Jigsaw Puzzle with Figurals

 In the past, my husband has mounted posters and made jigsaw puzzles of them. They include figurals, pieces cut into special shapes. He has been putting together an under-the-sea scene he made.

This puzzle has fish, starfish, lobster, seahorse, seal balancing orange ball among the figurals.

This morning my blood pressure was 85/65. I have never seen it so low. My doctor does not like the diastolic to be below 70. She wants to avoid dizziness. I do feel light-headed. I see on the internet that Reclast can cause low blood pressure. I am going to take half of my hydrochlorothiazide the next few days to counteract the effects of the Reclast. Hopefully, the pressure will regulate itself over the next week. 

When we ate lunch at Grace Village today, we had the opportunity to see the new robot waiters they are testing. When I took my photo, I mentioned to the live waitress that this was our first time to see the robots. She said sarcastically, "Whoopee." The machine seems under-utilized. All it does is bring the food from the kitchen to the table number that was input. The human being waitress then removes the items and puts them on the table. The slow part of dining at Grace Village is taking the orders. If the robot could do that, it would be a help. Otherwise, maybe not so much.

Our director of resident services will be retiring mid-May. She has been here over 20 years, thus the entire time we have lived at Grace Village. With a new development director since March, I am afraid things will fall through the cracks with new employees. Change is always hard. Resident services needs to interact with people and learn names. We have not heard anything about a replacement. 

My Trader Joe's flowers finally started drooping and dropping some petals. The rose was the first loss. I have "salvaged" the remaining blossoms and put them into a smaller vase. Maybe a few more days of enjoying flowers before they will need to be tossed out.

Rosie's Replacement

 

Rosie graced the sunroom for 3-4 weeks. Now she is tucked back in her home (bureau drawer) until next Easter. In her place sits the wooden rabbit I bought many years ago at Kohl's from its big discount shelf. His hat and bowtie lend him charm.

The springtime blooms are abundant. I saw some tulips in the neighborhood. My daffodils are blooming. The pretty little coral quince flowers are abundant.

This morning I had an infusion of Reclast for osteoporosis. It was done at the local hospital. I just barely edged from osteopenia to osteoporosis on my last DEXA test. My doctor decided it was time to be more aggressive. This drug is given just once a year. I am taking it instead of Fosamax because of my stomach/esophagus issues. Some people feel like they have flu pains as a side effect. So far, I am lightheaded and sleepy. Time to take a nap. I have about an hour to recline in my chair before my husband has the Cubs game broadcasting from the TV. 

I bought a Home Chef kit from Kroger for tonight's supper. Chicken street tacos. They can be warmed in the microwave for an easy meal. We have not tried these before. I will add the shredded lettuce salad left over from a few days ago. Relaxing today in case the Reclast effects kick in. 

I tried to sit on the porch Thursday afternoon, but without any breeze the 80 degrees were too hot to be comfortable. I will try again next week after our rain and cooler temps have left.

Beautiful Spring Day

 The weather is just gorgeous today. It was sunny and around 70 degrees with a light breeze. We did not really enjoy much time outside because we drove to Fort Wayne to do some shopping. The blooming redbud trees were plentiful in Fort Wayne.

At Trader Joe's my husband bought some cereal he really likes and a can of sardines (yuck). I bought a lemon mini sheet cake (1st time for that flavor), some "seedy" bread to toast for breakfast mostly, and two little bunches of flowers. That is one of the things I appreciate about that store: it has a nice variety of reasonably priced flowers. I wrapped a wet paper towel around the bottom of the stems and put them in a plastic bag, but sitting in the car for almost 5 hours did cause some degradation of condition. They probably won't last as long as if I had brought them home sooner. 

Pinks, purples, and white a nice combination. 

I was mostly shopping for a plain white tee shirt or white pullover top, a spring/summer dress, or a spring skirt. Though I tried on several things, I ended up buying just a skirt. I really liked the flowered dresses I had seen on the internet ads, but they were scarce or not in my size at Macy's, Penney's, and Kohls. 

I had seen this skirt in an ad from Kohl's. It described it as a front button-up skirt. Well, there are buttons, but no buttonholes. They are purely decorative, not functional. I think it will be a nice summery looking skirt that I will most likely wear with sandals in the coming months. 

Tomorrow is to be even warmer than today. Except for singing in chapel with the choir (be gone from home 9:30 to 10:30), I will be able to sit outside on my front porch and enjoy the beauty of spring. My daffodils are *finally* starting to bloom. When there are a few more blooms, I will snap a photo and share with you. My neighbors' daffodils bloomed several weeks ago and are almost done. These were new bulbs so I had no idea when they would develop and open. I also saw as we pulled into the driveway after our trip that a few coral quince blossoms are open now, too. Isn't spring grand?

Easter Desserts

We ate our Easter mid-day meal at the dining room at Grace Village. I had ham, scalloped potatoes, carrots, a deviled egg. There was also an option of rotisserie chicken and dinner rolls that I passed by.

The separate dessert buffet had coconut cream pie (which I took), cupcakes decorated for Easter, and "toadstools". 

 

When we finished eating and most of the people had been served, I went back to take a "toadstool" dessert. They had cut one open for us to see. I believe it is a brownie covered with red melting chips used for coating food. The bottom half (stem) is a strawberry covered with melted white chocolate or melting chips. I have not eaten it yet, so I am not sure exactly what the ingredients are. I see on the internet that is how most of the mushroom/toadstool desserts are constructed. 

It made for a festive table. I will eat my "toadstool" tonight probably.

The placemats had bunnies and eggs, others had a cross. It was nice to see at least a little recognition of the significance of the day. We did say grace at the beginning of the meal, thanking Jesus for his sacrificial death and resurrection that provided eternal life for us with God. 

We had a tasty meal with no preparation nor cleanup which was nice. Hope you had a blessed day. 

Canadian Brass Concert

 Friday Evening we attended a concert by the Canadian Brass held in Sauder Music Hall on the campus of Goshen College. The acoustics of the venue are excellent, but the sightline from the balcony not ideal. When I bought the tickets, there were a few scattered single seats on the main floor; the only places with adjacent seats were the left and right balcony. Once we sat there, we could see why these were available.

The musicians entered through the rear auditorium door playing when The Saints Go Marching In as they processed to the stage. 

Of the five performers, we could only see 3 unless we leaned over the railing. Fortunately, when a musician was featured in a piece, he stood out near the edge of the stage which meant we had a view. The men also changed seats if one or two instruments were prominent or had a duet. They took turns making the comments at the microphone; we did in that way see what all of them looked like. 

There was a wide variety of music interspersed with humorous remarks. For example, Bach's Well Tempered Clavier had been arranged and could now be called Well Tampered Clavier.

There was only one "dig" at the U.S.A. When they introduced the piccolo trumpets, the first one held up was Canadian and metric they said and "the other was American and you know . . ."

The tuba player at one point did "acrobatics" with his instrument, pulling it through his legs, twirling it around his head, and as he got lower and lower in the notes, sinking to his knees and with one last gasp collapsed on his face. This was done center-front so we were able to take it all in.

It was enjoyable and a nice distraction from the chaos in our country right now. We admired the almost-full bright moon on the drive home.

Lamb Figurines

 I saw a comment by Christian author Ann Voskamp that had me searching for a lamb figurine to display to remind me that My Shepherd loves and cares for me. With Easter approaching, I thought I would peruse eBay. There should be lots of lamb figures for sale this time of year.

Lambs are naturally cute. How hard would it be to find something that appealed to me? As it turns out, very hard.

 There were the Precious Moment animals with overdone curly coats that looked like poodles. There were figures so sleek that they looked like deer. One stylized lamb's brown texturized coat looked like skeletal ribs instead of wool.

 There were duplicates. One little girl (angel?) with a lamb showed up a dozen times with different paint jobs. She was cute, but the lamb looked mean and ready to attack. I decided it was the way the eyes were painted in a skinny backward slant. 

In fact, who knew facial features could vary so much that the lambs sent very different messages. One with a sappy look seemed like it had eaten locoweed. Another looked like it was grimacing from indigestion. One sneered as if to say you are not good enough for this flock. There was a painted? cowboy boot on one leg of a lamb but not the other 3. What is that all about? There are so many ugly lambs for sale, they outnumbered the adorable ones in my opinion. 

The Lladro statues were fine artwork; I was not ready to pay $80 to $100 to satisfy my whim. After scrolling through 70 pages, I was sick of lambs. I had seen some with humans that were cute, and I decided maybe I was focusing too much on the lambs. Find cute humans holding lambs and I would probably be happy. I did avoid the Mary Had a Little Lamb motifs. I also skipped Baby's First Easter lambs.

 I ended up with a Holly Hobbie with 2 lambs. It is about 5 1/2 inches high so small enough to put on the ledge of my pass-through window from kitchen to study. I will see it there often.

Spring Goodies

 

Rosie the Bunny is ready to greet Easter. She says, "Help yourself to some peanut butter cups."

Today I bought at Meijer some tete a tete daffodils in a pot. I intended to buy tulips but did not like the selection nor the price. 

I can no longer find the dark chocolate Godiva bunny, so I bought a Lindt one instead. I once did a "test" comparing the two and the Godiva was definitely my favorite. 

At least Easter is later this year; maybe we will have a warm day. We can always hope. Spring is very up and down in Indiana.

 A tornado went through nearby Bourbon, Indiana Wednesday night. My sister-in-law lost power but has a generator. She had no damage to her property, but Bourbon had structural damage to homes and businesses as well as fallen trees. We heard on the weather radio alert that a tornado was headed toward Bourbon and Etna Green. Our family members answered the text we sent, and they said they were sheltering in the basement. We had rain, wind, light hail but live further east than the tornado path.