Unaware

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

This whole week has a very strange feel to it. GwennieRu is her usual baby self, responding with smiles and interest in everything around her, blissfully unaware, looking perfectly beautiful.

We who have a little more knowledge about surgery and what it entails are less blissful. I am looking at her, drinking in every detail of her sweetness, and more aware of how thankful I am for her, and for this time with her. While I have no reason to expect anything but a good outcome from her procedure, I am so aware of the complexity of it, so aware of the skill needed and the vigilance required… that knowledge alone makes every minute with her special, including diaper changes and fusses and spit ups. All of it.

I feel the same angst coming from her parents as they have video conferences with the surgeon and the anesthesiologist. One thing we talk about is how the messages of support and prayer keep pouring in from friends and family. Many have dealt with similar uncertainties and various kinds of outcomes. It is good to hear that they have been able to walk the path God laid out for them. It is good to hear that they consider our request for prayer as a mandate, a job that they are glad to do for us. They join us as we go into this experience. They acknowledge that God is present and watching over Gwennie. I don’t know how people get through life without a belief that someone better than us is in charge. Times like this show us that so clearly.

This week, some ladies in Julia and Kevin’s church gave me and the other Shirley grandma (yes there are two of us) large gift bags full of things to help us in the surgery waiting room. I dare not eat all that they gave me on my Lumen low carb diet, but the thought was clearly expressed that they understand. A book to read, and reminders of scripture promises help me to know where my thoughts should be directed.

As sometimes happens, when we need it least, the trouble of sickness adds to an already critical time. One of Julia’s coworkers came down with covid. Our exchange student is suddenly beset with sore throat and cold symptoms. We are disinfecting everything and trying to avoid germs. Every time we feel a cough or a sneeze we wonder if we’re getting a virus that will complicate things on Thursday. Kevin doesn’t feel 100% well, and this morning Gwennie is a little “snuffly”. This too is something God knows.

Someday it will be important for GwennieRu to read this and know how she was cherished by God and her people. But for now, one more day of waiting and then, the day of surgery.

Adventures: Minding the Farm

Shirleyjdietz1 Comment

My 6 month old granddaughter’s surgery is this coming Thursday. Both parents are taking time off to stay with her in the hospital for the expected 3 – 5 days in ICU and step down units. I am staying home to mind the farm. My goal is that all animals be alive and where they are supposed to be when Julia and Kevin return.

You’ve heard enough about the dogs. Of course, they get fed every morning and evening (and anything they can get in between).

I’m writing this to see if I remember all the instructions I’ve been given.

MORNING CHORES

In the barn:

1. Feed Rosie the horse, 3 handfuls of horse feed (1 from her previous kind, 2 from the one she’s transitioning to) plus a squirt of some kind of goop

2. Feed Kita the horse, 3 cups of her feed, 2 doses of supplement, 2 scoops of diatomaceous earth, wetted down with a little bit of water. Hay for the day, and check water.

3. Feed Heidi the goat. Small scoop of goat feed, water, hay as needed.

4. Prepare feed for field animals. 2 buckets with 2 large scoops each of horse feed for horses, fill with water and let soak. Also a bucket of all stock feed for sheep – 1 large scoop.

5. Put halter on Rosie and lead her to pasture for the day. Leave halter on gate. Clean her stall.

6. Put buckets and bales of hay in Mule

Rosie, out to pasture
The Mule (an indispensable helper)

In the field:

1. For ponies, goats, rams – throw hay in two or three spots, at least half a bale

2. For horses – dump the two buckets in separate feed tubs, make sure donkey gets a little from the sheep bucket. Hay in hay box, about 3/4 bale. Check water.

3. For sheep (ewes) – dump their feed in feed tub. Put hay in for sheep and Rosie (they share a pasture). Check water. (Question: how do I keep Rosie from eating the sheep feed?)

Field horses and Carlos the donkey, finishing their morning hay

EVENING CHORES

In the barn:

1. Feed Kita, same as in morning, more hay if it’s really cold. Check water.

2. Feed Heidi. Check hay and water

3. Go get Rosie from field, feed her medicine with a handful of her food. Put rest of her food in the stall with her. Hay, couple flakes, and water.

4. Prepare feed for field animals as in the morning.

5. Buckets for horses and sheep in the Mule, along with hay for all in the field

In the field:

1. Toss hay to ponies, donkey and goats, at least half a bale. Check water.

2. Feed horses their buckets as in the morning. Hay again, 3/4 bale. Water should be good if checked in the morning.

3. Feed sheep their bucket and some hay, check water.

Sheep, doing their thing

Adventures at Julia’s Farm: The Haw

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

There are quite a few things that fascinate me, among them are recreational fires (not forest fires!) and rivers. They don’t have to be big rivers either. As a child, I discovered a small creek at my grandparent’s farm and you would have thought I’d discovered a new ocean, even though it dried up completely in dry years. Just the thought of water coming from somewhere distant and flowing past me in seemingly endless supply was so alluring.

That is now one of the most exciting things about being in North Carolina, where there are rivers and creeks EVERYWHERE. You aren’t here long before you notice that most of their roads are named after churches or rivers and the mills and bridges connected to them. Indeed, Riverbend Farm where I am staying with my daughter’s family is on Brooks Bridge Road, and Brooks Bridge crosses the Haw River. The Haw borders the northeast boundary of Riverbend Farm and the riding trail that follows it is one of my favorite places to explore.

Pre-flood, the Haw has some whitewater stretches
The black line shows the river trail. Arrow 1 was our first try, arrow 2 ends at the junction of Shanahan Creek and the Haw where the lake was.

I get to look at about half a mile of this 110 mile river. It used to have quite a few dams blocking it, providing power for early industrialization of the area. One of the dams is along this half mile, just north of Brooks Bridge. There are projects planned to remove some of the dams and restore the river to a cleaner, more recreational use, but there is nothing like that happening on the stretch I see. I feel sorry for this part of the Haw, especially when there are heavy rains like we’ve had this winter. It is swift, muddy and choked with uprooted trees and debris.

The dam at Brooks Bridge

But it is still fascinating to see what a river does, when it is the recipient of a large watershed. “I should go down there and check it out”, I said to myself after our last two day deluge. I had heard reports of water high enough to cover the road, although I could hardly imagine it could happen.

Kevin, Julia’s husband, creates the riding trails through his property down to the river and through 30 acres of land that was clear cut a few years ago. The forest will grow back, but right now it’s treacherous with downed trees, undergrowth of berry bushes, holly and other thorny plants. I followed the trail down a steep hill to the path along the river. Did I mention that GwennieRu was with me in the buggy? Yes. And the hill was steep enough that I turned the buggy around and backed down it. I didn’t plan on having to go up that hill again. So much for plans.

We eventually came upon places where the river breached the trail. Even though the backwaters were not flowing, there was no telling how deep and muddy they were so I had to go back the way we had come.

We tried another trail accessing the river and at the bottom of that one there was a lake where there’s not usually a lake. A small creek drains much of Riverbend Farm and it enters the Haw at this junction. The banks are usually four or five feet above the creek but on this day there were no banks.

The trail down the hill
The muddy Haw at flood stage
Part of the flooded trail
Junction Shanahan Creek and Haw
Flood stage erosion

This ever changing nature of the river, along with the power of its moving water is both eerie and fascinating. Although not in danger ourselves, being close enough to hear the rapids, and see huge trees that have fallen in and been carried along – it’s breathtaking. I can’t get enough of looking and imagining.

Log jams like this are not uncommon and difficult to clean up.

I would love to see this part of the river cleaned up and made navigable but it is far too big of a project for an individual landowner to tackle. Fortunately, most of the time the river is much lower, the trails dry out and life along the river returns to normal. It’s a beautiful place to walk or ride horse, and I feel blessed to finally have an interesting river in my life.

But you will not catch me down there when it’s chigger season, no, no, no. Been there, done that. Just sayin’… (Click here for that story.)

Lumen Experiment, Post #2

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

I should learn never to say that I will do more writing tomorrow when I know writing is not my first priority.

I have been using Lumen for a little over a week now, learning as I go. It is also learning me, which is interesting. It is 95% ready to give me my first flex score, which will give me an idea how adept my body is at switching fuels when needed.

It took two days on a low carbohydrate plan to get my system to switch to burning fats. When I was pretty consistently using fat as the major fuel, I was awarded a carb boost day to see how easily I would switch back. The goal is to move back and forth easily, as needed, which is why it’s called a flex score.

One aim each day is to wake up in a fat burning mode after a night time fast, in which any carbs eaten for dinner are used up. The carbs are always going to get used first because they are the body’s preferred fuel. Preferred because they are the easiest fuel available, but not the cleanest burning.

The Lumen device showed me that I succeeded in being in fat burning mode every day, even after the boost day when I had more carbohydrates.

This is the graph I see when I check in each morning.

1, 2, and 3 are fat burning modes. 4 and 5 are predominantly carb.

How do I feel about the program thus far? There are some revelations that it is showing me. The first one, and one I kind of expected, is that I was a bit addicted to carbs. I always want more bread, cereal, and sweet fruit and berries. It’s not exactly a craving, because I do forget about it during the day, and am not exactly hungry. But I do miss the taste and textures of these foods.

Another problem I’m having is how to get all the protein the plan suggests. I can’t seem to meet the requirement without going over the limit on fat, carbs or both. There just aren’t too many proteins that don’t come combined with other macro nutrients.

On the plus side, logging what I eat is much easier than it was with Noom. Any thing I buy with a barcode is read easily – the app takes a picture of the barcode and records all the nutrients for me. I only have to put in the amount I eat. If the app doesn’t recognize the food by name, I can log the food by putting in the macro nutrients (protein, carbohydrate or fat) myself.

Using the device is not hard, as I can still inhale for 4 seconds, hold my breath for 10 seconds, and exhale for 10 seconds. It’s a sleek, small, and somewhat expensive, piece of technology. I’m trying to be very careful with it but did drop it once (eek!). It sits on the charging station most of the time and has a little bag to shield it when I take it somewhere with me. It’s kind of fun to see it work. Results show up on the app within seconds.

I don’t think I’ve lost much weight yet, but I don’t weigh in very often either. As I said, I’m not feeling hungry very often, and if I do, I can have a lot of vegetables that don’t count in the carb column. So the plan is very vegetable friendly because it allows complex carbs. I’m kind of sad about desserts, and the occasional soda which are discouraged because they DON’T HAVE NUTRITIONAL VALUE. I knew that.

So we shall see what another week brings in the weight loss category. I’ll post results here but I’m not saying I’ll do it tomorrow, because I’m smarter now. (Maybe my mind is getting better, since better focus is one of the promised results of the Lumen program.)

Always Experimenting

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

Isn’t that what life is? An ongoing experiment?

Every now and then, there are enough disturbing changes in my health to make me reexamine what is happening and act. I would say that stress precipitates most of the changes, and that a lot of the stress is unavoidable. Still, to not pay attention and consider taking action that might help is, well, it’s stupid.

That is why I sometimes spend money that I would have thought excessive at another time in my life. The difference now is that I know how much it costs to deal with chronic illness and how limiting it is when my body succumbs to things gone awry. Health care is expensive. I would rather spend now to avoid spending later.

The “thing” I’ve done now is called Lumen. It’s getting a lot of coverage on Facebook, and the marketing is extensive. It’s a small device that measures CO2 in the breath and tells what fuel the body is burning at the time of testing. It helps me know when I’m burning fat instead of carbohydrates. An accompanying app on my phone helps me understand what I need to do to switch from one fuel to another, and when are the best times to do that for optimum health.

Last year (or maybe the year before – I’ve lost track of time.) I experimented with Noom, and learned a lot about metabolism, weight loss, and the psychology of eating. It worked well for me but I gradually stopped using the platform because I felt my good habits had been formed. Then came the illness and death of my husband, the birth of my grandchild, lots of travel, lots of decisions. My good habits took a back seat. Comfort eating kind of took over.

Lumen is very similar to what I learned in Noom, but now I’m not guessing whether I’m in a fat burning mode. I know, because of the Lumen device.

I thought it might be helpful to others and valuable to myself as I look back, to record my experience with Lumen, so here we go.

More tomorrow.

Lumen, a cool piece of technology…

Adventures at Julia’s House: Just One of the Pack

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

In case I haven’t mentioned it lately, Julia is an equine veterinarian. But that does not limit her love of animals to horses, not at all. When I list the animals on Julia’s farm, cats and dogs are usually at the end of the list, and that probably does not give a true picture of the magnitude of effect they have on the family. Specifically, the dogs are an inescapable part of life at Julia’s house. I know, having tried to escape them. So, I will introduce them to you to round out the picture of life on the farm.

Tessa is the oldest, the diva of the pack. She came to Julia years ago as a stray, and has been her faithful companion through vet school and at least four different homes. She is getting stiff and sore, and a bit owly at times. I identify most with her.

You’re getting old when your eyebrows turn grey
Diva dog

And then there is Penney, who was added a year before Kevin and Julia married. I think they got talked into keeping Penney without full knowledge of her. Penney is a yellow lab and her outstanding characteristic is that she’ll eat anything. This was discovered early on when she filled her stomach and esophagus with rocks (yes, they were under the grill and they did taste good) and had to have them surgically removed.

Penney
Penney and rocks

Next comes Moses. One of Penney’s redeeming characteristics is that she is a pretty good mother. Moses was the family’s choice from her first litter of puppies. He is a labradoodle. All I know is that there is a lot of hair walking around and he is in there somewhere.

Moses, Penney’s fine son

All three dogs spend a lot of time in the house. Their favorite places are anywhere that food might be dropped – always the kitchen at meal prep time and under the table when the family meals take place. They also like the same relaxing places that people like, namely, the couch. They are big dogs. They have big paws and dangerous tails, well, except for Tessa. She’s never had much of a tail and no one knows where she lost it.

Life with the dogs includes lots of barking, lots of letting them out, letting them in, feeding, watering and petting them. GwennieRu is already finding them fascinating, particularly when they loom over her and lick her face. When they are turned loose from their kennels in the morning, there is a mad scramble up the steps from the basement and out to the kitchen – you don’t want to be in the way.

One day, I came upon Julia and Kevin discussing ways to find money to cover projects on the farm. I shook my head in amazement when I heard them talking about puppy prices, and how they could have six to eight more labradoodle puppies to sell in fairly short order. Talk turned to action and in a few days Penney was taken to visit her “puppy daddy”. Since mating was not an easy event to schedule, the male poodle came home with Julie and Penney. Now there were four dogs dominating the house, and of course, one of them was in heat. Interesting. Fittingly, the poodle’s name is Hanky Panky.

Hanky the poodle

He stayed for a few days, and kept Julia up all night with his lonesome barking and whining. We were glad when he got picked up and taken home. He did his job though. I have pictures but you’re not going to see them.

You might have gotten the idea that I don’t like dogs all that much, but really, I do. I don’t like the dirt they bring in, the hair they drop everywhere, the dog scaze on the windows, and the barking that wakes the baby and anyone else who’s sleeping. But I do like them as individuals, and they must know it. I have been accepted as one of the pack. In fact, I’m often the one they come to for food or water or petting. They are part of the adventurous life at Julia’s house, and in a couple months it’s going to get worse… just sayin’.

Penney “you’re going to drop some of that on the floor, right?”
You might have thought you were going to sit here, tough.
precious (and rare) moments

Adventures at Julia’s House: Basement Saga part 2

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

The last time I wrote about the basement project at Julia’s house, the studs were being erected to compartmentalize the large open room. (Read about it here.) Since then, people who know about electricity and plumbing have been showing up. Our task was to be ready for the dry wall. We did our best.

It was the day of Gwennie’s doctor appointment last week. Julia, Gwennie and I had been in a rainy drive through the storm called Finn, and then a somewhat disappointing visit with the cardiologist. We were ready to go home and think about the day when we got a call from Daddy Kevin, back at the house. The call was accompanied by video.

“There is water coming in the basement. I happened to be down here and the leak started as I was looking. Did you see the video I sent? Oh, and the electricity is out so I can’t run the sump pump. They say we won’t have power until around 11 pm. Can you find a generator and bring it home?”

It is true that they had talked about getting a generator, because there have been storms before that took out power lines. But all the research necessary for getting the RIGHT generator hadn’t been done yet, and there was the matter of fitting it into the budget. And even now, the timing was not great on that account.

“Thank you God that we don’t have the drywall up yet.” This was Julia, being optimistic. “Can we just come home? We’ve had quite a day, with the storm and all. And I have the baby…”

“If you’re anywhere where there’s electricity, you’re better off than being here. It’s dark and uncomfortable.” That was Kevin, being not quite so optimistic.

So instead of turning off the highway on the road toward home, Julia kept driving north, while calling a good friend to get advice on buying a generator. I figured we were on our way to Reidsville, where the closest Lowe’s store was located.

I am deathly afraid of riding with Julia when she is researching things on her phone, so she graciously told me to look for generators for sale, and people who knew how to install and service them. I was reading reviews and giving her numbers to call. It turned out that it was not going to be easy to make this decision on the spur of the moment, and yet the vision of the water level creeping up the walls of the basement demanded some kind of solution.

I was hopeful when Julia went into Lowe’s. I stayed in the car with Gwennie, praying. However, she came out of the store later without a generator.

Back on the road, and still continuing north, I asked her where we were headed.

“I ordered a generator online from Sam’s Club. I had to choose delivery tomorrow because the order can’t be processed this late in the day. I did it online because there was only one left in stock. I didn’t want it to be sold out from under me! But we need it tonight, so we’re going to go get it.”

“But where are we going?” I asked this as we crossed the state line into Virginia.

“Danville, that’s the closest store that had one.”

When we finally arrived in Danville, the baby and I only stayed in the car a few minutes before she started crying (and before I had to go to the bathroom). By that time Julia was somewhere in the far reaches of Sam’s Club country and I couldn’t find her. After the restroom, we paced back and forth by the checkout registers, Gwennie, in her car seat, in a shopping cart, waiting and wondering.

Would the only generator in the store still be on the shelf? We were in a bad storm area and probably weren’t the only people suddenly needing a power source.

Well, some things about this story did turn out good. Julia appeared with a huge box on her cart. It only took about 20 minutes to find out how to change the sale from online to “immediate and off the shelf”. It only took two huge men to lift the thing into the car. It only took another hour to get home, and by then the power was back on anyway.

Remember, it’s all about the basement – that place that’s being remodeled so that someday Grandma can sell her trailer and have a room in the house when she visits. There will undoubtedly be another storm, and another power outage, and perhaps a need for a sump pump. But now, we have a generator, just sayin’.

Adventures at Julia’s House: Finn the Storm

Shirleyjdietz3 Comments

We found out, shortly after her birth, that GwennieRu has a ventricular septal defect, a VSR for short. The murmur that the doctor heard led to a cardiac ultrasound and it was seen that there was a hole between two chambers of her heart. Because of the kind of tissue the hole was in, it was fairly certain that it would not correct itself as she grew. But we hoped and prayed for that anyway, because it was still possible.

Gwennie had a cardiologist appointment last Tuesday afternoon. We were eager to see if anything had changed. Julia had made sure she was free to take her at 2:30 pm, and I wanted to come along. As the morning progressed, I wondered if the predicted storm would make any alterations in our plans.

Around 1:00 pm Kevin showed me the weather radar on his phone. “There’s a band of severe wind and rain coming across your path at just about the time you have to be traveling,” he reported. I wondered if he was thinking that we shouldn’t go, but no more was said.

I made sure Gwennie was ready and the diaper bag was packed as I anticipated Julie’s arrival. Then I got a text from her.

I think lots of things that I never say to people. In this case I was thinking…

Isn’t this kind of crazy?

We have a serious storm out there.

I have only driven your new fangled hybrid car once, and it made me feel stupid.

You feel okay trusting this old woman grandma to do this alone with this precious child?”

Pushing doubt, fear, and good sense aside, I decided I had better get going so I could go slowly and have time for all the uncertainties. Julia and Kevin thought I could do this, so maybe I could.

I packed up the child and carried her quickly through the rain to the car. Car frustration started at once. I discovered the car wouldn’t start until I buckled my seat belt. Halfway down the drive, I saw a warning from the computer. “Service required” it said with a picture of a tire and an exclamation mark. Knowing that service was not going to happen, I kept driving. It didn’t feel like a flat tire, so maybe one of them was a little low on air.

Weather alerts were coming through on my phone. Authorities were telling people not to go anywhere unless they had been ordered to evacuate. There was a lot of flooding on the roadways. About that time, I saw emergency lights ahead where a large truck was blocking my lane. A tree had just fallen across half the road and cars were taking turns going around it on the remaining lane.

The rain was coming down hard as I pulled into the equine hospital parking lot. Julia’s vet truck came in a minute later. I was glad she was going to be driving the rest of the way to the appointment. She scrambled in and we were on our way again.

This storm impressed us both. There was a lot of water on the roads. Sometimes there would be a low spot with enough water that Julia would suddenly grab the wheel tight to keep us going straight. Once, a car in an oncoming lane sent so much water flying through the air that it hit our windshield like a rock, shocking us. Almost every car had flashers on, and we saw several stalled cars when we got into the city.

Fortunately, by that time the band of severe weather was nearly past. The wind was calmer and the rain wasn’t as scary. We made it to the clinic. Julia let Gwennie and I out at the front door and went to park.

GwennieRu, none the worse for her harrowing ride, plays with her toes while waiting for her exam.

In retrospect, maybe we should have cancelled the appointment, but, as I said, it was an important one. We had so hoped to hear that open heart surgery would not be needed for tiny GwennieRu. That was not the case. Surgery was still the recommendation and the doctor made a strong case for it. It is scheduled for February 8th.

They say that children her age recover quickly, much better than older children. The normal progression is 4 days in the hospital and then home, with only Tylenol for pain. Complications are not common, and the expectation for complete recovery and full activity are the norm.

Thank God (and I do) that we didn’t die on the way to the appointment.

There is that element of risk, in varying degrees, to every adventure that I can think of. It’s the adrenaline rush, the seriousness of what one is doing, and what could happen that makes an adventure burn its way into our memories. I don’t think I’ll forget about this one.

Adventures at Julia’s House: Girl’s Day Shopping

Shirleyjdietz2 Comments

I could have titled this “Not the Usual Day Shopping”, or “How Much Stuff Fits in a Buick”. I settled for “Girl’s Day Shopping” because it was shorter, we were all girls this trip (Julia, GwennieRu and I) and we certainly did shop.

Sometimes I dream of taking a daughter to a nice clothing store, out to lunch, and maybe a stop at a nail salon or spa. These are only dreams though, and not really my style. Not really Julia’s style.

But I had offered to help Julia shop for her postpartum wardrobe, knowing that it is a difficult time when you’re no longer wanting to wear maternity clothes, but are still waiting for your body to return to normal. Every day can be a struggle in less than comfortable clothing. So shopping was in order.

We bundled ourselves up – it was cold – and went to town in my Buick Enclave. I had my empty propane tank in the back. Earlier in the week the store had been out of propane. I was hoping they had been resupplied. On the way to Tractor Supply for the propane, Julia remembered the order for animal feed that was now ready for pick up. Normally this would be a job for her truck, but, oh well. It wouldn’t hurt to try to get the 20 bags in the Buick as long as we were there.

Twenty minutes later, the back of the car was nearly full to the ceiling with 50 pound bags of feed and the now full propane tank sat in the second row seat next to the baby.

We were near Big Lots, a fun place to find odd things. I didn’t find much, but Julia found bleach on sale and got six gallons, and a few other things. We found room for them on the floor where they wouldn’t tip over. This shopping trip was already well worth doing.

Returning unwanted Christmas presents was on the list, so we went to what I would call a “ritzy” department store that actually had large departments for every age person, mostly clothing, and no carts for carrying anything like a car seat. I should have opted for putting Gwennie in the front pack, but she had looked so comfortable in the car seat, that I kept her in it and carried it in. I try never to disturb a comfortable baby.

We did the returns, and whizzed past what they called their “sales” where there was nothing we were interested in. I will say that they could do more for their customers by having a cart or two by the door. Why not?

We were hungry by this time and coasted around the outdoor mall for a while in indecision, looking for a satisfactory restaurant and a bathroom. Tropical Smoothie seemed right to Julia since she often drinks lunch. I ordered a salad and a side of sweet potato and thought to sat down and eat it, when Julia asked if I wanted to get going. I didn’t really mind, so the lunch went in a bag and sat on the dash, while we looked for the next store.

TJ Max was our destination. This time I put the baby in the front pack, which was not only easier, but more fun. All the people we met loved looking at Gwennie, and it was easy to go in front of a mirror and let her look at herself and laugh. Julia found a bunch of jeans to try on and disappeared into the dressing room. When Gwennie got bored, we went back out to the car where she took a bottle, and I ate my slightly soggy salad.

No trip to town is complete without a trip to the grocery store. Julie loves to buy groceries. I think it is her way of relaxing, since usually no one wants to go in the store with her. She can coast as many aisles as she wants to and consider all kinds of food purchases uninterrupted. This is rare and precious time.

When she came out with a full cart, to our already full car, we had a fun time figuring out where everything would go. My car cooler took most of the things that were perishable. Cauliflower, lettuce and assorted vegetables went in holes between the bleach and bags of clothing. I can’t remember everything we had but when we were done we high fived each other and felt pretty proud of ourselves. This kind of shopping trip is not for the faint of heart.

I was glad Julia was driving. She said yes, the front of the car did seem a little elevated because of the load of feed in the back, but not enough to impede our progress. We headed home. Shopped out. Well, not really shopped out but there was not room for anything else.

At home, Kevin came out to help us unload. He opened the back door and said “Wow!” We took that as a compliment and proof that we had done something significant. He started hunting for the baby which he knew was in there somewhere.

We found her. She was still smiling too.

And so ended our girl’s day shopping. We got a lot done. For now, that’s the kind of girls we are, and that’s how we shop. Just sayin’…

Adventure at Julia’s House: A Day in the Life

ShirleyjdietzLeave a comment

Mommy = Julia, my daughter. Daddy = Kevin, her husband. GwennieRu = my 5 month old granddaughter. Written by me = Grandma

Last night I walked to my camper at 9 pm. There is a circular drive that I travel, going back and forth. It is graveled and my feet make crunching noises as I walk. Sometimes I walk to the side in the grass so the dogs won’t hear me and start their barking.

Most nights it is very black, with little ambient light, and the stars are amazingly visible and bright. Orion’s belt is directly over my submarine shaped trailer. I stopped and looked last night, and most nights, even though it was cold outside.

When I wake in the morning, it looks like this. Again I am trying to burn this scene into memory because it is so beautiful. I make the walk to the house. Crunch, crunch, crunch.

GwennieRu was lying in her crib this morning, playing quietly with some toys. As usual, it didn’t take much to make her smile. Mommy had gone to work. Daddy was going to a doctor’s appointment. Felix, the exchange student from Germany, had gone to catch the bus to school. For a while it was just Gwennie and me, having the house all to ourselves.

Her routine is very simple. We played on the living room floor, she spent time in the swing while I fixed her next bottle, we walked around looking out of all the windows, we touched the kitty and the doggie. When the fussing started, I gave her “breakfast” and she fell asleep in my arms.

Mama came home between appointments. We had coffee and talked a while and she finished some outside chores, before heading to the gas station to fill the cans with diesel for the farm tractor. Daddy was home by this time and it wasn’t long before he came to tell us something. Mommy had somehow locked both her truck keys and both her cell phones in the truck, with the engine running, at the gas station. She was waiting for a man to come and open the truck for her. Poor Mommy.

GwennieRu and I went outside for a buggy ride. I was pushing her along the wide right of way when Mommy drove past us. She stopped her truck and ran out to give Gwennie a kiss. Gwennie in her stroller is pretty irresistible.

There was another long nap in the afternoon, during which I did some cleaning for Mommy and some for myself. Almost every time I come to “red clay country” I have a new pair of shoes that gets ruined. This time I scrubbed them clean and set them out to dry.

I was determined to have dinner ready before 6 pm today. When Felix got home from school, and he and Daddy were talking sports and dogs (the usual topics these days) I let them know that dinner was in the oven and would be ready in 45 minutes.

That morning when Mommy got in her truck, she had smelled something good and remembered that last Friday (this is Monday) she had gotten a frozen Penne Toscana from one of their favorite restaurants. She hadn’t meant to forget about it and was a little worried that it might not be good anymore. I told her I was willing to eat it. I cooked it and it was wonderful. Mommy has this sign on her refrigerator in the kitchen. It is our hopeful motto.

Mommy had a management meeting after work so she didn’t get home until 7:30, and wasn’t able to eat with us. Gwennie was taking her evening nap. She and Mommy get most of their together time at night, after I leave.

And now, the dishes are in the dishwasher, the leftovers are put away, Mommy and Daddy are having a glass of wine together and talking about their day. It was a pretty good day.

And now I am ready to walk out on the gravel path under the black, star studded sky.