I JUST WANNA PAINT!!!

So it's been five years living here now, and I still have not finished the walls in my bedroom.  After a years break because I was working on so many other things and time just flies by, I was back in action three weeks ago.

Back to the never ending prep work, scraping and sanding.  These plaster walls are driving me crazy.  The moisture in the house from a leaky bathroom when it sat for a year on the market caused a lot of peeling.

I finished a wall, painted and watched it bubble up and peel yet again.  I let it dry, I sand and scrap the bubbles, and paint it again, and so it goes on.

Our local paint store has been in the same family since 1949, and when I walked in after a year of being MIA, it was like Norm walking into Cheers.  I'm just one of the paint guys now!

They even had new paint charts, my favorite thing to look at!!  

This wall is now finished and everything back in place on the mantle. Saving photos for when it is ALL finished, so don't hold your breath!

The other project is to get the shrubs pruned before the end of the month when the bushhogger will be cutting the pasture as this is where I throw all my limbs and garden trash to be turned into mulch.

As you can see, there are hundreds of suckers with huge thorns on this elaeagnus (what I call elae-agony).  If this bush didn't get small flowers that smelled so darn good in the fall, they would all be gone!

This front row is done, but you can see to the left how high they had gotten and how the suckers reach the sky.  Of course, I have to keep these trim so the bear that is driving me crazy can get to my bird feeders each night.  Now taking them in every night, and that is a pain!

Passion flower in the pasture.

I stopped painting because I have had a hard three weeks with my seniors.  First Panda (this is his baby photo and he's the little runt in the back) had gone into the woods to pee one morning and came out dragging his legs like he was paralyzed.  We rushed to vet, xrays, tests, found he had a horrible UTI, but why the legs? Then we remembered when we adopted him we were given paperwork on DM (ALS in humans) and the gene kicks in at this age, he is now 11, and one limb at a time will stop working to where he will be a paraplegic. His brother Gus was already in the throes of this and not doing well.

When I realized this I called my vet, who looked again at his xrays and saw he had hip dysplasia. He was put on meds and is on the mend, doing so much better walking, and then this weekend he started bleeding when peeing and back to the vet. 

Roman, now 13 1/2, started his doggy dementia, Sundowner's Syndrome, I have been here before with two seniors, they switch their days and nights and their owners don't get any sleep because they pace and bark and don't stop.  Two weeks of that and to the vet we go.  He also has bad arthritis and vet thought it could be pain, so meds for arthritis and xanax to sleep and it's working.

Princess, 12 yrs. old, got two major ear infections from yeasty skin caused by all this horrible humidity.  She started losing hair and scratching and the infection got into her system, so medicated baths during the week, ear drops and antibiotics if this doesn't help.  I have spent a fortune and hours upon hours at our vet, so no painting is getting done.

Cardinal climber vine is on everything in my garden pasture and the hummingbirds are enjoying it.

With all the dog problems, here comes the hurricane! Airbnb had a program where you could donate your rental to evacuees and relief workers, we did, and we got a father and daughter from Charleston who had mandatory evacuation since they live on the water and they brought their three dogs.  They were here three days.

My friend Misha is in Wilmington, NC, the next to get hit hard and she wanted to get out with her two kids and three dogs, Persia being one that I had here a few weeks ago.  I only had the farmhouse, but it was full of my afghan boxes and hadn't been cleaned in a year, so you know what I did one day late into the night!

The next day it was a Cat 2, down from a 3, so Misha decided to ride it out, but then the tornadoes started and she was going to come, but the roads got too flooded to drive, so she didn't come, but the farmhouse is now clean! Good thing, my friend George from Gulfport, MS, wants to bring a chow to my friend Carol from VA and my house is the meeting place this weekend since guests will be in the boathouse.

Morning glories starting to emerge.

If ever I needed a break it is now!  My friend Chantal is at Myrtle Beach, SC for the week and invited me over, just a four hour drive.  I really want to go and have a day on the beach, but waiting it out to see how the dogs are, plus I'm trying to get a senior chow out of a shelter for my friend Virginia in Long Island (I was supposed to drive her next senior up to see her wildlife center), but all I want to do is have a margarita with Chantal and her mom!  Looks like they are starting without me!