Guilty As Charged

I admit it. I was one of the crazy people who got up at 4 AM today to watch the royal wedding on TV. The boys even got up with me - after I was telling Mike I was going to, they were gung ho for the idea too. I told them I was not going to wake them that early on a school day, so if they were determined, it was up to them to set their alarms. At 3:55 I came down stairs and Steve was up and dressed. Pete had begged him the night before to make sure he got up, but Steve said that he had tried several times, Pete wasn't getting out of bed. Oh, well. I said I was not going to get anyone up so early. At that announcement, Pete came out of his room and out to watch with us. During the Pre-wedding stuff on TV, I made omlettes for breakfast. About 10 minutes until the wedding was to start, I heard Pete snoring. We woke him up again in time to see the wedding, but he got bored and went back downstairs to play with the dog. Guess he's not going to be a Royal Watcher when he grows up.

Our Girls

Of our two cats, one is a recluse, the other a lap cat. Princess Fiona (yes, a reference to Shrek, a necessity from having sons), or FiFi as we call her, is our lap cat. Last night, after Mike and I went to bed, up came FiFi. She usually settles down at the foot of the bed, or sometimes shares Mike's pillow. Soon after we all settled down, Mike started growling at FiFi. She had apparently decided that she wanted to sleep on top of Mike's leg, and was kneeding it, trying to flatten out a spot to lay on. He was actually very patient and just tried to gently move her over to a spot on the mattress next to his leg. Unfortunately, she found my leg next. I was not so tolerant. I kicked my feet until she moved back over to Mike's side of the bed. Back to his leg. We finally convinced her the mattress was a much better bed for people and kitties, and she found her spot. Santara just took up her normal bed of laying in our bath tub. Much less drama. You have to wonder what she was thinking of the spectical Fiona was making of herself.

Hodge Podge

We have finished the third apartment, and out new tenant has moved in. He seems impressed (and rightly so) with all the work we did to make it nice. I am trying to get Mike to relax this week - he has admitted that he has been way over working this last year. It's not an easy task, and the best I have managed is to slow him down.

Our baby girl - Sadie - had a bonanza last night. For dinner I had used the refrigerator ice dispenser for ice for drinks. A couple of minutes into dinner, an ice cube fell from the dispenser and Sadie ran over and gobbled it up - she loves ice. A couple minutes later, another cube fell magically. She ran back over to eat that one too, and then she just laid down next to the fridge hoping for more (think vending machine spitting out chocolate bars!). So sad for my baby, no more fell.

Pete has befriended a black kitty that has been hanging around our yard. I have told him that we are not keeping it, so he needs to leave it alone. There are so many barn cats around, there are always cats running around the neighborhood, if we took them all in, we could be the "crazy cat family".

Well, It's Over

My 40th birthday celebration has passed. On the actual day, I took myself out for a nice lunch since I was out running errands and my husband took me to our favorite ice cream shop (just re-opened for the season) for a cone on our way to work at the apartment house - I love ice cream, so YUM! My sister flooded my e-mail with e-cards for my birthday and I got several cards in the mail from family and friends. Yesterday was ice cream and cake with family, and then a meal out with my husband and children (the boys were bummed because the waitress forgot they told her it was my birthday, so no one came to sing to me-darn!). All in all, not too traumatic.

A Bit Of Excitement

We have a new Amish saw mill going in down the road from us. We have been watching them move in the equipment, and now the logs have begun to arrive. Today I decided we would burn off the fence rows as soon as the boys got off the bus, before things green up too much. The boys and I each had a rake and took up strategic spots. As I was burning, the wind was helping keep the flames going but there was just enough green grass to make plenty of smoke. There was an Amish buggy coming down the road, and a big truck of logs going up the road, all converging around my smoky fence row. The poor horse spooked and began shying away from everything, as the elderly lady who was driving tried to keep things steady. I watched helplessly as the horse started backing up and the buggy was heading backward into the ditch. The back wheels of the buggy were stopped by the fence posts behind it and the lady was able to make the horse pull the buggy out of the ditch. She turned around and went back the way she came, no one hurt, nothing broken on the buggy. Luckily, there is a stop sign close to our house, so the truck had stopped at the first signs of trouble and it let the buggy begin it's journey again before starting on it's way. Soon the buggy was coming back, very unsure of the fire now. The lady got out and was slowly walking it, trying to coax it by our yard ( if you ever want to feel like dirt, be the cause of an old lady having to lead a scared horse by your yard!) The horse would stop and she would talk to it and then get it moving again (those horses are big ya know). There was a pick up truck behind the buggy, and a young guy (20 somethingish) got out and asked if he could help her. With him on one side and her on the other they quickly managed and she got back into the buggy and was on the way. Next spring, I'm making sure Mike is here for the burning day!

______Not Included

I'm used to buying things that require batteries (not included) - which is why we have a drawer full of batteries in different shapes and sizes. I just received a Kindle e-reader for my birthday that did not have any books included (althought I downloaded lots of free ones from the website), my cell phone functioned, but I had to buy a case for it. Last night takes the cake though. We were hanging a tin ceiling in the apartment house, and since Mike had broken his chalk line earlier this year, he stopped and bought one. He came to the house, and asked me if I knew where his bottle of chalk was......HHUUUUHHH? How can you buy a chalk line, but the chalk is not included? That one makes no sense to me. So off I run to the hardware store for chalk while Mike begins his figuring on how to lay out these tiles. So, I picked the color I liked (red) and mumbled about it the rest of the night. By the way, we got about 3/4 of the ceiling up and it looks great.

Peaceful Protest

My dog is a willful girl. Unfortunately, she is big enough that her will sometimes makes our will difficult. Last night I told Steven to take Sadie down to bed with him (her dog crate is downstairs by the boys bedrooms). He got her excited to play with him by squeezing her favorite squeaky toy and she began to go down the steps. As she went, I put the doggy gate (or for clarification purposes, a baby gate) at the top of the stairs - she does sometimes turn around and run back up past the boys when she really does not want to go to bed. Now, these steps have 2 landings that each make a 90 degree turn, and soon she was back at the top landing, looking at me and the gate with those puppy dog eyes of hers. First she tried to "cutify" me into letting her come back up - No Way was she going down by Steven and get put into her crate! After several minutes of that I heard her plop down, so I went to look and of course she takes up the whole landing, laying sprawled out with her head facing down in order to keep an eye out for any pesky boys who intend her to go to bed! She just looked so pitiful. Steve came to get her, but she was refusing to budge. Fine, Steve, (said I) just leave her and go down to get your shower and get ready for bed. She will eventually come down to see what you are doing and then you can put her in her crate. 2 hours later, Mike and Pete came home from the rental house. Sadie was still keeping up her peaceful protest of bedtime on the landing. One thing about those solitary shows of will, they are lonely. As soon as Pete went down, she willingly followed and was ready for the security of her bed.