New Sectional Sofa

 We got our new sectional for downstairs today...

...and I love how it looks and how it feels to sit on it!  Our old one hurt my back to sit on it, so this is a big improvement.

Spring Gardening

Several of my pansy's decided that they didn't like the place where I put them and migrated to places under the fence.  I thought they looked cute there, but they got in the way of mowing the grass, so they got moved back to their original flower bed today.

My planters by the garage have totally disintegrated this year.

My new planter with it's new plants for the year.  I'm anxious to compare pictures of it now with how it looks at the end of the summer.

Heel Diagnosis

After over a year of pain in my heel, and consultations with several people, first, my regular doctor, who gave me some exercises to do.  Then last summer, a physical therapist who also gave me exercises to do.  Then I saw an orthopedic doctor in January, who gave me an insert for my shoes.  I was consistently told it was my achilles tendon. All of these treatments seemed to help for awhile, then it would start getting worse again.  I went back to the orthopedist on Monday because it was hurting again and he decided I should see a podiatrist and have more physical therapy.  I saw the podiatrist today, they took an x-ray and he told me that I have 2 things going on with my heel.  I have a bone spur and a condition called Haglund's deformity, which means I have a bony enlargement on the back of my heel.  He said that I shouldn't have more physical therapy, that it wouldn't do any good at this time.  (I'm glad I waited to see him before scheduling any physical therapy!)  The bottom line is that even though he gave me some other shoe inserts to help temporarily, I'm going to need to have surgery to take off the bone spur and the bony enlargement.  After I have the surgery, I'll have to stay off that foot for 3 weeks.  That doesn't mean I'll have to stay in bed the whole time, the doctor said they would give one of those carts to rest my foot on, so I'll still be able to get around some, but I'm sure I'll not be quite as active for awhile.  Then I'll have physical therapy again after the 3 weeks is up.  We haven't decided for sure when to do it, but since some of my activities are coming to an end in the next few weeks, we may do it, the end of May or early June.

Weekend in April

One of our favorite theaters in Seattle does Christian friendly plays, which we attend from time to time. When we attended one of their plays in December, we noticed that they were looking for donations of antique furniture. We happened to have an old fashioned radio sitting in our garage, (I'm not sure I'd call it an antique) and when we contacted them to see if they'd be interested in it, they said they would like to have it. When they came to pick it up, they mentioned that they would be using it in their next play, "Freud's Last Session". We decided right then that we wanted to go to that play. I told Kari about it and since she was interested in the play also, we took her with us for her birthday present.

The play was about a conversation between Freud and C.S. Lewis in London during WWII, and the radio was used several times as they pretended to listen to broadcasts about the war. The picture above is of the set and our radio is in the dark next to a bookcase on the right hand side.

This picture is lighter but a little blurry, but you can get the idea of what the radio looked like. I was surprised about how thrilled I was to see it on the stage. I almost felt like a "proud momma" to see it have such an important part in the play. Anyway, it was fun to see something we had previously owned in the play. Even though it was another sunny weekend, (I can't believe we've had 3 of them in a row), we didn't spend all day inside. Before and after the play we went to a plant nursery, that's a favorite of Kari's, and got some plants for our yards.

I also got a new indoor plant, it's called a spring cactus. I thought it was really pretty, so I decided to get one.

Since I had gotten another house plant a few weeks earlier that the cats started snacking on, then barfed on my rug, I was nervous about them eating this one also. I asked someone at the nursery if they had any ideas of how to keep cats from eating indoor plants and the answer was to put cayenne pepper on it. If you look carefully at the pink flowers, you can see some of the cayenne pepper on them. So what's worse, cats nibbling on the plants or little brown specs on the flowers? The barfing on the carpet is definitely worse, so I guess I'll learn to live with the little brown spots.

When You're Alone on Easter

Every other year our kids and grand-kids spend Easter with their in-laws, so we're by ourselves. Instead of sitting home feeling sorry for ourselves, we've tried to come up with a way to make the day special, even if we are alone. A couple of years ago, we went up to Skagit Valley and visited the tulip fields and gardens. This year we went the other direction and visited "The Arboretum" in Seattle.

Luckily, it was a gorgeous day, unluckily, that meant there were a lot of other people visiting the arboretum. There were so many people we had trouble finding a parking place, but once we were walking around, it didn't feel crowded at all. If you're not into looking at pictures of flowers, you should stop here, because the rest is all pictures of flowers, most of which I don't know the names of, but they were pretty and deserved a picture taken of them.

There were lots of beautiful flowering trees there.

A close up of the flowers on the tree in the picture above it.

Pink flowers,...

...orange flowers,...

...and one I know the name of, this is a magnolia.

This tree just had buds on it...

...but I liked how they were all standing up waiting to bloom.

People strolling like the lower path.

Some kind of cherry blossoms, we think.

Standing under a flowering tree.

Lots of flowers on this one!

A reflection in the pond.

Heirlooms

A few years ago, Kari introduced me to heirloom tomatoes, by giving me an heirloom tomato plant, so I could try and grow some of my own. I really liked them and now whenever I can find them, I'll buy them, even though they are more expensive than "tomatoes on a vine". This winter, I discovered heirloom oranges! Again, they are more expensive than other oranges, but, boy are they good! They are really sweet and juicy, at least all the ones I've had so far, have been.

So far, I've only seen them at the Haagens store in Arlington, but I haven't looked for them in to many stores. Hopefully, they'll start showing up in other stores soon.