Life (and sun) over Laundry, everytime

Did I mention I don't even want to come inside when it's nice out? (except to fall into deep-coma-like naps every other afternoon) It's true. Consequently the dishes got out of control for a few days there, not to mention the laundry. I wouldn't mention the laundry, in fact, if this post didn't completely revolve around it. (it's okay, you can go now. I can tell you're bored already by yet another laundry post.) Alls-I-know-is I HAD to do a little wash. I told Grey to put a pair of socks he was wearing (outside without shoes, of course) in the hamper. He yelled back to me from the laundry room that he couldn't because the dirty clothes were "too tall"! Very nice. Don't you feel better about yourself now? Good - that's what I'm here for.
And now I'm off to ignore the new pile lurking behind the laundry chute doors and play with the horsies in the sun.

SFOD - it's catching

With all this beautiful weather all I have been able to think about is planting. Flowers. Trees. Shrubs. Vegetables. Herbs. I find myself driving by nurseries NOT on my way. . . slowly. I picture elaborate landscape designs and mentally spend thousands upon thousands of dollars on foliage I'm not sure will survive in this climate, and I'm quite sure I don't know the names of. It's an obsession, possibly even a disease. A self-diagnosed case of SFOD - Seasonal Flowering Obsessive Disorder. Heard of it? It's an up-and-coming condition, I swear. Once the pharmaceutical companies discover its' rampant existence you'll be able to medicate for it. (Not me. I'll suffer. Besides, medicine is yucky.)

So, I decided Wednesday was the day to kick of the season with a well-deserved bang. After all I have done a little weeding, and I was devoid of horsey duties for the day (other than the whole feeding thing). Trying to convince Tyler of the actual need to do this was, of course, another story altogether. Maybe I should have picked a day he was working. Note to self: Don't mention needing flowers to husband. So, in discussing our plans for the day, our conversation went something like this:

Tyler- SOOOO, what are your plans for the day?
Me- Hmm. Laundry. Little housework. Work in the yard.
T- Oh, you have the day off.
M- Something like that, yes. I thought I'd just run to the store and pick up a few things to plant and then get started.
T- You're planting ...what?
M- Flowers for the planters and some more stuff for the terrace.
T- So, is that really what you want to do?
M- Um, yeah. ( Was I speaking in code?)
T- I'm just wondering if there's something else you'd rather spend money on?
M- I SO don't get the question. . . (flowers, flowers, flowers, flowers. . .)
T- You want to buy flowers?
M- Yes. Flowers.
T- I was thinking fence posts.
M- You want to know if I want to buy fenceposts?
T- Yeah, to finish the fence.
M- (Flowers, flowers, flowers, flowers) Wellll, yes, but today I want to buy flowers. (And trees, and shrubs, and vegetables . . . besides, YOU buy fenceposts. Not quite my thing.)
T- I was also thinking we should get Max some of those hard tires for his bike.
M- O-kay. (and this has WHAT to do with my flowers?)
T- But you're thinking you want to buy flowers.
M- Yes. Flowers.
T- I was also thinking maybe we should go out for dinner.

I'm thinking maybe he was just thinking aloud. That's what I'm thinking. Otherwise it seems our lines of communication have completely broken down. Is it because of the flowers? I mean, I realize that prettying things up a bit doesn't enter into the realm of the logical male mind. I also realize - increasingly - that a large majority of decisions in my life seem to be based solely on a cuteness-factor that definitely lacks a certain logical factor. AND I'm thinking the consistency of that little habit may have finally short-circuited my oh-so-logical husband. The flowers are pretty though. AND, the herbs smell delicious. Maybe they'll bring him back to his senses.

Can Open - Worms Everywhere.

So, I guess it's about time to let the cat out, of the bag that is. It's been pushing it's nose out for months now - just little glimpses here and there, meowing incessantly to those close and possibly even scratching some eyes out. Cats. I do realize that some of you saw it for what it was right away, mostly due to the following facts:

• I have been simultaneously nauseous and famished 24 hours a day.


• I have leaped to new heights of anti-social behaviour - mostly due to the above fact.


• My nap time suddenly knows no bounds.


• I teared up during 'Chuck', 'Lost', 'Grey's Anatomy', and 'Bones'. Not to mention 'Monster's vs. Aliens'. I mean, really! Get a grip.


• Hot Chocolate has lost it's appeal. If you didn't know - that's huge, by the way. Huge.


• I'm wearing a short-sleeved shirt. . . and it's cooler than seventy-five degrees out.


• If it didn't completely gross me out, I think I could burp the alphabet at least twice - anytime after four p.m. . . . daily.


• My super-sensitive nose has turned into a near bionic phenomenon.
• I can't seem to hold onto anything! Loose joints, I tell you. Something my husband thinks is bogus, but I assure you, I'm not usually THIS clumsy.
• My bladder thinks it's the size of a peanut.
• What skinny jeans? They're in hibernation, bring on the fattys now and see how long they'll last before I have to add rubber bands to the fasteners.

That's right. I got myself knocked up (blasted husband :) Heh, heh). I've got a bun in the oven. I'm a defective typewriter. I'm glowing. I'm three sheets to the wind. Oh, wait. That's something else entirely. Scratch the three sheets comment. I'm eating for two. I'm prego, expecting, with child, hungry. AND I couldn't be happier. I was starting to think I should be on the lookout for hot flashes. Now I'll be getting a heat wave instead. Yay. (Not so much on the actual internal heat wave as on the baby-thing itself.) Anyway, here's to the second trimester energy actually kicking in one of these days so I can spend more time sitting here with you; because sitting really takes it out of me, you know.

Ah, such an idyllic life

A couple of weeks ago I was heading out to do the nighttime feeding (of all creatures great and small) when I heard my mother-in-law calling to me from her yard. "One of your horses is out!" I looked up in alarm, naturally. Surely if one was out the rest would be close behind. Luckily, it was Tyrone, the big Tennessee Walker that has no use for boundaries. As much as the others may want to follow his lead sometimes, very few ever do. I think they are stopped by one of two things; either they know Ty can simply leap tall fences in a single bound (and they can't so much or are too lazy), or they don't want to be caught following the low man on the totem pole anywhere - brilliant escape plan or not. So there stood the big beast calmly trimming our ever-so-patient neighbors' perfect lawn. (The soccer-field neighbor, not the not-so-nices' obviously) Apparently it was just too much for him to be in a nearly grass-less existence with all that tantalizing green so close. The fence line that separates our yards is simply ancient - it consists of cedar posts, some cedar rails, and a LOT of wire animal fencing. We haven't replaced anything there yet and it's weak spots are significant. My mother-in-law said she watched Ty pushing his head further and further through the fence, stretching his lips out to nibble the grass until she heard a crack. He broke the top rail, stood there for a minute and then stepped right over into their yard. The other horses were tearing around, rearing up, kicking, and generally just having a great time seeing one of their own on the outside, unaccompanied. The youngest mare, who is slightly less-than-graceful at times literally fell and slid at least twice (that I saw). 'All riled up' is the term that comes to mind. If any one of them had broken free anywhere - let alone in a field of grass - they would be nearly impossible to catch single-handedly. Tyrone, however, is that kid that's just not like the others.

It's not just the fact that his ears are a bit donkey-ish, it's not his fault, just his breed. I swear if he could talk his voice would come out sounding just like Eeyore's. Very sweet, but maybe a little dopey. So he just stood and waited for me to get almost up to his neck and then began to meander away with Izzy bolting around his feet yapping.

When we were almost to the back end of our neighbor's property, and passing our hay barn a white flash flew in front of us. It seriously took me a minute to figure out what it was, and then it dawned on me - Bunny the flying goat. I never knew she could jump through the space between the animal fencing and the barb-wire on the backside of her pen. In fact, I don't she realized it until that moment. She does this to herself no less than once every other day:

Then I have to spend an agonizing five minutes or so trying to get her head twisted just the right way to get her head and horns back through the fence - all so she can jubilantly ram me with her new-found freedom.


So, really, who knew?



And so, Ty kept meandering, Izzy kept yapping, I kept walking, and Bunny followed us all - except for the break she took every 30 seconds or so to stop and stand in front of me, or head-butt my thigh, or chase Izzy. (Why do we have a goat again? Oh yeah, it's cute. Almost forgot.) Ty rambled all the way out of their yard onto the covered canal where he turned South, and where at least it's fenced off at the end of our property. I breathed a sigh of relief. If he would have turned the other direction we could have been in for a long walk, and who knows what other random farm animals we would have picked up. He came to a rolling stop at the fence and let me halter him and lead him back all the way through our neighbors' yard, onto the street, around through my mother-in-law's yard, and finally back where we started. Remember, this me leading a horse whose back I literally can't see over, circled by a loud and annoying goat, chased by a yapping, jumping Terrier that suddenly thinks she's herding sheep. My only consolation is that (to the best of my knowledge) no one captured this twisted-pied-piper scene on tape. And this is where the story should end, except it doesn't. Because apparently I'm slow.

Back in the pasture I lost hold of the rope when I was latching the gate behind us - and Ty once again meandered off. Dragging his lead rope. Not a good thing. About that time he realized how excited all the other horses were and he decided to take a victory lap around the pasture. Not that big of a deal, really. UNTIL Bunny decided to play interference. Every time I got close to catching the little (big) twit Bunny was suddenly in front of me head-butting me or jumping sideways in the way only a goat (or a moron) would. Sideways, seriously. Finally I had to grab her and drag her off (making ridiculous choking noises, the big faker) just to get to my original mark.

In the end everyone was returned to their proper place. I even fed them.

Happy Belated

So, I've been completely non-existent in the blogworld for weeks now and I have so many posts stored up in my head that I'm not sure where to begin. How about this little beauty of a picture.

Awww, isn't he cute? Weren't the seventies sad?

And, I know. There are hardly words. BUT, first I have to point out a couple of things. Tyler SO thinks he's not a redhead, and granted, he's not so fiery now as he is in this picture, but still. There's no other color his hair could possibly be. RED. We spent the last week in Palm Desert with Tyler's brother and family and I'm pretty sure I heard their boys calling him Carrot-top during a heated game of 'Chicken' in the pool. . . Next, can you make out the pink ruffle peeking through? Enough said there, pink ruffle. I think he said he was ten in this picture so I thought it a fitting tribute photo for making it through a full three additional decades. Oops, did I say that? He told the boys he was twenty-five. Well, Happy Belated 'twenty-fifth' Baby! So, maybe we'll finally have that belated house-warming party mid-summer (once the you can safely walk in the back without muck-boots) and call it a belated 'Big 4-0' celebration instead.

Then there's this guy:

Greybug (our other March 25th birthday) turned six. I marvel at how much personality is packed into this little body! He's quite seriously a laugh-a-minute. And he's SO excited to be six now, he hasn't stopped talking about it for weeks on end - "I wonder what I'll look like when I'm six?", "I think I might like black beans once I'm six" . . . As far as I can tell, he's pretty much the same now, but don't tell him that. His life has been completely transformed as far as he's concerned.