Over the weekend we "gobbled" up the rest of the first season of Downton Abbey and took a small bite out of the second season. We are loving this series! The costumes, the acting--everything makes it a top-notch production.

We have also been gobbling up the food from this cookbook:

This is the cookbook I've talked about in another post that is British, but with American measurements and vocabulary as well as the British. (Remember: take one Swede …?) Not only is it a beautiful book to just browse through, but everything we've made so far has been a big hit: Chicken Pot Pie with Tarragon and Leeks (simple and delicious); Tamale Pie, that you top with a cornbread mixture that has green chiles mixed in; and this delicious lunch yesterday, Creamy Pancetta and Onion Tart. Yum!

Rick has declared the Chicken Pot Pie to be the best he's ever tasted! Unfortunately I don't have these recipes entered in to our recipe book just yet. But soon!

We didn't do much else over the weekend, it was too cold for most outdoor activities since we are below freezing again. We had a little skiff of snow, maybe an inch, on Saturday night. Just enough that Rick felt he had to clear the driveway. Nuisance snow. And we're supposed to get more of those in the coming week.

We managed to take the dogs for a walk and split some more wood for the wood stove and fireplace.

Other than that, Rick worked on our web sites--getting us running under new software and fine tuning things. Some of you may have experienced difficulty leaving a comment, or possibly searching the archives. We think it's working properly now, but please let us know if you encounter anything odd or can't leave a comment. (Use the Contact Me button at the top.)

P.S. The cookbook is available on Amazon.com.

Who is Black-Eyed Pea you might be wondering? Why, Hailey of course! Bernergarden’s Black-Eyed Pea is her official AKC registered name. Ms. Hailey with the blackest of eyes. The most perfectly shaped almond-shaped black eyes per the Bernese Mountain Dog Standard.

Hailey came to us from Minnesota. Instead of taking the money from a breeding with my beloved Sailor I opted to take a stud puppy back.

Hailey is nine years old today! A pretty darned good age for a Bernese, and she’s still going strong.

Hailey is a silly dog. We don’t really have all that many photos of her because it seems she’s always in motion. She’s “lurping” as we call it, all the time. Her tail wags the rest of her body while she “slurps” you with her tongue. Hailey loves to give kisses, therefore that makes her a lurper. Here she is lurping Rick.

Here are some photos of puppy Hailey.

 

 

Hailey’s favorite things are:

Food. Any kind of food. Dog food. People food. I can’t grab any kind of food without Hailey magically showing up at my side, looking at me soulfully with those black eyes.

Bones. She will also take everyone else’s bones when they aren’t looking and I always end up re-distributing them so everyone has a bone instead of Hailey having three.

Barking. She’s our alarm clark in the morning. When Bella and Alex are tugging on toys her job is to be cheerleader and encourage them by barking. Her staccato little barks come out at perfectly timed intervals. Rah! Rah! Rah!

Riding in the truck with her head out the window.

Her dog couch. Wouldn’t you know she’d pick a vintage loveseat as her dog bed?

She was a great nanny when Bella was a puppy. Very patient and a good playmate.

 

She’s a sweet dog and tends to stay in the background (unless she’s barking).

 

In honor of her birthday Hailey will be going to McDonald’s for a hamburger for lunch and tonight she’ll dine on steak.

Happy Happy Birthday to Hailey the Black-Eyed Pea! We love you, silly girl!

 

(Photos from Top:)
Hailey with her mom Diva @ 8 weeks old; March 2004
Hailey kissing Rick; Cabin June 2012

Puppy Hailey:
Hailey (sitting up on left) with litter mates @ 8 weeks old; March 2004
Hailey @ 9 weeks old; April 2004
Hailey at White Sands (New Mexico) 3 months old; April 2004
Hailey @ 4.5 months old; May 2004

Hailey on her bed; January 2013
Hailey with puppy Bella; November 2008 (both pics)
Hailey at the cabin; June 2012
Hailey (left) Alex (right) with me at the Snowy Range, WY; June 2012

 

 

I feel like I should be blogging about something. Anything. But I can’t come up with anything anyone (including myself) would care to read. My mind is pretty much blank.

I could tell you I saw a huge hawk in the tree this morning, just waiting to make a snack out of the birds feeding below him. At first I thought it was an owl because it was so big, so white, and so round. But it was just a cold hawk with his feathers all fluffed out. He spooked when I saw him and flew to another tree. I got the camera out but for whatever reason the photos were all out of focus. You’ll just have to envision him for yourself, or you can look at the out-of-focus shot. (It’s a Broad-Winged. They nest in our woods.) He’s beautiful even if he does like to eat little birds.

I could tell you it’s below freezing out there today and spitting fitful little snowflakes. Pfffftttt.

I could tell you that the dogs have had their second treatment for their scabies and are greatly improved. Good news for sure. The itching and scratching had pretty much come to a halt until we treated them on Friday whereupon they immediately started scratching again. The vet told us that as the little mites were dying off they would cause bouts of scratching, and so they do. No more ugly hot spots though.

Did I tell you that my neighbor Kim and I got to talking and I found out that she’s been treating her dog for the same condition? Yup, Finn has scabies too and she went through the same round of vet appointments and treatments (on non-treatments) that I did. No coincidence there since she has had to chase the fox away from their back deck too.

Hmmm … let’s see what else …

I could tell you we made a great Beef and Guinness Pie last night for dinner. Yummy.

I could tell you the lakes are finally freezing over. The ice fishermen will be happy about that.

I could tell you that over the weekend most of our last snow melted away. The snow squirrel has been reduced to a blob of white. Alex will have to resort to bushes and trees again.

I could tell you that it’s 2:30 in the afternoon and I’ve already started a fire in the wood stove because it’s cold in the house.

That being said, what the heck am I doing sitting here telling you uninteresting things that you could care less about when I could be sitting by the warm fire reading?

I’m off …

(photos: top & bottom: Blank Windows @ Long Pond : Mr. Not-In-Focus Broad-Winged)

Do you see what I see? I was correct when I said Alex would find a use for my squirrel.