Another One

This is Dorothy.  She was in a different kitchen drawer when I spotted her and scooped her up.  Hard to tell but she's bigger than Toto, the first one we caught.  Equestrian Girl also says she's mangier.  That round thing at the top of the picture is a bottle cap from a bottle of Gatorade to give perspective of her size.  Tiny.

10 Days Ago

Ten days ago this is what the lake looked like;  mostly still frozen.  Today it's mostly melted with just a few spots still frozen but this is the latest in the spring I can remember there being this much ice going into April.  I hope this means it will be a cool summer.  Warm is good.  Hot is not.

I believe.....

MOUSE!!!!

This drawer is where we keep our peanut butter and bread.  It has a space in the front with the glass where we keep a decorative layer of dried beans in one, fake oranges in another, etc.  Equestrian Girl was opening this one to get the peanut butter when she screamed, jumped, and ran about 25 feet in the other direction because she spotted this tiny little mouse in the beans.  He barely noticed her antics.

My first idea was to pop a red Solo cup over him and then somehow slide something under that but the space in this section of the drawer is only about 3" so that wasn't going to work. I ended up using a 1/2 pint jelly jar and literally just scooped him up.  He was agitated by that but hardly a crazed mouse critter.

Having him in the jar made me realize just how tiny he was.  Not really all that much bigger than the end of my thumb.  And how stinkin' cute is he?  Just a baby left behind by his mommy!  We didn't have the heart to just toss him out in the snow being so little.

So we did what good neighbors do and took him over to someone else's house!  Neighbor Jeff has him in a much bigger, nicer jar with paper towel for snuggling in, water to drink and bird feed to eat.  He even has him positioned under a light for a little extra heat.  Now to see if he makes it.....

Big Horse

New horse!  Not ours.  Actually, he's owned by the sister of the girl in the red gloves.  He's a biggie - about 6ft tall at the withers and a full-blooded Percheron.  

IEA Team - the Hancock Horsemen

I don't think we've ever actually had EVERYONE from Equestrian Girl's IEA team in one place at one time but we did have a pretty good group at the last regular season meet in Oberlin, OH a couple of weeks ago.  EG is in the middle with the white sweatshirt.  Most of the high school girls are in the front with her with the younger kids behind.  What a fantastic bunch of kids this is too - all are so good to each other and have become great friends as well.  Pretty soon it's off to Regionals where the team has a huge number qualified.

Last one for a while

Daylight savings time messes up my sunrise times.  This will be the last one I catch in the wee hours for a while.  When it comes up later I'm usually busy at my desk and forget to look out the window until I find myself squinting at the computer screen because the sun is reflecting off the windows of the building next door.  By then it's too late.  So this one was just before day light savings time went into effect.  There was still ice on the river.  And an odd double reflection over on the right....alien ship I guess.

This was just a few minutes later - the side of the building next door that reflects downtown Detroit and Jefferson Ave.

Skylines

When the sun is coming up and the sky over the river looks like this.....

the city is also glowing and looks like this.

What the???

Motocross Boy/Man was never one of those kids that left weird bits and pieces in his pockets like other kids so imagine my surprise when I found these relics in his jacket pocket.  Huh.  Made me look twice at the jacket and wonder when I had washed it last!

Changes...

Some changes are good.  My vote is still pending on this one.  The barn owners built four more stalls under the observation room in the arena.  When they started I couldn't figure out what the heck they were doing since the wood was covering any kind of entrance doors to the stalls.

Once it was done it made more sense although I still think the spacing is kind of weird.  It does look nice - the observation room always sort of looked like it was just hanging in the sky up there.