Easter Egg Hunt Pictures

I'm just now getting around to posting these. I've been very side-tracked due to the cat invasion and trying to find homes for them. These are pictures of the church Easter egg hunt that we went to. Note the winter coats. Brrrr...it was a cold day!

Metal Girl had fun finding the eggs with prizes inside.


Here are the two Metal Boys. Don't they look like two peas in a pod?

The Kitty Saga Continues

UPDATE*** I have wonderful news! Mark's coworker wants to adopt TWO of our kitty friends! She will be taking home Leo and Rascal. I'm so excited, although I am going to really miss them. :)

Lucy is the shyest one, but she is becoming more friendly. She is spayed and had to have her uterus removed. She seems very healthy now. She is becoming more social every day. In the sun, I see a little auburn in her fur and a few faint stripes on her tail. Her eyes are gorgeous green.


This is Jasper. He is sweet and loves to have a tummy rub. He's a beautiful soft gray. He is unaltered, but I may try to get him neutered this week.


Leo is beautiful and has been adopted! He'll be going home with his new family today. :)


We just found out today that Rascal will be joing his brother Leo and will be adopted today! I'm going to miss him! Rascal is the character of the bunch. He was riding in the bottom of the kids jogging stroller yesterday. He was also sitting on the birdbath as if it were a pedestal. He's sweet, and I really would like to find him a home. He loves children & is very photogenic.



You'll never guess what I did yesterday. I found out about a low cost kitty neuter/spay clinic taking place, so I packed up three cats in the only three cat carriers that we have and had them fixed. I chose the three that I THOUGHT were females, because I wanted to help them first. Well, I dropped them off and took MB to get his very first haircut. When I went back to pick the cats up, the vet laughingly told me that ONLY ONE of the cats is indeed a female! The two fuzzy ones are males, so they are likely all siblings. There's no Mommy. I really have to find a place to take the cats that we are not keeping because it's too difficult for us to handle & we are getting pressure from nearby family members who don't want them around and who have a doggy who would hurt them. I wanted to post the latest pictures. I'm so angry at whoever abandoned them. They're sweet people friendly cats.

Bobo to the Vet

Today I managed to take Bobo to the vet. It was quite an undertaking getting him there and inside with two kids in tow. We did it, though! He really is a sweetheart. And he is pretty healthy. His empty eye socket does have an infection, so I have to try to put antibiotic salve on it twice a day. He actually purred while they cleaned it! The only time that he was bad was when his blood was taken and when he got shots. He was just fine in the car as long as we sang softly to him. If we didn't do that, he would start meowing pitifully and trying to get out of the carrier.

I also called two animal shelters this morning. The no-kill shelter is filled and can't take the cats. But they can help in another way if we choose to do it. They can spay & neuter them at a lower cost and put them up for adoption on their web site. Then we'd have to deal with the people who are interested in adopting them and keep the cats here hoping that someone calls.

The third option is the humane society. I talked to someone there who said that they have an option where they try to adopt out the cats. Instead of euthanizing them if they can't find homes for them, they would call us to come back to get them. This would be the closest place to take them and the lowest cost. Keep in mind that Bobo's appointment cost around $170 today.

This has all been extra difficult to find time to take care of the cat situation since Mark and I have such different schedules. Mark can't take off much right now because of the loss of his supervisor. It's been a really stressful week. But I am glad that we got to help a sweet cat today. He's so incredibly nice. Still feeling a little overwhelmed, but it relieves some of the stress when I write about it. Thanks for listening.

Overwhelmed

Do you ever just feel overwhelmed, and it makes you just want to crawl under the covers and sleep? I feel that way today. I didn't sleep good last night, and then the kids got me up an hour earlier than normal. Then MG was feeling sick while MB was having teething pains, so that was stressful right at lunchtime. I've put off the cat situation, which is not good. They will multiply quickly like Tribbles if I'm not careful. One of the female kitties has bite marks on her neck...not a good sign. I've been depressed reading about the college murders. And about Mark's supervisor dying. And the cold not-so-Springlike weather. Cold and crappy.

Sad News

My husband Mark's supervisor at work passed away unexpectedly on Sunday morning. We have been in shock and saddened by this. She really was such a kind person who always had nice things to say every time I saw her, and always let me know how much she appreciated working with Mark. (Which is so nice to hear from a boss) She was so interested in our kids, too. It's been hard for Mark, especially because his previous supervisor had cancer and died. Both wonderful people with kind souls.

Stray Cat Pictures

This is Bobo who is missing an eye. He's the friendliest and very sweet.









Bobo's sister is a little shy, but very sweet and pretty. I love black cats.









I think that this one is the most striking with such white bushy whiskers and red/brown fur on the back. He's a boy!

And here is another boy.









These cats are all fairly friendly and seem to have been around children before. Bobo especially loves Metal Girl. Wish that we could keep all of them. I hope that we can find homes for them.

Cat Family

I have been trying to figure out what to do about our cat visitors. We have four. They are beautiful cats, but I worry about their fate if we take them to the shelter. Unfortunately, that's what we will have to do probably. I have fallen in love with them, so I'm depressed about this. I'll probably regret this, but I will describe them to you.

The mother is beautiful with long thick fur. She's black with white on her face and paws with striking white whiskers. Her eyes are big and yellow-ish green. She is very friendly.

There are three kittens who look to be about three or four months old. The female is all black with short hair and striking green eyes. She's a little shy. One male has long fur that's black and white, but with brown brushed on the tips of the fur. He has the most striking face with lots of white bushy whiskers. I think that he's the prettiest. He's a little shy as well. The other male has an injury. He's missing an eye. He has short hair that's black and white and the markings are like his mother. He is the nicest and friendliest of the bunch and loves Metal Girl who has named him Bo-bo.

I think that we are going to keep Bo-bo and take him inside the house after a visit to the vet. We feel that he is in most need of our help and he loves children and attention. I will have to take him to the vet next week to get his shots and to see if his eye injury can be helped. It looks like it must have happened when he was much younger, so it's not gory or anything. We just feel that if he went to the humane society, they would euthanize him because of the injury.

As you can see, I have fallen in love with all of them, so it's going to make me feel horrible to take any of them to the shelter. Two of my co-workers have stated that they want a second cat, but not right now. We've never had to take animals to the shelter before. Both of our indoor kitties were strays that we took in right away. Sigh. They're such sweet and beautiful cats. They want to be loved and fed.

I suppose that I'll post their pictures to see if anyone wants to travel across the country to adopt them from us. :) Or maybe some of you nearby people might want to adopt one. Just wait till you see their pictures. I am going to ask around over the weekend before we take them away. It will break my heart.

Cat Invasion

I found this odd but cute drawing online. You wouldn't believe the situation we are in with the hoard of cats that have decided to move in with us.

It all started at the beginning of last week when an adorable black and white kitten showed up on our doorstep. Actually, he followed Mark and the kids back from a walk. The poor little guy has only one eye. He has the sweetest personality and loves Metal Girl. We were thinking that he might be a stray and in need of our help. I had planned on taking him to the veterinarian.

Well, the next day his Mommy showed up. We're pretty sure that his Mommy is the neighbor's cat who we've seen on their doorstep wearing a collar. Then the following day, his sister dropped in. Then today another one who looks like the Mommy's twin arrived! Oh no....suddenly there's a cat family visiting with us.

It wouldn't have been so bad except that they're under our feet all the time. We have been feeding them, too, because we just couldn't let them starve in the cold weather. We thought that it was two cats that we were feeding, but now we see four or five hanging out!

Well, our neighbors just got back. Metal Mark took the kids out on a walk and the first two cats followed him out the road and didn't come back. And those were the two sweetest ones. I think that they are all probably barn cats that the neighbors were feeding. So I'm not sure if we're going to have to take one or two or what. We really can't handle the whole group of them since we already have two indoors! Poor things. I especially like the one-eyed kitty. He is the most loving. We'll have to see who shows up tomorrow.

Metal Girl has been especially bad lately. I'm not sure why. We got out today for a long walk, and she played at the park. I thought that playing outdoors would help, but she seemed even worse after that. I hear her getting in trouble as I speak. I'm not sure what's going on. Tomorrow is going to be boring because I plan in having "Poopapalooza" day. I'm going to put her in regular undies instead of the pull-up diaper to encourage her to use the potty. She has gotten very lazy with trying to use the potty, and I haven't been putting all my efforts into getting her to try. I did find a cheap Easter themed game that I put up on a shelf & told her that she could play it only when she poops in the potty. She got mad and cried because she wanted it, so maybe this will work. I'm extremely tired of changing big stinky poops. All you parents out there with young babies.... toddler poop is pretty disgusting. I don't know how it's possible, but I think that a toddler can poop as much as an adult. I feel bad because I sometimes gag when changing her diaper. Lately I've been saying "Ugh! This is gross!" and she will answer "Ewww! Let me see it!!"

Isn't that lovely? Keep us in your thoughts as we work on potty training. The ironic thing is that Metal Boy takes his diaper off every time he wets it! He is also very interested in the potty and wants to sit on it. But he will pull off his diaper and go on the floor, so I ended up putting the Princess pull-ups on him today. What a day! What a week!

Weighty Issues

I have weight issues. It's been especially difficult because I was always SO THIN as a child and teen & young adult. I guess my metabolism slowed down during my mid-twenties. That's when I first gained weight and went up and down with losing it and gaining it ever since. I used to do the slim fast diet and the three day diet. Then I had my first child and didn't lose all the pregnancy weight before getting pregnant with baby #2.

I've really been thinking about the psychological aspect of this. All too often, I will choose to stay at home instead of going to church or to a party or special event because "I have nothing that fits." It's true that most of my nice clothes do not fit me right now, but I think that there's more to it. I'm a shy person, so socializing is something that I really have to work at. Perhaps staying overweight has "helped" me to stay within my comfort zone. It's given me an excuse to continue being anti-social to some extent. This is not the best thing for my kids, so I really need to lose weight and become healthier. I think that it would help me to feel more energized too...I'm always so tired & feel like a sloth. I've got a lot to think about!

A blogger friend recently had a post about weight gain that really got me to think about this. It's something that I've been struggling with.