Cowboys and Indians

No, my kids don't play Cowboys & Indians or Cops & Robbers, but today they invented a new game: Bacteria and Antibodies. They were chasing each other around the house and fighting over who had to be the evil bacteria. Love it, love it, love it. (And by the way, if they did ever play Cowboys & Indians, I have no doubt the cowboys would be the bad guys.)

They were also quite upset with me for throwing away the moldy orange juice bottle I found in the fridge last night. Turns out it was a science project about which I was unaware. I told them to let me know next time so I don't mistake a plate of growing fuzz for garbage in the future.

Did you know that tarantulas can go 2.5 years without eating? We just learned that today. Thank you, Beakman's World.

Marian and Leo both completed a couple of reading assessments today; I'd stumbled across them and they looked quick, so we gave it a whirl. Marian (age 8) came in at a grade level of 4.8 (8th month of 4th grade), and Leo (age 6) at 4.0. The San Diego Quick Assessment just used whole grade numbers and Marian scored grade 4 and Leo grade 2. Both assessments measured only decoding (being able to read the actual words), not reading comprehension, and who knows how much worth they actually have. However, I can certainly see numbers coming in handy the next time I'm cornered by a rabid homeschooling/unschooling skeptic who's convince I'm ruining my children's lives.

On another topic, my foster cat had her babies the other day and has proven to be one of the most idiotic and inept new mothers I've ever known of any species. She is so clueless. I hate interfering with births and maternal-newborn relationships and have always been very hands-off, but I have no doubts that both her babies would be dead right now without me. She finally is getting the hang of it though, if finally nursing well, and hasn't forcefully (and accidentally) flung one of her babies into the side of the cage recently. Oy.

Wanna look down my top?

Jojo, Dharma, Louie, and Darla. (The kids named them.) They all just turned 6 weeks old and are having a blast. I'll have them for a couple more weeks before I have to give them up. Aren't they darling?

A valuable new plant variety

Furry love.

Cesar (my dog who almost died of parvo right after I got him last year), and Toby (a long term fosterling with cerebellar hypoplasia).

And yes, he'll be getting his nails clipped ASAP.

Heidi, Heidi

I've posted pictures of Heidi here before, from the bottle-feeding baby to the 10-ft-high celiling cat. Here is my girl these days.

Ten foot high ceilings

Heidi






Trudy



Around the corner.

Ocular Incident

Last night while I innocently watched TV with a purring kitten on my ample chest, said kitten stalked and bested my fragile eyeball.

With my cornea flapping this morning (well, it felt like it), I headed to the ER in at the advice of the doc's office. The hospital in the big town (pop. 8,000) 20 miles away is medical technology central for this big rural area.

Less than a minute after walking into the ER, we were being checked in, a few minutes later we were in a room. The doctor was friendly and personable and talked the kids through everything. He numbed my eye, put yellow dye in it, then turned off the lights and showed the kids what it looked like with the black light. Then he looked through the microscope (another cool lesson), and showed me on paper the jagged vertical line scratching the surface of my cornea from upper center iris to the just inside the constricted pupil. Meanwhile, Marian drew and colored a picture of what my eye looked like under black light, Sophie drew a picture of "Blind Momma", and Leo watched everything. They enjoyed watching me get a tetanus shot, and the nurse enjoyed watching the kids.

The eye should be better in a couple of days, following antibiotic eyedrops every few hours, 600mg ibuprofen every 6 hours, and my repeated thoughts of the vicodin prescription I turned down. I'm not wearing the eye patch because it sucks in countless ways. No night driving until I'm healed, because darkness will cause my pupil to expand further into the injured area, which will increase the blurriness of my vision. Since light shining in my eye hurts, I get the lovely choice of pain or major blur. Except when I have both and am spared the choice.

Doc says TV is better than reading or computer for my eye, so I'm not here right now and you're imagining all of this. Get help.




The evil hideous beast who committed this atrocious act:


Isn't she cute? She's sitting on my lap right now.

I forgive her.

Wandering words

I'm done with my semester and have a month OFF from school! Woo!

Marian and Leo can use chopsticks proficiently and have been able to since the first time they tried. What the hell? I'm 32 and only just now getting the hang of it!

Sophie told me the other day, "Momma, you're strange." Ah, the wisdom of little ones.

NaNo turned into NoNo for me. Ah, well.

I wish everyone knew how much fun it can be to have 7 kittens running around the living room.

Dang, my kids look so clean in new clothes. I mean, they were clean before, but everything was dingy and old. They look all sparkly and new now.

Life is Part of Life

Jerry


The stinkiest foster I've had, this potent tom cat was attacked by a dog and has bite wounds on both sides and his belly, in addition to being severely emaciated. Tomorrow will be a week since he came to me, and so far so good. None of his wounds are abscessing that I can tell, his spirits are great, he's eating well and gaining weight, and what goes in is coming out as it should. He has a long road ahead of him, and I'll be at his side for as long as he needs me.


Little Girl & Little Boy






Representative of real life, Little Girl is in the spotlight in these photos. Vocal and strong, she's a definite focal point. Her brother looks just like her, but his nose is brown. They are about 5 days old, and small for their age. They were found in an abandoned cat nest, very cold, with dead litter mates, nobody cleaned or detached from placenta, and near death. While small for their age, they are eating and eliminating and getting me up at weird hours and generally being charming little squeakers. I think their names will come when I can look into their eyes. I've had them since they were less than 24 hours old.

Millie and Bo

I've decided to make an effort to chronicle the story of my fosterlings. I volunteer at the local low-kill animal shetler, and am fostering many cats at the moment. They will all be a part of my family's history someday, I don't want to forget any of them. I won't be able to talk about them all in one post, but this will get the story started.

So far, my fosterlings have included 1 dog and 11 cats, all of whom are still in my home. I've adopted 3 of them (the dog and 2 cats).

Millie and Bo (in my home from April 20, 2007 to June 30, 2007):

Millie was the first. A pink-cream pregnant manx kitty, she caught my eye early on. She was sweet and affectionate at the shetler, and I knew she was meant to be part of my life, but I didn't think I'd be adopting her. Not long after, Frank asked me if I'd be willing to foster her until she had her babies and they were weaned. I agreed, and brought Millie home.

A week later, she had three babies as I looked on.

Unfortunately, 2 of them died within hours of birth. She was left with one surviving kitten, baby Bo, who was a nursing champ and thrived from the start.

2 weeks later...

Obviously it didn't take me long to fall in love. About 7 weeks later, I returned him to the shelter to go up for adoption, despite wanting to keep him myself. I can't wait until he finds his forever home; I visit him almost daily (at least 5 days a week) and am happy that I was able to give him such a safe and stable home for the first months of his life.

Since birthing Bo, Millie has adopted and nursed six unrelated kittens alongside her own. She welcomes each new life into her nest without hesitation, and her openness and generosity are an inspiration.

Millie is still available for adoption at the shelter. I visit her almost daily to clean the gunk out of her eyes (the shelter air doens't agree with her sweet eyes), and to let her out of her cage and watch her stretch her legs as she exploreds the cat room. She gets regular loving from me and the kids, and will until she gets adopted. If she ever reaches the end of her time at the shelter and still hasn't found a home, I will open my home to her once again.