Denise and the Cat...

Monday Morning. Today started normal. Tasha running through the house, waking up the family which is her self appointed job to do, I have the strong desire to fire her from this position, but what can you do?

Anyway, Denise was feeling rather industrious  after her morning wake up call, so at 8:30 in the morning she gthered her laundry together and went outside to the laundry room. Now I should explain, that in Charleston, the laundry rooms are separate rooms outside of the house but still attached. Ours is off the patio to the left. So while Denise is busily stuffing clothes in the washing machine she hears a samll faraway mew.

Now our cat has been missing for three days, so she was a little excited about hearing the sound she thought it was our cat. So she starts seaching, The Laundry room is the cats favorite place to sleep and hang out. She moves clothes, looks under boxes checks the dryer. No Kitty. She deciides she must have been dreaming.

Steps out side the door and  hears it again. She starts searching the back yard
looking uder bushes ,in the old dog house and  no cat. Just when she thinks she is losing her mind....she decides to go in the house

After heading in the house, yet a third time she hears the meow again this time a tad more urgently.

So,she heads off in the direction of the the sound, which is coming from the back of the yard still no cat  but she notices the dogs in the neighbor yard, who live catty corner to us, are barking uproariously at something, looking up in the tree she sees the cat. up the tree with two dogs standing guard below it.

Well, now we know where the cat has been for three days.

Denise come rushing in the house, excited I found the cat. She yells excitedly.

"Where" I ask

"Two dogs ran her up a tree"

Oh.

So, we go out and try to coax the cat down, the neighbor has an electric fence so we cannot climb the fence, I got a ladder, Denise tried to climb the tree with the ladder...ladder was too short.

The kitten has now seen us and is going wild, trying to decided if we could save her from the dogs should she jump.

Probably not a good idea.

Luckily the neighbor came out, she has a friend who had an extension ladder so she's off to call the friend to bring the ladder.

and while she is doing that......

The kitty trots down the tree on the other side right into Denises' arms.

Nothing like a cat to cause problems. Denise is happy, gleefully hugs the kitty, the kitty is shaking for minute then starts to purr......

We bring her in the house, she rushes for the kitty box. Can you imagine not going to the Bathroom for three days? THEN she eats and drinks and...........
asks to goout, yet agin..out you go.
try to stay away from dogs and trees this time.
The cat looks at me like I am nuts.

One day we need toname this cat

And so it goes....

of trees and fires, of children and accidents Random Saturday

Today is your typical Charleston day. It is not too hot,nor too cold. As a matter of fact it is perfect.

Tasha and I cut the grass this morning, we were awakened by a fire truck whizzing by  the house, the house around the corner was on fire. Pretty serious one as well. A man was brought out suffering from smoke inhalation, another man was brought out whose condition we couldn't tell. . Tasha and I prayed for both of them. The fire seemed to be in the back of the house , Eric told me.  He hopped on his magical moped and rushed right over, He got pictures, but since the fire I have learned the man died, so I won't post any pictures. The house was next door to a friend of Eric's.(this post as always was written over a couple of hours with me stopping to do something somewhere, some how for someone)

Its sad to think he was(the man who died) making breakfast for his family one minute then the next.....

Life is that way though:

Tasha helped me cut the yard this morning. She sat and talked on her phone while I pushed the lawnmower, prior she picked up sticks with me chattering all the way. have you ever met a three year old who doesn't chatter? She,at three wants to do everything. yesterday we made brownies, she broke the eggs, spread the brownies in the pan, ate the mix out of the bowl well, ate some and the rest was over her face, dress, hands, shoes, counter well you get the picture.

if you check my FB page you will see she keeps sending messages on FB for me as well.  

When her mom was three we were making cookies, and she dropped a glass measuring cup then proceeded to fall on it. As luck would have it, it cut her wrist, open right on the main vein. blood spurted, yes spurted all over the kitchen. Do you ever notice how we go into, some kind of emergency mode like robots? I still do not know how I did this, but I saw my child spurting blood, I had the presence of mind not to scream, or panic so the kids wouldn't, wrapped a towel around her arm to keep her from bleeding; then ran to a neighbor to take me to the hospital because I knew there wasn't time for an ambulance.

We got her to the hospital, she had 25 stitches and surgery to repair the vein. She has a large scar to this day to remind me to always use plastic measuring cups when baking with kids. A messageI am passing on to all mothers of toddlers.

And see how quickly life changes.

Eric and Deni went out delivering books yesterday, the went over to Johns island. Now Charleston itself is a series of islands, it is not just a city on the edge of the ocean. It is comprised of 5 islands, Mount Pleasant, Johns Island, James Island, Sullivan's island and of course Fort Sumter is on Sumter Island across the way. 

We haven't had time to explore all of the island as yet, but while they were on Johns island they ran into this huge tree (not literally ran) but met up with this tree.  They say you can tell how old a tree is by the rings in it's trunk. They didn't have all day to count but we are thinking it is probably as old as the settlers on the island or maybe was a baby when they came in 1525 to settle Johns Island. 

An awesome thing like this trees makes us remember just how small we are in the kingdom. if this tree could talk.....

 What would it say about our settlers? What secrets does it hold? imagine climbing this tree as I am sure many generations did.. Makes it  seem like Earth day should be more then once a year, doesn't it? Well thats it, you know how Saturday blogs are. 

 Everyone have a great weekend...

It was the day after Christmas

As you can see "Santa" with help of two sets of grandparents and her mom and uncle: helped Tasha to make out quite well this Christmas. Capitalism reigns on!

It was a busy day, because her mom

 worked on Christmas day, Santa was delayed to our house. He showed up around 2 in the afternoon right after mom got off work. While we were picking mom up, he arrived left his magic(with a little help from Uncle Eric) and rode off into the sunset or sunrise?. Of course a 2.10 year old doesn't care when he arrives just so he does. She was thrilled at her first "real" encounter with the Big man and spent all afternoon going from toy to toy. 

I was fairly amazed by the fact that unlike most almost three year old, she didn't just flit from toy to toy, but stayed and played with each toy for a while before moving on to the next one. Again she showed quite a bit of maturity. she got a new  kitchen; being she is quite domestic and played with that on the longest

The infamous tree, our Charley Brown Christmas tree, as you remember, had a slight accident and landed on it's back a few days ago.

it recovered somewhat, and at least stood bravely on its own trunk for the day. We put it out of its misery today, and it is basking in the South Carolina sun in the backyard. Next week it will be off to be recycled. Pitiful little thing, isn't it?

So today we spent the day recovering. Resting up, all except Deni who found herself once again working. But her day is coming.She will be off Monday and she can collapse as well. 

Christmas is a time of joy and giving. The look on the face of a child makes it worthwhile. I had

forgotten that look, in the years of turmoil. it was great to see it again. 

We all joined a gym for different reasons. My daughter is on her quest for health and diet, My son is into Yoga and working out to increase his energy. i am into just starting to get me together. I am going back into Pilate's, and working out to gain more upper body strength. I am looking for peace. Pilate's is a joint venture between body and mind. It causes you to be more away of your self and your health. I guess the phrase is "In tune" So we are all involved in the gym.

And we are all getting ready for 2009. 

But some of us have had a very hard two days. We just couldn't make it to our beds. We don't have the energy to make a New Years resolution. Too many toys, to much life to experience, so we sleep where we lay.

After all tomorrow is another day, more castles to conquered, More toys to discover, more life to live.

Speaking of toys, I got a new MP3 player which is great, I know it is because my son tells me so. He has told me all the wonderful things it will do. he has done the. Tnight after he goes to sleep, I am sneaking up on him and reclaiming my MP3 player. My daughter also got a camera, which is the reason we have pictures.  So christmas has been grand, we are moving into the 20th century. After months of cooking with one sauce pan, (with a hole in it if you put to much water init) one Dutch over and a stock pot, my son purchased for the house a set of pans. We could cook Christmas dinner.  Yes! so Christmas is over, until next year. 364 days to get ready again. We will need every one of them. 

I hope your Christmas was as nice as ours.