Spring Wings

As I was reviewing the tax paperwork before meeting with the CPA tomorrow, I kept hearing a rucus behind me. Upon looking out the window, I noticed a tree loaded with feathered friends of many sorts. I snapped a quick photo but it would be better with sound effects. The number of robins leads me to believe that Spring must be trying to make its way soon! Good news!

Best wishes for a safe and restful weekend to all and may your trees be singing to you as well! Make today something special!

Becky

Tax man a cometh

How does the old adage go? Two things that you can be sure of death and taxes. Well I am working on getting our 2008 taxes in order and I think I would rather be drug behind my truck, so does that count as dying? Yuck! Being more of a socially inclined person, sitting for long amounts of time trying to figure out what happened last May other than taking care of Jeff, is a bit of a reach. I have the one checkbook figured out for the most part and nearly half done with the other with a next Saturday appointment with the man. Sadly, I have about four inches of paperwork to then start in on to see how taxes work on areas new to me like social security, disability and the list goes on from there. One area that I can check off of my job hunt would be playing with numbers all day long. Go Donald Trump!

So as I go back into my little tax huddle, I wish all of you happiness and good health for the next week! It would be nice if this little snow storm would miss us in the next day as well! Stay warm!

Make today something special! Perhaps Obama will just end doing taxes with our current fiscal nightmare???

Becky

Peanut Butter Dreamsicle Valentine's

Friday evening before Valentine's Day began our adventure in a couple of arenas. First off, we just cannot seem to escape snow this year. Our predicted half-inch became well over four inches of slippery powder. Trenton and I saw a number of accidents in Cedar Rapids during our Friday evening outing. Thankfully all just auto damage but that snow just kept coming and it was difficult to see much. We braved our way to the Home Depot and left with our 16 gallons of paint. After loading them into the house, we called it a day. Trenton was touched that Mom remembered him with a Valentine on his pillow and I received a sweet hug before he fell to sleep.

Saturday morning we loaded paint into the back of the family truckster and headed North for the big day. Surprisingly we arrived first and this allowed us to get the paint and many supplies into the house before the rest of the helpers arrived. Jake, Kristine, Natalie, Haley, Dustin and myself started in prepping and adding color to the walls of Mom and Dad's digs. We really got busy by 10am and finally threw in the towel at 8:30pm. The hallways and kitchen are the color of peanut butter and the dining room was the hint of an orange dreamsicle. To the shock of all, my Father commented it looked "nice". (Dad is a white paint kind of fellow.) Jake and Trenton were in the bathroom painting the ceiling when chaos broke out. Trenton decided to fill in the "opening" on top of Jake's head so Jake prettied up the boring brown of Trenton's hair with a glob of white. Oh, yes, they were having a paint fight and my Mother was not going to have any part of it. By the way men, white paint is NOT a remedy for your bald patch. Tired and weary we called it a day and decided we would need to finish another day.

Trenton had gone home with Jake to have some fun with Kaden and so I brought my niece, Haley, home with me. We have been having a great time doing "girl" things. We watched some movie about a princess last night and today she is wanting to watch a movie about Prada. Rather unusual experiences for me and she seem puzzled why I would not know more about these topics. We are just returning from a restful lunch out and Haley is playing with the dogs.

Happy Valentine's weekend, all! Make today something special.

Becky

Cold time

Continuing to fight a head cold since this past Saturday that doesn't want to heed the vitamin C doses and decongestant. Put a few cards together tonight to keep me from going insane. Here is a peek at one that will go out in the mail tomorrow. My camera doesn't show the details very well. I stamped a light pink on the paper.

Make tomorrow something special!

Becky

Edgy

Great news! We had a great time at Chestnut Mountain in Galena checking out the slopes with the snowboards and none of the guys got hurt! (I always wince when I read the warnings with the snowboard rentals... Whew) I have been told that Nick ( borrowed son from another Mother) is really getting the hang of the sport and this is only his second outing. Trenton and Dalton were telling me some of the cool tricks from their adventures. I can admit to having enjoyed window shopping at the lovely shops in Galena. I did a thorough walk through at the scrapbooking store and found a few "needed" items, but otherwise just chatted with the store keepers or other visitors. One particular shop was well organized and I told the gal behind the register that I would pester her mercilessly if I were a local for a job. She was flattered and we had a great conversation following.

The guys were starving after coming off the slopes so we stopped at the on-site dinner and enjoyed the local fare. I think I will need to tell my Father to grow another cow from the size of the mammouth burgers they all consumer. Monster sized! As we walked towards the car we noticed a nearly full moon that was sitting in a clear blue sky. The guys all napped on the ride home and the fabulous warm weather had melted some of our ample snowfall. We can even see our driveway for the first time in months! The sun was so warm and beautiful today that you would just like to bottle it up for later in the week when ol' man winter makes his return. Ahh, the joy of a February thaw!

Make today something special.... we did!

Whistle and nocks ready

Today is the start of a new adventure for me and I had to shine up my whistle this morning. I am volunteering at the boy's school with the gym unit on archery. A week or so back in a moment of boredom, I approached the Principal about any needs the school may have that I could help solve. Some of you may remember a couple of years back I took my sons and a few other kids to Des Moines for the state archery competition and the boys won their way to nationals! Exciting!! I guess this makes me some kind of an expert and so I am helping by being an extra set of hands for the 4 - 6 grade classes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We covered the basics and lots of safety today. I made them all promise not to shoot me, so we are all ready to go now. Wednesday we set up the nets, targets and get the kids shooting. More to come with this fun story.

The weekend seemed to pass too quickly. We had superwarm weather that even surpassed the freezing mark! We must be down to only about 4 more inches of snow to melt in most places, but I see snow blowing around in today's manic winds. The rascally groundhog saw his shadow so we are set for another six weeks until spring. Rats! Too bad the Cardinals couldn't pull it off yesterday, but the game was interesting to watch. Great commercials as always to keep the night interesting. We all looked like a bunch of weirdies with our 3D glasses but the guys dancing was a hoot. We even had a chance to oodle over a friend's new diamond engagement ring and sounds like we need to slot in another wedding this fall. Fun!

Make today something special!

Becky