KIVA

Having almost six hours of sleep last night, versus the less than three I got the previous few nights, certainly improves the quality of my day—even a Monday! I’m trying to stay in a decent mood today, but since I know that my girl is leaving me on Thursday night for three days, I’m already feeling pretty bummed. I really don’t like when she is gone—particularly this time of year when I’m already husbandless! She will have fun staying with M’s parents and playing with her visiting NJ cousins. Her absence leaves a huge whole in our house, though! She’s the person I spend the most time with.

Our living room floor and stairwell are covered with L & H's cat town from this weekend. I'm feeling all sentimental and emotional about her leaving me, so I've left it up. It's comforting to see her stuff all over, so I'm thinking she will get a free pass on cleaning up until she returns from her visit in IL.

Of note in the herbivore room, Kealy and Darwin have constructed a lovely nest, made of hay, feathers, and shredded paper strips. It’s under one of the play cages in the room, and Kealy sits in the nest waiting for something to happen. That could be a problem since Kealy is a male lovebird and Darwin is a male cockatiel. Love knows no bounds, and I wish them the best. Soon enough, they will get bored with guarding their little nest with imaginary eggs and go back to just being a child-free party couple.



Here's L cuddling with Oona & Luna (the mommy/baby pair, though the baby is now bigger than her mommy!) tonight during our herbivore hang out time. Vivi & Jolsie and Pansy & Blossom are enjoying tonights greens.

Petey continues to put weight on and do well. As soon as he starts doing naughty things again, I will start to try to taper him off the meds, and see if he can maintain mental health without them.

The most important part of this entry, though, is sharing my new favorite website. I think you’ll be as excited as I am about it! Kiva allows you to provide business loans (from $25 to whatever amount you can afford) to people in third-world countries who are trying to break the hold of poverty. It’s an amazing way to reach out and directly help those who want a shot at “the good life” (you know, things like food and perhaps some shelter for their families). It’s my new hobby, and I only wish I could help every single applicant on the site! Since I can’t, I figure telling everyone I know about it is the next best thing. Have fun and make a difference!!! Service work and giving to others is the best cure for depression! (WARNING: You may find this addictive!) http://www.kiva.org/.

More lilies

More lilies from our garden.

I'm mentally ducking out of our family movie tonight. I'm sitting here next to my girl, trying desperately to not listen to this. We had a Netflix miscommunication, and ended up with a movie called Earth that is not about Earth actually, but the animals. I am near tears, and the crapping movie still has another hour to go. I may have to leave the room. There is too much animal suffering, and none of the animals have died on screen (yet, anyway). I can't stop feeling exactly what they are feeling in the horrible situations, and it makes me sick. I feel vomitty. It doesn't bother L nearly as much as it does me. Luce seems much less bothered by the suffering of others than I am or than Dej was at that age.

I've been trying so hard for months now to convince myself that there is a reason to live--that there's more to life than muddling from one bit of suffering to the next. Seeing the reality of nature and the world we live in reconfirms that I'm right. Oops--and so much for no death on screen. That's now been taken care of.

I meet a baby rabbit this afternoon five minutes before she died. It was a nasty accident that I happened to witness. We stopped by Sarita's house to look at her yard and help with some landscaping questions after L's dance class. As we were chatting in her backyard, looking over the huge shared central greenspace, we saw her neighbor's little dog tear off and run to another little dog. I thought at first that the dogs were fighting, but then Sarita made out that they had a baby rabbit. The dogs people were behind them chasing and yelling. I took off running to check the rabbit. The guys thought she was dead and were going to bury her, but she wasn't dead yet. I rubbed her chest, loved her, and talked to her until she was gone. I hope I provided her some degree of comfort at the end. I walked away knowing she was the lucky one. Her misery has ended.

We then went inside, where Sarita made us a traditional warm weather drink, jaljira. I love that she was generously sharing her culture with us, and I really wanted to like the drink. There is absolutely nothing similar in the U.S., to which I could compare it. The majority of the flavor seemed to come from the roasted cumin seeds, which is just not a flavor I am used to consuming in and icy-cold beverage. M & L took one sip and were both done. I kept drinking, because it is so different, and sometimes you just need to forge through the adjustment period, and strange new things become better. It will take more than a day to accustom my tastebuds to jaljira, though. I will keep trying. I don't ever want L to get the typical American attitude that all things American are good, and all things different are not good.

Okay, this movie is horrible. I'm depressed. I need to leave the room and go spend time with my cats upstairs. And it's times like this I can't help but think, if I believed there was a god of any type, and that thing created a world this cruel (nothing to do with sin of man and other such bullshit--the pure cruelty and misery of the 'circle of life') and nasty, there isn't a strong enough word or series of words to proclaim my complete and utter hatred and antipathy for such a foul being. Seriously, a being with all the power in the universe and this is the best he can come up with. Shit, I'll take over from here and actually do a decent job. My paltry little human brain can come up with at least 5,372 world configurations that would be better than this one. Worship me. I'm much smarter, kinder, and more worthy of worship. Plus, if you throw all your money at me, I will actually help others with it, not build giant blinking crosses and buttery touchdown jesuses.

Good night. Tomorrow is Monday. Oh joy.

Fireworks

I think the animals have finally forgiven me for abandoning them for camping. Ivan ignored me for several hours. He couldn’t keep that up, and finally had to come get some love. We got home before noon, and he wouldn’t talk to me until after 10:00 pm. Even after giving in, he was still hostile, angry, and short-fused for several days (more so than he usually is). Everybody was well cared for and stayed healthy for our whole trip! That was nice.

Sarita and I braved the sauna and walked over to the farmer’s market today. My 'greens lady' was not there! She’s the only one with organic greens, and though they are a little pricey, they are always fresh and gorgeous. I will have to go to the grocery store and try to find some before I have a mutiny in the herbivore room. They haven’t had greens for three days now, and though they like the other produce and eat it almost as piggishly, they really miss their greens. Their positive reinforcement has trained me very well. I love the squeals when I bring their nightly produce in to them, but I really like the extra happy noises and watching them try to balance on their two back feet while they stretch up as tall as they can get in an effort to get the greens into their little mouths faster. They are much better at training me than I am at training them!

I think that Fiona (the gray bunny) has recently grown to like sweet peas better slightly more than her greens. She gets excited and leaps around when she sees either, but if I give them both to her at once, she will always eat her peapods first. Or maybe she's like me and saves her favorite for last.
We did our own family night of fireworks the night of the third, instead of the fourth. My parents, L & H, and I watched while M lit it up. He only started our woodchips on fire once this year. We did them early, because M chose to work on Monday the fifth, so it made more sense to do them on a Sat. night than waiting until after the fireworks on Sunday like we typically do.

We had a typical, mellow fourth, except for one major problem. SyFy didn’t run the Twilight Zone marathon this year. It was a tragedy of epic proportions for me. I need warning before a change that major occurs! I felt ‘off’ all day. We went to my parents for a mid-day meal, where my fave aunt and her partner joined us, and we all hung around there until M & I had to go home and do our dinner-time critter chores. My parents & L came to get us to go to the fireworks. We weren’t sure if they were going to go or not, because it was raining and looking like more would be coming. Fortunately, the fireworks went on as planned, and there was no rain. They were a little shorter than usual (no $$ this year), but they were nice.


Libby, my mom's cat, spent most of the afternoon in my Aunt Bobbie's purse.

L enjoyed them and brought along a clay dragon she made. She’s made several clay dragons, and has kept some and given some away. Her favorite—the one she is taking everywhere these days—is Gretel. She’s been reading a book series about dragons (surprise!) made of clay who animate and can speak with the special creator (in this case, her). Gretel talks to her quite frequently and was asking her about the “flowers in the sky” during the fireworks. This is a very interesting phase.

She went over to play at H’s Monday afternoon. She was pretty excited, as she doesn’t get to go play at others’ houses very much, and because he was watching his grandma’s dog. I got a call from her an hour and a half earlier than I was planning to pick her up. She had been having fun, but then she dropped Gretel and broke her wing off. She was devasted and could barely keep it together. She just wanted to come home and fix Gretel and said she couldn't play or have fun until she was fixed. We picked her up early, and she ran to the hot glue gun and got her all fixed up. Whew!

Last night Dej came over and the three of us hung out and did a little crafting. I made a bracelet that was SO quick and easy, and since it's bright with lots of colors, it makes me happy. The girls both like it, and since it fits both of them, I'm sure they will be using it. I just used all of the leftover beads from all of our other projects. It's quite a hodge podge.

L made a necklace and created the cover for her tree journal. We used leftover cardboard (which I save for things like this) for the cover, and a heavy corrugated piece for the backing, so the journal is sturdy and easy to write/draw in. We put a spiral binding along the top, and ta-da...her tree journal is ready, so we can start her tree journal project this week. I thought the cover really turned out beautifully. She used her quill pen and india ink to draw all of the black stuff, and I was pretty impressed with the results. Those things are really tough to work with (at least for me)!

Favorites

Here are a few of my favorite shots from our recent camping trip.

More camping

We took some time away from hiking and the campgrounds to go to a couple of places nearby that we thought would be fun. The first place we stopped was The Museum of Minerals and Crystals. It's a small place but was definitely worth the stop. We had so much fun walking through and looking at the absolutely beautiful creations of our Earth. The owner was a very nice man, who was happy to share stories and information with us. It will take less than an hour, but if you're in the Dodgeville area, I would recommend it.

L and M had been there a few years ago on one of their adventures, and she loved it. She's been talking about it since and was so happy to get to go back and share it with me.

From there we went to The House on the Rock. M & L had never been there, and I haven't been there since I was in my early teens. It's a must-see, mostly because words can't begin to describe the place. Neither can pictures. It is very interesting and is an overhwelming visual and audio experience! Some of the collections housed there were absolutely gorgeous (stained glass, tiffany lamps, faberge eggs, carousel horses, etc.). Some were bizarre and wierd, and some were just downright WTF?!



I noticed this lovely lass looking at me from the doll collection and knew I had to have her picture. She's already been featured on two JibJab videos that we made (M, Dej & Luke, and I sometimes do strange things for entertainment late at night).

While the dolls were just...eeeew--neither myself nor my girls have ever been into dolls--the doll houses awakened another artistic outlet in L. She was absolutely enthralled with the gorgeous and elaborately decorated wooden doll houses. She has decided that it must be her new hobby. She has already selected the doll house she intends to build, gotten Hunter to agree to doing the electrical wiring in the house, and has been shopping for furniture and decorating ideas. Since this is perhaps the most ridiculously expensive hobby ever, she's either going to have to come up with a way to earn money and subsidize this hobby or her house will be furnished and decorated very slowly over the course of years.

L had three favorites (she couldn't chose just one): the food, the animals, and the beach.

My favorite part of this trip couldn't be captured with pictures. We spent hours, every night, sitting out by the campfire, enjoying the plethora of stars (it was very clear every night), and the full/fullish bright moon, which arose over the lake as a huge, bright orange sphere. There were also more owls than we have ever heard at a campsite before. It was so cool to listen to the different types of calls. We don't know which owl goes with which call yet though--that's a research project for us. The calm serenity I felt outside, in the dark bustling night was very restorative. I feel very "one with the universe" at times like that. I LOVE being outside at night and the sky is so much more beautiful and full of stars than it is here in our yard. M feels a little less comfortable outside in the dark with all of the sounds around. He kept his stick with a glowing tip of fire next to him, in case any monsters or rabid animals jumped out at him.

Our bedroom ceiling is full of these little glow-in-the-dark star stickers, which actually make me very happy at night. I can pretend I'm sleeping under the stars. I've been looking for a few years now for more of them, so I can add some constellations up there, but I can't find them anymore. :*-(

On vacation recovery

We made it through another camping trip and are trying to get caught up at home and caught up on rest. We had great weather throughout and not a single disaster. It was wonderful!

First and foremost, it was unique and sad. It was the first camping trip that L did not bring her case of cat figurines. She built a fairy house as soon as we got to the site, and it was then I noticed that she had not yet brought the cats out. I asked her about it, and she stated matter-of-factly that she decided not to bring them. I wanted to cry. She had brought along half of the stacks of books she had gotten the day before, when we went to B & N. (Are you seeing the theme there?)

We camped at Governor Dodge State Park, which is not far from home at all! M & L had been there before, but I had not. It was a very nice park, and we had a nice, big campsite which overlooked the lake.

M and L decided they were going to try to cook potatos on the campfire. I was pretty skeptical about the results, but as it turned out, the potatos came out perfectly. They cooked some every night. L seemingly has no limit as to how many potatos she can eat! If we ever have leftover potatoes, which is rare with our girl, they don't last beyond the next day.

As always, we did a lot of hiking, got to see many waterfalls, frogs, toads, squirrels, raccoons, beautiful forests, etc. We did encounter one unusual thing while hiking along a streambed. Periodically, near or in the water, we would see a rock sculpture. There were four in all, and each was quite interesting.

L then added a few of her own. They were NOT easy to make. Whoever made the original ones had a lot of patience!

We played games.

We had a fantastic day at the beach! We swam, and she made friends and built sand castles.