Since I'm trying to blast out a ton of posts here I thought I'd just mush most of May all together into one big old post. Here are the chapters of May:
Chapter One: A Sick Lizard.
Poor Samantha bit her tongue. Or ate a roach the wrong way or something. She got a big ouchie on her tongue and stopped eating. I finally caved in and found a vet who would see reptiles. Closest place was DRAPER. That's in the 100 souths. I live on 1 south. It's ok - I felt kind of cool to be driving along with a bucket of lizard next to me in the car. She's a sweet little lizard and I had a great experience at the vet's. They gave her meds and and tried to reassure me. I'm sorry to say though that this story does not end well - we did our best but in mid June we woke one morning to find that Samantha was no longer with us. (I know that's jumping ahead in the blog but since I have the pictures here I thought I'd just go ahead.) We were really really sad to lose Samantha - Chase was especially sad. He dug the grave himself. That tears at a mother's heart, just so you know, to see your very sad son tearfully digging a grave. We love our animals. Happily we still have Omnom, the male bearded dragon, and are trying to take better care of him.
Chapter Two: Coop Plans
We have been working hard to get a more permanent coop going for our flock of nine chickens. We cleared this back corner of the yard and leveled the ground and have made many a trip to "The Depot" for supplies. This is just the picture of the cleared ground, but we now also have a coop platform and three walls thanks to Troy. The fourth wall is on its way - much more complicated with its built-in nesting boxes and swinging door. It's going to be awesome.
Chapter Three: Outings with Friends
Our aquarium membership is just about up and though it's been great we don't have plans to renew it. Too far away, my kids are getting too big. But it was fun to take friends of Romney's and Emma's along for a day where we got to hold butterflies and eat sloth cupcakes and watch 3D movies.
Chapter Four: Shows that Make Us Cry
We waited and waited for the next of the Avengers series. We knew that this last installment was going to come in two movies, which totally warned us that this movie would be a cliff hanger, a middle chapter, an "Empire Strikes Back," if you will. We were warned. And yet....sad feelings anyway! I just have to say that I just loved sitting by my Romney during the show. There were some great moments and it was so fun to sit and laugh together, to repress our squeals together, to grab hangs with equal fervor. Oh, the entrance of Captain America. Good moment. We felt the same way about it. I could tell by the way we were clutching our sweaty palms together. So fun to watch together!!
Also, PBS made a new version of Little Women, one of my favorite stories. My girls didn't quite make it through all three episodes, but we watched the first couple together. I really enjoyed this version a lot, though not as much as the one from 1995 or whenever that was. Still, I loved it. And what I loved even more is remember my first experiences with the story as I watched my girls feel those same feelings as each memorable scene came along. Oh, how could Amy be so wicked as to throw that book in the fire! But when she fell in the ice? My girls were making the same exclamations I did at their age. Sometime we need to read it together.
Chapter Five: Planting Day!!
Pretty much from the moment we take down the Christmas lights I begin to anticipate the day we plant the pots on our porches. I can't wait for that trip to Western Gardens when we search out all our favorites: sweet potato vines, alyssum, lobelia, coleus, begonia. We always try out a few new plants here and there. We found great hanging baskets at Costco. It's a great day. Finally the cold has gone and our living space can expand onto our porch. (A July update - our porch plants are doing pretty well but not as great as last year. I've lost some lobelia and the sweet potato vines aren't going nuts like they did last year. I'm a little disappointed but our porch is still a great place to be. Hopefully things will get better.)
Chapter Six: Another Matthew Birthday
I know I kind of say the same thing every year when May 5th comes around. It's hard to know how to say how much this day means to our family, how special the feeling is as we make the day special together. How extra sweet the kids are to each other and how pretty much all the fighting seems to just waft away. I love celebrating our Matthew. It's 11 years now. The sting of the hurt is all gone and the scar that is left over is quite beautiful, marking all five of us. We have an extra sense of the eternal.
We got some quick food - Dominos thin crust pizzas have been treating us right lately. Not too much money, tasty, everyone likes them. Panda Express is usually the take-out of choice but it's not as easy as this pizza. We enjoyed dinner then played for a few minutes on the breezy hillside where we have taken to gathering.
Of course we had to have a balloon incident. How many years out of 11 have we NOT had a balloon incident? Like two maybe? This year was actually hilarious. We must have gotten some crappy old helium because after we carefully wrote our notes, which I always feel very tender about, we attached them to our balloons and gathered at the edge of the hill to let them go. On the count of three we sent off our notes to heaven and they began to drift away. Sort of. A couple of them started up towards the heavens but mostly they just blew half-heartedly downhill to the west. I doubt they made it more than a mile or two. Luckily this incited gales of laughter instead of the tears we have had other years as our balloons have departed earlier than meant or gotten stuck in trees or popped. It's okay. It's part of the tradition.
Chapter Seven: Late Nights at the Zoo
Are we too old for the zoo? So sick of going because we've been a million times? I guess not, especially on a cool evening in May when they are open late. Granted, Chase wasn't too interested in coming but the girls and Troy and I sure had fun. It's just a pleasant place to walk, to munch on popcorn, to enjoy a little animal life.
Chapter Eight: Sausage Surprise
Best Mothers Day Ever. Normally, we celebrate mother's day with the girls bringing me breakfast in bed. I love it. Very sweet. And that's about it. We aren't too big on gifts and grand gestures around here which suits me fine - I feel a little weird about it anyway. But Troy totally surprised me this year. He knew how much I wanted an apple watch; we had been talking about getting me one since about New Year's. I sure wasn't expecting one for mother's day though. And then as I happily ate my eggs and toast in bed with Troy and the kids eagerly sitting around me, Troy pulled out a gift. It was a little weird for them all to be so excited about me eating eggs, but the gift delivery made sense. A long narrow box...could it be? I excitedly opened it to see an apple watch box! Yay! Hurriedly I opened the box and there lay.....a sausage. Doesn't maybe sound that funny but we all busted up and laughed together really hard. I thought it was very funny. Luckily Troy had the watch not far off and I left the rest of of the family to nibble on delicious sausage while I got acquainted with the new toy which I enjoy a great deal. Thank you Troy. I still love my watch.
Chapter Nine: The Last Days of School
Here I am with Emma at her field day. There were a lot of ups and downs about working at the school year this year - I learned a lot, connected with many good folks, enjoyed being near my Emma. It sure wasn't easy though! Something that made it better was having a chance to see my gal in her day-to-day life. I think she loved it too.
Here's Ellie, my partner in crime, my fellow parent/employee/recess duty friend. I was her Young Women's leader long long ago but now she's much more of a help to me than I ever was to her! We sure bonded a lot as we roamed the playground together every day.
One other event worth mentioning that I don't have a single picture of is the annual Arts Showcase at the school. I have to say that this was a major year for me because it's the first year in about seven years that I wasn't stuck in some back room checking volunteers in and out all evening. I wasn't in charge of the volunteers! Did you hear that?? I did sit at a PTA table but it was out in public and I got to get up and walk around and go see things. GO SEE THINGS. This was amazing and I was super okay with it.
So there you go. That's most of May. Just little snippets but they added up to a busy month and happy times.
No comments:
Post a Comment