Life at a "Swell's" pace

We spent a quiet Easter at home, as the same as everyone this year. We wanted to make it a bit less boring and decided to sit and write out a scavenger hunt for Skylar to do, in order for him to "hunt" for this Easter basket. It took him about an hour to go through all of the clues and a few of them were in unusual places like, Hardy's dog collar, while he wore it. A few other places were around the duck's necks with bandanas, and hanging from strings in random places. Each clue before it gave the location of the next. He had a lot of fun searching and wondering where his next clue was. He had a total of 35 clues. We also dyed eggs in a new way. With my surgery being only a month before, and the pandemic, we used some food coloring instead of a more natural way of dying the eggs. This year, we tried the shaving cream and food coloring trick. It made for some pretty pastel-colored eggs.

The ideas for our scavenger hunt came from random accounts on Instagram. It seems we aren't the only ones to have the scavenger hunt idea this year.

(Source)

Hello.

Tax week here. Not fun, but I'm finally able to sit up in the bed and get a bit of work done. Every day Jeff and Skylar come in at the end of the day and let me know what's going on around us. I haven't been able to get out of bed much, except to go to the bathroom. I'm actually glad I can sit up and and eat, and brush my teeth. It's weird brushing my teeth in bed, but it's better than not. I've heard so many weird things from them this past week, masks being worn now, people distancing at six feet, first person in the state of Oregon dying (a 70 year old man), and how people's attitude is during this time. Our county of Linn, is the worst in the state right now, they tell me, and that's heartbreaking. On a positive, I guess I picked a good time to recover from a surgery. I've spent part of this gray day preparing for our tax filing coming up in five more days. Our taxes are pretty easy to file, but I'm glad we only do them once a year. Skylar bought me a new candle, so he's been lighting that in the evenings when everyone is in my room, and we're talking about things. It smells less like a hospital room in here, and everything is better by candlelight.

1. This Frosty Window.

Even in early April we had some frozen days. With living in a house that's pretty old and needs updated windows, the benefit is that you get some cool ice formations on the glass.

2. This Hawk.

We aren't quite sure why it was only running and not flying, but we ended up leaving and turning around to coming back and it was gone. So, maybe we interrupted it during a "stalking" moment. Seeing a hawk run down the road, though, was amusing. We love birds of prey, so any moment we can get to be up close and personal, we enjoy it.

3. This Dinner.

Before the Coronavirus pandemic hit, we went to eat at P.F. Chang's. Little did we know, that would be the last time we ate at a sit-down restaurant for awhile.

4. This Rainbow.

Life at a Swells pace.

5. Kitty Tricks.

Eleven is such a cool cat. I taught her how to roll over and also how to sit up on her back legs. She's been laying with me a lot and following me around to make sure I'm okay. Some mornings she will come up to my face and meow at me, just to make sure I'm doing okay. She's such a loving cat and she's been looking after me well.

Positive affirmations this week: "Which three words describe you best?"

•Empathic

•Patient

•Logical

Have a nice weekend.