Dippy Land

I recently returned from a lovely time in the cold and rainy California. Coo and his family were nice enough to ask us to go along for the fun. I'll just post some pictures for your viewing enjoyment.

The whole crew, minus me before we scarred J for life at the haunted house. You'll notice that we're wearing badges. They are I.D. badges that have everyone's phone numbers on for lost kids and lost Coos. I chose a Disney Character that we had a resemblance to for the front of the badge. Any guesses who was who?
Ma & Pa on their scooters in Tomorrowland (I rented one, too). What can I say? They were fabulous. They held all of our junk and provided rides for tired legs.

Ma entertaining E with a scooter ride.

J Chillin' with Gramps and eating licorice.


Aunt Roo and her shadow.

A and her Rapunzel doll. Yes, I am a sucker of an aunt that bribes nieces and nephews. It's my job. A few of A's favorite rides--It's a Small World, the roller coaster, and Alice in Wonderland (She had several more, but I can't remember them all.)


J and his "build your own" light saber. He refused to have his picture taken without the light saber across his eyes. I also heard he light-sabered baby sister E and had a bit of a time out. J's favorite rides were the "shoot the bad guys" ride (Buzz Lightyear) and the up-and-down go fast ride (Gadget's go-coaster).


A happy E. She was really good - and is a pro at rolling over. Unfortunately E didn't get bribed. I found there really doesn't seem to be anything souvenir and baby friendly at D land. E didn't tell me what her favorite rides were, but she seemed to enjoy most of them, but found It's a Small World a little long for her attention span.

If you can't tell, a fun time was had by all.

P.S. J & A, we left all the ghosts, pirates, & Bug's Life at D-Land. Hopefully, you'll forget these life scarring events, but I don't have much hope. I'm still recovering from the E.T. & Santa Clause incidents when I was 2 or 3.

P.P.S. Maggie the dog's heritage--50% Australian Shepherd, 25% Border Collie, some terrier, a bit of collie, and smidge of Bull Mastiff and Argentine Dogo. Yup, the test confirmed that she truly is a mutt

Corn, a few quilts, and vacation

Corn Season has begun here on the farm!




And here are a few quilts Ma and I have finished:
Sewn & quilted by me and bound by Ma.

Sewn & Bound by Ma, quilted by me.
All by me!
This was supposed to be a baby quilt, but ended up a little big.

And some pics from my vacation to visit Da in Montana. We also went to North Dakota and Saskatchewan. Please read her blog for details on the trip.

Pitchfork Steak Fondue at Medora, ND.


Me and Da as Mounties at the RCMP Museum in Regina, SK, Canada

Traveling the gravel roads of Canada


One of the fabulous murals in Moosejaw, SK, Canada


Da in front of the Moose of Moosejaw

On the Road

So, I've been having a lovely vacation up in the Northwestern United States. First, I stayed with my cousin Bee and her husband DaBee. I had a lovely time. We went to the Salmon Festival in Issaquah, where we saw the fish swim upstream and spawn. We also saw many little booths. On Monday, we went to the zoo with the kids that Bee babysits, where the search of garbage truck seemed to be more entertaining than the animals to the little ones. I, however, enjoyed the animals. After my nap, Bee and DaBee took me out to eat, and Bee and I followed that with clothes shopping (I needed new clothes because I am too fat for my old ones :). Tuesday was my last day up in the Seattle area. Bee and I went to Pike's Market, and then had lunch at the Space Needle, followed by a quick trip to the Sci-Fi and EMP museum. It has been lovely. I am now spending time with Coo, YooCoo and family. Enjoy the pics below. Just kidding. The pictures won't load, so pretend that you pictures of me at most of the places above.

Because MBCB said I should

Well, a certain MBCB has requested several times that I post about my recentish cruise, so here goes. I went with FarmerBoy to the Western Caribbean. I'll try to get a slideshow up with a few of the very few pictures that we took.

Day 1
Our flight left at about midnight from the Las Vegas airport. After our extended five hour drive (we needed books and goodies to survive), we got to the airport four hours early and I actually slept on the flight for a couple of hours.

Day 2
We got into Ft. Lauderdale, waited in the airport for a couple of hours before taking a shuttle to Miami on Superbowl Sunday. Traffic actually wasn't too bad. We got on the ship about 12:30 and promptly went to the buffet because eating is very important on a cruise. We took our tour of the ship and wasted some time before dinner and then went to bed early because I was exhausted from being up most of the night.

Day 3
At Sea. We spent the day going to trivia competitions, reading, sleeping, exploring, and various other things around the ship. This might be the day that FarmerBoy went ice skating on the ship and I went to the shopping seminar to learn about all of the great shopping deals that mostly applied to diamonds and really expensive watches.

Day 4
Costa Maya, Mexico. We were supposed to go parasailing here, but this was canceled because the weather had been bad the day before and all of the parasailing ships went to cozumel. We did, however go snorkeling. The snorkeling was diffiicult here because there were some waves, so we would swim and swim and not move much of anywhere. Next, I proceeded to get most of my silver jewelry and quite the sunburn on my back. I'd been to Cozumel before and knew that they didn't deal much. We also purchased a hammock chair, pagan mask for my parents' bathroom collection, and a cute little dress for Nookoo. I felt pretty good about my bargaining skills. I'm only willing to pay so much for earrings that I'll lose half of

Day 5
Lamanai Ruins, Belize. We took a bus for an hour and a half to a boat. We then took a boat ride up the river for about an hour to get to the ruins. Farmerboy saw a crocodile in the river and I saw sticks. He is a lot more observant than I was. On to the ruins. I thought they were fabulous and very cool. And we saw and heard howler monkeys, which was lots of fun. FarmerBoy climbed to the top of the building and took a picture of me sitting at the bottom as seen in the slideshow.

We got back about 20 minutes before the last tender to the ship and that was our day.

Day 6
Cozumel, Mexico. Again, we went snorkeling. The snorkeling here was amazing. Beautifully clear water and calm as can be. We stopped at three different locations and saw starfish and a turtle and tons of fish and coral and all sorts of cool stuff. The tour operators gave us the most delicious melon to snack on. We spent several hours snorkeling here and the tour guide was great, pointing lots of things out to us. We continued on with my shopping, getting the pearls for $1.50 an inch (I knew that shopping seminar on day 1 had to be worth something), as well as numerous lucidore (sp?) masks, and some T-shirts.

Day 7
Grand Cayman, Virgin Islands. We actually got to sleep in this morning, since our excursion wasn't until 1:30 or so. We went to Stingray city and held and kissed stingrays. No, we did not get stung and die. We then did a little bit of snorkeling there, which was pretty lame after Cozumel. I finished out my shopping with seashell necklaces and then we headed back to the ship. Grand Cayman is not my favorite place. Mostly it has high-end jewelry stores, which I'm not going to buy things from.

Day 8
At Sea. More random activites, art auctions, eating, and packing to go.

Day 9
Disembark at about 10:00 and spend many more hours waiting in the airport until our flight at 8:30 p.m. I did not sleep on the crowded plane this time. No leg room, and annoying people who thought that they should stand and talk all the way through the flight! Get into Las Vegas, spend the night and lose my .mp3 player somewhere along the way. Boo! I just bought it from S.Q. last summer. It may yet show up somewhere.

Day 10
Drive back from Vegas. Car quits at St. George exit. Mechanics can't figure out why. Car stops at New Harmony. We add more gas (the tank was not empty) and made it home safely.

Randomness
FarmerBoy and I found an old couple from Florida to team up with for our many trivia games. We did pretty well together, winning all kinds of useless stuff as pictured in the slide show.

As mentioned above, I burned my back pretty badly the first day that we were out, even though I used sunscreen. I just failed to reapply it. I spent the next days snorkeling coming out of restrooms and asking little old ladies if they would please line my swimming suit straps up with the white lines on my back. They were very accommodating.

I did spend some time in the Diamonds International stores collecting my free bracelet and charms, which I refer to as my DI bracelet.

You could eat 24 hours a day on the ship because they had a sandwich shop and pizzeria open 24 hours a day. The teenage boys loved the pizza place. We always went to the buffet for breakfast, and varied lunch between the pizzeria and buffet. Dinner was the dining room or buffet. A couple of the nights we went to dinner it took us 2 hours to eat, when we could be done in 30 minutes at the buffet.

FarmerBoy and I did not try the wave rider, but we did watch other people wipe out on it. Whenever it was going, you could watch on the T.V. in your room. We also did not do the rock climbing wall, because I am a wuss.

The Las Vegas and Ft. Lauderdale airports have very few entertainment options for those spending many hours there. Well, Vegas has slot machines, but I don't gamble. I find Chicago and Denver to be much better for those reasons.

Well, there is a long and boring post for you. Let me know if you have any questions I can answer about the cruise world.

P.S. The photos of FarmerBoy in the slideshow are for NooKoo's enjoyment because she loves her Uncle FarmerBoy. The rest of you close your eyes!

P.P.S. We bought the pictures of us with the stingrays. We didn't take them.

New Post because Roo said I should.

So, Roo said that I should write a new blog post. January, as always, has been a very big month at work. I have accomplished the following there:
1. 65 W-2s prepared and sent
2. 30 1099s prepared and sent
3. 6 943s prepared and sent
4. 1 940 prepared and sent
5. 6 State withholding forms sent.
6. 3 Annual meetings attended and minutes taken (1 to go on Tuesday)
7. 7 Board meetings attended and minutes taken (1 to go on Tuesday)
8. Hundreds Voting cards made for said meetings, and we actually used some this year!
9. 6 Nasty accounting reviews
10. 24 Hours of Comp Time, and 1 sick day.

Needless to say, my month pretty much consisted of work, work, work! Farmer Boy and I are going on a Western Caribbean Cruise. We leave Saturday at midnight. Hurrah! We will be doing much snorkeling. I have been purchasing much sun gear--spf clothing and hat, sunblock; water-proof sunblock; biodegradable, water-proof sun-block. I also had to purchase a new swimming suit, and the most unflattering board shorts that you have ever seen in your life. Good thing no one but FarmerBoy will see me.

There you go--an update from me. I'll leave you with a picture of me in my fabulous new spf sun hat. It makes me look like an old lady. Let me know which side you like best, flowered or beige.

New nicknames

Happy Birthday Eliza B!!!

So, after a bit of complaining from the peanut gallery, I suppose that I can change Squidgy's nickname to JooCoo (I contemplated CooJoo, but that sounds too much like Cojo) and his mother's name to YooCoo. However, JooCoo will still be Squidgy to me in my head. Just a not to YooCoo, I came up with the name while visiting you and even told you a few times, but my guess is you were too tired to notice:) If any of you would like to see pictures up to the Northwest, please visit my cousin's blog here. We did take a few photos, but I'm too lazy to put them up right now.

I spent the week recovering from my vacation. I have also sworn off sugar again. So far, I've gone four days without sugar. Yeah, me! Today, Ma and I went to the quilt show. I was impressed. They had 125 quilts displayed, much more difficult than the one I just finished. I'd show you a picture, but I forgot to take a picture before I sent it up to NooKoo. (Yes, I know that I change the spelling every time.) So, if Coo or Yoocoo, would take a picture and send it to me, I would much appreciate it.

Home again, home again

Well, I made it back from Portland safe and sound. Ma and I had a lovely time up there. We visited Coo, Cynth, NuKoo and Squidgy. Squidgy is the new addition to the family. He spent many hours telling me the secrets of the universe; however, I don't speak newborn, so I couldn't understand the secrets. NuKoo spent many hours on my phone, talking to various family members and imaginary people; however, the family didn't speak 2-year-old very well. NuKoo was kind enough to make sure that we were entertained the whole time. She is a very busy child and reminded us of Roo when she was little. It was very fun. We don't get to see many little children around here. I turned NuKoo into a jerky junkie. I didn't think she would like beef jerky, but I was wrong.

On our drive there, I noticed two different signs in Idaho (two to mention, anyway). One was your typical deer sign. The other was a game migration sign. Apparently, Idahoans felt the need to differentiate between deer and other wild game. I'd forgotten how cold Idaho is and how much colder the wind is. Nothing wakes you up on a long drive, like getting out in the Idaho winter without your coat on.

Places of the Dead

Rome--Installment 2

When in Rome, Farmer Boy (FB) and I went to two different catacombs, both of which had very unique and strange smells to them. A catacomb is a place where Romans buried dead people several layers deep. One of the catacombs we went to, Catacombs de San Sebastiano, had tunnels seven miles long, 3 layers down, with sub-levels within the levels. This particular catacomb housed over 30,000 bodies at one point. We only viewed one of the levels of the catacombs. This tour was very large and there were a ton of people.

The other catacomb we went to, Catacombs de Priscilla, was a very small, intimate tour. There were four of us on the tour and the only lighting was a flashlight. There were beautiful fresco paintings in these catacombs, as well as large rooms that we were able to see. In this catacomb, some of the sarcophogi (plural of sarcophogus) were kept sealed. It was really very interesting to see these places and how so many people were fit in such a small place. When we were in this catacomb, I thought what a great place it would be to play hide-and-seek. And then I thought, "that would probably be kind of creepy". I also thought that it would be a great place to hide and jump out and scare people.

On to the next burial places--mausoleums, burial places for the richer. The mausoleums had very decorated sarcophogi and were much fancier than the catacombs. This mausoleum was under St. Peter's Basilica in the Vatican city. These were built with bricks, unlike the catacombs which were dug out of dirt that hardened into rock when it was oxygenated. While there, we also got to see the bones of St. Peter, though I have my doubts whether they were his bones or not.

The next place we saw on our tour of the dead, I found gross and disturbing though FB found it fascinating. It was the Capuchin Crypt. It was several rooms that were decorated to look like a cathedral with human bones. There were thousands of peoples bones in there. There were specific rooms--like the femur room and the scapula room. They made chandeliers and sconces out of bones, as well as wall decorations. You can read more about it here and see pictures. I didn't take pictures because they told me not to, and who wants a picture like that to blow up and put on their wall. I keep thinking that I'm going to have dreams about the bones coming to life and reassembling themselves, so they can chase me. Yes, it did creep me out just a bit.

So there you have it, my tour of the dead or at least where the dead used to be. Sweet
dreams!