Its a beautiful sunny day in Boise so I thought I'd catch another picture of the Witch Hazel tree in bloom. No snow this time! Lexus is sitting patiently beside the tree waiting for me to finish so we can all go inside together. Shelby is just out of the picture sniffing the air.

When I was in Victoria, my parents took me and their good friends out for my birthday dinner. We tried to eat at a restaurant in downtown Victoria called Re-Bar. It is a progressive restaurant serving lots of vegetarian and vegan dinners as well as some seafood. We discovered it wasn't wheel chair accessible! It never occured to me that Canada doesn't have similar laws to the U.S. but they mustn't ever have passed something like the disabilities act there. Anyway, we had to punt and ended up at an East African restaurant called the Blue Nile. Almost all of their food was vegan so it worked out just fine!

I got home from Victoria last night. It was really nice to see my folks and some good friends of theirs. The witch hazel tree is still in full bloom! And because its snowing today, we have about a hundred finches, mostly American Gold Finches, feeding in our back yard.

Finch frenzy!

I have been busy making beads for spring. The past few days have been very spring like here - a real teaser as winter cannot really be over yet! Our Witch Hazel tree is getting ready to bloom. I am leaving on Tuesday morning to go visit my folks in Victoria, B.C. so I hope I don't miss the most gorgeous and outrageous (because its February) feathery yellow blossoms! If I catch the tree in bloom, I'll share a picture with you. If not, I will dig out the picture from last year so you don't have to miss it! Here is a sampling of the spring beads I've been making... enjoy!

We have good news on Shelby! Her blood protein level has returned to normal. We have prednisone to thank for this. Prednisone isn't all good though - the price for using prednisone long term (as we have to do in this case) is a shortened life with a diminished quality toward the end of that life. At the same time, because it is halting the effects of a terminal illness, it is saving her life now. I guess there are alot of drugs like that in medicine - I think of cancer drugs that destroy cancer cells and good cells. We are buying time in both cases and for us and Shelby, it is the best choice.

My Mom is still in the hospital but has started recovering. I am hoping to go visit her next week and hoping she will be out of the hospital for the visit.

I have added new beads for sale both here and in my Etsy shop. Hope you find something you like!

We are still waiting on blood test results for Shelby. I did 'get' to give a shot to Shelby yesterday - first one in my life. It will get quite easy in no time, I'm sure, but I have to say I didn't expect the skin to resist the needle the way it did! I really didn't want to force it but that is pretty much what has to be done.

And if there wasn't enough excitement between Lexus' & Shelby's health issues, I recently learned that my Mom was hospitalized for suspected congestive heart failure. Turns out it is serious, but not as serious as that. I was madly trying to get my passport renewed last weekend so I could get to where they are in Canada and am still going to go see her but it isn't quite the emergency we initially thought it was. I will probably go for a visit in a week or two, after she is out of the hospital.

So, with a bit more leisure, I snapped a cute picture of Lexus and Shelby together sharing a bed. Shelby loves to be touching someone and if her humans aren't available, her adoptive big sister is the next best thing!