A Clara Moment

The scene: It is late morning, I am in my bedroom rocking and burping a very sleepy Jane while reading my book with the door closed.

Clara enters: “I come say goodnight Jane.”

Clara puts her nose on Jane’s nose and says: “Goodnight Jane! Goodnight Jane!”

Clara looks up and points at two Diet Coke cans sitting near me: “What those doing there?”

Me: “I’m drinking them.”

Clara stalks over to inspect cans: “Oh, this one nothin’ in it. Just tiny sip for me.”

Clara walks out attempting to suck the last drops out of my Caffeine Free Diet Coke and slams the door behind her.

Jane and I return to quiet rocking.

Coming Down!

In this weeks photo challenge I used one of the pictures I took of Tyler taking down a tree for us over the weekend.  Since then I’ve been trying to post more but the computer was winning the “do I get to look at photos on the computer or not” argument the last few days and it wasn’t until tonight that I got the upper hand with the computer and was able to upload some more.  The main branch was just outside my bedroom window which accounts for the “birds eye” view of some of the action.

Before the cutting started. The tree had been trimmed many times by the power company leaving only one big branch that leaned out toward our house.

Planning the cuts.

Branches start coming off.

More planning.

My favorite of the cutting pictures.

Branches falling everywhere but on the house. Yay Tyler!

I’ve always liked watching trees get taken down, but I officially like photographing trees getting cut down best!

Thanks again Tyler!

Fighting For Your Life, Man-eater Bears by Tom Hron

Dear Cousin Johnny,

Thank you for giving me this book to read.  I now know that if things really go poorly I should attempt to punch a black bear that is trying to eat me (or my friend/family member) in the nose.  Since I’m hoping it won’t come to that I’m now considering getting a larger dog, baseball bat, machete and stun gun to bring with me in the woods – just in case- oh and I promise not to forget my binoculars. Also after learning that grizzly bears enjoy flattening and shredding nylon tents I may never go camping much less hiking in certain areas again. My Dad painted a vivid enough picture of polar bears for me that I wasn’t planning on spending my vacation with one anytime soon but just in case his stories were fading in memory I now have some new ones to reinforce them with.

Thank you as well for the nightmare this book gave me. I had accidentally fallen asleep in Clara’s bed and that got me right back up and into my own bed. You know, the one with my husband who has a longer reach than me and would be better at beating a bear with a bat or punching it in the nose than I would.  And I certainly can’t forget to thank you for introducing me to a huge amount of graphic, horrific, descriptions of people who were eaten alive by bears. I shall never forget what a bear can do, ever… even if I want to.

Finally thank you for giving me a book to read that made me laugh. Because if I’m going to read about graphic bear deaths I do truly prefer it to be with a good dose of sarcasm and contempt for those who ignore “traditional knowledge and wisdom”…  “for the sake of computer modeling by a bunch of pinheads who have never set foot on the pack ice.”

In Gratitude,

Jessie

Would I recommend it? Bears: They don’t just eat nuts and berries, sometimes they eat people.  There was quite a lot of useful and interesting information but it is certainly not for the faint of heart!

Speech Therapy

As a mother I worry. While I like to think that my worry levels rate pretty low on the scale of mother worrying I still do it. I can’t help it. John, he’s the Dad, worry is not in his job description, so as the Mom I’ve got to pick up a bit of the slack.

Currently I’m worried that Ivy may have a speech problem.

She seems to add this superfluous  “mmmm” sound to the beginning of everything and let me tell you, in addition to worrying that her new speech issue will affect her fluency and general communication, it’s beginning to drive me crazy.

We tried working on it today:

Ivy: “Mom, can I…”

Me: ” You already have my attention just say can I, you don’t have to say Mom.”

Ivy: ” Mom, OK but…”

Me: “No, don’t say Mom, just say OK.”

Ivy: “Mom, OK, Mom can I…”

Me: “No, hear the “mmm” don’t make the “mmm” sound.”

Ivy: Mom, can I…

A speech therapist I am not.

Then we went to Farm and Fleet and she continued to make that awful “mmm” noise. Except the “mmm” had evolved into a full fledged “MMMMMOOOOOMMMM!!!!!” complete with lots of tears eliciting quite a few looks of pity from other shoppers.

I think they must have been worried about her speech problem too.

Utter Confusion

One morning I sent John and Clara out to do a little job for me with the tractor and the chickens and only Clara returned home.

After a bit, I started wondering where John went and when I headed out the back door to find him I saw this:

The amount of time that I stood staring at the pants and shoes in utter confusion, with a hint of panic, is a bit embarrassing but no doubt directly correlated to the fact that I had yet to finish my first cup of tea for the day.

Did I ask him to do one too many jobs with the chickens and he lost his mind?

Did Clara’s demands finally push him over the edge?

Had my husband truly stripped off half his clothes and run away from home?

That’s when the light bulb turned on.

Run.

He was going to try barefoot running, and sure enough when I stepped around our dirty truck, I saw John (thankfully wearing shorts) and both dogs running up the hill.

I breathed a sigh of relief and went to go find my cup of tea.

If You Squish It They Will Come.

I love living in the country and some days little, unexpected, things happen that make me thank my lucky stars individually and by name that I live in a place without sidewalks.

For instance, I’m pretty sure that if I lived in the city there would not have been a roadkill rabbit at the end of my driveway for a few days.

And if there wasn’t a roadkill rabbit at the end of my driveway for a few days there wouldn’t have been two turkey vultures eying it up from the tree across the road.

And if there weren’t two turkey vultures sitting in a tree across the road Ivy, Clara and I wouldn’t have been able to look out the bedroom window eyeball to eyeball with the turkey vultures.

And if I didn’t think that was so neat I wouldn’t have grabbed my camera and snuck around the back of the house to try and catch a picture.

And if I hadn’t left out the backdoor so quietly Clara wouldn’t have come screaming out the front door looking for me.

And if Clara hadn’t come screaming out the front door the turkey vultures wouldn’t have flown away.

And if the turkey vultures hadn’t flown away they might have eaten our dead rabbit.

And if they had eaten our dead rabbit it wouldn’t still be sitting out front smelling bad.

And if the rabbit wasn’t smelling bad the turkey vultures wouldn’t come back.

And if it didn’t come back the three of us would be disappointed not to get to watch them at such close range again.

So I leave our dead rabbit out front, and thank my lucky stars once again that I live in a place without sidewalks.

And if you don’t think that dead rabbits bring fun and interesting times that’s OK, we can agree to disagree.

I’ll keep my dead rabbits, you keep your sidewalks!