Birthday

Happy birthday to me! I had a lovely nap and walk on the beach for my birthday, as well as pizza and cake with Grandpa and Tim. Joe was visiting for a few days and left on my birthday while I was at my Master Gardeners class, though before he went we had a lovely birthday dinner out and he got Tim motivated to do all sorts of projects we've been meaning to get to, like pulling apart the engine on the Escort to check for damage (could be worse, looks like we can repair it and get the car running again for not too much of the fishing money), and painting the truck - what a delightful sight to come home to!

The back is now finished, after an emergency trip for one more can of paint. He's also set about touching up all the trim with black, such as the cleats along the sides and the lettering across the back. It looks stunning - a whole new truck! And finally showing off the beauty of that 1978 body.

And would you look at those fine mirrors on the moped!

While Mom was here a few weeks ago, Tim unveiled his big birthday present to me - a full sized floor loom he'd done work trade for. Here he is leading me to it blindfolded while he and Mom narrated a scene about snakes about to bite me. Hence hiding behind Tim.

Also thank you to my parents and their support of my teaching plans with a very cool Alaskan themed hand crank ice cream maker (take note all of you planning to visit this summer) and the makings for my glow-germ kids hand washing lesson.

And thank you to Alice for the gift certificate to my favorite store: the Country Supply Store at the end of our street. After a few days contemplation, Tim and I walked Tilly and Sancho all the way to the store and stocked up on excellent, durable, and delicious Tilly toys, to be potentially used with Search and Rescue training. Also some ice cream bars for our long walk home.

It is tent caterpillar season here, and this seems to be the boom year before a, hopefully, long and dramatic bust in their population. We got fed up with their over population and decided to evict them all. Equipt with our extended trimmers, we did a little mid-season pruning on the trees around the property, then took our 5 gallon bucket of worms and nests down to the chicken coop for our relocation project. Unfortunately the chickens didn't eat them, but they have been busy making dust baths in the once-green run. They also have been tucking themselves up at the top of the ramp in the evenings after all day in the sun. Here are 25 rather large chicks tucked together to enjoy the sunset.

On gardening, our last Master Gardeners class was over grafting, so I have come home with many more tomatoes and a few eggplants that have suffered some Frankenstein practices. Hopefully between the potatoes, tomatoes, garlic, lettuce, and eggplants, we will get some reasonable harvest of food, though so far they are all looking a little doubtful - particularly those hot, dry kale starts. In better gardening news, I finally got a compost thermometer after two weeks of rotating my pile every weekend. The temperature is 160f, which is phenomenal and borderline too hot! I have yet to decide if that means I can forgo the rotation tomorrow or if that means I should keep at my weekly pitchfork exercises in hopes of having good soil as soon as possible.

Tomorrow, Cousin Min Min and Aunt Agnes come up for a visit and it is Tim's last day before heading North for a summer of commercial fishing in Bristol Bay. Tilly will keep me company and it won't be long before the next wave of visitors arrive: June for Mom and Dad, July for Nancy, August for Alice and September for Brother Daniel and Amanda.