Sprinkles

My husband loves having lots of critters around. From the sounds of it, he had lots of different pets when he was growing up, ranging from exotic monkeys, lizards, raccoons and porcupines to the more ordinary horses and dogs. When we were talking about moving down here last winter, I know he was most excited about all the opportunities there were to fill this place up with our very own petting zoo. I'm slightly less ecstatic since I'm generally the one who ends up with more chores, particularly in the summer when he's working lots of hours. Last night Robert managed to bring home a blind baby heifer calf from one of the neighbors. She's a pretty nice baby, but I can see already she is going to be a fair amount of work...Robert's already got me snagged into feeding at nights. Luckily she's got a pretty mild disposition right now and is pretty easy to be around. You can't tell from looking at her that she is blind, but it becomes pretty obvious when you start trying to feed her. If she looses hold of the bottle, she is instantly frantic and instead of bumping and mauling you like a normal calf, she's all over the place trying to figure out where the good stuff went. Carter decided she wanted to name the baby "Sprinkles" (one of her favorite things to eat--the ones you shake out to decorate cookies...). She almost settled on "Twinkle" for her favorite song, Twinkle Little Star. I think I'm glad Sprinkles won out.

Now I'm just hoping we can find her a friend. I know cattle are very social animals and don't do nearly as well all by themselves. I'm hoping for a free goat or sheep and have passed word through the local moccasin telegraph, hopefully that will turn up something. There are some for sale, and I got word back on another bum calf for sale, but they are expensive and with the price of milk, they are going to be costly to raise. I made Robert PROMISE that if her brought her home and we took care of her, that we would NOT!! eat her. If being blind is too big of a handicap for her and something needs to be, then someone else can eat her, but I just can't. Period. I understand where my food comes from and all that, but I just can't hand raise a baby then turn around and serve it for dinner. I sincerely hope I'm never hungry enough where that suddenly seems like not such a bad idea!

My Aunty Linda managed to get in a bit of a horse wreck and ended up in the hospital with a mild concussion along with some broken ribs and a collar bone. Ouch! Carter is going to miss her for the next couple of weeks as the last thing Aunty needs for her recovery is a demanding toddler! We're hoping she feels better soon!

Friends

I figured since Robert was out of town, I certainly wasn't going to spend the weekend cooped up at home with Carter. We had my cousins family over on Friday night, so Saturday, we went up to visit my Gramma. My Gramma Pat is one of my very favorite people. She's so INTERESTING and is just a wonderful spirit to be around. I can't say that anything I've heard about her life was easy in any way shape or form, in fact I don't know how she did half the things she has done along with raising 4 kids and countless grandkids and great-grandkids, and through it all, she seems to have maintained a cheerful outlook. One of the best, funnest dinner parties I ever went to was with my Gramma, her sister Aunt Ginny and their good friend Willene. I sincerely hope that when I'm her age I'm still riding ponies, taking art lessons with all my good buddies, making stain glass pictures, growing a garden, canning all the neighborhood apples and spare fruit, visiting this friend or another, having company all summer, growing a whole house full of African violet, just for starters. Carter is so lucky to get to know her, and I try to visit whenever we can, particularly when she's been making apple pie.

Robert came home from his roping clinic on Saturday night. He had called up to let me know he was on his way and to get dinner started. Well, I'd spent the afternoon cooking and was in the middle of eating dinner with my brother (enticed down with country fried steak and banana bread...) but hadn't made enough for Robert and Joe Close, who was giving him a ride back--I hadn't really expected Robert back until Sunday. So, I thought I'd be sweet and spend another hour mixing up another batch and get it cooking so they would have a nice hot dinner. By the time they got in, Robert had come down with Carter's flu and wasn't interested in eating ANYTHING, and Joe had somewhere he needed to be. (As Jess would say, Grrrr!!!) Oh well, guess what we are having for lunch today??

Anyway, Carter was sure glad to have to her dad back home. They were laying on the couch together this morning and she had her arm wrapped around him. She told me "Look Mom, he's my friend!"

Tea party

Since Carter was finally feeling better, I took her down to play with my mom on Friday. As I got her all dressed up in the morning, she asked me "Where goin'?" I told her we were going to see Gramma Debbie. She instantly perked right up and all excited said "Tea Party!" My mom had told her last week just before she left that when she came back, they would have a tea party, and boy Carter sure didn't forget. I think her and Mom promptly had a tea party that morning which ended as soon as Cade got there. Carter did NOT want Cade playing with HER tea party, so she was all done...until he left again! When I came down to pick her back up in the afternoon, she had to show me just how a proper tea party functioned. Her favorite part naturally was pouring the tea and stirring in the sugar. Drinking the tea was a bit tricky since the cups were scarcely bigger than a thimble. But, spilling it, drinking it, it was all the same to Carter, she just had a ball.

While Cade was there, they managed to get Grampa to read them one of Carter's favorite books: 10 Little Monkeys. She particularly likes how Grampa reads the book and the part where you shake your finger and yell "No More Monkeys Jumping on the Bed!" (Note: Carter's wearing her very favorite shirt, the Rainbow shirt. As soon as she was feeling better, that is the only thing she wanted to wear. I spent a good half hour muttering to myself about just how I wasn't going to spoil my kids as I searched for the dang thing... )

After Dinner Games

Robert took the weekend off to go to a roping clinic in Sheridan, WY with Carter's horse, Picky (since he still can't rope off his...) It's nice for him to have a break and go play since he really works so hard. For me, my ideal break is him taking Carter for the day and just letting me stay at home reading or puttering around the house. That's my idea of a vacation right now. Some day, I'm looking forward to going to Chico or Fairmont Hot Springs with the kids and doing all sorts of fun stuff, but right now, it's WAY too much of a hassle and to me not worth the trouble. Not quite yet... Maybe Number 2 will like traveling more than Carter does, although she's getting better all the time.

I figured since Carter and I were batchin' it this weekend I would make up a big pot of hamburger soup and see who I could entice to come over and play with us. Luckily my cousin Wynne is up to her ears in studying for her nursing degree and she and her family are always up for dinner, particularly if someone else is cooking. Even better, she generally commandeers her kids and they do up the dishes and generally leave your house cleaner than when they got there. (I used to occasionally cook and just bring the food over to her house, but didn't take me long to figure out the better deal!) Works great for me since Carter loves having her kids come over to play. We had to run to town first before dinner (Robert was sweet enough to leave me a list of stuff he needed done today while he was off playing...) With gas prices the way they are, I figured I better pick up groceries and everything else I needed before coming home. By the time we were headed back home, Carter was exhausted and fell asleep. Normally this isn't a big deal, but when we have company coming over, it is less than ideal. She HATES waking up to a house full of people, it really seems to mess up her idea of what home should look like when you wake up. It generally takes her a hour or so to perk up, glued all the while to my hip, and by the time she's finally ready to play, everyone is heading home and she is now upset all over again. Tonight we got lucky. Chance and Blake got to stay and play awhile longer. They are showing Carter how to do their "Bunk Bed" trick on the trampoline below.

Chance is showing us just how high he can jump!

Carter is carefully watching as Blake shows her how to do a flip...I'm rather hoping Carter will wait awhile longer before attempting that stunt.

Now they are roaring around the house, playing ponies. I'm thinking Carter will sleep good tonight despite the late nap. (Or more my luck, she'll be wired and all hyped up until way after mom's bedtime!)

Diaper Wars

While digging around on the Internet for information, I found a great website that I wanted to pass on for all the new moms and moms still dealing with diapers: http://babycheapskate.blogspot.com/ (I must admit the name really appealed to me...ranks right up there with the Tightwad Gazette). This lady has put together some GREAT information that is incredibly useful such as approximately how many diapers of each size you'll need, and what is a good sale price for diapers so you know when to stock up. I really like her breakdown prices for each size such as for size 4 diapers, .25 cents/diaper is a good price. Made me realize that the great deal I thought I got at Costco (.29/diaper), wasn't really all that great...in fact I could have gotten Carter's pull-up's she is just using at night at Target for 1 cent/diaper cheaper (since they are on sale right now). Not a huge difference, but when you can anticipate spending hundreds of dollars on the dang things, every little bit helps. I wish I would have had this info when Carter was born. I was under the delusion that bulk meant cheaper which as this site shows you is really not the case with diapers. Anyway, I though I would pass this on...

Feeling Better

It's been a long week. Carter was sick for most of it, and FINALLY today started feeling better. I kept her home just to make sure, and I figure since she was jumping on the trampoline again, she must be feeling better. She looks like to me that she's lost several pounds since this all started. I didn't have her weight exactly before she got sick, but she's definitely thinner. You know they are sick when they don't even want to eat ice cream. It's so scary to me the effect a flu can have on a little kid. I'm just so very glad it wasn't any worse and even found myself pretty happy that she was back to getting into stuff and tearing the place apart rather than staying curled up on her bean bag. Hauling the bunny's sawdust all over the house while I was on the phone was almost a bit too much though. I'm finding it EVERYWHERE: under couch cushions, in kitchen drawers, clogging the drain of the bathtub, IN MY BED! Deep breath...counting to 10...

Robert just came home to take her to town with him and she was so excited to go. I can't remember the last time it only took me 5 minutes to get her ready...probably the last time I pretended her cousin Blake was on the phone telling her she had to get ready in a hurry or Blake couldn't come for a party. It was raining a bit so I got out the umbrella (shook out the dust, since I can't remember the last time I used it) and sent her outside to meet dad. She decided she so had to take it town with her. "Me need it, me SO need it." I really hoping it's another wet spring and she'll need it lots this year.

Going to town is a big thrill right now for Carter and she mostly loves going every chance she gets, especially with dad, since he's always filling her up with treats and generally makes sure she has a good time. I think in her little mind, going to town means ice cream and french fries. I've noticed the last couple times she went with me that she was very careful about staying pretty close by and not trying to run off and hide somewhere in the store. Apparently Robert decided to teach her a lesson the last time she tried it with him and basically turned the tables. He then hid from her for awhile...long enough to scare her. Then when he finally let her find him, he told her next time someone would pick her up and try to take her home with them. Seems to have convinced her.

Typhoid Mary

About 3 am on Sunday morning, Carter decided to get really sick. I didn't think too much of it right away since she'd eaten a pretty wild combination for dinner with grapes, corn chips, cotton candy, and a little bit of hot dog thrown in. Unfortunately it was something more than the food. For the rest of the day she couldn't keep anything down and had raging diarrhea on top of it all. Naturally she was generous enough to share so we both spent the day feeling sorry for ourselves. She definitely had the worst of it though. I felt so bad for her. She'd look over at me and whimper "Don't feel good" then look at me like I could magically make it all better. Oh baby, if only there was something I could do! That has to be the very worst part of your baby being sick...not being able to do anything and them looking at you like you should be able to fix it, dang it, you're MOM!! My whole house reeks today of vomit and worse things, although I've mostly gotten it cleaned up. My dad came to the rescue in the afternoon and brought Pedialyte from town which really seems to be helping. The Pedialyte Popsicles he found were just the ticket. She was able to keep a little down this morning and fingers crossed hasn't thrown up again since 4 this morning. She doesn't really like the stuff although the popsicles are better than anything else, and since she had puked back up everything else we tried she was willing to give it a shot. She doesn't want to puke anymore that's for sure. Mom doesn't want her too either! Robert took the night shift last night until about 4 when he was just too tired. He came and got me to take over and I've been up since. Luckily she slept quite a bit today and seemed to perk up when Robert came home, enough to go for a little drive with him. Now mom can go take a nap!



Sounds like the whole neighborhood is coming down with this flu too...oops! I just hope little Avery doesn't get this...she's had a tough enough flu already and it's so scary when they are so little.



Number 2 has decided its time to make its presence known. I've been feeling little bubbly feelings the last week or so, but wasn't really sure that was the baby. But last night I could actually feel the little kicks. With Carter it seemed to me that it took a lot longer to feel anything and I don't remember them being this strong already. Now I can feel them all the time, particularly when I'm trying to sleep...bad sign of things to come!

Official Taste Tester

Carter helped me cook dinner last night and decided that her role was the taste tester, which is somewhat surprising since she is generally suspicious of anything new or different. We were doing pretty good on the cooking and tasting until I put cottage cheese in the sauce which was completely taboo and she was done tasting. I was able to later convince to actually eat dinner (It was spaghetti sauce over macaroni with some cottage cheese thrown in since I had about a cup left and wanted to get rid of it. I thought it tasted pretty good, but it took Carter awhile some time to decide that I wasn't poisoning her. Strangely enough, Robert had almost the same look on his face when he saw the cottage cheese, but was smart enough to keep quiet.

Carter has been coming up with some of the funniest sayings and is always cracking me up. I told her one morning that I was getting her all wrapped up in her blanket like a little Carter burrito. She looked up at me and said "No, not like burrito, like yogurt!" Hmmm. Ok, so we wrapped her all up like a ah, yogurt. She has also always hated my singing...if you've ever been unfortunate enought to have heard it, you can understand where she if coming from. I was singing to the radio on the way to town and she told me "Stop singing momma! Hurt ear!" Well, good thing I never had any illusions of being on American Idol!

Presidents and babies

As I've mentioned, my sister Jessica and her husband Eric moved last week to Kyiv for Eric's new job. To me, starting a new job is always stressful. I would think starting a new job in a foriegn country where you don't speak the language and you are 9 time zones away from your home VERY stressful. Finding out that the president is going to be at your office on your second day of work, well, I guess would really make for a very interesting day, particularly when it's THE PRESIDENT. My sister's baby Keenan seems somewhat less impressed than everyone else.

I don't think anyone was as tickled as my dad. He printed out the pictures of his grandson and carried them in his pocket everywhere he went, showing them off every chance he got. He even tried to show them to me, twice.

I find it a bit ironic that my sister Jessica had to move to the other side of the planet, to Kyiv, to meet the President, but I'm so excited for her an her family that they did get to meet him along with the First Lady and the Secretary of State. The story in her blog is great: http://lifewiththelundgrens.blogspot.com/2008/04/lady-with-baby.html

I'm so glad we have this kind of technology available to keep in touch when this far apart. My uncle was in Russia when I was little girl and I can remember how difficult it was for him to get any communication back. I think he was faxing letters periodically. It was very lonely for all involved is my memory of it, although I'm sure my Aunty has much better details... This is SO much better.

Circus!

This has been incredibly busy around here this week, and I wasn't nearly as prepared as I hoped I was. I started training two new people at work...basically they are working in Colorado, and I'm training them over the phone for 4-5 hours a day, then trying to catch up on all my client emails and phone calls before and after that. I generally only work 6 hours a day so this has made a terribly long week. My days have been starting around 6 am (not too early unless you add in the 3 or 4 times I have to get up and go to the bathroom every night...not exactly conducive to a good night sleep. Baby number 2 has no mercy.) and by 8 pm, it's all I can do to get Carter and myself ready for bed. She stays up and plays with Dad a little longer, but I've been in bed and asleep by 8:30 most of this week. Except last night. The Shrine Circus was in town and although I knew in the back of my mind that if we were going to go, we should really go to the early show, all the cousins and kids around here were going to the 7 pm show. Carter was SO excited to go; it was all she talked about all day, somewhat egged on by the other kids that were going. Cotton candy was the main word she kept repeating when you asked her what she wanted to do and see at the circus.

Carter going to the circus!

We got to the circus early to that we could get tickets and the line was already stretched around the building. Not a good sign. They had a little pen of petting zoo animals that we stopped by to kill some time. Carter was pretty quite at this point, a good sign she was getting pretty overwhelmed by all the commotion, but she really wanted to stop and pet all the animals, until one of the goats rammed into her and knocked her over. She got all covered in hay and sawdust and managed to get half of it down my shirt. By the time we got in and set down, she was already starting to get tired. We managed to sneak in a pony ride, and she really enjoyed that. In fact was pretty indignant when her turn was over, "Me NOT done!" But at $6 bucks a pop for a 5 minute ride, oh yes, she was done. We got the long coveted cotton candy, watched two performances and she was ready to go home. In fact the only thing she was more excited about after the pony ride and covering herself in pink sugar, was seeing my car in the parking lot. So all in all, the circus was a bit of a bust this go round.

Carter coming home from the circus!