I've gotta feeling....

that everything is about to go crazy around here. No real reason, just a feeling. Back in June, our washing machine flooded our house, and we have not had a clean or organized house since. It is really frustrating and I cannot understand why people cannot just come in, do their job and get the hell OUT of my house!! I have about 8 different repairs started, but not a single damn one of them is completed! It is VERY frustrating and extremely depressing to see my house so ....gross.

Way off topic, just to occupy my mind with something other than the destruction of my house:
Braden is obsessed with Barney, Caillou, and Elmo. Thank goodness we have Sprout!
Ryan has been telling his teacher, the principal, and the counselor at school that he never gets to eat breakfast in the mornings because I dont let him, or because we are mean...WTF!?!? The little shit would get his breakfast, if he would get the heck out of bed and get ready to go when he is told, instead of whining, yelling, screaming and fighting with everyone in the mornings. Not even kidding you....I wake him up around 7. He showers at night, so that is not an issue. School starts at 8:10, so in order to have school breakfast, he has to be there by 7:45. He has not made it to school before 8:20 more than 3 days yet. It is SO stinkin old. We have started to just leave, and if he wants to get to school, he starts walking (it is a whole 7 blocks).
Cody is still pretty calm, cool and collected. He has started fibbing a lot, and we are working on it.
Both of the boys are doing really well at school, and Braden is trying to potty train! It is fun, but sad. My babies are growing up way too fast.

Ooops...sorry.

I know I promised to be better at this, but I really suck. The rabbits are all grown, weaned and most are gone to their new homes. We have expanded our breeds, and are now raising New Zealands and min-rex in addition to my little loves, the mini-lops. I cannot help but adore them. They are all so sweet and funny. I have more pictures, but I need to get some new ones today.

Silly Wabbits

Back in March, we bought 2 rabbits- Oliver and Sophie. They are really so sweet and fun to play with. They are cuddly, and litter box trained (awesome! and SO easy!) and we love them. We knew that we had a male and a female - and we were prepared for the inevitable. What we were not prepared for, however, was for OLIVER to give birth. :) So...now we have to get used to either calling them the opposites, or to figure out new names. It is hard to go so long calling a rabbit by a name that is no longer a very good name....I am sure we will survive.

We have 5 seemingly healthy, wiggly, bald, pink babies. Oliv....erm, Momma seems to be taking to motherhood quite well. She is in great spirits and does not seem to mind at all when I poke around to snoop on the babies. They are so cute - in a gross kind of way. They are not really gross, just bald - and they've not opened their eyes just yet, so it is hard to really tell what they will be like later on. Based on their skin color, I would say we will probably have one that looks EXACTLY like Momma, and an all grey (Chin - think chinchilla) one, which I am excited about. Looks to be a mostly white, and then another broken black - but not as much black as momma, and a broken chin like daddy. Whatever they look like, they are sure to be freaking adorable. I will have a hard time letting them go if someone wants one. My plan is to keep my favorite one - as long as it loves me a bunch, too. Anyone in the market for a baby mini-lop on or around September 7th? I can totally hook you up! See pictures below...

Daddy 'The rabbit fomerly known as Sophie'...

Momma 'Oliver' ...


The babies...they are covered in the mom's fur - she made this nest about 5 minutes before she gave birth. She pulled all that fur out of her stomach and chest and pulled all of her hay out of her feeder to make it. She also scratched and pulled off as much of the cardboard from the box that she could...

July 13, 2000

Nine years ago, I had just moved back home with my infant - escaping a marriage that would even torture Satan. I had reconnected with my friends, and the livin' was good.... On the 13th of July in 2000 - my world turned upside down. My best friend, George was swimming in Perry Lake, he went under to retrieve some dropped sunglasses for a friend and disappeared. It was probably, at that time, the worst thing I could ever think of experiencing. I remember sitting by the phone - glued to the television- surrounded by people that I grew up with, and that all loved George so very much - praying, waiting...hardly breathing. We all had our own thoughts and hopes - perhaps he was disoriented and swam to shore? He was a certified scuba diver, a strong swimmer - drowning was not even a possibility, right? Wrong. Impossible things happen. They found his body shortly before 9 am the next day. I sit back and reflect on my uni-browed best friend and realize that although life is so devastatingly different and wrong without him, in his death he gave me a lifelong gift. I feel strongly that he made sure there was someone to take care of me and my son. Jeremy and I would not have ever taken the time to connect in the manner that we did had life not taken such a turn. In the two weeks after George's death, I found myself surrounded at home by people that no matter how far we grow apart, I will always hold dear to my heart. You do not endure the loss of your 'brother', your best friend, without the group of people that move along in life holding you up along the way. Life has taken many different turns, but it has taken me in so many wonderful - and some equally horrible - places. My support group dissolved - and all that has been standing through everything has been my rock - otherwise known as my husband. I will forever thank George for bringing us together, all the while cussing him for leaving me....

School's Out for Summer!

I just uploaded my final assignments for the two classes I took this summer....hallelujah! It was excruciating, jamming a semester's worth of work into 7 weeks. Kicked my ass, really. Thank goodness it is over - I will not be voluntarily taking summer classes again! I guess we will have to see if my stress paid off when grades are posted Thursday...

Today

You know, just when I think things cannot get any worse - they do.

Just when I think that I cannot take any more - something bigger is thrown at me and I discover that I can.

As soon as I feel overwhelmed, and am ready to turn my back on the world - a dirty, sticky, slobbery kiss from a two year old makes the world right.

Summer Time

My kids are going to drive me to the nut house. I am serious. I only work Monday, Wednesday and Friday so I am off on Tuesdays and Thursdays with the boys. God help us.