👓 MAY 👓

Lovely Spring Lilacs 

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/lovely-spring-lilacs-m-donna/

The lilacs are blooming and smell so wonderful. I  just wish they lasted longer. The sun is shining today and looks like we are going to finally have some summer heat this week end. 

My first news is that our grandson is doing wonderfully. He is home with his twin brother, who is taking 5 weeks family leave to take care of him, put him through his PT, etc. He has an appt. with a neurosurgeon the end of this month to make the surgical appt. to have the part of his skull put back on. He doesn't remember the accident, which is probably a good thing. Thanks for all the prayers and good wishes for him. He is our hero!

I have been having so much fun making themes using AI images, etc. I know some people probably don't like them but I find it fascinating. I hope most users will like them.

I finally got my appt. with the Pain Clinic and will be getting an injection in my back next week. I am keeping my fingers crossed that this will aleviate the pain in my back and legs. The Dr. said a lot of my leg pain is that the Fibromyalgia kicked back up when I broke my shoulder last year. I was quite confident that was part of it. So I am keeping my fingers crossed. I don't sit at all during the day. I stand up and do everything possible. Also wearing a back brace, but I am still riding my exercise bike every morning. I did have to quit walking but am hoping I can get back to at least a mile a day!

I have been looking for low sugar recipes for muffins, etc. for my husband. Found several we really like. It is very hard to cook with no/low salt and low/no sugar! But I love baking so I keep looking and keep trying. 

Going to get back to work. Hope you all are having a great spring. Keep your Firefox up to date! Keep Windows updated to keep your computers safe and in good health!

       A Light in the Night

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/a-light-the-night-by-m-donna/

🌧🌦April Showers🌦🌧

                                      Fluffy Spring Kittens

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/fluffy-spring-kittens-m-donna/

Happy April everyone. Been working on spring and Easter themes, plus still getting old ones updated so they work better with the latest Firefox.

March wasn't so great for our family. One of my grandsons was working on a 3 story roof and fell. He was unresponsive when the ambulance arrived (in only 3 min.) but they revived him! Thank God! They had to remove a part of his skull to relieve the swelling and if all goes well they will be putting it back. So far all the signs are looking hopeful. He hasn't come out of it yet but is in Intensive Care and they are taking very good care of him. He has a twin brother and they are so very close, so he has been spending as much time as he possibly can with him. He works for a contractor that works for Microsoft and they have rented office space for him that is 5 min. from the hospital and giving him all access to GrubHub! What a fantastic employer he has! His older brother is the IT guy for WWU and they are letting him work in Seattle for at least a week. His Mom and Dad are spending as much time as they can in his room. But they are only allowing 2 immediate family members at a time. Any and all prayers will be accepted! So far everything is going better than can be expected and we all know it is going to be a slow process.

 I ended up in the ER a couple weeks ago, too. Apparently I have a pinched nerve in my back and it causes horrible pain and numbness in my right leg. It came on so sudden in the middle of the night and after 4 hours my husband took me in. Like all ER's I had to sit in a wheel chair in the waiting room for 3 hours before I could get in, but once I got into the back, they did MRI, CT scan and all kinds of blood tests, etc. Now the problem is getting into the pain clinic. They are so backed up I may have to go the the County south of us, but haven't heard. It only bothers me at night and slowly gets better as day goes on and I am fine. Had to quit my daily walk...But am getting all my work, etc. done during the days. And it isn't every night now...so that is good.

We have had such cold, rainy weather, even snow at times. I am so anxious for warm weather.

My husband's blood sugar was up so now I have had to change all my baking and cooking. I love to bake so I am finding lots of recipes for muffins, etc. that are sugar free.  

Our 65th wedding anniversary is tomorrow. We like to go up in the mountains for a drive on our anniversary but there is still so much snow we won't be able to do that tomorrow.

I have been fascinated with AI images lately and have been using a lot of them for some of my themes. 

Looks like our past pres may not get by with all of his past "mistakes"! Nothing more to be said!

I think I mentioned that we are getting our groceries delivered free from WalMart, plus if you sign up now you get Paramount Plus free. It's great to have them delivered and we love Paramount Plus. So I am going to add a link/code that I can get $20.00 off a delivery if someone signs up for this great service that will make your life easier. Just add this code when you sign up.  http://share.walmartplus.com/donna52724 

I thank anyone that does this. You won't regret it!

As I said earlier, all prayers for our grandson will be accepted and our entire family will be appreciative.

Let us all hope for a better May. And thanks for all the support. I appreciate and am thankful that you are using and enjoying my themes.

💚💚Merry March💚💚

 

                                                   Patrick's Gnomes on the Farm

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/gnome-on-the-farm-by-m-donna/

 March came in like a lion here in the Pacific Northwest. But I guess we can't complain because it sounds like everyone is having bad weather. So sorry for all of us! I am sure we are all ready for summer. 

My 84th birthday was last Sunday and the kids were over. Had a really good time, but then we always do

After being at the Dr. last week about my back I decided I would try to borrow an inversion table from someone, but couldn't find one, so ended up and had to use Amazon. It was here when we got up yesterday morning so that was yesterdays project! Oh, my goodness....how many part it has. We decided it was too much so texted our youngest son to see if he was busy and it was just starting to rain so he couldn't burn the piles in his field so he came over and they got it all put together and got it set up for my height. I used it too long the first time and my back hurt the rest the day. But we moved the back heat massage "pillow" this morning and it is in a better place. They call it a pillow but it is too hard to be called pillow!

We got our last Xfinity bill and I just about freaked out. So called them and got our "package" put down. We have the lowest package that has mainly just the networks on. I do miss CNN and MSNBC but the bill just got too high. I honestly don't see how people can pay the enormous amount they charge anymore. Something should be down about it...The next thing will be cut the cord  completely, I guess. But you have to have internet anymore. Our homeowners insurance went way up, too. I know everyone is going through the same thing. So I shouldn't complain! Everyone is going thrugh the same things. Sorry!

I will sign off for now. Still working on themes and updates. 

I can't believe we are actually hearing about the next Presidential election already. I think maybe we were smart cutting half the cable.

The sun is shining this morning and all is well!

Have a good week, a good month and be well.

💖💖Fantastic February 💖💖

                                                     Gnome Valentine

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/gnome-valentine-m-donna/

 I will start updating my blog but will have to finish tomorrow since the day is running out on me. But Valentines Day is tomorrow and it is hard for me to believe. 

Will get back to this tomorrow or there won't be any dinner for my dear hubby!

I am back. Just got back from my walk. I managed to save enough to buy a pay of heated gloves to wear. My hands would get so cold. The first pair I ordered only kept the top of my hands warm so I returned them and found another pair. This pair works wonderful. I wear snow pants, scarf and heavy jacket.....plus my heated gloves now. 

 Had a new ex-ray of my back and it isn't good. It has only been a year and half since my surgery but my spine is deteriorating quickly. I sure don't look forward to another surgery and haven't made an appt. to go to Dr. The longer I don't go, the longer I don't have to make any decisions. I don't sit at the computer at all. My stand up desk works great.

Made a bunch of gnome valentines and didn't even get them all submitted so will carry over till next year, hopefully.

You know, I am getting so I hate to hear the news. I am anxious to hear it but dread it, seems like. You don't hear any good news anymore. The left hates the right and the right hate the left....war...earthquakes, floods, snow storms, UFO's, balloons, etc.

Kids all came over to watch Super Bowl. I was the only one in the bunch that wanted the Chiefs to win, so I was happy! We had Papa Murphy's pizza, and lots of snacks. Daughter in law made apple crisp and homemade ice cream. Fun day, but sitting that long didn't help my back any!

I am so looking forward to warmer weather. If our kids didn't all live within 5 miles of us, I would want to go to AZ but then again, we couldn't afford that so that is a pipe dream!

Got our income tax finished so hope that goes well. 

I have decided since I didn't sign up for any incentives for themes that I will  accept Amazon gift cards for any amount. That is easy to do....all you need is my email address to do so. I would appreciate any amount since we do a lot of our shopping from them. Haven't been as happy with their service lately because it seems like it takes them much longer to send out a shipment than it used to. I haven't received anything the next day in months like we used to. 

I hope everyone had a nice Valentines Day. I am cooking my hubby a special dinner and that is about it. 

My 84th birthday is coming up in less than 2 weeks. Seems like time goes too fast. Our oldest great grandson will be 18 this Sunday!

Going to sign off for today and start dinner. 

I want to let you all know that I appreciate the wonderful reviews and comments. I read each and every one and always try to answer.

Have a great rest of February!

 

 

A New Year Begins

                                                                 Jumping Fox

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/a-jumping-fox-by-m-donna/

Wow, can you believe it is 2023?  Amazing that we made it through 2022, but we did.

We had a bad storm the week before Christmas. No mail delivery for a week, no package deliveries, etc. We live on a dead end road and the County never plows it. Luckily one of our 5 neighbors has a Bobcat and plowed our road the first day but we had such a bad NE wind that comes down from Canada that it blew shut within an hour or more. When it finally quit snowing, he plowed it again so you could at least get down our road. Then it started raining and everything turned to ice and you could not walk outside! Our snow drifts because of the wind so we actually had bare spots in our front yard that were skating rinks. So glad that is all over....for now anyway. My brother and his wife flew up from AZ for Christmas but with the weather so bad we didn't get to visit with them before they flew out. I was so disappointed but you can't fight the weather!

The kids could get here Christmas and we had a really nice, homey day. We couldn't get out but I had my daughter pick up 10# of chicken wings at Costco so I could make our chicken wings. Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without them for us. The kids all brought lots of stuff so we had plenty to eat. As soon as dinner was over we played Uno for hours. Our daughter in law makes up new wild cards so our Uno is a Killer! Gets pretty wild but all in good nature. Our daughter works at a grocery Corporate Office and they get lots of sample products in so she had been collecting some for a gift bag, so whoever wins gets to go through the gift bag and there is always something everyone wants! I hope you all had a Merry Christmas and got to be with family. At least we didn't have to mess with airlines! 

We are such stay at homers, we even quit going out for groceries. WalMart had a special where you if you joined WalMart+ you got Paramount+ free, so that was all I needed to join. We had been doing WalMart pick ups for months. But this is so nice....having your groceries brought to your door! Plus we had been wanting to get Paramount+ for a long time but just didn't feel we could afford it. We are old timers and like western type shows. We had joined the free month last summer just so we could watch 1883! But had canceled after 2 weeks. So now we are looking forward to 1923. But are going to wait until the season is over and watch it back to back. Plus we are looking forward to Yellowstone coming on Peacock. We have the economy pack from Comcast and get Peacock free. But our cost is going up in January by $13.00 and just found out our power is going up 12+% so there goes our "big" retirement raise! 

I hope you didn't get tired of my gnome themes! I fell in love with them and am working on all the holidays. 

Our son and his wife brought a Nordic Trac they couldn't use anymore for my husband (he turned 87 in Dec.) to use. But after being in the shop during that winter storm we had, it won't work. They went through it yesterday and mechanically it is fine so it has to be in the panel so my husband is checking that out today.

I am still doing my walks, but I don't go out when it is super cold and windy. Hoping to be able to get out today.

I wish you all a Happy, Healthy New Year. Please take care of yourselves and your loved ones.

                         4 Gnomes New Year

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/4-gnomes-new-year-by-m-donna/
 

Cold, Cold December

                                           

                       A Christmas Gnomes Home
 https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/christmas-gnomhome-by-m-donna/   

We have been having a really cold December! And it's supposed to stay cold for awhile. I do not like it! Cold weather is much harder on the elderly. We both notice it

I have plenty to do to keep me busy, though.

Thanksgiving was really fun. Tons of food and we played Uno afterwords. One grandson and family were all sick so they didn't get to attend. There is so much sickness going around. We still aren't going out much. We did go and get our 2nd Shingrix vaccine yesterday. We should have gotten the 2nd one 4 year ago, but they never told us so we didn't. Next week we both get our tetanus shots updated.

The laptop I bought with my first Covid check updated to Windows 11 yesterday. I hadn't planned on it, but I accidentally did, So far, so good. It isn't that much different but going to take getting used to. I noticed it had a bunch of junk like TicTok and several apps that I won't use so I got rid of them. I don't do my Photoshop on the laptop so still using my old, old desktop. It just keeps plugging away.

I imagine everyone but us is buying Christmas gifts! We quit gifting quite a few years ago so I don't have that to worry about. When our grandkids were small I went way overboard. I sewed for months before and made each of the 7 almost a new wardrobe! I loved the sewing and wish I could do more now.

But this is what I pretty much work on now. I work standing up about half the time because of my back. 

 

                                   Winter Gnomes Home

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/winter-gnomes-by-m-donna/

 As you may have noticed I am working on a lot of gnome themes. I think they are the cutest things ever. The Winter Gnomes Home, I also made a wallpaper to match that one. If you want more of your theme to show just add a toolbar and you will see the entire image!

I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas and winter. Don't spend too much money. What with grocery prices I am very glad we aren't shopping for gifts also. We will have Christmas here but no gifts. We don't fix dinner for Christmas anymore, just tons of snacky stuff! I have got to figure out what to make soon. 

Well, I am going to sign off for now but wanted to add a bit for December.  

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you all!

 

💨💨Blustery November💨💨

                                                  NOVEMBER GNOMES

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/november-gnomes-by-m-donna/

 We got through October! Have you had enough election mailers and tv ads? Boy, we have! This is one of the hardest fought elections I have been through and one of the most important. I am not feeling very positive in my old age!

What a wonderful summer we had! But now the fall is here and it is cold, rainy, windy and even a few snowflakes have fallen. We are about as ready for it as we can be at our age. I am back into hoodies and half the time when I am working on the computer back here in my "office" (boys old bedroom!) I have the hood up! It is amazing how much warmer you are with a hat on. My husband told me that years ago, that a large percentage of your body heat goes out the top of your head. He was right!

I am still updating and working on a lot of new themes. I still love working on new themes and sometimes I get so excited over one. But then go back later and can't figure out why I liked it so well, so delete it.

Veterans Day is Friday. I hope everyone thanks a veteran they know. My Dad was a veteran from WWII, My brother is also a veteran. So thank you to all the veterans that have kept our country free.

My husband and I do a lot of reading on tablets so they are all ebooks. I get most of them free from Amazon. I get a daily update of free books from BookBub and Freebooksy. If you read a lot and read on a tablet of some sort, you can sign up and get an email every day with a list of free and discounted books. You can choose the genre you like. We like historical and mystery. My husband favors Western. I also get free ebooks from our local library. Just finished reading Hold the Line by Michael Fanone. That was a really good one! I don't usually write reviews on books but I did on that one.

I have never asked for money, etc. for my themes but I have decided if anyone wants to send me an Amazon gift card as a thank you I would more than gladly accept it. We use Amazon a lot. I do the Subscribe and Save for a lot of things that we use all the time, supplements, etc. So gift cards are very useful! Just had to order a walky talky set because the one I use in the house finally broke down. We use walky talkies so we can keep in contact when he is out. We have gone through a lot of sets over the years so I ordered a much cheaper set this time and it seems to work fine. If you set them up to the same channels you can use an old one along with a new one...

I started my fall cleaning, but the shoulder I broke in late April isn't up to window washing! I was surprised because it hasn't bothered me much but I guess all of them won't get cleaned on the inside. Will try one more and see how it goes.

I am so afraid my desktop is not going to start some morning when I open it up. My grandson (the IT guy at WWU) built my desktop so many years ago I can't remember. He put XP in it. I have had 7 and 10 and can't update it to 11. He has had to replace a few things in it. A video card once and a SS hard drive but otherwise everything else is pretty much the same. I know I want another desktop but it has to have a lot of USB ports and most of them don't. So I just keep working this as long as it starts! My old Photoshop is on a disc and I am going to have to put the program on a USB so I can install it whenever I have to get that new one. Maybe I will do that this afternoon. 

I hope you all have a fantastic Thanksgiving and lovely fall. I will get back on one of these days.

All is well here in the PNW!