Melissa's Quiet Book is Finished!

Finally, after two months, Melissa's quiet book is finished! I started it March 15 and would have finished earlier, but I interrupted that project to sew masks for people to wear during the COVID-19 pandemic. But it's completed now and I am really happy with how it turned out.

Kyle asked for a sunny theme since he and his family live in Florida. The fabric of the cover depicts things found in the ocean. (I always ask my kids what they'd like to see in their kids' quiet books.)

 I made each page separately on felt squares to give the backgrounds interest.

This pretty fabric is very sunny, but it also has apples on it. That's a nod to the orchard that my family owned and where Kyle and his siblings spent many happy days with their grandparents and aunts and uncle. (This is an in-progress photo - I cleaned all those loose threads up before putting it into the book.)

I could not believe that I could find an appliqué of a beach chair. Ya gotta love Etsy!

This one I drew and stitched directly into the book. My mother drew the palm tree years ago, and I wanted to put a little bit of her in the book since she used to enjoy making them with me. There are some little treasures inside the chest and the monkeys are on velcro and can be moved around.

The flowers can be picked and the snail's shell can be laced/unlaced with the green cord. This is a new page for me. I saw the idea online and adapted it. The pompom grass is leftover trim from another project but it adds interest and is tactile.

 Not only can you braid the princess's hair, but you can put her sparkly hair clips into your own hair.

This was one of my kids' favorite pages when they were little. Kyle's kids requested that I put it in their sister's book for her.

 Another idea I saw online and adapted for my own use. The orange and blue ribbons represent the University of Illinois, the blue also represents BYU where Kyle and Ashley met, and the black and gold are for Purdue.

When you are making a quiet book for a toddler, you have to be very careful that there are no choking hazards. I double knotted these large rings to the ribbon "tentacles" to keep the beads from being pulled off.

The horsey page - representing me! And I am so excited about it. I saw a giraffe idea online and changed it to a horse,

 one that eats the same treats as Abby - carrots and candy canes!

The dog's ear is free and flops around so you can put earrings on it or take them off, put them in the bling basket, or even put them on your own ears. (You can put the princess's hair clips on the dog, too.)

I designed this one for Lukie a year ago and have since used variations of it for Susie and now Melissa.

 Color changing sequin fabric is fun, relaxing, and even mesmerizing.

 Another pattern that I drew. I saw the fabric in JoAnns and bought it, not knowing what I would use it for, but determined to add it to Melissa's book. (I've learned that when you cut it, you end up with sequins all over the floor! I am still picking them out of the carpet.)

More orange fabric to reflect the Illini, the team that Kyle grew up with and has rooted for all his life.

Because the pages have so many three dimensional aspects to them, they do not lie flat.

 Assembling the book can be a real bear as a result.

It won't lie flat, that's for sure! But who wants a flat quiet book? The fun is all the surprises and manipulatives inside that give it that lumpy appearance.

Melissa at home in Florida playing with her siblings' books. (Hers is the twenty-first quiet book that I have made.)

I cannot wait for sweet little Melissa to see it.

A Bucket List Item Crossed Off

For several years I have seen this tall tree in the woods off the road that I travel to get to the barn. I've wondered what those objects could be that are in its branches.

It's about a quarter mile off the road, and so this close up from my cell phone is blurry, but you can still see something odd about the tree.

Fast forward to just a week ago. Knowing that I love birds, Tim Gibb invited Craig and me to come walk through the woods behind his home to see a Great Blue Heron rookery that was located back there in the trees. I put two and two together and realized that that rookery is what I had been seeing from the road.

What an opportunity! Great Blue Herons are my favorite bird, and I knew that they nested in colonies, but I had no idea that there was a colony so close to my home. Craig and I jumped at the chance and met Tim and Loni one sunny afternoon for a hike back through the woods.

 Craig, Tim, and Loni.

 It was quite a journey through the woods and then alongside a creek. The ground was very uneven, but the rough hike was worth the sight of those birds. It turned out that there was more than one tree in the rookery. This was the first tree that we encountered. I count four or five nests in it.

The main tree is the one I had been watching from the road. If you look closely, you can see some adults perched next to their nests. We could occasionally see chicks poking their heads up out of the nests, especially when an adult arrived with food.

 The adults were constantly flying in with food and then leaving to go get more.  A constant chatter from the birds could be heard the entire time we observed them.

 Loni and me.

Tim at the far end of the meadow looking at the last tree with nests. All in all, I counted four trees with 30 plus nests scattered throughout them. My guess is that there are more; we just could not see them all from our vantage point.

I will remember that day for the rest of my life. 

Barn Visit

Sultanna is nearly ready to foal. Tim has been checking her daily, and now that I can drive again (I couldn't until I stopped having headaches from the concussion) I am checking her every day, too.

You can tell by looking at her that foaling time is getting closer.

Yesterday afternoon I met Lisa out at the barn and we spent some time just enjoying the horses' company.

They especially love her because she gives the best neck rubs. Hokey and Trouble were so happy that she came with me.

 Abby got her turn, too. I also checked her rain rot and am pleased that it is healing very well.

Sultanna has the most gorgeous coat, and in the summer it just sparkles. Even in the end stages of pregnancy she is beautiful.

I'll go out later this afternoon and check her again. And I suppose I will be asked to rub a few necks, too.

Not that I mind!

My PenPal, Pepper: Oh, Pepper!

Hallo, Mom!

Are you staying inside and being safe during the pandemic? Lynn and Craig have been staying home, but luckily I still get two to three walks every day. 

Mom, I know that you are really smart and know lots of things, so I wanted to ask you about something that Lynn and Craig say all the time. It's, "Oh, Pepper!" and they usually laugh when they say it. I am a little puzzled about what it means. Lynn said that she would post a few photos to help me explain.

In this photo, Lynn is seated at her desk and working. (She wanted to write, "trying to work" but I told her to take that out.) I am curled up around her legs and holding onto one of her legs with my front paws.  I ask you, why say "Oh, Pepper" to that? 

Here's another example. Lynn says that this photo reminds her of the story about the camel in a sandstorm, asking to put his head just inside the sheik's tent. Then his neck, then his shoulders, and so on until the camel is completely inside the tent. (Makes sense to me. Who wants to be out in a sandstorm?)

All I am doing in this photo is sitting in her lap on the couch. Well, okay, I'm not supposed to get on the furniture, and I did start out by just leaning on her. But she can pet me so much more easily if I am in her lap, so it just makes sense to climb into it. (And how does that relate to camels??) 

Now, in this next example, Mila and Lukie are visiting our house. I am trying to get them to play by rolling around on my back and offering them three of my favorite toys - the donut (Lynn says that is donut #42; eye roll!), my donut-shaped squeaky red ring, and Squeaky Cow.

Lukie and Mila are hanging back, unsure what to make of me. (Lynn did tell me that their other grandma's dogs are not very nice to them and that they are a little afraid of dogs.) I rolled and I wriggled and I tried to be so cute that they would come play. And what happened? I hear, "Oh, Pepper!" yet again.

Now, while I am not allowed to get on the furniture (um, true confession, I do get up on it at Nacho's house but Lynn doesn't know. Shhh!) I am allowed to sleep on Lynn and Craig's bed. It took me a while to convince them that I belonged up there, but they FINALLY accepted it, and so I hop up whenever they go down for a snooze.

So, why did Lynn wake up and go, "Oh, Pepper" when I snuggled up beside her and stuck my hind paw in her face? She puts her hand on my side while I sleep; I am just returning the favor. 

And sometimes she reads in bed. If she can bring a book to bed, then why can't I bring my kong and Squeaky Reindeer to bed, too? As you can see, I kept them right close by me (in case she wanted to play during the night) and they weren't bothering her. So why the "Oh, Pepper!" remark?

This last picture is just for fun, although it probably was an "Oh, Pepper" moment, too. I am cuddling Squeaky Cow between my front paws as I lie under the dining room table and make puppy eyes at the camera.

So, there you have it, Mom. Knowing how smart you are, I am sure that you can explain the "Oh, Pepper" phrase. It doesn't really bother me, but it does puzzle me. 

In the meantime, I hope you, Dad, Ursula, and the kitties are doing well. Give everyone hugs from me.

Happy, wriggly licks,

Pepper

The Risks of Cleaning

I've mopped my floors probably thousands of times. I know that wet floors can be slick. I know to be careful. But it just takes one moment of forgetting to be cautious to wind up in the emergency room.

Yesterday just before lunch I finished steam mopping my floors, waited what I thought was enough time for them to dry, and then walked down the tiled hallway to get something from our bedroom. Suddenly my feet went out from under me and I fell head first into the door jamb, smacking the side of my head right into it.

I knew right away that it was not good, and having had several concussions before, I figured out quickly that I had just given myself another one. I waited a few hours - I absolutely did not want to go any place where I might be exposed to COVID-19. But finally I called my doctor who directed me to go to the hospital immediately.

Due to the pandemic, Craig had to drop me off at the door where a nurse put me into a wheelchair and took me back for triage and then into a bed. Non critical patients were placed in the hallway with screens between us. And since they didn't want people in the ER to stay very long in case of exposing them to COVID-19, treatment and testing went quickly and I was in and out in an hour and a half. 

My nurse had a great sense of humor. As she wrote out my release papers, she asked, "How about I put in your release note, 'Patient should never mop floors again?'"  We had a good laugh over that.

I'm lucky - no skull fracture and no brain bleeds, but I do have a good concussion. Even twenty-four hours later I am still nauseated and have a headache. 

No barn for me for a little while, but Tim knows I won't be out and said he'll give Abby extra good care until I can return. And my fingers are crossed that Sultanna won't foal while I am homebound!

Staying in Touch During a Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has shut most of the world down. Thankfully, there are ways of staying in touch during the pandemic. Julie, Kate, and Susie have been using social media to talk with me. Recently we had a little impromptu fashion show. 

It began with Kate sending me a text with a photo of herself in a cute horsey tee shirt.

And then a Marco Polo where she described the horse on her shirt and told me about the "lines" on it. (I think she meant the reins.)

Sweet little Susie chimed in, just to say she loved me.

I decided that I would send a Marco Polo back and show Kate my own tee shirt.  She loves rabbits and bunnies even more than unicorns and horses, so I grabbed the only article of clothing that I own that is even remotely connected to bunnies.

My Jackalope tee shirt, a tongue in cheek gift from my friend, Nancy Kelly. (Nancy knows I really dislike unicorns, and the tee shirt says "Jackalope - Not everyone can be a unicorn.")

 Well, that opened the door to three more Marco Polos.

Next I got to see Kate's color changing sequin unicorn shirt. "It goes easily back from gold to silver," she explained as she ran her hands up and down the sequins.

Julie got on, only she didn't want to show me her clothes, she wanted to discuss her passion, birds. (Including the fact that some cultures make soup out of birds' nests.) She also told me about the juvenile robin that had spent some time on their patio but then "Its mom and dad found it" so everything was okay.

I slipped over to the bush in our yard where a robin is making a nest and sent back another Marco Polo showing Julie that nest, a hummingbird nest from last year that we'd found when we'd trimmed our clematis a few days ago, and the barn swallows' nest in the arch over our porch. (And where two bluebirds roosted at night last winter.)

As I stay home during the pandemic, I sometimes feel isolated, even with Craig and Pepper around to keep me company. I am very grateful for social media that allows me to stay in touch with family and friends. Talking about everyday, normal-life things like tee shirts and birds' nests brings some normalcy into the craziness of the world right now.