Sammy Pictures

Ramblings on a Tuesday – Sammy & Summery Things

June 9, 2015 by Darlene

Well I’m having Sunday Ramblings on a Tuesday because I completely forgot to do up a post for Sunday. In my defense I’ve been really sick with a terrible summer cold and couldn’t do much of anything including read. I’m starting to feel better so hopefully I can get myself back on track with reading, dieting, and blogging. Anyone do anything exciting over the weekend? Reading anything good?

I started back on my reading on Sunday so I’m finishing up Doughnuts & Deadly Schemes by Janel Gradowski which is just as good as I expected. This should have been reviewed last week so my apologies to Janel but I was just too sick. I’m finishing up The Killer Next Door by Alex Marwood on audio and all I can say is wow. It’s creepy and sooooo good! Just what I needed when I wasn’t feeling the best and needed to take my mind of things. Next up is Second Life by S.J. Watson which I’m looking forward to and which is coming up for review this week. I’m also listening to Misery by Stephen King for the Misery Read-a-Long and it fantastic. It’s so hard to stop listening but the read-a-long is a month long so it wouldn’t be the best to finish it in a few days – lol. I also have a few book winners and they’ve already been emailed and responded but congrats to them a little late:

The Promise by Ann Weisgarber – Lisa G
The Dream Lover by Elizabeth Berg – Sandra F
The Mapmaker’s Children by Sarah McCoy – Shannon R

In summer news the garden is doing great. We’ve never had our garden come up so fast and I’m already excited for the beans especially but there is also zucchini, beets, peas, carrots, and potatoes. I didn’t take a picture but we’ve also got cucumbers, lettuce, and tomatoes planted alongside our garage. I’ll take a picture of them for next time.

Can’t wait for the yummy veggies!

I love when these little yellow tea roses bloom!

White lilacs are one of my favorites -wish you could smell these!

In Sammy news he’s the same as ever. His skin is slowly getting better once again but I’m going to take him in to the vet this week anyway and see if we have to check his thyroid. He’s been a little more sluggish again and while it could be the hot weather I want to be sure. So as you all know he hates having his picture taken so while these aren’t the best photos in the world they are all he would allow. LOL.

Mommy I want to go ‘in house’! Why aren’t we going ‘in house’ yet? (Why – because mommy would like to stay outside for more than five minutes)

I’m not barking mommy. I’m guarding you and the house!

Ahhhh, this is the life mommy… I’ll just wait here for you…

So that’s it for another week. I hope everyone has a great week ahead!

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Sunday Ramblings – New Look & Sammy Stuff

May 31, 2015 by Darlene

Happy Sunday everyone! It’s been ages since I’ve posted on a Sunday but I had my blog redesigned a bit and I have a few pics of Sam I wanted to share so here I am. I’d love to get back into my Sunday posts but we’ll have to see. I’m having a bunch of dental work done this summer and I get sedated for it and it manages to knock me out for a few days (lol) so my blogging may suffer slightly.

So the new blog design. I found Lea from Lea Christine Designs who is an awesome designer – check out her site – and told her what I envisioned the blog looking like and she did such a great job. It’s exactly what I wanted! I’ve wanted to change the blog for a long time while still keeping my general look so it’s still identifiable as my blog and Lea did that perfectly. I’ve had issues for a while reading blogs on coloured backgrounds so that was one of the main things I wanted to change as well as decluttering the blog which is why there is only one sidebar now. Anyhow there’s a few little glitches to iron out but I’m very happy with it and I hope all of you will too!

I haven’t shared any pics of Sam for ages so I’m going to post a few – even one of when we had snow in the beginning of May. He’s been doing pretty good health wise other than the issue with his skin. He’s on his liver and thyroid meds and still on his diet which all seems to be agreeing with him. We’ll be doing bloodwork at the end of fall I think so hopefully it’ll still be stable. Anyhow he’s still full of trouble driving his mom crazy so that’s a good sign I would think. Lol.

Snow in the beginning of May. The only one happy with that was Sammy. I love this picture because you can just feel his joy at being in the snow.

Lazy Sammy…

Sleepy Sammy…

Sammy smelling the flowers on our walk yesterday.

So what did everyone do this weekend? Anything special? Reading anything good? I just finished The Seven Sisters by Lucinda Riley which I’ll be reviewing tomorrow and it was awesome! Now I’m reading Doughnuts & Deadly Schemes by my great friend Janel Gradowski and listening to The Virgin’s Daughter by Laura Andersen – both are very good.

Hope everyone has a great week!

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Merry Christmas to all!

December 25, 2014 by Darlene

Merry Christmas everyone! Thanks to all who visit my blog regularly and to all the great friends I’ve made since I began this blog! I wish you all a wonderful holiday season with family and friends!

Merry Christmas from me and my favorite snow bunny!

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Sunday Ramblings & Sammy

March 23, 2014 by Darlene

Happy Sunday everyone. I thought I’d do a quick post with an update on Sammy and other things. I sure hope everyone is having much better weather than we are. It snowed again and it’s cold and there isn’t a whole lot of improvement for the week really. It’s time for spring already and I’m pretty sure most people have had enough of winter already. I want to see green grass and flowers and get to go outside without a scarf! LOL.

Well, let’s see – Sammy is doing pretty well. I don’t want to get too excited because my hopes have been dashed before but he hasn’t been sick now in twelve days which is good for him and he doesn’t seem to be getting as much tummy pain. I’m praying that this means that the spaghetti/chicken diet is calming his tummy and liver down. Since I started him on it he’s pretty much eaten every day and while it would be nice if he ate a bit more he’s still eating on a regular basis and seeming to feel good from it. He’s also been more of a pain in the butt and started up with some of his old antics again which means he’s feeling better too and I’m ok with that. It’s nice to have him driving me crazy again! But I guess the blood tests will tell the real truth. I’ll make an appointment in the beginning of April sometime and see what the vet says. He told me the last time I was there that if Sam started going longer between getting sick and started eating better that it was a good sign so I’m pinning my hopes on that. Please keep him in your prayers until his blood work is done and we see what’s going on in that little body of his. I’ve got some pics of him at the end of the post for you.

What else – oh I missed my blogoversary again. That’s the second year in a row. It was on March 8 and it’s now been 6 years. Wow, I can’t believe that I started this blog six years ago but I’m still really glad I did. I still enjoy blogging and reading books and being a part of the book tours. I have cut back this year on the spotlights and giveaways because I wanted to get back to reading and reviewing more. We’ll see I may pick up on the spotlights again – depends on how things go with Sammy. I think the biggest thing I’m grateful for when it comes to the blog is the great friends I’ve made. I’ve made a few friends who I know will be lifetime friends for me – you know who you are – and that means more to me than anything else. We share our lives with each other and most of the time I think they all know me better than the people I see all the time. Then there are the readers of my blog who don’t necessarily comment but I know they are there and I’m grateful for them too. It all boils down to the fact that I’m not going anywhere yet and I hope you’ll all keep coming by the blog and I hope enjoying it.

I’ve also been reading and knitting. I’ve been reading a lot of good books lately – well I guess I’ve been listening to them. I’m so hooked on audios right now. I love them because I can still knit or play with Sammy or do whatever. Right now I’m finishing up Tilt by Ashley Chappell for a tour stop tomorrow and it’s the second book in her Chaos series and I’m really enjoying this one too. I just finished listening to The All You Can Dream Buffet by Barbara O’Neal and I enjoyed it as well. Next up to listen to is Under Magnolia by Frances Mayes that I’m really, really looking forward to. Now for the knitting – I’m attempting my first sweater. I bought some pretty sage yarn but I didn’t want to use it for my first try so I’m using a brown variegated one that I have a fairly big stash of to practice on. I’m not too far with it though. I’m just getting the back done and should be starting on the shaping of the upper part today. Wish me luck. Don’t be surprised if you can hear me cussing all the way to your house if it isn’t going well. Here’s a pic of what I’ve done so far…

Geez I’m long winded today. Well if you’ve stuck around this long here are the promised pictures of Sammy Bear – sorry the snow pics are a bit dark but it was gloomy and snowy outside and you can only lighten them so much. Enjoy…

Oh yeah! A Snow Day! Now this is what I call fun mommy!

I love rolling around in the snow and washing my face. Mommy doesn’t seem too happy though when we come in and I’m getting water all over the floor but it makes me happy so I’m sure it’s ok.

What do you mean it’s time to come in??? NO! I’m not done playing yet!

Yeah I’m cute. I know it!

Hope you all have a great week! Let me know what you did with your weekend and what you’re reading!

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Sweet Sammy on a Sunday … and some Rambling

February 23, 2014 by Darlene

Happy Sunday everyone! It’s been ages since I did a Sunday post but I think I’m going to try to get back into doing them. I have the very bad habit of doing updates on Facebook but not posting on the blog about Sammy and I know not everyone is on Facebook. So I thought I’d update everyone on him and me and life…

Sweet Sam – well he wasn’t doing too well so I had him to the vet a week or so ago and we changed up his food and meds. Now he gets spaghetti and chicken which he loves. He never has liked rice much so I knew he wouldn’t keep up an appetite on that. He’s been doing really well on it only being sick once but then yesterday he wasn’t feeling well all day again and wouldn’t eat or drink until finally at supper. I know there is a period of time that it takes to see if the different food will settle his tummy out so maybe he’s just had a few off days. I pray over the next few weeks to see more good days than bad like he had yesterday. Those days really tear at my heart. The vet said it takes about 3 months for their systems to settle and to see an improvement in the liver so we have till the end of March for that. If in the next few weeks he isn’t doing better then it’ll be an ultrasound and likely surgery to do a biopsy and I really don’t want to put Sam through that. Those who have been praying please keep up those prayers!

As for me I’ve finally been able to get into books again although mostly only audiobooks. If it’s not an audio I let my Kindle read to me. I don’t know why but my concentration to actually read a book has been horrible. I’ve been listening to quite a few great audios though which are awesome for taking your mind off the more serious things in life for just a little while. I just started listening to While Beauty Slept by Elizabeth Blackwell and it is already promising to be a very good book. I just finished some great Highland Romances by Eliza Knight and those reviews will be up this week so I hope you’ll pop in to check those out. Oh, wish me luck – I have to have a blood pressure holster test for 24 hrs this week. My stupid blood pressure has been sky high. NOT HAPPY about that!

Ok, the moment you’ve all been waiting for … pictures of Sammy … Enjoy!

Oh boy! Snow and blowing wind – I love it!

What do you mean you want me to come in. Can’t you see I’m busy sniffing the wind.

Shoot I thought I could turn around fast enough that she wouldn’t catch me on that camera thing again.

No Mom. I do not wish to go ‘in house’ yet!

Mommy I’m not feeling the best. Must you snap that phone thingie of yours?

Really Mommy!!! I come under here to get away from you and that camera!

So what has everyone been up to this weekend? Reading and relaxing or something more exciting? I hope you all have a great week!

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Prayers for Sammy

December 29, 2013 by Darlene

For those of you who don’t follow me on Facebook I thought I should post what’s been happening in my world lately as I’ve been pretty absent from the blog for the past few weeks. My Sammy hasn’t been feeling his best so I took him in to the vet and after some extensive blood work we find out that he has something wrong with his liver as it is showing as injured. For now the vet has him on antibiotics and a few other medicines in addition to a bland diet hoping we can get his tummy calmed down and in turn calm the liver down.

All of my readers know that having just lost Buddy a few years ago this is especially hard. So many bad memories have come rushing back and I want so bad to understand why this has to happen to Sammy too. I am trying hard to stay positive because it’s better for Sammy but I’m such an emotional person that it’s hard not to just sit in tears. He’s the sweetest dog with such a big heart and he sure doesn’t deserve to be sick. I’m praying that after the next set of tests we will see his liver enzymes down and hopefully it can be a matter of being on meds for his life. I’m ok with that as long as I have him.

I’m not sure how much I’ll be around the blog for the next bit anyway. My concentration level is nil and I’m even having issues with audiobooks but maybe once I calm down a bit again I can once again turn to reading for some comfort.

So for those of you who pray I would appreciate it if you can keep my Sammy in your prayers.

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