Just In Time For Halloween

The Birds!

Shot this about an hour ago off our deck .... very spooky. Not sure what kind they were ... hawks? .... vultures? .... black birds? .... it was pretty dark but they were very big and very quiet. This is a most unusual occurrence ... at least for us .... and it was amazing to watch them. This video doesn't do justice to the poetry of motion these birds displayed but here it is anyway ....

Screen Door, Halloween, Stone and Sydny

I've never built or hung a screen door before but the outside door to "the cave" is an odd size and I can't find one to fit so I had to make one. I surprised myself on this one ... it's sturdy, tightly screened, hinged well so it swings easy, fits and latches .... wow.


"The Cave" is the dirt floored basement that I make the PEG'S in and even though I'd open the screened window and close the door to the finished basement, the resin odor would still get into Lea's shop and even up into the house. I tried just opening the cave door but all kinds of critters kept coming in so I really needed this screen door. Everyone in the household is much happier now.

So I finished decorating for Halloween last week (inside and out). Here's some shots of the outside ....






I told Lea that I've been getting lots of emails requesting more Sydny videos so she's promised to do one this week. For now all I have is this shot I got of her last night while she was coming out of this cool rock cave that Lea made for her .... she's sooooo cute and sweet .... we really love her. Oh .... it's kinda red because she has a red heat lamp. She also has a UVB light that's on during the day so she gets vitamin D to keep her shell growing strong. I actually stuck my hand down in our water meter hole yesterday to try and catch some crickets for her .... they're hard to catch and all I got was icked out. No shots of that :)


Here's the latest on the pink bathroom ....


We dug through our rock collection and threw some into the mix. And .... Yes .... we're regrouting all the white grout in the pink tiles to black. This whole pink bathroom thing is really crazy and I'm convinced it will never go away and be a never ending ongoing project ..... next week purple walls! OMG! What are we doing?? I'm writing that with a smile on my face because it's really fun when you don't have anyone telling you that you can't do that. WE JUST LOVE BEING ORPHANS!

Bathroom, Firewood, Bike Path and Colors Update

We pretty much have all the adhesive off the pink bathroom floor but it still needs work. We've moved on to stoning the countertop. Today Lea will seal the stone and by tomorrow or so we should be able to grout it .... black grout of course. We've also decided to paint the walls .... again .... probably a dark purple. It's like .... nothing we do could make it worse :()



I've resumed cutting wood since the only people we found to buy wood from broke down just short of making it to our house so we took it as a "sign" and I'm now continuing to cut our own wood. What you see in this carport photo is about 1/2 of what I have cut .... we have wood storage down by the basement porch entrance too. There's sooooo much wood on our property .... mostly oak, hickory and aromatic cedar .... it's all downed trees just laying on the sides of what was cleared by the previous owner to create the view we have.


Yesterday was our day to go to the big town (Mountain Home) and do our PetCo and Lowes shopping. We took the dogs with us because it's now cool enough for them to stay in the car while we shop. On the way home we stopped to walk the dogs at the park in Salem Arkansas which is about 1/2 hour from home. It was an interesting surprise because you can't see much from the road and we've passed this park maybe 50 times and didn't realize that there's a walking/bike path that goes around a lake. We've been looking for place to take our bikes since you can't ride them on the streets around our place (way too narrow and dangerous).




Last but least for this morning is my "fall color" report ..... here's the what we were looking at while drinking coffee and eating cheerios this morning ...

The Weekend

We left the dogs home with their kitty on Saturday ....


And went for a drive out to Martins Creek but first we stopped at the park in Hardy to see what was was going on. There was an arts and crafts show (yes.... we knew about it but couldn't get our s**t together to do it) and a VW car show ....


If this one had been for sale we probably would have emptied out our bank account to buy it ...


We moved on to Martins Creek road (about 10 miles from home) and drove about as far into the hills as we dared and then came back .... we just love driving on the back dirt roads into the hills. We stopped at Martins Creek Watermill on the way home ....


Today .... being Sunday and all ..... was nature hike day with the dogs. So here it is in all it's 9+ minute glory :)

Thumbs Up!

Lynda and John are packing up and moving from Huntington Beach Ca. to Cherokee Village! Lynda bought this really cute yellow house on 2 lots sitting across the street from Lake Navajo and across the lake from Diana and Nancy. What doesn't show in the photos is the second lot that looks like a park in the forest. Lynda is an artist so in this environment she won't have to go far from home to paint. The house also has an attached garage with lots of windows that will be perfect for her studio. We're so happy for her! Way to go Lynda! The thumbs up photo was taken about 5 seconds after she got off the phone finding out she got the house.

The leaves are falling and the colors are still beautiful. We went for a little hike near our house next to Otter Creek which is pretty dry right now but as you can see in this photo .....

it carries a lot of water at times

But for now it's really fun to walk around in ...


With just a trickle of water running & sounding so pretty .... I must take my field recorder and record the sound for you next time I go.


We took Lynda to Memphis yesterday so she could go home and pack. It's a long day so we take the "kids" with us. Millie held onto Lynda almost the whole way there ...

Yes ... I took this while driving :)

We stopped at the "Turtle Creek" mall in Jonesboro on our way back, it's about an hour and 15 minutes from home so we don't go to the mall as often as we used to but it does make it special.


The place is huge with all our favorite stores ....


Put your Sombrero back on get your taco off the floor Bobbie ..... you know the real reason we stopped at the mall was because I wanted to go here ....


Because I love to decorate for Halloween!

Boo! :)

Hardy, Fall and 3 Babes At A Beach Club

Another beautiful day in the Ozarks with our town looking gorgeous!




And a shot down the side of our place this afternoon looked pretty too ..... We can see this tree down our hall looking out the side door through the carport so we've been watching it evolve into all it's glory ....


It was a little rainy and thunderstormy at times today but we promised Lynda a trip to the Hardy "Beach Club" ..... I dressed first and they copied me ..... how embarrassing .... but we still look pretty sexy don't you think?


Lynda's working on a silk scarf and I finally broke out one of the 30"x30" silk pieces to paint ..... almost done but I may add some stick trees to the scene


Julie .... the 30x30 silk satin is awesome ... but I haven't steamed it yet

There's very good reason for the thumbs up here but I think I'll keep the surprise for another day or two :)


Of course I'm always accepting of anyone wanting to take a guess

The Monster Mash

Starring the usual "creeps" ...

View From The Deck This Morning

Halloween Rap

Our Halloween Rap starring Lea as the Witch, Lynda (Lea's sister) as Frankenstein, Ozzie as The Mummy, Millie as Dracula and me as the DJ (of course). Don't wear it out :)

Sorry that it's slow loading but it's High Definition so it's a hog, just pause it a bit ....

Burls, Cauldrons and Fly Fishing

The guy who owns the shop where we sell our art gave Lea 3 wood burls yesterday. One was really heavy and Mark helped us get it in our van but it was up to us it get it out (we have that problem a lot). We got it out and it rolled down the hill but Lea was able to roll it back up and take the power washer to all 3 .....

Lea will turn these into beautiful works of art

Our "cauldron" is working great ....


And we've started decorating for Halloween .....


Can never seem to get enough Silk painting .... now Lynda's hooked :)


We went down to the river around 5pm this afternoon. Lynda did watercolor ....


While Lea and I Fly Fished ....


Did you notice the purple sun ray on Lea .... cool huh

And yes .... we each caught a fish and let it go ....

The Rope

Yesterday we crossed the Mississippi river into Memphis to pick up Lea's sister, Lynda, from the airport .....


The dogs thought they were going to sleep all day but we took them with us ....


Saw Elvis on a Fire Truck on the way home ....


So here's a self portrait shot of the 3 of us down at the river ....


And the star of the post today is "The Rope" .... and I'll end it with that :) love the rope

Wood, Kitchens and Bathrooms

It's really feeling like Autumn now with the cold nights and cooler days. Still, next week is supposed to be in the mid 70's for highs and high 30's for lows. The leaves are just starting to show hints of turning color. The farmers are setting up their pumpkin stands on the sides of the roads and we're loving every minute of it. Bought a huge, and very heavy pumpkin the other day on our way back from a Lowes run to Mountain Home so you should be seeing that come up in the blog soon.

We've got the chain saws buzzing and we're starting on cutting up all the slash on the sides of our property. If we're lucky we just might be able to get enough wood cut for the winter without having to buy any. Here's what we were able to cut in a couple of afternoons ....

This will have to be full and then some but it's a start ...


And some for the "cauldron" ....


And although Millie is displeased about not having her own personal patio anymore she still enjoys the area ....


We didn't care much for this sink in our kitchen .....


So we replaced it with this one .....


The dishwasher that was in the house didn't work and after much back and forth thinking on whether we should replace it or not, we finally decided to do it so here's a shot of the sink and the new dishwasher ....


Thanks to Diana and Nancy for turning us onto James .... a great plumber/handyman who did the sink and dishwasher install in 4 hours. Next up for him is some needed roof work .... time to fix those little leaks :)

Lea and I are still working on that darn pink bathroom. We spent over a week getting the carpet adhesive off the tile floor so now there's no way that we're not going to love and embrace the white and pink tiled floor :) Our challenge now is to do whatever it takes to the cabinets and countertop to try and subdue the pinkness of the room .... yea right. Ok so we stripped all the paint off the cabinets, cut a new countertop and cut in the sink hole yesterday. Today we'll mount the sink and plumb it, paint the cabinets black and then later this week we should be getting the black pebble stone we ordered to cover the countertop with ..... whew!

So here's what it looks like this morning .....


We'll see what it looks like this afternoon if we don't get sidetracked into doing something fun instead :)