Make the most of yourself, for that is all there is of you.

That quote is from Ralph Waldo Emerson, but I thought it quite fitting considering the conversation I had with my niece this afternoon!

She was going through my basket of yarn, looking for little (and big) balls of left overs that I had saved for future use, and found a little bit of fluffy pink stuff, that I had used for a friend's little girl. She asked the little girl's name, and found out she had the same name as the other little girl! She was a little disturbed by the fact there was another girl "just like her" who had blonde hair, and a little brother, just like she does. She was extremely relieved to discover that this other girl has blue eyes instead of having the same big, deep, brown eyes my niece has. Well, after deciding it was okay to have the same name as another person, and having been informed that there was no other little girl just like her now, nor would there be, because God made her uniquely special... she has decided to adopt this other little girl as a long-distance buddy of sorts. She's now in the process of making a present for her!

Sorry, Ev, but you may have a very odd looking necklace arriving in the mail sometime! LOL! I'll see if I can convince her to make something a little more... normal...? Right now she is quite insistent that a "scrap yarn necklace" is the perfect present for a 1 year old, hehe! You may just end up with the necklace and a picture too (she likes to draw)... I guess it's an interesting time to strike up a friendship of sorts between a 6 year old and a 1-almost-2 year old, hehe!

Let's see... other than that, I figured out how to make fish sticks from scratch, and how to make ketchup (or catsup as my dad sometimes calls it!) as well! I thought it tasted pretty good, though I had a picky eater saying it didn't taste "as good as the fish sticks I sometimes gets in my lunch do". Oh well. It's not like I was trying to compete!

I was given an idea for a meal for tomorrow, so we'll see how it goes... if it flies, we'll have it again, and again, and again, and again... Just not every day in a row! I really want to make nalischneky (no clue if that is the right spelling or not), but I don't think I can get the right sort of cheese here! It's some sort of dry curd cottage cheese, and I'm honestly not even sure if it exists around here!

It's quickly turning from what I would call spring, to summer already! We actually had seventy degree weather this afternoon, and I saw a purple iris in bloom today! I feel so strangely out of place, because to me, irises are LATE spring, or early to mid-summer flowers, and here they're blooming! Well, the "leafless" magnolias (they'll get leaves later) are almost finished their blooming, the apples, plums, and other fruit trees are in full bloom, and now I think we are just awaiting the blooming of the shiny leafed magnolias that are all over the place here! A nice relief is that the American Elms are nearly done with their seeding season, so I'm no longer having such horrible reactions every time we go near some of those!

Outside the apartment complex, in the river/inlet, there are a number of birds making regular visits. Today I saw a pair of ducks, about six sand pipers, probably a few dozen seagulls (no surprise) and one brown pelican! Normally we don't see the pelicans, but we see a lot of herons. I found out last night how to tell the difference between a white heron and a white crane-- cranes fly with their necks stretched straight out, and herons curl their necks up. So, I now know for a fact that we see a pair of cranes, a lot of white herons, and the occasional Great Blue Heron.

And, since I'm just rambling, I suppose I should stop talking! I have quite a bit to accomplish around here anyway, including writing two research papers! :-)