Mike and Marilyn's Anniversary

My brother and his wife celebrate their 40th wedding anniversary next weekend.  Since their children gave them a vacation on Mackinac Island as a gift, I brought their gift from me to them yesterday.  Hubby and I took them out to dinner and I gave them a quilt.  Since Mike and Marilyn have moved to their new home they have been quite interested in birds. I hand dyed the sky material and got the shape of the tree from the Master Gardeners book "How to trim a pear tree." I appliques the blossoms on and almost 30 different birds.  I worked on the project for 3 years.  Back 40 years ago I got together with one of my girlfriends and introduced my brother to her cousin. That was a good thing to do.

Sewing for Granddaughters

I finished a stack of clothes for Sofie and Molly. Now I want to wait until they try them on. Sofie wears a pattern size 1/2. She has shorter legs than Molly.  Molly's clothes are size 2 and I am really worried they will be to big for her. The pattern says it is for babies 34 inches tall  but they look awfully big to me. Sofie will be here to visit the first week of June and Molly the first week of July.  Oh, their mothers will come too.

Handicapped Parking Tag

Today I took my Mom to get her handicapped parking tag.  Of course she dosen't drive but we need one when we take her to the store or restraunt. They insisted that she have a doctor's signature that she needed one.  (Being 95 was not a large enough criteria.) The doctor signed that she had a permanent disability. (old age).  When she got the tag, the expiraton date was 12/21/17. I said to her, " did you notice the date?" She said,"Yes it's my birthday."  I reminded her the tag expires on her 100th birthday.

Penny and Sofie

Last week I spent several days in small town Ohio babysitting my grandchild, Sofie. Friday Hubby and Penny came down for the weekend. It was a little hectic. Penny understood "leave it" when it came to toys on the baby's play table, but Sofie. 13 months old, would hand the toys to Penny and she just couldn't resist that. It was a fun weekend. One of the things we did was go to the Cleveland west side market. They had everything there. Mary who loves to cook had a marvelous cookbook called "1000 Mexican Recipes." This morning we had chili rellenos with scrambles eggs and bacon. Marvellous.

Bad Puppy Trainer

Today we took Penny into Costco, which we have done several times before, only this time she did a big dump in the center aisle by the wine. I had all my cleaning supplies with me and even used a Clorox wipe on the floor. The manager was there and called out the big cleaning machine, Hubby called it a Zamboni. On top of that we were so shook up we forgot the wine. The night before, at obedience class, our puppy counselor talked to us about Penny's behavior at the vet.  We knew she had been terrible, but didn't know the vet wrote a long email to our puppy counselor saying the dog was out of control. I came home and went off of my weight watchers diet and had 2 glasses of wine.

Penny Update

Penny, our puppy we are raising for Leader Dogs for the Blind,is getting much bigger.  She is a 45 pound golden  retriever. She is a real challenge.  I think she is settling down a little more.  She walks on a loose leash beautifully unless she is distracted.  She goes down and sits nicely, unless distracted.
Housebreaking was a breeze. We have had some trouble with her being "mouthy."  When she gets excited or distracted, she tends to bite our hands, never breaking the skin.  She also eats anything she can get her mouth on, furniture, plants, especially pieces of cloth, Kleenex, or napkins. She also barks when she gets excited or distracted.  Did you notice the frequency of the word distracted? We take her to obedience class every Tuesday where we are often the focus, as the other dogs in class distract her. We have her until September 1st of this year, by then it will be terrible to have to give her up.

Happy New Year

Wow, I didn't realize it had been that long since I posted. I guess I will have to add a New Years Resolution to post more often.  Every year I make the same New Years Resolutions.  You know, lose weight, exercise more, play the piano more, read more, the usual. I am certainly not bored, but maybe boring. Maybe I will make a New Years Resolution to think of a more exciting resolution.