Rambling . . . Rumbling . . . Mumbling

This has been a pretty rough week for me. My brother lost his fight against cancer and passed away on Tuesday. The funeral was yesterday. I thought that most of us were pretty restrained with the weeping at the funeral, but Wok said everyone was scaring him. Mostly I'm happy that my brother isn't suffering any longer, as the last few weeks were pretty awful for him. However, it's still hard that he's gone.

After the funeral, we decided to take my mom out to Utah Lake for a short boat ride to cheer her up a little bit. Except that it had been raining all week and after Wok drained the rainwater out of the boat he forgot to put the drain plug back in. After loading the boat into the lake I noticed that the boat was taking on a lot of water. Wok had to dive in and put the plug back in, then we had to get the boat back out of the lake and drain it. After all of that, we actually had an enjoyable few hours out on the lake. Leave it to Wok to find an unconventional way to break a serious mood.

Today we had a short Field Trip Monday, due to some prior scheduling issues. We headed out to Camp Floyd State Park in Fairfield, about an hour away. The state park is more of a museum than a park. I had never been there and wanted to check it out.

The driver's side window in the Jeep decided it didn't want to work a few weeks ago. We've bee putting up with that, but finally Wok couldn't take it anymore. The dealer wanted $500.00 to fix it, so Wok decided to McGuyver the electronic parts so that it would roll up and down. Except that Wok didn't actually use duct tape and chewing gum. We went to Lowe's and asked 6-7 employees where to find various parts . . . none of them GM sanctioned, but then again our warranty expired two months ago. So that means we, I mean Wok, can think outside the box now.

Here's a photo of the door during the McGuyver process:


Anyway, the window works now, yay. And it's a good thing we saved $500 on that repair, because the tires were pretty worn down and we had to replace them before going on any more adventures. That set us back $650. Ouch!

I took Wednesday off work because it was my birthday, and it's my belief that nobody should have to go to work on their birthday. Wok took the day off too, and we took another trip out to the desert to try geode hunting again.

Now that school is out for the summer and we didn't enroll Wild Child in summer school due to some scheduling issues, I declared Mondays as Field Trip Monday. Our first Field Trip Monday was a trip up American Fork Canyon, mostly to take advantage of our National Forest/National Park pass. Wild Child invited T along.

I wanted to go to Cascade Springs, but the road to that part of the canyon was closed, boo. We went to another part of the canyon, which entailed driving on a bumpy dirt road. I was trying to get to a campground at the end of the road where I could park the Jeep, and then we could go on a hike. However, the two girls cried that the road was too bumpy, and they were going to puke any second, and could I please stop already.

Yesterday when I got home from work, Wok told me that one of the cats had a) gotten out of the house; b)caught a baby bird; and c)inspired the parents of said baby bird to dive bomb it. Unfortunately, the baby bird didn't survive. However, Wok said that there was another baby bird out in the yard and he wondered if the cat was going to find it as well.

Wok wanted to go check out the Dugway Geode Beds, as he'd heard that it was a good place to take kids that are gaga over rocks. Initially I wanted to put off the trip until the rain cleared up, but Wok insisted that he looked at the weather maps on the internet and there were NO CLOUDS over the area where we were going.

Of course, Wok is not from Utah and has never really been out to the Utah desert and doesn't understand how things work out there . So when he looked at some silly internet map he totally believed it!

Today is my and Wok's wedding anniversary. We've been married 11 years today. I was going to decorate the house today before Wok got home from work, but Wild Child blabbed out the plans last night over dinner. The surprise element is gone, and so has my urge to decorate. Anyway, I made Wok a cute card and we're going out to dinner later tonight, so I'll just call that good.

First off, let me just mention that my brother is home now and is doing unexpectedly well. We are still taking each day as it comes. As we learned all too well in the hospital, a good day doesn't guarantee a good day every day going forward. But we are hopeful that he will be with us for a while longer yet.

On top of this stuff with my brother, Wok has had to look for a new job. His department felt the ax of the recession/economy/whatever you call it. It's been pretty stressful as everyone in that department is feverishly applying for the open positions within the company. Finally this week Wok found out which new department would hire him . . . and it was his last choice. He was pretty bummed, so I suggested that we take a drive somewhere as Spring is finally here and the Jeep is raring to go on an adventure.

Somehow the scrapbook muse smiled on me and I won a stamp set in a drawing on my Close To My Heart's consultant's web page. I won the Easter Egg stamp set that was stamp of the month in February. My consultant, Rock Star that she is, even brought to my house in person!

Anyway, my consultant said she thought she'd have a drawing for that stamp set as it was good for Easter. My Easter craftiness is done for the year, but after she left I was looking at the stamps and thought that it might work for a spring-themed card.

Last week, I made a few cards using some paint and die cuts from my Silhouette. I mailed the best card off to a friend in Maryland, so I wanted to wait for her to get the card before posting them here.

I knew that Spring was finally on its way when I found this plant in my back yard:



Now I know that all of you normal folks (and Wok) are shuddering at the return of the dreaded dandelions, but if you are a guinea pig, well, then, this plant is the best snack ever! In fact, it's so yummy that it's sacrilege to call it a snack!

I like the dandelions because I can give the piggie free snacks. Last year all of our dandelions died after I ripped off their leaves and fed them to Desperaux. It turns out that while dandelions can survive the nuclear holocaust, after you tear off their leaves they're big wimps and they die. I was, in fact, a bit worried that they wouldn't reappear in my yard this spring and I have been scoping out vacant lots that are really dandelion breeding grounds. For now, at least, I don't have to sneak off to a vacant lot in the middle of the night to purloin some dandelion leaves for my poor starving piggie.

We'll see how long our dandelion crop lasts.

Today my bro was still on the ventilator, but the drs are planning on taking that out today or tomorrow. In other news, the drs found a few holes in my bro's colon, and he has more tubes stuck in him to drain that area. The word is that he'll be in ICU for "a while." And it turns out that the thingmajig the drs installed wasn't leather; it is this mesh stuff that will supposedly dissolve as the muscles heal together.

Today the drs installed the leather thingamajig in my bro to close up his incision. My brother didn't have as many problems coming out of the surgery as the last one, but he is back on the ventilator and sedation. My mom just called to say that he was having some bleeding from the incision and that she and my sis in law were kicked out into the waiting room while the drs are getting that issue resolved.

Well, Easter is coming no matter how crazy my life is now and I'm sufficiently scared of the Big Bad Bunny that I am continuing to work on my Easter decorations. Actually, it's been a great stress reliever, especially on the nights my mom comes home late from the hospital and I can't sleep because I'm too worried about how the day went.

I found this paper Easter basket template that seemed to be small enough to work for giving to the neighbors.