Welcome to the jungle...

Rosie Meets Coco...

Some of you may or may not have met Rosie:



Rosie was given to us. Just like Skittles was given to us. Skittles, however, moved on to greener patures. She went to a home with no kids, with two other small dogs and the owner lives in the country on an acre of land and says, "I tend to spoil my dogs". So Skittles has it good now.

Rosie is the runt of the litter and is on the small side. And she is called a red due to her coloring. It is apparently not desirable to have this combo in a yellow lab but I think she's just lovely. She came to us at 10 mos old and had no training. Ugh. At 40+ lbs she will pummel Silliness to the ground when she jumps on her so we have to be careful. (Silliness, however, is not afraid and will purposely get close to Rosie to be able to pet her. It's a good but bad thing!)

So we've had to really put efforts in to training her. She shows promise but there are a lot of bad days. Somehow she seems to know when to have a good day just in time.

One evening Papa Chanoli was gaming online. I had put Rosie in the office with him so he could keep an eye on her so I wouldn't have to. I needed a break. Rosie had the opportunity to "meet" Coco the play horse. Coco stand about 2 1/2 feet tall and can support 120 lbs. The kids love playing with her.




Later, Papa Chanoli came out and made a statement about goofing it up. I thought Rosie pooped in the office. He showed me what he was carrying in his hand:

Yep, Rosie ate the head off the horse. So we live, we learn and then, Lord willing, we get to start a whole new day of the same thing :)

So, as Chuckles is blossoming in the creative department I thought I share a bit more of ways in which he's wowed us. For most kids this is probably normal activity. But for Chuckles he seems resistant to drawing and the arts and crafts type stuff. I haven't been able to place my finger on why he's so uninterested but I guess I'll take what he gives me when he comes up with these sorts of things!

Ok, we all know boys like their guns. Here we have a cowboy holding one. I like how undetailed the cowboy is but the gun is full of it. Oh, and it's HUGE in comparison to the cowboy :)





But wait - who's that happy cowboy over there?




Uh, oh - we've got a shoot out!




Wait! There's another joyous cowboy - where'd he come from?




That's it - May the best cowboy win!

Creative. Memories. Bam.

A couple of years ago we bought Chuckles some Legos. We knew he would love them. I mean what boy doesn't? Fast forward (or rewind?) to a year or so ago I really, seriously considered getting rid of them. They had gone unused for all that time. He clearly wasn't the type to be interested.

But much to my surprise and delight here a couple of weeks ago he decided to start using them. He just spent, like, 14 minutes in his room and *bam* he had a car! So I sent him back to make a different vehicle and *bam* he had another! I was truly impressed with his attention to detail. Most of it can't be seen in these horrific pictures:









He has since made a submarine and a dog - we are loving it! Of course, as a kid who loves to be praised he's only too willing to make more stuff :) Stay tuned for more creative memories. Bam...

Speaking of a leash...

So this lady person who feeds me treats and makes strange gestures when I tinkle or poo on the floor read in a book that I ought to learn how to use a leash. So she thought it was a good idea to have me in the kitchen with her while she did the dishes so I could learn it. Ok, so here's the thing - I'm not fond of the leash tied to the barstool business! I kinda tried to figure out a way to remove myself from the situation:




Strangely, the more I tried to flee the shorter the leash got!:




People! I think that's enough for one day:




Sincerely,
Skittles

When you're five....

....life can be a little twisty turvey. Like when you dress for church but put your underwear on backwards. There's a lot of twisting thru the day. Or when you go to Target with said underpants and then you pick up a hand held toy fan just to see how it works and it gets too close to your hair. Well, ok, it gets IN your hair and twists around six inches of it. Mom then becomes turvey as she laughs because she doesn't know what to do except ask for scissors :) Then she gets tired of holding the hand held toy fan while leading you around the store on what looks like a hair leash and makes you hold it - you might get a bit twisty turvey by the end of that ordeal! Finally waiting for the check out lady to finagle with the whole fan/leash because she doesn't want to cut such "pretty hair" but doesn't mind having a line form causes a Mama to get all twisty turvey knowing it just needs to be cut. Whew - yep. When your five life can be a little or a lot twisty turvey!

Space....

....the final frontier. Here we have Captain Chuckles and First Mate Giggles. Their space ship is circling the earth and they are loving the view from their cockpit :)






It is NOT them "helping" Papa Chanoli make raised beds for the garden. Nope - it's not.