October 2, 2011

The weather here has been absolutely beautiful lately!  It is cool to chilly in the mornings and then it warms up into the 70's or 80's.  Absolutely lovely, although we are still very low on rainfall.

We have had a lot going on around here and I really need to post more often to capture more of it.  The latest update on the kitten saga is that Tinky went to the vet on this past Thursday to have surgery so she would not have kittens:).  Ben was asking questions about this and I reminded him why she was there.  He said he thought it would be nice to let her "lay" some kittens.  Hmmm.  Looks like we need to add more animal study to our homeschool:).

Tinky has not been the ideal patient.  We brought her home on Thursday afternoon and pretty much had to turn around and take her right back because she was aggressively trying to pull out the stitches.  They put this blue collar around her neck so she would not be able to reach the incision.  It was made of a felt-like material.  She had taken it off before we got home from the vet's office.  They told me to tie it tighter so, when we arrived home, I did that.  She had it off again in no time at all.  She could dig her claws into the material so there was pretty much no way this thing was staying on.  Back we went.  This time they wrapped her and we all decided it was best if they kept her overnight.  To make a long story a little shorter, she ended up staying a couple of nights because it took a while for them to figure out the best way to keep her from taking out the stitches.  She was able to get the wrap moved up enough to pull out two of the stitches.  They put staples in to replace them, left off the wrap and put a plastic collar around her neck.  This thing stuck out soooo far, it was pitiful.  It was definitely meant for a larger animal but it was the smallest plastic collar they had.  This ended up working but she sure looks miserable.

This afternoon we all went to see her and the husband and I stood there discussing how we might be able to bring her home.  The problem was that she could not be in a room where she could jump up on something because she could really hurt herself with this hard plastic collar.  (Think satellite dish around her neck.)  But we also did not want to leave her there in this small cage for another week to 10 days.  She could not really move without bumping into something with the collar-dish and, while standing there petting her, I noticed she was drinking a lot of water...and then I noticed that if I shut the cage door, she could not reach her water dish with the satellite-collar-dish.  No telling how long she had been without water and she has been drinking a lot since she came home.

We ended up going to the pet store and purchasing a large dog kennel-cage thing, which is much roomier than the small cage at the vet's, and she is now camping in the living room.  She is not happy about the cage thing but she is definitely happier than when she was at the vet's.  She is very verbal so she yells at us a lot and let's us know how horrible this whole situation is.  Poor girl.  It's going to be a long 7 to 10 days.

Did I mention that she follows me around the house all the time, just like Zoe did?  I have missed her since she has been gone but then I feel a little guilty because Dancer has been really enjoying the extra attention without her around.  He definitely enjoys being an only cat and he was not happy to see her today, even confined to a cage.  He hissed and growled at her.  It took a while for him to realize she would not be attacking him while she is in the cage.

In other news, Ben turned the big 6!!  He was so excited.  And he also lost another tooth so he is now missing the two middles on the bottom front.  This time he did not swallow it.  He put it under his pillow in a small plastic baggie and it was exchanged for $2.  The next morning he wanted it back so he could keep it in his keepsake box.  Back to the 6 thing.  Nick has such a hard time with Ben getting to have his birthday first every year.  It is very hard for Nick, who still believes he should be first at pretty much everything.  He is also not happy that he has not lost a tooth yet.

Tonight they are sleeping upstairs in the loft area in the dad's big tent with the dad.  They have been asking to do this for a while now so tonight is the night.  They were so excited.  From the sounds of it, they are all asleep already, which is a huge surprise, especially since they were all downstairs not too long ago, sitting around the island in the dark kitchen with their flashlights having an ice cream cone.  The last time they tried to do this, they could never settle down so they ended up back in their beds for a late bedtime.  Looks like they are going to make it this time and the dad is a heavy sleeper so he will probably be there until the wee hours of the morning.

Homeschool continues to go well.  We are moving right along with our reading/phonics lessons, math and writing.  This week we will be finishing up addition to 10 in math and moving on to subtraction.  They have also memorized a lot of Bible verses.  Last weekend our homeschool co-op rented out the local YMCA for our back to school party.  It had been delayed due to weather, or something.  The husband had to work so I took the boys and they really had a fun time.  They spent most of the time swimming in the indoor pool.  It is a really nice pool; more like something you would see at a resort, with a large play structure with slides in the very large kiddie pool area and a huge, curvy, enclosed, tube slide that is actually goes outside of the building.  You climb up stairs inside of the pool area and you climb into the slide in the pool area (up high) but the actual tube slide part is curving outside of the building and then it dumps you back into the pool inside of the building.  It is really neat, although the boys were too short to use it.  They also had this island area where the water swirled around the island fast, like a river current.  And then they also had two long lanes for swimming laps and all of these different areas were part of the same swimming pool so you could move from one to the other without getting out of the water.  This is the same place where the husband goes to swim laps and work out too.

After the boys had finished swimming, they got dried off and dressed and then we went across the way to the volleyball/basketball courts.  The boys had a good time trying to make a basket for quite a while.  Then we hit the snack tables (everyone had brought snacks) and loaded up two plates full of stuff for the boys to eat on the way home (it was past bedtime).  They ate every bit of it and went straight to bed and were asleep in no time at all.  Fun evening and very nice people.  We had a large turnout.

Did I mention that I really love our Bible study class on Sunday mornings at our church.  Our teacher is great and the group of people are really wonderful.  I always look forward to it.  It will be nice when our church finds a pastor.  The boys are really enjoying the K class and being with the older kids now.  The only thing I don't like is that they spend the first hour in a group setting, having a children's church type thing where they  sing and have a short 'sermon'.  Then they go to the K area for the second hour where they have their Sunday school lesson and they rotate from room to room, where they have the various centers to keep them busy.  I wish they had the two hours were reversed, where they went to Sunday school first because I had planned to have them in our worship service with us, so we could worship together as a family.  Now I can't because they will miss their class and I feel that is really important for them.  Oh well.  Maybe they will change it up in the future.

I know there are many things I am forgetting to post about but it is getting late, we have school tomorrow and I need to get some sleep so time to sign off.  I must post pictures soon.  We have some of Tinky with her satellite dish collar on; poor thing.  Have a good week!