Moo Moo's Revenge

Those of you who have met "The Moo" know she's a bit of a spaz.  She's small, fast and wirey- and enochlophobic... a bad combo.  So all appointments at the vet are made with a sense of  foreboding. (I'm realizing that I never blogged about Moo's adventure getting her anal glands expressed.  I was gigantic pregnant at the time and it was not fun for either of us.)

Thursday's appointment was for two- Hobbs needed her senior check up (my baby is a senior!)  I managed to get them into their crates fairly easily.  Hobbs growled the whole time but Moo was surprisingly calm.  Her nose turned bright pink (Moo's fear meter, white being very happy) and she meowed occassionally but otherwise she just chilled.

The vet decided to give Moo her exam first.  Quick weigh, exam, all is well- time to go back into ther crate.  But Moo had other ideas.  She jumped down and hid under some chairs (that were bolted to the wall of course).

Fast forward to after Hobbs' exam.  Moo is now cornered and angry.  The next five minutes went like this:

*Me: Moo, please come out honey.

Moo: MROW!  (swipeswipeswipe) Hiss!

Me: (Laughing)  Moo, seriously, you're embarrassing yourself.

Moo: hiss(swipeswipeswipe)hiss

Me: (putting treats down to lure her out)

Moo: crunchcrunchcrunch.  (realizes what I'm up to, runs back to corner)

[Repeat from * 48 more times.]

Then the vet tech comes in with "the gloves".  When I worked at the shelter these are the gloves they used for ferals.  This is not good.

Me: Moo, look what you made them do now...

Moo: MROWMROWhisshiss(swipeswipehissswipe)(strugglestrugglestruggle)hiss

Door closes on crate.

This is what I get for trying to squeeze her into that Karate outfit on Halloween...

Halo

So for the past three mornings I have been awakened by Moo Moo sitting on my head. Not snuggling next to. Sitting ON. It's a good thing it's not Polly, I'd be crushed to death. I think she knows about that Halloween costume I bought and is trying to suffocate me in my sleep before I get a chance to squeeze her into it. 


Or maybe she's trying to put me on my misery since yesterday I was convinced that my iPod had died.  I took it to the Geek Squad at Best Buy and explained the situation. The Geek Squad Girl proceeded to test the iPod (yep, broken) then turn it off and back on. Fixed. Wow, am I stupid.  Not because I hadn't thought of that but because I didn't even know that it was possible to turn the iPod off. 


I think I've officially crossed over into that age where technology becomes baffling, music becomes annoying,  everything used to cost a nickel and I tell stories about hitting goats on the head with a sledgehammer because that's what you do on a farm (actual story from my Pap).  

Vitamin N

So we finally got Nate to start eating gummy vitamins. I'm really relieved because his diet is that of a typical toddler- find a food you like and eat ONLY that food for the next 294 meals.

So this morning he asked Brain for his 'candy' (which I explained to Brian that he needs to tell Nate that these are VITAMINS, not candy but that's another story...). He gets 2 a day so I told Brian to give him one now and I'll give him the other one tonight after daycare (because he's going to ask for one.)

Brian gives it to him and Nate wants more but Brian says no. Then Nate wants to hold the bottle (that's his new thing, holding everything. Of course earlier in the week Brian let him "hold" a hard boiled egg and that ended badly, so you would think he learned his lesson.) So Brian gives him the bottle and then comes upstairs to put something away. A few minutes later, I head down to iron my clothes and find Nate at his picnic table shoving gummy vitamins in his face like they're- well, candy.

I FREAK OUT. Scream for Brian, grab the vitamins, scare the holy living crap out of Nate. I called the pediatrician. I called poison control. Long story short, because the vitamins don't have iron in them, he'll be fine. I on the other hand am still trying to get my heart to slow down. The best part of the whole thing was me trying to be calm (while feeling like a parental FAIL) and tell the poison control lady that the vitamins were Marvel Super Hero Vitamins.

Thanks for nothing, Captain America.

And he was a beautiful butterfly.

On the way inside tonight, I spotted a beautiful caterpillar on the railing right outside our front door. I mean this was like no other caterpillar I have ever seen. So interesting I just had to take a photo. I'm not a big 'nature photographer', preferring instead to take photos of the people and pets in my life. But this was something.

I ran in and grabbed my camera and started snapping away. Nate quickly decided he "didn't yike" the caterpillar and headed in through the open door as I was finishing up. He then proceeded to slam the door shut. Approximately .0081 seconds later I heard a click followed by a tiny yet triumphant voice shouting "I WOCKED IT!!" [Insert insane giggling here.] Oh. Crap.

I tried the door. Yep, 'wocked' all right. Let the pleading begin. "NATE, unlock the door please. Seriously Nate, unlock it." [More giggling.] Nate struggled with the handle and for a quick second I panicked at the thought of my two-year-old loose in the house unsupervised except for four (about to be really pissed off) cats. And then I saw his face light up as he figured out how to unlock it and I pushed the door open before he could change his mind.

I should say (before CYS starts knocking on my door) that we DO have a garage door with a keypad so he really would have only been alone for a minute or two. But for today I learned two very important lessons: 1) It's time for door knob covers and 2) even the caterpillars in this town are Steelers fans.


Thanks to bugguide.net for helping identify this as Halysidota Tessellaris (or Banded Tussock Moth Caterpillar)

Caution: Slippery When Knitted

For those of you who don't know, I knit. I realize how this sounds because when I first met knitters of my own age I started to analyze them more carefully. I admittedly had preconceived notions about what a knitter looked like yet none of these ladies were elderly, tacky, wearing head to toe knitted garments, or had more cats than me.

So as last fall rolled around and days were getting shorter, I found my boredom growing quickly. I could no longer foster kittens because no one in the house was getting enough of my attention as it was. And then I saw an adorable hand knitted baby sweater. I decided to give it a go.

I was immediately hooked and have been knitting ever since. I recently decided to give socks a try. My first pair took forever and turned out WAY too big for me (or anyone smaller than Sasquatch) to actually wear as socks. So I decided to make them slippers. (Hang in there, here comes the relevant part.)

So the other night I had them on and Brian fell asleep while putting Nate to bed. I went upstairs to wake him during a Glee commercial break so I was moving pretty quickly. If you've seen the show you understand. I hit the bottom step on to the hardwood and saw my bright pink knitted foot going flying out from under me. I scrambled up and quickly tiptoed back into the living room before I missed any musical numbers.

At least I'm falling in fine hand knits now. It feels like a step up.

The offending sock:

I should know better. No good can ever come of pink.

What I Did On My Summer Vacation: Video Edition

Best.Day.Ever

I took the day off today to spend with Nate. It was a tough week, I missed him a lot and really needed some special Mommy/Son time. So we headed to The Children's Museum which is quite possibly the coolest place ever. They currently have a Bob the Builder section which was fun even though we're really not Bob fans.

Here's Nate sticking it to The Man:



Disclaimer: I did stop him from ACTUALLY sitting on the cat so that we didn't get kicked out on our first visit...

After the museum we went home and took a nap together, then ran some errands, visited with my cousin and her daughters and then had pizza for dinner. Every day should be like this one.