The White House

The White House

Monday, June 28, 2010

Slacker

Not a Sanibel Slacker, but a picture-taking blogging slacker.

Wednesday night my nieces stayed over and the kids spent most of Thursday in the pool. It was a beautiful day.

Lucas had soccer photos and a game Thursday night. If you've ever coached 4-year old soccer on picture day you'll know what I'm talking about. If you haven't, don't. Organizing, gathering, leading your team and parents through 200 other confused players and parents to a camera they will not cooperate with is exhausting. I won't share the other adjectives I'm thinking of.

But this guy is so darn cute it makes it all worth it!

Unfortunately, I think he spent too much time in the pool and was too tired. He was very uncooperative and ornery. At one point he actually looked at me, turned around and kicked the ball in the other teams net just to see my reaction. No, actually, he did it twice. He's got a little devil in him, that's for sure.

See...see the wicked little smile. Both Nick and Prakash are trying to get him to kick to his left. He did not.

Olivia and Lucas were wrestling the other night. And no one cried. Unbelievable.

Friday night I spent about 2.5 hours soaking my dry gardens only to have it rain all Saturday and Sunday. Who knew? Anyhow, this guy/gal got out of the bird pen and was in with Daisy. All alone. It was some kind of bird-panic as I listened to this squawk-tweet-whistle until I finally went and put him back. Then quiet. I'm sure he'll do it again.

Roscoe: the wild savage beast. He was temporarily relocated to this tree in the driveway. Saturday I shovelled the dog pen and put up a dog run from corner to corner inside for him. (About 20 feet of running distance) I was pretty proud of myself for doing it without help. I changed his obnoxiously heavy chain to a light rope which he can chew through if he realizes it. Let's hope he doesn't. It's only a four foot fence that he goes over with lightening speed so until I can afford an electric fence for the top he'll have to be on the run. This is one step closer to civil. Maybe. I need another battery for the shock collar so I can start working with him. Trust me on this. It would take you about 3.5 seconds to realize it takes a small army to control this guy. If I was independently wealthy I would send him away to a doggie school, but since I am the complete opposite I will frustrate myself beyond belief trying to make him calm. Should be fun.

I have scaled back considerably. In fact, for me, it feels like I no longer have a pulse. I'm used to pushing so hard. I do the maintenance....feeding and caring for all the animals; watering the gardens; caring for the children. After that, I only do something if I feel like it. I've done a little more dehoarding...a project that I wish to complete by the time school starts in August. I shovelled a little dirt. I did some weeding. I'm hurrying with absolutely nothing. The gardens are in and now I am going to enjoy summer. I hope to buy a couple cheap tents at the end of the week and go camping. We aren't that family. Our life was eight kids in endless sports. Now that all our activities are scaled back we have to relearn how to do other things. It's an odd, but fun adventure. Hope you are taking time to smell the roses as well.

2 comments:

stace41971 said...

You never cease to amaze me...you accomplish so much. I hope you enjoy the rest of your summer and have fun relearning to smell the roses :)

Janie said...

I'll bet Roscoe would be better behaved if he could run about 10 miles every day. Daisy is the picture of calm after she's been out on the trail.
Around the house, I use a shock collar. She knows when she has it on, so the most I ever have to do is buzz her to remind her to stay close.
Have fun camping if you get to go. It's great to take the time to smell the roses and wildflowers once in a while.