Yesteryear Acres - Doodle Days : February 2016

Monday, February 29, 2016

First Time Outdoors

Truffles puppies are finally big enough to venture outside. Their first adventure today went quite well. They decided the warm sunshine was awesome and picture taking was rather cuddly with Mr. Yesteryear Acres.

Look how big we are now!

We will start solid foods this week

and learn how to go outside

and will have regular play times!

But we still love snuggling the best!

Caramel Girls

Such cuties!

Snuggling with Mr. Yesteryear Acres is the best

We could stay here all day long

He gives the best back scratches

HAPPY MONDAY!

Sunday, February 28, 2016

How do I look?

Winter weather isn't officially over yet so it isn't quite time for our Spring Grooming extravaganza. All our Doodle Doggies will be getting a lovely short springtime hairdo in late March/early April. Even though they aren't ready for the full beauty treatment, all of the doggies needed their nails trimmed plus a little trimming around their eyes and under the tail. Mr. Yesteryear Acres was in charge of the nail trimming duty while I did the hair cuts. I am sure I do not have to explain why the under the tail trimming is necessary. Let's just say, I like to keep what belongs outside....outside! LOL. Now for the eyes - Doodle doggies look sooooooo cute with long hair hanging down on their face but if you cannot see your Doodle Doggie's eyes......your Doodle Doggie can't see you that well either. It is really important to keep the hair around their eyes trimmed so they have a good field of vision. I just simply cut an upside down V around the bridge of their noses. It keeps the hair out of their eyes and they are still soooooooo cute! One by one all the doggies said, "How do I look?" The answer was of course - Fabulous! Now we can clearly see.... that's a lot of Clean Tail Wagging Devotion!

Saturday, February 27, 2016

Everybody Loves a Doodle Pillow

It seems to me that today must have been Doodle Pillow day. I was unaware of this holiday until today when it became evident that it was indeed Yesteryear Acres Doodle Pillow Day. When I walked into the living room, I caught these two napping together.

Obviously Blossom makes a very nice pillow

They stayed like this for hours

Snuggle Buddies

This was the scene in the kitchen.

Um? Who me? Snuggling with a cat? No way!

Doodle Butt Pillow Perfection

and then finally

to confirm all my suspicions that today was indeed Doodle Pillow day

I walked in on this.....

Double Doodle Pillow time

Olive says, "You didn't catch us napping!"

"We are just snuggling!"

"Yeah.....we are SNUGGLING!"

"And we will never get up!"

Everybody Loves a Doodle Pillow!

Friday, February 26, 2016

Just Get Going

Despite all the work I do every single day here at Yesteryear Acres, I generally am a lazy person. If given a choice between running around all day and watching a movie with a big bowl of popcorn, the movie would win every time. It is so rare for me to ever have a lazy day but I dream of it often. I would love to just sit around and have nothing on my schedule, nothing to do except to just sit and relax. Of course this is far from realistic and my list is always a mile long. There are some days when it is just harder to find the motivation to get everything done. I look at my list and think, "Ugh." Today started as one of those days. Then I gave myself small pep talks. Just go load the dishwasher and then you can have a cup of coffee. As soon as the dishwasher was done, it became, "just go take out the trash" and "just go clean the refrigerator" and then "just go vacuum the kitchen". Basically JUST go and get moving. Once I started moving it was easy to stay moving. Newton's law of motion, "A body in motion stays in motion" once again saved another day. I ended up getting the entire house vacuumed, all the farm chores finished, a big homemade dinner for Mr. Yesteryear Acres and I made one of his favorite desserts. I just need to remember.....just get going.

Thursday, February 25, 2016

Silver Lining... I mean snow crystal lining

We definitely have had our share of crazy winter weather here. One day it is short-sleeved weather and the next day it is parkas. I never even know what to wear until I open the back door and see if it will be a day spent in the arctic or a day in the tropics. This morning it was arctic. I opened my door to lots of snow and began putting on my layers of warm clothing so I could go out and start the farm chores. As always, Mr. Yesteryear Acres and I have a lot of poop removal in our daily chores. I mean a lot. This winter has made my poop removal work vacillate between chopping away at frozen poopsicles and scooping up muddy runny "used-to-be" poopsicles. Today was an oh so pleasant mix of both. As I was scooping up the poop, I noticed the most beautiful snow crystals falling on the smelly brown piles. The snowflakes were so perfect. They reminded me of the snowflake sprinkles I bought for our gingerbread house decorating this past Christmas. 6-sided crystals of beautiful perfection. I just stopped and admired just how beautiful they all were. I guess there really is a silver lining to most things. Or make that snow crystal lining. I guess even poop removal can be a beautiful thing!

Wednesday, February 24, 2016

The Gaggle Cacophony

Every year we have a pair of geese that choose to make their nest in the low flood-prone part of our field. I am not sure why they pick this location because we have hundreds of better places to make a nest but for some reason - this is THE place. Once the little hatchlings are big enough, the mom always leads them to our pond where they reside until they mature and fly away. Well this year, the word must have gotten out. "Come to the wet soggy part of the field!!!!! It is the BEST!" This morning the raucous in our field could be heard all the way up at our house. There is quite the competition for the "prime" nesting location. It has gone on all day long. Geese flying in and out. Geese fighting. Geese parading. Geese strutting their stuff. The Doodle Doggies are quite amused by all of this. While I am certainly happy the Doodle Doggies are well entertained, I hope that just one pair will ultimately win. 5-6 goslings are more than enough waterfowl for our pond. So let the cacophony continue until we are down to hopefully one quiet sweet pair of geese.

Tuesday, February 23, 2016

Yes we have Doggies

Mr. Yesteryear Acres and I had a full day. We got up early and we were busy the entire day non-stop. We managed to get most everything crossed off our list including going shopping at not one but two warehouse clubs. Man we know how to have fun don't we!? We didn't even really get to shop together. I had a cart for all of the household things and Mr. Yesteryear Acres had the flatbed for all the Doodle Doggie things. He went one way and I went the other and we met at the checkout when we had our lists complete. Of course I beat him to the checkout lane because I had things like milk and eggs and bread and he had DOGGIE things. What is more interesting than Doggie things? Mr. Yesteryear Acres got stopped at almost every single aisle with the normal warehouse club questions..... "have some dogs do you?" and "how big is your dog?" and "how much does all that dog food cost?" I am fairly certain Mr. Yesteryear Acres enjoyed his famous status today. He took the time to talk to everyone and even though we were in a hurry, you could never tell. Mr. Yesteryear Acres is always nice to everyone. I love that about him. And why yes - we do have doggies!

Monday, February 22, 2016

Chocolate Kiss

Truffles puppies can now hear us when we walk into the room and they jump up with little tail wags and little barks of appreciation. They are starting to wrestle and play with one another and are just so adorable! Here they are hamming it up for the camera......

"Whatever you do......Don't look at the camera!"

"Quick! Pretend you are sleeping!"

Chocolate Kiss!!!

"Ha Ha Ha - My eyes are closed!"

"Heh Heh....Mine too!"

"Look at me! Halfway open!"

"Alright guys....Time to get serious!"

Truffles Caramel Boy

Truffles Chocolate Boys

Aren't they so cute???

Truffles Chocolate Girls

Chocolate Super Models

I love their silky coats

They were happy to have their pictures taken all day long

Striking a pose

Thanks Chocolate Girls!

The Caramel Girls said, "Hey we are super models too!"

"See?"

Caramel Super Models!!!!!!

Happy Monday Everyone!!!!

Sunday, February 21, 2016

Sunday Morning Biscuits

My son requested homemade buttermilk biscuits to accompany our Sunday morning breakfast. Of course, I was happy to oblige and was lucky enough to have company while I made the biscuits. Both Mr. Yesteryear Acres and my son sat in the kitchen with me and we began having just the very best conversation as I rolled out the dough. We were talking and laughing and before we knew it our big Sunday breakfast was complete. We sat down in the dining room to enjoy our feast and the conversation never died down. We sat and talked about life goals and happiness and doggies and work and the many things that come together for a life of meaning and fulfillment. It was a great breakfast. It lasted over 2 hours. We didn't even realize the time had flown by so quickly. We really didn't want our time together to end but it was time to get busy and start checking things off our long list of things to do today. As we stood up and began deciding what to do first, Mr. Yesteryear Acres came up with the best place to start.......

"Well, it looks like it is about time for lunch!"

Sunday Morning Biscuits .... my favorite way to begin our day

Saturday, February 20, 2016

Sunshiny Day

I had to run into town this afternoon as I had a special order that had come in and needed to be picked up today. I couldn't believe how beautifully nice the day was. It felt like spring. It felt like kite-flying weather. It felt like a picnic in the sunshine kind of a day. When I got to town - I could not believe the overwhelming number of people that were there. I could hardly find a place to park! Every store was filled with people. There were people everywhere! I felt like it was a Black Friday shopping day. I had a few errands to run while I was out and I had to stand in a long line in every store. All I could think was "WHY?!" When I talked to the store clerks - they all said the same thing.....WHY? They too had wished they were outside enjoying our spring sneak peek. Hours later I returned home to find very tired very happy doodle doggies. My son had come home from college and took the doggies out on a super long off leash hike. Their muddy happy contented faces said it all. They definitely won the best way to spend a sunshiny day! Before I could even say how sad I was to miss the doodle doggie walk, my son offered to go on a long walk with me tomorrow. Yay! I can't wait! I love going on Doodle Doggie hikes with him!!!!!!!

Friday, February 19, 2016

Can you hear me?

Last night I made one batch of Old World Raspberry Bars and one batch of Old World Fig Bars. They were exceptionally delicious. We ate our allotted serving of dessert with great enthusiasm and joy. This morning.....I clearly heard the leftover Raspberry bars calling me. They said, "It doesn't matter that it is morning......you should eat another one!" As much as I tried to ignore their pleas, I could not. I took out a teeny tiny baby spoon and cut exactly one bite. Oh my goodness! The bars were even better than they were last night! I told Mr. Yesteryear Acres that his fig bars were calling him and he IGNORED THEM! I couldn't believe it. The fig bars were clearly yelling for him to eat them - but he didn't budge. I thought perhaps Mr. Yesteryear Acres was losing his hearing. I worried that perhaps he could no longer hear the calls from the pastry drawer. Thankfully at 11am this morning, the fig bars cries made it to Mr. Yesteryear Acres and I caught him with a big spoon in the pan. Aha! So you CAN hear them!!!! This is pretty much how it went all day. Every time we walked into the kitchen, the pastry drawer opened, the spoon went in, and the bars got that much smaller. I am quite certain the entire 11" square pan will be completely empty before dinner. Both 11" pans. Hey...did you hear that? ANOTHER BITE WAITING! I gotta run!