Fun in the sun

Sunrise and geraniums

When I was out on the front porch at sunrise, I saw the sunlight giving my front porch flowers a pretty halo, so I grabbed my iPhone and snapped this picture. I love my iPhone camera, but just this morning I realized that in the years since I bought my new iPad, I hadn't taken ANY pictures with it.

Taken with iPad Air2

Since I knew I would be volunteering at WAHA all day today, I thought maybe I could forward this picture from my iPad into Google blogspot for a new post while I was working. But even though I had wifi connectivity, I could not figure out how to transfer a photo from my photos to blogspot. Therefore, I came all the way home during a break to write this. I'm fairly confident that somebody out there can tell me how I can get a picture from my iPad to my blog. When I'm on my laptop, I export the picture onto the desktop in a low resolution and do it that way (as I did above).

It's probably an easy fix, and when I have time I'll do some research on it, unless YOU know how to do it. Anybody?
:-)

Back to walking with the ladies

Judith and Barbara framed by the sun

Yes! This morning I went for a wonderful walk at Lake Padden with the Fairhaven walkers, my first time back in three weeks, since I hurt my knee. I intended to go around once (instead of twice the way we usually do) in hopes that I wouldn't be taxing my knee too badly, but after one time around, I was pleased to find that there was little to no pain. And now here it is a while later, and there is still no pain, so I am quite thrilled.

No, I won't be heading out on any nine- or ten-mile hikes with the Trailblazers quite yet, but I'm definitely on the mend. I'd call my knee 90% better. Then I headed to the Farmers' Market to have a piece of Sophie's rosemary and sea salt bread, toasted with butter and apricot jam. Now it's a nice rest on the schedule for the rest of the day.
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A lovely day not hiking in the woods

Rhododendrons in bloom

Another day not hiking with the Trailblazers. My knee is SO much better, but I'm not willing to have a setback, or worse yet, need to be hauled out of the woods by my friends again. So I'm taking it slow. Plus today was a rather steep, hard hike that I didn't mind missing. I sure miss my friends, though, and hanging out with them for a day. This was Week Three and I suppose it'll be another couple of weeks before I feel safe. So I drove around and took pictures of the rhododendrons, Washington's state flower, which are in full bloom all around town.

Just beautiful out there today

Our hikes to the High Country might be starting soon, and I'll be there, hopefully, with my knee ready for heavy use. In any event, it's not easy to hold back when I think I'm doing well, but I'm learning the hard way.

Sophie taking her wares to the market

Speaking of the hard way, Sophie of Raven Breads hauls her entire Saturday's offerings to the Farmers' Market by bike and trailer. Somewhere on there she also has a toaster, which gets lots of use toasting up her dense fabulous breads for her customers. I partake almost every Saturday myself.

This Saturday I will make an attempt to walk with the ladies for the first time in three weeks, and I expect to do just fine. It will be a test for me of my readiness to resume my regularly scheduled activities.
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Making peace with my name

I was supposed to be just "Jan"

Back when I was born, mothers were kept in the hospital for nine or ten days. As you can see from this little snippet from my birth certificate, I was born at Hanford Sanitarium in California, because my father was stationed at the time at an Air Force Base that didn't have its own maternity ward. As you can see from the time she spent in the hospital prior to my birth (two hours), she was obviously not ill.

But that's not the reason I took a picture of this. It's because of that first name, written in a different handwriting and short of stuck in. Well, that's because it was: my paternal grandmother, Dorothy, decided on her own that she would go into the hospital records and insert a proper first name on the birth certificate. Mama found out after the fact. As you can imagine, I was NEVER called "Dorothy" in the years when I was growing up.

She (the Dorothy in question) also never allowed us to call her anything but "Mommy," although she was actually only my father's mother. Didn't matter: this cheeky woman was very strong-willed and everyone did as she said. Here's a picture of her with her three sons.

Marlow, Mommy, my dad, and Jack

She also gave birth to a daughter, but I never met her. For some reason I was never able to know for sure, she disowned Edith long before I was around. And nobody was telling. But I decided a few decades ago to add the initial "D" to the beginning of my name, becoming "DJan," which is unique enough to make it easy for me to find myself on Google. Anyway, that's the story of how I became DJan, and now I'm quite fond of it. "Jan" is still nice, though, which is what my family has always called me.
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Good news and more

Golden Chain tree in bloom

I took a picture of this tree while I was on my solo walk this morning! Yes, I walked more than two miles at a reasonable clip and felt little to no pain in my knee. It's getting better very quickly, at least to anybody else standing by watching. When I saw my fantastic doctor yesterday, Patrick, he listened carefully to my description of my knee woes and then twisted it this way and that. We discussed treatment options, but he was so positive and upbeat about the possibility of being back to normal in just a couple more weeks that I was ecstatic. He treated me like an athlete rather than a creaky old septuagenarian, and I thanked my lucky stars that he is my new doctor.

He told me he would send me to a specialist if I felt the need, but he suggested that I begin to try some walks and see how things go. Since it has not hurt that much lately, I went out this morning for that walk and enjoyed seeing how well I could do. By the end of the two miles, I could feel my knee but it still didn't hurt that much. I'm resting now, and for the rest of the day I'll spend time in the garden but otherwise take it easy. He suggested an MRI, but I told him I didn't think I could have one because of metal in my hip.

So, to find out the scoop on my old hip fracture situation, he ordered an x-ray of the pelvis. This morning I got the results from the radiologist and found that I could indeed have an MRI if necessary. She also noted that I have mild osteoarthritis in both hips, which surprised me since I don't seem to have any pain from them. Maybe it doesn't always hurt. I suspect that three decades of running contributed, not to mention more than 4,000 landings under my parachute, not always perfectly. But in general, I am pleased that I am doing so well!

Carol crossing a downed log with help

Several people sent me pictures of last Thursday's hike, and this one (from Bob) was my favorite. Apparently the windy winter caused lots of fallen trees on the Noisy Creek trail, some of them huge like this one, and there was nothing to do but crawl across, with lots of assistance from fellow hikers. Eleven Trailblazers enjoyed a ten-mile hike complete with adventures like these, and great views of Mt. Baker.

Would you eat one?

I finished my walk this morning with a visit to the Farmers' Market and saw this booth with "Jurassic Snacks." Yes, powdered crickets pressed into little cookies! I listened to the spiel and considered whether or not I'd have one, but I finally declined and took a picture instead, which I can share without having to ingest any insects. Maybe some day, but not today.
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My favorite garden store

Joe's Gardens

When I woke up this morning and tested out my knee, it felt pretty good. But not good enough to go to Noisy Creek with the Trailblazers. Although I don't know how many of them went, I suspect they had a good turnout, since the day was just about perfect for it. Here's the link to our 2013 hike, when it was perfect weather, too; in fact, I named the post "Noisy Creek was Fabulous." I am hoping they are having just as wonderful a day, and maybe somebody will send me some pictures. I won't be going to the gym tomorrow because I'll be heading to my doctor's office to talk about my knee and hope I can get a referral to a specialist.

Whatever. Today I spent going to the gym and riding the exercise bike and taking the strength and tone class, while I tried to avoid looking out the window at how beautiful it was outside. So in desperation to spend some time out there myself, I went to Joe's Gardens to get some flowers and some veggie starts.

An enormous selection of just about everything

Such a beautiful day! I sure hope they are having a good time without me. I went out to the garden and got a good start on my starts, so to speak. I put in gourmet and spicy salad starts, as well as something called "brokali," a hybrid broccoli and kale plant. I'm excited to see what it is.

The beginning of my 2016 garden

Here you can see what I've done so far. In the front are my strawberry transplants, and then after the three stones are the salad stuff, and behind them the brokali. I just got a call from John and he says if I come out to his farm right away, he'll cut me some fresh asparagus right out of his garden for dinner tonight! How can I turn that down? The garden will be waiting for me when I get back to it.
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News from my corner of the world

Lilacs and sky in Bellingham today

I didn't write a post on my other blog on Sunday because I could actually hardly wrap my head around just a few words, I was so sick. Saturday morning everything seemed normal, with just a twinge of a tummy ache bothering me slightly. I wrote the previous post on here after I got home around 11:00am. Well, from that moment until early Monday morning I was so miserable all I could do is stay in bed and try to sleep. Chills and fever of 101F, headache and body aches, and worst of all, vomiting. I could keep nothing down for two days, including water. As of Sunday night, my fever had not broken when I went to sleep.

But when I woke Monday, it was all behind me. Fever gone, everything seeming normal except for residual weakness and a slight queasiness, which is still here on Tuesday. But I'm so much better it seems like roaring health by comparison. So I gave myself permission to go out into the beautiful warm sunny day and walk carefully to the bus stop. Once I got to the coffee shop, I didn't even want any coffee but I had a really nice half-strength latte anyway. It stayed down, I was fine, but working out didn't seem like a good idea, so I strolled around for awhile and headed back home.

What was really interesting is how much my knee improved after staying off it for two days. People had been telling me to take it easy and to stay off it. Now how do you do that unless you're flat on your back? Which I was, and it made a difference. I am walking much better but still injured. I've got a doctor's appointment on Friday, which I am looking forward to.

But there is something else that is very contagious. One of my blogging friends, Far Side of Fifty, wrote a post about spring cleaning, and I commented that I would only do it if I had a housekeeper. Well, not long after I wrote that, I had to find something from last summer and couldn't remember where I put it. After digging through drawers and pushing numerous dust bunnies aside, I caught the bug: I'm going to start with one room (the bedroom) and make a huge donation to the used clothing store, and organize my dresser drawers!
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