The Cone of Shame

I’m not sure why I call it the Cone of Shame – it’s not like Naldo did anything wrong and I have to punish her with it. She hates it, none the less. 

Naldo is a very sensitive soul and with all the stress going on in our household right now, she’s broken out in a rash on her leg and her tummy. A quick visit to the vet got her some ointment and The Cone. I am to apply both twice a day for two weeks.

Thankfully she only has to wear the cone for about 10 minutes while the meds get absorbed into her body – but she truly hates it. Alternately, I have found that if I just hold her for 10 minutes, then I don’t have to subject her to that particular torture. Not that she enjoys being held for 10 minutes. That in itself is a form or torture. But it’s better than the cone, at least.

Poor Naldo. Life is so hard.

So Many Books, So Little Time

My TBR shelf has grown again. It’s both an exciting thing to see and an upsetting thing, all at the same time. Exciting because there are so many good books on that shelf – I can’t wait to dive in! And yet it’s upsetting because I simply don’t have the time it will take to read all of those wonderful yummy books. Life just gets in the way, you know? And they just keep publishing more books!

I’m in the middle of our Book Club book right now, Ship of Magic by Robin Hobb. It’s the first in a series of maybe 6 or 9 books (depending on how far you want to go with it). I’ve read them all before, but that was a long time ago, and I am enjoying getting reacquainted with them all. But do I go on? Do I not? I don’t know yet. I have next month’s book to read, too, however. Stinger by Robert McCammon. Not sure how I feel about this one yet.

Our annual Book Exchange (borrowed from the Icelandic tradition of Jólabókaflóð or Jolobokoflod) was a great success again. My niece Laurel drew my name this year, and gave me The Great Alone by Kristin Hannah. She actually went to my Goodreads account and looked at all the books I’d marked as Want To Read. Pretty clever of her, I thought. Then my niece Katy got A Fate Inked in Blood by Danielle L. Jensen for me, technically for Christmas but she borrowed the Book Exchange format and paired the book with some Chocolates from Trader Joe’s.

My partner gave me two books for Christmas this year, books 1 and 2 of a series I had been eyeballing. Leave No Trace and Cold Burn by A.J.Landau are both thrillers set in National Parks, the first one featuring the Statue of Liberty and the second one set in Glacier Bay National Park. Both should be very exciting books, I think.

In preparation for my trip to study Sharks in September, I ordered three books that will get me more familiar with our featured creature. All three of them look really good (Emperors of the Deep by William McKeever, The Secret History of Sharks by John Long, and Sharks Don’t Sink by Jasmin Graham) but I think the Sharks Don’t Sink one will be most helpful. I’ll let you know when I return from the expedition!

And, while I’m ordering myself some books, I of course have to get a few “just because” books. I mean, who could turn down Beasts of the Sea by Lida Turpeinen or Maiden, Mother, Crone by Joanne Harris or I, Medusa by Ayana Gray? Not me, that’s for sure.

Last, but most certainly not least, his mother gifted me with a few of her favorite books from the past. The Lives of a Cell by Lewis Thomas and The Firmament of Time by Loren Eiseley will be some heavy reading, requiring my full attention. But I do believe the results will be well worth the effort – both of them look to be very interesting and thought provoking.

Bryan’s Surgery

He’s been complaining for months that his arms hurt, so finally went to have it checked out. Turns out he’s somehow managed to tear both of his biceps! No clue as to exactly how he did that – but the end result is that he has to have surgery on both arms!

They decided to operate on his right arm first – so surgery was scheduled for this past Monday. Bright and early, we headed on down to the surgery center, got him all checked in, and waited for his turn in the operating room. All the nurses and doctors at the center were very nice, each one very carefully and clearly explained exactly what was going to happen. He finally got wheeled in at about 9:15 (that meant we only waited about an hour and a half, so not too bad) and they started the procedure. I went back home to work for a while, thinking I had some time to get things done. Unexpectedly, they called me an hour and a half later saying he was in recovery!

So back I went to pick him up. He was groggy and in a bit of pain still, so we waited maybe an hour for the pain meds to kick in. Eventually he was ready, so they got him dressed and into a wheelchair, and off we went to the car.

He’s home now, in a sling and on some pretty hefty painkillers. His post-op is in two weeks, where they will remove that temporary cast and give him a “half cast” which I understand will be a plastic thingy that just supports his wrist/elbow.  Then he will start in on the PT to strengthen and regain mobility.

He’s doing so good!

Homemade Fire Starters

You all know that I love a good art project – even more so if it uses up things that would normally go to the landfill. This week, he made a batch of fire starters for the wood stove!

We save the lint from our dryer (a box lives in the windowsill right next to our dryer: we just put the lint in the box each time we run a load). We save all the used-up candles (I love burning candles, but even a really good, expensive candle leaves behind wax that cannot be burned). We save all of our old egg cartons (we do give some to my nieces who have chickens, but he does love his eggs, so we have a lot of containers).

To remove the wax from the candle container, just pour boiling water in each jar. The wax then melts and rises to the top. You simply pick it off once it’s cooled down and solidified again. (remember to recycle the glass jars once you’ve removed the wax!) Then you place all that wax into a large can, which is then placed into a pot of boiling water. Melt it down till its liquid, then pour a small amount into each dimple (that’s Wikipedia’s official word for the compartments in an egg container – I looked it up!). Place some lint on top of each puddle of wax before it solidifies. Then pour more wax over the top of the lint. Continue layering wax and lint until the dimple is full or you’ve run out of supplies.

Place the filled egg cartons on a cooling rack and let stand until the wax is cooled and solid. Cut the dimples apart and store in a basket nearby your stove (but not too close or they’ll melt!). You can see that cutting the dimples apart is not quite as easy as it sounds – we ended up having to get a hand saw for some of them!

Voila! Homemade Fire Starters!

New Year’s 2026

This year we decided to ring in the New Year by renting a cabin up in the mountains all to ourselves, with just us & our kittens! I think it was perfect – but then, I am not exactly a people person. It was bitter cold out, however, with temps well below zero. We had a hard time keeping the cabin warm, as you can see by the frozen window in the bathroom!

As usual, I had my crafting with me. I got to spend 3 lovely days doing nothing but make cards, binge-watch the old X-files series, and munch on snacks!

Bryan worked on computer stuff the whole time, fixing a friend’s laptop that had been accidentally doused with coffee to the point where she was unable to access any of her files. He was a happy little boy, with all that technical stuff going on. And yes, he did manage to salvage the info - but she will need to get a new laptop.

The kittens weren’t quite as enthused about the weekend as we were. They did have their heated blanket, however, so could warm up when they needed to.

We treated ourselves to a meal at the nearby Lodge for the actual New Year’s Eve dinner. They were not officially open but agreed to deliver something off their normal menu. I got a Blackened Halibut Salad while he opted for the Bison Meatloaf with a side of Parmesan Fries.

Christmas 2025

Christmas this year was both quiet and hectic, all at the same time. No different than any other year, come to think of it, but completely different on a whole different level. It wasn’t bad, by any means. I quite enjoyed the whole season. It was just the first Christmas in many years without Mother at the house. She had a way of dominating everything just by walking into a room, you know?

We started off the season with a crafting session (of course). My sister-in-law Heather and her two kids Sam & Kaylee came over to help me make Reindeer ornaments from a kit we subscribe to. It comes to us quarterly, with seasonal crafts that we can all sit down and enjoy together. This one was, as I mentioned earlier, Reindeer! We had a great time!

After that, we decided that we had to make cookies. I originally envisioned us making one or two different kinds, but somehow, we ended up making Cowboy Cookies, Peanut Butter Cookies, Butterscotch Cookies, Chocolate No-Bake Cookies, and Rum Balls! Trust me, that’s way, WAY too many cookies for just two people. But we had fun, and that’s all that really matters.

Since we had so many cookies, we decided to bring a plate of them over to Mother at the Pioneer Home, so she could enjoy them with us. My niece Laurel brought her two girls Autumn and Annalise over as well, and we all had a great visit. Mother was in good spirits, chatty and very much “there”.

Christmas Day at the Beaver House (my house) was a good day. We wore our new pajamas, opened up gifts, and enjoyed watching the kittens play with the discarded wrapping paper.