Sunday stills, Landscapes, Fall Foliage

Sunday stills for this second to last weekend of Oct.
This is the Klickitat valley looking south, you can see Mt. Hood in the distance. That is the Klickitat River. This country is a lot different from 50 or so miles away where we live. On this drive you go from Fir trees and scrub Maple to Oak and Pine forest, it is a very dramatic change.
Most everything up there, the fall colors are yellow, very little red or orange.

I found a little orange and red in this fruit orchard that is at the end of its cycle. Near the town of Husum in SW Washington state. The foreground is blurry because we were driving.

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Some architecture on Friday

I have to look up more when I am in town. This is from when we went to the Camas Days Parade this year. Downtown Camas Washington. Some of the old buildings are so pretty, the detail that they do not put into buildings these days. I love the relief designs on the facade of this building.

Some more detail on a building across the street. Very pretty. Is it to costly any more to make buildings pretty? And the next pictures are from across the pond.

The next pictures are taken by my daughter Sara in Iraq. She wanted me to ONLY post some of them on my blog, that said, these pictures are copyrighted by my daughter and I am posting them with permission, so here are a few for you to enjoy. This is the ceiling in the Al Faw Palace. Talk about intricate detail.

More ceiling detail in another room in Al Faw Palace. I love the colors here, the rich turquoise and subtle browns and greens.

A close up shows much more jewel tones, purples, pinks, greens, reds, beautiful detail.
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And Al Faw Palace from the outside, I wonder if Hussein, appreciated the beauty of the place. I hope you enjoyed a little architecture today, from home and exotic locations.

And.... this last picture is where my daughter has to live for the six months she is in Iraq, on the left, fancy tents, at least they have air conditioning, which only works at night when the heat isnt to much for the air conditioners. When I talked to her on Wed. the temp was a cool 97 degrees!

Hunting season

September 1st around here, hunting season starts, Hubby went for a ride with Bro-inlaw#1 and they got a grouse, we have Ruffed Grouse and Blue Grouse around here


Oct. 17th, Meg and Dad are up at dark-thirty and read to go for a drive up to hunting country, me I didnt get to go this time, Dublin had his puppy evaluation on that Sat.

My Dad never took me hunting when I was a kid, I never hunted until I married my husband. I have harvested a cow elk and two deer in the last 20 years, LOL it doesnt seem like much but it is a lot of fun, and not all about killing the animal either. We wont get to hunt much this year Hubby doesnt have any time off, with his new job and all, so we will go when we can, weekends or what ever. Just to get out and be in the Mtns is good for the soul.

Macro Monday....

What is it with dog noses LOL my Macro Monday is late today, havnt had much opportunity for picture taking lately, this just cracked me up though, so I hope it gives someone else a good laugh too!



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Sunday stills, the letter C....

I thought I might have a problem coming up with some C pictures, well seems not LOL I found some good ones!
The first is the C-at, in one of her favorite perchs, her name is Amber.


C-rawdad! These sure were good when we cooked them up this summer! It still amazes me that they are reddish dark brown before they are boiled, and this bright red-orange after cooking.

And the C-amas Days parade and a couple of cute C-amelids, or Llamas LOL

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Puppy Saturday

Dublin had to go to Gresham today for puppy evaluation day. The drive over to Oregon was miserable! It rained soooo hard, and its hard to drive in that much water, traffic slowed down to 30mph a couple of times because of downpours.

Guide Dogs had to cut down on their staff so the CFR's are stretched pretty thin with big areas to manage and can not get around to every puppy club to see and evaluate puppies. So they asked all of us in our club to go and meet our CFR (havnt figured out what that stands for yet LOL) and see how our puppies are doing. Happily Dublin is a confidant good little guy, we have been having some potty issues, but are working on that and will take a stool sample to the vet on Monday.

We went for a walk with the CFR and Mike our club leader and Dublin did wonderfully. He walked over grates in the sidewalk and manholes and stairs, all with good forward confidence, He did catch his reflection in windows every once and awhile and want to play with the other puppy! LOL But all in all for a 13 week old puppy, he isnt afraid of anything, and seems to take it all in stride. Now if we can only get his bowel problem figured out, loose stool and 1 or 3 am in his crate, is not fun, and most of the time it involves a mini bath for him too ((sigh))) But we are working on it, poor little guy doesnt mean too.

Dublin is only 13 weeks old, so he will grow and get better. The only other problem that might hold him back is a lower canine tooth that is growing in, so the tip hits his upper gums, we will watch and see what happens when he gets his adult teeth.

These puppies have to go through a pretty rigorous mental and physical evaluation and there are quite a few things that can cause them to be career changed, they dont fail, but get changed to another job or go to live with their original raiser or someone that wants to adopt.

I think Dubby is a little Rock Star!! LOL that is until I am cleaning up poop at 3am!! Gotta have a sense on humor!!

Excitement last night!

(obligatory cute puppy picture) LOL

We had a bit of excitement last night. Early in the afternoon the power went off for a couple of minutes, no biggy it came back on. We have been having a bad wind storm and some rain, just figured a tree fell against the lines. Around 9:00pm last night the power went off again. The power was flickering and I thought the light bulb under the stove hood was going out. I was getting ready to take the puppy out to potty. Then it went dark! LOL

Meghan and a friend, Kelby came up on the back deck, telling me to call 911 we were on fire WHAT!!!! No not the house, the power pole out front of the house had caught on fire! They had been out in the garage talking and watching TV.

I went out and turned off our main breakers to the house so we wouldnt have a power surge when or if the power came back on. Kelby called 911, and that was entertaining LOL he is a volunteer and paid fireman in the county, (He worked on the forest fire from my previous post) and he had to think about what phone number to call LOL uh what number is 911 LOL needless to say we gave him a bad time LOL. (He is used to using the private numbers for the 911 office)

A fire truck and two firemen came down, Kelby met them out at the road and they walked up our driveway and shined their flashlights on the pole, and said "well, since there is no fire, there is nothing we can do" "PUD has been called" and they headed on their way. I decided to call PUD just to make sure they were coming, glad I did because the dispatcher didnt know there are three houses on this transformer. She said someone was on the way.

About 10:50pm I called Hubby and told him the power was out and the transformer out front had blown! I caught him just as he got off swingshift at work.

I hung up talking to him, yes we still have a landline, as cell phones dont work down in the hole we are in, about this time we see the PUD truck go by, and Meghan runs down to the end of the drive with the flashlight and flags him down. He was checking poles along the road and this pole is down our driveway about 150 yards, we are a ways back off of the road. He comes in and setts up his truck and replaces some little doo hickey circuit breaker wire connector type thing LOL(like that LOL) and says the power is back on, about this time Hubby had pulled in the drive and Bro in law was out talking to the PUD guy and they asked me if me had power, duh, not until I turn the breakers back on LOL so I did and wahlah, the miracle of electricity! Comes back on!

It is about 11:30pm now, lights back on, Hubby is home from work, time to go to bed! LOL actually we were up 'till about midnight watching TV.

The puppy slept through the night for one of the first times too, and it was a short night for me LOL he went into his kennel at 10:30pm and woke up and a little after 6am. I hope he keeps this up now!!! I have been a bit sleep deprived, due to the little guy.

Thats the first time in the 43 years this house has been here something like that has happened! I hope it doesnt happen again!

Excitement over, nothing happened today really, I fixed the stall wall for now and since it wasnt raining hooked onto the bedsprings with the quad and drug the horse piles in the field, its supposed to stay wet here all week so its a good time to get it done. I also cleaned stalls and fed the mares a little early. The rain means I am feeding them inside now.

Thursday I have my MRI I had to reschedule so I wanted to get some stuff done before I am sitting around feeling crappy after anesthesia. It takes a day or two to get that out of your system.

So what kind of excitement have you all had?

Fire scare....

We had a local wildfire over the weekend. Not fun, had friends that were within a couple of miles of the fire, and worried about having to evacuate their homes, a few people left for safety but the flames didnt come onto private property, the fire stayed on DNR land and burnt about 60 acres.
Here is the smoke Sunday morning. The fire was probably within 20 miles away from where we are.


The helicopter carrying water to put on the fire. The copter flew over all day Sunday, back and forth. We have a young friend that was up fighting the fire, he has some awesome pictures of it! Forty foot flames and fir trees looking like torches! Wow!

LOL I cheated on this one, a picture of the newscast, this country is very very rugged and steep, covered in mostly fir trees and heavy heavy brush. In 1902 there was a huge huge forest fire here called the Yacolt burn, the largest in Washington state history! So needless to say people are punchy about forest fires around here! I have seen the old stumps left from the Yacolt burn, with the old saw marks in the bottom of them where they cut down the snags, with a hand saw, after the burn, amazing!! (You can google Yacolt Burn, if you are interested).

Fire was put out for the most part on Monday, and the wind has been blowing to beat all! Which wasnt good for the firefighters, but rain is coming in, rained Tues am a little, wind is still whipping! Feels like winter! A freind on Facebook asked who switched on Winter! LOL brrrr. Snow on Mt. Hood and snow in the Columbia Gorge this morning! I think we are going to have another bad winter!

Sunday stills, Photoshop....

I play with my photoshop programs all the time. I have several, each one has its merits, but each one does different things, depending on what I am wanting to accomplish.
I thought this turned out cool LOL, it would make a cool quilt.


Using antique or sepia setting, to treat a picture of the midway at our County Fair, I thought it turned out cool.

And Luxor, I retouched this only in the background to make it a uniform black, the lighting was great when I took this picture. I love how this turned out too! I dont think I can do this with Dublins color LOL, he doesnt reflect the light. This looks like an old velvet painting to me, remember those?

To see more Sunday Stills, go here http://sundaystills.wordpress.com/ Enjoy!

303 posts! Wow....

Wow! It has been almost a year I have been blogging now! A lot of you have been with me for awhile now! I have 63 followers as of today! Awesome, thank you for being interested in my humble doings! My year anniversary is still a month away I cant believe it, November 10th I will be blogging for a whole year, I want to come up with something special for my anniversary, will have to do some thinking and planning.

You all have been with me as I blog about my kiddos.
This is the last picture I have of our son John, the last time he was home, he surprised us! It was good to see him.
Our Daughter Sara got married January 30th! I cant believe it still LOL I am so happy that Meghan and I were able to go!

Meghans last year through doing WAHSET, what a cool program! Then Meghan graduated from High School! There was a time in the last two years I didnt know if I would be here to see either of these lifetime milestones!!

Of course the horses in my Bubblebath, LOL, Easy, Mickey and Emma. I started with posting my memories of all the horses I had as a kid, and wow I am still going! And you all are still interested in reading!!

Our dogs, and the Guide Dogs program, Luxor, who is now in phase 10, almost done with his training and waiting to be matched up with a blind person, who will be his lifelong partner and vise versa.

To getting Dublin, so we can cry again when he goes back, LOL, if he makes it through the vigorous standards.

303 posts! wow I may not make it to one a day at 365, but it will be close! I am enjoying this ride! It has been fun, who knew after all I have been through I would have an online Blog?

Here is to many more posts!! And thank you everyone for reading, and posting replys!

Waggin Wednesday....

Ok I had to come up with a day to show the Puppy pictures!
How many positions can a puppy sleep in LOL....

Gravity is helping here LOL

He is so little here is this pic!

LOL I just have to laugh at him!

He wants to be a big dog, here he is still about the same size as Teddy, now he is twice that size! He is growing quick!

Just too sweet.

He loves to sunggle up and sleep with Jessie when I am cooking dinner, she tolerates him realy well!

Well there are the cute Dublin pictures for the day!! Enjoy.

I love this comic....

Labradors think they are the center of the universe LOL Good thing they are so cute!

MRI today, bleck. Be back tomorrow.

Macro Monday...

Warning! Shameless puppy pictures! Ahead!


Sleepy puppy.

What do you want, I is sleeping....

Got my toy!

More pictures! Doesnt he have the coolest eye liner?

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Sunday Stills.... Happiness is....

This is my Husband, Rick, he makes me happy! He has stayed by me through a car wreck and brain tumor surgery, he is the best! We are coming up on 20 years of marriage in June of 2010!
( Sorry this one is way overexposed) He is my HERO!

Seeing our youngest graduate from High School this year, with her Guide Dog Luxor, who was her Senior project.

And being able to ride again after all I have been through, makes me really happy!

I told someone the other day that the Lion has pulled me out of the herd twice, thats enough!

For more Sundays stills go to http://sundaystills.wordpress.com/ and see what makes everyone happy!

My latest stupid moment....

Ok we have had this frost free faucet in the barn for years. This Summer I started filling the trough in the pen 1/2 way and leaving the hose in it so it was convenient to just turn it on to fill when I walked in the barn, feed then turn it off when I was done or the trough was full.
For weeks I couldnt figure out how Easy was drinking so much water, and then, no the trough has a hole in it somewhere. Yeah I know what your thinking LOL it wasnt until I put the hose in a regular bucket and the bucket was empty an hour later....hmmm duh moment LOL Now this was a matter of a couple of months to figure this one out LOL

These faucets are made to drain back down and out a hole in the bottom of the pipe after you turn them off. They siphon back, so all this time I thought the trough had a hole in it the faucet was just sucking the water back out and into the ground duh! LOL At least I finally figured it out! My laziness caused me to think I had a problem I didnt have, the trough is just fine, now I pull the hose out of it after its filled and.... go figure no problem with it holding water. LOL Easy was probably wondering who was drinking her water too!

So has anyone else done something silly like this? LOL Or do you want to admit it? LOL LOL At least we have a good well and the water wasnt running. When I told Hubby about it he just shook his head and laughed at me. So that was my recent duh, moment, uh or stupid moment however you want to put it. So the moral of this story? Dont leave the hose in the trough when you have a frost free faucet!