February catch up

So February commenced and I received this amazing card from a scrapbooking friend Julie from the USA, she made it specifically for me.  Look it's Buster and Bo Bo.  She's even got Bo's distinctive light coloured stripe across her head.  Of course I cried bucket loads of tears.  Oh the kindness of people, a gesture like this means the world, I will treasure this card forever.

Then quite by accident during the month this happened...

We had still been keeping them apart then one day Mike accidentally opened a door,

Buster flew out, and they came face to face.

And they've been fine together ever since.

Buster continued to grow.  How quick do kittens grow !!!

   

Kittens aren't the only things that grow quickly.

Mr. Codan is now 1 year old!  How did that happen.

Flowers delivered to work for Valentines Day.    Everyone say ahhhhhh!  

Peace reigning supreme in the G House.

I did the 10km Bellarine Sunset Run, second year it's been run.

And oh just as much fun as the first year!

Again with a kick ass medal.

Beth and I ran together, soooooo much fun.

And at the end of the month Mike and I ran the Noorat to Terang.

Again V for Veterans.

I again protested, why not use R for Rock Star or S for Super Star.  Hmmmph.

Always one for a grand finish! 

 And lastly another gratuitous kitten photo for the month.

January catch up

So how to catch up on my blog being that we're already past half way in 2017.  How about a monthly catch up, it might be the easiest way.

So we finished 2016 on yet another loss in our lives when our beautiful Bo Bo girl passed away on New Years Eve.  We had started 2016 with the loss of Molly and ended 2016 with the loss of Bo Bo.  Then a few days into the year and this happened ...

We still hadn't had time to process the loss of Bo Bo and step-daughter number 2 turned up one evening after having driven 2 hours with this little bundle.  He and his siblings had been found in a car boot at the wreckers in the summer heat.  The call had gone out to find homes and ... well ... as much as we weren't ready, Mike has always said when a cat needs a home they will find you.  Looks like this little bundle had found us through my step-daughter.

It didn't take long for Mike to fall under his spell, I took a little longer.  We named him Buster Q.   He looks like a little Buster, don't you agree?  The vet placed him as about 6 weeks old, way too young to be without his mama cat, so Mike and I were surrogate parents and we had to bottle feed him the first week or so until he started chewing through the teets of the bottle.

       

And let's just say it took a LOT LONGER for poor Lucky to fall under his spell !

Oh boy we were in for some fun and games.

Lucky would get the whole crazy eyes and body shakes happening with Buster's tiny high pitched meow.  I think Lucky would have ripped his head off if he could.  If Lucky was out of the house, Buster could roam.  If Lucky was in the house we had to have one in one room, the other in another.  We halved the loungeroom with a wire fence, yes we got that desperate, until Buster learnt how to climb.


During the month Mike and I ran the Surf T Surf in Warrnambool.  I ran the 10km and Mike the 6km.  And we got to chat to the famous Steve Moneghetti, always a treat.  Feeling very proud running in our Aths Club shirts.

We dedicated our 16km total to Mike's Uncle Frank in Scotland

who is ill with cancer.  He was chuffed to wake up and see our photo on Facebook.

Although words of  "why run when you can drive missy" would ring in my ears.

In the meantime we had a very special visitor when Miss Aleyna came for a visit.  Already a month old and just as sweet as can be.  Grumpy was definitely under her spell.

  

During the month we could have both Lucky and Buster in the room together under a watchful eye and hand.  Still not able to have Buster roam around with Lucky on the loose.  Still some stressful times.

Stressful not just for us, but for Buster too - keeping a watch out for Lucky...

   

Mel and I had made it to the back page Sports section of the newspaper!

Woo hoo.  Always knew one day it would happen  ;-)  ha!

One might think we were running so far out in front with no other runners in sight.

Ummm, more like bringing up the rear!

And January saw Mike's veggie garden start to fruit, 

and soon we would be swimming in zucchini and tomatoes.

    

And that's a wrap for January!  

Dusting off the blog

Excuse me whilst I dust the cobwebs from this blog

It's time to start talking again.

No idea if there's still anyone out there listening!!

but here goes ...

So 2016 came to a close

So 2016 came to a close, we had ups and finished on a huge down.  But I'll get to that later. 

Mid-December saw grandchild number 3 born, a girl, Aleyna Grace, daughter to hubby's eldest son.  So over the moon with her, she's little darling.   Here she is with proud Grumpy and Nanna at one day old.   Mike is sooooo not comfortable holding wee little ones.  It was a quick hold for him and then quick, someone else's turn! ha.

Then we had the Christmas Parade for our little town.   I was part of our CWA 'float' - we dressed up as reindeers (plus I had Lucky the rein-dog) oh boy, he owned that parade like a boss.  Marched himself down the middle of the road in his little reind-dog outfit !   Look, truly he loved it, he's smiling right!!??    Heck it was hot in those reindeer outfits!

We got to meet Santa too!

Well it helps to have husband's in high places.

Mike drove Santa's golf buggy.

Lucky Santa made it to the Carol's in one piece, as the practice run the night before

Santa fell off the end of the golf buggy as Mike took off.

Mike and I took part in the special Christmas Eve parkrun, so much fun, 

all dressed up with my friends.    Again, rather hot!

I did my usual Christmas run round the streets in town, Santa hat and all.  

Lucky came with me.

I think he saw Santa when I took this photo, what do you think?

Mike piked on me this Christmas, he stayed in bed!

I did my usual colour co-ordination of my gift wrapping.

Lo and behold anything that wasn't in the colour scheme of black, white or silver.

It went on the chair beside the buffet.

I love my little wooden Christmas tree sent to me by my US friend Kathie.

Then what I had been waiting months for.

My bestie Sonia came for a visit with hubby and son.

So excited.  We just pick up where we left off.

It had been two years since we'd seen each other face to face.

Yep, it was REALLY like old times.

I haven't had my tenor horn out for donkey's years.

We spent some time in Warrnie, and didn't capsize.

We really were so cute in our sailing gear!

Alright so we weren't over our head.  

I don't think we were even over our waist.

Love this pic I took of Daniel.

New Years Eve we went into Parkrun.

Plans were to walk and talk.

But we did do a few runs for the photographer.

And my grand tally for the year was added up.

However it wasn't all fun and games.  Over the past few months Bo Bo had started losing weight again.  She'd take two steps backwards, one step forwards, but slowly got right down in weight.  Mike and I made a conscious decision that this was going to be her time.  We wouldn't put her through the trauma of nights away in hospital again.  As long as she was holding her own and not in pain, we would let her live out her time.

But alas on New Years Eve we had to make the heart-wrenching decision to say goodbye to our girl.  She wasn't coping, she had stopped eating again and her slight frame could hardly hold her as she struggled to get up.  With many many tears Mike and I made the call that broke our hearts and we said goodbye to our love of 14 years.  Our beautiful girl who came to us as a stray kitten, faithful to the end, she went to sleep gazing deep into Mike's eyes.  I'm crying as I write this, I don't think I'll ever be able to think of her without a painful lump in my throat and pain in my heart.

Goodbye sweet girl.

We loved you so.

This photo from a few years ago when she was look magestic.

Lara Fun Run

In an effort to catch up my fun runs before the year is over, going back to November here and I took part in the Lara Fun Run - run by the people from PB Events, I always enjoy their events.

I've done this run once before, it starts and finishes at the beautiful Pirra Mansion.  Such easy parking across the road in a mown paddock so a mere five minutes walk away, easy bib pick up, bag drop off, a few display tents from various vendors.

Was great to meet up with Carmel, which incidentally this is where I first met her way back when the first time I did this event.  Was also good that a couple of local girls came down for it - Floss and Debbie.  Fantastic to see them.   Look at Floss and I in our Runners Connect shirts!

There was a children's run first off, then a 5km and 10km event (the 10 just being two laps of the five).  I think they said there was about 700 people taking part all up.

The sun got very bitey when it came out and it was quite blowy in parts too.  You'll see from these pics the type of terrain we were on, easy gravel paths, apart from the grassy area to and from the mansion.  I just plodded along, quite tired after a big day the day before.

A wee little out/back as part of the course.  No we didn't have to run all the way to the You Yangs.

Saw Debbie and Floss as I was coming back down the finish line, some hot guys were yelling out "Go Carol" - well they were only human after all!!  Then I realised they were reading my name on my bib.  A high five to the announcer as I went across the finish line and I was done.   Good on the organisers for having finisher medals too, adds a nice incentive to the PB Events.