elected the first non-white president with a majority of the electoral vote. I'll be curious to see what happens over the next four years.

My writing space

In September, "Poets and Writers" asked readers to submit photos of their writing spaces. They wanted to see each writer's unique approach to writing and how those writers find inspiration, motivation and focus. Some of the spaces on the website were stunningly beautiful and others were austere and barren. My study/studio is a place of organized clutter.



And yes, that is Perry Mason on the small television. I finally have all the episodes and play them over and over. The window on the left looks out at the crab apple tree, the greenhouse and the garden.

What finally happened to Opus?

I've read Berkeley Breathed's comic strip "Opus" for many years. Apparently, Mr. Breathed is retiring and worked out a contest with the Humane Society to find the perfect last episode.

It took me a minute to find the final panel, but it is absolutely wonderful.

The comics said to visit humanesociety.org/opus.

I found the final panel at:

http://www.hsus.org/forms/the_opus_contest.html

Home -grown onions

This is the second group of onions I pulled from the garden in October. I'm learning how to braid them together. Next year, I'll grow a few more.

The Ongoing Story of Charlie-the-cat-who-bites

Yesterday was Halloween. Terry and I woke up to a little crushed kitty. Charlie was probably hit by a car; his pelvis was crushed and his tibia was fractured/broken.

We cried a lot.

We took him to Dr. Wayne who said that the pelvis would heal by itself, and he could splint/pin/amputate the back leg. We opted for the splint because it is the least invasive; it will still be a challenge for Charles--the pelvis is broken on one side and the tibia is broken on the other so there is no pain-free way for him to move. So, soon, we will bring home the little orange kitty who adds so much to our lives. As we said before, our lives would be greatly diminished without Charlie.

It’s that awkward moment when money matters/doesn’t matter and when we, as humans, get to play God. I always dislike these life and death decisions about animals. Through my tears, I threatened Charlie, that if he lived, I would have him declawed and make him live in the house for the rest of his life. Ha! Yeah, right!

Then I swore that after these four pets (three cats and a dog) were gone, we were done with animals! But, a friend pointed out, then I would miss all the joy of having a pet.

Charlie will come home a sore and worn out little fellow. He’ll get better, and we will continue to delight in his antics.

'Until one has loved an animal, part of their soul remains unawakened!