Monday, December 3, 2018

No Puppies This Year





This is so hard to write. We miss raising puppies so much and so many people are writing and calling to buy a puppy. My site has been a place where people copy my photos and they’ve saved them on Pinterest (without my knowledge) and then those pictures were copied and are on dozens of advertising sites with Blue and Red Heelers for sale.

We might sell puppies again. I need to have some medical issues addressed at UCLA and be ready to give all that attention they need. We still love them and have the cutest Babydoll Sheep they can work and learn to gently work them. The Heelers smile so much and sleep so well when the dogs work the sheep.

I’m so sorry this has happened, again. So many photos are used throughout Social Media that advertisers use to catch unsuspecting families or individuals that want to buy a forever friend. Please  complain to the Social Media like Pinterest (the worse) Facebook, and Instagram. I know there are lots of others. I’m not an advertiser and I will use my own site to sell our puppies or word of mouth in our rural valley in the future.

Thank you for loving our puppies, they’ve all been sold a couple years ago and have happy homes. Sending hope for all to find the perfect puppy for Christmas.

Tuesday, May 22, 2018

I’m Alive, I’m Alive

 I did it! I had a pacemaker put-in and yep, it was a German one my daughter-in-law help design. It’s a BioTRONic. I still look at my heart through my phone heart monitor app to see the tall and regular heartbeats. I felt great right-out of the procedure and super-goofy and full of pain-killers. It works. I hated the little blue hospital sling that choked me, so my daughter bought a new soft and comfortable sling from Amazon.

Now I need to follow instructions (not many) but to get daily exercise after a week’s rest. The worry is pulling the leads out of my heart. The sling is a reminder to don’t lift my left arm for four weeks. I don’t have a scar!

I wanted a picture of the cardiac unit, there was no time. Someone was with me continually.

My daughter took this photo. We do this because it records the date of my hospital visits.


We have a lot of Quail on our place and I asked Steve for a picture of a painting of a quail near my room. He did and I love it. It matches my stained glass Quail my mother made for my new house.



I wanted a Thanksgiving dinner for Mother’s Day. I wasn’t afraid at all as I was wheeled-in the operating room and thankful my pacemaker worked. I was grateful for prayers from everyone including the Temple. I loved my Priesthood Blessing I received. My children and grandchildren and mostly the faith I had in the Savior and His Atonement for me. Early Mother’s Day we went to Ventura so we were able to see and visit with both our grandsons who are serving as  missionaries. It was so touching to hear them talk in Spanish to each other though Face Time. That was such a gift! This was a very Thankful Day. 

My family worked on a huge turkey dinner for our family and especially me. The blessing was said and as we said, “Amen” there was a loud scream from the barn. A big, buck kid had his leg hanging-out, breech! Yes, my dear dairy goat decided Mother’s Day to birth us all two kids. The breech buck was really stuck. My daughter pushed him back and did the adjustments. Lots of blood. No one ate dinner and I had the giggles and looked around. I even heard, “Mom, did you plan this?” I couldn’t eat because I was so excited. If you have livestock you know turning a head and bringing the feet forward takes skill.









Hannah shared on Instagram!




Melody our doe, was completely exhausted, so dear Kiely put the kids on our porch in a large animal crate. They’re in a covered kennel now. I felt well enough today to feed. Kiely is going to make cheeses from my recipes! 🐐🧀 My Steve is reliving pasteurization and seeing jars of milk and bottles everywhere. My cheese hoops are in the milk house and so is the big cheese press my father-in-law made for me. Tip: cleaning bottles is so easy w/o a brush. We used dry rice and soap for the soda bottles and shake. We use pop-on nipples made for soda bottles. Lots of kids and lambs get a lamb bar. Melody is a first-time milker and she has great udder. Kiely got almost a gallon only this morning. Matt, my son-in-law was milking and said, “This is so “teat”eous!” 😂 I’ve got to get to the milking and help pull them down a little. I need to learn to breathe and walk. My heart is working perfectly now, but I need to exercise. I still have a sling.

Our older grandchildren helped a lot. They sure took lots of photos. All had a memorable Mother’s Day! 

We had fun watching my son, the ‘prankster king’ get pranked by Matt. He had taken a Mountain Dew bottle and put about 3 cups of water in the bottle and then made it yellow with food coloring.

Marnie was able to take a blurry video of Dustin pouring a cup of “fake pop” and he’s telling us a hilarious story made funnier by him holding the cup and he’d start to drink the pop and pause to tell more story... and he did it again. All of us were laughing but my daughter, Marnie and I were almost paralyzed laughing. Finally, he drinks it and looks straight at us and sternly said, “WHAT IS THIS?” We couldn’t talk. We were only guilty of having fun watching it. Whew! No payback. 

Dustin has pranked me since he was about four. He scared me so much when I was pregnant with Larin by running though the house with a short black hose wiggling it and saying, “I caught a snake!” “I caught a snake!” I started screaming and hung-up the phone on my mom. She had to get in the car to see if I was okay. I almost fainted and he even had the neighbor kids running in with him. They were yelling, “A snake!” over and over. 

The kids are so cute!











PeeWee has his babies to protect. Funny how the chickens are so onery! The chickens are buddies with only one of my little granddaughters and follow my husband everywhere.

Great Mother’s Day!
This is plenty for one post.🐔


Thursday, April 26, 2018

Don't Look At the Past Except To Remember The Good



I started this post so long ago when I had decided I was going to keep-up on my journal of  what's going on around here. The truth is there's not enough desks for me to use my big computer to write a post. First there was a desk by the front window and it's way too hot by that big, dang window to even think to sit there, even when it's chilly impossible. One day our antique chair just fell apart. I'm so glad someone wasn't sitting in it. Not like an arm or the leg; it disassembled itself completely including ten minutes later a wheel rolled-out about two feet from the pile. Creepy. We were all doing projects and goofing around so the noise and boys jumping, bounced our original ship-lap floor (I know what that is, now) and shaky floor wiggled the desk chair apart. Right? I still think it was a trick. Steve and I sat in it and were crippled by it. No wonder it was a give-away, but I couldn't bring myself to say no, 'cuz I was taught, "Don't look a gift horse in the mouth!" Can't say it was really a gift. Demonic chair!

My husband's desk is in the kitchen and it's his only. He's got so many projects going on, on it. I don't dare touch it and that includes using the copier most of the time. I do love his sturdy chair! There's Church work, Board-up work, CERT teaching, Citizen's Corps, the city radio, but also Ham Radio. There's no room for me.

I received another beautiful desk and Oh, my Slivers, this information is ALL so boring! 

We got another huge desk. One has my big computer, ultimate scanner, and all my programs, but my daughter needs it all! She is in the tailoring business and has so much work; she has slipped-in and stole my two big desks. She didn't move them, but she needs them. We are working on a "She Shed" for her and all the sewing machines and tailoring paraphernalia can go in there. Hopefully, it'll be done soon and it's so cute. I really need to take more pictures. I know Kiely is going to hate our stairs to come up inside our house and even her stairs on the "She Shed" porch. This is because she does a piece and then she shows me. I'm trying to stay very critical, but what she does is always perfect. This daughter has done so much great weird sewing in her life and lots of quilts that showing me her efforts is plain redundant. I wish I had her talent but not her worry and she can fix my clothes! (heehee)  My size radically changes with every medical procedure.




Okay, this is hard to write. I'm getting a pacemaker. I've had six ablations.There was the medical one and the  two accidental ones and one was aborted (so really five?) and I came conscious during the time I was being intubated in my trachea to breathe better. Maybe I should say un-intubated because they were pulling the tube out. I don't breathe regularly just like my heart doesn't beat regularly. I had another clot and the anesthesiologist chick-doctor saved my life. (last blog post) Freaked-me-out a lot, but the job had no mistakes and I know it sounds like it, but Dr. Lee at CMH is wonderful. She also helps me wake-up without shaking or hyperventilating and that's a big deal to me.

I went over my number of cardio-versions. Now I think I've had seven in 15 months? My brain is wrecked. I am certain that my holding the electric fence when I was young caused me to be a special needs student. I have the original sign warning me to not touch the fence in my kitchen. You grab the pole and then the wire and we have grounding. Why did I do that? One of my doctors told me that I was self-medicating my heart-rate. I've had this my whole life and didn't know a crazy beating heart was unusual. No wonder I couldn't breathe right playing sports. I'd go catch the horse and grab the fence and I could relax. Honest, not all the time, we rotated pastures a lot and the horses didn't stay there more than a month and it was a move to another pasture without the electricity, we weren't really "into" electric fences. My dad thought they'd catch fire. There were eight pastures and also the hillside we leased during the rainy January, monsoon season. The sign for now is to remind me to take my medication on time and my pill holder is so full I have to use a rubber-band to hold my medications in each little box. Confession: I count my pills every single time I take my pills.

Getting ready to go get "the paddles" is not easy for me. It involves a lot of me talking myself into doing. The first one I pretty much flat-lined with the medication cardio-version. This particular experience is more than I can talk about on a blog, but I'll never forget it.

I have been in Atrial Fib. again for more than 3 weeks and I'm on a better blood thinner. The doctor came into my appointment two weeks ago and was pacing back and forth. He was late and I was impatient (duhr) and I said, "My daughter told me to say two words to you." And he said, "Can you make it one because I want to ask you something?' I said, I think it's two words, "Pacemaker!" He looked at me very puzzled and asked me who she worked for or what medical company. I think I rolled my eyes. I also think he thought I got a second opinion. He named off a few companies and I said my daughter worked for a dermatologist and she didn't like her, and I named a pair of family doctors that shared an office she worked at. I told him she worked for them over more than 20 years ago. My daughter got her job because she gave great shots and could draw blood. Anyway, all her experience with livestock gave her a medical assistant degree. It’s true, but NOT a Cert,  but she did it. My daughter gave me shots and and also my mom. I didn't tell my doctor about her experience, but I did say she's a farmer on a ranch clear-out on the plains in Colorado. The Doctor pulled his neck in tight and frowned. I thought he was going to yell at me. He said he did want to give me a pacemaker and this other appliance at the same time, but the insurance wants him to do them separately. No, not again.....  I don’t want to go “under” again. The pacemaker was what he was fretting about telling me.
BTW: This is the new hospital almost open and fancy.



One week from today, I get a gift and I suspect I'll see it before it's inside me and I won't look at it like thinking, "Don't look a gift horse 'pacemaker' in the mouth!" Besides, it's brand new and hasn't lost any teeth yet. I found out MY wiz-kid daughter-in-law helped design it or designed it and it's awesome. Is this weird or what?! MY SON'S WIFE! So now "All my Children" said-- I should go for it. I said yes to the pacemaker before I knew about my daughter-in-law hand in development and that was so great to hear. I feel so blessed to hear about what it does.

Soap Opera "My Real Life"

The quotes around the 'all my children' is that I'm so old I watched that soap opera series from the first to the last one on TV. Not others, just that one. I'm thinking of watching a Telenovela Mexicanas to learn Spanish. One is about a lady that's Una Duena? 



I can't find it, so I'll have to go to the hairdressers and have them show me the channel and I hope it'll last awhile because it'll be a problem if it's playing when my grandchildren are here and they will want to watch TV, probably. They like horses, maybe it'll be okay to watch a Spanish Speaking soap opera. Their daddy speaks fluent Spanish. 

So yeah, I have A.D.D. too. If anyone that has ever read my blog they know I get distracted very easily. Super easy! We live a Mormon Soap Opera Life.




Friday, March 2, 2018

No School but Still Learning- My Health News



A Little Creepy, to Me

I’ve been procrastinating this post for so long. There's a peculiar speech bubble stuck in my head; I feel I’ve failed my school courses. They weren’t hard and I had just figured-out the modules and new way to learn. It was mostly doing an assignment and checking-off each assignment. 

I stopped school suddenly. It was one of those atrial fibrillation episodes. I could do both. I told myself so many times and I even thought my prayers would be answered. They were and it wasn't meant to be this semester. Twice I went to the hospital and both times they worked all night and all right to lower my heart rate without the cardioversion. One was an accident when I was startled out of sleep and the other was 100 and jumpy, and the hospital could let me go home.

I was finding that I was becoming tolerant to the heart meds and I was taking the highest recommended amount. Finally, after a few days, my heart was normal. I knew school would have to wait. I need those ablations. It’s like using a disbudding iron and burning my electrical escapee points.


Wise Words and Photo from my daughter, Larin Knapp


Now, I've had six cardioversions in one year and four ablasions, actually one was a dud because the team had to stop because there was a blood clot. Really, they saved my life by finding it. I did have another rough and extensive ablation, but somehow I managed to put myself back into "crazy heart" again.

--------------------------------------------

I've got to become a normal blogger without the gaps. It's been six whole months and I thought I'd get on with trying to just finish this one blog post and try and go back to writing regularly. What I didn't know was that my heart just needs medication and move on. I'm not upset with my heart that I was given and grateful it was only atrial fib and tachycardia. My valves in my heart could be causing more trouble, my murmur could be a lot more severe, and more.

 My knees could be better and it really makes me upset that my thoughts 20 years ago were to not climb the ladder and I did anyway. I fell on my knees and then was dragged into a fence, that was used for military runway stability. The fence didn't give, in-other-words. The rope was nylon and I didn't have gloves on and I now have no calluses. I made mistakes all the way around and I knew beforehand. That accident changed my life. My daughter rear-view mirror photo fits my life so much. I could've done so much more, I could've hiked and leisurely walked in the park. Lesson learned and  I do have to be better. I think this is where my New Year's resolution begins in March.

Yes, I'm disabled with my knees and heart, but no way am I changing my ADL. An acronym for Activities for Daily Living. WHAT? It's on my chart at my Primary Care Doctor. Sheesh, I brush my own teeth, shower, lots of make-up, etc. My ADL even when I don't leave the house!

I'm going to the doctor again on Tuesday, and by that time I will have been in atrial fibrillation and tachycardia for 24 days. I don't know what the doctor has planned. I know the routine. I have the best doctor and anesthesiologist and I awake like I've taken a nap. No shaking. I'll have headphones for privacy or to give privacy to others. Then, it's off to USC to have my Thyroid removed with a cardiologist. I'll be so happy that for awhile my hospital visits will be in my past, please. 

No more griping about health stuff because I have so much else to think about. When I read back on this I'll know why it took me so long. I think facing any surgery causes anxiety and I was putting off my blog post because I was afraid that anxiety and writing about my heart and knees would send an arrow in my brain that I didn't want to face-up to it. I did and really, I do feel better and yep, I could have a stroke or heart attack without this procedure and going to the doctor. But, maybe later because I have lots more to do. I'm not dying today and there you go. Health News is over.

Proverb Art by Mary Engelbreit