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Highlights, News, Tidbits, Chatter, and Photos from 2011:
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• Geek Dog |
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March Winter Fun In March we joined Kathy and her family for a week in the mountains. We stayed at a cabin in Tahoe and happily enjoyed lots of snow. At night there were board games to play by a warm fire. During the day there was ice-skating and skiing outings. AND Rylan went skiing for the very first time!
Our Annual Family Reunion aka The Gray PEAR Affair For this, I am only showing some photos from the reunion. To read about the reunion and to link to more photos on Kodak Gallery, go HERE.
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Summer Tripping Our trek to Washington for the family reunion was prefaced by a trip to Salt Lake City to attend the Austin Convention followed by ventures to City of Rocks, Twin Falls, Shoshone Falls, Boise, and Chinook Pass. We even went on a zip line through the mountains out of Horseshoe Bend! Once in Bellingham, the Pines let us stay with them at a vacation home in Ferndale while we attended the reunion. From there, they all headed to Canada for a weeklong family vacation. Robert and I then headed home after a visit with my two best childhood friends in Bellingham and in Seattle. On the way home we enjoyed a visit to Sundial Bridge. A highlight of our Washington trip was seeing my Mom's shoot for a Starbucks Pumpkin Spice Latte commercial. My Mom being in a Starbucks commercial is a real trip! It went live on the Internet at the end of August. Didn't see it? You still can. View it on YouTube.
For the Grandkids To add to and to enhance the play structure built last year, this year Robert bought a NASCAR tire to hang from the oak tree by the chicken coop. He then remodeled our two-swing set to make it a four-swing set (given we now have three kids who want to swing and the top beam had rotted, it was good timing). He also built a roof over the swinging bridge on the play structure to keep sap from an overhead pine dropping onto it. (If he had not come up with this idea, we may have cut down the tree, which would have taken away the nice deep shade!) In the spring, we planted 100 sunflowers to create a sunflower fort. With the kids at our house at least once a week (most of the time just the girls since Rylan is now in first grade), we enjoy taking them places. Such outings included the Lawrence Hall of Science with Rylan and Aubrey, the Oakland Zoo with Rylan and Aubrey, and the pumpkin patch with Aubrey and Sierra. And of course there are always lots of outings to places like local playgrounds, a bounce house, Scientopia, the library... Special Birthdays too:
Oh, and you have to check out the special pancakes I make for the kids.
Showing My Age Cataract surgery on May 12 (two days before Aubrey's birthday) made me realize I am not a young lass anymore. I guess now that I am almost 66 I am going to have to admit I really am a senior citizen. The cataract surgery went well, even better than well. I could not believe how blind I was before the surgery. I really should not have been driving. After surgery I was astounded how much clearer and brighter everything was even though I only had my left eye done. My right eye has a slight cataract developing but is Amblyopic so I do not anticipate surgery soon. Overall, I found cataract surgery to be a breeze. During the recovery phase, the biggest downside was eye fatigue; I had to limit my reading and computer time. Not being able to be on my computer was hard.
Lots of Moving Going On With Jean's passing, there was a lot involved with her house. She had lots and lots of stuff because well, she collected everything! There was a bedroom plumb full of fabric and craft projects to empty out. There were dolls stuffed in corners everywhere and on shelves all over the house to organize to sell on eBay and in yard sales. (To be sure, numerous yard sales followed.) There were snails, clocks, ducks, patterns, trolls, dishes, thimbles, stuffed animals, magazines, newspapers, wrapping papers, old greeting cards, old birthday cards, jars and jars of buttons, countless spools of thread, thousands of photos and so much more I cannot come up with offhand. Lots of time, diligence and energy have gone into reorganizing, donating and dumping. At last, in August, the house was close enough to ready for Robert's brother, Gary and family (Fely, Nick, and Briana) to move into. Then came the moving of Gary's collection of stuff from his home in Watsonville, a real challenge given Gary, like his mother, is also a big collector (one of those idiosyncrasies that runs in families; ours being no exception). One U-Haul truckload later it was quite obvious there was much, much more to move. After settling into the Benicia house, which involved painting hardwood floors throughout the house, Gary rented a second U-Haul to bring home the best of what was left. Everything else he decided to give up, all of which would have filled anther three truckloads or more. Gary, Felly, Nick and Kim then continued to clean up, dump out, and organize. They were on a mission. Gary really wanted to host Thanksgiving this year at the Benicia house. And so he did! Although obvious there is still more to do, the house looked great for Thanksgiving Day. Gary, Felly, Nick and Kim did a fine job! Kim even added special decorating touches including making sweet turkeys for the dinner table, each with a riddle name tag.
Yes, We Still Camp Memorial Day weekend we joined Tim, Kathy, Rylan, Aubrey and Sierra for three days of camping near the ocean in the Redwoods at Samuel P. Taylor State Park. The nights and early mornings were quite cool. We had to bundle up big time. The afternoons were warm enough to go to Hearts Desire beach to play in the water, to hike Devil's Gulch trail and to wade in a shallow creek. We also had camp bandits!
Geek Dog
Ideas for Geek Dog comics come from our two GSPs, Paris and Dakota. Also Chris, Kathy, and our three grandchildren, Rylan, Aubrey and Sierra are involved in technological innovation in one way or another and provide lots of inspiration. Robert also gives me ideas and editorial input. I find coming up with new cartoons challenging for my brain and finalizing them in my computer drawing program is quite therapeutic. I get excited every time someone "likes" Geek Dog's facebook page. If you haven't "liked" the page yet, march on over and do it for me! I post a new cartoon every week or so. P.S. I also created a facebook page for the Napa Tree Moose, a local landmark. Lately the moose has been painted two or more times a week! "Like" this page too and you can enjoy the many colorful and unusual paintings of the moose (actually a Eucalyptus tree branch).
New Additions This summer it became obvious we needed a cat. The mice and gophers around our place have become a problem (We have not had a cat for about two years). Mice have been getting into our chicken house and into our barn. In the barn, they have gnawed through the plastic bin where we keep chicken food. Of course they are eating it up! In our field, more and more gopher mounds are popping up. In September, after bringing one kitten home, I found out she had a sister who also needed a home. The two kittens are from a local rescue group. We named the darker kitten Kennedy. We named the other kitten Reagan. Reagan was the first one we brought home. Their mother is a Siamese and the two kittens are the only two she had. Reagan settled in quite well and lets me hold and pet her. Kennedy, on the other hand, is very skittish and frightens easily. So far she has hardly let me touch her at all. At first Paris and Dakota were not sure what to think of the new kittens. They were actually a bit afraid of them and didn't understand why they couldn't chase them. They are doing much better now and are so comfortable with them; they will even let them eat their food! A couple of months ago, we also set up a new aquarium and now have 13 fish, about the limit for our 55 gallon tank. We spoil them big time giving them tubifex worms and frozen shrimp almost every night. Two are angels and have already quadrupled in size! As you can guess, the kids enjoy both the kittens and the fish, as do we!
Last Word I am not diligent about updating Osborn Country, however I am active on facebook. I find it is a much faster and efficient way to share with friends and family. Recently I switched over to Timeline and like the look and layout of the new format and really love being able to easily go backwards in time all the way back to January 2009 when I first became a facebooker. Below is a modified screen shot of my facebook page (from December 17, 2011). |
This year I became a wannabe cartoonist. I have always wanted to be a cartoonist but never thought I could come up with material on a regular basis. June marked the birth of Geek Dog, a cartoon character I originally came up with to fill space in the 
