Diane – Page 7 – Living de Good Life

The Grass IS Greener!

OK! You have heard the saying “The grass is greener on the other side.”, and usually when we say that, we are alluding to the truth that often we think the grass is greener on the other side but when we get there, we find it is the same grass that we had before, but it just looked greener! Well, I am afraid that Oreo discovered that at least at this point in our spring, the grass definitely was greener on the other side!

Of course, we were thirty minutes away at Micah’s ballgame when I realized I had missed a call from our sweet neighbor, so I immediately returned her call. She informed me that Oreo, our 7 1/2 month old steer had escaped our pasture and was happily grazing on the growing grass in theirs.

Immediately, Jeff packed up his chair and headed home. In the meantime, I called Noah to see if he knew of anyone who had experience with cattle who could help until Jeff got there. Then, I tried to get ahold of the farmer I bought our cows from and couldn’t reach him. I then made a plea on Facebook and texted a couple of people. Then Noah, who was still at work, called back and said he didn’t know anyone else but was headed over. Now this is a big deal to me because he hasn’t had much experience with our cattle because he moved out before we had more cattle than just the two mamas. This was such an act of love!

In the meantime, our sweet neighbor, Susie, was sitting at the back of her house keeping an eye on Oreo. She was concerned he might realize he was FREE for the first time in his life and head toward the road, but thankfully, he kept his head down most of the time devouring the new grass.

Noah assessed the situation, and made the smart decision to move our truck into a position to block the escape hatch so Caramel and Truffle couldn’t get out and then he had a talk with Oreo! He said Oreo didn’t like what he had to say!

Shortly after this, Jeff arrived, and even with the two of them working together, Oreo didn’t want to cooperate. He didn’t want to leave the lush grass for the dry patch of ground he has been confined to as we allow the pasture to grow. Looking at it from his perspective, who can blame him? Choice: dry hay or lush green spring grass! Thankfully, they worked together and eventually Jeff was able to get the lead rope on him and lead him back through the break in the fence.

I am so thankful that our neighbor was home and cared enough to call us! I am so thankful that Noah headed over and did what he could to minimize the danger or we could have had three ornery beasts devouring the neighbor’s pasture. And to top it all off, I am so thankful that while all of this was going on, Micah had a great game of baseball and his team beat a D-1 school team!

Exciting Announcement about Upcoming Guest Post

I am very pleased to let you know of an upcoming guest post by Dr. Keith Lewis of Healthy Life Doctors in Upper Arlington. I have asked Dr. Lewis, who many of you will remember is the one responsible for me being able to keep my gall bladder when my symptoms were misdiagnosed by my family practitioner, to write about the effects of eating refined sugar on our bodies. He is so very knowledgable and I am eager to be able to share with you what he knows about this important topic. So be watching!

http://www.healthylifedoctors.com

For the Love of the Game

For a girl who begrudgingly endured baseball games (one right after the other) as I was watching next to my dad or grandpa, it sometimes amazes me how much I love baseball. I used to think it was just some grown men, batting around a small white ball and running around the bases, but now after being married since the new millenia to a baseball fanatic (aka enthusiast) and now raising my favorite baseball player, who from very young had an understanding of the strategy of the game far beyond his years (me: what? there is a strategy to batting that little ball around the green grass?), I have grown into a somewhat aware fan.

When our youngest son was little, I remember standing in the check-out line at Aldi with him and his big brother. He, of course, had Cleveland Indians garb on and someone commented on it. His response was something like “if you don’t like the Indians, you can’t live in our house!” Oh my! I suspect he was more right than I was willing to admit that day!

So, spring not only brings the excitement of the Indians’ new season, it brings the joy of watching my favorite player play ball. He has come a long way from the little guy who used to set up a baseball diamond in the living room in front of the television and duplicate and emulate what he saw the Indians doing, including pitching, batting and running the bases! This is the boy who at two-and-a-half years of age played t-ball at the “Y” in town and was disappointed when he learned that there were no balls and strikes and that they had set up little individual diamonds on each base so that the coaches could teach the game on small scale to the other kids. He was trying to turn double plays when there weren’t even any outs. It was an outrage to him that everyone got to bat every inning whether or not we had exceeded three outs.

So fast forward through 14 years of recreational baseball teams, coaches and games to one and-a half years ago when at the end of the rec league scheduled games he said he needed and wanted to play more baseball games. So we did some investigating and he started last year playing for the local high school. It was just what he needed, even though it wore him out. After homeschooling for so long, I wasn’t prepared for being on someone else’s schedule and it was a tough adjustment but so worth the sacrifices as I watched him thrive under better training and the love of playing more games.

Now we are halfway through the schedule for high school baseball and it is going too fast. He has improved so much in strength and skill. Watching this young man play what he loves is so thrilling. So, our lives revolve around the schedule of games dictated by coaches we know and those we don’t know, by the weather – both spring and winter like it’s been this year, and it is so worth it. I absolutely LOVE watching him do what he loves and what he seems to have a real talent for doing.

It’s hard to believe that in another short three weeks, he will have another high school baseball season under his belt and he will be heading to play with his friends on the rec league where he admits there is less pressure. I am well aware that there won’t be very many more seasons before this part of the journey is over and I admit that I dread it. What fun it is watching your child thrive at something they excel at doing. So, as crazy as it is, I am hanging on for the ride! So, see you at the ball park, whether local or Columbus Clippers or Cleveland Indians. It’s for the love of the game!

Spring has finally sprung…

…and with it comes a somewhat easier time for this “Jersey girl” to do what needs to be done: trips to the barn to milk, trying to dress warmly enough so that I’m not frozen by the time I get back into the house, breaking up ice in the outside water troughs (thankfully my very helpful son does that most of the time), and more. Walking to the barn is a pleasure instead of a race to get out of the winter wind.

However, there are some real dangers for my cows as spring emerges from the frozen tundra. The most glaring danger is a condition called “grass tetany”, from which cows can die! I first became aware of spring dangers, when Mocha’s sister, Coco, after being out in the spring grass just for a few hours on spring afternoon, was found deceased the next morning when her farmer went out to milk her. Grass tetany, also sometimes called “grass staggers” or hypomagnesemia”, a metabolic disorder of cattle related to a deficiency of magnesium. It usually occurs when animals are grazing lush pastures in the spring, but it can occur during the fall and winter as well. The rapidly growing, lush grasses create the greatest problem after cool, cloudy and rainy weather is followed by a warm period.

Another danger is “pasture bloat” which is a digestive disorder caused by an accumulation of gas in the first two compartments of a ruminant’s stomach. Production of gas is a normal result of rumen fermentation and these gases are normally discharged by belching, but if the animal’s ability to release these gases is impaired in some way, pressure builds in the reticulum and rumen and bloat occurs. Pasture or “frothy” bloat, results from the production of a stable foam and if not relieved, the pressure created by the unreleased rumen fermented gas in the foam can lead to death by suffocation in as little as one hour or less, but there can be a lag of 24-48 hours before bloating occurs in cattle that have been placed on a bloat-producing pasture for the first time.Bloat can occur on any lush forage that is low in fiber but is most common on immature legume pastures.

There are some ways I try to guard against these dangers. First, we introduce the cows to the spring grasses gradually, beginning with just 30 minutes to an hour at a time. They are typically not happy about their pasture time being cut so short, especially after the long winter, but it is important to me to protect them if I can. After a few days on the pasture for this length of time, we gradually increase their exposure to the new grasses. After a few weeks, they can be in the pasture full-time.

There are several other ways that I try to protect them from these dangers. One way is to make sure they are not hungry when they are turned out to pasture. If they have full bellies, they will not be as likely to gorge themselves on the delicious new grasses. I also wait until after the morning frost has dissipated and dried and I do not turn them out after a rain until the grasses have dried.

Another thing that we must protect our cows from, even in spring weather is heat stroke. Cattle have high body temperatures, especially dairy cows as their bodies are extremely efficient machines for producing milk. They could have adverse reactions to warm weather, even to the potential of having a heat stroke in 70 degree weather. Making sure they have shelter and plenty of fresh water is vital to their well-being.

If you have followed my blog for very long, you realize that our cattle are more than just “milk machines” to me. They are animals that I truly love and enjoy. I want to make sure I am doing everything I can to take the best care of them possible and that can mean protecting them from something that they love when they can’t understand the dangers.

NOTE: Thank you to Ron Lemenager, Allen Bridges, Matt Claeys and neither Johnson at Purdue University Departments of Animal Sciences and Agronomy for the precise descriptions of these conditions of which cattle farmers need to be aware.

Sugar, Ah, Honey, Honey

I love to cook and bake! I guess I always have. However, when I developed the digestive issues that prompted me to give up all grains and refined sugars (see my post on my history), I had to learn a new way to cook and bake which included eliminating ingredients that were inflammatory and processed with ingredients that were harmful to my healing. The first of these ingredients I will deal with is refined sugars.

Even though I don’t normally have a “sweet tooth”, giving up refined sugar was difficult for the baker and the mom in me. If you are unsure how much sugar you and your family intake, just take a walk through the grocery store and read the labels of your “go-to” processed food items.

Let’s start with breakfast cereals. Check out the sugar content on processed breakfast cereals and let’s start with a one-cup serving of Special K Cereal, the cereal that many people eat if they are trying to lose weight. Special K has 4 grams of sugar per one cup of cereal. Four grams is approximately equal to one teaspoon. Now let’s compare a “kid” cereal. Trix has 12 grams of sugar per one cup serving. That is equal to three teaspoons of sugar.

Now let’s look at an old classic cereal: Kellogg’s Frosted Flakes. Let’s also consider the difference between a serving (3/4 cup as listed on the box) as opposed to a bowl of cereal. If the man in your house eats a bowl of cereal like my husband does (when I have it in the house), he is eating far more than a one-cup serving; maybe more than double, depending on the size of the bowl. One serving of the Frosted Flakes has 10 grams of refined sugar…that doesn’t sound bad until you figure out that a bowl is more than double that serving amount. If your bowl is perhaps 75 grams, that puts the sugar intake up to 25 grams per bowl and that 25 grams equals more than six teaspoons of sugar.

Ok, so let’s say you just “grab a bar” on your way out the door. A Nutrigrain Cereal Bar (sounds healthy, right?) has 13 grams of sugar, more than three teaspoons. If you start adding up the sugar you are consuming just from processed foods and then add it to the sugar you add to your foods, you will start to see why some studies estimate that the average American consumes approximately 19.5 teaspoons (82 grams) of sugar each day which translates into about 66 pounds of added sugar each year, per person!

Reading the labels and educating yourself about what is in the processed foods you buy is the first step to lessening the sugar in your diet. You will also need to educate yourself on the many aliases that sugar goes by: dextrose, fructose, dextrin, fructose, glucose, high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS), lactose, maltose, maltodextrin, mall, mannose, panocha, and many more. As you begin the process of reading labels, you will be surprised how many of your staple items contain sugar: ketchup, pickles, pasta and other meat sauces, mayonnaise, and salad dressings, just to name a few.

Now, I do not have a medical degree, so feel free to do your own research and draw your own conclusions. However, I found that from the day I stopped eating refined sugar, it took my body about two weeks to get through what seemed like a “detox” period and for the sugar cravings to stop. I discovered that once I was past that time period, food began to taste different…better. I did not crave sweets and foods tasted sweeter to me without sweetener and typically “sweet” foods were too sweet for me. I also had more energy and definitely fewer “highs and lows”.

That was 2013, and to this day, I do not eat refined sugar. Occasionally, someone will beg me to “taste” something…and if I do, I wish I hadn’t. My sweeteners of choice are natural and/or organic maple syrup (NOT pancake syrup), local raw honey (I use it sparingly, mostly just in my cup of green tea in the morning, because although it IS natural and has many wonderfully healing properties, it does have a high glycemic index), organic stevia powder (use sparingly due to extremely sweet taste) and organic coconut sugar (I use this in place of brown sugar in baking).

Hope you have found this post thought-provoking as well as helpful as your journey to a healthier you! Till next time, when I talk about flour: the good, the bad and the choices you have.

A Girl is a Girl is a Girl

If you are a girl/woman, do you like to go to the beauty parlor to have your hair done? I do! It’s so nice to sit back in a chair and have someone wash, cut and style your hair and all you have to do is sit and relax! Do you know that on some level cows are like that too?

We have two jersey cows for milk. About this time of year, they begin shedding and need to be brushed. This morning, Mocha was laying in her stall after the milking was done. She looked so cute so when I finished milking Jersey, I went in to love on her a little. I knelt down beside her; she was so loving and docile and it was then I realized how much she is already shedding. I began combing her with the curry comb and it was obvious how much she enjoyed it. I brushed everything I could reach and then without warning, she suddenly stood up so I could get the rest of her. As went from side to side, she kept watching me to make sure I wasn’t leaving. She enjoyed it so much.

A couple summers ago, our girls were standing in the barnyard and I began brushing Mocha. She stood so still which was abnormal. Our other cow at the time, Heidi, came up to see what I was doing to Mocha. She tried resting her head on Mocha’s head which made it nearly impossible for me to brush Mocha. She tried to push Mocha out of the way so she could have her turn. Mocha wasn’t going to allow that to happen and stood firm. Soon I realized that Heidi was standing behind Mocha, like she had gotten in line behind her, waiting for her turn. It was our Bovine Hair Salon!

It’s funny because Mocha is pretty persnickety when it comes to what she wants and doesn’t want. If I was just going to come up and pet her while she was in the pasture, she wouldn’t want anything to do with me. However, if I have a brush or the curry comb in my hand and the girl in her shows up! Regardless of species, we girls enjoy being pampered!

My Journey to a Healthier Me

I have had quite a long journey through many scary and painful experiences to reach my current state of health. I have learned a lot over the past few years and I hope by sharing my story, my experiences and the knowledge I gained by them, information on products and ingredients, and recipes for healthier eating, that I can encourage you on your own journey to better health.

My digestive issues began after I had knee surgery and was given oxycodone for the pain, which was excruciating at times. I didn’t realize it then, but for some reason it seems that the oxycodone was the beginning of my digestive problems. It was so acidic and because I was healing from surgery, I was very sedentary. I began experiencing such burning and piercing pain in my upper abdomen that it totally immobilized me and at times the pain was so intense that it caused me to pass out.

These attacks went on for awhile so I finally made an appointment with my family’s conventional medicine physician. She ordered several tests and I received a call late on evening from her telling me that I needed to contact this specific surgeon THE NEXT DAY and schedule surgery to have my gallbladder out. However, before I made that call, I began doing some of my own research and realized that my symptoms did not match the symptoms of a diseased gallbladder.

It was then a friend of mine who was being treated naturally for her digestive issues told me about her doctor, Dr. Lewis. I made an appointment with him immediately and after reading my ultrasound results, he discovered that although I did have some small stones, my gallbladder was not diseased. He diagnosed me with a sliding hiatal hernia. There was a small tear in my esophagus and when I would bend over, especially after recently eating, my stomach would slide up into that tear and get caught, causing an esophageal spasm which produced heart attack-like symptoms. My digestive system was so inflamed that I couldn’t even lift a gallon of milk or a laundry basket and I walked around feeling like I had a cinder block affixed to my stomach.

These attacks began happening more frequently and the episodes began lasting longer and longer. One Sunday, an attack began while I was sitting in church and continued through the afternoon until I could no longer stand the pain. I texted my new doctor and even though he was at a convention, he responded and told me to go to Urgent Care and get an “anti-spasmodic cocktail”. Shortly after drinking that concoction, I had relief from pain. Needless to say I carried a small bottle of this cocktail with me at all times for a many months.

Dr. Lewis provided me with a chart of anti-inflammatory foods as well as a chart of acidic/alkaline foods. With the implementation of these two charts, along with some natural supplements to help heal my digestive system, I began the path of healing my gut. This new way of eating was like stepping into a different world. I was overwhelmed! But, I knew that I had no choice but to learn how to eat differently if I wanted to get better and heal my body.

I stopped eating all grain: no wheat flour, no rice or corn products (many people don’t realize corn is a grain and not a vegetable). I also stopped eating refined sugar including organic cane sugar and refined sugar. You may recognize the term “paleo”. I didn’t know the term at the time and several years ago there were absolutely no products available to aid this kind of diet. As a result, I began to heal and have now been four years without an attack. I not only have been able to resume the “mom” tasks, I now live on my farm and do all kinds of manual labor. I am thankful to be a long way from the woman who couldn’t do laundry or lift a gallon of milk.

I want to be able to share the knowledge I have gained so that it may help someone else. There are so many common cooking ingredients that are not beneficial and may even negatively impact your health and digestion. I will share ingredients, brands, recipes and sources I have come to trust. When I started this journey I wasted a lot of money and effort on recipes that just didn’t make an edible item.

I hope that you will find the information shared here to be helpful and I hope that you will share comments if you find something is helpful to you.

Good Gifts

If you are a parent, you know from experience that the good things we do for and give to our children are not always appreciated by them. Perhaps this is because their immature and inexperienced perception is short-sighted, or maybe we have just raised ungrateful children.

Take the gift of protection, for example. Now, I am not talking about the crazy kind where you lock your kids up till they are 32 years old! But, the kind where their environment, friends, activities and exposures are carefully monitored to allow them to grow happy, healthy and wise. Instead of the thwarting of rights and freedoms, protection is a gift.

From the parent’s perspective, good gifts sometimes come with a hefty price. I will use my family as an example. Due to several circumstances in my extended family and some knowledgable people God put in our lives, we began to explore and eventually pursue a more healthy way of eating. Part of that included less desserts and fewer processed foods. Also included in that change of life was the desire to raise our own food, as much as possible, thereby knowing exactly what the animals were being fed and how they were being cared for. Our desire to be “country folk” proceeded this change of life but as we educated ourselves, the two walked hand-in-hand.

Along with country life and farm animals comes chores. Now, I don’t know about you, but would any child choose the life of chores if they could choose for themselves? But, I am convinced that the hardship of living in the country and raising our own chicken, eggs, beef and milk is a good gift we have chosen to give our children. They may not realize it while they are young but I know there are many life-long benefits to this life besides better health: a healthy work ethic, fresh air and exercise, and learning to care for someone besides themselves being just a few such benefits.

The Truth of God’s Word, and specifically the words of Jesus Himself in Matthew 7:9-11 says, “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone: Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” Since I know that my children don’t always see the gifts I give to them as good gifts, I wonder how many times do I have the same response to the good gifts that my heavenly Father gives to me? We can’t always see the benefit of the gift at the time but that’s where trust and faith come into play, knowing and believing that Romans 8:28 is true when it says “And we know that all things work together for good, for those who are called according to his purpose.” Just as we want our children to trust us, so God says that we can trust him, even if our circumstance doesn’t seem like a gift at the time.

Then there are the gifts the come along that are obvious gifts! Some examples might be a new and better job, a pay raise, healing from an illness, an answer to a specific prayer, protection from a potentially hazardous situation, and the list goes on and on. James 1:17 says “Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.” When these obvious gifts rain down on us, do we stop to thank the Giver of those good and perfect gifts?

So whether the gifts we receive are obvious gifts or whether they are gifts in disguise, 1 Thessalonians 5:16 says “Rejoice always“…ALWAYS! Verse 18 of the same chapter says “…give thanks in all circumstances.” Just as our children cannot always see the goodness of the gifts we give at the time we give them, so it is the same with us as believers and God’s gifts. This is a life of faith, so trusting and thanking God for the good gifts should be an act of praise and worship that we offer instead of grumbling and complaining.

I hope you have a great day and let’s remember to be thankful for the gifts that come our way today, whether they are obvious gifts or gifts in disguise.

Can’t Help But Smile!

Have you ever just been doing your thing…easy or hard..and realized you are smiling involuntarily? Well, I have! In fact, it happens often to me here on de Good Life Farm. I thought I might share with you some of the things that make me smile because this morning, again, I caught myself smiling as I went about morning chores.

Usually, the first smile in the morning happens when I look in at our sleeping goldens…sometimes Beau is laying over by Belle in her kennel; sometimes he and Lacey are laying together; but usually, Beau lays right by the door to the milkroom. I think he does this so that when anyone has to go through that door in the morning to do barn chores, he will have to be awakened because no one can come in or out of that door without him having to move and he will lay right back down there, even if it means he has to move ten times!

As I walk to the barn, I look over at the west pasture where Caramel, her sister, Truffle and her uncle, Oreo are currently staying. They are so adorable. I always talk to them on my way by and as I call each name, they turn and look at me. It is impossible for me not to smile when interacting with the calves.

Mocha is the next smile-maker. First, her face is the cutest bovine face I have ever seen. That alone, makes me smile! Then, she has this habit of standing as high as she can get on her hay pile which increases her height by at least a foot or so. I ask her if she is playing “Queen of the Hill”. She stands there and watches everything that’s going on in the barn. She knows eventually she will be getting new hay and watches intently until that happens. If we open the “window” on her stall, she will stick her head and neck out as far as she possibly can and it is absolutely so adorable, I can’t help but smile at her!

Sometimes when I am milking Mocha, she will turn around and just watch me, but most of the time she stands calmly, just chewing her cud, patiently waiting (most of the time) until she is free to eat her hay. Just watching her standing there makes me smile. Sometimes, she is not so patient…trying to reach the hay pile if it was left close enough for her to reach. Then, I am definitely not smiling because I find myself doing one of two dances: The Bovine Two-Step (moving back and forth two steps at a time to keep up with her moving) and the Milk Stool Shuffle (moving my stool over and over trying to reposition as she moves). Neither of them bring a smile to my face until hours later and I imagine what it would look like if it had been video recorded!

After milking, I always go into the pasture to love on the calves and Caramel. For some reason, Caramel has grown somewhat timid…but she is so very interested in how much Oreo and Truffle love the attention from me that she slowly and slyly saunters over in a “don’t notice me”-kind of way and gets close enough so that I can rub her nose or her chin or neck. That definitely makes me smile!

Watching Oreo run down the pasture with his legs kicking up so high that I can see his white cream filling (the white patch on his belly) when he is running makes me smile every time! It is so precious! He is getting so big but runs and plays like he is still a young calf.

I’m sure my neighbors must think I am a crazy cow lady because I can’t leave in my car without putting down my window(s) and talking to whomever is in the pasture. It takes me forever to leave because I have to call to each one individually and then watching them turn to my voice as I say their name makes my day! Then, when I return home, just seeing those precious bovine in my pastures brings a smile to my face.

Watching our golden retrievers run and play with each other is so much fun. But what REALLY makes me smile is watching Belle run circles around Beau. She is so stinking fast and she loves to tantalize him. She will run up to him with a stick in her mouth just to tempt him to chase her. When he falls for it (and he does multiple times during each playtime), she takes off like lightning and leaves him in the dust. Sometimes Beau will find a stick Belle hasn’t found yet but as soon as she realizes he has a stick, she zooms up to him and before he even knows what has happened, she has retrieved the stick from his mouth and it is now in hers and she runs away with it! She can carry at least three good-sized sticks in her mouth at once. Oh, and Lacey! She plays with them for awhile right in the thick of it, then she sits with her back to them like their behavior is so disgusting and she is too good to be a part of it. Their antics bring more than a smile to my face: more like eruptive laughter!

Then there are other things that make me smile from time to time: a fat robin hunting a stray worm; a cotton-tailed bunny hurrying across the path in front of me; a gorgeous pink and purple-striped sunrise; the first flower of spring popping through the ground; the first bud on the tree; and the list goes on and on.

One of the cutest things that made me smile this week was Belle and Truffle. It isn’t a frequent thing that we get to observe two species interacting with each other; most of the time the canines and the bovines keep to themselves. But the youngsters of each species are definitely drawn to each other. Yesterday I was in the pasture loving on Oreo and the dogs were playing in the yard. I turned around to see Belle hopping and pouncing around, putting her nose to the ground trying to get Truffle to play with her…and the amazing thing was that Truffle was nearly imitating Belle’s antics back at her…head down and tapping her front hooves on the ground, hopping around back at her. Keep in mind that there is an electric polytape between them but Belle’s desire to play with Truffle was almost more than she could stand and I was concerned she was going to go right through the electric fence.

This life we have chosen is not an easy life. In fact, sometimes it is down-right excruciatingly difficult but, as long as I can still catch myself smiling involuntarily, I know I am exactly where I am meant to be.

IT’S MOVING TIME

I am excited to announce that I have begun my blog at a new address…one where I hope to gain more followers and eventually make some money!!? Anyway, I will no longer be writing here, so wanted to make sure to give you my new address and ask you to begin following me over there. It is:

http://livingdegoodlife.com

I will have some new categories for you to enjoy. Additionally, I am currently in process of moving all of my past posts to the new site. Please tell your friends about my blog if you think they would enjoy it!

Hope to see you over there soon!

Diane

Author: Diane