Easter Eggs and More

 We turned Easter up a notch this year.  First we made natural food dyes and dyed free range local eggs, which started off white, blue or brown, and made our Easter Eggs. We got some really vibrant yellows and pinks.  We had no success with carrots, but we had to give it a try.  We even did a scientific write up, so we turned the whole thing into a great lesson.  Beets, blueberries, and turmeric/tea/onion peel were really the best.

     We went to the Unitarian 9 am service and the 9:30 group breakfast, which was a great chance to meet new people there finally.  Easter activities and egg hunt, usually in the beautiful overgrown, floral graveyard, because of rain it was held in Gage hall classrooms. Mark was with us and we all really got a full tour of the grounds together.
      At home the baskets were pretty simple, but each kid got a new wrist watch (to practice time on).

CHESTER:
We loved him at first sight, so handsom. Then it turned out his new home was full of people allergic to dogs... don't blame them they had a lab for 12 years or so and never realized why some one always had a cold.
He fits right in here and seems content. He was a rescue who needed rehoming. He came to us as Buster. We tried on the name Chopper, and Chops... then Boomer and Butcher. Then somehow Chester and we all seem to like it, maybe it will stick.

Wanting

G-man mentioned he wanted a dog again. :-(

I just don't know if we are ready for it. I'm hoping I can delay a while. There has been a hording rescue near here involving 31 living disheveled dogs and 10 dead ones. Hound mixes. I just don't know what to think but Grady pointed to a picture of a hound the other day and said it reminded him he wanted one.

Grady was Elmo for Halloween, and I dressed Cora as a Doctor/Surgeon. Cora LOVED Trick or Treating, and ate a Kit Kat through the wrapper while in the bike trailer before I could confiscate some things and inspect anything. As far as her candy collecting went, she was in awe and possessive from the first little packages put in her bucket. I had to take her because Big Brother is into it. Luckily she sat a good bit of it out while sucking on wrappers.

Today both kids are running fevers and Cora has a sick tummy. UGH.

Asking

The other day GMan asked me for a dog. I think my heart started to whimper. I thought about Christmas, I thought about CBird's age. I think we will wait a bit longer if he doesn't ask too often. It is something we want as a family but the cost is prohibitive right now unfortunately... and I'm cleaning up enough poo and pee right now. Maybe, Maybe if a rescue situation made the right older dog available at the right moment...

CBird has seven teeth, and has a terrible time falling asleep so we are making some extra efforts to create a sleeping routine for her. Her sleep has improved a lot with the use of a white noise machine, the Homedics clock/radio. Thunderstorm seems to be our favorite. (She sleeps with me.)

GMan just made his first own sandwich, all by himself... a Nutella treat. Home schooling is progressing despite losing our second copy of the preschool guide book. Presidents, Civil War, bean sprouts, Collage, separating and counting Coins, writing practice and primer math. Feeling very productive.

Goodbye to my Beloved Bluew

We have also made the difficult decision to put Bluew down, and Grady and I said Goodbye to him today. He has long lived with very bad arthritis and recent circumstances found us in a place where we no longer had treatment options to makes his life comfortable. Because of his pain, his behavior had also become unpredictable at times. I will miss him dreadfully as he has been with me for 12 long years. It is the end of an Era for me.

Our Sweet Ginger is Gone

We had to put Ginger down today. She suffered a stroke back in March, and another much more severe one yesterday. She was unable to walk or see properly. Her prognosis wasn't very good at all so we let her go. She is already very missed as she was a very sweet soul who always laid down near Grady when he napped, as he is doing now. I haven't perfected how to help Grady with this change but he knows she was very sick and she is not comming home.

Boy Plays with Dog

About a week ago G was very upset at Bluew. He kept crawling up to him and Bluew would growl and walk away. G would just wail and fuss. Then he would stop crying and charge Bluew again. Bluew would move away, G would cry. It was clear he wanted Bluew's attention and that he was feeling some amount of frustration and rejection. It was hard to watch, Mark and I were both keenly aware that G wanted something specific. So when we saw This scene unfolding in front of us the other day we encouraged it and filmed it and photographed the heck out of it. Bluew may be realizing that not only is there food to be found dripping from this little boy but fun also.

They played a little bit of tug, and Bluew was appropriately gentle... it was very rewarding to see the old Bluew again too (which may be inspired by the hair cut).

There is, ofcourse, also a great video of this on my YouTube.

Life Happening

Just after a bath.

As a side note Bluew tried to clean the cloth diapers this morning... at least one pile of shreds is headed to the rag pile.

Updates

I just want to let you know we have been having a blast with the little guy over the last few days. He just seems to be changing at lightening speed. In just thte last three days I have put 3 videos on YouTube, all of which are hilarious! Remember you can just click on YouTube akmoyer75 under Links on the right. Then when you are in YouTube search for akmoyer75. That should take you to all my videos.

G has also discovered the joys of petting Doggies. Yesterday I noticed he was eyeing Ginger so I called her over to him. I tricked her into sticking her neck out over his lap so we could pet her. She was wonderfully calm and I thought I saw G "petting" her neck. When she tried to pull away I realized he had her ear balled up in his fist. She never winced, barked or bit. I pried his little hand open and freed her up... then she hung around for more petting from us both..

Yesterday teething also started - I mean the crying and more crying kind of teething. What is amazing is his resilience. Later on, the same day, he was laughing and carrying on. Then he discovered splashing. Which brings me back to the videos. What you see in the spashing video is the first time G discovered really rambuncious play all on his own