End Of Life, New Life

End Of Life...

Nicole's bunny (my favorite) Charlie died. :o(  We have no idea why, he was fine one day and dead the next. I've narrowed it down to two things...either something bit him or stung him, or he was sick and we didn't know it. We had a little funeral for him just like we did for Petey and he is buried over near where Petey is. I feel badly for Nicole, but told her no more bunnies. We now have a male and a female and if/when they have baby bunnies, I might let Nicole pick one. But for now we are focusing on the new life in our lives.

New Life...

Two new little puppies have joined our home. We are not planning on keeping both, but rather are just trying to see which fits better in our home. We have a male and a female. The boy, Nicole named Bear after his grandfather. The girl, Rachel's family named Tiny. Her name is Tiny because she is the runt of the litter and definitely the smallest of the 11, being half the size of the biggest in the litter. I will keep everyone up to date on their progress in our family, but for now here are some pics I took of them as soon as they came to our home. Here are pictures of the boy....

 

Here are pictures of the girl...

 

 

And a picture of them passed out in the kitchen. In this picture you can see the size difference between Tiny and Bear.

 

 

On a couple of other notes, one of Nicole's top teeth is finally just about ready to fall out, so I will take a picture of that once it happens. And the other night we got to see a spider build a web right outside our kitchen window. It was really neat to watch. Funny thing was the spider was only there for the night and gone in the morning!

 

 

 

 

Missing "Home"

Man, yesterday I was missing home, family, friends, and even just my town (things to do around town)...more than ever. For awhile when we first moved here, I was under the impression that Joe was more than likely going to want to move back home after the year. But talking with him yesterday he is positive now that he is going to want to stay after the year is up. This is really bad news for me because I am pretty positive that I am going to want to go back to FL when the year is up. I know a lot can happen between then and now, but I can't imagine a whole lot happening that would make me want to stay here away from everything I've known and loved for the last 30 years of my life. If it stays this way, this is going to be a huge problem at the end of the year for us because somebody is going to be extremely unhappy...and that somebody is usually me. I sacraficed so Joe could finally live his dream of moving to TN and seeing what it is all about, but I did that knowing that I would not want to stay here the rest of my life. I guess I should have just refused to come as everyone suggested I do. I guess all I can do now is wait until it gets closer towards the end of the year and see where it goes from there.

On a different note, ugh...here is a cute picture of a turtle Joe found in the middle of the road. The girls wanted to keep it, but we had nowhere to keep a turtle of this size, and he wasn't exactly the friendliest turtle ever either.

Staying with the animal theme, our baby bunny Joey is finally starting to eat other things other than rabbit food. We couldn't get him to eat a carrot, or fresh flowers (which the bunnies love), or any other "snack" other than regular rabbit chow. Finally the other day Lacy was holding him and trying to feed him a flower, and he ate it!

So with the rain comes mud and with the mud comes messy kids. Actually, just one messy kid. Nicole and Ashley don't have much interrest in getting all muddy, but Emily loves it! She gets on her rain boots and jumps in the muddy puddles, and even sticks her hands in it. Here is a picture of my muddy girl...

Yesterday we went to a local state park, it was fairly nice, didn't get to check out the whole thing, but what we did see of it was decent. While there Ashley asked another girl around her age to play with her, and the girl said "no, I don't want to play with you". I couldn't believe it! Aren't we in TN where everyone waves at each other and seems genuinely friendly?  On the flip side Nicole found a girl around her age to play with. On the way home we stopped at another place which were ancient Indian grounds. A lot of walking, so we just went to one mound. Here are a few of pics. I got a picture taken with the girl's too, but it didn't come out too well.

 

 

And last, but not least, a while back ago I posted some pictures of the house. Well I now finally have my kitchen how I want it, so here are a couple of pictures of the kitchen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Slumber Party!

Before I get into the slumber party, it must be said that one of the reasons Joe wanted to move to TN was because he was/is afraid of FL flooding since it is surrounded by water and not much above sea level. Ahem! With that said, here is what it looks like around here after a few hours of heavy rain and a few hours of light rain in one day. One of these pictures is taken 5 minutes from our house, one of these pictures is on our street!

5 minutes from home

Our road!

After seeing this after one day of rain, I am very concerned about flooding around this area! Much more than I've ever been in FL. What if we had a storm lasting a few days or a week!?!

 

ANYWAY! So tonight the girls had a sleepover with their two closest friends here (their only friends really). Originally it was only going to be Laura staying the night, but their friend Lacy was here with them most the day so I invited her to stay as well. They played with toys, they played Minecraft, we had spaghetti for dinner, cinnamon buns for dessert, they painted, and now they are lying together watching a movie. Laura and Ashely fell asleep by 9pm but the other 3 are still awake. Hopefully they will be falling asleep soon! Here are a couple of pics of all of them tonight.

 

 

 

 

 

Some of you may know, but for those of you who don't, we will be getting a puppy within a few weeks or so. I feel ready to move on and feel I am ready to give love to another dog. At first Joe didn't want to get a puppy, but he DID want a 4-wheeler, so we made a deal. He gets the 4-wheeler and I get the puppy. He said he wants to be part of the process, so when my friend's puppies are ready for a new home we will go together as a family to pick out a new puppy for us. Not looking forward to the housebreaking again, but other than that I feel I am ready. 1st thing will be picking out a puppy that is NOT skittish, because that is why we couldn't get Petey back in the house. If you tried to approach him like you were going to pick him up, he'd run away scared. He was that way his entire life, even before we got him, so it really couldn't be trained out of him. We'll be looking for a medium energy, friendly, playful puppy. I will start training early, and the dog will not be allowed outside while were are leaving the house, under no circumstances. The dog is just a mixed breed "mutt" and will be free, so really looking forward to seeing how this puppy will do for our family compared to Petey, since he/she will be completely different than Petey was. Though I still miss my boy very much so. :o(

 

 

 

Rabbits, Loose Teeth, and Minecraft

Have I ever mentioned how much I LOVE Nicole's rabbit? I love all the little rabbits, but especially love Nicole's. Out of the 3, he is just so sweet and lovable, he is the only one that will run right up to you when you open the cage (to come out and be held). He's the best eater and basically just like a baby (as close to a baby as you can get for a bunny). I also had to give him a haircut with the electric clippers because his hair got all knotted up before we knew it. Let me tell you, for never hearing, seeing, or feeling clippers...he did so awesome letting me cut him! If I could have him inside in a cage I would, but I just don't really have the space to do it or the money to get him set up to do it. This isn't a great picture of our neighbor Lacy, but it's a great picture of Nicole's bunny where you can really see his personality a little bit in the picture. He loves to be held like a little baby and fed carrots, lol. :o)

 

So Nicole still has those 2 top teeth loose but already lost another bottom tooth! It happened rather unexpectedly. We went out to eat and she tried to open a ketchup bottle with her teeth, and it loosened up a bottom tooth that wasn't even loose prior to her doing this. Doing that got her tooth so loose, that it actually came out the very next day. I did the same thing I did for Emily, tied a string on it and yanked, and it came right out! She said it didn't even hurt. Here is her picture once the tooth came out.

 

 

The latest thing going on at our house is the addition of two more computers. We put the girl's computer desk next to ours and put two computers there so that we can all play minecraft together. During the day Ashley can play on Joe's computer, and in the evening she will sit with either Joe or I and play. The girl's have definitely gotten into both playing minecraft and watching minecraft video's. I can't really complain because there isn't a whole heck of a lot else going on around here. They still get their schoolwork done, they still play with their friends, we still go to the park and church, and they even still play with their toys...but minecraft has definitely become part of the day and the routine. I guess you could say it's official, we're a gaming family! Here is a picture of the family playing together (minus me taking the picture).

 

 

I am starting to heal over the loss of Petey. I still have my moments of just not being able to believe he is gone, but I'm not crying everyday anymore. I feel that if we got another dog, I'd be able to show it the love it deserves (which right after Petey's death I really didn't believe). My friend's dog had 11 puppies and in a few weeks they will be ready for a new home. I am considering getting one because it will be free, and it will be a great opportunity to try and start over with a new puppy (and it also wouldn't be a small dog, but more of a medium sized, hardy dog). Not sure yet, I probably won't even make a decision until that time comes because I still have so many mixed emotions over it.

 

The other day I actually rescued, saved, and found the original owner of both a cat and a chicken....all in one morning, it was crazy! Nicole is starting to feel really homesick, telling me she wants to go back down to FL to visit her friends and family that she misses so much. Because she is my most social child, I really expected this, and am rather surprised it took a whole two months for her to start feeling this way. The restaurant is doing fairly well, especially since they haven't advertised and had their grand opening yet. Tonight Joe called me to tell me he was on his way home, and that they had an extremely busy night (and at night they are only doing pizza). Basically they do BBQ for lunch and pizza for dinner.  Other than that, no other news to report.