Wow, it's been a while...

It's been a very busy month and the next two months aren't going to be any better, so I figured I'd get a post in now while I can.  So what have I been up to - let's see.  Working, working, and uh, working.  Wedding and camping last weekend, wedding this weekend, 4th of July party next weekend, huge family birthday bash at Mom's the weekend after that.  Five days later leave for Holden Beach, North Carolina (yay!).  Home for a  week,  training class at work for a week after that, then off to San Jose, California for an SEO conference for work for a week.  My head is spinning!  The only thing keeping me in check is my excitement for both of my upcoming trips.  I get to see my long time friend, Ginny, and her sister Katie for the first time in 15 years and I'm so excited!  Beach bumming like the good ol' days when we used to do beach vacations with our families every summer.

And I'm really looking forward to my California trip!  I've never been and Jason is going with me.  We have a few days after the conference to do the touristy stuff so we're heading to San Francisco to see all the sites.  And we should have plenty of time in the evenings to see some of San Jose as well.  There will definitely be lots of photos generated from both trips!  If anyone knows of any sites or places we should visit let me know!

In other news, the fish pond is looking great now that we have it landscaped.  Just trying to rid of the algea problem.  We're attracting a lot of new birds and dragonflies - it rocks!  Poor Lois Lane, my jack russel mix, had a siezure on Friday.  She's done fine since, but we're waiting on blood work to come back this week to see what's going on.  And we're watching her closely to see if it happens again.  I hope I don't have an epileptic dog and hoping it was just a fluke...we'll see.  Luckily my brother-in-law will be staying at the house while we are away on our trips so he'll be able to keep an eye on her as well.

Sadly, that's about it for any updates.  So now I'll leave you with some photos (of course).

Mocha, Mom's 12 year old chocolate lab:


Backyard pond lily:


Baby mockingbird:


Obligatory Blue photo - accompanied by Hardy & Lois Lane:

Baby Fawns & Driving Permits

Whoo boy what a week it's been!

Thursday afternoon Jason spotted a baby fawn in the neighbor's yard right at the tree line.  Upon doing some research I found that sometimes momma deer will leave the baby to go find food and come back within a few hours.  So we left him alone for that evening, even though he was crying and not walking very well.  We didn't want to impose on nature if we didn't have to.

By that evening the baby had moved to the woods behind our fence line and was still crying out for his momma.  Jason walked back to check on him and saw a doe not too far away.  Naturally, we assumed this was the mother deer and left them alone.  There was no sound from the baby the next morning so we thought all was good.  Then that afternoon Jason heard him crying again.  At that point he decided we needed to do something, so he went in search of the baby.  He found him curled up in an open area of the woods behind the house, still crying.  Jason walked right up to the baby, but the baby didn't move.  Jason then reached out to pet him so he knew he meant no harm and the poor little thing got scared and ran about 20 feet before he face planted in the dirt.  Jason went to him again and did the same thing, and the wee baby ran again, only making it a few steps before he collapsed.  So Jason picked him up and brought him on the porch and put him on one of the dog beds.

He and Portia got him to drink a few ounces of milk before he tired out to take anymore.  At that point he called the Kentucky Wildlife Association who referred us to a vet clinic we could take the baby to.  From there a wildlife sanctuary came to pick him up and take him to their facility where they will nurse him back to health and re-release him when he is strong and healthy enough.  You can read the full store on our PetResearch site in case you ever find a baby fawn that appears to be abandoned.  And of course I got a few pictures!





In other exciting news, Portia got her driving permit on the same day!  *gah!* She's been a little hesitant to get it (she was eligible to get it when she turned 16 in January), but once she really thought about it and realized she could go to Taco Bell whenever she wanted to once she got her license it was on!  (Had I known this I'd have dangled a taco in front of her 5 months ago!).  She is getting my 2003 Ford Escape since I only drive my F150 now.  She's been out driving a few times and is picking up the ropes pretty well.  Of course, I had to get some photos of her first driving experience.

Showing off her permit:


Getting some last minute instructions from Dad:


And she's off...and smiling all the way!


And then today she took a big step.  Jason offered to let her drive "Big Nasty", his F350 Diesel down some of the back roads on the way home from dinner.  I thought for sure she'd chicken out (I would have) but she said "Heck yeah!" and drove that puppy all the way home.  :)

Yellow Water Lily Bloom

We have our first water lily bloom!  It's not fully opened yet, but I was too excited to wait.  I'll post more photos once it's full.  One of the white blooms is getting close to opening as well and I believe we have a pink lily in there somewhere.  The pond is really starting to shape up.  We got a few plants around the perimeter, a few water plants inside and just need to finish the rock work around the edges.  It's amazing how many new critters have been in the yard since we put in the big pond.  We have a resident bullfrog, purple martins, dragonflies and all kinds of water striders!  It's awesome!

Yellow Water Lily


Resident Bullfrog

Attention Span of a Gnat

Yup, that's my Blue.  Can't pay attention to anything for more than a second or two!

Scavenger Hunts and Site Updates

My first photo scavenger hunt is completed and I came in 5th place out of 11 participants.  Not bad for my first attempt!  The next one starts soon so I'm hoping to do better.  I didn't find 4 of the items on the list, which cost me 20 points, so my goal for May's hunt is to get all items for that extra bonus!  You can see all the items I managed to find for April's hunt here.

Not much else going on.  Mother's Day is tomorrow so we'll be making the rounds to visit moms.  I made gifts for my mom, mom-in-law, grandma and mama this year.  But since some of them read my blog I can't say what it is just yet.  But I'll likely be posting photos in the coming days as it's a first attempt at this type of project.

I've been working a lot with some of our "pet projects" this week.  One of them is our PetResearch.net blog, which we just set up discussion forums for.  If anyone has pet related issues to discuss, check it out!  It's a wealth of information already and growing steadily.

Another site we've started noodling around with is our Garden and Home site.  It's basically the same idea as the pet research site, but for information about craft projects, gardening tips, recipes, etc.  We just got the first post up yesterday (a small how-to on hand made Mother's Day cards) so it's a newbie site and still pretty small.  We have faith that it will grow nicely though.

Happy Mother's Day to all you hot momma's out there.  Hope you have a wonderful day!

New Mouse House

I finally got brave enough to purchase a large cage for the mice.  They have been in a 20 gallon
aquarium since December while I waited for Pip to get big enough to not be able to squeeze through any size cage bar spacing.    I ended up going with a bird cage and converting it a bit to accommodate three bouncy mice (well, two bouncy mice, Hazel practically rolls where ever she needs to go). Yesterday the cage was all ready and we plopped in the mice.  They hid in the igloo for the first several hours, of course, and still weren't out much before I went to bed.  With the exception of Moo - she lives in her wheel (you can barely see her nose poking out of the wheel in the photo).  I half expected Pip to be long gone by the time I got up this morning, but she was snuggled up in a piece of fleece on the second level of her new abode.  So it looks like it's gonna work out great. The new cage will be extremely helpful in cleaning the litter, feeding them and giving them proper ventilation.  However I did forget about the curtains behind the cage, so they now have some new custom mice lacing.  It's been a while since I've had rodents and I've forgot how much they love to pull fabric and other items into their cage through the bars.  Oh well - at least I have happy mice now! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For information on choosing housing for mice and rats, visit our "Habitats for Rats and Mice" blog post at PetResearch.net.

Vacation Photos

Last week I was on vacation and had several photo opportunities.  I meant to post these last week, but my free time got away from me.  So this entry is all photos - enjoy!

Louisville Balloon Glimmer






Louisville Zoo















My Backyard - trying out the hunting blind












Obligatory Blue Photo