CAT TROUBLE

Our Ollie, bless his little heart has been making the rounds in our neighborhood. Back in California he picked up a couple of names for himself. He was called at various times, the Gangsta, mobster and/or the juvenile delinquent. I just come home from taking Mimi to school and I was told by Shelley that Ollie made his way to her house again this morning. She said that she was quite surprised that he remembered how to get to her house. Now mind you, she does not live next door to us, but lives 2 streets over on the other end of the block from us. Also you have to know that although she has 3 kids, her house is something that you would see in a Martha Stewart magazine inside and out. Needless to say she was not happy when Ollie came over and caused a ruckus with Rex her Pugle. Ollie who is not afraid of any dog was chasing Rex around his own backyard. EGADS!!! If it is not Mimi's sassiness that is driving me nuts, it's Ollie raising a ruckus! There has got to be a light at the end of the tunnel somewhere and I'll let you know when I find it.

LIFE'S TOUGH LESSONS

Off and on up until this past Sunday Mimi has been quite sassy. We went toe to toe on many occassions. There must be something going on, there is something most definitely in the air. According to the other moms in Mimi's class they too have been going toe to toe with their kids. Maybe it's just that they are all 6 year olds and trying to test their limits. Who knows??? As a result I told Mimi that she was to have no playdates after school last Monday. That was the punishment for her " I can do whatever I want and I don't have to listen to you!!!" attitude and roll her eyes at me like I have STUPID writtten on my forehead. As a result, this past weekend it was Braden's 4th birthday and Shelley had made quite a bit of cupcakes to take to the park Monday after school. Mimi was invited to join them. I so wanted to go as I do enjoy adult conversations now and then but then on the other hand I thought to myself "what am I teaching her by making empty threats???" "That it is ok for mom to tell me my punishment and then not have her not follow through. WOW! I can bamboozle her into anything!!!"I tell you it was really hard as a parent to follow through. Mimi cried and cried that she wanted to go to Braden's party but I stuck to my guns so to speak. Then true to Northwest weather, it started to rain right along with the thunder and lightening which did not make Mimi's crying any easier. Yesterday Mimi was right back to being such an angel. No sassiness whatsoever.

Today started off beautifully. Mimi, Blake and I went to our local McDonald playland for lunch. Then Blake said that he wanted to walk to school with us. Ok that was fine. We stopped at home to pick up Butch and Mimi's backpack. Since Halle lives across the street from us, Mimi wanted to see if she too would like to walk along with us. She did. So there I was walking with Mimi, Blake, Halle and Butch. Then Ollie our cat decided that he too wanted to tag along. EGADS! Walking 3 kids and a dog on a leash is not bad but a cat! Ollie caused quite a stir with the kindergarten kids waiting to get in. I finally made it home in one piece and my sanity intact. Then it was time to go out to do some errands such as gassing up my car and buying grandma a birthday present. Next thing I knew it was time to pick Mimi up from school. This time I thought that I would leave Butch at home. Ollie on the other hand still decided to follow me to school again. YIKES! We all made it home safely. Then all of the kids wanted to go to Erin's for a playdate. Janet said that it was fine with her. I said that I would come to to help out as there was 7 kids vs 2 adults. Things were going fine until Janet said that the kids could play with the kiddie garden tools. That was when they started running around the backyard with them. I had told Mimi 3 times not to run with or swing the tools around. I did not see it happen but somehow Mimi's hand shovel met up with Halliwell's head. Fortunately it was not serious and there was no blood drawn. That was when I had Mimi tell Halliwell that she was sorry and also had her say good-bye to her friends and marched her (who by this time was crying herself) home. We had a long and I mean long talk about what she had done. Next I had her call Halliwell to appologize again and I spoke with Brandy about what had happened. I really love being a parent but it is soooo darn exhausting at times. Sigh. Almost forgot to mention that when I was home cooking dinner, I got a phone call from Zoe to come over to her house and get Ollie who was climbing their fence trying to get in and causing a ruckus with their Pugle "Rex". Ollie is not afraid of any dog whatsoever and I could hear the barking and yelping in the background. When I got there, Shelley said that Ollie had follwed them all the way home from the park next to Erin's house. EGADS! I tell you, there is never ever a dull moment around our place.

GONE FISHI'IN

This past Saturday was the fishing derby at down by the lake. Blake decided that he wanted his ol' buddy Mimi to tag along so she did. Keri stopped by the house to pick her up and Mimi was soooo ecstatic that she could not get out of the house fast enough to suit her. "Bye mom, bye dad!!!" she said as she whizzed past us barely brushing our cheeks with a kiss. She was grinning from ear to ear when she came home after it was all over. She said that afterward they all went to Red Robin for lunch. Bubba and his dad Neil joined with them. Later in the evening Blake came over to the house. When his dad Wade came to pick him up he regaled us with the story of what happened at the fishing derby. He said that Blake is such a natural at fishing which I totally believe. Blake does play sports such as soccer, basketball and baseball but is not great at it however he does have great hand/eye coordination for casting the line out into the lake. Our Mimi is completely the opposite. She is great at gymnastics, soccer and just about anything that has to do with running but does not have great hand/eye coordination. I must say that she rather sucks at it. Can't throw the baseball worth a darn nor hit it. The same seems to be true of casting out her line. Wade says that they let Mimi use Bailey's pole and the hook went straight up in the air then straight down. Blake tried to teach her how to do it but she just couldn't quite get it. Needless to say she did not catch anything but Blake one the other hand caught a nice size trout. Wade then said that he could not believe how much mac 'n' cheese Mimi could pack away. Now that was no surprise to me.

WALK OVER

For quite some time now Mimi and her gymnastics classmates have been practicing handstands against the wall at the gym. Eventually they will do "walkovers". To my surprise the other night Mimi was already doing them. Still needs a little more practice though.

MYSTERY PLANT

While doing gardening work the other day, I noticed these plants growing underneath my kitchen window and for the life of my could not figure out what they are. Then I remembered that last summer I had purchased some herbs at our local arboretum then proceeded to forget to take them from the plastic pot and plant them. Also forgot to water them. Needless to say they up and died on me. Somehow the seeds must have gotten into the soil and these plants showed up. I pulled a leaf off to rub into my fingers and smell it. It smells almost like celery. Hmmmmm.

JAPANESE MAPLE TREES

Even though I do appreciate the luxury of being a stay at home mom at this late stage of my life, I absolutely love it, crazy, hectic schedule and all. Training a fairly new puppy, school for Mimi, playdates, baseball, gymnastics, piano lessons and swimming this summer. Also besides doing the daily chores of grocery shopping, cleanning house and laundry, I am working on beautifying our backyard. I have been making quite a few trips to our local Walmart where they have some fantastic deals on plants and such. In the top left picture is our Japanese Maple Tree that came with the house when we bought a couple of years ago. Last year I thought that I would plant a couple of more trees to spruce up our fairly bare backyard. It is a running joke in our family that mom "does not know how to read the instructions". Which is what happened here. I bought the trees just by looking at the picture (and not reading) on the package thinking "what beautiful trees these are" Time goes on and a pretty strong Winter came. By the time Spring rolled around both dad and I thought that these trees were gonners. Everything else was blooming except these trees. So the other day I went out to take a look. Lo and behold tiny little leaves are starting to pop out! I then actually read the package and was surprised to see that I had planted more Japanese Maple trees! Holy Cow! I guess there are different kinds of Japanese Maple trees as the picture on the package looks nothing like the one that came with the house. It does however look pretty on the package picture and yesterday Mimi and I were at Costco (my other home away from home) and saw that they are selling these trees for $54.00 and above. EACH! YIKES! I bought a smaller Japanese Maple tree at Walmart (my 2nd home away from home) for less than half the price of Costco. My apple tree is starting to bloom too. Things are slowly starting to take shape around here. Thank goodness. If you have the $$$ (which we don't), you can buy the plants full grown like my friend Shelley does. She says that she does not have the patience to wait. I on the other hand don't have the patience either but I would rather spend our money at Disneyland (hopefully in the fall) and the Olympics next year.

AT THE PARK

Today was actually much, much nicer than what appears on the camera. Tomorrow is supposed to be real nice too thank goodness as the Lugnuts have a scheduled game. It all goes downhill after that.