End of the Week Roundup

This week was the first full week without any classes. Needless to say, what I thought would be a nice relaxing week turned into being busy. Oh well! No rest for the wicked right?

1. I am in the process of "rebranding", changing around my blog name and layout. You'll be seeing the change soon, and I'll give you a heads up closer to the time. I emailed Lauren at Lauren Elizabeth because she just recently rebranded from her old site "From My Grey Desk" to the new one and asked her for some pointers on changing everything around properly. From past experiences emailing fellow bloggers (they aren't always helpful or kind and it always felt a bit like they viewed me as the competition) I assumed I'd get some quick blurb, if anything, in a few days about where to go. Instead I got an extremely informative and helpful response from her in a few hours. She was sweet and kind and everything I had ever imagined or hoped she would be. Her sister is Kate from The Small Things Blog, (aka the Pinterest hair girl) who I happen to follow religiously and both girls are pretty popular and I'm sure very busy. The fact that Lauren not only responded to me quickly but also was helpful and supportive meant so much to me. She completely made my weekend.

2. Dave and I happened to be driving home from work from the same area at the same time on Monday night (he is a carpenter so he works all over the place), he called me on the way home and asked me out to the movies and so ensued an impromptu date night. I love date nights that are on the fly. We saw Iron Man 3 (a must see!) and then went out for some frozen yogurt (I'm not newly obsessed or anything). It was so nice to have a surprise break and just relax, moments like these don't occur very often so when they do, I cherish them.

3. Both of the summer classes I signed up for were cancelled due to lack of enrollment. At first, I was panicking because I was relying on these two classes to graduate at the end of this year, but I'm working on finding the silver lining. I'm still trying to figure out what the heck I'm going to do about a certain English course I need to take, however the second class just needed to be an elective and I think I'm going to use it to take three one-credit courses that interest me: photo shop, stress reduction (ha!), and anatomy of a criminal trial. In fact, I'm pretty excited now about the prospect of taking these classes, but we shall see what the future holds. 

4. Thursday night Dave surprised me with a book as a early mother's day present, unfortunately for Dave, I already had the book he bought me, much to his chagrin. Either way, the fact that he went out of his way and bought me a book is pretty awesome. I'm lucky to have someone that not only allows me to fill a room full of books, but encourages it. 

5.  And lastly proof that my cats will lay wherever and however as long as you rub their stomachs....

Yes, Nibbler is being held up only by Dave, if he were to let go Nibs would fall and this is how Nibbler positioned himself.

That's it for this week. Have a happy mother's day!

Never Know when You'll Need it...

Fair warning, this post is super long, I'm sorry in advance for it, but I felt the story that goes with it is so important that it had to be, so I'm sharing this extremely valuable link today in the hopes that it will help you as much as it did me. I'm also going to include it at the top of my blog for easy access. 

The SPCA offers a very helpful website for pet owners to go to and find out what plants are toxic for their pets. Please, if you have pets, keep it handy. This site saved Nibbler's life last summer, and it makes me shudder to think what could have happened if I wasn't aware of it.

One of my facebook friends posted the link on her wall a few months prior to me needing it, and I remember saving it as a just in case. I noticed one of the toxic plants for cats was lilies, which I had in my front garden. I never thought much about it because Nibs and Squish don't go outside unsupervised so I figured having it in my garden wasn't a big deal.

Last July I brought Nibbler outside with me, he loves being out in the sun and normally just follows me around chewing on the grass as we walk around. I decided to pluck the pollen off my Stargazer Lillies in my garden because I heard doing that would make them last longer. As usual, Nibbler was next to me just chilling in the garden, helpfully eating the grass I needed to weed out. I turned away for a moment and when I looked down Nibbler had taken a bite out of one of the lily leaves. I scooped him up right away and tried to take the leaf out of his mouth but he had swallowed it. I took him back inside and vaguely remembered seeing lilies on the website so I pulled it up again and saw it on there. I called the poison hot line that the SPCA has set up for situations like this and was told to get him to the hospital, NOW.

I took him to the local emergency vet and they took him back right away and I sat in the waiting room with Dave fearing the worst. If you aren't already aware of my insane love for my cats, Nibbler is my heart and soul. He is the first thing I see in the morning, the first one to greet me with his soft purr and cuddles, my day doesn't start without him. We fall asleep curled up into each other, my day doesn't end without him. And in between? We are inseparable, if I'm home and he isn't dozing on Dave's lap, he's with me, following me around. What if I just lost one of the few things in this world that I have a connection to? Terrible thoughts kept racing through my head: this was all my fault; if I had been paying attention...; if only I had made him get out of the garden; what am I going to tell Squishee if we lose Nibbler?

About an hour later the vet came out and told us that they gave Nibbler some charcoal and made him throw up the leaf but that we weren't out of the woods yet because the toxin from the lily plant could already be coursing through his body and shutting down his liver. She told us they had  to keep him for three days and take daily blood tests. She said we had a 50/50 shot of Nibbler being ok but that if he wasn't we would have to decide between getting him very expensive dialysis, which only has a 50% shot of working or putting him down. It was one of the absolute worst moments of my life. I would lose everything, my house, my car, my job, EVERYTHING, to save Nibbler if I had to.

We had to go home without our Nibsy and there was a hole in my heart. I felt so empty and lifeless. I cried everyday, all day. When I was home Squish could tell something was up, he wouldn't leave my side. Dave and I went to the vet everyday and sat with Nibbler in one of the rooms for a few hours. Nibbler would just lay there sleeping on my lap or cuddling with Dave. You could tell he wanted to go home but he was being strong for us, he was so calm when he was there. He wasn't jumpy or jittery, like he normally is, he would just lay there and melt himself into our arms while we were there.

On the third day they gave us the good news, Nibs would be ok, all his tests came back good and we could take him home. First thing we did when we brought him home was give him a bath to get all the charcoal off of him (thank God he doesn't mind water). He wasn't happy but was super quiet the whole time. About an hour after we had him out of the bath he walked up to Dave and I and just dropped on his side (he does that as a greeting, it's kinda like the fainting goats), rolled on his back and purred. It was the best sound I ever heard in my life. I will never forget that moment or the sweet melody of his purr. It filled the emptiness in my soul that was caused by this whole mess and made me feel like everything was really going to be ok.

The vet told us that it was the quickness of getting Nibbler to the hospital that saved him. She said if we had waited any longer than an hour or two we probably would have lost him.

Timing is everything.

I hope you'll never need to use the link, but keep it handy for just in case.

He is my North, my South, my East, my West; my working week, my Sunday rest

A Picture an Hour

I've seen fellow bloggers do a picture an hour blog post and I thought it would be neat to try. I enjoyed taking the pictures, it helped me to look at things from an artistic point of view (like, hey that would make a good picture!) and it also forced me to be active when I would otherwise just be sitting on the couch, playing on the computer. I stopped at 3 because then I got busy with making dinner...and watching TV.

8 am

9 am- Nibbler playing with the string on my sweatpants

10 am

11 am

12 pm- Squishee meowing at me while I weeded

1 pm- Making homemade tea for Dave and I 

2 pm- Playing around with blog stuff

3 pm- Starting dinner, which is also going to be an upcoming recipe!

End of the Week Roundup- Nephew Edition

I had my two nephews, who are two and three, this past weekend. Todays' EOTWR focuses on the time Dave and I spent with the boys.

We picked them up Friday night and then we dropped them off Sunday afternoon. Not to state the obvious or anything, but kids are a lot of work. I don't know how parents do it everyday, day in and day out. Dave and I barely made it 12 hours before every bone and muscle in our body ached and we fell asleep the minute we sat down on the couch or a chair. Having the boys this weekend was a really fun time, but I was definitely missing my independent, quiet life.

1. On Saturday we went to Strasburg Railroad, which the boys were pretty excited about:

It was such a fun time. The boys got to ride the big train and then they had a smaller "Pufferbelly" one that you could sit in.

Lucas enjoying the Pufferbelly train

There were also "cranky cars" that moved when you cranked a handle. It was tough getting Jacob off the cars, he had a meltdown every time he had to get off, which is to be expected from a two year old, but it definitely humbled me and made me respect parents who have to deal with meltdowns on a regular basis even more.

Jacob (L) and Lucas (R) loving the Cranky Cars

2. As exhausting as it was, I loved watching Dave interact with the boys. When it comes time for me to stop being selfish and for us to start a family, I know he will make an incredible dad. He was patient and kind to the boys, I started calling him Uncle Softie because those boys had him wrapped around their finger.

Every time I see this, it warms my heart

3 .We both read to them, Dave grabbed a book I already had in my "library" and I bought a book Friday that I knew was going to be a hit, "Press Here". I'll go into more detail about that awesome book in another post but for now, I'll let the pictures do the rest of the "talking" here:

Engrossed in Uncle Dave's story

Jacob: "Whoa the bubbles moved!"

4. I really like my neighbors, but I never knew how much I LOVE my one neighbor until she came to my rescue this weekend. What didn't this woman do? She came over Saturday with her son, who is three, and made PB&J for the boys and let Lucas and Jacob play on her son's swing set. When I ran out of juice she came over with a new bottle of apple juice so we didn't have to run out; when Lucas wouldn't eat she suggested some ideas and even brought over soup and crackers for him to eat. The boys have allergies really bad so they had runny noses, she brought over a nose sucker and a Vicks dehumidifier for the boys. But she didn't stop there, she even rubbed their chests with Vicks baby rub so they could sleep comfortably. This woman was a God-send this past weekend. I'll never be able to thank her enough or show my appreciation for her kindness.

5. When Jacob gets sad he sticks his lower lip out, it's the cutest thing in the world, partially due to the fact that Dave does that to me when he wants something. I taught Jacob how to do the face when he's in a good mood (he has no idea that the does this when he cries) and bribed him to give me the face every time he wanted something from me. Lucas jumped in and started doing it too when he saw how much I loved it when they did it. Here is a pic of them being goofy and giving me the "face":

Giving me the "look"

*Bonus*

6. I was super tired on Sunday after we gave the boys back to their mom, and I couldn't wait to get  home and clean up all the crushed crackers on my couch and floor and revel in the peace and quiet. Then I walked into my quiet house and I kinda missed the chaos. Don't get me wrong, I'm good not having babies for a little while but this whole weekend I questioned whether I would want to deal with all this on a regular basis and the constant answer was "I don't think so", but then when it was all said and done, I missed the boys and the craziness of the weekend.

I love the shirts their mom packed for the weekend!

Cause at the end of the day, isn't it smiles like this that make it all worth it?

And on that note, I'm out! See you all Monday!

Favorites

So we all have our favorite something, favorite color, favorite band, favorite food, etc. I have a favorite word...I'm curious to see if anyone else does...fair warning, this post is a little off the wall, just go with me here.

Anyway, having a favorite word doesn't mean I use it every chance I get, it just means I like the way it sounds, the way it rings in your ears. I like the way it rolls off the tongue, and in the particular case of my favorite word, the way it sounds exactly how it would sound when you do something that would describe it.

So what is the word? It's CRISP.

Think about it, when (if) you bite into a crispy piece of bacon, what sound does it make? CRISP! When you say the word out loud, what sound comes out? Its pretty close to biting into a crunchy piece of bacon!

It's not just the sound that crisp makes though, its the memories and the thoughts that the word brings to mind. When fall begins, the leaves begin to change and the air is crisp it reminds me of hot chocolate, warm fires and everything else that makes me happy about fall. So when I think of crisp, I'm reminiscent of many things that I enjoy in life.

Dave says that when I say "crisp" that it sounds different from how others say it because I emphasize the "s" and the "p" separately. I noticed I do that too, I think its because I just really love the way it sounds.

So...do you have a favorite word, or am I just nuts?