A "fwump" in the night....

I don't know if "fwump" accurately describes the sound I heard last night. I was talking to Molly on the phone late last night as I was sitting in bed and I heard a "fwump"ing sound, like wings beating. The sound came from behind me so I figured some creature was in the little storage alcove behind the wall. I only heard it a few times so the nerves calmed down.

Fast forward to 2:15 a.m. I wake up because of a noise - something fell. What would make something fall? I didn't want to investigate but turned on the light next to my bed to see what happened. I didn't see anything at first, but then saw a bat flying erratically in our bedroom - erratically because the ceiling fan was on. I hurriedly pulled the covers over my head so did not see where the bat went. I woke up Chris so we could both be awake and nervous.

3:38 a.m. Still awake - I'm guessing I'm awake because of the fear of bats. The light is off and we shut our bedroom door and put a thick robe in front of it so no bat can come in under the door. That is, if the bat flew out of the bedroom. If it didn't fly out of the bedroom, now it can't leave. The clock keeps ticking....I know this because I'm not sleeping.

It's the afternoon now and it's been raining most of the day. That means the house is a little dark which means the bat may come out of its hiding place. Everywhere I went in the house today, I went there in trepidation. Is the bat on the shower curtain? Is it hiding on some clothes left on the floor? Did it fly in my closet because the door was open and it's dark in there? Did it go downstairs and decided to spend the day in the curtains? What is its next move?

I love where I live but I can do without these "friendly beasts". I hope I will have no more tales to tell about our resident bat.

Fwump, fwump, fwump.....

Staging my comeback, Part II

Okay, maybe the hairstyle will work. I did my volunteer work and one of the employees (who is young and has good eyesight) noticed I had my hair cut. She liked it and said it was "youthful".

I will now be accepting visitors.

Staging my comeback??

It all started in April. I was walking through Wal-Mart and stopped to look at the books. One title caught my eye -- "Staging Your Comeback - A Complete Beauty Revival for Women Over 45". After leafing through the book, I decided I needed to have it and make a "comeback". So I went home and ordered it and had it shipped to Utah because I was flying out there to attend a women's conference and visit kids and grandkids. The book finally came (the day before I was to leave), but that still left Emma, Molly, and me time to look at all the before and after pictures and get inspired. It really is a great book and I saw myself in some of the before pictures (so did Molly and Emma!!). I decided to look on the book's website and discovered that the author, Christopher Hopkins, has a salon in Minneapolis, MN. Guess where I was going in mid-May - I was flying to Minneapolis to attend a family reunion in Wisconsin! So I gathered up my courage and called the salon to get a haircut to help me "stage my comeback".

Two of my sisters went with me for moral support as I got my hair cut - not drastically, but shorter and kind of fun. It was easy to take care of and I liked it. I even took "before and after" pictures but didn't publish them. The stylist told me to go to my beautician soon after I got home so she could see the cut and copy it. I sort of did that....it may have been longer than she recommended, but I did go and I got it trimmed and it still looked okay.

Well, since then I've been to Georgia and while there I decided I didn't like how long it was in the back - it made me think of mullets and we all know what people think of mullets. So I decided it was time to cut off the length in the back and make it more even. I called my beautician and went for a haircut yesterday. We looked through books and I showed her the style I liked and she asked questions and I answered them in, I thought, a clear manner.

The back gets cut and it looks good...then she started on one side and cut it short, like right below my ear. Now the back is longer than the side again, which is NOT what I wanted. "I guess we got our lines crossed...I thought you wanted it short" were her words. "We must not have been on the same page" she said. "I'm sorry" she said. I bravely smiled, all the while wondering if a person can pull on their hair to make it longer. (You can't.) She finished cutting the other side and trimmed the back a little bit more so it wouldn't resemble a mullet. It sort of looks like a bowl has been placed on my head and then cut around the edges.

There are no "before and after" pictures. I will be accepting phone calls, but no visits for the next month. I am going to stay secluded on my little farm and sit and watch my hair grow.

I have pictures!!!

Emma just walked me through the process of adding pictures to my blog - thanks Emma!! I know I'll need help again until I get it solid in my head. Fortunately, I'm on Emma's 'Fave Five' list, so we didn't have to hurry through the process. It's tough to teach an old dog new tricks.

I downloaded all my pictures from my camera - all 52 of them, starting with pictures from Emma's college graduation in 2007. Isn't that terrible - so few pictures and so many events in our lives!

As I looked at the pictures which I've posted here, it made me wish for warmer weather. It's in the low teens right now and snowing on and off and blowing. Very cold...anyway, these pictures were taken in November before the loggers started driving up and down the driveway with loads of timber from the woods. They're the "before" pictures, just in case the heavy trucks caused damage to the road which was just rebuilt last summer. It was amazing how many times we encountered a log truck either driving in or driving out of our driveway. Of course, they couldn't back up very well, so we had to be the one to squeeze way over or back up to a wide spot in the driveway. I hate to back up and don't do it very well but I wasn't going to argue with a huge, heavy log truck. Fortunately, they are done cutting down the trees since the snow and ice makes it impossible to squeeze over.

Don't we live in a beautiful spot? I love living in these surroundings.

Find time to read this book.

I volunteer at the local library and I gave the librarian a list of books I would like to read. I don't care if she buys them or gets them through interlibrary loan. My latest list was of new books so we couldn't get them on loan, so she ordered them. I volunteered there yesterday, and four of my book requests were there. The librarian (Jen) let me take two home even before they were put into the system and I read one of them last night and finished it today. The title (which is a big one) is The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society. Odd title, but a great book. I laughed, cried, and pondered through the whole book. I read parts of it out loud to Chris so he could enjoy it. Now that I have finished it, I need to get him to read it. We looked up Guernsey Island and read more about the German occupation of the island during World War II, which is the background for this book.

I'll let you know if my other book is as good as this one was. I love to read and this book carried me to the places and time of the writing. Wonderful characters - it made me want to live there and have them as my friends and be a friend like they were to each other. Enjoy!!

Cat and mouse

We had a nice thaw last Friday, but the cold has returned. We woke up to 0 degrees yesterday and today it was 5 degrees at 7:00 a.m. I think this prolonged cold brought on the problem last night (or early this morning since it was 2:30 a.m. when I heard the noise).

Remember in my last entry I wrote that Otis (the cat) had received a mouse look-a-like catnip toy that he chases around upstairs. I've heard him scrambling around during the night and assumed he was playing. That is, until last night when I heard him running around again. I listened for awhile and then noticed that the sounds weren't quite the same - there was a chewing, slurpy sound (sorry if this is too graphic). I found the flashlight and shone it on Otis who was on the carpet at the foot of the bed. To my dismay, he was not playing with the catnip mouse - he was playing, (actually eating) a real, dead mouse. How disgusting!! As I'm standing on the cold floor, flashlight in hand, freezing, I hear a voice from under the warm covers, saying, "pick it up by the tail and flush it down". Thank you very much. Of course, Otis doesn't want me to take the advice from the voice under the warm quilt, so I have to pick him up with one hand, carry the flashlight in my other hand and go to the bathroom to get some toilet paper so I can pick up the mouse by his tail. I accomplish this mission, go back to the bedroom with a squirming, mewing Otis under my arm, pick up the mouse by the tail, and follow the instructions given by the voice under the warm blankets.

I think the cold weather brought the little fellow into the house but maybe all those nights when I thought Otis was playing with his Christmas toy he was really playing with the real thing. I also think Otis doesn't have to sleep so close to me at night. Two nights ago, he curled up on my pillow and started to lick my face. I wonder if he just got done playing with a mouse....

Cold, cold, cold!!!

We are experiencing a cold spell here in Pennsylvania. When I went outside this morning, I was surprised to see a reading of 4 degrees on the thermometer. If I would have known it was that cold, I probably would have stayed in bed with the heated mattress pad turned up to high. That gift from the kids last year was the best...it is so nice to climb into a warm bed at night. We enjoy it so much we decided to give some away as gifts for Christmas. Grandpa doesn't mind Grandma opening the window at night anymore - he's nice and warm in his heated bed.

With all the snow we have been getting lately, we have been feeding the birds regularly. Any old bread gets tossed out and I love to see their tracks on the snow on the porch. I held Otis (our cat) up to the window to watch the birds, but he wasn't as interested as he used to be. For Christmas, Otis received some catnip filled toys, one of which is shaped like a mouse, including a long tail. Dad and I have both stepped on them in the dark and are relieved when we realize it is only a toy. I'll see the mouse and have to look twice to make sure it is not real. Otis still has energy - he bats the toys around and chases them from room to room. He's lost them a few times but we have managed to find them. We have Grandma to thank for Otis' Christmas gifts.