happy birthday tiger

While dating Zach, his younger brother gave me a large stuffed tiger as a gift.  I love this tiger and have had it in my kids rooms since I began having kids.  Connor has taken over the caretaking of Tiger and sleeps with him every night.  It is his Hobbes though his name has never graduated beyond Big Tiger.  

A few weeks ago Connor declared that it was Big Tiger's birthday and he spent the afternoon wrapping presents for him and putting them on the table just like I do for them on their birthdays.  That evening before bed we crowded around the table and watched tiger open his presents.  It might have been one of the cutest experiences of my parenting life.

Happy Birthday Big Tiger!  We love the joy you bring to our lives!

kitten love

Poor Micah thought he had time to relax on the swing and read before his baseball practice.  However the cats love him and I mean LOVE him and when Callie saw him sitting up there all alone she decided to keep him company.

At first she just sweetly sat next to him but then she decided he needed a bath and then a lap buddy and then a bath again.  Now Micah has the knowledge that a cat's sandpaper tongue can tickle, bad!

leia, obi, and callie rey

We moved into our home having just lost my sweet 14 year old Golden Retriever, Daisy.  However waiting on the porch of the home we had just bought was a skittish little gray and white kitten with a hurt ear and an infected eye.  She had been through something for sure but decided our porch was her refuge and every day I came back to work she was standing guard.  It took a few weeks before she would let us touch her but she had already claimed our home as hers and the boys were in love so Leia officially was ours.

Fast forward 8 months and add in some very poor age calculations on our part and Leia became the mama of a black and white boy and a sweet calico, which I learned are always girls.  Who knew?  The black and white one was going to stay so he became Obi Wan Kenobi May, Obi for short.  The original plan was to find a home for Callie (short for Calico) but as the weeks wore on the two kittens were so sweet together, were hilarious to watch play and followed each other and us everywhere that we caved and Callie was officially a May.

Since then we have loved having these new additions to our family.  They are outdoor cats because of the allergies of many friends, my lack of desire to change a litter box and the intense hunting skills they possess.   I built them a kitty house and insulated it via pinterest instructions so the winter weather shouldn't be a problem.

Leia is a complex young lady.  She's a wanderer, a hunter and a homebody in one.  She's also the only one who tries to sneak inside every chance she gets.  If the door is open a crack she bolts.  We have found her relaxing atop many a bed and blanket not knowing how long she's been hiding out.

Obi is the cuddliest of them all and the worst hunter though he is improving.  I once witnessed him letting a squirrel get away after Callie had handed it over for the final demise.  She was none to happy about it.

Callie is now Callie Rey May after the new Star Wars heroine.  We certainly can't leave her out as far as the namesakes go.  She is very skittish but has decided recently that it's ok if I try to pet her occasionally.  She loves Micah the most and will let him pick her up, cradle her, and dance with her.  It's so so cute to watch.

They love to be with us when we play outside and will hang out playing in the yard right next to wherever the boys are.  They also love to watch me paint, Callie from a distance but Obi right next to me so close that his nose has caught a couple colors.

We really love our trio.

kitty palace

Our kitties are officially spoiled.  Either that or I'm too picky to have a non adorable bed for them to sleep in.  Winter is coming, and even in Georgia nights can get pretty chilly.  Our sweet hunters needed a warmer place to sleep and there were plenty of tips online of how to make a warm bed for outdoor cats.  Unfortunately most of them, while warm, were made of big tupperware containers and that is not something I want to stare at on my porch. 

I wanted an end table or coffee table out there anyway so the boys and I went on a Goodwill search Monday and found the perfect starting piece.   A little cleaning and chalkpainting later and our babes have a cute and cuddly place to sleep.  There are still a couple pieces missing on the inside for the truly warm and cozy factor but they have already spent a night all cuddled up together so I think it's a win.  Now to get them to actually use the kitty door...

kittens

After we closed on this beloved new home of ours lots of work was to be done before we could actually move in and use it as our everyday home.  Of course lots is still to be done now that we are here, but isn't that always the case.  The first day that Logan and I showed up to start out weeks of painting all the things we saw a little gray and white kitten on our porch.  Her ear was cut, her nose was a little bloody and she wasn't the biggest fan of us trying to pet her but she ate our offerings of chickfila waffle fries, crushed up scooby snacks and drank water from a ripped in half styrofoam cup found in the empty cabinets.

The next day went about the same way and the next and the next until we realized that somehow our home had been adopted by this little girl and we were going to have to take her or force her out.  Little by little she grew used to us and by the time we actually made the big move, Leia was officially ours, albeit outdoors only because of all the allergic people in our lives.  On my long list of summer to dos was written to take Leia to the vet to make sure more little Leias didn't start crowding the porch.  However, an overly busy summer and some miscalculations of age led to a discovery two weeks ago.

We had kittens!

Somehow this young mama had two kittens and kept them safe and hidden for over three weeks (more or less) around our home.  Zach found them under Connor's skateboard and all five of us were immediately smitten.  I mean seriously kittens are so stinking cute!  For the past two weeks we have been watching Leia care for her son and daughter and intervening only when she decided that another hiding place was necessary and carted them off to the across the street neighbor's garage.  

Just yesterday we decided that we will for sure keep one so the little black and white blue eyed boy is going to stay here with us and hopefully we will find a friendly home for the little Calico soon.  Until then we'll just oooh and ahhh over the cuteness and set up a vet appointment STAT!

rain is good for ducks

On the way home from running errands yesterday we saw two ducks playing in the puddles on the street in our neighborhood.  It's been raining A LOT so there are big puddles. Connor could not believe that there were ducks here and let me know how they got here and why they came.

Mama, the ducks were at the 'feed the ducks' park and they were too wet and they were cold so they got in their car and drove here so that they could play in the rain and just a little water not a lot of water.

glossary:
feed the ducks park- Turner Lake Park where we go to feed the ducks
a little water- a puddle
a lot of water- a lake

daisy

Logan LOVES Daisy!  Loves Loves Loves her.  Her name is one of his two favorite words and he will yell it constantly, especially when he wants to give her a snack.  He loves grabbing her, petting her, feeding her, yelling for her and watching her through the window.  The only other child who has ever been this fond of my Daisy May is Mr. William.

My sweet Daisy is 12 years old and will probably not be with us much longer.  However she is a stubborn southern woman so she could surprise us!  For however long it is our baby boy is loving every minute of it!

occupy patio

At some point in the last couple weeks our neighbors decided they no longer wanted their house so they left it.  It's the fourth house in the last few months that people have just abandoned in the neighborhood and it's quite frustrating.  As much as I want to hate them and say it's not fair because I want to move too but I'm not just going to up and leave, I have to remember that I don't know their story or what might have given them the thought/reality that there was no other choice to make.  This is not easy AT ALL.  

What makes it even more difficult is the three new visitors we have in our backyard.  Left behind were five cats (that we know of).  Two have taken residence in the backyard of our across the street neighbors.  Three, one cat and two kittens, have decided to stake their claim on our backyard.  Occupy Patio!  The cat only comes around when it's hungry but there's a little gray and white kitten and an all white kitten that pretty much never leave unless we come out there.  The gray one is pretty brave and has let us touch it a couple times.

Although they will not be coming inside my home, (seriously there's not enough room for us let alone more animals) I can not let them starve to death so we'll keep feeding them and letting them hang out for however long they want to.  We don't know if they are boys or girls but Micah has named the gray one scratch because it scratches at the door all the time and the white one Emma but I have no idea why.  The big cat he named Jacob yesterday.  My votes were Katniss, Peeta and Gale but Micah didn't agree :*(