In the Water and Between the Pages

I think our UPS delivery person was as excited about this delivery as I was! I promised him autographed copies of all four books for this three kiddos. I left them on the front porch for him the next day in an envelope with "UPS" on it. 

If you want to get a copy, right now it's only available from Book Baby, or from me personally, but you can preorder from Amazon or B&N for delivery after October 18th, good if you get free shipping from them. If you don't get free shipping, order from Book Baby, because more of the price goes to St. Jude, or from me if you want a signed copy.

Earlier on Tuesday we had our regular vet take a look at Sandy, as recommended by the vet in LaPine last week. Dr. Tucker looked at what the other vets had done and recommended another blood test. (If you missed last week, Sandy had gotten into my vitamins prepared for our camping trip to LaPine Campground and probably consumed a small quantity of Vitamin D3, which is very toxic to dogs. I'm so grateful that our breeder recommended Trupanion coverage for Sandy. It was still an expensive event for us, but they are picking up 90% of all the treatments (blood tests, etc.) needed for this event, other than the vets' exams, which are responsible for. Because we started out at Bend's Animal ER (where he was examined), then moved to LaPine for camping (where he had to be examined again) and then back to Bend (where Sandy was examined again by our regular vet) we had to pay for three different examinations of Sandy, but it's great to know that three different vets looked at him. They were all in agreement as to treatment and monitoring. The results from the last blood test (which was more extensive) were encouraging, and our regular vet consulted with an endocrinologist who felt that the levels were acceptable unless he started having symptoms, which he hasn't.

We had dinner at our next-door neighbors' home Wednesday evening. We brought a loaf of Dutch Oven bread and a bottle of very nice Madroña wine. A very nice dinner it was, too, with portobello lasagne, a lovely salad, our bread and wine and Crème Brûlée for dessert. They are great neighbors. We have a lot in common, and they look after our place when we're out of town...unless they're out of town, too.

Thursday we packed the trailer, and on Friday we drove to Pine Point Campground at Timothy Lake. It takes about 2 1/2 hours to get there from our place, and we definitely will go again. We were planning to meet up with our younger son's family at McKenzie Bridge Campground for this weekend, but our reservations were cancelled due to forest fires impacting the area. We had to scramble to get a new location for our joint camping trip. The problem was needing a site with enough room for a tent and our little trailer and two additional vehicles. We found a group site at Pine Point. It was a bit more expensive but it was so worth it. Charlie and I arrived before 3:00 PM, more than an hour before regular check in. (I think this is a first for us; we're usually late.)

The campsite didn't have many level areas, and the most level one we saved for the kids, who would be camping with a tent. It was clearly a tent site, anyway, and would have been difficult to get into with the trailer. (It's easy enough to level a trailer, but a tent really needs a fairly level space. We were right on the lake, although the trail that goes around the lake (about 13 miles) was between us and the lake. The view was gorgeous, though.

We could even enjoy the view from inside the trailer!

It was nice to know the bed in our RPod 171 was already made and comfortable.

The temperature was nice. There were no bothersome bugs. We got out our camp chairs and sat, admiring the view with the pups.

The "vault toilets" were nice and clean (or so I'm told; we have our own facility) and there was no trash anywhere. The camp host who was on duty when we were scheduled to check in said hi, as she went by on her kayak. When she came by later, she asked us not to feed the ducks or other water fowl (they also have loons). The ducks came up and tried to dissuade us, or maybe they were saying this campsite wasn't supposed to be inhabited yet, and they were supposed to have some time to check out the place for any scraps left by the previous campers. They certainly weren't afraid.

The kids arrived while it was still light enough to set up their tent. We shared a supper of hot dogs (regular and vegetarian), baked beans and homemade potato salad. The next day we did a 4+ mile out-and-back hike in the westward direction. This took us through the area called Meditation Point, where campsites were accessible for backpackers. We found an empty campsite where we could picnic. The pups (Dusty, Louis and Sandy) had a chance to play in the water and chase sticks. We had a great hike. We encountered our first ELOO, a composting outhouse. This may be the wave of the future. Soren and Johan got to take complete control of a dog's leash without our help, and they did very well (mostly).

The kids and dogs had more fun back at the campground. The camp host had provided us with junior ranger kits (including a special button to wear) and a kit to make a hummingbird feeder. Time flies, as it does when we're camping, and this was a short weekend, only two nights. Sunday morning, the kids and dogs played in the water again. We had one of the camp chairs on the beach, so the boys and dogs could learn the finer techniques of throwing things into the water to entertain the three dogs while an adult watched. We took turns watching.

The boys learned there were some rules required.

1) Look and make sure no one (human or canine) is in the way when you throw a stick.

2) Let the dog wade or swim and get the stick. Don't get the stick and give it to the dog.

3) If the dog doesn't see where you threw the stick, you can toss a small rock to land as close as possible to the stick, to get the dog's attention to where the stick is. 

4) When you toss a rock, always look at where you toss it. Make sure no person, dog or duck is there. It will go closer to where you wanted it to go if you look.

5) If you're tossing a stick for Sandy, throw it farther out. Dusty and Louis won't go out where they can't touch the bottom, but Sandy can swim for real.

Louis likes to go after a stick, but he doesn't expect to swim for it.

The kids had a great time, and so did the dogs!

We had a nice, but shorter hike, on Sunday before we left. It was close to two miles, out and back. We had a nice view of Mt. Hood from the trail. You can just make out Mt. Hood in this photo taken on our hike.

We left a little late. (Sorry, wonderful camp host!) We made it home, arriving within a few minutes of the time our son's family arrived at their place.

In other news, Soren had an EKG and an echo cardiogram this week, because, with his SATB2 diagnosis, cardiac problems are common. He was a rock star during the procedures, and everything appears to be healthy.

The Wisconsin grands have been busy dancing. Here's graceful Daphne.

Zachary is amazing at all forms of dance.

Only now he has injured a little toe, so he can't dance for a while and has to wear a special shoe at school.

Happy eight-month birthday to Sandy!

I have a lot of difficulty responding to comments to my blog posts because of technical issues beyond my control (my lack of understanding of how things work). Message me on Facebook, Ravelry or Spoutible if you need information.

If you have a few minutes and are willing, please go to Amazon and B&N and search for "Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook by Peggy Stuart" in Children's. Every click on the page for the book makes it more likely they will keep a good supply in their warehouse and stores. If you are outside the US, you may have a separate website for these retailers. If you have a copy of any of our books, including Emil and Mariah, please leave an honest review on the websites, especially if you bought from them.

Where's my blog: If you want to follow my blog, go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Still the Kultainen käki cardigan. About an additional inch finished on the plain stockinette stitch section.

What's on my loom: I didn't any progress on the placemats. But I need to get on it, because I need to make more rugs.

What's on my sewing machine: Still quilts.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: In Being Good, Jolena learns that she already has some good ideas about what a doll needs to do to be good, a rerun from 2018. 

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still listening to Die Unendliche Geschichte by Michael Ende. Not much progress this week.

What's in my wine glass: Gran Maestro Rosso Puglia, 2019. Not bad!

What's my tip of the week: Parchment paper has great uses in the kitchen. Did you know it could be washed or rinsed and reused?

Where are my books: The stories in each book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with a few changes. 

Our Favorite Verses: Poems from The Doll's Storybook is available from the BookBabyBookshop and other booksellers worldwide. Poems included are Valentine's Day, Keeping Pets, Back to School, Victor the Vulture, The Week Before Christmas, Insomnia and Veronika's Vocabulary Verses.

The stories in Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are Little Green Greatcoat, The Boy Doll Who Cried Wolf and Lost in the Woods.

Emil: Stories from The Doll's Storybook and Mariah: Stories from The Doll's Storybook are also still available from booksellers. The link for Book Baby is here. The three stories in Emil are Best Buds, Getting What You Want, and The Boys Cook Dinner.

The three stories in Mariah are Being Little, Besties, and Distraction.

If you don't get free shipping from Amazon or B&N, buy from the BookBabyBookshop, because 50% of the price goes to St. Jude. Other booksellers pay much less. 

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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Dietary Indiscretion

We started out the week with a trip to Bend Animal Emergency and Specialty Center (BAE) for a blood draw for Sandy. If you read last week’s post, you know that he got into the vitamins I had put aside for our camping trip. He may have eaten one or two, but two of the gel caps were clearly bitten into. I knew how many I had of each and what they were. The vets at BAE determined that the only thing of concern was the Vitamin D. Sunday the levels were still normal. Monday the calcium and phosphorus levels were both up a bit, but still in the normal range. They recommended another two days of checking but said that we could go ahead and go camping at La Pine State Park Campground. The receptionist at BAE gave us a list of vets close to the campground. I made an appointment, and we pulled out the trailer to park in front of the house to pack.

We were late leaving, not because of the Monday blood draw, but because a UPS delivery was “out for delivery.” We didn’t want to leave it out on the porch all week for porch pirates to pick up. We didn’t have far to go to get to the campground, though, only about 25 miles, and check-in was 4:00 PM or later. We made it in plenty of time to back into our site while it was still light. Amazingly, we backed in on the first try! We still had good daylight for hooking up the water and power. (Our area of the campground had no sewer hookups.)

We’re really enjoying the little RPod 171. Cooking is a little complicated because of the limited space, but we have as much as we had in our old fifth wheel. We mostly had simple meals, like Tofu Pups with chili beans, sauerkraut and pickled beets or reheated frozen salmon with chimichurri sauce reheated with the microwave, with oatmeal cranberry cookies baked in the convection oven for dessert.

So I did use the convection mode of our convection microwave. I wasn’t able to get it to preheat, but it baked from cold quite well. I just needed to let the frozen cookies thaw completely and then cook them a little longer. I used that method to bake our pizza, too.

We discovered that our little trailer had a convenient wine rack. 

Someone with a big trailer mentioned that they had a fireplace. The RPod 171 is pretty small, but we decided we had room to install a fireplace (iPad running the Fireplace3D app) within a cord’s reach from the USB charging ports.

I used the wet bath to shower. There’s plenty of room for me, with at least 6” space from my nose to the wall on the three sides used for showering. (Photo from the dealer to remind you.)

Tuesday we took Sandy for his blood draw at La Pine Animal Hospital. He had another checkup with a new vet, which we were responsible for, but Trupanion picked up the rest minus my 10% co-pay. The phosphorus was just outside the normal range, so not a concern yet. The following day’s bloodwork showed phosphorus up a bit more, so the vet wanted to do one more. Thursday’s had leveled off with no change over the previous day, so the vet said we could stop testing, but recommended a followup visit with our regular vet on Tuesday (tomorrow). I don’t know if he is going to want to do more bloodwork, but we will see. Trupanion has been picking up 90% of each visit, other than the exam fee. I found out the diagnosis is “dietary indiscretion,” which sounds as if he knew what he was doing. On the bright side, Sandy has a fan club at La Pine Animal Hospital now.

Our campsite was right next to the camp host. On Wednesday, Charlie learned that UPS was delivering wine and chocolate that day! He went back to be there for the delivery and to get some warmer clothes. The pups and I took a hike and then sat in the campsite. I got some knitting done, and the dogs watched the ground squirrels come and go. One must have had his home close to where we were sitting, because he kept approaching us and then scampering off to watch us from a slight distance away. I told the dogs “leave it” when he got close, and they were very good. If they even twitched, though, the ground squirrel would turn and run off.

Finally, he seemed to get up his nerve to approach closer and then still closer. He seemed very interested in Sandy, and it was mutual. The ground squirrel came within about 12” of Sandy and stopped. He got up on is haunches and looked at Sandy. Sandy looked back. They must have looked at each other for 30 seconds at least, before the ground squirrel ran off again. It was almost as if they were having a conversation. Maybe they were! I wish I could have taken a photo, but I was afraid to move, to end the magical moment.

We took at least one real hike each day and one other walk around the campground. (Screen shot from our Walk for a Dog app.) Sometimes we managed two hikes.

On one hike close to the campground we encountered a foursome of deer, all bucks. They all had nice antlers. One had quite a large rack. They seemed very interested in watching us. I couldn’t get all four in one photo, but you can just make out three here. I wondered if they were having a stag party.

Wednesday night was clear, so we took a walk to see the “blue moon.” It also occurred on Thursday, but the sky was overcast, so we couldn’t see it, and we had light rain. We got this photo Wednesday night.

I took this photo during Wednesday’s hike. I tried to get Dusty to pose, but he wasn’t interested. Sandy was happy to oblige, though. He was sitting in front of the Deschutes River. The sand was hot, so I snapped a few photos and then let him move.

Thursday the whole family hiked again, mostly on the same trail. It would have been Rocky's 19th birthday, so this was a Rocky Commemorative Hike in his honor. Sandy enjoyed it for him.

Some of the signage is…interesting.

La Pine State Park Campground has a great off-leash Pet Exercise Area close to our loop. We went every day, usually at the beginning of a hike so they could get their wiggles out. Otherwise, Sandy tries to get Dusty to play on-leash, which is a no-no.

The pups had a great time each time we were there. There were plenty of sticks to chase if we didn’t bring a ball. They love competing with each other.

Sometimes there were other dogs there. Even when it was just the two of them, it was good for them to run and play. 

Sandy seems completely comfortable in the RPod. The only thing Dusty doesn’t like about the trailer is the floor. He’s fine with rugs down. I had brought two, and Charlie brought the third one (which I had washed after the last trip) from the house when he went home on Wednesday, so we could make Dusty feel more comfortable. The “hallway” area between the bathroom, bed and galley area isn’t wide enough for the rugs, but I turned up the edges a bit, so most of the floor was covered. I’m thinking of cutting the edges off the rugs and finishing the raw edge with some kind of binding. Not sure if I’ll get to it this week, though. It’s going to be a short turnaround before we go camping again.

Twice during the week someone had to get out of bed to use the bathroom in the middle of the night. If we didn’t realize Sandy was awake, he got down and peed on the rug. He hasn’t figured out how to scratch on the door to let us know he needs to go out. 

We decided to stay an extra night, but our first campsite was reserved, so we moved on Friday to Site 116, in the northeastern corner of North Loop. We put the rugs out to dry. (They ran through the washer when we got home!)

I gave the RPod a nice cleaning on Saturday after I stowed everything away for our trip home. It took maybe 20 minutes. We made a list of things we need to add, like a duster and an extra dish towel.

This map was at the kiosk at the entrance to North Loop. It shows the hiking trails in the park. We decided to go back there later in the month. Maybe Sandy will stay out of trouble and allow us to take some longer hikes.

Generally, the weather was very good. The air quality was moderate when we got there on Monday evening. We had taken the small air purifier, and we had power, so we ran that in the trailer all Monday night. The next day, the AQI was much better, and it stayed that way the rest of the week. It was pretty warm on Monday, but it cooled off and was mostly pleasant, although Charlie hadn’t thought to bring a fleece, so he picked up one when he came home to wait for the chocolate and wine. Other than a few sprinkles, the only rain we had was Thursday night, and it wasn’t a lot.

I did get some knitting done, but not as much as I would have if the drive to the campground had been longer. This is where I was on Saturday after we got home. I got a few more rounds done during our weekly Zoom call, but you could already see the cuckoo motifs here, so it doesn’t look much different.

This popped up on my iPad screen Sunday morning. La Pine State Park Campground has no internet, and I rarely had more than one bar of service on my phone, so I didn’t have much screen time. It was mostly taking photos and using the Walk for a Dog app. I did post a few things to Facebook, went into my email to delete things and uploaded my invoices for Sandy’s bloodwork to Trupanion. Not really any playing around, though.

I'm expecting my books to arrive Tomorrow afternoon.

Finally, for some cuteness, here are the Wisconsin grands and our grandcat enjoying the sprinkler.

I have a lot of difficulty responding to comments to my blog posts because of technical issues beyond my control (my lack of understanding of how things work). Message me on Facebook, Ravelry or Spoutible if you need information.

If you have a few minutes and are willing, please go to Amazon and B&N and search for "Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll's Storybook by Peggy Stuart" in Children's. Every click on the page for the book makes it more likely they will keep a good supply in their warehouse and stores. If you are outside the US, you may have a separate website for these retailers. If you have a copy of any of our books, including Emil and Mariah, please leave an honest review on the websites, especially if you bought from them.

Where's my blog: If you want to follow my blog, go here and sign up to follow.

What's on my needles: Still the Kultainen käki cardigan and the EmPower People Kerchief (hibernating).

What's on my loom: No progress on the placemats.

What's on my sewing machine: Still quilts. No progress this week, for some reason.

What's in The Doll's Storybook: In Stars, the dolls look up at the sky and wonder where the stars are and why they can’t see them in the daytime. This was another reedited rerun.

What's on my iPad/iPhone: Still listening to Die Unendliche Geschichte by Michael Ende. I listened some more while sitting in the campsite, knitting.

What's in my wine glass: Viñalba Reserva Malbec Touring Nacional 2019 from Argentina. Not bad!

What's my tip of the week: Our grey water tank started filling up during our stay. (Grey water is water that has been used to wash dishes, brush teeth, wash hands or shower.) We had access to potable water from the tap (called city water) so we weren’t trying to conserve water. Of course, we went to the dump station on our way out of the campground, but what to do with all that water when you don’t have a sewer connection and your grey water tank is getting full? Campgrounds may have a sink for washing, so you can dump it there, or if allowed, you can pour it into a flush toilet in the campground, but get permission. Some campgrounds have special pits for grey water scattered around in various locations to give access to campers from several campsites.

At the campground where we stayed, the faucet for each campsite was located inside one of these special pits, so tent campers could brush their teeth and dump their dishwater right there. If you don’t see something like this, ask the camp host. (Photo credit: Good Sam RV.net)

Where are my books: The stories in each book first appeared in the blog and they are reproduced with a few changes. 

Our Favorite Verses: Poems from The Doll's Storybook is available from the BookBabyBookshop and other booksellers worldwide. Poems included are Valentine's Day, Keeping Pets, Back to School, Victor the Vulture, The Week Before Christmas, Insomnia and Veronika's Vocabulary Verses.

The stories in Classic Tales Retold: Stories from The Doll’s Storybook are Little Green Greatcoat, The Boy Doll Who Cried Wolf and Lost in the Woods.

Emil: Stories from The Doll’s Storybook and Mariah: Stories from The Doll’s Storybook are also still available from booksellers. The link for Book Baby is here. The three stories in Emil are Best Buds, Getting What You Want, and The Boys Cook Dinner.

The three stories in Mariah are Being Little, Besties, and Distraction.

If you don’t get free shipping from Amazon or B&N, buy from the BookBabyBookshop, because 50% of the price goes to St. Jude. Other booksellers pay much less. 

Note: This blog post was produced on the iPad and the MacBook, using the iPhone for some photos and some photo processing. No other computer was used in any stage of composition or posting, and no Windows were opened, waited for, cleaned or broken. No animals or dolls were harmed during the production of this blog post.

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