From The Leader

Nice to get a little press for the family.

Lazy Day

I've been hanging out this weekend watching the Bourne movies, doing a little de cluttering, watching golf but mostly just relaxing.  

I feel like it has been hectic lately, so this weekend, I decided not to do much.

I guess I'm not the only one.  Both Saturday & Sunday,  

I watched this squirrel chow down on bird seed and then head off to this branch to rest.  

Nothing like a Sunday afternoon nap!

It's good to chill out!

20 years

Thanks to all who traveled to Luck for our reunion yesterday.  

We missed those of your who could not come, but certainly we understand.  

It sounds like next year will be in Des Moines, more details to come from the Iowa-anians.

This is the whole group who gathered in Luck celebrating 20 years of Johansen Cousin Reunions!

More photos later after I rest up a bit.

As long as I had the camera on a tripod & we had family gathered up, we took a few photos.

Alyxis and her Dad Andrew

Dana & Erin with Jackson & Jake

Andrew, Krista, Kaija, Dana with Kathy & Glenn

Something funny was going on that I couldn't see

I think Jackson was putting on an act just out of my line of sight.

Krista and her nieces Milli & Charli

Krista and Mark and their niece Alyxis

Krista & Mark

Kaija, Cordell, Mike
Charli, Milli, Bryce & Wynni

Kaija, Cordell, Mike
Charli, Milli, Bryce & Wynni

More reunion photos coming soon.

Here fishy fishy

Glenn and I were able to spend an afternoon on his pontoon boat fishing.  It was bright sunshine and humid, and only the little fish were biting, but it was still a fun day.

This pretty little dear was standing out in a soybean field not far from Glenn's cabin.

Later I heard that my friend Jan's daughter Amy had passed away that morning, so perhaps this was a little sign from Amy that she's still beautiful and at peace.

I like to think that way.

Glenn caught the first fish, it was also the smallest.

A green heron gave us a fly by and also perched high above us.

I think he was thinking of dive bombing for fishes.

I had just said to Glenn, show me a Belted Kingfisher and then this guy flew by.

Well, it's nice to be able to order in the birds I want to see.

We anchored the pontoon and fished the lily pads for a couple of hours.

Two loons swam and preened and relaxed for the whole time just out of the range of my biggest zoom lens.  They are fun to hear, and wonderful to see.

The preening involved rolling the white belly around and then lots of feather grooming.

 We also got to see a mature bald eagle and there was at least one young one circling around too.

This one, again a little bit too far away for a good photo, had a fish in his talons that I saw him nab out of the water.  No wonder we weren't catching anything, the eagles beat us to it.

As it turned out, I caught 4 fish, but as you can see, none were keepers.

But that's really fine with me, I didn't have to clean any fish!

I did get new line put on my reel, so that was a good thing, and Glenn showed me a few other tips.

Pumpkin Seed Sunfish

Large mouth bass

Perch

It was a fun day, and I was invited to stay for a burgers and on the grill supper.

Life is good!

Fan Club

I'm not sure what I did to deserve this honor. 

Last weekend Noah,  my great nephew - in law, played in 

The Wisconsin Football Coaches Eight-man Football All Star game.

 This was his bio in the program for that game. 

I'm so honored,  Noah is a good role model,  a nice young man and an excellent athlete.  

I wish him the best of everything as he heads off to the University of North Dakota to play D1 football this fall.  He will be dearly missed around the Johansen house in Luck. 

I sure am a member of his fan club.

A little gardening

I've had orchids in my kitchen window almost since I moved in here.  They bloom when I bring them home from the store, and then they start their descent into death.  I can't really have houseplants around indoors because the cats don't understand that they should not dig them up nor eat them, but the orchids seem to go untouched above the sink.

Recently I wrote about making a small succulent garden in a glass and I loved that so much, that I wanted to have another.  I found a few succulents on clearance and then starting looking around for glass containers in my cupboards; 

a cut crystal bowl that was given to me by a bridge playing friend, 

a wine glass from our Monet & Merlot evening, 

a wine tasting glass from the WITC Wine and Beer Tasting, 

and an olive boat that was my Moms. 

Now I have a nice little set of gardens on the window sill.

This is my kind of gardening, spray with water occasionally & enjoy.

I love my little gardens.

Classy friends

I moved to Colorado after my freshman year at Luck High School.  

Trust me, it was NOT my idea.  

The move had to do with Dad's job and probably a fresh start for a marriage that was struggling.  None of that was important to me as a 15 year old girl.  

So, I focused on keeping my ties to my Luck friends and managed to finish high school at Lakewood High School making only a very few friends in those 3 years.

As it turns out, that was okay (other than the misery I probably caused my parents with my sulking) as those Luck friendships have stood the test of time and distance.

I'm happy to continue to be close with several of my Luck classmates and yesterday was a real treat as we gathered to reunite 45 years after graduation.

We had an informal meet up in Luck at The Bon Ton Tavern.  Out of 53 students, 13 were there yesterday.  It was really fun to find out about the lives of my friends, many are retired, many are still working but all seemed to be really enjoying their lives, even with health challenges that seem to come with being 60+ years old.

We decided to gather every year during Lucky Days, 

I to look forward seeing these folks again next year, 

and I'll have a good reason to go to Lucky Days too.

I'm also lucky to say that the closest friend I made at Lakewood High, 

continues to be a very close friend today.

Friends are such gifts.

Community Education

I have always really loved community / adult education classes.  I've taken many interesting subjects, some more successful or useful than others, but I have pretty much enjoyed every class.

My most recent class was to learn to make mosaic garden stones.  I've always thought this would be a fun craft to make and it has turned out to be just that.

The Luck School District offered this class, and as it turned out, it was taught by a woman I knew and who is very good friends with my sister in law, Lois.

In the first class I made a Danish Heart and I'm quite pleased with how it turned out.

It was so much fun and I was so impressed with the results, that I decided to dive into this hobby.  I purchased the glass cutting tools and then found some colored glass to buy.  The heart above was built on a paver from Menards and it is about 8 X 14, I went to Menards and found some small square pavers and went to work.

These are not as impressive as my larger stone, but once they dry completely and I seal them, I think they will be cute in the garden.

Our second class was on Tuesday night, 

I decided to purchase a specially cut piece of glass for my project.  

The process is to cut the glass into the desired shapes and lay it out on the paver.

Once your design is complete, a piece of contact paper is applied to lift the glass, and the design, from your stone.

Then the thin set cement is applied.

Once your cement is leveled and ready, the glass design is carefully reapplied by lowering the contact paper holding the glass back on to the block.

My finished design, contact paper applied before the lift.

Once the thin set has dried completely, about 48 hours after the class, the grouting takes place.

Small heart stone with grout

Carol using the grout float to press her grout into the glass design.

And after the grout is wiped away to the desired thickness, you have a masterpiece.

Carol's grouted daily

Wanda's grouted Badger stone.

The last step is to seal the grout after a drying period of 48-72 hours.

The sealing makes is weather resistant, although since this is glass, it is recommended that it be stored indoors in the winter.

I'm pretty tickled with the results of this latest project.

In fact, Carol and I have decided to take the next class & last class offered this year.

What will I make?  I'm starting to noodle on a design.

Learning is good.

Loving the lilies

      My daylilies are really showing off right now.   

All the daylilies were given to me by my friends Gary & Mary.  They started growing daylilies in memory of their son who died much too young in an auto accident.  Now their lilie numbers are in the thousands and they generously share with friends.   

My day lily border on the driveway is a show stopper!

Close Ups

Today Omaha visited the bird bath for a slurp of water.  

This isn't something I'm crazy about as I don't want him hunting my birds, 

but he only came and drank and then left, 

otherwise I would have had to have words with him.  

I'm always on the watch around my bird feeders and don't want him to linger any where near.

The sun was just right I guess as he gave no indication that he saw me through the window, so I got some great beauty shots of the little feline.  I got a close up look at him, he has a healing scratch over his left eye, but otherwise seems to be in pretty good condition.

Slurpppp

He's pretty for an orange cat.

Thirsty cat

Yesterday we had a little standoff at the bird feeder.

A Mourning Dove was sitting on the platform and a Blue Jay kept flying in and trying to take over.

Interesting to me, the Mourning Dove stood ground and the Blue Jay left after making sure the dove got an earful.

Last night, I saw movement on the front deck and caught this bandit in the act.

He didn't leave until I opened the window and advised him that he should 

"GET BACK IN THE WOODS!!"

Never a dull moment.

9 years is a lot

On Sunday evening I attended a fun pizza birthday party for great nephew Owen.  Owen met me at the car and gave me a big hug and thanked me for coming.  I asked him if he thought he was getting pretty old, and he said he thought he was.  Nine.

Grandma Lois had made the cake, the number nine was spelled out with little squirt guns, she's really the cake master for her grand kids, always a clever idea or exactly what they request.

Owen lit the candles.

He waited patiently while we sang Happy Birthday

Then the wish! and blow out those candles

Great Uncle Harry, brother Ivan, Aunt Heather, cousin Anders, cousin Ruby, sister Megan, cousin Jens, Owen & Great Aunt Lois were just a few of the party folks.

As always, it was nice to see the family for the evening

and Owen give big hugs to everyone after opening his many gifts.

My drive home quite nice, saw a few deer, 

but all kept their distance from the roadway, 

just the way I like it.

Owen was just a little over 1 when I moved here, he has grown up into such a nice, quiet boy.

Life is Good.

Summer with Omaha

Omaha is certainly found an outside home here.

He comes and goes often, I rarely see him, 

but lucky to have the trailcam that catches a photo of him now and then.

I did see him lounging in the tall grass at the edge of the woods one day, 

my guess is he doesn't go far from my yard most days.

He's looking pretty good, we are having a good summer together.