She Did It!!!

Much to my amazement on September 1st, my little girl got into the bathtub all by herself without being told to!!!  Maks will run and jump into the tub as soon as he sees me getting out his towels.  LillyAnn, on the other hand, hides under the bed and has to be coaxed out and then carried to the tub.  But, on Tuesday, she kept sneaking into the bathroom to  peek while Maks was taking his bath.  And then, to my complete shock, she came into the bathroom on her own as soon as Maks jumped out of the tub and sat beside the tub.  When I asked her if she wanted a bath, she got into the tub all by herself.  I'm soooo proud of my smart little girl!!! 

The Good, Bad, and Just Plain UGLY!

First the GOOD news:  My garden is awesome!  All of the veggies are growing nicely and it looks like I will be eating good this summer.  I picked my first snow peas yesterday and they were quite tasty.  I've got my eye on a couple of baby yellow crookneck squash, scallop squash, and zucchini squash that should all be big enough to pick and eat this weekend.  Yay!!!

And the even BETTER news is that I helped some clients write an offer on a property today. I'll be keeping my fingers crossed that we are able to negotiate successfully and have a contract in place by this weekend.  

Now for the BAD news: The lawnmower has a broken wheel adjuster part.  It's kind of hard to mow the lawn with only three wheels. I went to three different tractor / small engine repair / equipment stores today and have essentially been told that the replacement part needed to properly keep the wheel on the lawn mower is a special order part that will take several weeks to arrive and cost me almost $30.00.  Needless to say, I'm quite frustrated!

And finally, the outright UGLY: I am suffering from an infestation of fleas at my house.  Said infestation was discovered last night.  Actually, it discovered me.  Evidently I taste good, because I am now covered in red ITCHY welts from the little devils biting me!  I bathed and sprayed both dogs and went through their fur hunting for my tormentors - found a grand total of ONE flea.  Tonight the cat gets a bath and flea spray - I'm sure he'll be all sorts of thrilled about that. (NOT) And tomorrow, the cat gets locked outside while the dogs and I go on a field trip for 5 hours so the house can stay closed up and let the bug foggers kill all of the little demons deader than dead.  And then, after I borrow a lawn mower from the neighbor down the street and actually mow my lawn, my yard will be sprayed with more bug spray to kill all fleas and ticks and mosquitoes that even dare to think about coming anywhere near my property.  Yup, I'm quite pissed off at bugs right now... therefore, THEY MUST DIE!!!  

Spring and Gardens and My Desire to STRANGLE the Neighborhood Cats!!!

Two weeks ago I got my raised garden beds all ready for seeds to be sown.  I tilled the soil, pulled the weeds out, added compost, raked it all even, planned the layout of where everything would grow, and put obelisks in the center of the beds for the pole beans to grow up.  Then I patiently waited a couple of days for the weather to co-operate and proceeded to plant my vegetable garden.   I put in two varieties of sweet corn, two varieties of peas, pickling and salad cucumbers, purple pole beans, blue lake pole beans, lima beans, carrots, onions, lettuce, turnip greens, cantaloupe, watermelon, eggplant, zucchini squash, yellow crookneck squash, white scallop squash, and tomatoes.  All started from seed.  It's a rather ambitious garden.  

The following day I went out to water my seeds.  Seeds don't grow without water.  As I walked toward my garden I was HORRIFIED -- the *$#%^@(*&^!!! neighborhood cats had been using it as a litter box!!!    Normally I don't harbor negative feelings toward cats.  BUT I am NOT going to allow my garden to be used as a shitter!  I have been battling those stupid cats for the past two weeks: turning the garden hose on them, throwing sticks at them, and letting the dogs chase them off (normally the dogs are not allowed to chase cats).  Two of the beds finally have enough veggies coming up that the cats no longer venture near them.  Now I only have to keep them away from the bed that contains the squash.  I am sooooooo FRUSTRATED!

Good news is that everything I planted has come up and it looks like I'll be up to my ears in veggies this summer.  

Well... he TRIED!!!

Last night, as I watched thoughts of tormenting the cat enter Maks' head, I admonished him to, "be NICE to the kitty cat.". He was shaking from the amount of control it took, but Maks managed to very carefully and thoroughly cover Jack's face in puppy kisses. Relief spread across his face as I told him what a good boy he was for being so gentle and nice to the cat. Being nice to the cat is exhausting. So it makes sense that Maks would want to flop down for a bit and relax after that ordeal. He stepped away from the cat, turned around, and proceeded to sit ON the cat. OOPS!!!

It seemed like a good idea at the time...

Yesterday was absolutely beautiful - a perfect fall day, all sunny and warm, such a great day that it screamed for an outing to the park with the furry ones.  One of Lilly's favorite parks is Barfield-Crescent in Murfreesboro, so that was our destination yesterday afternoon.  Maks had never been to the park before, so this was his very first trip.  It probably seems strange that he's nine months old and only now going to the park for the first time, especially when I take Lilly all the time.  But, Maks hasn't been up for a park trip until now.  He just hasn't had the stamina (he is still a puppy after all) to keep up with Lilly and I for more than a two mile walk through our neighborhood.  Which means that he definitely could not manage the four mile up & down hill off road hikes that Lilly and I head out on.  With the day being absolutely perfect, I decided that he could probably manage the shorter easier loop at the park that is just about 2 1/2 miles long.  So, into the car we all got and off to the park we went. 


Driving into the park, I noticed signs saying there was a Halloween event and saw some bounce houses over by the softball fields.  I really didn't think much of it since we were headed to the other side of the park.  I probably should have paid a bit more attention.  We parked the car and headed up the trail.  All was going great, Lilly was overjoyed to be out hiking again and Maks was having a great time sniffing everything in sight.  Until... we came around a corner and met a GIANT turtle sitting on the side of the road reading a book.  Miss Social Butterfly (Lilly) got all excited and went over to inspect the person and costume and had a grand time making a new friend.  Maks hid between my knees and refused to walk past the turtle.  Just when Lilly and I had managed to convince him that it was safe to continue on the trail... a GIANT frog came walking up the path toward us.  Lilly busied herself making yet another friend, while Maks did his best to become invisible by hiding behind me.  Maks finally decided he'd trust me enough to follow Lilly and I further down the trail and we didn't run into any more characters for over a mile.  Unfortunately, on the last half of our hike all characters were in place and poor Maks was repeatedly spooked.  First it was the fairies with flapping wings, then the lights across the trail that were off until he went to step over them and someone plugged them in just at that moment, then the trombone and tuba playing lobsters, the singing raccoon, the bubble machine, and the fog machine.  At each of these Miss Lilly Ann stopped to make new friends and socialize while Maks hid behind me yet again and refused to move past the scary monster.  Lilly was quite fascinated with the singing raccoon and even got a tummy rub at that spot - it was the only place where Maks even attempted to be social, he let the raccoon talk to him and got close enough for the raccoon to pat him once on the head.  I was quite glad to be done with that portion of the trail and decided to head back to the car a different way to avoid more characters.  If you haven't figured it out by now, we walked through a children's Halloween hay ride exhibit (thus the toddler - not Maks - friendly characters).

The trail I chose to take back to the car is a gravel service road that goes past the frisbee golf section of the park.  OOPS!!!  I had unwittingly chosen the Haunted Halloween trail for teenagers and grown-ups.  Again Lilly was fascinated by the characters - gory, bloody, moaning corpses and all.  Maks however was less than appreciative.  I was afraid I was going to have to carry him past all of them.  Evidently moaning corpses are a lot scarier than trombone playing lobsters!  We finally managed to get off the service road and onto the frisbee golf course where thankfully there were no more scary characters and Maks was able to relax and enjoy the rest of our walk to the car.  Lilly, on the other hand, had so much fun making friends with all of the characters that she wanted to head back to the haunted hay ride and visit some more.  I told her we had tormented Maks enough and judging by how fast he was trotting AWAY from the goblins I was pretty sure we weren't going to be able to convince him to turn around.

I wonder if Maks will ever want to go to the park again?