It's Only Spring After All

The last couple of days have been much chillier. The heater runs off and on all morning, after several days of not running at all. If it's sunny it warms up nicely by the afternoon. Eric bought a new mower over the weekend and mowed after work yesterday. The hand-me-down electric mower that he used all last season just wasn't working very well and it took him forever to mow with it. The gas mower is a great improvement. I love the look of freshly cut grass. I usually love the smell of it too, but we have a lot of onion grass in our yard and that stuff is overpowering! Wow.

Mama Dog has been super itchy for the better part of the past two weeks. We've been giving her benadryl which helped a little. A few days ago I suddenly put two-and-two together and realized that the constant scratching-biting-chewing started at the same time as the really nice weather ... when she began spending the better part of every day in the yard. For the past few days she's spent more time inside than outside and whadaya know, now she is way less itchy. I'm thankful that she's doing better; however, I'm reeeeally hoping that she isn't allergic to our grass! That would be a major bummer, dude. Hopefully she's just sensitive to the pollen from all of the trees blooming right now so that when they stop blooming, she'll stop itching. Meanwhile we're keeping her inside as much as possible, wiping her belly and feet when she does go out, and I'm trying an anti-itch spray as well as a diluted raw apple cider vinegar spray to see if that helps. She smells like salad dressing, but oh well. Could be worse, right? Poor thing, she wants to go outside so badly. She lays on the floor with her nose pointing at the door.


Yesterday the girls were watching Blue's Clues. The Boogie chose the episode "Steve Goes To College" where Steve, guess what? leaves for college, and is replaced by Joe. Apparently she hadn't seen that one before. Toward the end of the episode she called to me and said with quivering chin and quavering voice, "Steve is going to college. Why is he going to college? I don't want him to go," while tears began to slowly roll down her cheeks. I hugged her and we talked a little bit about how it makes us sad when people we love go away. We talked about going to college and she said repeatedly that she doesn't want to go! "That's fine," I told her, "you don't have to go to college. But maybe someday you might decide that you want to go, and that's okay too." No, she insisted, she did NOT want to go to college. "And, Honey," she added, "I don't want to watch this one [episode] anymore, because it makes me cry." She's so cute.

I was summoned for jury duty this week. I thought, no big deal, I can make arrangements for childcare for a couple of days. Then while trying to figure out who could watch the girls for what times for only two days (not to mention figuring out a way for the dog to NOT have to be crated for hours on end), I realized that if I am chosen to serve on a jury it could be for several days. Why didn't I request an exemption or postponement? I'm happy to do my civic duty, but I'm the primary caregiver for my two small children and we certainly can't afford to pay a babysitter for several days; to be honest, I don't even know anyone I could hire to watch my kids for several days! Family and friends are always willing to help out; however, there's only so much time they are available for, even with juggling kids around. Thankfully I was excused for today and hopefully will be again tomorrow.

When the Boogie found out that I don't have to work today, she got very excited. "Yay, now we can go to the library!" she shouted. Poor kid. I can't remember the last time I took them to the library! We used to go ALL the time. I went weekly when the Boogie was a baby, lugging her around in the infant carrier. When she got a little older we went every two or three weeks. Now it's been months.

I have been informed several times by coworkers that I cannot leave until I put updated pictures of Peabody and the Boogie on the desk computer for the screensaver. I've sadly neglected picture-taking for several months, so I've been trying to remember to pull out the camera and get some candid shots. Both girls, however, are attracted to the camera like moths to a lamp, and as soon as they see it they stop what they are doing to pose and say "cheese." Last night they were pretending to be dogs. Never mind that they actually have a dog, it's way more fun to pretend to be one.

I love this face!

I'm so thankful that they play nicely together (for the most part,) and that they like to play together (well, you know, for the most part.) They are best buds and I pray that continues.