Green Bed at FallenTree

This is the site we were digging at. The eggs were about walnut and slightly bigger sized and have shown opal,agate and crystals of calcite with a really interesting green matrix that polishes really well. It has in itself a beautiful pattern. It must be a lot of jasper. The other site we dug here produced larger baseball & bigger sized eggs. I found one that has agate, opal, & moss in it. It has an ugly matrix but it is quite interesting.

main dig for Fallen Tree eggs

Jerry just emptied my collecting bag from this trip in prep for a fossil expedition and out popped a really ugly egg but ended up being quite attractive. We have so many thunder eggs now that they have 2 shelves dedicated to just them.

We are looing into putting in an 8×10ft swim in place pool in the front of the house. Jerry has done all the

work to look into it and we have met with an architect. We have pretty much picked out the pool and are planning on getting it done next spring. I could use it 6 months of the year. I would use it daily which I can’t do now. I have been swimming 2x a week for the past several weeks and must admit I need to be doing more of it. I feel so much better getting the regular exercise and when it is hot it is the best thing to do to stay healthy. I look on it as saving my life or at least adding a few more years. I am most excited at the thought of doing this despite having to spend the $$. Oh well I think we are worth it.

The kids: Timmy & Cleo are fine. They are the team bunny killers. Timmy is fast enough to catch them as they try to escape the yard and Cleo bury’s the evidence to savor for later. I hate seeing the cute little bunnies. Today Cleo corned a mouse in the rock garden by the driveway. She was hell bent on catching that mouse so I put on gloves and caught it to throw outside the fence. A fighting chance you know.

I transferred my medical after so many years in Portland to the Bend Clinic with a nurse practitioner who I really like. The whole clinic is really mellow and nice. Not at all like being in Portland.They use St. Chucky here for lab work so don’t have to wait to take specs to Portland.

Going ammonite hunting tomorrow. Jerry found a bunch of wave points and we have heard there can be some nice specimens so we are out on an adventure. Jerry really needs the exercise as do I even though I walked from the clinic to the auto dealer today-a very healthy walk. I always feel so much better after getting some kind of exercise even though it was 30mins it was good. Such mundane tasks today-DMV visit to renew license, copy newsletter, take car in, actually do shopping (hated it). I used to enjoy shopping but whenever I go in large stores like Bed Bug & Beyond (our new name)- it is overwhelming. Best Buy is the same way-I just want to get what I need, get out and breathe again. a bit of my neurosis showing here.

Bunnies have been out galore. Jackies and cotton tailed both. We have a new lettuce drop for them so we can see them from the dining table. We have a morning & evening show if we are lucky. The dogs, especially Cleo, sense there is something there we are focusing on but all Cleo will do is go out on the front porch and bark. When we get the addition in she’ll want to be out there I bet. Too cold to finish up the swim season here in Prineville. Damn weather. At least I got to swim for 6 weeks this year. Soon if we can swing it we’ll have our own pool to use till we leave.

As far as immune stimulating factors I already get adequate sleep, exercise, eat well, don’t drink to excess or smoke and am not under a lot of stress. The only factor I can figure might play a part is I do have a tendancy to push myself to the maximum. So I am now being a couch potatoe and playing games on my puter and catching up on this blog, as well as watching funny movies and reading till my eyes cross. I don’t have to worry about the garden anymore as summer has finally come and we might actually get some corn and beans as well as our lettuce and tomatoes. I have a greenhouse tomatoe plant that is bearing nicely and we will have those tomatoes before the garden ones by far. Our little desert rat ,(ground squirrel), is getting his holes plugged with poison as he decided to start knawing on our nice tender lettuce. He has taken down half our peas this year even while they were under covers. We haven’t found any new holes since Jerry plugged his others with nasties. We had an ugly Colorado Potatoe Beetle that we conquered by using a natural Bacillus pesticide. The taters are blooming and looking very healthy. We are just keeping our fingers crossed the corn will get a chance to come on and ripen before our first frost in Sept.

We are doing an interesting CORC field trip with a geologist the 24th of this month to study the caldera that Prineville sits right in. It should be a facinating trip to find out what happened here so many years ago to create such beautiful rock.

I don’t know when I started this post but its high time I finished it! The ER in Portland screwed up royally by loosing my stool specimen (I know TMI) but its important as it really makes a difference in tx. So we have to go on empirical info as the docs keep telling me. I did resort to using the patient advocate to report the incident because it took me over a week of phone calls to find out it was lost, meanwhile I am running out of medicine. I finally got into a VA clinic close to our home (only an hour away instead of 3), and was given a script to take to a local safeway who doesn’t carry Vancomycin, nor does Costco, the other place I could take the voucher to get the VA to pay for it. So back on the phone to the doc to get her to send it via computer to Portland so they can mail it to me. Meanwhile I am using an expired solution that has funny particulate matter floating in it until you really give it a good shake. Makes me want to scream at incompetence especially being from a nursing background. I just keep my fingers crossed that I can hold the sx at bay until I get fresh meds.

On a good note it’s been beautiful, warm and nice with occassional thunderstorms-the garden is growing like it should have a month ago and we just might get a squash or two before long. Lots of cherry tomatoes and Roma’s are forming too. Beans, beets, corn, radishes, lettuce, onions, carrots, and more on the way. We keep our fingers crossed that no early frost in Sept. will hit us.

Our sick boy Timmy

Should I come in where it’s cooler or stay out in this heat? What a quandary Timmy was in this day-a very hot Sunday just 4 days ago. He stuck his head in and stood this way for oh so long. We laughed and thought he looked so cute-little did we know our guy was getting very very sick! He’s a Low-Chen/ lion dog- who loves to cruise the property and munch on all kinds of things; he also has a preponderance for rolling in icky, smelly things which he had done earlier this day; requiring a back porch bath. That evening we noticed he wasn’t eating and seemed kind of lethargic. He had vomited earlier from what we thought was just something irritating his stomach. The next day, Monday, Jerry & I went to town for swimming & errands leaving Timmy & Cleo at home as usual. We returned home and Cleo greeted us as usual with her incessant barking-ragging at us for leaving her; but no Timmy, which is very unusual. He was in the house very lethargic and sleepy but not much of anything else. As we sat down on the couch he joined us as usual and he felt like a heater on high. I checked his mouth to see if he was dehydrated (learned that trick from a vet), and he had sticky gums, very hot & dry nose. I thought I better check his temp-maybe he was getting heat stroke even though he hadn’t been in the high heat that day, but had the day before. His temp was well past 105 and I immediately called our vet who said, of course, bring him in right away.

By the time we got to Redmond, which is a good 24plus miles from home his temp had gone even higher. His eyes were incredibly bloodshot and he was very dehydrated. The vet immediately put him on IV fluids and drew blood work as well as giving him antibiotics and anti febrile meds. He let us take him home but we had to return with him the next morning to be rechecked. The following morning (Tues), his temp was still over 105 and he remained very lethargic and very ill. His blood work showed he had almost non existent white blood cells as well as abnormal magnesium,thyroid and abnormal cells on the blood count differential. We were dealing with a real crisis that our vet had to figure out! Did he have sudden leukemia? Did he have bone marrow disease or did he have sepsis from an overwhelming infection. Our vet Jim Bousveld, who is great, consulted on Timmys blood work, gave him a liter of more fluids, more injectable antibiotics, antipyretics and sent us home to watch him until he could research his blood results. We returned to the clinic a few hours later with a still very sick dog. By this time Dr Jim had consulted about his blood work and found out he most likely had sepsis from an infection somewhere. He had no wounds, no ingestion of toxins, but did have a tender, firm abdomen. So under the x-ray machine he goes. We find out he has a strange looking mass in his abdomen with lots of air in his gut so now its time for an ultrasound to make sure he doesn’t have a tumor. Coincidentally we do find out he has some scarring in his chest from the Valley Fever he’d had yrs before, and  a slipped disc in his lower spine. Jerry and I watched and helped keep him still for the ultrasound which is inconclusive because he has so much gas in his intestinal tract that the doc couldn’t determine if the mass is an abscess or not. So more fluids, meds and back home we go for observation to return again this morning (by now Wed). By this time he has had so many shots of antibiotics, a lot of IV sticks for fluids subcutaneously, and been  the perfect patient. Dr Jim checks him for Parvo and Tick disease. The Parvo comes out neg (whew), but the tick disease tests take 3 days. But Timmy is starting to rally and wagging his tail, he wants to drink in the morning and can’t figure out why we won’t let him but let Cleo! His temp is still on the high normal side but his eyes are better, he eats some bits of soft food they give him and recheck his white blood cell count. He is making more white blood cells again and the quandary remains-what made him so sick? Dr Jim puts him on 3 antibiotics orally and lets us go home again to watch him; giving him only very small bits of soft food and sips of water.

$1200.00 later we have a healing Timmy! We will keep him on antiobiotics for 10 days and watch him very carefully-get to monitor his temp and poop-what fun. His blood cells will be double checked by the pathologist again and we’ll see if he continues to improve.

This is a scary story because we don’t know what really made him loose the ability to have white blood cells; although an overwhelming infection can do that, its more likely he would have had a very high white blood cell count. Very strange and it could possibly be a tick borne disease or parasitic disease that has done this to him. Time will tell but we are so very fortunate to have the $$ to afford to have spent it on him. So many people can’t afford to help their animals when they get this sick. I read on line that if you have an animal you should be able to afford a vet and I thought what a cruel statement. Yes you should be able to care for them but when a severe health crisis occurs some elderly/fixed income folks just can’t afford such extensive care/investigation. Our vet is willing to take payments for treatment which I think is grand.

One thing we have learned out of this is how to watch for signs of a fever/infection and not to wait too long before getting treatment. If we hadn’t taken him in when we did he could have died. So what I am telling any of you who read this is check the mouth for stickiness,(dehydration will make the gums really sticky,not slick),  look at the eyes for clearness(shouldn’t be bloodshot), and if their temp is higher than 103 take them in right away.

Give your dog,cat,bird,ferret,or whatever pet you have a bit of extra love for you never know what can happen to them and all of us with pets love them and want to keep them healthy!

Rocky tucked into the elms gave us nice shade from the heat

We had a lovely site for shade with a view of the river so Nancy & I could sit & visit while the guys were out fishing. The bugs were not bad at all-I came home with only 3 mosquito bites all on my head and probably attracted because my hair was clean & smelled good. You can notice Rocky’s stairs are a bit high-those are about to get fixed as it was a hazard for all of us to negotiate. The first evening it was so warm we slept with only a sheet & light quilt. The next night it got very cool; we had stripped Rocky of all heavier bedclothes so we resorted to using the heater. It actually got into the 30’s we found out later.

Nancy and I decided to go on a nice little hike into an old mill site north east of camp and found a beautiful waterfall with the remnants of an old mill of some sort there.

This falls is quite tall and could certainly generate some power for a mill

We had a lovely young couple come along as we first arrived and we exchanged taking each other’s pictures. It’s hard to see our faces behind our floppy sun hats!

Nancy & I with the falls in the background-being incognito behind sun hats!

Rhett & Jerry fished both evening and early morning with bites and one small trout-to small to keep-so we had to cook the steaks we brought just in case we got skunked. The elusive steel-head were not running this part of the river yet so only bottom fish (ugh) and trout were catch ables. Jerry’s little trout was a couple inches short of a keeper so for breakfast we had omelette’s & pancakes.

The river along here is fun to watch as many many rafts put in above Maupin and float down to Shearers Falls. It is so peaceful and relaxing and there are many man made areas along the river for dipping into if you get to warm. For me I wore my gel neck cooler, a floppy hat and limited my sun exposure. I stayed very comfortable. The trip went by to fast but we live so close we intend on returning to try again.

Jerry is perusing his supply of flies to see which might be the lucky one

A small riffle out front of our camp site. Nancy & Rhett's tent was tucked back into the trees to the left

Next time perhaps we’ll get to have trout for breakfast or dinner! A nice 2 day getaway for all four of us!

The jewelry aspect of our Moki Stones

more rocks

You can see the Cholla we used as a hanger for the pendants-not the best photo but we made one for bracelets and one for earrings and they are cool. Got lots of good compliments on them. These photos were taken at the Prineville Art Market 2 weeks before Western Daze so it gave us a chance to see how we wanted to display and we still have a ways to go.

Prineville Disposal Drumming Band-best in show

keep the beat now guys!

We had some excitement around here this week. Jerry found a rather moderate sized rattler in our backyard where it would be dangerous for the dogs as it would not leave the yard. So…it lost its head. We kept the rattlers; there are seven which could make it 2-3 years old since they can molt 2-3x/yr. It was big and scary enough to make me not want it slithering along the back side of the house!

about 24-27" long and 7 rattles-"I am not giving up my spot"

olive turq,peridot,silver charm "calm"

Desert sun

Coral beauties

Carnelian Delight

This piece above has a gorgeous quartz center and wonderful red color.

mossy

colors in this are very nice…may change it to leather now that I see the silver in a pix.

Well as I am writing this it is a week after my beginning this post. The market was not a market. It was Jerry & I. The owner of the store was off at a shoot, she’s a photographer, in Nev. She hadn’t done any advertising and no one knew about the market being open. The poor lady left to run the store didn’t really know what to do but did go buy balloons and move one sign. So we had to rely on just people stopping. We made a total of $29 which at least paid or fee for sitting in the parking lot. It’s a good thing they had the lot as no one mowed the field it was to be in. We decided this wasn’t for us again. One point of encouragement was that everyone who stopped bought something!

The following day on Sun. we decided to visit the market in Bend. Jerry spoke with a guy who worked there and we  were told there were spaces. So he emailed some pix and an app. but we never heard a word; we weren’t planning on getting in for 2 weeks. So I called and spoke to a woman who sounded like she was the person to win over for a spot as there is a lot of jewelry right now. She wants something different and we have that. more pix sent and another app and we are still waiting to hear. In the meantime we have gotten a 3 day booth at Western Daze here in Prineville. Its right downtown and gets a lot of traffic for here so we should do ok. We need to make over $70 to pay our fee.

We looked into doing the Prine-tuky farmer’s market but with them requiring insurance from every vendor wether you are craft or food is going to dampen the market a bit. My insurance company wouldn’t even do it for the amounts they wanted us to have and the one referred to us by the market was absolutely outrageous in price, non-refundable and for only doing 2/month for the summer it just doesn’t pay. It did cover bazarres and other craft shows but I never had to have insurance at the art fairs in Portland. My friend who does weaving had never heard of that either.

It is a very good thing having the greenhouse this spring. It is going to freeze again tomorrow night so the heat goes back into it. I have 3 good sized tomatoe plants in the garden in “walls of water” and I have to say they appear to keep those little babies nice and warm. They look like  little turquoise teepees sitting in the garden. We have lettuce, radishes, broccoli, tomatos, potatoes, chives and garlic in the garden now. I have 6 more tomatoe plants growing in the greenhouse along with squash, basil, and flowers waiting in the wings. Those little tomatoes went out after the frost, it got cold again and wiped out all but 2 of them:( So I am keeping one in the greenhouse for the summer as a savior for falltime. I did find something interesting in the garden the other day-a peach pit had rooted and a little peach tree is now growing in the greenhouse. It appears very healthy! It came about by Jerry throwing the pits out there after eating them. I believe it is a Kimberly as that is what we buy mostly.

At the moment we have blankets on the taters, around the beans, around the tomatoes and water wells around the peppers & some tomatoes. I have to admit those things keep the plants very warm. Every  morn I am greeted by the quail. They scratched out my last pumpkin seed so it looks like no pumpkin this year unless I can sacrifice one from the ones I threw away down in the field. Oh the field got mowed this week and it is so nice to see again. We saw 3 Jackie’s this am cavorting around the trees and field.

Hello I am Ms Chubbers-my nickname

nice profile of mom & babe

she was making sounds and funny faces for us

It’s so nice to see her happy and healthy after such a scary start to life. It will be our pleasure to watch her grow and help her learn but most of all to keep her safe and happy and loved by her family

All my tomatoes, basil, daisys, and broccoli are growing well in the greenhouse. It has been so warm that I have to open the door along with the vents to keep everything comfy. I found some Italian Peppers seeds we planted last year so I started a few of them. Hope they grow as they are absolutely wonderful BBQ’d with cream cheese and wrapped in Prosciutto. Yummy!

Timmy & Cleo went nuts today chasing a rather large buck Jackrabbit who has been living along our back yard fence. I don’t know how they know when he is there but they come running from wherever they are and chase him away. Cleo loves to bark at him and he’s almost as big as she is. No more sign of our herd of deer. They must have gone back down to the river. Probably decided its not messing with too little bitchy dogs.

This post was started a mere week ago and since then the weather has gone to crap. We had to travel to Portland on the 19th in a snowstorm and it hailed, rain, blew and generally was like April instead of almost June. We came home yesterday and had to put a little heater in the greenhouse because it got below freezing! How weird is this spring??

We are not living on Earth we are living on planet Hoth! (star wars ice planet).

6x4ft Mt Hood Sunshine Greenhouse on the south side of our house

The vent on the top is really cool. It opens up automatically when the sun heats it up inside. It works by heating up wax inside a tube and lifts the vent. There is a smaller one in the back of the house. The door can be opened half way also. There are already plants inside-Basil, a Passion Vine and various vegetable seedlings that will stay inside until all thought of frost is gone-which may be June/July at the rate we are going.

The top vent open almost all the way

rear vent

Another major project on the list this year is a solar hot water heater for the barn. Currently we have water plumbed to it but it is ice cold without any heat source for it so my dear husband, who is a wizard, is making one. I am amazed at how he can conceive these ideas and then make them work.

beginnings of a solar hot water heater for the barn.

This is the first picture taken of the new to be solar hot water heater for the barn. Jerry found corrugated steel at Lowes, lined it with copper tubing he welded together with an intake/output valve on each end. The copper tubing lays nicely inside the corrugated steel notches!

a closeup of the steel and copper

The next step is to paint it black so the water in the pipe will be heated by the sun.

copper tubing is now black & sitting inside a box

This is almost done! The whole tubing system sits down inside a black painted wooden box made from scrap wood. There is a plexiglass lid that fits over it and the whole mechanism will be mounted on the stable section of the barn. The hardest part is yet to come and that is the plumbing. Jerry found a small 10 gallon hot water tank on Craig’s list that sits up in the loft in the barn and will attach to this baby. Soon we will have HOT WATER instead of frigid, icy, freeze your pinkies off water for working on rocks.

complete & ready for plumbing & mounting on stable

Here it is all done with its cover (wood & plexiglass left over from the greenhouse). Simple looking little mechanism that holds pressure well and should work like a charm. It costs about $200 counting the water tank. Not bad when the cheapest we found online was $1000.

The lower section of the barn-the stable is where the box will be mounted

I am so proud of my husband-the engineer & wizard for being able to create and do these projects for our home. This will keep us off the grid even more and will keep our hands warm.

We had such a beautiful sunny, warm weekend and today it is only 40 degrees and raining. Glad I got some of our gardening done. Now it is off to the studio to try and be creative!

mahjong bracelet

This is made from authentic Chinese tiles that were drilled for me by an old friend in Portland. I have made several pieces-necklaces and a couple of bracelets out of them and they are so unusual they make very great pieces. This one is mixed with bone, antique glass beads,trade beads, carnelian and even yak bone prayer beads.

We are excited to find out that Pinetukey (as a friend calls PVille), is actually going to have a craft market every Sat. starting the end of the month so we have two choices of where to show our work. Everything at this market must be made by those living in Pinetuckey and must be hand made so we more than qualify. It also means I have to be more disciplined about getting into the studio. I am currently working on a really nice jelly opal silver bracelet. We found the opal, tumbled it and drilled it as it was perfect for bead size and makes up into really nice jewelry. It is so exciting when a piece comes together so nicely. Now to sell some of this and get some of our money back. I’ll post a pix of that once it is done which better be by tomorrow!

Janie loved her mahjong bracelet and it fits her to a tee. There will never be another one like it that’s for sure.

I thought I would have studio time today but instead we put up our little greenhouse and am glad we did. It was a gorgeous day and perfect for gettting the little guy up and running. All the seedlings are out there and no  longer taking up space on the dining room table. There is lots of room for seedlings and when they get big enough to end up in bigger pots before ending up in the garden there is room for that also. The temp is nice in there and the auto vents work really well. I must admit it was well worth the $$ it cost.

I worked in the garden also today and did enough diggging for lettuce, carrots, broccoli, chives, and  cilantro. I planted some chives I found amongst the god awful piles of cheat grass. The strawberries are looking good and I dug up the horrible gooseberry bushes I can’t stand. Instead we are planting raspberries where they were. Much more worthy plants!

I’ll try to get a good picture of the new greenhouse tommorrow and post it.

Oh we had a huge herd of deer finally come through and visit us yesterday morning. Quite a site since they were such a large herd. All looked like females but hard to tell when its so early in the season. The first large herd we have seen this year. Hope they don’t have ideas of visiting the rest of our yard like our garden!

a large herd of deer in our pasture

This one just stared at us & was quite large