Been a long time

It has been a long time since I have done anything with this blog. I have not been idle so I will give a quick run down of what has been happening.Since I last wrote I have been to the doctor many times, had some medical procedures and tests, started volunteering at the Family History Center, started planning and preparing for the garden, and celebrated Don's birthday.I guess I will elaborate on some of the activities.

Medically I have continued pursuing help with my kidney and liver problems. The liver is now resolved, not exactly sure how it happened but I seem to be free of the anticipated problems. The kidney is still holding its own which in my mind is an absolute miracle, I seem to be learning how blessed I am with such good health when they say I am not healthy. I have taken my health for granted and abused my body for a very long time. Repentance and education seem to be a never ending process and not just restricted to our spiritual well being.

My left eye has been not healthy for many years and had gotten to the point it was in constant pain. When I visited with my daughter and her family the condition worsened to the point the eye needed to have surgery to remove a band of calcium deposit from my eyeball. Today my eye is absolutely pain free, an absolute miracle. I have even been able to look at the computer screen for extended times and the sun is not causing pain when I experience its rays.Returning to the Family History Center shift has been a real joy. I am so excited about some of the new things there. Of course the newest asset at the Center is a machine that can digitize records from film and fische. What a marvelous advance -- this allows us to document with images of events and data about our families, the documents can be viewed with close up technology, writing and pictures can be better interpreted, and we can download the information to media formats to take them home and add to our records. The only problem I have is I still have to learn how to fully operate the machine -- but I am very grateful to be exposed to it. The last good thing is the Center is allowing us to download the information with their special machine for free, another miracle in this day of economic upheaval.

I have not been well enough the last few years that we have not had a garden and this year I am hoping to revitalize the greenhouse and the garden. I am making plans for a parimeter garden for our family and really excited to see if I can do it. I have taken out the rosebushes along the north side of the front yard and am now preparing the soil for planting. I suggested to Don we plant dandelions (something I have started eating since last year) along the front but he is not going to allow me to do that -- oh well I will come up with something. My sister Donna is going to help me sort of plan other features in the backyard, hopefully easy care, visual pleasure, and high productivity.

Lastly, we celebrated Don's birhtday most of the week last week. The boys surprised Don with some computer software and updates he is going to really enjoy but as usual when something gets updated something else has to be done to allow the update to work properly. Don received some exercise equipment to help his back and I really hope it will. Tanya and Berret sang Happy Birthday on the phone to him and he was pleased to get a call from them. He has been real pleased with The Harris blog and seeing is grand daughter growing up before our eyes so far away. We all enjoy their posts.

Michael and his wife are doing well -- we are very fortunate to hear from Michael almost every weekday as he travels to and from work -- high tech work world has allowed us to keep track of our family with computers and cell phones and I am so grateful -- my apron strings are so long.

Last week I had a choice experience and tried to take a picture and I just did not seem to be able to get what I saw in a picture. It was a pussywillow tree in bloom. I have never seen a mature pussywillow tree in bloom before and when I saw it I remembered how my mom loved pussywillows and had a special song she used to sing as we were growing up. Such a wonderful interlude.

Pussy Willow

Recently I talked about my mother and her teaching us the "pussy willow" song as we were growing up. My mom loved pussy willows and she tried to grow a pink one according to my sister Donna, but alas it did not survive. When I originally found the tree in bloom it was absolutely covered with the blossoms. This picture shows how unique it is formed which was not visible when it had so many blossoms.

This is a picture of the pussy willow tree 1 week after I originally discovered it. The day was grey with showers the day I took the picture and many of the blossoms had gone away. I tried taking the picture with the cell phone, I did not take the picture the day of discovery because I forgot how so I had to learn how -- Sam taught me that night so I took the picture the next week when I was in the area. Today, Sam helped me email the picture to myself & now I can finally do something with it. Isn't it great to be able to capture these moments?

Below is a try at a closeup of the tree and some of the pussy willows.

I thought about it & I decided to see if I could remember all the words and had some trouble so I searched the Internet and found it. It really brightened my day to see the words in print.

I know a little pussy

Her coat is silver gray

She lives down in the meadow

Not very far away

She'll always be a pussy

She'll never be a cat

For she's a pussy willow

Now what do you think of that?

Meow meow meow meow meow meow meow meow

Scat

Start singing on the lowest note and each lines goes up a note - start with hand low and as you sing higher and higher bring hand up a little bit.

On the Meow's go down a note at a time and then a loud scat at the end.

I found the song in an area of the music teachers instructing children how to sing going up and down the scale with their voices. It used each note of the scale and mom taught us motions to go along with our singing.

Thanks for the memories.