Dogs on Thursday

This week's special guest for Dogs on Thursday is a new baby girl addition to our work family. I am so happy to introduce sweet little Shea!
She is the sweetest little Golden Retriever puppy--just like a little blond teddy bear. Fuzzy hair, kissable belly, and those extra-pointy-needle-like-teeth that are sharper than Ginsu knives. Here she is in her daddy's arms.

You might remember him from this post, or from this post where he made dog bowls for my hooligans. Here she is all tuckered out laying on my foot. I need a puppy!

Welcome to our corner of the world, little Shea!

Antiques Roadshow!

Remember these pictures...


...from this post?

It seems like eons ago, but it was just last June. The Antiques Roadshow segments that were filmed while the crew was in New Jersey last summer are finally going to air. The NJ shows will be on for the next three Monday evenings, beginning tonight! I'm not sure which week the museum will be on, though. Hopefully tonight!

You can go the the Antiques Roadshow website for information and a local broadcast schedule for your area. It's worth watching just to support fellow knitter Mark Walberg. The fact that he has those incredible blue eyes doesn't hurt...


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Edited to add:
Here is the link of the segment filmed in the Museum

Here is the link of bonus footage of Mark Walberg making a paperweight

Enjoy!

Wild and Wacky South Jersey!

One day this past week I became an "Adventure Girl"! That's the label I give myself when I go wild and crazy and go down a road I've never been on before just to see what's there. Pathetic, huh? Anyway, while on one of these "adventures", look what I found:

We saw a Bald Eagle a mile or so back, soaring over the marshland, looking for a snack. Could that be a Bald Eagle's nest?

Yes it is!
It is on a little road in the back of nowhere on the way to a little town called Seabreeze. Town??? Not really. Not even close. More like a cluster of houses on the edge of the bay. I just had to take a photo of this one.

Very well cared for, right down to the plastic flowers in the blue barrels and that unique fence. What kind of fence is that?

Yes, indeed, it's a fence made from kitty litter containers.
No 50 million years in a landfill for these babies. Nope. They are put to good use. The final irony?
You can't make this stuff up!

Dogs on Thursday

Happy Dogs on Thursday from all the Brits in Britknitterville! This morning I was able to get a rare photo of all three dogs together:
They're not exactly together, but at least they are close enough to get in the same shot. Emma, of course, is in her little nest that she makes in the sofa cushions. Here is a shot from the front on the sofa:
She smooshes the cushion down into a comfy little hollow, and she will stay there all day! What a life!

I've been off this week and a lot has been going on, mostly involving taking care of the sick! Mom is doing better, but still gets very tired after any kind of activity. She went to church on Sunday and it wiped her out for two days. We've been making meals and taking them over, and mom always greets us with a chorus of "Meals on Wheels!" The only problem is that mom and dad are not vegetarians and they think a meal isn't a meal without MEAT! Blech!

Dad also celebrated his 74th (!!!!!) birthday this week, and I took pictures of him building the perfect burger, but they were taken with my cell phone and were impossibly blurry. You'll just have to trust me that it was a work of art. A (not-so-heart-healthy) half-pound burger with lettuce, tomato, cheese, pickles, bacon, onion, green pepper, and anything else he could possibly fit into a bun. Yuck. I made my yummy broccoli spaghetti casserole, and to my surprise both mom and dad tried it, and liked it, even though there wasn't a scrap of meat in it. I just might turn them into vegetarians yet! Then again, maybe not.

Anyway, to make up for the lack of a birthday picture of dad, here is a recent shot of mom and dad from their trip to Vermont a few months ago.
And here is one of my favorite pictures...that's me with my head on dad's shoulder. Can't you just feel the love?
I'm incredibly lucky to have such a wonderful dad!

Dogs on Thursday and Good (???) News

First for the good news. Mom had a heart attack. I know, I can't quite wrap my brain around how that can be good news, but her cardiologist said it is good news, so I am choosing to believe him. The cardiac catheterization shows that the damage to the heart is minimal, and it's in the "best area" for a heart attack to happen. Or at least the "least worst" area, I suppose.

I feel as though I should give a shout-out to the hospital. We went to Penn Presbyterian Medical Center for the catheterization, and it was a great experience from start to end. The staff was wonderful, from security to nursing to, well, everyone we ran into. Food was not so great, but they had Wawa coffee and a salad bar, so I was happy. Dad wasn't thrilled with his choices, but hey, it's a cardiac hospital! If they are going to offer greasy breakfast sandwiches and pizza and onions rings, you can bet that they use non-fat cheese and one of the "good" oils for frying and such. But I digress. If you have to have a catheterization, I'm thinking that Penn Presby is the best choice. Or at least the "least worst."

Selective Reality - it's a good thing. :-)

In other news, it's still cold here. They keep promising that we are going to warm up, but so far, just cold, cold and more cold. These pictures were taken at Parvin State Park a week or so ago.


Brrrrrrr..... It's not fit for man nor beast out there! Joseph says he is staying under his heat lamp until the daffodils bloom again. Seriously, I think it would take a crow bar to pry that cat out of his cat bed.
Cooper says "Who would want to be outside when you can snuggle up in the cushions of a big comfy chair by the warm pellet stove?"
I still haven't caught up on my blog reading. Truth be told, I haven't read a single post in weeks. My bad! Soon...very soon.

It's been a while...

What has come and gone in the two weeks or so since I last posted? Christmas, New Year's, Sophia's christening, a couple of Dogs on Thursdays, snow (and then more snow), ice, lots of knitting, lots of worrying, which leads to more knitting, knitting, knitting. Not much blog reading, though, and my "Google Reader" is at a new record high (for me) of unread posts. Must get caught up...one of these days.

Anyway, I managed to finish my Christmas knitting in time for New Year's. Heh. Here is Emma helping me take a picture of the three baby dolls I made for my nieces & my mom. Yes, one is for mom. She fell in love with the first baby doll I made, so I surprised her with one, too.

This picture is from Christmas Eve at mom and dad's house. Bessie was more interested in the wrapping than in her presents. Typical cat!

This is mom and dad on New Year's Day. Mom is holding her newest (honorary) granddaughter, Sophia. Pay no attention to my messy knitting corner in the background.

I don't have any pictures of Sophia's christening because I operated the video camera. Sophia's big brothers (7 and 5 years old) both had a part in the ceremony, while her big sister (2 years old) sat quietly munching on a bag of mini marshmallows. Not her usual snack, but she was having a melt-down in the church, and "any port in a storm," right?

Next the snow, snow, snow. And ice, and more snow, snow snow. Hate it. Hate it all. Enough said.
Now for Dogs on Thursdays... all of the brits are doing just fine, after a couple of trips to the vet.

Tara broke a nail on the frozen ground late Monday night. Blood everywhere. Everywhere! During a semi-frantic call to the Nanny early Tuesday morning, she told me to just head into the vet without an appointment and Dr. WonderVet would see her right away. God bless my the WonderVet, and the Nanny! After a needle in the butt and 10 days of antibiotics, Tara is doing just fine.
When I got Tara home, it was too late to head into work, so I stayed home on Tuesday and got some chores done...and watched Emma limping around. Yes, Emma hurt her leg last Sunday by jumping off of the sofa, and had been limping off and on, so I called the WonderVet and asked if I could impose on them without an appointment twice in one day!
Emma didn't limp at the vet, of course, but Dr. WonderVet said it's not uncommon for the adrenaline to take over and negate the pain. Anyway, she is on Rimadyl for a week, and will have X-rays next week if that doesn't help. So far, both girls are doing just fine.

As far as the worrying, I'm a natural worrier, and someday hope to get a gold medal in the Worrying Olympics. The only way to do that is to practice, practice, practice, and family and friends have graciously provided me with new and dizzying things to worry about. At least I have my knitting to help me through. That is, until yesterday when I closed my finger in a door. No knitting for a while. Back to full-time worrying.