What has Poppa been doing?

Well, let me see...........

........ I don't know!  What is he doing???  Oh!  One day while he was outside reading, he watched the lawn mower drive over a sprinkler that hadn't slid down when it was done sprinkling.  So - before the sprinklers turned on (they do that automatically - the system is underground, and when the pressure comes up the pipe - the little sprinkler head jumps up about five inches above the ground.  Ideally, when the pressure is gone, the little sprinkler head slides back down) Poppa thought he should get it fixed so that it didn't just flood that area of the yard and miss the larger area, he should get it fixed.  So he disappeared with Squeegie and returned with some pieces to repair it.

He carefully dug out all around it.  As you can see it is right outside the screen room, so he had to get a special head for it.  When he was satisfied with his working space....

........ he put in the new piece he had got.......

.. and then, under the scrutiny of his supervisor (pictured above), he carefully replaced all the soil...... and then patiently waited for the sprinklers to come on that evening.  He went out and stood in the dark watching, and declared it successfully repaired - for obvious reasons I didn't get a picture!  Another day I went hunting for them again...........

..... and found them outside cleaning Poppa's golf clubs.  You might notice that the supervisor was sitting in the shade inside Spiffy, but the labourer had to stay outside in the hot sun!  I should also tell you that the labourer was not complaining about the heat at all!  Speaking of Spiffy....

....... some interesting things have been happening to him.  Here is Poppa cleaning the license plates!  Why?  Well, as you know....

...... Spiffy's rear end was all fixed up nicely after that unfortunate rear-ending incident we had.  But, because of that incident, the chrome frame around the license plate was somewhat bent.  The shop had straightened it out somewhat - but not well enough to please Poppa - so he straightened it, cleaned it, and then cleaned the plate before putting it back on.  But that wasn't all he was doing!

He cleaned up my palm tree frame from the front plate as well, and then he put it back on Spiffy.

But even that wasn't all he was doing............

Can you see anything different?  Probably not, I'll show you a close-up............

See those two pinstripes leading off the side vent?  They weren't there before!  We noticed quite a few other Ford Escapes around, close in colour to Spiffy - and in a Wal-Mart parking lot that was sometimes an issue!  I kept complaining about not being able to spot Spiffy easily - unlike Zippy - who Poppa had put pinstripes on to make her stand out from other vehicles.  He got tired of my whining and decided to fix it for me!  This is the result!  Just in case you missed it.........

Here is the other side!  What else has he been doing?  Here is a clue......

Stitches

Normally, if I called a Blog "Stitches", one would assume I meant............

.......... the 72 stitches I would cast on for a sock - like this pair that Mommy picked this year.  But this time it is something different..........

............. here is your clue!  This is little Curtie sitting in the ER after an unfortunate event.  He had some friends over and they were all playing and having a wonderful time.  Our little superhero jumped off the sofa - slipped on his way off and did a head plant into the coffee table!  By the time Mommy got to him, he was bleeding profusely from a head wound.  A mop up was done, some gauze and adhesive tape were applied and he was bundled into his coat for a ride to the local hospital.  After getting the gash cleaned up by the kind staff at the ER.............

...... it looked like this - ouch!  But - look at how brave he is being - not a tear (or a smile).  After waiting for a while for some freezing ointment to take effect, and some more help from the ER staff.....

..... the deed was done and our brave little guy had four stitches!  He got a bandage put on before he was released.  Mommy says he has a bruise on his nose and a black eye ( I think we can see the beginnings of that in the pic), but other than that seems fine.  Yesterday, since the boys are on March break this week, Mommy and Daddy were taking the boys on a trip to the city they were born in to see some of the sights and maybe do some shopping.  Today Mommy and Daddy were having a March break and left the boys at the day care to get away for a romantic visit to Niagara Falls.  So.... I haven't heard from her - which probably means all is well.  Meantime..... it has been.........

..... absolutely marvelous being in Florida the last couple of weeks.  The temperatures have been in the high eighties and a couple of days ago we saw a 91F!!!!!  Poppa has been taking advantage of the wonderful weather to catch up on some reading, and............

.... Crunchie and Squeegie joined him!  What else has Poppa been up to - well more on that later!

Happy Birthday!!!!!!

I wasn't there, so I don't have pictures..........but on Saturday March 14th, Aunt Peggy turned 100 years old.

Here she is last summer at 99!  She hasn't changed much!  God Bless Aunt Peggy and Congratulations!

Today is St. Patrick's Day - Top o' the Morn to Everyone!  That also means...........

........ it is Taffy's Happy Birthday today!  Congrats to our little 7-year-old too!  We are going to T.G.I. Friday's tomorrow night to celebrate!  And, while I have your attention.....

.......... here are our little boys just after opening a parcel they received from Nanna and Poppa.

What (Chapter 2)......

........... do girls do when they are on vacation in Florida for the winter????  Well.....

.... when it is cool, they snuggle under a blanket and sip a drink while they watch TV, or.....

..... when it is hot, they work on their suntans, or.....

..... they chat about the latest fashions, or.....

............. they get dressed up for church, or.... 

........... they make a cup of coffee for Poppa, and sometimes.......

.... they do some knitting, so Auntie Colleen can............

.......... find a pair of socks she liked this year.  These are made from Opal yarn purchased from Lahay's (my local yarn source in Canada) one day while Auntie Colleen and I were in there browsing. She also chose another pair - which you'll see later.  Sometimes the girls.......

.... get dolled up to go out for breakfast, sometimes.....

........... they get dressed up to go out shopping, and ..............

..... come home with something they found .............. by then .................

.... it's time to have a cup of tea, watch television for a while (they both like Criminal Minds), and then............

.......... it's time to get tucked into their blankie for the night!  Goodnight little bears!

What..........

............ do boys do when they are vacationing in Florida for the winter????  Well....

......... they supervise just about everything that goes on in the villa!  They watch while the dishes are washed and dried.....

.... they carefully scrutinize all in-coming food and taste-test it to make sure it is suitable for the other people to consume.....

.... they check the numbers on the lottery tickets to see if we have become millionaires overnight.....

............. they wait patiently (or not!) for the rest of the household to get ready to go out for breakfast....

............... they play with Wilson...........

..... on a bright, sunny, hot day............

........during a Florida afternoon..........

................. they help Poppa figure out how to check his e-mail.....

............ or play a game - what are they doing???  Hmmmmmmmm...........

............ oh......... it's a jigsaw puzzle!  What else??  Well.....

............ they sit around and look cute............

........... they pose for pictures, and at the end of a long, tiring day..........

............. they crawl into bed for a good night's sleep, so they can start over again the next day!  Oh, by the way, while Uncle Ernie was here, he requested a pair of socks, so..........

........ I grabbed some new yarn I had just received and made these for him to take home.  There has been lots of other sox action - but that's for the next post!

Visitors!

We recently had visitors in Florida!

Uncle Ernie & Aunt Lynda arrived in Florida last Wednesday and took up residence at the Comfort Inn just up the road from the villa.  We invited them to stay here, but they preferred their own space.  Their first couple of days were spent shopping.  I didn't take pictures at the Florida Mall or at the Flea Market - except for this one...........

......... taken from the upstairs lounge at Starbucks in the Florida Mall.  Poppa and I stopped there so Poppa could have a coffee.  Aunt Lynda didn't buy too much, but she got a few things.  Uncle Ernie wasn't impressed with shopping at all, so....

......... we drove to Homosassa Springs to see the wildlife park there.  As you can tell from the photo, we took the boat tour up the Banana River.  This gave the impression of going through..........

........... a jungle - can you see the turtles on the log?  Or.....

........... the alligator on this log???  Or...........

............. a couple of cute ducks swimming on the other side of the river from the alligator?  Or....

.............. the man-made bird habitat perched on the edge?  We saw all this before we ever entered the actual park!  Inside there was also a variety of wild-life.....

............. this is Lou the Hippo.  He is not indigenous to Florida.  He is 47 years old and was saved from a privately owned exotic animal park when it closed down.  However, right beside him...........

....... was an area with a lot of these creatures, which as I'm sure you all know - are indigenous to Florida.  There were lots of other animals there too...........

........... including these two wild fellows - are they brothers????  There was...........

.......... a small building which housed displays of local snakes - there were a lot of them!  We didn't stay in there too long............

....... but long enough to spy this American Crocodile (who knew?).  He isn't very big - maybe between two and three feet.  We saw..........

......... a large group of flamingoes, which seemed to be following that white swan up the river, for some reason known only to them.  Around the corner..........

.............. there was a squirrel sipping a drink from the water belonging to these birds.  We had to....

........... stop to see if we could spot the.............

......... black BEAR!  That's him in the back right corner - yeah - that little black blob is him.  There was another one sleeping on a pile of rocks, and I took a picture, but he was still, the rocks were a dark colour and the bear was pretty obscured - so I won't bore you with it.  We also stopped....

........... to admire the American Eagles.  There were lots of other birds too.....

................ and thankfully, there were signs posted to identify them for those of us who were not so familiar with birds.  We checked out all the available critters...........

.......... including the timber wolves - who looked kinda annoyed at all the tourist gawking at them........and then..........

............ we crossed the bridge (are they brothers?) and headed to the underwater observatory.....

........... where Aunt Lynda took some pictures, but there were no manatees in sight.  We did see some in the river, but they were not high enough to get a decent picture - maybe next time.  As we approached the exit.......

............. we did find a couple of large ones!  Look at that!