VeganMom...stumbling through life

It is so unbelievably nice to have a router that works all the time! Our old one has been having problems for so long, I had almost forgotten the luxury of having Internet whenever I open the machine. Until we got our new one, it was always a great craps shoot as to whether we would have it or not, and if not, how long before the router would choke and drop Internet. I am still thrilled when I open the machine and Internet is reliably working.

How cute is this! This is the card and gift she brought me when I was in the hospital. These aren't the best photos, but I really don't feel like waiting for a sunny day and trying to get a better photo. The front of the card says: "Turn them upside down", and if you look closely at the daisies, you'll see she drew frowny faces, but when turned upside down, they are smiley faces. Inside the card says: "I hope you don't mind Ivan by your bed mom" and, "Ivan has been missing you already but I miss you more". The photo was taken a month or so ago at my parents' house. She's never seen Tim Conway's Dorf, but we looked up to find her kneeling in her shoes in a perfect imitation. After we finished laughing our asses off, my parents took a pic of it. She also painted a chipboard container and filled it with candy for me. On the top is Ivan, and around the sides, she has several different types of birds, a dog, and another cat. I just adore that child and love her creativity!

Yesterday, while waiting for the plumber to finish up in our upstairs bathroom, I made a new batch of catnip toys for the little furballs. We see our plumber way too often these days, by the way. He's a nice guy, but I hope we don't have to see him again for a good long time! Anyway, back to the catnip toys. Of course I had to make more toys than we have cats in order to prevent fights. Sometimes I just toss the catnip out on the living room floor and let them party with it, which is terrifically entertaining. Sometimes I give it to them in toys. I like to give them a variety. Petey is never content to play with the toys and enjoy the catnip like the rest of the cats. He has to rip his open and spread the catnip around, leaving the 'toy' (really just socks that Luciana has outgrown--I stuff the end with catnip and tie a knot) useless and a mess on the floor. He can't just do that with his. No, Petey has to wait until all of the other cats have finished playing with theirs, and then go and rip those up as well. Tica was having so much fun playing with her toy, and Petey was standing there politely waiting for her to finish up so he could destroy yet another toy.

The cats have also started their annual tree redecoration process, which some people might refer to as trashing the tree, but I'm trying to be optimistic here. Lila is the only one we've caught 'red handed' in the act of climbing in the tree, pulling ornaments off, and knocking over the little tree that Luciana and Hunter decorated and put on the mantle. The others are probably doing the same thing she is, but are smart enough to wait until I'm sleeping when they do their naughty deeds.

I'm still working on recovery. I'm surprised I still have pain at this point, but I most definitely do. I guess I shouldn't be surprised, because I was told that I would, but I somehow always just assume that my body will behave better and heal faster than anyone else. I really don't know why I always think that, because it pretty routinely lets me down, yet I still persist with my magical thinking. I can stand up straight and walk fairly normally--not very long and not very fast, but at least I don't have to hunch over and shuffle anymore. I'm still very tired. I'm feeling very quiet these days--not depressed, grumpy, or sad--just I guess, enjoying my cocooning time in my house with my family. I'm sure I'll be back to my overly loquacious self shortly, but for now my posts may be less wordy than usual.

And on a totally random note, I love Sarah Silverman! She is hilarious--I would love to hang out with her! Laughing cases me quite a bit of pain since the surgery, so when we got the Sarah Silverman cd from Netflix, I really suffered. It was side-splittingly funny, but so worth the pain it caused me!