The baby finches hidden in our clematis. 

Tia thinks she's a lap dog! All 60 pounds of her!! 

Nice water lily, eh? 

And our wisteria is in bloom 

One of our frogs!  

Tia's New Digs

Jeanette and Tia decided that she (Tia) needed a dog run, so we (I) converted the unused space on the west side of our house into a dog run. I think Jeanette got the idea from Erin and Lance on our last visit to Fresno. (Thanks Erin and Lance.) I put up an iron fence so she could look out and watch all the people go by. I could have used Jacob's help in digging the holes! The next thing to to is to lay some flagstone and then some sod. That way she can lie on the cool grass, smell the wisteria and watch the exciting things happening on our street. So that's what a dog's life is, eh? Move over Tia.


Tia's new dog run 

Who do you think had more fun?

I think Tia was a hit with the kids!







But of course there was work to do too... we dug holes for some plants...



and built several trellises for some Bougainvillea.



We didn't want to be greedy so we left lots of plants for Erin and Lance to plant after we left.

So after a fun-filled week, we had to head back to Boise. On the way, we met Winfield and Tracey for delicious Persian dinner in Sacramento. After that we head east on I-80 to make it to Reno or Winnemuca for the night. Unfortunately we hit a traffic jam as the freeway over Donner Summit was closed due to a whiteout blizzard. That meant we had to turn around and head back to Sacramento (along with the thousand other vehicles) for the night. The next morning the road was open and we made our way (along with the thousand other vehicles) over the pass and on to Boise. Ah, Springtime in the Sierras!

Playing with Play-Doh 

Springtime at the Duekers

After twelve hours in the car, spending one night in Reno, the mess of putting chains on to go over snowy Donner Pass in California, and then downpouring rain the rest of the way, we arrived at the Duekers. We think that Tia was a little nervous because she didn't P or P the entire first day and she also shed like a maple tree in Autumn. Of course, once we arrived we found out that Jacob and Allison had really grown since the last time we saw them. They showed us their goggles they use for their swimming lessons during bathtime.


Laps in the tub. 

The rest of the week we will be playing with the kids and planting 300 plants in the backyard - something about cheap landscaping labor. We'll see.


A few plants for the Dueker's backyard 


An outing to the park 

Tia has a new pastime

We found out that Tia likes to watch certain tv shows and movies. Here she is watching "Lady and the Tramp."


Tia's new favorite movie 

Winter is back!

Well, the temperature has dropped a bit here in Boise. The pond has frozen over again. It's funny because last winter it didn't freeze at all and now this winter it's frozen solid twice. It's so thick that you can actually stand on the ice. But it makes the waterfall look pretty.


Winter is back! 

She's settling in

As you can see, Tia is getting accustomed to the Klein family household. I think Jeanette is too. (By the way, this is how Jeanette normally watches TV.)

Meet Tia

Today we went to Petsmart to pick up some catfood for our cats. As we walked in we saw the usual table holding the cages of cats up for adoption. They were cute but kittens always are. Then next to the table was dog. For some reason she caught my eye. It was a small boxer mix - about one year old. She was so calm and relaxed but curious of everything happening around her. We stayed and played with the dog for a while then we left. Jeanette had to be at a birthday party for a niece's one year old and I went home to make dinner. When the party was over, Jeanette gave me a call to see if I needed anything from the store. I said no. Then she asked me if I had thought anymore about the dog. I said yes.


Meet Tia 


Not just another pretty face 


She's tired 


Jeanette showing Tia her new digs 

Happy New Year, Everyone!

Hope you all have a wonderful 2006!

To get the new year off to a good start, I had Mike help prune (which means he did all the work and I cleaned up) the apricot tree in our backyard. Mike said that he pruned it like he pruned the kiwi plants when he was in New Zealand. Does that mean we are going to get kiwis instead of appricots? I think there must be something to genetics - he pruned the tree as much as I remember my dad pruning our peach tree. Take a look for yourselves -


Before... 


...and after 

Is it Christmas yet?

Winter has come to Boise - even though technically it is still Fall. And it's been cold. I think we'd had a couple of weeks where the temperature was mostly in the teens. To that Jeanette says, "Brrrrrr." On one of those cold days I finally got the Christmas decorations up on our house. Nothing too gaudy - I prefer to think of it as simple yet elegant.


The Christmas decorations are up. 

And if you go around to the back yard, you will find that the pond is frozen over. The pump is still running, but it wasn't last weekend. The impeller in the pump broke. Argh! was my first thought. And the pond was completely frozen. In the middle of the night I woke up with an idea of how I could fix the blasted thing. Next morning, sure enough, my idea worked and the pump started doing what it was designed for. My dad would be proud of me. But when the water started flowing down the waterfall, the water went on top of the ice. Remember, the pond is completely frozen. Now I couldn't break the ice without doing irrepairable damage to the fish, so I poured boiling water on the ice and melted a hole. It looked like someone opened the drain as the water flowed back into the pond. Then I melted another hole at the base of the waterfall and everything is back to normal.


The pond is frozen - hopefully the fish aren't. 

Another happy birthday for Jeanette!