Here it is April the 12th already~~We are so excited to have a new grandbaby in the family as of yesterday morning. This little bundle of sweetness made her appearance early in the morning around 7:30. From what I have heard all is well at this point. We will be able to make a visit to see mom baby and the rest of the family in a day or two.
The winds have been blowing blowing blowing here for what seems like an eternity. Bringing with them the snow, the hail, and coldness. Even with sunshine the wind bites through one. I wonder many times whatever happened to April showers bring May flowers seems more like March went out like a lion and April has not figured out that it IS April ~~in the meantime we keep the fire stoked and really enjoy the cozy comforts of the inside of our home.
I did manage to get my first batch of diapers and diaper covers sewn and shipped only to find out I was suppose to do them a little differently than I did but I am thinking that all though that is a bummer the good thing is they are all done the same in that batch so the next batch will be done the way they should be done.
A week-end long birthday party for our youngest daughter was fun. Friday was her actual birthday but she had to work. We did have some streamers up and balloons and made a nice supper and spice iced and sprinkled cupcakes for her. Saturday some long time friends came out for supper and birthday celebrations with her and a friend of hers stayed the night. Sunday her oldest brother and family came out for the afternoon and early evening. That was fun unless you were one of the cats. Haha All of us had fun watching the otters in the river. And the merganzers swimming around in amongst them. Busy river. And one mustn't forget that we had a nice visit from a magpie yesterday too. We do not get to see magpies often here so it is great fun to have one come and spend the day even if the dogs do not approve!
This morning the ranch lies in cold greyness. The crows flapping by landing on the hard ground strutting about looking for what ever they think they can find to eat. They are quite busy building a nest in on of the big spruce trees on the river bank.
Our golden eagle has not been seen the last couple of days but the bald headed eagles are back taking up residence in their huge nest down where the two rivers meet. They like to sit in an old tree at one end of the little islands here out the kitchen window. We get the privilege of watching them as they watch the river for fish.
Our son and his wife said they saw a bear on their way out here yesterday so the bears are up and about now. That means they will be hungry as this part of the country does not exactly have any berries growing as yet. Last spring at this time our friends down the road a piece lost a ram to a hungry bear. A hungry angry bear at that. That was a scary scene.
We do not have sheep or really anything that a bear would be interested in for to eat so that way we will be safe from angry hungry bears. It just kind of makes one walking in the bush a wee bit more cautious.
The house is starting to come to life so I think I should probably get some breakfast rustled up here and get my day on the go.
How beautiful upon the mountains
Are the feet of him who brings good news,
Who proclaims peace,
Who brings glad tidings of good things,
Who proclaims salvation,
Who says to Zion,
"Your God reigns!"
Isaiah 52:7
May the Peace of the LORD be with You
Roxanne
Easter bunnies hop here and there wherever they please here on the ranch. It seems lately that they do not have to follow the rules of staying in their shed shelter. No matter how you fix it up they can find a new way out. I have managed to catch a few and have them in little cages. There they stay put unable to dig their way out of those so far. Meanwhile we (that is the royal we meaning mostly the man of the house or ranch) is building a new shelter for bunny rabbits. It will have a nice run and three pens so to speak. one for the young bucks, when they are old enough to separate from the mama bunny, one for the young does, and the middle run for the mamas and babies and the daddy. I hope I can find the daddy that is. He left one day and is a gentle old soul and one of the dogs chased him. I have not seen him since but he may be living with the bunnies that are under a shed and coming out and have a great time in the round bales. Like I said they have little shelters for themselves any old place they feel like taking up lodgings. Some are big enough now to put in the stew pot so they may not have to worry about lodgings much longer. And seeing as they did not lay any coloured eggs the stew pot is a very good place for them!!
Then there is the cow! The cow that goes on a rampage ever so often. She charges her big round bale and stomps it to make sure it is good and dead and butts it and continues to terrorize it just daring it to fight back. Puts the chase on the so called "cow-dogs" scaring the tar out of them. Even to the point of jumping in the truck one day! Has become very demanding of her feed of grain. That is alright Jezebel you too are going to end up in the stew pot.
The wind blew over our hard frozen land all this last week. For the Easter week-end the wind stayed with us keeping us nice and cold to the bones. Temperatures dropping way below the freezing point and only rising somewhat above the freezing point during the day. Sometimes there was sun rays shining down upon us. Teasing us. We have had snow and hail too. Believe it or not the river has opened right up. You can tell it is a river now. There is still lots of ice on the banks. Huge huge blocks of ice but the water is making itself heard now. The Canada Geese, the swans and all kinds of ducks are in their glory. Through the night you can hear them chattering away to each other as they drift the river.
Our Easter has been a quiet but busy one here at the ranch. We have seen the odd vehicle going up or coming down the dirt road.
We were invited to supper last night at a neighbour's house. That was a fun time. And a very delicious meal. And a pleasant way to spend Resurrection Sunday to be sure.
Today it is back to sewing, sewing, sewing. I will make our Easter supper to share with our youngest daughter who will be back from house-sitting one of her older brother's and family's place later today.
I will watch the sun rise from its cold bed and the bunnies happily hopping about. Their will be grazing Canada Geese and gracefully swimming swans. Crazed cow. Cautious dogs and yeowling cats. We have a Go
lden Eagle back and even a few robins. Spring has sprung and the big garden is out from under its covering of snow. The flower gardens still hidden under their blanket of mulch (which I lifted up in spots to peak under)lie frozen but there is hope. Seems every year the grass gets green and the buds begin to appear. We do have lots of pussy willows. That in itself proves that spring is here in the Cariboo country too.
The LORD is my portion,
saith the soul;
therefore will I hope in him.
Lamentations 3:24
Praying God's Blessings be Upon You this day
Roxanne
For some time now I have been doing baking for a few friends. Baked goods such as homemade bread:white or brown or varieties. Big iced or uniced cinnamon buns, buns as in rolls, baking powder biscuits and have added Angel Biscuits to the list. Cornmeal muffins is another big hit. I can honestly say that it pays for the ingredients and maybe the gas to town(for those who don't know town is an hour and a half away) and if I am really "rich" from all the baking I may be able to even buy a few carrots for us or butter or a bag of wheat or layer pellets for the chickens. Maybe the dogs will get a bag of dog food or treat the cats to a bag of cat food but not really putting money in the bank.
Now that I am no longer working a few hours here and there at the local little tiny store/cafe I have been graciously invited by a close friend to help with sewing. Her sewing business is called babycanucks and will soon have its own web page. In the meantime whilst the web page is being made up I am sewing up diaper covers that are "sew" cute. and one size fits all diapers. The covers are one size fits all also.
Now another friend sent me a message last night after I had told her what we were doing. She thought it was a wonderful cottage industry. Now isn't that fun? Here all this time I thought it was a survival technique!Well that goes to show one how perspectives come into play.
To give you an idea of how one day is for me here at the ranch I will walk you through one day~~
it usually starts with pulling my legs out from under about three cats and putting my tootsies onto a very cold floor as the window is usually slightly open. Morning ablutions tended to I stoke the fire and start the tea water. Heading for the computer after letting dogs in and dogs out and cats in and cats out.
There is breakfast to tend to. And if it is a baking day as was Wednesday the bread is started. The bread is made by hand ~you know in a bowl mix it up punch it and cover it and let it rise. It makes eight loaves at a time or five and a half or so buns. Wednesday I did not make cinnamon buns so there was five and a half buns that sell at $3.50/doz. seven dozen baking powder biscuits at $3.00/doz, seven dozen Angel Biscuits at $3.50/doz.
I made Mince Pumpkin Loaves two of them for ourselves. Thawed out a gallon of fish soup our youngest daughter and I had made up from the salmons we had last summer. Made moose meat stew for supper. In amongst all that I fed and watered bunnies , walked the dogs. Actually they took me for a walk to get outside.We tried to locate the missing cow. Never did figure out where her hiding place is. There is lots of room to hide in out there but she did come back PTL!! Cleaned house, did four big loads of laundry, cut out eight dozen diapers and a smaller amount of reusable baby wipes. Talked on the phone a couple of times. Watched a movie and went to bed with a novel.
And sometimes someone will say to me ~~the famous line~~"What do you do all day way out here?"
I think I am an occupier or something because I do not find time to be bored that is for sure waaay out here! And so far there is no fear of me becoming rich and famous either. LOL
Honour the LORD with thy substance,
and with the first-fruits of all thine increase:
So shall thy barns be filled with plenty,
and thy presses shall bust out with new wine.
Proverbs 3:9 & 10
Happy Day to you and God Bless
Roxanne
Thursday night a quick decision was made to take our one grandson down to visit his daddy. It was such a quick decision in fact that it may have happened Friday morning I honestly do not remember. I do remember Friday morning though!! Quickly throwing together some clothing to take along with us. So quickly in fact that I actually forgot my toothbrush. LOL Our small animals we given water and feed and given instructions to live and make do until we come back. The bigger animals had a round bale to chomp on. They are good at fending for themselves. Electric heaters plugged in. The fire stoked one more time in hopes that the place would not freeze up before we got back. Stopped in on our way out to tell our daughter and son in law that we were on our way to Kamloops. Big surprise to them as they were at our place Thursday night and we weren't at that point going anywhere. How things can change in a night!
Picked up young grandson and off we were. Travelling was good. the deer around the Williams Lake area were well behaved for a change and in hayfields instead of on the road trying their very best to jump onto your vehicle.
Our visit after dropping of our grandson was to Kamloops where my friend has started a diaper business. She designed cloth diapers and their diaper covers which I had to quickly learn how to sew and put together in a few short hours. Not too hard to make and everyone who has seen them seems to love them but a couple of nurses want us to make adult diapers in the same style. They are having a very wretched time of it with the now present diapers available for adults. That is the cloth ones which they are in desperate need of a better design. Well we may look into that but right now my friend (and I second it) wants to concentrate on the baby diapers. Her diapers are called "baby canuks". She thinks her web site will be up and running in a month. You might be able to view some of them on my facebook page for those of you who are on it at least.
After the sewing "lessons" it was off to see my mother in law and meet our son Harely's new girlfriend. She is a sweetheart to be sure. Gramma or great Gramma depending on who you are was doing not too badly. She is having issues with her one kidney and may have to go on dialysis. We are praying not so. She is hoping to soon go into assisted care.
From there out to the Skeetchetsn Reserve where we ate a delicious homemade supper and stayed the night. Of course there was the usual hints to us of coming back home to live. Maybe someday but not right now.
a quiet trip back home and here we are.
Canada Geese flying overhead. Snow melting. Visitors coming for coffee. Talk of baby calves, sewing, knife making, guns.Later our son in law and daughter came over. He played crib with the papa. We said good bye to him as he is leaving on the jet plane for Ontario tomorrow. Sob sob~~ And now I am cutting out flannel for diaper making. Have cut out 46 diaper cover liners which need to be sewn. Praying I can remember what I am to do to put it all together. LOL
There is so much to get done today that it is hard to not have my head spinning. When I figure out how to do it and it is up and running I will add the diaper website link to this blog of mine.
In the meantime back at the ranch~~the dogs have checked out the world. The cats, at least a couple of them are curled up cozy as can be. The day is moving onwards and getting close to 7:30 so my morning is really starting to get away on me. I have to say though the air outside smells of spring. Even the damp grey rather grim looking morning cannot take away the excitement that spring in the air brings. Robins were even sighted not too far away although I have not seen any here as yet.
For the LORD shall be thy confidence,
and shall keep thy foot from being taken.
Proverbs 3:26
God Bless
Roxanne
Laying all cozy in bed last night with a book and heated up magic bags the window open not to very much the phone rings. Now this might not be an unusual thing to some but we do not get a lot of phone calls at 10 pm. Hey says my friend on the other end whatcha doin' ~~well I am reading why? well get outside and watch the northern lights girl. So I jump out of bed and in bare feet and my flannel negligee and my husband by my side we went out on the front porch and watched the lights flickering across the sky. Not the most spectacular showing I have ever seen but it is always so awesome to watch nonetheless. Finally my feet which were still bare and the temperature being at freezing or lower they were getting kind of cold. So came in and back to my book and warm bed.
Today being Sunday and no fuel for the thirsty truck to spare to go to any kind of church meeting this evening we stayed here doing things. Dennis knocked down a couple of trees for firewood for our oldest son's family. Woody came for a nice long visit and I made dinner for all of us. After he left I punched down my bread and went out and gave Dennis a hand piling branches and loading the truck with the firewood. He managed to get the truck out of the upper pasture even with the deep wet snow. The snow is full of water now with the temps that are so warm for this time of year. We did have a blizzard more so I think than we have had all winter thus far I think.
Now I have the dishes done up and the just about all eight loaves of bread are done.
I think I will settle in for another evening.
Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus
Christ be with your spirit. Amen.
Galatians 6:18
God Bless
Roxanne
Well this has been interesting as since early this morning I have not been able to post anything . As a matter of fact I have not been able to open or even go to this blog of mine. It tells me I am denied access~~
Apparently that is a not unusual thing to have happen but why me?? I do not know enough about computers to have nasty tricks like that from cyber space.
so I was going to tell all of you about the incandescent moonbeams shining on the snow making the sparkles dazzle and dance between moonshadows. I may have been going to tell you all about what I was planning for the day. Not sure anymore being as I got so frustrated with the whole thing.
I am not even sure I trust this internet nonsense now. things might be quicker and all with internet and one may be able to contact old friends and loved ones and even some new friends through internet but oh my what a fine pickle one is in when it doesn't want to work right and you have to stare at in utter amazed confusion carefully touching a key hoping you won't blow the whole thing to beyond repair!
So in fear and trepidation here I be mostly an experiment to see if it is still going to publish this. What can I say~~? If it works then I will actually write about something tomorrow...God Bless Roxanne
