Scarlett

Scarlet the bunny joined us yesterday.  We had a tragic and unexpected loss a few weeks ago, when Francesca the rabbit--Ferrero the one-eared-rabbit's soulmate--died.  It was a shocking and horrible experience for all of us, but especially for Ferrero.  They loved each other deeply and were constantly snuggled up together.

Ferrero has had a rough time with partners.  We adopted him years ago as a partner for our Fiona rabbit.  She was an older girl and very sweet and they were very close, so it was tough when we lost her.  After several dates, he selected Freesia as his next partner.  Freesia's whole family was in foster care, and most of the siblings had strange health issues.  At a fairly young age (around 3 years old) Freesia started losing the use of her back limbs.  It didn't take long for full rear paralysis to set in.  One or two of her siblings had similar issues.  Paralyzed rabbits are not unusual, and maintenance can be a challenge.   It takes quite a bit of work to express their urine, keep them clean and free from urine burns, and dry.  I was able to keep her comfortable and fairly happy. She needed to be repositioned every couple of hours and cleaned up.  They can't be left wet, so we spent lots and lots of time blow drying her fur after a thorough cleaning.  She was my second paraplegic rabbit, so I knew what to expect.  When she passed away, it was really hard on Ferrero and me.  She and I had bonded so much in the last few months of her life.  Ferrero was depressed, even with his guinea pigs friends to comfort him, he is a guy who really likes having a partner.  Ferrero stayed by her and cared for her up until the end. 

We scheduled more dates for Ferrero, and we went back to Freesia's sisters who were still in foster care.  Big white rabbits with red eyes are the least adopted, so they tend to languish in shelters and foster care.  He matched well with Freesia's sister, who we adopted and named Francesca.  I knew that we were tempting fate by going back to a litter with extensive genetic issues, but I was hoping we'd get luckier this time.  Unfortunately for Ferrero, we were not lucky.  Our sweet Francesca was absolutely fine at night--behaving normally, eating well, etc., and I found her dead in the morning.  We were heartbroken at the loss.  He was so happy with her.

We were planning to go back to the same litter and try for another sister, but fate had different plans.  We have gotten to know many of the neighbors along our normal dog walk route, and one of the families had a small rabbit who's been living in an outdoor hutch.  Every time we walked by there, it broke my heart.  She was alone outside, very hot, very cold--didn't matter, in a wire cage with a wire bottom all day, every day.  From time to time, the little girl who adopted her and her four siblings took the rabbit out to play with, and it didn't appear to be very gentle.  No animal should be confined to a cage.  What a horrible existence!  Worse than that--a wire bottomed cage.  Imagine spending your entire existence barefoot, standing on thin wires.  It causes all manner of discomfort and foot diseases/wounds/infections.  After Francesca died, I told them that if they were ever open to it, I would love to adopt their rabbit.  They've dumped several animals already, so I thought it was worth a shot.

Friday afternoon, they told us that they were ready to get rid of Scarlett, so I could have her.  I was thrilled!  We picked her up Sunday.  She's never been to the vet, so we will take her tomorrow and get a clean bill of health.  Until we get vet sign off, I'm keeping them separate.  She's in the room with Ferrero (and the guinea pigs and birds) but she's in an enclosure.  As much as I hate having her locked up, it's A LOT bigger than what she lived in before with a soft fleece floor for her little feet.  She has very thin silky fur and very little body fat, so she was especially unsuited to be out in the cold all winter.  I'm so glad she's warm and comfy.  I feel a little bad about taking a visually desirable rabbit rather than a big white one, but it seems like the universe wanted her here.  I've always focused on adopted the ugly/special needs/less desirable animals, leaving the "cute" more adoptable ones for people who care about things like that.

Once we get a clean bill of health, I can start trying to introduce them and hope for the best.  Rabbits can be very particular about their partners.  I've always done bunny dates and been confident that we had a love match before bringing anyone home.  In this case, I have not done that and am desperately hoping for the best.  Ferrero is a very laid back, non-aggressive bunny.  He was attacked a couple of times by the females when he was dating and never fought back.  All three of his previous partners were bossy and spunky, and he was happy to go along with whatever they wanted.  He's a big sweetie.  Scarlett is tiny and very sweet and non-aggressive with me, so I hope that bodes well for their relationship.  I'm feeling cautiously confident that we can make it work.  In the absolute worst case, if they hate each other and can't safely be alone together, I will have to put up a barrier and split their room in half.  It's not ideal, but it will work.  I'm really hoping, though, that this is his fourth and last beloved.

In other news, my husband turned 50.  I'm older than him, so it's always nice when he finally crosses into the same decade as me, so I don't have to listen to him say he's still in his 40's, while his wife is in her 50's. :D  He's such a goof.  Before Covid, I had planned to throw a surprise 50th party for him.  He likes things like that (I do not!).  Obviously Covid took that off the table, so he observed his usual birthday tradition of drinking beer while binging on Game of Thrones (GAG!) all day.  I made him shepherd's pie (his favorite) and a variety of peanut-butter-focused desserts (also his favorite).

Pasha

I did not want any more cats.  I do not need any more cats.  Yet Pasha the cat moved in to join us about a month ago.

She has been hanging around our property for two years now.  She was ear tipped, so I didn't have to worry about trapping her for a spay. She came to eat every night and stayed in our garage (which has heat lamps and heated beds all winter) but wouldn't let me touch her.  I started sitting outside every evening at her food spot for an hour or so, until she seemed comfortable eating while I was there.  It took a few more weeks of sitting there quietly before she allowed me to barely touch her fur. A few more weeks of perseverance and she was letting me rub and scratch her everywhere--even rolling over for belly rubs.  I treated her for fleas and started bringing her in from time to time in the evenings.

She would immediately relax, purr, and go into the deepest sleep I had seen her in.  When she slept outside, she was always on edge, listening and popping her eyes open, always alert for the potential encounters with other cats or animals.  It made me see to see her truly relaxed inside, knowing she never had that luxury outside.  Each night that I brought her in, she would cry at the door between 2-3 AM.  Since it was summer, I let her back out.  I kept hoping she would stop asking to go out.

The weeks around the fourth of July were really traumatic for her. She was jumpy and scared all the time, and frequently didn't finish her meal because of a loud firework that sent her off to hide in the garage for the night.  Shortly after that, we lost ground.  She seemed afraid and skittish and scooted away whenever I tried to touch her.  We had lost most of the ground I made over the past few months.  It was heartbreaking.  So, I started the whole process over.  After a couple of weeks of that, we were almost back to our previous comfort level.

About two weeks before I brought her in, she showed up with scratches on her face.  A few days after that, her normal robust appetite was slowly decreasing.  Each night, she ate a little less, and it took her longer. That, combined with a cold snap in the weather, convinced me that it was time to bring her in.  I had taken care of an outdoor cat for about three years before she showed up.  I called him Sasha.  He was a beautiful black and white, long haired cat, and despite my best efforts, he never let me touch him.  He was always here.  One day in the middle of a cold winter, he disappeared.  He was not returning to his garage to sleep, nor was he eating.  I watched for him (and still do) but he never came back.  That ripped my heart out, and I still think of him daily and wonder what happened to him.  I couldn't live with another disappearing cat, so Pasha moved in.

I was committed to ignoring her 2-3 AM demands to be let out.  The first night was rough.  She yelled, and I sat with her.  I took her to a litter box, but she immediately jumped out and returned to her safe window shelf.  The second night, we followed the same routine, but this time she used the litterbox before returning to her shelf, and she stopped meowing.  This continued for a couple more nights, until she was comfortable enough to walk to the litterbox herself.  Apparently she was crying to get out, because she had to poop and didn't feel safe yet doing so in the house.  Her appetite continued to decrease.

I took her into the vet for a wellness check.  She was ten years old and looked good and healthy with the exception of what appeared to be a plum-sized tumor growing through her abdominal wall.  Because of the location, it couldn't be removed.  They tried, unsuccessfully to aspirate the tumor.  We came home very sad, and just hoped that the tumor was slow growing, so she could enjoy some safe, peaceful, indoor living before she died.  He appetite was almost non-existent within a couple of days and she was increasingly lethargic.  I was devastated that it seemed the tumor was aggressive.  On that Sunday afternoon, we noticed a dime-sized hole had appeared on her side, over the location of the tumor.  I called the vet and sent a picture, and he said we'd just start her on antibiotics Monday morning.  I picked her up to carry her down for snuggles, and her side exploded a massive quantity of hot, rancid pus that ran down my arm.  A lot came out!  About the amount that would be commensurate with a plum-sized growth.  

I spoke to her vet on Monday to get the antibiotics, and he voiced my hope--it was very possible that she had a nasty sack of infection that looked like a tumor on Xrays.  If so, antibiotics would clear everything up.  After her two-week course of antibiotics were done, she went back in for tests.  The best-case scenario was true:  no tumor, no cancer, no infection, not even a scar.  She's a healthy, ten year old cat, with many years to enjoy the household living she's become accustomed to.

She spends her time rotating between four windows.  She likes to watch different parts of the yard at different times a day.  She is fully at home exploring the house, and spends a part of the night cuddled with me and a part with Mark.  We haven't had any fights or issues integrating her with the other cats or dogs.  I showed her the outdoor enclosure, and she spent a little time out there the first day but hasn't gone back out since.  I was surprised by that, as I expected her to want to spend more time outside.  She doesn't ask to go out and seems very content to be a house cat.

I'm so glad I brought her in when I did!  Had I waited any longer, she would have been too far gone, and possibly wandered off to die.  So despite the fact that another cat is the last thing in the world I need right now, I feel terribly lucky to have this sweet girl!

The wedding

 My older daughter got married last weekend.  Because of Covid, it was an outdoor ceremony, with only immediate family present. I encouraged them to wait another year--so Covid would be over, and also, why rush a wedding, but they were insistent on now.  We are not a family who considers divorce an option.  If you make a promise and sign a contract, you stick with it, no matter what. If you fall out of love, too bad. You made a promise.  If your spouse is not helpful or kind, too bad.  You made a promise.  So...I tend to want to put off such a binding promise.  I'd feel better if they'd been together a few more years before committing for the next 50+ years, but it's done.  I'm glad she was at least older (30) and had some time to experience life on her own and with different partners.

I got to officiate the wedding, which was held at an apple orchard.  Unfortunately for us, it was 42 degrees.  We didn't wear our coats for the ceremony and pictures, so it was a brutally cold day.  Mark walked Dej "down the aisle", which is something he's always looked forward to.  She wore my grandmother's broach, so grandma was kind of there with us.

It was a very short ceremony, with advice from each of the parents on how to maintain a long, happy marriage, since the four parents have over 50 years (combined) of successful marriage under our belts.  I read a short blessing, and they exchanged rings and read their own vows to each other.

They rented the outdoor pavilion (also cold), with a separate picnic table for each side of the family, which allowed us to remain distant.  Dej made some of her delicious waffles, dipped them in chocolate, and she had raspberries and whipped cream (all vegan, of course!).  I made caramel apple cupcakes, and they also had warm apple cider.  We had lots of delicious food to celebrate with!

I'm so eager to see the photos, which are not yet back!  There are a few that the photographer posted as a sneak peak, but I'm stalking the site for the remainder of the photos.

I'm really proud that they had the exact wedding they wanted, where they wanted it, and did things their own way.  It would have been equally small and simple without Covid.  They are focused on saving their money for a house, rather than dumping thousands of dollars for one day.  Their marriage and life together is so much more important that the wedding, and I'm really glad that they know that.  Dej chose a very non-traditional, but absolutely perfect, red dress, which was very much reflective of her.

I fell behind a bit on my grading but have worked hard this week to get caught up again.  As much as I love and will miss teaching, the idea of having a job where: 1) I'm actually paid for the work I do instead of working summers, holidays, weekends, and most evenings for free, 2) I'm paid fairly for my work, instead of being grossly under compensated while dozens of admin/bureaucrats who generate no revenue and work an easy 40 hours are paid several times what I am, and 3) Having weekends, holidays and actual real days off, really appeals to me.  

The university system is broken and getting more so by the day.  The students certainly aren't getting their money's worth in education, and this makes me feel really bad for them.  Adjuncts are not appropriately compensated.  There are still far too many very low-quality faculty members who are focused more on being published than educating students.  Covid may be the final blow to the quickly failing system.  I hope whatever replaces the system, when it fails, gives the students a quality, affordable education, compensates the teachers (revenue generators) appropriately, and does not simply redistribute wealth to a handful of administrators.

It has been a difficult time to watch what my younger daughter is going through, with one frustration after another and very little help coming from the college, as email after email is ignored.  The majority of her teachers have simply dialed it in, with a complete lack of organization and quality in the materials that they just dumped online with minimal effort.  I donated my entire summer, working full time to create quality materials for remote learning, but I was not paid. We are constantly given the horrible choice of choosing to give our students a quality education at our own peril (hundreds of unpaid labor hours and lost family time) or screw our students over by spending almost no time but having a life and not donating the majority of our time to a university that doesn't offer any compensation or job security in return.  We're paid the same whether we're great teachers or awful teachers. Many of my colleagues, understandably, chose themselves over their students. It's really frustrating to be the parent paying for a sub par education and less-than-professional curriculum and instruction.  I desperately wish there was an alternative.

Poor Bea!

I was shooting for blogging once or twice a week but have clearly not kept up with that.  I'm trying to approach this differently this time, and not hold myself to a schedule, which I inevitably fail to keep, then feel guilty and a sense of failure for not keeping up with the meaningless expectations I've set for myself.  I'll blog when I blog and try not to feel the guilt and failure when I don't, because it really doesn't matter to anyone but me.

I'm already starting the week with a sense of guilt and failure (self-induced, as always).  I have been an intermittent faster for over two years now and generally love it.  I don't eat my first meal until 3 PM (or after) and don't eat anything after 9 PM.  That is the schedule that works best for my mind and body.  However, there are days when, inexplicably, I'm starving early in the day and can't think about anything other than food.  I've been pretty good about sticking with it, even on those days.  Today I was not.  It's a dreary, ugly, depressing Monday.  I'm tired and fairly stressed, and gave in and had my normal 3:00 snack (cashews) at 12:30 today.  While I'm now able to focus a little more on work, instead of thinking about food and watching the clock, I'm upset with myself for my lack of discipline today.  I need to let that go.  I'm not great at letting things go--especially when it's a failure or weakness on my part.

I've learned as I've aged, that even the absolute worst situation comes with some positives if you're open and look hard enough.  The Covid plague has certainly brought a mixed bag of negatives and positives.  One of the "gifts" of CV is that my husband now works out with me religiously, every single day.  Another gift is that we've instituted family game night each week.  After several disagreements over our approach to games, we found a couple of new games that work well for us.  I like to play games for the fun of playing games. I don't like to keep score, and I don't enjoy "winning" or beating people I care about.  Collaborative games provide the perfect solution.  I mentioned Ghost Stories previously, and we've been enjoying working together to beat that game.  Though my husband seems happy enough to play the same game every week, I needed a change of pace, so we added another collaborative game to the mix:  The Crew:  The Search for Planet Nine.  We played that Friday for the first time, and it was really fun.  I like it a lot and look forward to continuing to complete each of our 50 missions!

We had to take Beatrice to the vet a few weeks ago, as she had developed a limp in her right back leg.  She's a very high-energy (almost) two-year old dog who runs and jumps constantly, so we figured she had just pulled something.  The vet gave us really bad news, however. She has a ruptured knee ligament and will probably need a very expensive ($3000-$4000) surgery.  Additionally, dogs with a genetic disposition for this generally have the same thing happen in the other leg shortly after.  We had to keep her quiet and inactive (impossible, but we did our best) for two weeks, then resume light activity for another two weeks, then return to see how things are going.  Though surgery is by far the most likely outcome, there is a small possibility that the knee joint can form a capsule around and stabilize the ruptured ligament and make surgery unnecessary.  Obviously, that's our hope.  

For two weeks, Bea had to watch her whole family go on daily walks--the thing she enjoys most in the world (or maybe second most, after attention).  That was as heartbreaking for me to watch her hopeful face become sad and crestfallen when she realized that she would, again, be abandoned and unable to do her favorite thing as it was for her. She has no way to understand it's for her own good, and that was a horrible two weeks.  We tried to take her in a couple of different wagons and even tried Silas' wheelchair, but the constantly wiggling ball of energy would not tolerate a passive walk in any format.  She's now able to go on short, slow walks, so we take her for a half-length walk and keep her from running and jumping.  She gets to walk by herself, so we are now doing three dog walks per night to cover everybody's needs.  She's still limping, but it seems to be less pronounced.  Our hope is that indicates that there's some healing taking place, rather than that she's adjusted to her condition.  We won't know until we go back to the vet next week.

I'm still getting a batch of tomatoes each week from the garden.  We have so many green tomatoes out there yet, I'm hoping they ripen up soon.

I made a batch of one of my favorite cookie recipes last week and experimented with it.  I love them even more now.  Vegan Richa's brownie cookie recipe is so quick and easy. I love the taste and texture of the cookies and especially love that they're gluten free (as I'm quite gluten sensitive--though I think it's more of a sensitivity to the RoundUp chemicals present in all wheat products than the wheat/gluten).  This time, instead of using regular maple syrup, I used a habanero maple syrup in the.  It was fantastic.  I love the addition of the heat that hits after the chocolaty, sweet deliciousness of the cookie and will definitely continue to make them with the habanero syrup in the future.

Our zinnias continue to produce gorgeous flowers that make the garden look pretty glorious.

Hello, sunshine!

Silas, Froggie, and Bea

We survived the last week of rain every day, cold, and no sun.  It was horrible.  The sun finally returned today.  I'm waiting for it to dry the yard a bit more (the garden is still pretty swampy), so I can get some power weeding done. I also need to stake some of the grasses that the rain knocked down.  My mood and energy level seem to be strongly determined by the sun.  When it's ugly like that, I just slog through with no energy and feeling down.  It's so nice to have a sunny day today, as I'm so much happier and more productive.

Poor Silas went to the back door every day, looked out, and decided he wanted no part of being out there.  He definitely likes the sun and warmth.  Today was his first day of deck sunning since last Sunday. He's back in the house now, lying in a sunbeam by the side door.  He's going to make the most of the sun.  

I cut back the morning glory vines, and his diarrhea has been totally gone, and he's back to his normal poop schedule, which makes my life SO MUCH easier.  I think that's pretty solid evidence that the morning glory leaves were the cause of it.  One of the challenges with a dog who survived on the streets by scavenging for food, is that he tries to eat and get into absolutely everything.  Almost every walk, I have to pull something nasty out of his mouth that he snatched up from the ground.  He gets into grocery bags, while we're trying to bleach and unpack everything. He will eat anything that is dropped, and he's so fast.  He's a very aggressive scavenger!  It makes me nervous, because his colon appears to be fairly sensitive, and I don't want him to get into something that makes him sick (or causes diarrhea).  I can't really leave him in the yard unsupervised, because there's too much out there that he can eat that could cause him stomach problems.  He's very smart and determined, which makes it even tougher.  

Silas, Froggie, and Bea

Last night I had the oddest dream that he decided to move on and leave me.  He swam away in a little stream with his new girlfriend and dog friends.  I was so sad that he left, but he looked happy swimming with his doggy girlfriend.  That was one small part of a much larger, much weirder dream--none of which makes sense to me in the light of day.  I also dreamed about my dear friend, Patrick, who ended his life in 2017.  While I hope every night when I go to bed to dream about him, it doesn't happen very often at all.  I can count on one hand the number of dreams in which he's appeared since his death.  Each one is such a gift.  Real or not, it restores my soul to see him and spend time with him.

My friend Julie brought me a bag of apples (50 of them) from her tree, so I made a caramel apple crisp this week and a batch of apple sauce.  I still have almost half of the apples left, so I'll be able to do another dessert and another batch of apple sauce next week.  My parents are coming by this afternoon for an outdoor visit, so I made a batch of whipped cream to go with the crisp.

I've roasted a couple more batches of heirloom tomatoes to add to my freezer stock.  We should have at least two more batches--hopefully more.  We harvested another batch of eggplant, and I used that to make a South Indian eggplant chickpea stew that was delicious.  I also made a Jamaican jerk (using soy curls) and coconut rice.  I'm looking forward to having that for dinner tonight.  If I can harvest a pint of cherry/grape tomatoes today, I'll make mac & cheese tomorrow.

We're starting the third week of classes this week, but I still have one class that hasn't met yet. It's really odd to be holding a first class in the third week of classes.  It's a Monday class, and the first week, we started on a Tuesday, and the second week, Monday was Labor Day.   

Silas' new skills

 The first week of classes is done.  The first week of remote classes isn't nearly as fun as the first week of face-to-face classes.  I miss the interactions with and connections to students. There's no way to make it the same online.  I'm doing my best to replicate it, but while I think the education can be equivalent, I don't think the connections can.

Silas had diarrhea again last week.  That is miserable for everyone with a dog in diapers.  He's been eating only rice and quinoa for a few days, and it's finally cleared up.  I've been brainstorming since it started to try to figure it out.  He eats the exact same food as the other dogs (and I make it, so I know it's fine), he's not on any meds right now, he hasn't been stressed, and he's always with me, so I know he didn't get into anything he wasn't supposed to.  I'm pretty sure I figured it out this morning.  He was sunning himself on the deck, as he does every sunny day, and I happened to notice him grabbing and trying to eat morning glory leaf.  He usually spends an hour on the deck, and I'm not out there the whole time he is, so I think he ate a few morning glory leaves and that's the cause of his diarrhea.  We're pulling all of the morning glories off the deck railings, and hopefully we won't have to endure the misery again!

His new hobby is trash tipping.  We have only one uncovered trash bin in the house, and that's in our laundry room.  It typically contains dryer lint and paper towels that we've used to clean up cat pee/vomit/etc.  Now and then, we throw in an empty bag of chips or an empty bag of cat food, and that's what he's there for.  He's so cute and proud of himself that I can't even be mad at the mess.  Last week he proudly came into the family room with the big empty bag of outdoor cat food in his mouth.  He really enjoys shredding paper and cardboard, so he had a blast shredding that big bag into hundreds of tiny pieces.  Yesterday he brought me an empty chip bag.

He also managed to take the lid off of the metal container in which I had stored extra rice and dry beans.  It's not easy for me to get the lid off, so I'm still not sure how he managed it, but he did.  I left him in the family room on an ottoman, chewing one of his toys, and ran upstairs for less than two minutes.  When I came back down, he was in the middle of the family room, with a two-pound bag of brown rice in his mouth.  He had put several holes in the bag, so the rice was all over the family room.  He again, looked quite proud of himself.

He's made really good progress with stairs, too.  We carry him up and down stairs, but he gets very impatient and sometimes goes down by himself.  When he started doing that, we'd always tell him NO firmly, because we didn't want his legs beat up by being dragged down stairs.  As the stubborn boy has continued to try to launch himself down stairs at will, he's gotten much better at it.  He is able to hold up his back legs, so they don't get banged around as he goes.  It's pretty impressive.  He can make it up the one step in our front-entry way, but I don't see how he would ever be able to safely get up stairs on his own.  

Last night was family game night, and for the second week in a row, we worked on playing/figuring out our new game, Asmodee Ghost Stories.  It's a collaborative game, so instead of playing against and trying to beat each other, we work together to beat the game.  It's extremely complicated.  The first time we tried to play, we couldn't begin to figure out the directions, so we ended up watching some YouTube videos that helped a lot.  We are starting to get the hang of it and managed to figure out some effective strategies last night.  I LOVE this kind of game.  While I enjoy playing games with the family, I don't like competing against each other. I wish all games were collaborative. I think it's much better for families and a lot more fun!

End of summer sads

I've been working all day every day on getting the last of my courses prepped and loaded for our remote-learning format this semester. I think I'm done, though every time I say that, I remember some small thing in the middle of the night that I need to do. It's going to be an interesting semester. We start Wednesday. I'm much more prepared this semester for the remote learning aspect and had the luxury of being able to work on getting my materials and activities created specifically for remote learning this summer. I worked full time on it over the summer (unpaid), and I think the materials and plans are pretty solid and equivalent to the face-to-face learning experience. The big weak point is that it's hard to replicate the interactions and bonding that occurs in the classroom in an online environment. I will really miss the casual conversations and interactions that happen before and after class and randomly on campus. On the other hand, being home with the animals is a huge benefit, especially now that we have Silas who needs a lot of help and supervision (and diaper changes). 

We've had a rough couple of days with Silas, who has a monstrous case of diarrhea. It's the second day of massive diaper blowouts and having to clean the house, scrub floors, ourselves, our clothing, and he's had lots of baths. I switched him over to white rice only tonight, and we'll stick with that until it starts to clear up. He's acting fine and normal, still has an appetite, lots of energy, etc. We're not sure what triggered this nightmare, but I hope it clears up soon. 

He tipped the only uncovered trash bin (in the laundry room) in our house over  and came marching into the family room with his spoils--the empty bag of cat food that I use for the outdoor cats and raccoons.  He really enjoys shredding paper and cardboard and went to work on it.  He had a blast and was so proud of himself for turning the bag into confetti.  He's pretty cute.  He's also the best ball player in the house.  He "runs" so fast to catch any ball that I thrown and unlike the other dogs, he brings it back and lets go of it, so I can throw it again.

My mom turned 70, so we've gotten together two weekends in a row (outside at a distance). Her actual birthday was last weekend, so she and my dad came over and had chocolate peanut butter smoothies. It was pretty hot! This weekend the weather was perfect for an outdoor gathering, so I made brownie cookies, peanut butter chocolate chip oatmeal cookies, and snickerdoodle balls (all Vegan Richa recipes; I love all of her recipes!), and made ice cream sandwiches with the cookies. The ice cream melted too fast, but they were tasty. I'll definitely make the brownie cookies again--so good. 

 We've been enjoying garden goodies recently. I've roasted three huge batches of tomatoes from the garden. Most are now in the freezer, but I used one batch for a super delicious sauce in
tonight's dinner--a pasta dish that also included lots of eggplant and some red peppers from our garden. Our cantaloupes are not ready yet at all, but my friend, Orinda, had a ton, so Mark and I went out to her garden and got some last Monday. We've been eating delicious melon every night with dinner since then. She has always grown the biggest, juciest, sweetest cantaloupe but can't remember the variety. Last year I saved the seeds from her melons (and am doing so again this year), and planted them in our garden, so I hope we'll have our own delicious cantaloupe every year. 

I've fallen behind on weeding with my push to get everything ready for school in the last few weeks. I got a little done today before the rain hit. The zinnias are gorgeous enough to distract attention away from the weeds. They're such an easy, stunning flower. I'm so grateful for them. While everything else looks sad and past peak, the zinnias just keep bringing the beautiful color and shapes. The sunflowers and some roses are nice too, but there's certainly not as much variety as the glorious zinnias.