Peep Day!

I trekked over to Cameron this afternoon to pick up my day-old chicks from Ideal. At first, they had misplaced my order but they soon came out with my little box of chicks. This day has been long awaited.

Are these not the cutest little chicks you've ever seen? Okay, all baby chicks are cute...just little puff balls of soft down. The little black ones are sooo tiny. If you're wondering why the picture has a pink cast, it's because they're under a red heat lamp.

After sitting and watching these mice in my kitchen crawl out of the stove and hop in the plastic live trap, eat the baited peanut butter cracker and turn and get OUT, thumbing their little nose at me....I resorted to calling my friendly exterminator ...."HELP!" He advised me to find the hole where they're getting in...are you kidding me?! Other than that, out comes the black box baited with poison (no more peanut butter) and snap-traps. The black box sits outside so, hopefully, they will go off and die and then the snap-traps are right next to my stove. And, of course, just as soon as I crawl in a nice warm bed last night...SNAP!..okay, out of bed I go, get dressed and go out and pitch the little sucker. This is gross but in the last 24 hours, my pitch pile is getting big. Yuk...

I have to show you this picture of Gretchen..she's a very mini dachshund. Last week we had cold weather with sleet and snow and she just couldn't warm up. I went looking all around for her (keep in mind, there's not too many places to get lost in an RV!) and she finally stuck her head out of the dirty clothes basket. Aha! There you are!

Isn't she cute? I went out and bought her a little pink sweater with pom-pom's on it. What you don't see in the picture is the fact that she really doesn't like it. She's just not a sweater-girl!

I guess I'm gonna have to get with the program and put up some Christmas lights or something. Everybody's been posting some wonderful Christmas thoughts and pictures. My friend, Robin, has her house completely decorated with a Christmas tree in every room in her house. She could give Martha Stewart a run for her money! Your house looks awesome, Robin!

Happy Trails...

Cowboy Up!

Now I consider myself a country girl but when I met Buddy, I was introduced to a whole new world of "rodeo" lingo...some descriptive phrases I can do without but one that makes a lot of sense is "cowboy up", meaning that when the going gets tough, you get up, dust yourself off and keep trying.
This past week I have been telling myself repeatedly to "cowboy up" and persevere. First of all, I've been trying to get my online store up and running but I guess December is not the month to think that I'm going to find some quality, undisrupted quiet time to work on computer stuff that takes my undivided attention, especially in tight living quarters in a fifth-wheel RV. I'm not real computer savvy but can usually figure stuff out if I can have time to concentrate and be very patient. Unfortunately, it is not happening right now. I am still working on getting it up and running so please don't give up on me.

Speaking of living in tight quarters in a RV - as I've mentioned before, we are in the process of building our house out here at the pecan orchard and are living in the RV next to the house site. Well... I think every mouse in this county has moved in with us and are breeding right here in the walls! Yuk!! I sit here at the table, trying desperately to work on my computer and off to my side is a mouse coming out of the stove and staring at me like I'm irritating him for being here! Please... he has no fear! It is amazing how something so small can make so much noise. Being the creature loving person that I am, I decide to go with the ol' technique of putting out cotton balls soaked in peppermint oil to make them leave. Ha! I think they are using them to build their nests! So next I go out and buy some of those little plastic no-kill boxes that traps the mouse and you take them out and let them go. First, they go in and take the peanut butter cracker and somehow keep the trap door up and get out! ?!?! These little guys are so prevalent, I sit here and watch them! They could care less that I'm sitting here. So.... I've mastered setting up the traps...aha! Now I'm taking handfuls of little plastic boxes full of mice out far away every morning and letting them go. I think I'm going to start doing like those zoologist or animal behaviorist or whoever they are and tag these little guys because I think they're circling around and coming back in...they look mighty familiar!

Okay, I'm open for suggestions...can somebody recommend a webhost with an easy tutorial for the website design? I'm not giving up. And if anyone has any suggestions on getting rid of these mice, please leave your comments. If I thought they could be trained, I have enough for a three-ring circus with backup!

Happy Trails...