Category: Living life

Weekend Coffee Share; Weekly Smile Fun in April!

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekend coffee share, weekly smile10 Comments
  • My bloom in my garden! A gift from a friend last year, blooming this year!

Welcome to my weekend coffee share where we share what’s been happening in our lives with old friends and new! What can I get for you today? I have both coffee and an assortment of teas. I have recently discovered how much I like Earl Grey tea and have been drinking it more often. This last week was a busy week as we celebrated birthdays. It was my hubby’s birthday and my sweet daughter’s. My daughter’s birthday is one day after my hubby’s. She came home for her birthday and spent time with one of her best friend’s here who’s birthday is one week earlier so it’s a busy birthday month! I am going to also call this my weekly smile post. I’ve always written these posts separately but this week was super busy so I’ll use this post for both. 😀

My daughter bought tickets to an outdoor symphony at the beach. It was super fun and an adventure to drive an hour to the beach to attend this small intimate style concert literally at the beach. It was held at Bolsa Chica State Beach which is in Huntington Beach, Ca. We arrived early enough to order food that was there for us so it was dinner and a concert that was approximately an hour long. The symphony was performed by Orchid Quartet and these women are part of the LA Philharmonic Orchestra and the music was excellent. The last performance included a keyboard player who travels and performs with the quartet. The only thing about this evening at the beach was that it was a bit chilly. It was barely 60F (15C) with the wind it felt colder. We dressed warmly and brought blankets which helped. It was super cloudy, looked like storm clouds but it did not rain. I captured some fun photos I will share. They make me SMILE!

Sealegs at the Beach restaurant is where the venue is hosted and you can see the quartet all bundled up performing!

I loved being at the beach and should visit more often and I am smiling as the drive to and from the concert was traffic free! We have so much traffic here in California and we just happened to be driving the other direction during rush hour and left early because we thought it would take us longer. So thankful it was such a nice easy, fun adventure! I have some video’s I want to share. This music is close to my heart as I just LOVE classical music and some of the pieces I can play on the piano. It was beautiful to hear this string quartet play, so enjoyable. They played Beethoven, Rachmaninoff and Tchaikovsky to name a few composers. I hope you enjoy!

The second video is Rhapsody in Blue by George Gershwin and there is the piano player on the keyboard behind the speaker on the left side of the stage. We were sitting at a picnic table in the back. The picnic tables were cheaper and we were a group of four. They had fire pits which cost more and seated more people. My daughter said it was just about sold out online but there were many empty seats so I am thinking the weather may have kept people from attending. Here are more photos of our fun adventure! 😀

Haha, this is a really up close selfie! I almost did not post but thought why not, its cute I think 🙂 The wind made our ears cold!
Aww, my beautiful daughter and the sun a bit bright washing us out but have to share! ❤
Besties, love these girls to the moon and back again! ❤ ❤ ❤

Such a fun week and I love the setting sun, how can you not smile watching the sun shining through the clouds! I’m so thankful for all our family and friends!

There were over 35 cargo ships sitting out in the sea waiting to be unloaded is our best guess. Port of Long Beach is just around the corner. Maybe the unloading takes longer due to Covid? We’ve never seen so many ships anchored off shore.
You can see more ships out there in this photo. The sun is really trying to shine through the clouds as it sets!

Thank you for visiting my coffee share and I hope I brought you a smile or two as well. I am smiling and am so happy I could spend these days with my family. Since we were down in Huntington Beach we stopped by a dear friend who is my hubby’s best friend. My daughter hasn’t seen him in quite awhile and we were only 15 minutes from his place so it was fun to visit with him. My daughter had to get back home but am so thankful for the time we get to spend together. It will be my turn to drive and visit her soon as I haven’t seen in person her kitty that I am so excited to meet.

I have to thank Trent for hosting the Weekly Smile and Natalie who hosts the Weekend Coffee share! I so enjoy sharing and thank you so much for visiting. I hope you have a fabulous weekend and wonderful week ahead.

Beachcomber Mom,

~Diana ❤

Weekend Coffee Share; What I do for Work!

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekend coffee share24 Comments
Welcome to my weekend coffee share!

I have some freshly brewed coffee which I drink with a splash of Italian sweet cream. I also love Earl Grey tea and have some for you if you so desire. Can I get you a cup of either with a donut or muffin? I thought as we visit I would tell you all about my work and how I got involved in what I do for a living. I’ve been wanting to share and thought why not over a cup of coffee. So here goes nothing, as I’ll start with a little history.

Growing up I loved two things, horses and the medical field. I got my first horse when I was 10 years old and was with several English horse trainers and rode Hunter/Jumpers. When I graduated from high school I worked full-time for two different horse trainers grooming and showing year round. I thought I wanted a career in the horse industry but after 4 years of dedicating my life to horses I felt like I was missing something. I thought to myself, is this what I am going to do for the rest of my life? That’s when I decided I wanted more and thought I need to go to college. I wanted to be a nurse!

Yes, this is me jumping my show horse Chester. His show name was Norwegian Wood, after the Beatles Song and for his coloring!

I decided to head to college and while talking to our equine veterinarian at my trainers he told me about a Veterinary Laboratory where he drops off his blood work for testing. I told my horse trainer (my boss) that I could not work full-time and go to college and so I needed to find a new job. He understood and had other grooms and other girls working for him so he continued as my horse trainer until I sold my horse. My show horse Chester my trainer convinced me to sell him which I did to a nice lady who was learning to ride. So he was retired and went to a good home. Before I left my trainer and started college I had bought a young show horse that my trainer wouldn’t let me ride! I couldn’t believe it and I was rather annoyed, so it made it much easier to head out in another direction and I sold that horse and stopped riding for awhile. I felt like it was the right decision at the time. New goals, right? I did miss the horses though…..

Can I get you a refill? or another muffin? I was able to contact the veterinary laboratory that the equine vet recommended and went for an interview and was hired on the spot! I started working there in 1982 and never looked back. It was cutting ground in the veterinary laboratory industry back then and we were using instruments that you use in the human laboratory. When I think back it is amazing how we use to do the testing compared to today. There were no computers – NONE! A lot of the testing was very old school, chloride testing by titration for example, (anyone remember chemistry in school?) a lot of manually testing that is now all 100% automated. I was hired into the Chemistry department. I was just starting college, and it was such a fun job and still is believe it or not! I Love my work!

To this day anyone can open a veterinary laboratory. There are vet hospitals and vets who have tried, and there are many smaller vet labs around that are growing but there are now two GIANT vet labs competing against each other and I worked at one and left to work at the other. The veterinary lab work is not regulated by the state. There is some federal regulations which would be for special tests that are not routine like rabies testing which I believe is done at Universities. The federal government also regulates an Equine test called Coggins which is for a highly contagious disease that the federal government has complete control over. You have to go to “Coggins” school in Iowa and be trained on how to perform this test. It tests EIA which stands for Equine Infectious Anemia which is transmitted by bloodsucking insects. Anyways, I’m going off on a tangent here and what I am trying to say is no one needs to be licensed or degreed to work in a veterinary laboratory. It is helpful but not a requirement!

This is our state of the art Chemistry instrument, Beckman AU5800. Where I work there are 2 of these instruments. (Do you see Thing 1? They named the instruments Thing 1 and Thing 2 and put the character on them! Haha)
Open lids you can see the pipettors which move the reagents and the 2 big circles hold reagents for testing.
Looking to the right, this is the second instrument with the other side open. More pipettors and a wash station which is where all those tubes are in the photo.

It is all really complicated to explain how these huge giant chemistry analyzers work but they are completely amazing. These are used in human labs as well, all our instruments are used in both settings. I have been to training at the manufacturers on many occasions on generations of analyzers over my 40 years of working in the laboratory field. I didn’t take photos but there are two more instruments called Immulites that run endocrinology testing. I have many certifications of my training which gives me expertise in this field. I did attend college but did not get my degree. I ended up getting married and had my 3 beautiful children which are all wonderful grown adults. In the beginning, when I started at that vet lab, I just thought it a job to help me get through college. After 4 years at the vet lab I quit and went to work at a human lab which was a great experience. I was there for about 12 years and without making this too long of a story I quit to move and live in our local mountains and be a full time Mom. That only lasted one year and so we decided to move back to suburbia and I contacted friends back at the vet lab and became the supervisor of the Chemistry department. I actually love helping animals through my job and veterinary science has come a long way and is just as good as we get for ourselves! 😀

As the supervisor for 20 years I learned so very much. I realized that my job was really my career. Moving back to town and getting into this position really pushed me to learn and be a leader. I am very proud of my department and all I did for those 20 years but they were all working grave yard shift (night shift hours). Last year I decided to look for day shift employment. I knew being in management for the last 20 years that there were no viable jobs to stay with this company and so I looked elsewhere and landed a job working swing shift hours with almost the same rate of pay. I now take care of 4 instruments full-time, run blood work and prepare another 9 instruments for the night shift run. I just run quality control on those 9 instruments with a little bit of daily cleaning. It is all doable and I really enjoy this new job, with these great new hours! 😀

I hope this all isn’t too boring and sorry for the techy language which I didn’t want to over explain. If you have any questions, please ask as I’d love to share! I so appreciate you having coffee with me today. I’ll end with this photo!

A photo of a photo, he just loved to jump! Chester and I in 1978 at Del Mar Horse show in Del Mar, CA

It’s only fitting since I found my career because of my love of my horse. I know I am helping all those with furry friends as I run their blood work through the analyzers to see if their kidneys are working or if they have diabetes for example. There is so much more, but working in the medical field has been very rewarding. I hope you enjoyed and thank you Natalie for hosting our #weekendcoffeeshare!

Keeping animals healthy, with Love!

~Diana ❤

Weekend Coffee Share; April Fun

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekend coffee share14 Comments
  • New blooms! So Pretty!

Welcome to my weekend coffee share! The weather has been so wonderful we can sit outside on my porch and admire my roses that are blooming. Oh how I love Spring! Can I get you some coffee or tea? I think for those who celebrate I need to say Happy Easter. I do not have any little ones around for all that usually goes with the festivities and this is the first Easter Sunday in maybe 15 years that I am not working. I am planning on riding at the stables in the morning and then I need to figure out dinner. I did not plan at all for Easter Sunday, but I will go to the store and put something together. What do you usually do for Easter dinner? Any traditions? I use to always have a ham or turkey dinner of some sort. I’m hoping to have something nice and delicious.

I have been wanting to stay positive as there is always life that pulls us this way and that. There is a sweet friend at the stables that has gone through surgery for cancer and is now going through Chemo therapy. She said the surgery went well and they believe she will be cancer free after the Chemo is completed. She is such a strong woman, horse woman are amazing as she is coming to the stables on the weekends through this tending to her horse and I think having her horse is therapy and is helping her get through it all. She had hired someone to care for her horse during the week, but this person wasn’t showing up and so she asked me if I could help her and so she is paying me to ride her horse twice a week. I figure since I just have Chloe now, it would be my pleasure to help her. I know there are others that have lost loved ones and so I try and share happy fun things, and hopefully can help people smile. Even if it’s just for a little bit, life is tough and rough but can be joyous and fun too! I feel like I am not explaining myself very well, but hopefully ya’ll get my meaning!

This is my friends horse I am riding. She is a retired Western pleasure show horse around 19 years old. She is so sweet!

I have to tell you the funny part of my good friend here at the stables, her name is Bonnie and that is my sister’s name! And even more interesting is guess what this horses name is? YES! it is Chloe! Hahaha, so there are 2 Chloe’s at the stables and now I ride both of them. My Chloe lives 2 barn stalls down from this Chloe pictured above! I am also taking care of another horse at the stables to help another friend and that horses name is Ava. So I am taking care of all girls, or mares! Let’s go girls! Haha, too cute!

I have to make sure I have the horses name next to the name Bonnie in my cell phone so I don’t text the wrong Bonnie. I actually have already done this as there was another Bonnie at our barn but she moved her horse, she is still my friend. So I have 3 Bonnie’s in my phone – popular name I think! I think Chloe is a popular name too. This mare named Chloe is very well trained and super sweet. Her owner wants her to get out on the trails and we have gone out and she is very good. I will ride her with a buddy for awhile because our trails can be scary since they are city trails. Our trails are not country trails so it takes time for the horses to get use to everything going on outside of the barn. She is easy to ride and fun in the arena. This last week I also rode my horse on the trails with my best friend.

Chloe ready to go, just need to put on her bridle and my friend on a horse from her stables. His name is Doc!

We are really warming up here as we hit 85F (29C) today. We will be in the 80’s all this next week and so I will relish this before the summer heat arrives. I have been enjoying riding the trails and am very thankful my horse will go out by herself. She is very brave, steady and a great mount traveling around the blocks knowing every turn. I call them Chloe trail rides because she will sometimes make a turn left or right ~ to her liking! She’s so smart!

Here is a short video I wanted to share of her munching away on some grass after I had her turned out. She absolutely loves the grass, they all do. She gets plenty of food and always has some hay to eat in her stall all day long. The fresh growing grass is such a treat and I don’t let her eat too much, but it is a delight to let her graze. I hope you enjoy! ❤

She just loves to graze and sometimes I wish she had a pasture to live in. But she is well taken care of here at this barn!

I Love the stables here where I board and keep Chloe. The horses are well taken care of and the facilities and people are amazing. There are like minded ladies and men (only one man here owning and riding his horse), he is outnumbered with all of us horse crazy ladies! He is such a gentleman and helps us ladies with moving that DG dirt into stalls and other chores if needed. We have a great group and I am truly thankful for all our pony friends. We all look out for each other! 😀

I wish everyone a great Easter weekend and (maybe) you’ll be able to enjoy the time with family. I know there are many areas that this is not possible and my heart goes out to you all. I know I have been able to get in some cherished family time which makes my heart full. I am sure everyone will be safe and I hope for smiles and good times. I enjoy sharing and I will include a link here if you would like to visit other coffee shares. I will thank Natalie for hosting, she is doing an awesome job and its so wonderful to read and meet up with others.

Caring Cowgirl,

~Diana ❤

My Weekly Smile; March 25, 2021

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekly smile16 Comments
  • Smiling on my morning walk!

Welcome to my weekly smile! I was out on my morning walk this week and just loved how the sun was coming up behind the trees! It just had a glow as I was walking so I couldn’t resist and had to take this photo. We had a couple of sunny days early in the week and as the week is ending lots of clouds and threat of rain. It has been very cool and I am enjoying every day. I know the heat will be coming and so enjoying these Spring days. I am also enjoying my blooms, so many flowers! I decided to take some photos to share because they all make me smile. 😀

I am heading out tomorrow to see my family in Arizona! YAY! ❤ I am so excited to see them and I will be babysitting so my son and his wife can take a day and celebrate their anniversary. I shared last weekend some really cute photos of my grandchildren and if you missed it you can click here to visit. I am so happy that I have the entire weekend off and I can travel and not feel sleepy from working night shift. I am so enjoying my new job, and can’t say enough how happy I am that I made the decision to leave my old job. There is so much that makes me smile these days, I am just so grateful and happy. Back to my photos, here are some flowers I thought you might like! 😀

I haven’t seen this bush have so many blooms! It is going flower crazy!! And my container flowers are blooming too!
This is my flowering bush further away and I haven’t ever seen it so flowery ~ this year it’s going crazy and I Love it!
  • I LOVE these purple flowers!

I plan on working in my garden and plant more flowers. I mentioned before I was not going to grow veggies but as I have been thinking about it I may plant just tomatoes. I Love home grown tomatoes and so I am thinking of giving them another try in a container. Do you have a favorite veggie you like to grow? or flowers? I know there is so much to choose from. I remember my Mom had gardenia’s in our yard and I just LOVE the smell of gardenia’s! I am thinking of planting in containers and I have some shady spots for them because I know they can’t take direct sun and summer heat. I also remember the artichoke plants my Mom grew. I love artichokes, definitely one of my favorites but would have to investigate if they would be worth planting and growing.

I want to thank you for visiting my smile post this week. I am excited about my weekend and am hoping you all have a ton of things that make you smile too! I hope you have a wonderful weekend. I am going to end with my sweet pony. I took this photo of her earlier this morning. It was a very cloudy day, but I thought it a cute photo and decided to share. She brings me many smiles and helps keep me sane! Love my sweet Chloe! ❤

Smiling Happy Grandma!

~Diana ❤

Weekend Coffee Share; Enjoying March!

On By dprastkaIn Living life, Love being Grandma, weekend coffee share13 Comments
Welcome to my weekend coffee share where we share what’s been happening in our lives with old friends and new!

Can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? I just finished up a nice hot cup of coffee as it’s been cool out, the best weather ever to be honest. March is really a beautiful month and I am enjoying every day. We have had some rain which we always need and the sunny days are so enjoyable at the perfect temps between 60F – 70F (15C – 21C). Yesterday it was a little blustery and the sky full of clouds. There was a 10% chance of rain and never rained in my town but it was very cool. Today it is sunny and not a cloud in the sky which I will enjoy in a little bit as I will head to the barn before the morning disappears.

I have been thinking a lot about my garden and I have about 4 containers and 2 have flowering plants in them and I have decided the other 2 I am going to continue on this theme and plant more flowers. I have not had much luck with veggies in the past and with the attention these types of plants need I decided I am just too busy to be consistent with watering and such things that I decided I will just try for some pretty flowers. I know there are a ton of choices out there for flowering foliage and I LOVE flowers so much and have taken many photos that I’ve shared, so that is where I am heading in my gardening adventures!

On to sharing what’s been happening and if you haven’t guessed what I am about to share it’s what I do every day! Haha, more horse adventures. I took another video that I want to share because I can’t help myself! I find it so FUN! I’ll start with a couple of photos first. 😀

I am going around on the same block but went out the other direction. It is interesting to see the block from the other eye and that is how horses see things as each eye for them works a bit more independently than our eyes.

As we headed out on the trail instead of turning right we turned left and so this is the same block I shared in my last video share only I am heading the other way. I have had my horse walk quietly by things one direction and when we head by it with the other eye she can sometimes spook or be like “what is that” as she sees it with her other eye. Yes, they have monocular and binocular vision and have a far greater peripheral vision than humans because they have their eyes set on each side of their head. They have a small blind spot directly in front of them and behind them. Because they are prey animals they need to see far and wide to stay safe and flee if needed from predators. They can see things we may not and you can wonder all day long at what has ruffled their feathers if they get upset. You can’t know what they sense as we are not as attuned to our surroundings as horses! Our training involves them feeling safe in our presence and this is a subject that people make a living on or write novels about, understanding horses and being able to work with them so that we have a safe ride. Haha, I don’t want to write a novel on training today! 😀

Heading down Hillside on a beautiful trail ride on this cool day!

I Like how you can hear the birds in the video and even though I call the day blustery there was a little bit of wind that actually picked up as I arrived back at the barn. The wind was cool, which added to the wintery feeling. Now it is officially Spring! We will be slowly warming up but I don’t mind if that takes some time. I absolutely LOVE SPRING! I am already seeing some beautiful blooms and so am excited as I already mentioned to plant more flowers.

As I rounded the corner I came upon the field that I usually pass first. Remember I rode around the block the other direction so now this big field is the last part of my ride. I did not let Chloe take a bite of grass, it is only a treat every once in awhile! I wish sometimes I had a super nice camera for days like this where the clouds in the sky and the sun rays hitting the hills with the lush wild flower field all fell into place and was just gorgeous. My phone camera doesn’t do it justice, but I snapped the photos anyways! Here are my photos ~

The clouds shimmer with the sun and you can see the wild flowers all blooming with a yellow and purple hue!

I am enjoying Miss Chloe immensely as I am sure you can tell. I am so happy and in a good place in my life right now. I feel very fortunate and never want to take anything for granted, I truly feel blessed. I am going to end this coffee share with you today with my grandkids. My son provides such wonderful photos, I just have to share. My son said the weather in AZ is good too, not too hot yet so they are out going for walks and enjoying it before the heat sets in there. They sure bring me warm fuzzy feelings and huge giant smiles as they enjoy being outside! I think my granddaughter’s photo says it all! They both are so ADORABLE! ❤

Loving my Grandkids! Love you sweet Teddy and Alice!! ❤

Thank you for visiting and enjoying coffee with me this weekend. I hope you all have had a wonderful weekend and enjoy the week ahead. Thank you Natalie for hosting the coffee shares and if you would like to connect up with others the link is here!

Trail Riding Cowgirl, and Grandma!

~Diana ❤

My Weekly Smile; March 10, 2021

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekly smile9 Comments
The morning sun in the clouds! Makes me smile! 😀

Welcome to my weekly smile and I finally got out for a morning walk. There are storms here this week and lots of cloudy skies. I love weather and this week my smile goes to winter rain and cloudy skies! It’s been nice and cool as well. I am enjoying the cool weather immensely. I will say that the hardest thing I am having trouble with is fitting in walking. I think I am a bit lazy and so procrastinating is part of the problem. I always feel better when I get in a morning walk, but I have been using excuses like its too cold out to walk. I’m a bad girl, but finally this week I told myself just go out and walk! And I got this cool photo which I thought I would share. What makes you smile this week? I have more to share!

I took this photo the other day on my ride because the clouds looked so cool!

One more photo of some clouds and I can tell you that we could probably count the cloudy days here as we get a ton of cloudless sunny days. So that is why I love it when some weather blows through our area. We don’t get snow here, only in the local mountains at higher elevation. I’m very grateful for this weather as outside activity is possible all year around. I like to make a big deal about the weather when it arrives. It rained like cats and dogs last night, even hailed a bit too. We have had so much water that the arena at the barn has a lake in the corner. I’ve shared many photos of this giant puddle (lake) is a better description. We will be getting more rain tomorrow, so its to rain most of this week which we really need. I hope this helps keep us from drought conditions. I think I’ll pull up an old photo and share here of the arena with my horses in the water. I have a fun upside down photo that my phone flipped after I took it.

Fun to reminisce and share this photo once more. I did not flip this photo but my phone did with the mirror image in the water! Pretty COOL!
Here’s a right side up photo. My horses Love the water. They will dig a trench to help drain this corner! The rest of the arena is usable. 😀

It is fun to reminisce and its great to have these wonderful shots full of memories!! I am so thankful I have a ton of great photos to have and to share. I have some fun smiling photos of my grand kids that my family sent that I want to share. I think I’ll just share with less explanation. Haha, I also have a time limit here to write trying to fit in this smile post today!

Teddy’s first visit to the playground! I think he is having a blast and I’m Smiling from ear to ear! Hi Alice and Teddy! 😀

With this last year being as crazy as ever the kids haven’t been to any playgrounds which is totally understandable. I am so happy they are able to get outside a bit now. YAY! and I always love to see them in action. I will end with one kitty that you can guess where he is in the photo that my son sent. It is a good ending to all the smiles I am thinking about this week. I hope you all are smiling or I hope what I share brings you a smile. Thank you for visiting!

How can you not SMILE! Silly kitty!!

Have a wonderful Smiling day!

~Diana ❤

Weekend Coffee Share; First Weekend in March

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekend coffee share21 Comments
Blooms in the desert! I love the beautiful pastel purple color!

Welcome to my coffee share, can I get you a cup of coffee? or maybe some tea? I am reminiscing a little as I share this pretty photo of the botanical garden. Such pretty blooms! As I write this I am staring at a small stack of gift cards that I have received and can you believe I have no idea what to buy? One of the gift cards is from my work, a Christmas gift. I think it is for $25, thoughtful and sitting here unused. I then received from my Equine Veterinarian office rebate offers from the manufacturer who makes the pain pills I purchase and give to Chloe. I have mailed away for rebates over the years, and I have never received anything ~ until now. WOW! I have now received 4 separate rebates and I may have one more coming for every bottle I purchased last year. I mailed these to the manufacturer about a month ago as this offer expired by March 31. My Vet had sent to me photocopies of my purchases through their office. These Equoxx pills are easy on the horses stomachs and help with arthritic pain which Chloe has in an old injured back leg. I now have about $100 in Visa gift cards. What to buy? I have no idea? Something I have to sit and think about I guess…..

I have some good news. My puppy dog is fine after blood work and an aspiration was done on a lump on her belly. They said it was a fatty tumor that is benign and she needs to lose a little weight. We will look for some diet food for her, but she is a breed that can be a bit heavy. I am so VERY HAPPY she is okay. I needed that good news and thought I would share. I am also really happy that my horse Chloe is doing great too. She seems very happy in the place she is living, she is not stressed and has been fine through this last month. I took her out on the trail Saturday morning and took these photos. I just can’t help myself! 😀

I love the big eucalyptus trees lining this street. This is the main street in our town!
I snapped this because I just love our shadows! I think it’s a FUN PHOTO!!

I think Chloe really enjoys our rides together. I know she especially likes going out with other friends at the stables, but she is more than willing to go out by herself with me which makes me so very happy. I have to say that there have been times throughout the years that her back leg seemed to be more sore and she limped more and so I thought maybe our days are numbered and I should retire her from any kind of work. But I keep her moving and amazingly it has really helped her and of course I think the pain pill I give her helps her too. It would be like taking one Ibprofen a day, and lately I have been splitting the pill to half a pill a day and she is doing great! I had turned her out in the arena the other day, and she hardly limped at all. I think she is really doing extremely well for a bad injury that has healed. (She had broke her “knee” called a stifle. It was a hairline fracture that has completely healed with a lot of scar tissue. She is lucky to be alive and to be doing so good, its amazing!)

My Trail ride this weekend!

It was so quiet as I rode down this street, I thought it would be fun to share a video. Sorry for the jerkiness as I zoomed in on the mountains! Haha, I really wanted to share them as these are the mountains that are so beautiful when we get a lot of snow on them. When I shared my last video, I had friends point out how Chloe listens to me as I talk and she does so even more in this video. As you watch and hear me talk you can see her ears turning towards me as I say her name and chat away. I just love it every time I watch it back, she is so aware of EVERYTHING! ❤

The other day I was out by ourselves and I went around a shorter route and down a cul-de-sac and as we were heading back to the stables we could hear a rumble. It was deep and she stopped in her tracks. I knew exactly what it was but of course she can’t see this rumbling and it was deep and loud and I’m sure the ground even trembled a bit. It was a Harley motorcycle that was in a garage behind a house. She didn’t want to go forward opting to turn around and I thought it will take us longer to backtrack then to go the direction we were heading. She was afraid, but I have taught her that it is okay to go a bit faster past something she fears so I asked her to trot (which is like a jog) and we moved past the scary rumbling and then went back to the walk. I praised her and we continued on relaxed. She would have been fine if the motorcycle was in plain sight. Because it was hidden, she didn’t know what it was! She doesn’t get rattled easily, a seasoned trail horse, I LOVE HER SO!

In her stall eating her lunch! She is very happy living here which in turn makes me happy! (Since I described her injured leg, the leg she is resting in this photo is the injured leg. The stifle is the bend near her belly high up on that bent leg where the injury is located)

I am happy to say that I am very thankful I can enjoy the trails on my girl. One day, hopefully a long time from now she won’t be able to go out on the trails and I will be there keeping her as comfortable as I can as she ages. I can’t help but share as this is what I do every day and every weekend. I’ll spice things up a bit as you all know with my other hobbies, this weekend I am enjoying the beginning of March and my outside fun on the trails! Thanks for joining me and I hope you all are having a great weekend too!

Here is a link to many more coffee shares and thank you Natalie for hosting. I so enjoy sharing!

Crazy horse gal,

~Diana ❤

My Weekly Smile; March 3, 2021

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekly smile17 Comments
  • Desert Botanical Garden ~ Phoenix, AZ

Welcome to my weekly smile and I have a lot to smile about. I had the most fabulous weekend and I am so excited to share. My daughter and I were able to travel to stay with my son and his beautiful family and celebrate my grandson’s first birthday! I am in grandma heaven! It has been over a year since I have been able to visit and stay the weekend. I am planning on visiting a lot this year as I miss my grandbabies so much. My grand daughter is not a baby any more at 5 1/2 years old and she sure can be silly and enjoys making her baby brother laugh. She is in kindergarten and doing well. She attends virtually at this time. We started out our weekend by visiting the Desert Botanical Garden and I wanted to share some photos. In the photo above those very bright cactus are all made out of glass which is at the entrance, beautiful! 😀

It was perfect weather at the gardens. Teddy with his Dad, Alice looking adorable and Teddy in stroller!
I like to take random photos as we walk, which includes interesting foliage!
My son, wife and Alice getting so big, such a sweet family! ❤ ❤ ❤

We had a great time at the garden and we could not have asked for better weather. The winter in Arizona is perfect and the best time to visit most anything outside. There were so many beautiful plants and flowers and many were blooming. What a fun afternoon! I have to thank my daughter who so thoughtfully planned and booked this outing. I am so happy we were all able to do something together and enjoy the beauty of the desert. I hope you have enjoyed our little adventure as it sure makes me smile! 😀

I have more to share and am so excited we were able to help celebrate Teddy’s first birthday! I wanted to share a few more photo’s of his special day. I have to say that I did not take a lot of photos instead enjoying as much time with the family. I was asked if either my daughter or I wanted to make the cake and I volunteered and made a confetti cake with vanilla frosting. Teddy absolutely loves strawberries and so I put whipping cream in the center of the cake with cut up strawberries. I then lined around the top strawberries I cut in half. I was holding Teddy during the singing “Happy Birthday” song, so my daughter shared her photos so I can share with you. As soon as Teddy got close enough to the cake (Alice helped blow out the candle since Teddy is too little) he grabbed one of the strawberries, so adorable!! ❤

Teddy turns 1 and is eating a strawberry, his favorite!!

I realized and knew strawberries have a lot of water and I tried drying them off really well and they still lost some water on the top of the cake. It tasted delicious, I would share with you but we just about ate the whole thing! It tasted like strawberry shortcake, haha. I cut up the strawberries thinner and smaller for in the middle of the cake. I’m just a home cook and baker, but it is made with Love ~ the best kind of food I think! ❤

I had so much fun last weekend and as anyone that follows me knows I just can’t get enough of family togetherness with miles in between loved ones. Some day that may change but for the long term future my Grandma heart is in Arizona. I am always going to dream of living closer to them, we will see what the future holds! I want to share a few more photos of fun with the family. Just can’t SMILE enough!! 😀

Teddy walks all over the place now! Me and my selfies with Alice and adorable Teddy
Best ending ever! How can you not Smile, they make me laugh and I cried when I left! ❤

Thank you for visiting my smile post for this week. I want to thank Trent who host’s our smile’s and I absolutely Love to share. Not only is it fun to have a place to document my Life and the happenings as I hope it will be fun to go back and visit these fun times. Alice cried when I left, which in turn made me cry. I will be back to visit as often as I can make it happen. I feel so grateful for my family, and I Love each and everyone of you so very much. Here is to many more fun visits and maybe someday I’ll only be around the corner instead of a state away. Someday……

Loving being Grandma!

~Diana ❤

Weekend Coffee Share; End Of February

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekend coffee share19 Comments
Welcome to my weekend coffee share where we share what’s been happening in our lives with old friends and new!

Can I get you a nice hot cup of coffee? I do have tea and I can serve either hot or cold! I do love ice coffee for a change of pace, but my favorite is a nice warm mug of coffee with my favorite sweet Italian creamer. I am doing pretty good, how are you doing? I am enjoying our Southern California weather and my heart goes out to all in the frigid cold. I pray for all in areas where they met some bitter cold that affected not only households but farms and ranches. I am hoping some warm weather is near so that the thawing can begin. As I sip my coffee, I ponder what the future holds which for me is feeling more and more comfortable as I am enjoying my new job. Less stress and normal working hours, every weekend off! I feel like I am in work heaven, and that is my work at the veterinary laboratory. I can honestly say it is definitely the best decision I have made in a long time. I am so happy I decided to leave my other job after 20 years of night shift and supervising my department. I worked very hard, and now am working just as hard but without being in charge. I am SMILING! 😀

I am not sure why I am being so introverted with my thoughts. I guess because when you lose something so near and dear, it makes you look at your life and your decisions and what is happening now and what will the future hold. So much retrospection, it comes and goes but when I want to write this is what comes to the forefront of my mind. I believe this is natural, so forgive me as I wonder around my head with these things. I will say that as I am trying to focus my thoughts I am very grateful to be here to share. I really enjoy blogging and sharing. I have some fun photos I wanted to share. They are all kinds of random things I enjoy.

Some blooms in my garden today!
  • My daughter’s pretty kitty amongst the fluffy stuff!
  • The two brothers, my sons kitties. They are so adorable!
My happy, handsome, funny, smiling grandson Teddy! Howdy Teddy!! You make me SMILE!!

His mommy and daddy say he can say “awww duu” for “all done” which is so darn cute. He also purposely puts his foot in that position in the high chair to be “stuck” and laughs about it as you can see in the photo! Haha, he is a cutie patutie and is just as cute and adorable as my grand daughter was at this age! AND those kitties are so cute. My daughter use to have one of the brothers but he was really hard to have in her apartment with her Guinea pigs. So he went to live with his brother at my sons house. So it’s funny she gave her brother, the brother to his cat! Haha, follow?

And to make things more complicated my son had three cats when he took in the brother which made four and they all didn’t get along. My kitty was very old and went to kitty heaven, so I took two of my sons kitty’s and they are sister’s which one of them didn’t get along with the others. Between all of us (in different houses) we have six cats! I am so happy my daughter has found a nice beautiful black kitty that is so happy in her apartment with her Guinea pigs. The Guinea pigs live in a cage most of the time, it was the hay that the brother kept eating which upset his stomach and made messes all over the place. Anyways, fun to reminisce on how who got where! And I love to share their photos.

Candid selfie as I try and take a photo of my girlfriend and I out on trail. She can’t see when I am taking the photo so she wasn’t looking at me. I like the photo and really wanted to share so forgive me Jane! It’s still a nice photo of our ride!
Another candid shot with Jane on her horse Irish! He is so beautiful with his ears looking forward. We can’t remember what we were talking about, probably the photos I was trying to take!

I have another photo of Jane on Irish but his ears aren’t forward but Jane is smiling. Haha, Jane still looks fine and I’ll call this my action shot! I have a super cute and heartwarming story to share about Jane and Irish. She told me this last weekend that since my horse Zack passed away Irish does the most sweetest thing. You see, Chloe lives in the barn up near the cross ties area where we all tack up for a ride. As Jane gets on Irish and they start walking to either the arena or the trail, she rides with a lose rein and he chooses a path directly to Chloe’s barn stall. He checks on her every day! They nose each other as if he is saying “it’s okay now” and then he walks off to a ride with his owner. I’m incredibly touched and I actually witnessed him doing this and it touches my heart. Chloe is well known at the stables as I have ridden with so many at the barn. They are feeling, sentient beings. ❤ ❤ ❤

Thank you for joining me for coffee today. I so enjoyed sharing and even though I have shared random items they are all near and dear to my heart. I am hoping you all have a wonderful week of the last week of February! I can’t believe March is around the corner. I am going to work on my gardening and am going to try a little bit at a time. I don’t want to bite off more than I can chew, because I would like to have a successful garden! I would love a super huge lush garden with many veggies and beautiful flowers and shrubs. I want to learn how to garden correctly, and do it all by myself or with help from hubby. And I will just slowly build on my garden, that’s more my speed. Looking forward to Spring!

Happy Gregarious Grandma,

~Diana ❤

Weekend Coffee Share; Taking a Short Break

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekend coffee share17 Comments

Welcome to my weekend coffee share. Can I get you a cup of Joe? or maybe some tea? Sigh, I have had a crazy couple of weeks and so I am going to take a break. I wanted to write one more coffee share this weekend and let everyone know I am doing okay. For those of you who may not have read my last post I had to euthanize one of my horses last weekend, I’ll offer you the link here. But I totally understand if this is something that may be hard to read and I respect any and all decisions. I wanted to write a respectful and thoughtful post for my sweet boy, and it has helped me process the whole event. Anyone who owns animals knows these times are difficult but happen. Now I have to take one of our dogs to the vet as she has a growth on her belly (near a mammary gland). I hope it isn’t cancer, but it is getting a little bigger and is bothering her and now has some swelling so off to the vet we go. She is a super sweet girl, so I am praying it will be benign. We have another older dog who is just about completely deaf, but doing good otherwise. It seems the circle of life continues and so I thought I would take a couple weeks off of blogging. I just want to be in a better place and so I think since I have to deal with my sweet girl, this would be a good idea to take a break.

The shep/mix is my girl which has the small growth. The border collie can’t hear so he won’t stay sitting for photos!

Haha, I caught her licking in the photo. They are the sweetest pups and Love my hubby! Not that they don’t love me too… They love my attention but the border collie is more attached to my hubby. It’s all good, it just is what it is. I can’t take dogs to the barn as they aren’t allowed. I know I don’t talk about my puppy dogs much, they are loving and are loved but you all know the center of my life is really the horses. I am surrounded by furry friends and love them all! ❤ ❤ ❤

I have been going to the stables every day to take care of Chloe. We have been going out on trail rides and I have to say she is super calm and seems very happy. Part of the reason why is because we don’t have Zack along as he was rather a bugger, nipping at her, he even use to bite my stirrup as we walked down the trail. It would be akin to an annoying brother or sister. You know, when you are young and they just don’t stop annoying or bothering you? That basically was Zack on every trail ride. I tried my best to get him to stop, but he never did and so Chloe would walk a little bit faster, sometimes moving over or nipping at him. You can totally tell how much at ease she is now. I have known this about the duo, but I couldn’t leave him at the barn alone with all his anxieties. As I write this I can say that I have felt guilty the last few days because there has been a sense of relief. I was always worried about Zack, now I don’t have to worry any more. Here is a cute photo of Zack I wanted to share!

My good friend sent me this photo. She gave us these treats that he is begging for, he was so adorable! This was some years ago.

It feels good to see him and I want to get some photos printed and framed. I may use this one but haven’t decided. Or I might just print up a photo book of all my photos of him. I think I would enjoy that too. I thought I would share some photos of Chloe and I on the trail this last week.

Me and my shadow and Miss Chloe!
Chloe has a bigger back paddock! And those are guinea hens that fly in and out of the stalls. I also am finding an egg being laid behind that black feeder in her box stall almost every day. That is from chickens, not guinea hens.
She has a double wide back paddock as you can see she can see out in two places now! She is much happier in this new stall!

I moved her over one box stall with the paddocks and Zack was to be right next to her. She has more room now and I can tell is much happier with the room and the look outs. She can see what is happening and is content. She and I are doing good, and I am so thankful I have her to focus my energy on and it has made the healing go faster. I have lost 2 horses while owning Chloe. I had a Morgan before Chloe and when Chloe was 6 years old (I bought her when she was 2 years old) my Morgan passed away. It was another rather tragic event, we found him very ill and he passed away before we could get a vet on sight. I have been told by my vet he probably had an internal rupture (a twisted gut) which can happen with these rather fragile equines. Sorry for talking about this sad stuff, obviously on my mind with all the recent events. Chloe and I moved on from that and then 5 years later adopted Zack. I don’t want another horse, it will just be Chloe and I for a long time.

I don’t know what I will do when she gets older or starts to develop medical issues. She is 17 this year. Hopefully, it will be many years before I have to worry about all of that and we can just enjoy the trails. I think for my mind, heart and soul a short break will do me some good. So I appreciate you all, I won’t be gone long and I will most likely continue to read other posts and comment when I can. I am so happy to have this lovely coffee share group of amazing people and all other blogging friends here on WordPress. Natalie is doing an awesome job hosting and I am so thankful she took on the coffee share!

I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and week ahead. Stay safe and healthy!

Love,

~Diana ❤

Tribute To My Sweet Boy, Zack

On By dprastkaIn Barn stories, Living life37 Comments
He was such a handsome, beautiful horse!

Last weekend I shared that I was feeling a bit in a funk. It was because of this big beautiful animal that had me in a worried state because he is the sweetest horse but also a bit neurotic. Zack has separation anxieties, he is what they call “herd bound” where he whinnies and calls for Chloe if she is out of sight, or too far away from him. He has always been this way and most often these horses that have these kinds of anxieties are their own worse enemies. We try and make their life less stressful and so I have tried my best over the years to keep these two horses that I own near each other so that Zack would not be living a life of anxiety.

Back to last weekend. Zack was living in a barn stall and across the aisle was Chloe. Zack’s barn stall is a box without a run. Chloe across the aisle is in a box stall with a run or paddock. My plan is to move Chloe over one stall so that I could move Zack next to her, but here lies the dilemma. Once next to her, the only way he could see her is if he walks out into the run or paddock ~ they can’t see each other if they both are in the box stall while eating or drinking. (I wish there was windows in the barn. This is an old wood barn built with no windows. Many barns do have windows with bars so horses can see each other.) So we made a plan of sorts. I bought plastic mirrors safe for animals to put up in the stall so he could see himself (another horse) which should calm him and I asked the employees of the stables if they could feed my horses out back in the paddocks so they can eat next to each other. In this way, I thought Zack would end up being more comfortable with a bigger stall and right next to Chloe, his herd mate.

One of the prettiest horses I have ever had the pleasure to call my friend! He was very spoiled and loved!

As Chloe, Zack and I figured out even more ways to ease anxiety, one of the smartest things I taught myself was to pony Zack next to me so that every single time I rode out on the trails he always came with me. I know I made his life that much better by doing this because he was very stressed out when I took Chloe off the property and left him behind. Sometimes I had friends or my sister if she was in town, ride him out with us and so that worked too. But that was not every ride, so I was very proud of us as we have had a wonderful time out on the trails. I even posted just over a week ago where we rode seven days, a whole week out on the trails! We were doing so good. I am very happy that even though Zack was declining in age, losing muscle tone which is normal, he was feeling good and his anxiety was always right there but manageable. It would never go away, hence why I was so worried about moving him to a different stall. I just figured I was in for some weeks of anxiousness and I didn’t know what to expect. But what happened next no one could ever predict!

Such personality! This is his way of begging for a treat! PLEASE!
Our last ride together. How fortunate my sister came to town the week before for some fun trail rides!

As I write this I thought I would be unable to make sense of things and would be crying my eyes out. I have done plenty of that, and is partly why I waited to write this because I wanted it to be understandable, relatable. I knew this would be cathartic and this would help start to mend my heart as I honor my dear sweet boy. I can tell you it has been the most absolutely shocking weekend and my heart is broken but I know he is in a better place. You see, last Sunday I had to euthanize my sweet boy Zack. Sunday was the end of the month so the stalls were open as the other horses had moved out. I decided to put Chloe in her stall and I went and got Zack and put him in his new stall and as I did this I closed the barn door to his stall and walked over to get their Equoxx pills (horse pain pills, like Ibprofen for people) that I give them before our trail rides. That’s when I heard this banging noise, like someone was pounding the wood on the barn. I looked up and saw my pony sister coming my way, with a look of terror as she said he jumped over the door!

I walked around the corner and there he lay unable to get up. My girlfriend said he just walked up to the door with his ears up and looking straight ahead and he lifted himself up with his legs up high and tight to clear the door. What made him think he could jump out of the barn? He was in this stall for barely a minute, maybe two. He walked to the back and I walked away where he promptly walked to the front and up over the door he went. He somersaulted out and landed in a way where he basically could not move anything but his head and neck. I don’t want to be too graphic, his weight and body mostly landed on his shoulder and neck. (it was not that gruesome, no blood, its just really sad) because of his catastrophic injuries once the vet arrived it was in his best interest to be euthanized. I am so sad. He went so peacefully and I owe a huge debt of gratitude for by bestest friends (ALL OF YOU AT THE BARN) for the love, support, loving on Zack while we waited for the vet. THANK YOU FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART! YOU ALL ARE AMAZING WOMEN! ❤

I’m going to miss you silly boy! He was so spoiled and loved! ❤ ❤ ❤

I love so hard. When you love hard it just hurts so much but that’s me. It is worth the hurt to love as much as I do and these animals, these huge giant beasts have such personalities I can only try and show through my photos! They are smart, have feelings, they play and call to you! They melt my heart! I wanted to write a tribute to him because he was such a huge part of my life, including my blog. Imagine, people from all over the world know my beautiful horse Zack and Miss Chloe!

I will be okay. This is not my first rodeo, I could write a novel on loved ones I have lost. I had been beating myself up because I thought I could have done better, that I screwed up somehow making this move with him. But it has been said to me that no sensible horse would do what he did. He use to be a jumper, so to jump like he did – well, he knew how to jump. But he is old and the door too big for him to jump. He suffered from EPM which is a protozoa living in his brain and maybe this affected his thinking. Maybe he was not with a sound mind, but no one can know what he was thinking when he jumped out of that stall.

Because this is how I roll, I would like to end this sad post with smiles. I want to remember my sweet boy with tons of SMILES! I don’t want to look at photos and cry. I am planning on getting prints of my favorite photos. I am so thankful I have a horse to Love on as Miss Chloe needs me and her and I are doing good. The vet said it can be helpful for the herd mate to see the passing, so I took her out to see Zack after he was gone. She did not want to sniff him or get too close. The vet said that’s okay, they each do their own thing. She has been nothing but stoic and strong. You would not know she lost her best friend. Definitely, I believe he was more attached to her than her to him. I am feeling better each day. The self loathing is gone (you just hate yourself for a day or two because you think what have I done!) But I am smart enough to realize that no one could have seen this coming or know he would do such a thing. My best friend said to me, he had 26 years of a beautiful life and one hour of pain. Run free my friend! ❤ ❤ ❤

With Love To You Zack!

~Diana ❤

Weekend Coffee Share; End of January!

On By dprastkaIn Living life, weekend coffee share34 Comments
  • Welcome to my coffee share! Can I get you a cup of coffee or tea? Let me tell you about my morning…..

As I left my house this morning for a walk I was looking down and was positioning my walking stick in one hand and opened my front gate with the other with the cool air on my face. It was a nice 44F degrees and the sun was up above our hills shining on my back. I haven’t been walking as much as I would like, something I need to fit into my schedule. I was feeling happy to be out and as I walked I thought to myself what always makes me smile is mother nature and her wonders. Isn’t it so wonderful to enjoy all she has to give to us? I stopped in my tracks, I looked up at the sun, and then I decided to turn around and as I turned this is what I saw. Wow, majestic! this view took my breath away!

I couldn’t believe my view as I turned around from my walk, WOW!

I wasn’t paying attention as I headed out the door and I turned right to walk down this road which is away from this mountain view. I was so happy I slowed down to stop as this was a great place for a photo. The blocks I walk I saw more wonderful views, but this one set me in a good mood as I took in a deep breath and went back to my walk. My walk was a bit slow as bones creaked a bit and as the sun was rising I decided to take another photo heading more along the path I was walking.

The sun rising above the hills. I felt like I was getting a sunrise hug!

As I finished up my walk I got to thinking about how fast this month flew by. I can’t believe in about a week it will be 3 months since I started my new job. I can tell you I have never felt better sleeping every single night. (For new followers, I use to work grave yard shift full-time and had been on that shift for over 30 years!) I think I feel 30 years younger! Except for my creaking bones, a bit of arthritis in my feet and with this cold weather my right arm that I broke some years ago which has a plate and screws will ache a bit. I found some wonderful cream that helps with pain in muscles and joints that I use. So I get some relief and go about my day not thinking about it again. But when I get up in the mornings, I am a little creaky! Haha! 😀

Can I get you a refill? As I am enjoying the rest of my coffee, I just can’t stop thinking about how I am so enamored by the great outdoors. As I sit here and write on my laptop I can look out my front window and this is what I see. I can honestly say that this house we have here has some pretty cool views. I thought I should try and take a photo. So here it is!

Haha. the view is through a screen on my front window. Not the best photo but I love the view.

With it being a sunny day the snow melts fast and within a few days these snow capped mountains will be no more. However, there is another storm coming this next Wednesday so the snow will return once again. I don’t think one will ever tire of the snowy mountain views! I use to live in the local mountains many moons ago. It was an experience, but am happy down in the valley with my horses.

I have been in a bit of a funk. That’s a strange word “funk” but its a good description. I am in between crochet projects and have been doing nothing but coloring. Yup, you heard me correctly ~ coloring in my adult coloring book! It is rather therapeutic to color, but it is not motivating me to start a new craft project. I’ve been wanting to make this shawl which I bought yarn to crochet but the pattern is a little complicated. I started it but got a little discouraged and stopped. I also could get back to making my crochet animals? I usually am not so distracted. I usually move from one project to another, I am hoping to find my focus soon.

This is the shawlette I am going to crochet. Power of positive thinking as I work out the instructions! Haha!
Maybe I should just make some ponies! Okay, they look so cute!

Maybe I should just make these really cute crochet ponies and they will help me with my funk. Aren’t they adorable? I think I will work on these and get back to the shawl at a later date. I will share what I make once I get some of them completed. There are a whole herd of horses to create in this book, 10 to be exact. I have to thank my daughter for buying me this crochet project book. I am getting excited writing and thinking about these crochet ponies. I find working on my crochet crafts brings me much comfort and I LOVE creating things with my hands. It is so rewarding and always makes me smile. I also find the more I crochet the better I get, and so I enjoy my projects even more! What do you do that stirs your creative juices? I am sure many of you bloggers enjoy writing! I also have friends and family that love to sew. My sister’s sew quilts, so talented!!

I am going to wrap up with some kitty photos just because they make me smile. 😀

These are my kitties who are sister’s. Duchess closest with Dinah behind her. They were fast asleep until I bothered them with a photo!
These are my sons cats, the brothers. I love this photo as they are shaped like a heart! One is Wolfie, the other Dublin but I don’t know who is who! Haha, they make me smile!

Thank you for joining me for coffee today. Sorry about being in a funk, haha, I had to use it again because it’s such a funny word. Makes me smile to think I’m in a funk! I also want to do some gardening but I want to educate myself about gardening. I have been bad about my teeny gardens which the last one was in containers. I am just winging it, buying some fertilizer and then some starters and all I do is water. I know I live in an area where I could grow some serious food if I put some effort into it, which means taking the time to read and learn how to really garden. I need to know how to take care of said garden, and be a more mindful educated gardener. Sounds great! Now just need to learn! I’ve enjoyed sharing the beautiful mountains and kitties. I hope you all have a wonderful week ahead!

Enjoying Mother Nature and furry friends!

~Diana ❤