The New Additions

Shortly after moving, we had to put our oldest cat down, so we have adopted 2 new kittens to keep Theo company:

Mostly Theo is not thrilled, though we have seen him racing through the halls with the kittens. 

Turns out, we have forgotten what kittens are like.  Apparently when you're a kitten, there are only 2 types of things in the world:  things you can eat and things you can climb.  They're pretty excited when they find something like a houseplant that can be both.  This is why they're so cute--to keep one from killing them when one finds them climbing the shower curtain or one's best dress.....

The Look

Anyone who thinks cats can't learn things hasn't lived with one. It took Theo maybe a month into his diet to figure out that I can ignore his whining, but this gets to me every time:

So Much For Spring

I planted a few flowers in pots yesterday, so it's snowing today. Let's hope pansies are hardy plants.

End Of An Era

When we first moved into this house, we added some "temporary" garden boxes in the back yard, thinking eventually we'd figure out something better.  Now, almost 11 years later, we haven't come up with a permanent idea, but

 the boards had thoroughly rotted, some had broken apart, and all of the boxes were overrun with weeds and voles.  So this year we're taking them out, and if the ground EVER dries out after all of our rain/snow this year, we'll till this all in and hopefully solve the drainage problem as well.  It's heavy clay soil and there's a slight slope, so if it rains, part of the yard turns into a swamp.  As you can see, grass has already mostly taken them over this year anyway, so we don't have very far to go to put this all back into grass. Apparently, we just need to stop interfering with the progress of the grass.  That's easy enough!

Spring!

I kicked off the first official day of spring by taking the cats in to the vet for their annual shots.  Whew, do I know how to celebrate! 

The vet has given (by which I mean sold for a surprisingly high price) me some de-stress drugs to sprinkle over their food to help them cope with stressful situations--such as vet visits.  Where the heck is the human equivalent?  I mean really--how about an open bar at the dentist's office?  Maybe some nitrous oxide at the gynecologist's office?  I'd even settle for chocolate at the DMV. 

We have so much to learn from our pets.