April 19-25, 2020 Garden, Nemesis, Migraines, Cards for Laura

April 19-25, 2020 

Garden, Nemesis, Migraines, Cards for Laura

My buddy, Henry!  

Hello Friends!

Henry actually dislikes having his picture taken; he always turns his head and looks the side or behind him!  It is kinda funny and kinda frustrating!!!

Can you believe it snowed a few days this week!  It was a beautiful and peaceful slow snow with little accumulation that didn't stay on the ground for long.  We also had hail in the mix!  Spring in Michigan is always a toss-up.  The planting I did last week started coming up this week.  I was so happy to see the new growth and hope for a good harvest this year.

Migraines and Headaches:

I'm still stuck in a major migraine cluster that I can't seem to break out of, but I did have three days off from the pain until it really hit hard on Saturday.  I've been trying the new medication, Nurtec, that my doctor prescribed and it does in fact help.  She also suggested I take the steroid, Prednisone, if I couldn't break out of a cluster and I did start that on Saturday.  I will have to take that for a few days, which will hopefully take down the inflammation in my body.  I had a headache Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday.  Then on Saturday a massive migraine started.  I'm looking forward to next week when I'm scheduled for my Botox shots; that always seems to decrease the severity and frequency of my migraines...a little.

Lettuce is coming up very well!  I think every seed sprouted!  I wish the spinach was as successful!  

Kale is coming up in the island bed.

Winter/Summer Clothes Switch:

Since I wasn't feeling very strong on Tuesday and Wednesday, I decided this would be a good time to go through my clothes and pull out my winter clothes.  I brought down my summer clothes boxes from the attic and picked out some of those to add for this summer.  Dh thought I was a little crazy for packing up my winter clothes while it was snowing outside!  He had a point, but I know the warmer weather will be here soon!  I sure did make a huge mess, but managed to get things back to normal by the end of the second day.

Pool Evergreen Bushes Continued:

Dd had helped chainsaw down many branches from the evergreen bushes in front of our pool, but I still had a lot of burning to do to get rid of some of them. I felt pretty good on Monday, so I worked outside pulling vines and scrub trees while I kept a small fire going with the piles of branches I'd been making.  We have a lot of thorny vines around our property and each spring I desperately try to pull up as many as I can while they are just waking up.  By around June they are much more difficult to yank up for some reason, so right now is the prime time for this kind of work.  The same could be said for the grape and poison ivy vines.  I'm very careful to burn the grape vines and never the poison ivy -- the smoke from poison ivy can cause major problems in your lungs so you should never burn that!!!  

Hiking With Henry:

Another great week of hiking in the backwoods with Henry.  He loves being out in the woods as much as I do!  I'm so thankful for our time enjoying nature together.

Chickens:

I'm using the chicken tractors and picking grass and dandelions for them.  Fresh greens is important for their health, so I make a lot of effort to help them get as healthy a diet as I can.  They are all doing okay this week.

Bleeding Heart Plant--I've put compost around the plant this year to hopefully improve its longevity.  For some reason it never seems to have enough water during the summer and dries-up.  I'm hoping with compost around its base it may do better???  Can't hurt!

We are finally enjoying spring flowers a-plenty!

Laura's Birthday Cards:

Heather, my friend in Indiana, was planning her Dd's 10th birthday party for next week and asked us to mail Laura a few cards to help her with her idea of a nod to Harry Potter's Hogwarts letters.  I looked up the font and image of Harry's cards and tried to resemble those; with the line, "cabinet under the stairs" as a finishing touch!  I think I sent out seven cards and Dd did one.  There is always something special about turning "10," the big double-digit birthday!

Dd and Seth:

This week Dd cooked her pork butt in her birthday gift--the Instant Pot.  The pork did taste fantastic!  She also made two Pumpkin Rolls; one for our house and one for her boyfriend.  I'm glad he likes them because then I get a roll too!!! Her boyfriend, Seth, came over again on Friday.  I had made dinner and we watched Malcolm in the Middle together.  It was a nice time.  It is hard to believe they have been dating six months now.  As each month goes by we see her less and less.  This is one stage I didn't see coming and am probably not enforcing enough boundaries; I admit I am at a loss!!!  I guess I was bound to find a time when my parenting skills were not up to the task and this is that time.  She is only allowed to be with Seth when they have a third person with them and I can only hope that she is honoring my rules.  As always, it is in the Lord's hands.

The downfall of having a dog is they pee in your yard and kill your grass!  It is such a shame!  But, there you have it.

The spinach is coming right in!!!  Yay!

Work: Pizza Shop:
Dd is trying to decide if she should go back to work at the pizza shop... I know she misses her friends, but most people are truly missing out on that right now.  She is debating and weighing her decision.

Asparagus is already popping up!

When we first moved here I transplanted some Indiana Blackberry plants in this black soil area and now they keep coming up even though I dug them all up and moved them to a new area.  This week I, once again, pulled up every plant and hope to keep the vines out of this garden!  

Henry is doing really well at staying by me when I'm gardening.

Read Aloud:

Dd and I are enjoying our latest RA; Nemesis by Agatha Christie!  I love reading to her and enjoy discussing the books with her.  

Dd's Progress This Week:

With the continuing 'lock-down' Dd continues to have her classes online here at home.  

Bible and Devotions:

Our church has the sermons live on-air on Sunday and noon prayer services each day.  She is working on Proverbs currently.

The peonies are coming in!  I had to move one plant this week to better space the peonies; we have nine peonies the appreciate.

Grace Co-Op Classes:

Writing: Analytical Writing for Essays and Research Papers (IEW) 

These green chives survived the winter!

Science: Anatomy and Physiology (Apologia) (3:30 hrs)

Last year I tried hostas in these beds and found it to be a poor choice.  These beds get full sun and the soil is very sandy.  I'm transplanting Coneflowers and Black-eyed Susan's into the bed and removing the hostas for a wetter, shadier bed where the hostas will thrive.

Art: Drawing at home

Here is the hostas that I removed from the too-sunny bed.  I think they will be happier here.

Foreign Language: German through DuoLingo (6 sessions)

Physical Exercise: 3:00 hours this week

Math: Algebra II (Saxon) with tutor

Literature: RA: Nemesis by Agatha Christie

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March 15-21, 2020 Lock Down and Flu, Bunny, Andy Stanley, Sequence

March 15-21, 2020 

Lock Down and Flu, Bunny, Andy Stanley, Sequence

This post is out of sequence; I somehow never hit 'post' and it fell out of line....

  

Hello, Friends!

What a difference one week can make in the history of the world.  On Sunday, for the first time I decided to stop going to our church service in person and watch it online at home.  We attend a 'packed' church; so many people all jammed together and that has been worrying me.  



Covid-19 Denied Testing:
Dh went to work on Monday, but he didn't look or feel good.  By Tuesday he was very sick with the flu, as was I.  On Wednesday he called the Michigan Health Dept. and they had a doctor call him back, a few hours later, to review his symptoms, as we were afraid we may have contracted Covid-19.  Because he didn't have a high fever (actually our temp's had been 95 most of the weekend) or hadn't been in contact with a 'confirmed case' he didn't qualify to get tested.  So, we spent most of the week very fatigued on the sofa.  We really just did the bare essentials this week.

Grocery Store:

My last visit to the grocery store was on March 9th.  I hear things have really changed at the grocery stores since I last went!  I guess there are lines in the morning to get into the stores and then lines to check out and there are lots of empty shelves.  For once, it paid for me to be proactive and shopped before most people determined this virus was a real threat.  I don't know how long I can go or how I will plan my next shop, but I'm going to go as infrequently as possible.  I made it through this week without grocery shopping.



Church:
I was too sick to go to my Bible Studies this week; honestly, I was too sick to even do any of the lessons.  I'll have to catch up next week.  I'm not sure, but I believe the classes were canceled due to Covid-19.  Both my classes are going to move to Zoom, so we can have our classes as a group together online.  I'm so glad there is Zoom; I'd never heard of it before but it will really save the day!  

Tractor Supply:

The ONLY place I went to this week was a five-minute rush in to grab four bags of chicken feed at our local Tractor Supply store.  There was only one other customer and I was in and out in minutes.  I was very careful not to touch anything but my feed bags and sanitized as soon as I got in the car and then again at home with soap and water.  I wish I could have done this errand last week, but I kept putting it off as I couldn't determine if this would be a store that could be closed or not.  I hope Tractor Supply is deemed 'essential' but I finally decided it would be smart to go ahead and buy the chicken feed now and not have to worry about whether the store closes or not.

Chickens:

Ack. My white chicken, Bunny, died on Thursday.  The miles I've gone through with this specific hen is crazy.  She was the bottom tier in the pecking order and struggled all last winter.  I've hand-feed her more than any other chicken as she continued to be the chicken that was most prone to get sick.  This was at least her second time getting pneumonia and I had her isolated in her own small cage in the coop with her friends for the past few weeks.  I'd been cooking her scrambled eggs to add to all sorts of other goodies every day.  But, this week she finally died after a roller coaster of days getting better followed by days getting worse, I just had no way of knowing her outcome until her last day.  I will really miss my special, Bunny and her way of just being a special girl.  The rest of the hens are doing fine and at this point there aren't any other sick chickens.  I'm hoping the three chickens I lost over the past six months will be the end of the winter illnesses.  I'm glad spring is finally getting here and the chickens' health will improve.



Andy Stanley:
Dh and I have been enjoying watching the pastor, Andy Stanley, on YouTube; his "90" series.  We have really been getting a lot from this series and recommend it highly.



Face Time: Heather:
This week my friend, Heather, and I Face Timed! We became friends when I lived near Indianapolis, Indiana.  The hardest part for me moving to Michigan was losing contact with Heather.  It took me years to find a friend that was similar to me--sensitive, artistic, Christian, and a deep nature lover.  It is was great getting to catch-up with her!  We are going to try to catch-up more often, maybe make it a once a week thing?  That would be awesome!!  



Sequence:
We are loving playing Sequence on the dining room table lately.  It is so great having Dh home!!  



Hiking with Henry:
I'm so thankful for another week getting to hike in the woods with Henry.  I'm really hoping I'll find time to hike with Henry during the summer, unlike last year when I got too busy.  I really benefit from Forest Bathing with Henry; but "Hiking with Henry" sounds better than "Forest Bathing!" I just deeply love looking at the trees, especially the view staring straight up and seeing the sky through the branches, especially when the branches are bare and have no leaves to block the view.  I've been posting some pictures of Henry on Instagram: tracyruth9





Dd's Progress For The Week:



Bible and Devotions:
Dd went to church with Seth again this week.  



Grace Co-Op Classes:
Science: Anatomy and Physiology (Apologia)



Art: Painting Studio



Writing/English: Analytical Writing for Essays and Research Papers (IEW) 



Math: Algebra II (Saxon) with a tutor



Foreign Language: German with DuoLingo (5 sessions)



SAT Prep: Khan Academy : 1:30 hours (3 sessions)



Drawing at home: 5 sessions at 20 min each



Physical Education: 4:00 hrs (YMCA with Hailee)



Read Aloud:
To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolfe



Work: Dd is still enjoying working at the pizza shop

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