One year ago last weekend.

Well, it was just about a year ago some very good friends of ours came to visit and helped us revamp our kitchen/dining room and bathroom. It was Hodaka Days here in Athena and Mark and Karen helped us do renovations!

The start of the Hopkins Hole in the Wall.

Mark, Steve, and a smaller Jon looking to see if it is a load bearing wall. Karen is seen here unloading it. As usual, she was taking care of business!

And here is the first part of the Hopkins Hole in the Wall.

Today, it looks like this (OK, it is pretty untidy and the color is off, but the idea is there!):
The view opens up into all three rooms and the colors complement each other, too. Mark's Custom Painting (Mark) helped with that later in the year, too.

The bathroom was pretty scary, but it got much better!

It was a mess and Mark and Steve were wonderful!

Today, it is more like this:

Still pretty smallish, but it has a much taller ceiling and more space all around.

Thank you Mark and we will miss you forever, Karen. And Karen, we'll see you on the other side.

The welcome mat is out!

Hooray, it is DONE!!!!! The Little House is done and, if I must say so myself, it is sweet! Come on and stay for a bit and play. Granted, there is no bathroom, but that is a minor technicality!
The futon, bedding in the drawer next to it. We have also added two pillows for comfort! The boarding in back will eventually host a dart board. We need a cork batting for it before we put it up. You can barely see the floor here, but it has carpet on most of it and then a great kind of laminate tile on the rest. A loverly thing!
Since this photo (taken Sunday evening!!!) a Nintendo has been added and the top shelf has an array of Mtn Dew collectibles on it.

This area has changed the most since Sunday. The window now has a curtain (I didn't get enough rods before) and we have added lego bricks to the Bionicles and K'nex. I am not sure what else is on the shelves, but they are full of toys! Here we see the wonderful bookshelves. I still need to add some more books. (I am thinking the ones by Brian Jacques would be nice out here. This room kind of reminds me of the gate house at the Abbey!) As you can see the pull out desk is waiting for a writer and the linen drawer is just underneath it! The curtain on the door is fabric from the Arabian Nights play THS did ages past and the rest of the curtains are aged sheets that had a bit of life left in them.

I wanted curtains that would hold up well and wash well. Thus, I used sheets. I like using sheets to make curtains, they are much more durable! In fact, the ones I made and hung in Tony's room are from Oz. The Wicked Witch's magic powers burnt tiny holes in the sheet and I couldn't see tossing away such a wonderful bit of history, so I made curtains from the wholer cloth!

Speaking of THS theatre, this photo is a bit hard to see (the angle I had to shoot it from was awkward, I was on the stairs). It is in our basement entryway. There are 4 plays present here. Hot, Oz, Beauty, and Nights. Pretty fun, huh???

Still reading Jacques. The Badger books!

Trip Pix!

He is home and has slept for about 10 hours. I hope he is ready to work now! We have lots to do before Tony gets home still!!! We did finish the skull. It looks pretty nifty!

And here are some shots of Jon in the East.

He took many more, but I thought I would put these two on for now. They are the self explanatory ones!!! His favorite thing was the pizza in New York and he was also impressed with the Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich. More on his impressions of the East later!

Done with Alcott for a bit, am reading Brian Jacques. Just because! I won't do too many, though.

MORE plants and Scaredy Cats

Yup, I have more unusual plants. This one I was talking to Jake about. I am going to pass it on to the wonderful OSU people, too! We'll see what we have. Isn't it is pretty lethal looking? To get the real look, you need to click on the photo.

They are not in a useful part of the yard and if they do not turn out to have flowers or fruits, well, it might just be moved on to the firewood phase! It is kind of dangerous to run into!

And here is my mock orange! It has finally bloomed! After years of keeping it alive on the coast, it seems to like living here. Isn't it loverly? And an unexpected bonus plant! A Dutch Iris, I am told.

And last but not least. We finally got Teddy shaved for the summer again. And guess who does not recognize him!!!? And he looks so 'normal', too!!!!

Max was seriously stressed but held his ground, however, Moses was moving so fast, I was lucky to get this shot!

He's off and new link

Well, Jon has officially left the city. He is on his way to the East Coast and we will be doing all kinds of odd things around here to get stuff done! I added a link to the band tour. A drum major wanted to do this. We were told there would be few photos due to privacy issues, but there will tons of words. Anyway, if you want to read what the group Jon is with is up to, check it out! More on the later!

Reading Louisa May..I was feeling Alcottish!!!!

They hatched!!

Yippee! They did hatch and Jon says they look like camouflaged peeps! Personally, I agree! Now if we can only keep the peeps away from the cats! They have left the nest area now and are running free in the weeds. Killdeer are one of the few birds that can run soon after hatching. But, the parents still keep a pretty good eye on them, as you can tell!!! We thought it was interesting that the babies looked a lot like the shells of the eggs they were hatched from. Many birds are hatched from eggs that are blue or pale white and spotted and they look awful after hatching! These are more like chickens and barnyard fowl.

They hatched on Saturday, June 6.

MORE flowers and a nest hunt

I love my new yard. It has so many kinds of flowers in it! My Tillamook yard had flowers, too, but these are all new ones and it is exciting to meet them! Since I took most of these photos, we had a HUGE thunderstorm and many of them were flattened or otherwise disfigured. At least we have the proof in the photography!

My iris are GREAT. I love iris. They remind me of my friend Kanga and her mum. So far, I have the yellow ones and only one brown one that bloomed this year. I need some purple ones. When the yellow ones get too heavy, they fall and I bring them inside. They smell yummy.

My roses looked and also smelled great. They were not as handy as a cut flower as they only lasted one day. I need to save the petals next year, before the thunderstorms!

My very favorite flower so far this year, I do not have in my yard yet. My plant is about a handspan tall. I am looking forward to next year's flowers! These all came from friends and neighbors and they are wonderful! I was really surprised at how they fall apart so fast when they are done. Jon was wondered how so many petals could fit on one flower! I did explain it was parts of several of them, but it is still amazing how they work! I laughed when I saw the mess on the floor, I thought it looked like chicken feathers! So, here are the peony and petals (sounds like a rock group, huh?)

OK, now that we have done chicken feathers, here is a 'Where is the nest' photo!

Amazing, huh? The parents are killdeer and we are not sure if they are going to hatch, it has been a very long time since they were laid and they incubate for about 28 days. We really want them to, as they are in a very bad place. Steve almost ran over the nest a couple of times before he found it and now we try to avoid it, but it is very hard!

Just read a 'new' book. It is a 1926 Newberry called 'Smokey the Cow Horse' and it was very fun to read!