St. Patrick's Day Parade

The local St. Patrick's Day parade was a two hour affair in which I took almost 80 pictures.  I have weeded through to find a few of my favorites to share.  The boys dyed their hair green for the day, and received tons of attention.

Big angry Leprechaun?

The Vikings are always popping up randomly across town.  I've had them on the blog before.

The police department met with warm applause from the crowd.

Pierce was very impressed by the Deloreans.

We were surprised by how many Shriners were in the parade.  They amused the boys.  

Lots of bagpipes.  Pierce now declares bagpipes his favorite instrument.

Vintage firetrucks of all makes and models.  

A large group of Bolivean folklore dancers put on an impressive show.

We were fortunate to have nice weather for once.

When asked about their favorite part of the parade would you guess what the boys said? 

Catching candy, of course!

Granny Cat

1.  We recently moved our rocking chair (aka Willie's favorite chair) on the porch.  Now, instead of hunting mice all day like he used to do, he sits in the rocking chair on the porch like a little Granny Cat. 

2.  I don't eat cereal for breakfast.  I've never really liked it, probably because I don't really like milk.  But the boys do, and Paul does.  We go through so much cereal in a week. 

3.  I like toast for breakfast, particularly cinnamon toast on my homemade bread.  It holds me over fairly well, too.

4.  I used to love oatmeal for breakfast, but somehow I burned myself out on it.  Now I don't really like oatmeal either.

5.  We got 5 inches of snow on Tuesday.  Luckily, it was too warm for it to stick to the roads.  But I'm wondering when we'll stop getting snow/ice weekly?

Linked with A Rural Journal.

Francie Goes For Broke

How about an update on Francie, our little rescue horse?  She certainly has come a long way since Thanksgiving.  I'd still like to see her put more weight on, and am hoping that as the grass gets more green with spring she will. 

I have been getting on Francie lately, after her lunging session.  She gets nervous.  All we do is walk around the arena slowly.  I do lots of reassuring.  This picture is from the third time I got on her.  She wasn't having the best day.  It was very windy, and she was all hormonal from her first heat cycle.  She had spazzed out a bit when I first tried to get on.  I backed off, reassured, calmed her down and tried again.  That's my approach to training.  Slow and steady.  There are other methods that are quicker, but this is what I prefer.  As we walked around the arena, I could sense that her every nerve was on edge.  Usually she calms down from my voice, but she didn't so much on this day.  I hoped that the neighbors wouldn't go flying by on motorcycles, as they tend to do sometimes; it wouldn't have had a good outcome.  Fortunately, they didn't.  I kept the lesson short, gave her lots of praise, and hopped down.  You can see me petting her neck in this picture.

I am tall, but even so, you can see how stunted her growth is.  She probably won't grow any more at this point, and will always be pony-sized.  My hopes for Francie are to get her solidly green broke over the summer, and then find a horse-crazy preteen girl in Pony Club or 4-H who would spoil her unconditionally and finish her training.  She has a sweet temperament, and I think she'd bond well with the right person.

Isn't it awesome to see how much she has progressed from the sick and unhandled horse she was last November?

Rock Formations

In front of our house, there is a weird rock/concrete formation in the ground, right next to where our apple tree used to be.  I've always wondered about it, because it is man-made. 

It measures about 12" by 12", so it's fairly small.  What could it be for?  It seems a little small to be where an outhouse might have been once (plus, it seems strange to me that people would've put the outhouse in the front yard?).

Perhaps someday I should dig underneath?  What do you all think?  Might there be a time capsule under there?

Shirley

Another picture of Shirley, our sailboat, from 2004.  We bought her from someone in Maryland off of EBay, back in EBay's heyday.  We had some good times with Shirley.  However, my parents sold their lakehouse, and now Shirley has been sitting up in the woods for the past decade or so.  She's become quite the clunker of boats.

But we sure did enjoy taking her out for a few years there.

 

Readers, have you ever been sailing?

Diving in to Spring

Ready for some warmer temps?  Why, yes, I am.

This picture is pre-kids, from 2004, taken at Smith Mountain Lake.  I dug it out recently when looking through some old pictures for one Paul needed of our sailboat.  I'm definitely ready for some warm sunshine, how about you?

Spikes Hurt

1.  Another picture from the 40s.  I'm not sure what kind of bird this is.  In the original picture, you can see that the beak of this bird is long and hook-shaped.

2.  A few weeks ago I took the boys for haircuts.  Normally I do this myself, but I admittedly don't do the best job, and a local hair place was offering $5.99 cuts.  While talking to the 3 different hairdressers as they were cutting the boys' hair, I suggested that Reid get his hair a little spikey on top, like his older brother.  Reid immediately got all upset and said he didn't want spikes.  I said okay, since he seemed to feel very strongly about it, and later I found out that he thought getting spikes would hurt.  Well that makes sense!

3.  We like to watch survival shows.  I have a new favorite.  Dual Survival.  We just watched the second season, and it was my favorite of any season of any survival show I've seen.  They just give really unique and creative tips for all sorts of scenarios.  Plus, they are amusing. In one of the final episodes, Cody and Dave are in Kentucky, and Dave (who refers to himself at times as a hillbilly) says that the P.C. term for hillbillies is Appalachian Americans.  Love it.

4.  The other day I picked out a Taste of Home recipe for dinner, and I didn't pay much attention to it other than that we had all the ingredients.  When I finally went to cook the "nacho cheese bake" I realized as I put it together it was quite possibly one of the most unhealthy meals I had ever made.  Ingredients included egg noodles, green olives, ground beef, nacho cheese soup, cheddar cheese, diced tomatoes, green chilis, tortilla chips, and ranch dressing.  Wouldn't you know - the kids went crazy over it.  They said it was weird, at first glance, but then they cleaned their plates.  They especially liked the green olives in it.  I have to admit - it was good.  Maybe it could be a once a year sort of treat.

5.  Now that it's spring, will it finally stop snowing?

Linked with Nancy's Random Friday.