No bears are out tonight........NOT!

I couldn't sleep, so I went upstairs and laid on the couch and turned on the t.v.  Cisco was in the garage barking her guts out for god knows what reason and I didn't feel like getting up to tell her to shut up.  So I laid facing the back of the couch.  Someone walked by, but I looked up too late. Maybe it was Heather or Nate coming up to tell the dog to shut up.  Then Nate comes into the kitchen and tells me there were two bears outside digging in the trash!

I started asking a million questions.  He heard the dog barking and got up and looked out our sliding glass door in our bedroom and what does he see but a baby bear. He is thinking to himself "oh, how cute" and was startled to see the momma bear right behind baby! Then all he could think was, "did they see me looking out the curtain?"  He said she was about 500 lbs and on all fours and was about 4 ft tall.  

Bears can knock down a door and ransack your fridge!

So he came up to see where they were heading and they took down a garbage can and stole the garbage.  Later, he found the remains of the trash strewned on the ground behind some scrub oak, and they had eaten the corn cobs!  

Can you believe it! Bears!!!!

St Ignace is Still on My Mind (but mostly Aub, Nate, Claralynne and sweet baby James!!)

One of the Coolest things we got to see while in Michigan was the Coast Guard Cutter that had docked.  The guys on this boat stay on sometimes for a year or more. Our Nate didn't want on one of these ships cuz he didn't want to leave his family for so long.

                                                     Clara wants to run free into the lake.  
                                                         Claralynne loves her new brother.
Aub, Nate and Claralynne at the falls. The baby is in his stroller at the edge of the pic.
Nate and I at the falls.  I'll get the name later.

Boy do I ever miss Michigan and my sweet family up North. 

                                                             Little James so sweet.



A boat harbor in Petosky



Macinac Bridge

My Michigan trip is still so fresh on my mind, that I have to put out a few more pics. I miss the moisture, my hangnails have returned with a vengence, and so has my anxiety on the day before work.  I've slept very little the last two nights. 

We are planning on going back next year.  We'll have to save for the trip and hope we can spend more time in Traverse City, Petosky and that other town that sounds something like Charlevoix, oh so cute and eclectic!!

Bucket List

"Three things to remember when you get older: 

Never pass up a bathroom,

Never waste a hard-on, and 

Never trust a fart!"  

(Quoted from good ol' Jack on "The Bucket List".  He always gets the great lines).

Do you have one? A bucket list...... or a "kick the bucket list".  Those things you would do if you only had so much time to live.  I don't either, but I'm going to make one. It won't be published on blogger, but it will be placed where I can review it and check things off.  

I have a niece, Jamie Marie, who died at less than 2 months old of SIDS,  another niece Alexis who died at two years old. I have a nephew who was four when he passed.  My sister was only 38 and left behind four kids.  My mom died at 72.   All of them died too young in my opinion.   None of us know when we will "kick the bucket", so I think it's a good idea to make a bucket list. 

We just watched the movie tonight and loved it.  I had seen the commercials for the movie and it didn't look all that interesting even though I love both Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson.  I'm glad we rented it.  If you haven't seen it yet, I highly recommend it. 

The Mouw's Got Mange

We own a cat.  We aren't exactly sure of her age.  I guess-timate at about 15-16 or so years old.  I base that on the fact that we lived in our house 14 years and have been here two so that's sixteen years and the cat showed up maybe after we lived in West Valley a year or two. Maybe more. How did we acquire this cat you say?  Well here's the story.  

Lori, my sister, was visiting and rumor had it that the kids had found a cat and had it outside.  I went out back to check up on them and found Whit and my nephew Ricco in the shed. Whit was about four or five years old, Ricco about three. As I entered the shed, both boys looked up at me with fear and guilt on their faces, which changed to fascination after they saw my reaction to what they had hidden.  With fervor and excitement, both little boys lifted up the lid exposing the tiny kitty held prisoner in a food cooler.  They provided it cherries from off the tree to eat, how sweet.  This kitten was darling, beautiful yellow eyes and just a little ball of black fur.  However, I had no desire for a cat and besides, Nathan is allergic so keeping it was out of the question.

 I took the tiny black fluff ball with me into the kitchen to show Lori and tell her about the cherries and it proceeded to crap down my shoulder.  And that has pretty much been the feeling I've had for kitty ever since.  Well, with the exception that I never gave permission for the kids to keep her. I found out later that they had kept her in their room for three days before I found out she was still hanging around. 

What was I supposed to do now?  Throw her back out into the streets where they found her?  She was just a kitten!!

So, the kids promised they would change the kitty litter (ha ha ha.....every week it was "I did it last time...... I don't want to do it.......").  

Who changes the kitty litter now?  MWah!   Yes, Heather's moved out of the house now and Aub didn't take her when she got married.  Whit wants nothing to do with her.......so whose cat is she?

Definitely not Nates.  He's always teasing about how many lives she has and how he leaves the garage window open so the cat can go and mingle with the coyotes!  He will feed her after much coaxing giving me the quote from Morgan on Anne of Green Gables...........Alright, I'll look into it as soon as I can!!!  

The cat has soft, fine black hair that really builds up  growing her winter coat.  Unfortunately, she is still mostly a wild cat so she doesn't sit still long enough to be brushed and I'm not into getting severely gouged by the two good hind quarter paw claws that work (we had the front ones declawed............. I should say Nate had her declawed and fixed, another story entirely). 

Pretty much after winter was over the cat's hair was matted so bad you couldn't get a finger down to her skin if you tried.  Poor thing.  I felt bad but didn't know what to do for her and I never gave permission for them to have her soooooooo.......

 

Aub and Heather would take the cat aside and rip the fur right off of her. "You do what?"  I'd say............ "She likes it mom" they'd tell me.  They would either rip the hair off her, or they would take the scissors to her or a combo of both.  Aub and Heather would work as a team to do this, one holding her down and the other snipping away.  OMG, that cat looked so funny when they were done, leaving only the tail, head and legs with hair.  We have shaved her a couple times and I've wanted to do that here but since she hasn't had her shots, no one will do it.  So guess who's ripping out cat hair?  Here's the proof.  I got one strip off her the other day that was at least 12 inches long.  And you know what?  She does like it!  No really,  it can get a little painful and that's my signal to let up, but I get quite a lot of hair off her and she seems to appreciate it once it's gone.  Sadly, you can see all the dander that's built up under the layer of old hair.  And she licks it afterward which makes me believe it's pretty itchy under there. 

Are you thoroughly grossed out by now?  Obviously not in the medical profession are you?  

So I've almost ridded the poor cat of most of the large matted areas on her body.  The hair comes in soft and shiney.  Right now she has quite a large number of bald spots.  Poor thing.  That should have been her name instead of Mouw Mouw, or Mee Mouw, or Kitty Mouw, or Kitty Mee Mouw.  She is not unlike all the other animals we've owned who have a number of nicknames.  

Nate is always commenting on how many lives she still has which only leaves me that many springs I'll be left yanking hair out of the Mouw!!!!!

My Family in Michigan

I was planning on writing all about my Michigan trip after I got home, but, I'm on the last day today..... well, really the second to last day, we fly out Friday and it's Wednesday today.  

I have had a wonderful time here and I can't help but be ever so grateful to Aubrey and Nathan for opening their arms to us during such a wonderfully joyous time in their lives as well a time of adjustment for them and their little family.  

Pictures seem to lend so much more to a story and I have TONS!!!!

I have been threatening to put my little Clara in my suitcase and take her home with me.

For some reason I am unable to move the pictures around within my blog, possibly because I am using a Mac instead of my normal PC,  none the less, I'll post many more pics later. 

My heart is so full, I can hardly contain my emotion. I love all my kids so much and this trip has sealed the deal for these new little grandkids. I never would have believed that I could love someone else's children as much as my own.

When I look at little Claralynne and see her dance and talk and just be herself it takes me back to when Aub was a baby. It freaks me out how they are so much alike.   

Bittersweet this has been.  To only get a snippet of their lives and be able to touch them, and smell them and feel them in my arms until who knows how long makes each and every moment so precious.  

I've been able to get Clara up first thing in the morning when she wakes up and have had the privilege of seeing baby James being bathed for the first time.  We've shared dinners at several restaurants, taken all kinds of walks and eaten fudge from a shop in St Ignace.  It's been more than I could have dreamed it to be. 

Michigan is such a beautiful state.  The locals have ever so slight an accent and are very friendly.  The air has just enough moisture in it to have rid me of my hangnails and my skin has felt soft .  The air is crisp and clean and only slightly cold in the mornings.  I've enjoyed my morning runs through the neighborhoods to see houses built in the 1800's and along the shore line in front of the shops and ferry lines. 

What a privilege I have just to have the right to hold this new baby. Just to be able to watch his uneven breath, or see his eyes move while he sleeps.  To see him smile makes me wonder what on earth he could have on his mind to smile about, or where could possibly have gotten humor when he laughs.

They are both so sweet and I feel like the luckiest person in the world.