10.17.2013 9 Weeks with Clark

Thursday, 10.17.2013.  Overall a good day with Clark!  Lots of smiling, playing, wooing, but also alot of disgust grousing about the bottle.  He much prefers his mother!

Last night I bought this play pad and for short periods of time, he was happy being surrounded by it.  We discovered that if you pull the ring on the elephant, songs play..so that was good.  He actually grabbed hold of the double ringed monkey and finally figured out how to let go. The below picture doesn't have great focus, but he was MOVING...  :)

10.14-16, 2013 9 Weeks with Clark

I'm a Granny!  My favorite middle son Tim and favorite middle daughter in law Mary had a baby boy back in August!  Mary is a teacher, and she contracted to take the first 9 weeks of school off to stay home with Clark Davis.  I contracted with my place of employment to work via computer and cell phone so that I can stay with my favorite first grandchild for the next 9 weeks of his life.

I started this past Monday.

Oct 14…awake around 4:45 and dozed until 6:45 when I pulled on clothes and went downstairs to eat oatmeal before they left.  How was the day?

It was the Best of Times... it was the Worst of Times. 

When he wasn’t shrieking his disgust about the absence of his mother and the milk she delivers, he was either Clark napping (short naps, here and there, when he was overcome with exhaustion from the disgust shrieking) or thankfully, he was a cutie pie...learning how his face works...smiling, frowning, sticking that lower lip out, wooing “haaaaoooooo” or gazing up at the sky in wonder as we walked around the backyard.   I was happy to see 3:30 arrive and I was HAPPIER that he had just pooped, we had just had a few happy moments during the diaper change, and when his parents walked in, there was little evidence that he can shriek like an Irish Banshee.  I went to bed at 8:30, intending to read, but overcome by exhaustion when I laid down.

Oct 15.  Up at 4:45…sigh.  Dozed until 6:45.  Downstairs for oatmeal!  Clark didn’t shriek in horror when he saw me, so evidently he’d forgotten the hell that was yesterday.   We played and then he slept for about an hour…woke up and we went for a stroll!  It worked out really well, and he fell asleep half way thru – so I kept walking until I felt like I was pushing my luck.  I brought the entire stroller up the tilted front  yard and then left sleeping Clark in the carrier – he slept for awhile longer.  He tried the bottle for awhile, but again, not much impressed.  But we’ve had lots of happy smiling time, read a few books, had a few laughs, a few walks around the back yard.  If it ever rains or gets cold, I might be in trouble...

Oct 16.  Woke briefly at some point but went back to sleep and woke when the alarm went off at 5:35…ran downstairs for a shower before the kids started their routine and was back upstairs before they even got out of bed.  Baby slept well and ate well…and then slept for nearly 2 hours after they left!  It was a good day overall…I’ve discovered a trick about the bottle.  If I sit in the soft chair, and have the tv on, he’ll watch the tv with enough attention to overlook the fact that he’s trying to drink milk from a bottle.  He probably drooled more than he drank, but he had enough to get thru the day and he was sucking on the bottle when Mary walked back in the house at 4!  From 2 – 3, we strolled around the neighborhood; he slept for most of the trip and I somehow lucked out that we got back to the house just when he started grousing. Into the house for an hour of diaper table, smiles, and a bottle drool.  A good day overall!

09.25.2013 Letters in the Mailbox!

09.25.2013

I wrote a letter a few weeks ago on a section of that white packing paper you can buy at the U-Haul store. I used one of those marker type pens to write the letter, which seem to make the words flow a little faster.  I stuck it into an envelope, put a Johnny Cash stamp in the upper right hand corner, and then popped it in the box at the Greenwood US Post Office!

While going thru a box of photos a few weeks ago, I found a letter that my Grandpa Yarbrough wrote to my son Tim after receiving the announcement of his birth.  As I read it, I heard Grandpa's voice in my head.   He wrote as he talked.    I have a letter my Dad sent to my Mom before they were married, when he was stationed in France back in the early 50's.  I laugh every time I read it - he was a goofy boy who wrote silly things to make his girlfriend smile!

Email and cell phones are great, but finding a LETTER in the mailbox is something special.  Everyone should start writing letters again!

and where did this come from?  I stumbled over this internet site - some pretty cool stuff on here

http://www.lettersofnote.com/

03.12.2013 Retirement Home for Big Cats

South of Brazil, Indiana, out in the country, is a home for lions, tigers, cougars and other assorted creatures of the feline persuasion.  We decided to visit this past Saturday - a birthday present for Jenna, my son Sam's fiance.

The Exotic Feline Rescue Center (   http://www.exoticfelinerescuecenter.org/home.html  ) is home to over 200 felines, all shapes and sizes.  They've always been in captivity; none were born in the wild, captured and sold.  They were bred to be sold as pets or to animal shows.  For a variety of reasons, each was brought to the back roads of Indiana to be cared for, a Forever Home.

The animals are in good sized grassy pens, with platforms for climbing and little houses for shelter.  Visitors to the center walk along paths separated from the pens by only a bit of grass.  The guide leads the way, telling each animal's story - these stories can be read on the website.

Here are some pictures of these beautiful creatures!

03.03.2013 Happy Birthday to my Mom

03.03.2013

My Mom would have celebrated her 78th birthday today if the surgery and subsequent chemotherapy had worked.  But none of it worked, and March 3rd is now a day of remembrance, not one of cake and presents. 

It doesn't matter what type of relationship you currently have with your mother...loving, testy, argumentative, long distance or none at all...you will miss her when she's gone.  I miss mine.  You too will miss that presence in your life. 

If it's a bad relationship? You will have so many regrets about opportunities lost after she's gone. 

If it's a good relationship? Your safety net, your comfort zone, the person you could always go to regardless of how crazy she made you...will be gone and there will be a big hole in your life that you can never fill.

More than likely your relationship with your mother is like the one I had.  A mixture of most of the above - loving, testy, argumentative, and long distance for the last 30 years.  

I moved with my parents from Illinois to California in 1979, and then returned to Illinois to marry in 1982.  I never lived in the same town as my parents again.  For a few years we lived in the same STATE, but nearly 6 hours away.  Visiting was always a long car ride, or a plane ride.  I couldn't just drop in for coffee or have them over for supper.  It was always a VISIT...and you know how visits can go.  No matter how much the visit is anticipated and appreciated, sometimes the visit is just a day or two longer than it should be.  :)

Anyway - I'd always send a box of gifts to my Mom and my Dad for their birthdays.  The box would contain little things, certainly nothing they couldn't find in California, but stuff that made them aware I was thinking of them - a book, maybe a t-shirt from a place we'd visited here in the Midwest, always some thick, new socks, and some favorite candy.  My Dad loved that orange taffy candy you always see around Halloween AND he loved Reese's Peanut Butter cups..so he always got that.   Mom?  I always sent her a few packages of PEEPS.  

She loved Peeps. I do not. Honestly, I think she was the only person I know who loved to eat those things.   Peeps of any shape or color.  And Black licorice.  

The Easter Peeps are now out in force in every store I enter -- each time I see them, I smile and think of Mom. Last year I was with her on Easter morning. I gave her an Easter basket filled with Black Licorice and a variety of Peeps. She took glee in biting off their little heads. :) 

Below is a picture of  Mom taken at her surprise 75th birthday party.  It was a Good Day.  I wish I could have had a few more opportunities to buy those nasty peeps for her box, just a few more Happy Birthday calls.  :)

02.19.2013 My Cat Charlie

02.19.2013

Last Friday my traveling companion Scott and I drove north to Lafayette, IN for some Tim and Mary time.  Tim is my favorite 2nd son and Mary is my favorite 2nd son's wife. :)

Tim has been involved in improvisational comedy since he was a student at Purdue - a 3 year member of the Crazy Monkey's improv group, he missed being funny after graduation and started up another group named Ad Liberation.   Unfortunately for me, their shows seem to be mostly scheduled for Friday nights at 7:30, which makes the timing tight for me to get up there after work.  However, this last show was 8:30 and all was well.  Even had time for Pizza before the show with Mary and her family.

But I digress.  This post is really about My Cat Charlie.  Since my divorce, Charlie has lived with Tim and Mary.  So really, anymore, he's Tim and Mary's cat.  But in my heart, he's still mine.  And every now and again, when I'm visiting, he remembers me briefly and I feel him sigh and relax when I cuddle him on my shoulder.

Born in the shed to a feral calico cat, he caught a bad cold around 6 weeks.  Very friendly, very dumb and very sick, I knew if I didn't claim him as mine and bring him into the house, he'd end up as a dead pile of yard fluff.

So small he fit into my hand when he came into the house, he spent the first few months riding around the house on my shoulder or sleeping on the back of the couch.  He also was very fond of curling up for a nap in the small wastebasket by the desk.

 Eventually his maleness asserted itself (despite being neutered very early) and it was decided that he needed to become an outside cat, first in the yard he was born in and now in Tim's back yard, his front stoop, the neighbor's front porch and other various spots he's made into his lounging areas.

And I told you all this simply to share two pictures Scott took of Charlie and me last Friday.  Charlie is no longer able to fit in my hand.  At 25 pounds, Charlie is a Big Cat.    But he still likes to cuddle on my shoulder.

01.03.2013 Leftovers and New Projects!

01.03.2013  Leftovers and New Projects.

I knit and crochet.  I also play piano.  I play the flute.  I have canned hundreds of jars of tomatoes and pickles and jellies and jams.  I love to ride my bike.  Therefore, I have carpal tunnel.  :)

And that's fine, except I need to pick and choose wisely what I do at any point of time.  Because most of the stuff I love to do causes my carpal to flare up.  Therefore I can only do any of the above things I like to do one at a time.  I can't play piano for 2 hours and then crochet until I go to bed.  I can't ride my bike for hours and hours and then expect to be able to play flute in a band.

Lately I've been crocheting.  My pal Scott has two granddaughters, K1 and K2,  and this past November I decided to crochet them each an afghan for Christmas.  Well, I got one done.  here's a picture - yes, it's bright.  As my sister said "now that my eyes have stopped bleeding, I can see it's really pretty!"  But those colors are K2's favorite colors and she's in 2nd grade and the colors match her bedroom perfectly.  Yes, I know you're wondering how she sleeps at night with all those colors but she does!

The second one unfortunately did not get finished in time for K1 to open it on Christmas morning.  In fact, it's still not done.  I'm steadily working on it however, and it WILL be done to give her next week on her 12th birthday.  This one is not as bright..but it is also crocheted in panels, a shell stitch.  The color of the panels?  Royal blue, dark purple and Lime Green.  Yep.  Her favorite colors.  Each is outlined in Black and I will connect them with a raised stitch of black Sparkle yarn.  I'll try to remember to insert a picture here when I'm done.  

So yep, I have a leftover project...which will soon be finished.  I have another leftover project, a scarf I started in June with the intent to hand it over to my cousin Sue when I saw her on my vacation.  It's still not done.  I have no interest in the pattern, so I'm thinking of ripping it out and starting over.  ugh.  I have another leftover project, a Nook case,  made with little knitting needles and expensive yarn that I started in 2010.  I WILL finish that because durn it, that yarn was too $$ to let it just languish.    I have another leftover project.  Last October I bought 2 skeins of REALLY soft thick baby yarn for a road trip project.  10 bucks a SKEIN!  I'm into the 2nd skein.  Just straight crochet.  It's fast going with such thick yarn, but it got shelved when I started the Christmas afghans.

Another leftover project?  My mother bought me a crewel needlepoint kit years ago - very pretty..lots of birds on a tree of some kind.  I remember her buying it for me when I was about 12.  I still have it.  I'm 55.  I never started it.  Sigh.  OOOHH, maybe i'll give it to K1 next week for her birthday!  

New Projects!  I have a Grandchild in the works  :)  So I'll be spending lots of time crocheting baby things this year - I saw THIS today on Facebook and decided to try to win the book.  

  http://www.allfreeknitting.com/sweeps/knit-a-monster-nursery-book-giveaway

My son is more fond of ROBOTS, but this has pretty cute monsters!  and I like the monster hat!  

Again, Happy New Year.  I hope 2013 brings only good things to you and yours!