It Only Feels Like Another Country.

So this afternoon I picked up KB and her friend Claire from school.

When Claire got into my car, I noticed that she had on some *fabulous* purple shoes encrusted with diamonds, and I commented on how cute they were.

"Did you mom get those at Justice?" I asked.

They just looked like Justice.

"No," Claire answered. "Try to guess where she got them."

"I don't know; give me a hint," I replied.

"Well, its another country, and it starts with a letter 'C.' And its a place people like to go on vacation."

"Cancun?" I guessed (knowing its not exactly another country in itself).

"No. Guess again."

I thought and thought and came up with...

"China?"

"NOOOOOOO!!!!!" howled Claire, laughing hysterically. "Not China!!"

"OK, then tell me. Where did your mom get those shoes?"

"In CANTON, you silly!"

Ah, yes, Canton... letter C, another country, and a lush vacation spot... Gosh, now why didn't I think of Canton? :)

A Vocabulary Lesson From Annie: All-Girls.

All-Girls.
Pronunciation: \ol'gurls\
1 a plural archaic : loose protective trousers worn over regular clothes b usually plural : trousers of strong material usually with a bib and shoulder straps
2 chiefly British : a loose-fitting protective smock worn over regular clothing
Example: "I don't wanna wear my all-girls today, ok mama?"

Eight Years Ago...

Eight years ago today my sweet KB was born.

Actually, eight years ago she wasn't exactly born yet.... I believe at this precise hour eight years ago I had already been sent home once from the hospital and was moaning and groaning at home alone, writhing in agony and cursing the name of Dr. Flanagan because he had sent me home from the hospital where I might find blessed relief from the agony of labor pains.

He's not one to want to be inconvenienced early in the morning for someone else's baby, by gosh....

So, eight years, give or take 12 hours, ago, this little bundle was born, and my world was turned upside down.

I'll be honest.... I wasn't sure what to do with her.

Babies weren't really my thing. I never played with dolls... never gushed over newborns.... never really understood the appeal of spitup and diapers.

Because I had no mom-instincts (or didn't think I did), I read a lot of books. And probably made her life a little more difficult because of my compulsion to rigidly follow all the baby-training rules spelled out in my stack of books.
But somehow we've survived.... in spite of my total lack of parenting ability. And somehow, she loves me anyway. Somehow, we have an unbreakable mother-daughter bond that God knew I needed ... probably more than she did.

The past eight years have been difficult and challenging and fun and joyful and thrilling and amazing.

Being a mom has been the greatest joy of my life.

And also the most heartbreaking thing I've ever done.

I just wonder how eight years have flown by so fast? Eight years of Bubba the ladybug...

Eight years of playing animals...

...and passionate love for animals of all kinds, but especially horses...

...not to mention bugs...
...and eight years of playing Animal Doctor...

...and lots and lots of dress up.

Its been a fun eight years of 'firsts'... first steps, first lost teeth, first days of school, ...

I'm so proud of how my girl has turned out, and love the person she's becoming. I thank God every day for letting me be her mom. I can't wait to see what the next eight years will hold....

Except for the driving lessons. That, I'm not looking forward to...

Yum, These Words are DELICIOUS.

Yes, I'm eating my words this week.

I remember once upon a time saying something to the effect of "My kids will never go back to public school," or some such nonsense. And at the time, I meant it... I loved having both of my kiddos home, and it was all going so well that I could never envision wanting my children to return to school.

Well....

KB is back at public school.

As of Thursday.

For a multitude of reasons, the main one being that I CAN'T DO IT!

I was having such a hard time fitting it all in, and on a day when I had to run an errand or something, school wasn't getting done.

I decided it was unfair to the Girl to be uneducated simply because we needed to buy groceries that day. And when I picked up Claire at Caldwell one day last week and she was naming all the bones in her body and pointing out where they were, that sealed the deal. Bones?? We're barely even fitting in spelling.... I came home and cried.

I love the idea of homeschooling; I really do. I totally admire my friends who can make it work.

But as of now, I don't feel like I can do it in a way that ensures my child actually learns much of anything.

I don't see how homeschooling women juggle educating the kids, keeping the house clean, and running a business...... my house was steadily caving in around my ankles, and my business was steadily deteriorating as I had less and less time and energy to devote to it.

Those of you who know me well may recall that I am lacking the multitasking gene.

And its really not fair to KB.

So she's back at school.... I'm missing her terribly.... but I feel good that I tried as hard as I could, because I had to try. She's back at school, but its all for the best.

The end.

Sunday Reading Time.

One of them is engrossed in University of Arkansas news, and the other is perusing the latest American Girl catalog.

I won't say which is which.

Ford Family Rodent Farms, LLC

Well, I can't believe I'm about to share this little newsflash, but it turns out that we have ... (gasp) an infestation.

I told you about this little incident... and though I'm wondering if I should be embarrassed to tell you the REST of the story...

Nah. Discretion is overrated. I know you want to know, and my goal in life is to amuse someone, so here goes.

After that little incident , I had company that night. Eleven women, as a matter of fact, came over to play Pokeeno in my dining room.

I never let on that I had spotted a mouse in my kitchen earlier that day. The kitchen that, you know, we were eating our meal in.

I just prayed that the Lord would so write it upon the mouse's heart to stay hidden somewhere, and please, dear Lord, don't let it run across the floor when my friends are here....or worse, across somebody's foot...

And this is a funny little side note: I had told hubby about the mouse, and he scoffed, rolled his eyes, choked, and chortled at the ridiculous notion that I had really seen an actual rodent in this house.

Pfft. Women. They're so... so... silly. Flighty. Emotional. If only women were logical and rational like men they wouldn't just (air quote) see a mouse behind the refrigerator(end air quotes)... Pfft. (Insert Eye roll.)

So Pokeeno came and went and my company went on their merry way, with nary a rodent sighting (thank you Lord), my family was in bed, and I sat down at the computer in my pajamas for my usual nighttime email/facebook/twitter catch-up session.

I should tell you that our home office is at the entirely opposite end of the house from the kitchen. Kitchen---Dining room---entry hall---living room---home office. Its a long trek, and no matter what, it never fails, whichever end of the house I'm in is the opposite end from where the ringing phone is. But that's another story.

So I'm sitting there quietly minding my own business, facebooking away, when I hear a rustling in the WASTEBASKET. UNDER. THE. DESK. BESIDE. MY. ANKLES.

Oh yes.

I looked down, startled, just in time to see another mouse pole-vault OUT. OF. MY. DADGUM. WASTEBASKET. and sprint for the armoire against the wall where he slid in behind it to the tune of the Mission Impossible theme music.

For the second time within 24 hours, I leapt into a chair and screamed like a cartoon lady. You better believe I did.

I know it was a different mouse, because, 1) no mouse, I don't care how stealthy, could sneak his way from the kitchen, through the dining room, the entry, and the living room, to the office during a Pokeeno game, unnoticed, though it was a loud and raucous Pokeeno party, and, 2) the Wastebasket Mouse was bigger.

For some reason, perhaps it was the sound of my blood-curdling screams jolting him out of a sound sleep, hubs believed me about the second mouse, and promptly, as in the next day, went to Home Depot to buy some mouse traps.

They're not like the mouse traps from Tom & Jerry where the mouse goes for a chunk of Swiss cheese and has his head snapped off by a plunging piece of metal.

These are nifty little cardboard boxes with a blue piece of poison tacked inside.

The mouse crawls in, happily gnaws on the poison, and ever so humanely can run off to die a pleasant, peaceful death choking from thirst and dehydration, the fluids in his body evaporating until nothing is left but a ball of dehydrated rodent fur.

I'm sure its a nice way to die. Because I'm all about keeping it comfortable for them.

So anyway... hubs buys two traps. One for behind the fridge, one for behind the office armoire.

Within hours, both had been gnawed on.

Within a day, one entire piece of poison was gone.

Which sorta clues me in that ... we have more than two of these suckers.

After the mouse-pole-vault incident I lied awake all night, adrenaline pumping through my veins, listening to the sounds of RODENT. FEET. SCAMPERING. EVERYWHERE. Were they real? Were they imaginary? I just can't tell anymore!!

In the attic crawlspace to one side of my bed.

In the attic over my head.

In the space under the bathtub to the other side of my bed.

Under the floorboards between the first and second floor.

OH. MY. GOODNESS!!! THEY'RE. EVERYWHERE!!!

I felt like Shrek when the Fairy Tale Creatures moved in to his swamp. They're in the bed. On the table. In the bathtub. And this is MY HOUSE!!! Who invited these creatures???

And hubs was so grieved that he had not believed me that he meekly and humbly, on his knees, begged my forgiveness for ever doubting that I had seen an actual mouse and swore he would never, ever doubt the word of the woman he loved again.

Oh wait, I think I just imagined that part....

So anyway.

Hubs has thrown himself full-force into his role as Harbinger of Death to Mice.

As in, he's a little too enthusiastic about annihilating the little creatures.

He can't wait another two weeks until deer season to blast one of God's creations to Kingdom Come....

Today, after seeing the missing poison, he went back to buy more traps, where he came across an electric mouse trap. (Cue Tim the Tool Man Taylor grunting).

You smear a little peanut butter inside, and when the mouse crawls inside his body completes a circuit and the little guy is zapped to death in seconds. So sweet!!

I have to admit I protested. A lot.

Its not that I'm not all in favor of removing every last rodent from MY HOUSE, by any means.

Its just that the stench of burnt rodent hair wafting through the house doesn't appeal to me so much.

I mean, seriously. Will we walk into the house after being gone a while and see clouds of smoke from roasted rat? Smell his cooked carcass? Will our lights dim as the current shoots through his little body?

Something about it just didn't seem right. I just wasn't convinced an electric mouse trap was truly the way to go...

Fast forward to Friday evening.

We leave to go to Longview for dinner at Dudley's Cajun Cafe.

Hubs has the trap locked and loaded behind the fridge.

He could hardly think of anything else as he wolfed down his plate of blackened crawfish tails smothered in etoufee.

He jumped up, wiped roux from his lips, threw money at the waiter, and navigated the family SUV home at 172 miles per hour.

He had to get home. He had tasted blood and was hungry for more.

He walked in and let out a yelp: Mission Accomplished. The green light was blinking.

We had a kill.

We hastily got the kids into bed; no need in them witnessing this gory scene.

Then ran downstairs to find...

One teeny, tiny little mouse, who could literally curl up in a tablespoon. A baby!

Which, if you're counting, makes the third mouse we've spotted this week. THIRD!

The bad news is.... I'm pretty sure mice don't birth their babies one at a time.

Where there's one baby..... there are bound to be more.

Heaven help me.

Hubby's Saturday plans: Go to Home Depot. Buy 10 more electric mouse traps.

They make a really fun toy for a grown man.

It would make me feel so much better about living in a rodent-infested shack if you'll leave me a comment reassuring me that I'm not the only one.

Or maybe I really am the only one??

Better go.... I think I smell something burning?

Camping Couture and Other Nonsense.

We went camping at Daingerfield State Park last weekend.

For now, I'll leave you with this one picture of this little camping cutie...
More camping pictures and stories to come.

Please hover on the edge of your seat until I get those posted.

For now, I have a multitude of hairbows to make and ship NOW before angry villagers show up at my bow factory with torches and pitchforks customers take their hairbow business elsewhere along with our family's livelihood and we're forced to live under the Highland Avenue bridge with that homeless man who wears a high school letter jacket and I don't have any spending money.

And on a totally unrelated note: if I promised you hairbows at any point this month, they are, ummmm, in the mail...