If you don't like puppies and kittens....

. . . skip this post. It is a flagrant wallow in pet-cuteness which I totally understand not everyone enjoys. But it's the last post of the month and will soon be relegated to the archives, so I'm doing it anyway... epithets and all!

We spent a lot of time on the computers yesterday, and Sam & Pippin spent a lot of time sleeping near us (the cat completely took over the pet bed; Pippin got the floor). The cat was being especially cute, but he also doesn't have the annoying habit of hopping up or moving as soon as I get the camera out!!

Napping PetsStretch!Enough with the pictures, already.Wake up, wake up, wake up!!

Day Trip

After church on Sunday, Erik took me to Rosamond to visit the Feline Conservation Center (http://www.cathouse-fcc.org/index.html)! It was a HOT day, but the trip was fun. Some of the cats were hiding, but we saw quite a few and heard some interesting information. They have an evening event in September when they do some activities--we may go back for it! We also enjoyed the peacocks wandering about on the grounds.The drive was an interesting one; you go through several types of landscapes as you go up into the mountains and back down. Mom, do you recognize some of this from our arrival in Bakersfield?

Joshua trees:Windmills (this doesn't give you any idea of how MANY there were up there):As you come out of these mountains, the valley (floodplain) that Bakersfield is opens up before you... huge green fields. I couldn't get a good picture of that though--wrong side of the car!Random pet pic... they were done eating and then the cat discovered I hadn't put the food up yet. He thought he'd sample the dog's food! Which, of course, brought the dog running.

Kathryn & Rebekah

To answer your question, yes. Unfortunately Pippin DID chew on the sandals... almost through one leather strap and on the front part of the other. We had to throw them away. :-(

And Sam has been stealing straws out of our water cups if we leave them at the computer desks! He likes to chew them into little pieces and bat them around.

They definitely do naughty little things, but more often have fun playing together.And of course when they sleep, they look like little angels! ;-DI miss you too. Can't wait to see you!!

Happy Birthday!

Erik's birthday was on Wednesday, which he celebrated with a day off and then again on Saturday with friends.Lots of talking and eating and playing Pictionary... clockwise: Ben, Pei, Robert, Bill, Susan, Vance, Steve and Erik.A good time was had by all (note how the cat hates company....)Pei did leave with a different pair of sandals... Pippin got a little excited about the taste of hers. :-/

Face from Home

Michelle (formerly Stelzig) lived in my building in Point and just moved to Bakersfield with her new husband!! She came over for dinner tonight and it was great to catch up--I only realized later I hadn't thought to take a picture. But we'll get together again when she's in town (long commute for her right now). Yay for good Wisconsin folk!! :-D

Little Trip

Well, Pippin took his first little road trip yesterday and we explored some new landscapes!After church, we headed up to Hot Springs and into Sequoia National Park... not exactly what I'd expected, but very beautiful. Pippin was REALLY good in the car; we all got out for this first glimpse past Hot Springs....Then the road started to wind quite a little bit and we got higher... and Pippin decided to climb up on the bin of maps and blanket in the back. I commented that I couldn't do that because it would make me carsick and Erik said he never got carsick. But apparently Pippin takes after me because when we next stopped he had thrown up. Poor guy. But the view was pretty and he decided to alternate between watching out front and laying down after that.
So it was clear sailing from then on! We wound through and discovered a beautiful waterfall
and stopped at a pretty little spot for a picnic lunch.Saw people leaving to raft the river and coming back from camping and fishing... found a little offshoot of the river that was shallow and Pippin swam for the first time!We passed through Kernville and then Lake Isabella (where we stopped to grab yummy shakes from this place:

http://neldas.dine.com/--they have over 100 different named shakes!) and then home!

A Lovely Day :-D

Backlog

Whew... just got some pics of camera that have been sitting for a little while. Ben came for a whirlwind visit!

The pets did NOT like him at all, as you can see.... Nope... they were scared silly... hid the whole time... yeeeeeaaaahh He was doing some work on my computer with the new goodies I got! :-DRequisite cute pet pics....
Kitty trying out for Circus Clown positionCompletely Innocent Dog & Slightly Dopey CatSleepy BudsAnd... AND...

There are peaches on our tree!!And nectarines or white peaches on our other tree!!And tiny green tangelos starting again on our OTHER tree!!! :-D

Eep!

So, we had a minor tragedy this week. . . we were doing the dishes on Monday and as Erik opened the cupboard and reached up to put away a mug, two of those little plastic shelf-holder-thingys BROKE and one of the shelves came crashing down. It was, of course, filled with glass--cups and saucers and mugs--and directly ABOVE another shelf of glasses and mugs. It was a veritable SHOWER of glass crashing; I thought it would go on forever. An hour later my ears were still ringing from it!

But, we were lucky in several ways:

1. Erik, in his bare feet and surrounded by broken glass, only had one minor cut;
2. The pets were both outside so out of the mess--boy did they look scared and want to come in and be comforted though!!
3. Erik was able to catch the shelf before it hit all the stuff below it... saving several mugs and everything underneath.

So, the annoyance of clean up and some broken stuff aside, not a True Tragedy. We're looking for metal pegs to replace in both of those cupboards as when we took the other pegs out one broke in his hand. I've been pretty jumpy about noises in the kitchen lately though!

In other news, you may or may not know that Erik and I first met playing a game over the internet called City of Heroes. And last weekend April Rayne, one of our good friends from the game, organized an in-game wedding for us. So we got together with folks and celebrated!Not much other news, except that Erik's birthday is coming soon!! ;-D

Da Boys

Sometimes when you want to strangle them for being relentlessly crazy or naughty... it just helps to post some pictures of when they were CUTE. And then go to bed.
While I am not fooled (I can clearly see that this is a survival mechanism both pets and kids wantonly employ), what the heck? They ARE cute.