Everything is bursting into bloom here. The plum trees are in full bloom so the yard smells delicious. The peach tree should start blooming tomorrow. The Mexican plum is budding, so we expect blooms from it in a week or so. The water lilies have new foliage coming out. Lots of wildflowers are in bloom--spring beauties, anemones, bluets, wild garlic, wild onion, bloodroot, henbit, chickweed and others whose name I do not know. Some of the native Chickasaw plums are blooming along a few fencelines in the Thackerville area though not yet blooming along our road a bit further north. Some of the ornamental pears are blooming...either 'Bradfored' or 'Aristocrat' or both. Daffodils are in bloom everywhere, and I saw the first hyacinth blossom yesterday. I haven't seen any redbuds in bloom yet. The iris foliage is up, and lots of herb volunteers like catnip, lemon balm, chamomile, are up. Some of the chamomile plants are on the verge of blooming. The chives are just a handful of days away from blooming. A lot of the trees are getting that fuzzy look you notice from a distance when they're about to bloom or start leafing out. All the winter weeds are growing like mad and we're going to mow them down tomorrow. Down near the river, some of the native willows are leafing out already. The native blackberries have leafed out but haven't bloomed yet. We have honeybees and lady bugs all over the place, and a few butterflies and moths. Tons of birds are everywhere. Lots of frog activity around the ponds. Spring-like weather is here, but I still expect we'll have another freezing night or two at the very least, although I wish we wouldn't. Spring officially arrives in a few days, but the plants are acting like it's already here. Unfortunately, the bermuda grass here is beginning to green up too. Dawn

Here is my list - - Additional blocking in the framing stage to accomodate grab bars, towel bars etc. Additional blocking being the slidebar of the shower also makes it sturdier to use as a grab bar. - Kerdi board for waterproofing - Heated wires throughout the floor including the shower area - Tall niches with shelves sized to fit the costco sized bottles - Tile that is not too slippery for the floor. Also used epoxy grout to make future maintenance easier. - frameless shower doors - we did pay a couple hundred dollars extra for the really clear glass - U-groove frameless - One of the bathrooms is curbless to accomodate access issues. Has nice looking grab bars and a folding teak shower seat that is ADA rated to 400lbs. - LED cans (california code) - Elongated Toto skirted toilets with sanigloss to make the cleaning easier - the special lutron switches where the fans stay on an extra 20 mins to clear all the steam. we used them with panasonic fans which are much much quieter than what we had in the past - wall mounted heated towel rods - hooks instead of towel bars.. I just preferred the more streamlined look of hooks - plug outlets inside the vanity to charge things. - wheeled laundry basket with divers to sort laundry has a niche to be tucked in. - separate toilet stall with a door. We did not do comfort height as we are not overly tall people. Elongated toto toilets with an integrated skirt to make cleaning easier and a GFCI outlet to plug in a washlet. - paper towel holder from Moen that doubles as a grab bar in the ADA bathroom. - accomodated for daylight (skylight or a window) in both the bathrooms to help people to wake up in the morning.. I love the daylight. - radio for listening in the morning. We are big public radio fans - wall mounted lighted makeup mirror - mirror defogger to prevent the mirror from getting steamed up.. - vac pan at the floor level that connects to our central vac system to make daily cleanups a breeze. I am picky about hair on the floor - solid core doors to prevent bathroom noises from being heard outside. I often have to get ready before dawn and the shower noise wakes DH up. - recirculating pump for our tankless to avoid warm water delays. Ours is integrated into the tankless. - Hansgrohe ibox to get the thermostatic control to preset the preferred temprature - Ebbe integrated drain that has a hidden hair snare. - Handheld shower with a longer hose to make it easier to clean the walls. - rain shower on a longer arm so that you can stand away from the wall.

OK Celine, after the whole foods parking lot video, I just will never think of quinoa the same way. Though I'll know how to pronounce it: rhymes with "bra". As it turns out, we crawled into the chocolate chip and pancakes camp. I've yet to make the granola. But dd1 insisted on making spice bars for a school potluck (to which I'm not invited? wha?) and dd2 needed to make choc chip cookies (though this hardly needed baking as all she wanted was the raw dough in truth) and there were some rotting bananas that I had to make into banana bread. Then it was father's day so verbotten meat (lamb) got roasted and eggs had to be scrambled because life without scrambled eggs is pretty close to a life not worth living....Last night, like mnerg, we actually had pancakes (p. 357, Diet 4 Sm Planet) for dinner; that's how syrup-starved we all were. We've been busy here today! And the other night we did the obligatory paper-on-the-cc-burner to great acclaim. The young, strapping hungry hombres just-back from the field had to settle on outdoor-grilled food because I couldn't quite tackle the new indoor beast at the time, but we all enjoyed the simmer-road-show. But truthfully, the very first thing that got made? It was boiled water for pasta. Isn't that pathetic? The second was to stew up some inedibly sour fruit. Funny how plebeian cooking turns out to be. Recipe for green chile stew? Here's for spice bars: boil 1 cp water and 1 cp raisins, remove from heat, stir in 1/2 cp apple sauce (or oil) and let cool; add 1/2 c sugar before all the way cool. Stir in 1 egg when cool. Sift tog dry ingred and add to wet above: 1.75 cp ww pastry flour, 3/4 t salt, 1/2 t cloves, 1 t soda, 1 t cinnamon, 1 t nutmeg (opt: chopped walnuts, 1 t allspice(ick)). Bake 20 min in 13x7x2 pan @ 375. When cool frost w/butter-cream: 2 cp confect sugar, 1/4 cp butter, 1 T milk, 1 t vanilla.

((((Hugs and Love and real Christmas Joy from me to you)))) You're very wise to spend a happy Christmas in your home with your family instead of somewhere else with a drama-rama going on. I have a friend, with two children, that has been married for 29 years. They have never, ever, once had the Christmas holidays in their own home. It's always been pack up the kids, pack up the gifts, drive half-way across the country, spend exactly the same number of hours at first his "family" and then her "family" (and reverse the times and meals for the next year, AND keep a diary so you can prove that they didn't slight anyone) and then rush home to get back to work. Their kids are in college now, and don't have a single memory of their family having a Christmas in their home with their parents and tree of thier own. I don't understand it all. I'd rather be by myself, in a hotel room in a foreign country, than have to deal with my bickering, stressed, angry, hurtful, at-each-others' throats extended family. There are a few family members I'd love to share a holiday, any holiday, with, but they are few and far between and most of them are under the age of 10 or over 80. You hang in there. Tell the people you love that you love them and make happy holiday memories for you, your kids, and your home, and your hubby.