A Cat's Tail

Do you want an update on the cat situation?! Really, you're not sick of it yet?! Ok, here goes.....

We have successfully moved four of the six cats out of the house. With a few hiccups.

One the third day of having them out, Max's Bear cat tried to follow Lee out of our storm door on the back mud porch. Which is great, he loves, loves being an outdoor kitty and was already pouncing on the mice in the barn the first afternoon!

Unfortunately Lee moves like the wind and Bear did not have enough time to get his entire body clear of the door. He must have been jumping through because when the door closed, it trapped his tail and left him hanging by it. At his first howl Lee flipped around to open the door, however, a cat hanging by his tail from a door is not about to take that calmly. As Lee tried to reopen the door the cat stuck his claws into Lee and proceeded to claw at him.

The door has been sticky for a couple of months and jamming a cat's tail in it, did nothing to help it! So Lee is pushing the cat off his leg with one hand and desperately trying to get the door open with the other. Mind you all this is over in less time it will probably take you to read this.

At the first howl I knew what had happened and happened to be right by the other door into the mud porch and sprinted to the storm door and could see what was happening in a flash. So now you have Lee yelling because the cat is clawing him and did bite him at one point, you have the cat screeching and howling and now I'm yelling at Lee to back off and let me open it from my side. Which he immediately does.

Once the tail is free the cat is GONE. I'm not too worried about him, I knew it was possible he had a pretty good injury, even a possible break to his tail, however I was more worried about Lee and not about to go track down a completely hacked off cat!

Oh and did I forget to tell you that Lee was headed out the door to help load the suburban with gear because we were supposed to be leaving.......yeah.

So now I have an injured kid, an injured cat and I have to leave to go get gas, then come back get the rest of the gang and then hit a chiro apt. and a ortho apt and some other errands.....

So I left Lee in Mom's capable hands and went and got gas.... it seems like there was some kind of timing or something that created this situation of me leaving and coming back, but of course I can't remember it. When I came back Mom has doctored Lee all up and he's hanging in there. I was most worried about the bite, I've heard bad things about bites around joints and the bite was close to his fingers. But it seemed shallow and Mom got lots of hydrogen peroxide on it. (and he healed just fine, no worries from any of the wounds!)

As we're finishing loading up, Lee comes to me with blood on his hands and tells me that Bear is bleeding all over.... Of course he is, cause we don't have enough to deal with! I catch the unhappy cat, have Than hold him with a towel over him. Look at his tail, decide it needs some clipping to truly asses it, and then yep.....he really needs to see the vet. It's all the way through the layers of skin and long enough that I don't see any way we're going to get it to heal well.

So I make phone calls to the vet and the chiro, arranging to drop the cat off on our way through town and still make our chiro apt and ortho apt. And after running all our errands and being on our way home, the vet calls and we can pick him up. Perfect timing!

The news was not perfect however. I was given one groggy, mad cat complete with a cone of shame around his neck and told that if we couldn't keep him from getting to his tail and chewing on it, we might have to amputate. Oh fun.

I get to put him in the bathroom, the bathroom I had just freed of cat litter two days before, the bathroom that I had put blood, sweat and almost tears into to polish it up. The bathroom I was hoping to take a bath in real soon. It has the only bathtub in it. I was soooo proud of that bathroom, proud enough that it might have been sinful. But the vet tech pointed out that a bathroom with a tub, where cleaning blood and vomit would be easier, was probably our best option. Oh joy.

Of course it only took him about 20 minutes of being free to get his cone of shame off. From there it was just a count down, the second time took 15, third was 10, fourth 5, and then he'd get it off as soon as we put him down. So we finally gritted our teeth and left it off. We did put lavender oil on it, which he licked and hated the taste of. So that seemed to help. We crossed our fingers and left it off all night and he did great.

In fact he didn't once chew on his tail the entire time he had his staples in, which by the way is what they used to close it back up with. Five staples in his little tail. Poor baby. I think it's possible that he had some nerve damage. We would completely forget he had an injury those first few days and pet him as normal and swipe our hands down his tail and he'd never react.

When I took him back for the removal, they were very impressed. They had expected him back. Cat tails are apparently tricky to get healed well as it's very hard (I think impossible) to keep them from reaching their tails if they are determined enough. So even though it was a traumatic experience, we lucked out and all is well that ends well.

Lee felt very horrible over it and was very sad the rest of the day. But it was a complete accident, no one did anything wrong, it just happened.

Bear was back outside within about three days after the injury. We couldn't keep him in easily and he was doing so well not chewing on it, we just let him go. Jetta discovered Mom was back complete with her soft heart and sweet talked her way in to staying in Mom's room at night. But now that Mom's back on the west coast, Jetta seems content to be an outside cat. We don't see much of her inside now.

The three orange outside cats want to be inside and in fact we did let them in and out freely for several weeks, but now we've got a peeing problem again. So I'm being pretty strict about who is where, hoping to narrow down the problem. We'll see.

That leaves Than's Sherbet (scaredy cat) in full time and Collin's Dandelion is still living in his room. She was a feral kitten (aprox. nine months) that Mom found outside one day last year. She too is a scaredy cat and so we're introducing her to the chaos that is our house a bit at a time. She's getting braver and has actually been outside the room a time or two, so that will come.

We decided it was too traumatic to transition Sherbert at the same time as the others, she was just too upset over it all. But I have caught her at the door a time or two thinking about it, so she may still try it out at some point. The others love their freedom and so far have stayed away from the road. They've even caught a mouse or two for us! They usually come back in to the basement at night and we are feeding them there twice a day. So they are still well looked after. They also have several litter boxes down there, much to the boy's chagrin. Guess who gets to clean litter boxes?!

What do you get.....

when your five year old absconds with your camera?

(by the way the date on this post was originally 9/27/09!)

(disclaimer: no animals (or dolls) were hurt in the filming of this great epic, although it is entirely possible and probable that the scenes are out of order)

(here is Jayden's photo shoot, he might have gotten a little cranky towards the end...)

I don't think the older brother was as amused as I was when I found these pictures on my camera.

SKYPE!!!!

Need I say anymore?! Holy cow was that FUN!!! I just got to see my Grandma live for the first time in three years!! And I didn't even leave my house!

How come I haven't done this sooner!! Mom and I have mentioned to each other about Skype for months now. But I finally just did it tonight and boy am I glad I did! Soooo cool! I can't wait to tell the boys about it in the morning....we can't call Mom until Wed. morning, because of her schedule and ours, but I think they are going to FLIP when they see it!

We're hoping Lee and Mom can play guitar together on it and I know the boys are going to love being able to play their piano pieces for her over it. IT rocks!!!

Ok....gotta go settle down and sleep. We're off on a field trip at 7:30am tomorrow.....well it'll be today or later when you read this! But we're going to see the Dead Sea Scrolls in Milwaukee tomorrow. It's going to be a long, but fun day. At least I hope we enjoy it!

another blog?!

Yes, another blog. I actually have been trying to get this project off the ground for over a year. So bear with me....

The newest blog is http://oneorganizedwoman.blogspot.com/

I love, love organization....probably has something to do with the control freak in me....

I hope this blog will help inspire people to gain control of their environment around them. I know it makes all the difference for me! I want others to find the peace I find when my home is ordered, not chaotic.

A Meal Fit for Kids

(I just want to start this by saying that I started this post mid April! It's not from lack of trying that I'm not posting. I also have two other posts partially started from over the last month, there just has been a lot happening!)

(don't forget you can click on pictures to see them larger and see details, just make sure you use the back button on your browser)


We left April 2nd to go visit Brent's brother and sister in law in Michigan for a week. No Brent did not go with us, I braved the in-laws all by myself.....ok, ok.....it didn't take much bravery at all! Brent has a great family and I enjoy them all, as do the boys.

Their oldest daughter is fund raising for girls camp this year and her young woman's leaders are having them do a cupcake fundraiser! So she and Chef J picked out three different projects from http://www.hellocupcakebook.com/, went shopping with Pam (who had NOOOOO idea what she had gotten herself into but was so great with the kids!!), and got to work baking and decorating.

They picked out meatballs and spaghetti, corn on the cob, and for desert Van Gogh's Starry Night.


The Starry Night was a lot of cupcakes arranged in a rectangle and filled in with chocolate wafer cookies.
Then they carefully piped frosting on it, and Aubrey spent a lot of careful time pulling/swirling the different colored frosting together to replicate Van Gogh's picture.


She's very talented and I was very impressed with how well she did, this was her first time using this book and doing these techniques.






While Aubrey worked on the painting, Jayden whipped up a batch of spaghetti and meatballs! Yum! Yum! He took cupcakes in a circle and piped on frosting in strings that looked like noodles.

At some point his shirt came off, this was serious business!


Finished! He did this project mostly on his own with Pam supervising. Did I mention how much I appreciated Pam handling this project!!! She was so good with them. Patient and letting them do it themselves.

They both made corn on the cob, but I only got Jayden's.



Then we set the table and the natives were ready to eat!!

But game for some pictures to make their Aunt/Mom happy. (not to mention a Grandma or two or three!)

So very good.





Just seeing those corn on the cobs gets my mouth watering every time!!! They are made with Jelly Bellies and man were they GOOD!

Thank you Aubrey and Pam for letting Jayden join you, he has a such a wonderful time and we sure enjoyed the end project!

I spoke too soon.....

But it's still not nearly as bad as early in the month!! And just as a side note, yes it's stressful and busy and causes me to pull my hair out, but really, I'm fine. I'm not overly stressed, I actually feel more "level" than I have in a long time. I'm posting these "adventures" so I can laugh at them sooner than later, so I can remember them later and to share with my loved ones, a glimpse of a day in my life. Of course you may not WANT that glimpse, but here it is anyway!

Sooooo, here's the scoop. We confined Mom's cat to one room (a large, mostly empty room) for a couple of days. While she was in the room, I saw with my own eyes, Skipper pee. So then we turned around and confined our four to that room and let Jetta free. Right away we had pee on the room floor,(which is wood) that did not stop until we added three litter boxes to the room. And then the second night Jetta was free, she peed in two different spots. So she was confined to one of our bathrooms for the weekend, while we were gone.

Monday morning we took both Jetta and Skipper to the vets. Several hundred dollars later I got to pick them up. Brought them home. Jetta was easy to reinstall in her bathroom. But of course it couldn't go that easy with BOTH of them....... No, our other three cats HAD to react to Skipper like he was a new cat and come unglued!!!

So we had to retrieve Skipper from the room full of hissing, growling cats and regroup. In the end (after installing Skipper in the one remaining bathroom) we let the three cats out and put Skipper in the room. Because we know that Skipper pees for sure. So now it's a matter of time to see if anyone else pees while loose....not a fun game I want to play!

In the mean time I got to check on Jetta, who is groggy from the knock out stuff used to help get urine from her, and find that the nausea has caused her to hack up a hairball, with enough fluid to cover a small portion of our bathroom floor, and she's still working on more......oi vea, how much more drama can I endure!

And, this morning the three cats are still treating Skipper like he's a new cat AND refused to eat in the room where their food already is, which is where they lived all weekend. Well guess what..... I refuse to move the food, they can starve. That might be a way to solve the problem!! Just kidding, kinda. They won't really starve and they have plenty stored up for a rainy day. They'll be fine....I think.

The results will not be in for awhile on the cats. Maybe tomorrow (Wed). We'll see. The two cats for sure have some things going on, but do not have crystals, which is a very, very good thing for Jetta.

I am at Fox Hills currently, the boys are swimming with a friend and I'm blogging away. Or trying..... So see, life's not to bad!

Thanks for the positive comments and support on the new blogs, I appreciate that.

another new blog

I'm working on several blogs, and actually have been trying to get them up and running since last year, however it's been slow going.

Here is another one: http://onespiritualwoman.blogspot.com/

a new blog

I've started a new blog and it's starts out with a bang! It has what we hope to do in the next four years posted, so hop on over and take a look! The title definitely gives you a hint!

http://onetravelingwoman.blogspot.com/

Update:

Well it seems as if that was the peak....shhhhhh though, I do still have 7 more days left of March and I don't want to jinx them!

I did end up making bread, to my kids joy. They informed me that they didn't like store bought bread anymore, "It doesn't fill us up!" That was nice, but it does put a little pressure on.... I thought I'd trick them and buy Texas bread the last time I ran short of home made bread and time. But do you know what that costs!!!!!! Yikes! So I not only got two loaves made last week, which lasted two days...... I got four loaves made last night, which are looking like they too will only last two days! I know the math doesn't work on that......but it is my reality.

I did end up reactivating my BB and I am LOVING IT! I couldn't get my headset to revive and was literally heading towards the garbage with it, when a little voice told me to plug it in. Wahla! We had lights! I'm almost crying, just thinking of my joy upon those lights coming on! So I have my much loved phone and headset back.

Max has settled down some. And we have come to realize that he was most likely in sugar withdrawal. We embarked on a sugar free adventure last fall. We spent aprox. 40 days sugar and corn syrup free. No store bought bread, hamburger buns, hot dog buns or ketchup, mayo or ranch dressing. No jam. If it had sugar or corn syrup as part of it's make up, it didn't enter our mouth. We used honey and maple syrup instead.

Then we let up and we could eat what ever we wanted outside of the house, then the holidays hit and we ate what ever we wanted, regardless of where it was!! About half way through the holiday season, Collin remarked that next holiday season we were NOT going to back to sugar. Max was that bad on sugar and that noticeable different off of sugar.

It took us all of Jan. and Feb to stop having misc. sugar laying around. But by March it was all out of the house, just in time to have cake and ice cream for Jayden's birthday! But we had the cake and ice cream and then we were done. At this time we have almost no sugar in the house.

What we do have is corn syrup in our ketchup and I think our ranch dressing and sugar in our mayo....these three things are the only items we have not been able to keep out. Mostly because so far we haven't found an acceptable substitute for everybody. We also are still consuming the freezer jam that my Mom made last summer. We have also given it to some friends and will probably give some more away. But once it's gone, it's gone. We use jam that is made with just fruit (read expensive) or use apple butter (read not so expensive!).

But I digress. Max is a very different child off of sugar and dairy and so we are working hard to keep him off of it! The rest of us have felt the positive changes in ourselves also and so keeping sugar out of the house isn't as hard as it could be. In fact we made it through Valentine's Day with no candy entering the house and the request has come in for no sugar in the Easter Baskets. They would like Lego's or something else along those lines. I'm so happy.

I think part of the reason the kids are at ease with it, is that we have worked with them so that they listen to their own bodies and know what feels good and what doesn't. We also are not telling them no/never. We are asking them to moderate themselves and to listen to themselves. So if they are at a party and want the sugar items, then they have them. (although I've started to become pretty strict with Max, it really does make him a Monster and we all can see it)

I think it helps that they've also had to learn to listen to their bodies due to the dairy sensitivities they all have to varying degrees. A few of them get ear infections and Than and I have ear aches if we over indulge. And so I've taught them to be aware of what they are eating and how it affects them.

Back to Max, who is sleeping peacefully next to me, while I type away on Brent's laptop. My friend Lissa said I needed to point out that not only was he better for the field trip, he was an angel. Because she followed him around all day and he didn't have to keep up with us. She was perfectly willing to just let him do what he wanted and he was so happy with it. She more than made up for not watching him all those years, that day. By allowing the rest of us to do what we wanted without dragging Max along to keep up! He was an absolute gem that day.

He's done much better this last few days, just crossing my fingers he keeps it up!

The cats are still having issues. Currently Mom's cat is isolated in her own room, but this morning I caught one of our male cats peeing on a garbage sack in the office, it was on the floor, waiting to go out. So now I don't know if it's just him or if it's him and the other females or if it's everybody!!!! I am glad I canceled the vet apt. yesterday for two of the females. Can you imagine how I'd feel today, having seen him do that!! I'd be so mad! So now I'm brainstorming ideas for isolating the cats and seeing just who is peeing outside the litter boxes, besides him!

Happy is just fine. He generally is after a seizure. This last one was just a lot longer than others he's had and it had some differences about it, that made me worry while we were in the middle of it. But now he's back to normal and he may or may not have another one. We just don't know what triggers them for him and we may never know. I'm just thankful that they are infrequent and that he's otherwise healthy.

So there you have it. Just thought you might like a positive update. I am surviving my life and it does seem to be looking up for the moment!

Alexander and the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad day

Only it's my terrible, horrible, no good, very bad MONTH! The animal drama has continued, on a lesser scale, but it's still there.....

Cat(s) peed on my recipe notebook, that I left open on my kitchen counter, so I would be inspired to actually cook a meal for my poor neglected children. There was dog throw up in the hall, this morning....and did you know it's invisible to all but a mom's eye. I think that could be marketed, you know, something like chocolate that only a mom could see?

Max spent the morning screaming and yelling and not listening to us. So I tried to get him down for a nap, for two hours.....the good thing is that the younger boy's clothes are all put away nicely and I can walk across their bedroom floor without stepping on legos...... He never did go to sleep, round two is this afternoon.

That was just today and it's only noon!

I've had other cat spots. It's not an every day thing, just often enough to catch me off balance. And lets not forget the diarrhea that was found on the floor and then I had to go check cat butts. And did I find anything for my effort? NO! The barn is looking better and better.

Yesterday Happy had a seizure of such length and oddity that I started to think this was it and he was dying in my arms. He hasn't had one in a long time, like maybe last summer was the last one?

Today I changed my laundry out and found that my blue tooth headset, that cost more than I'm willing to admit, is all nice and shiny clean......here's hoping it drys out and works again.... It's not just a phone headset, I can also listen to my music through it. You can't just do that with any blue tooth headset, thus the price. So I really, really hope it drys out. Please baby, be ok.......

Because guess what......I FOUND my phone. Yep. It only took 14 days, but I found it. Well ok, maybe stumbled upon it would be a better description. It was in our four drawer filing cabinet, that is reserved for very occasional filing and tax paper work. Evidently I had opened the drawer on the 1st and set my phone down on top of the files.

That was a good thing. But then it incited all kinds of mind drama. The phone is a Blackberry. For the uninitiated, a Blackberry (BB) allows you to get your email on it, and respond to said email, also it has pretty nifty tools, like calendaring, music programs and list making. You can browse the internet and access websites that you find you want while away from your computer. There are lots of other apps, otherwise known as programs for your phone, that can be helpful or amusing. I use it A LOT. However, it's $25 a month for the privilege of having it all in one place.

We dropped our phone bill by $20 by lowering our minutes. And then because I had lost the BB, I replaced it with a regular phone, after I tried another BB. It wasn't the same model and I just couldn't bear it. It made me miss my BB to much. So that was another $25 saved, for a total of $45!

Well now, that was pretty impressive to me! We're serious about paying off our consumer debts and every little bit helps!

The mind drama is that I keep arguing with myself over the dang phone. I really, really miss my BB. A LOT! But I really like the savings and really a BB is NOT a need. And on and on I go. Brent told me twice yesterday to just go back to the BB. So I guess that's what I'm going to do.....maybe.....I have to decide tonight or tomorrow. The current phone drops too many calls for me to keep it. I have 30 days to exchange my phone for different one, that's US Cellular's guarantee. I could get a different, better brand phone that wouldn't cost me $25 a month to have....... I could.............I think I can..........I think I can.......... Talk about wasted energy, MAKE UP MY MIND ALREADY!!

Also in the last two weeks on the negative side.....Max ran away from us deliberately in the store and stayed hidden long enough that I was headed up front to tell them I lost my child. We didn't know he was doing it deliberately, so we were starting to envision him having been kidnapped.

Jayden went to the bathroom and came out holding our toilet seat and lid....that was the same day as Max running away. And it was Saturday night, so we spent Sunday, Monday and Tuesday with out a seat on that toilet. I'd start to head into that bathroom and remember..... We don't shop on Sunday, and I wasn't going anywhere Monday or Tuesday that I could do something about getting a seat. Brent was very kind and bought one last night when his meeting got canceled and he installed it last night too. Such a wonderful guy.

Last week I messed up our checking account and had to pull money out of our emergency fund to the tune of $1500 to fix the account......

I think maybe I should go back to bed and avoid the rest of the day. I see a pattern of things continuing to go wrong, once they start......

On the positive side.....we paid off $11000+ and closed out a line of credit. Collin got braces last week, and we paid cash for them up front , something we usually have to make payments on. I had the $1500 available to take care of the mistake and I didn't incur any overdraft fees!

Brent's working an outage and so his overtime is replacing the money I used without impacting our regular monthly stuff. This is huge, if I had done the mistakes any other time of the year, we'd be hurting!

Collin and Lee both started lessons this month. Lee is doing guitar and Collin is doing voice, both with the same teacher. Jayden started piano this month and he turned 8!

I found my motivation again and have been making progress on spring cleaning/decluttering.

And so far we haven't strangled any of our animals.........or Max.........just kidding.

We had an incident in the first week of this month with him.....it was a close run thing. He was so out of control that every one noticed and was frustrated with him. His brothers ignore him to some extent, but there was no ignoring him that day. I had to stop the car repeatedly to deal with him and I threatened him with staying home the next day when everyone was going on a field trip.

My friend, Lissa was coming to stay the night, along with her son. That way we could get an early start as where we were going was a couple hours away. I mentioned that she was coming so she wouldn't have to drive and she wouldn't be thrilled to find out she was driving everyone but me and Max to the field trip.

One of the boys said that Lissa could stay home and watch Max. I replied, "Lissa will only watch Max if I provide a roll of duct tape to use on him, and I've resisted using duct tape on him for 6 years and I'm not going to start using it now!" True story. Max was so difficult to keep track of as a toddler that Lissa really did refuse to watch him, and I completely understood!

Now I'm off to make bread....I hope.....I'm having kitchen challenges too. As in it's a challenge for me to enter it and actually cook/bake something. I just am resisting it with every fiber I have right now, and I don't understand it.....

animal drama part two

Animals 8 to Humans 7:

That's the days we have had issues to the days we have not had issues in the last two weeks!! Including the horse fencing issues we had with Casper. And I didn't even count all the fun of worming by hand a flock of 60+ chickens on Sat. I will just say it was a family affair, everyone had a part to do.

Monday evening, I let the dogs in, sit back down to fold laundry and Briston comes in and lifts his leg against the wall under the window!!

It took me a few seconds to realize that I was actually hearing him pee!!!!!! We have never had him go in the house. So I was a bit shocked. Than said he hadn't been in bugging him and he certainly did not come tell me he wanted out, he just walked in and peed.

Tuesday morning I got up to a chunk of roast by my door. I found out later that Brent stepped on it.....eewwww. He didn't know what it was, it was 4am and DARK in the hall. So he threw a paper towel on it.

We keep a roll upstairs for this reason, well not because we find roasts outside our door, but because it seems to be a popular place for the animals to throw up at. I think they're going for that gross factor of stepping in it at 1am and having it squish through your toes......TMI?

I realized of course that one of the dogs must have picked the roast out of the sink, where it and two other pieces of meat were thawing.

I had heard Happy in the hallway last night and thought he wanted in our room, so I let him in. Can you imagine his thoughts all night after I let him in our room.....and he laid next to the door smelling that roast all night!!! Serves him right.....

When I get down stairs it's obvious that the other roast and package of steak has been consumed by Briston, who was nowhere to be seen. I was afraid to look on the porch, in case Brent had taken him off somewhere and disposed of him!!!

Brent told me later he couldn't find Briston at first and that Briston didn't come when he called (can you blame him.....). Brent tracked him down to the game room with the air hockey table and fooz ball table, he was hiding under one of the tables and still wouldn't come to Brent. (Brent wasn't yelling or anything, he was pretty calm, or so he says......)

Briston did come out eventually and Brent said he calmly put him on the porch. I was proud of Brent, I'm afraid I would have quietly strangled him and told the kids that he'd run away!

Both dogs have gotten bad about getting into the garbage and taking things of the counter and it is partly our fault as we haven't been proactive about it at this point, other than to confine them to the porch when we're gone and never leave food out they can get to.

I was concerned that this was the last straw for Brent regarding Briston. So when I peeked on the porch he was there, thankfully, I think....

And yes we did leave the meat in the sink, but we've never had them disturb other meat we've done that with. They were just waiting for the mother lode of meat.......

And of course did he eat the meat on the kitchen floor where it would be nice and easy to clean up.....NOOOO he eats it on the ONLY carpeting on the main floor! So I got to spend some time getting blood out/off the carpet, along with drool.....lots of drool.....

Luckily I have learned the trick of using hydrogen proxide to remove blood and we got a small green machine like cleaner to combat pet spots and boy was that money well spent. The carpet cleaned up pretty easily, just took some time to get everything, cause of course he didn't eat it in one small spot, he spread it around a bit.....

I have to say they spent most of Tuesday on the porch or in the yard. I felt too much like kicking them, every time I saw them......

Wednesday I go out to feed horses to find that the ponies have decided I was late (I was an hour behind that morning) and figured out that they could help themselves to all of the remaining treats in the bag and some of the treats in the bins. They ate a large portion of the hay next to the door and in general made a mess. I think they pulled the door open.... I don't think it was left open.....and yes that is being fixed, it has a temp fix, but I don't trust it too last, so Brent will be doing a better fix on Sat.

Then when I went to do laundry I had to ask why there were two beds worth of bedding, I knew that one was from Jayden's bed, turns out the other was from Dandelion having thrown up and having diarrhea on Collin's bed!

Later in the day I go to get my Cub Scout stuff ready and find that some cat has peed in my CS box. Which is the fourth time in a week I've found a place that a cat has gone somewhere other than a litter box.

We have two different kinds of litter boxes on each floor.....I've switched up litter boxes, added litter boxes, taken litter boxes, I am just so done with this.....I am thinking we're gonna have five barn cats come spring. Our two females have never reliably gone in the litter box and I just don't get it.....we've put a lot of effort into getting them to do it.....

Oh and I mustn't forget the two dog throw ups that contained bone from the previous day's feast........where upon I felt like kicking a dog or two again......

Today it was pretty minor so far, just that my jeans got knocked off the hook in the bathroom and some CAT peed on them....so that makes the fifth time this week.....

Oh and wait....can't forget about the "phantom" pee in the kitchen the other morning.....it didn't smell like cat, and it was a small puddle, so I'm thinking it was the cocker, however, he had gone straight out to the yard, so I don't know WHEN he had a chance to do it!!! He almost had to squat and pee as he came through on the way to the door. I just don't know.....

It's like they are plotting and planning behind my back to methodically take me out! All I can say is that it's all out war now.....

And to cap off Monday/Tuesday, I lost my phone Monday night and STILL have not found it as of Thursday.....it's a wonder I got up this morning..........I think I'll be drooling on the floor soon and Briston can clean it up this time!

animal drama part one

Sunday-

5:45am- try to ignore the cat fight in the hall, hope that it doesn't stir up the dogs

5:50am- of course now that I'm awake, now I have to pee..... Get up, dogs take that as the signal to get excited about breakfast....yes, at 5:50am. (should I mention that they don't even lift a HEAD when Brent gets up!!!! They don't even look at him, but if I get up, they're dancing at my feet and heaven help me if I sleep in past 6:30, cause then they're dancing at my door and wrestling each other and banging off the walls......)

5:55am- stagger down the stairs, shushing dogs, telling them to go lay down.....watching Briston (the Saint Bernard) stagger into one wall, then another, cause he's just so excited about the prospect of FOOD. Have you ever had a 130 lb dog bounce off your walls at 6am? It's LOUD!!! He was just wiggling all over, he was so happy.....and he just literally bounced down the hallway off the walls.

6:10am- ok, ok....I'll let you out, all four of you.....we're dog sitting two dogs, Trooper a border collie mix, and Nigel a cocker spaniel. As I open the outside door to let them all back in, I watch the mini horse, Casper, come to the two strand gate from his pasture into our barn yard area. We've been having issues with him getting out, thought we had it under control. Seems like he's staying where he belongs...

6:15am- I might as well feed you, I'm now wide awake. Feed our two on the porch, feed Trooper and Nigel in the kitchen and living room. Can't separate Trooper entirely from the dogs, as he will not eat then and at this point I think he's eaten twice since we got him Wed. night, really don't want to turn him back over to his owners underweight! Can't leave him and Nigel alone to eat, they'll eat each others food, not to mention that Nigel doesn't LIKE to share and tells Trooper that.

As I stand there one eye on them, one eye on Casper out the kitchen window......there goes Casper, right through the bottom strand of the gate. Ok....breathe......he didn't go very far last time he got out.....he'll probably be fine until these guys get done eating......continue to watch, Casper goes out of sight......breathe, he'll probably be right back, surely he won't leave his herd mates...... Callie, his best friend lowers her head and looks like she's going under the gate!!!! ACK!!!!!! If she goes, I have a chase on my hands......as long as he doesn't have a buddy to run with, he won't go very far, if he has a buddy, who knows where they'll stop?!!!

6:20am- frantically throw on boots and a coat, run out the door. Casper is clear around the garage and headed out into the big wide open farm fields next to us!!! No wonder Callie was thinking of breaking out!!! She wanted some adventure too. Get to the barn door to get a halter and realize that I left Trooper and Nigel unsupervised!!!!!!!!

6:25am- Callie is in the barn safe, phew....get a hold of Casper, he's safe. Now what? On Friday, (when he busted out the first AND second time) we put them back into the pig pen, which was where they had lived until we moved them in with our horses. But we couldn't let them out into the paddock attached to that pen, as they had previously torn up the fence between our horses and them, and we hadn't gotten it fixed well enough to hold up to horses on both sides pawing at it.

So we left them inside over night, until we could fix that part of the fence. The next morning when Than went out to feed, they had bent over the 32 inch hog panel so far they went over it and were loose in the barn. We thought we had the fence problem solved, so we let them back out, Sat. morning. He stayed in the ENTIRE day, no worries. Did I mention he stayed in the ENTIRE day? Just wanted to make sure you got that part......

Back to 6:30 Sunday morning- I put them into the 4 foot hog panel pen that we used for the goats, but I realize that Callie can still get her head over the "gate" which is a pallet wired to the posts and actually can also get her head over the panels too. Which means she can lean on them until they bend/break away too........

I didn't have anywhere else to put them, so into the goat pen they went and into the house went I. And wonderfully, there was no blood shed. Nigel was very happily eating Trooper's food and vice versa. Although Happy almost had his blood shed as he had barked (on the porch, because he was stuck there and didn't want to be there) the entire time I was in the barn and I could hear him in the barn (so of course anyone in the house can hear him) and when I got on the porch I wanted to ring his neck. Did I mention that EVERYONE else in the house was still sleeping and really needed to sleep as we had been up late watching the Olympics!!!!

I got Brent up and he hot wired the two strands for the gate, they are a heavy spiral wire (think heavy duty slinky about 10 feet long) and they aren't part of the hot wire fence line, so he had to construct a way to connect them. We let the little monst....., I mean ponies back out, and off we went to church holding our breath.

It looks like he found out it is hot, because all he did was look at it when we went out to see him after church, he didn't come up to it or try to mouth it, which I saw him do on Friday. He stayed in ALL day Sunday, after that. The ENTIRE rest of the day....for some reason devious comes to mind when I think of him now....

Monday 4:45pm- driving home from art co-op, hey look Casper is out! Grrrrr.....much swearing under my breath...... decide to get the mail at Saxonburg, anyway......come back and hey where did he go?!!!!!!! YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME, WHERE COULD HE POSSIBLY WANT TO GO?!!!

Oh phew......he's back in with the other horses.......park the burb, get out and hey look there's a note in our door handle......why look..... it says that at 4:30pm there was a white pony out on BB, sticking close to our house.......now whose pony could that be......

5pm- back into the goat pen with them, page Brent, consult the tracks in the fresh snow (thank you, thank you, THANK YOU for snow that morning, I could tell exactly where he had gotten out!!!!!) consult Brent on fencing strategies, decide that Brent can deal with it when he gets home.......

7:30pm- the fence is lowered in many places and the ponies are once again let out.....here's hoping Casper stays in. Thank goodness I am HOME almost the entire day and that Than IS home the entire day, so we can monitor him. Of course his staying in for an ENTIRE day proves NOTHING right now........but one can hope. And laugh, really hard.....a day or two later.....maybe.....

guess who had a birthday today!!???

OK.......it wasn't him. He made the awesome, super duper cake! And no the My Little Pony wasn't Brent's bday gift. He used it for a model for the cake. Didn't he do awesome! Can you guess whose bday yet.......


Here's a close up of the eye. Yes, that really is a heart in the eye, the model has one also.....did I mention how awesome Brent is!!


However the bday boy was less than impressed, he has officially watched WAY too much "Cake Boss", a cable show that we all love. He repeatedly told us that he wanted a cake by the "Boss", and of course we repeatedly told him it wasn't going to happen....evidently that didn't sink in.

He did eventually come around and praise his Daddy's effort and tell him that he was happy with the cake.....boy is he one spoiled boy. I told him he was lucky to have a Dad that could pull it off that well and he sure didn't have a Mom that could do that and that not just everybody has a parent that can do what Brent does!

So we had cake and ice cream, pepperment ice cream. Yum. Yum. It's a good thing his Grandma's love him, he got cards from them and Lee made him a card and a gave him a few small gifts. That was it. Our gift to him, is to go skiing again. And again, he didn't totally believe that he wouldn't have an actual gift to open, even though we told him, again and again. But Lee took pity on him and wrapped a few small items he had, that he knew Max would like. What a great big brother!

We also went sledding and swimming last night. AND, he's old enough to sit in the hot tub, now! He was so excited! Up till now he's had to just dip his toes in.


And just for the heck of it.....(cause who knows when I'll get around to another post, I'm already risking heart attacks by posting two in one month!!!) this is what Lee did with our poetry words and other misc. magnet shapes on our fridge...I like it.......

don't faint...but it really is a post.....

I told the kids we couldn't decorate for Christmas until the living room was painted....as I didn't want to put the living room back together and then take it back apart to paint. It's been torn apart for a few months now..... So we pushed, all of us pushed, and got it painted in the last week.

All five boys....at one time........well ok, it was three paint rollers and one paint brush, so only four boys.....all painting at the same time.....yes, really. It would have been all five, but I didn't have enough pieces to have all five at one time. So they rotated.

Anyway the final result was so worth it. We LOVE how it turned out. This first picture is of the boys FINALLY getting to decorate the tree this year. (we still have plastic on the carpet in the background, I'm still painting some other stuff...)


Lee decorated this window with our stuffed snowmen...

The brown is called chewy caramel, the white (which was supposed to have a hint of tan in it), footprints.....

Lee is putting the nativity scene up on the piano. The boys are so happy to have the piano back where it belongs!

Our three living room windows.....

AND.....we have NEW living room furniture coming....well new to us and it was generously given to us by a ward member. It's a medium size sectional and it's about four years old, but looks brand new. No pets, no children......we'll fix that....... We're hoping to get it tomorrow night.

big dogs

I didn't get good pictures of the big dogs....but here is what I got. Here is the first sign that we have several LARGE dogs in the house...... a 3 gallon bucket, that had to be filled twice daily..... And the towel is in indication that two of the dogs drool..... a lot..........

And here they are........minus Nicki that is 390 lbs of dog sitting there. With Nicki we had 400 lbs of dog running through the house!!

The Reservoir

I'm at a hospital getting to indulge my new baby desire to my heart's content! Courtney had her baby yesterday evening and I've been staying at the hospital to help her out, so that her hubby can go home and be with the kids. His Mom is staying with them, too.

Anthony Joshua arrived yesterday at 6:35pm weighing in at 7 lbs 13 oz and is 21 inches long. I arrived about 45 mins after he did and it was perfect timing. She was just done getting cleaned up and so was AJ!

No waiting around wondering when that baby was going to come! It's about a 3 1/2 hour drive from my house to hers and when I left things were just getting moving for her, so I did not expect that she'd be all done by the time I got there!!

I'll be here until tomorrow and if all is going well, I'll head home when she leaves the hospital tomorrow. I'm also here to help with the breastfeeding as she's previously left the hospital with cracked and bleeding nipples and we don't want that! So far we're doing ok there.

The following pictures are from our trip to UT in July. We headed to the reservoir on Thursday, despite the cold and rainy weather. It was our only day to swim and it was the only day the TOYS were going to be there! Pam's (Pam is my sis-in-law, married to Brent's brother Merrill), sister's husband's uncle.....still with me.......let them bring their sea-doos down and let us play with them. The older boys had a lot of fun on them, but the younger boys were done very quickly. Did I mention rain and cold weather?

Brent and his sister actually left with two cars full of kids after being there a short time as the younger kids were really miserable very quickly.

Here is Pam's sister with Aubrey and Collin.


Collin really enjoyed his ride!

It's hard to see here, but his smile is a mile wide!

Than went out once or twice, but that was enough for him.....did I mention wet and cold weather?

guess who went shopping today!

We went to the Scout Shop today and the boys got their scout shirts. They were so excited! Scouts has been on hold since we moved from De Pere and I've heard about it off and on from them. There has been much rejoicing now that they are back at it.

They put on their own patches and after that they wore their shirts and stuff for a couple of hours! I had to bite my tongue, I really wanted them to just hang them up! And then of course they wanted to work on merit badge stuff, so they were outside doing, who knows what with the shirts on, of course....although I do know they were teaching Lee knots at one point. And NO I did NOT get a picture of that. But I did get these pictures.

Than

Collin

All three of them

Lee, who really was much more excited than this picture portrays!