News and Views

Allow me to introduce you to Mister Hunter Longbow. He's a charming fellow. I have been tasked with transforming him into a modern and desirable gnome, by my dear friend Chad, stationed in Illesheim, Germany. Hunter is the Bravo Company mascot, and let's be honest, his style choices are lacking and personal hygiene also falls below the bar (dust in your beard Hunter? Really?). So here he is, idling on my workbench, clearly disregarding my no-smoking policy. Maybe it's a bubble-pipe.

We have a lot of work to do here at Gnome Makeover HQ.

In other news (and check out the views!), it is my first year here in Tennessee, and the season is spoiling us. I've told the boys that Forrest is coming home soon (next week for R&R!) so here are my two cuddle-bugs gazing expectantly at the forest (no no, I said Forrest! Daddy!). oh well...

So it's almost the month I've been waiting for. I am up to my eyeballs in errands and projects and Rudy is tapping his watch and saying that BlueBall awaits us in the garden. No rest for the wicked. Oh, Happy Halloween!

On this lovely morning:

life feels good.

Cold days, Warm dogs.

It has taken just one week for the temperature to drop 20 degrees, all the leaves to fall off the trees and for me to switch my wardrobe from shorts and tees to long socks and sweaters. The dogs are looking smug in their fur coats when we brave the chilly 6.30am walk. I'm wearing gloves and hats and jackets in the 50s and wondering how I'll make it through the zeroes. With hot chocolate, for a start.

Dog-blog.

I'm working on redesigning my blog banner, as the current one just isn't my cup of tea, my Sunday morning, my warm socks on a cold day anymore. I was telling my husband that he'd better come home soon, because I feel like I've been married to the dogs lately. Not healthy. That said, they are a big, bright part of my days, and so I thought I'd include them in my new banner. Felix brought me a bug from the garden today, so he deserves a little something in return, afterall. At first I ended up drawing something ludicrously detailed for a simple application, but after slapping my forehead, and cursing wasted time, I did a 5 minute sketch which will probably work just fine.

In the meantime, Rudy has collected all my old shoes together for me so that I can take him into the garden and play fetch. Mustn't keep him waiting....

(I'll tackle Felix tomorrow....it's a work in progress!)

Family Time!

I suppose it is an inevitable circumstance that when a family member visits, they must at some point leave again. We gloomily waved my Mum back across the Atlantic yesterday, after what was an entirely pleasant three weeks of being a tourist in my own town, eating pie, and crowning my Mum the new most exciting person of interest for my dogs. As ball-thrower in chief, it didn’t take my Mum long to endear herself to the boys. Rudy fell in love. (again).

Felix must have grown 10 inches from all the extra treats. Rudy used his charm-face and spoke his human words in a bid for more (and more) ball-throwing. Walks at the river were a happy transformation from our fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants approach (two dogs, one under-muscled human: me) to organized semi-chaos (two dogs, three humans: Me, Mum and my sister, Kate). This might be the most relaxed I have felt since Forrest left 6 months ago.

Nashville Zoo entertained half-heartedly. It was nice but I was hoping for penguins. Maybe a hippo. Flamingos make up for any amount of disappointment however.

Nashville is becoming a little more familiar to me, though when my GPS broke halfway there, you could very well have deposited me on the surface of the moon and I’d have found my way around more efficiently. Eventually we succeeded in navigating between pancakes and parks. Not bad for a day’s confusion…

One of our final days trips was to the quite beautiful ‘Land Between the Lakes’. Thanks to the Autumn leaves for putting on such a show. Thanks to the weather for finally being generously cooler. Thanks to my Mum and Kate, for a lovely 3 weeks.

Good times, wonderful family.