Softball

Ken's brother Matt was asked to play in a charity softball game this weekend. His teammates were all DJ's from various radio stations in town. This wasn't your regular softball game. The umps were allowed (and even expected) to take bribes from the spectators. The bribes could be for any amount of money, and whoever paid the ump got to decide which player did what. Some players had to hit with a tennis racket, golf club, or left handed. Others had to chug a beer or 3. It was pretty entertaining, and Matt had plenty of "fans" in the stands willing to pay to make sure he didn't have too easy a time out on the field.

He did manage to get a few hits good hits before the bribes started rolling in.

Somone paid to have Hayden run the bases. Matt was his base coach.

Ken can hardly contain his excitement.

After the game, Hayden, Molly and Syd had to go run a victory lap around the bases.

It's Not Easy Being Green

One of Syd's Christmas presents was a frog habitat. The company also provides tadpoles to go in it, but they wouldn't ship them until it was a steady 40 degrees all the time. So we had been looking at an empty frog habitat until the first part of May when the tadpoles finally arrived. We followed the directions about the water and food and waited for them to turn into frogs. It turned out to be a very long wait! It took 2 months for one of them to grow his feet. The other is just barely starting to show little nubs where his legs will be.

This is how they arrived in the mail -- in a little plastic cup of water inside a cardboard box.

They seemed to like their new home. They swam around and ate everything we gave them.

Finally started growing the feet! You can see the other one isn't even close.

A full grown frog. Now, if only his friend would catch up so they can be set free.

We have liked watching them grow and change, but now I'm not sure what to do with them. Luckily they aren't screamers like that wild frog Ken and Syd caught was!

The Whole Gang

Today was the first time, since we brought the babies home last Friday, that everyone has been in the same place at the same time. Everybody was cooperating so nicely for the picture, except Biz, who kept wanting to sneak away before I was done. Ken was laughing at me talking to Biz like I do the dog -- "Sit! Stay there!" Storm is definitely a better listener than Biz.

I didn't realize until I was taking the picture how mono-chromatic everyone is. The entire spectrum of black to gray to white is displayed between all the animals. Those must be the animal colors I'm drawn to.

From back to front: Biz, Duda, Toad, Later (on the end table) and Storm.

Say Hello to My Little Friend(s)

Syd and I with the babies at the Humane Society

Since winning the workout bet and talking non-stop about it, Ken resigned himself to the fact that we would be adding a new member to the family. Little did he know that not one, but TWO babies would be coming home with us! We used our free day Friday to go to the Humane Society and pick up the kittens we had fallen in love with on Wednesday. (By we, I mean Syd and I :) The Humane Society is overrun with kittens all summer, so they were having a 2 for 1 sale.

The first one I loved was the fuzzy gray one. He wasn't overly active in his cage, but something about his fluffiness, and laid-back attitude grabbed me. Ken almost didn't want to get him out to interact with him in the little "get to know you" room because he thought he was a slug. But as soon as we had him out of the cage, he turned into a normal kitten -- playing with toys, running around, and being goofy. As soon as one of us picked him up, he would go limp in our hands and start purring his head off. I knew he was definitely coming home with us.

After we had decided on him, the lady told us about the sale. There was a tiger striped kitten in the cage below the gray one who was being so rotten to his twin sister. He kept pouncing her, biting her ears, and being a pain. But he would occasionaly stop tormenting the sister long enough to stick his arms out through the bars to touch us. He never put out his claws, just gently touched our arms or clothes. I usually don't like tiger stripes, but he was so engaging I had him come out to play with the gray one to see how they got along. The tiger stripe was like a different cat away from his sister. He did pounce and play, but he wasn't mean and malicious like he had been with his sister. The two connected so fast and so easily, I knew we had another winner. He also purrs really loud when you pick him up. He's not as snuggly as the gray one, but you can snatch him up in the middle of running wild and he starts purring and settles down.

I haven't mentioned their names yet because there is still some disagreement between Ken and I as to what the gray one's name is. I knew going in that if I got a boy his name would be Toad. (I've been thinking about that almost the whole 30 days, and nothing was going to change my mind). If I picked a girl, her name was going to be Layla. At the time we decided on the gray and the tiger, we thought we had one of each, so the names were already a done deal. Toad was the tiger stripe, and Layla was the fluffy gray one. Come to find out, as we were signing all the papers to take them home, they are both boys!! Ken wouldn't let me call a boy cat Layla, so I had to think of a new name. Somehow Ken came up with Tater and liked how it sounded with Toad. Growing up in the land of spuds, I don't need any more references to potatoes in my life, thank you very much. I still had Layla stuck in my head, but after hearing Tater I amended it to Later. Ken thinks that's a dumb name, but I feel the same way about Tater. So for now, we each use the name we like when talking to him. They sound enough alike that it doesn't really make that much difference.

Syd loves packing them around. And they are both so good about letting her carry them all over the house.

Toad is a wild animal. He's always bouncing around, chasing toys, pouncing Later, and climbing up the cat climber. I think he's going to be a trouble-maker, but he will be endlessly entertaining. And look at that face!

Later is very mellow. He will play with toys and with Toad, but at a much slower pace. He doesn't race around, but lazily swats toys and walks around. He's very snuggly and we've spent a lot of time already just hanging out together.

The first night they were so worn out from the excitement of coming home and exploring. They both just crashed out. Syd and I both got a good long turn with two sleeping babies on our laps.

Since they have been in the house, their personalities have come out so much already. They are both so different from each other, but alike in one important way. They are fearless of the other animals. Both Duda and Biz were grumpy and unhappy at their arrival. They hissed and growled at the babies, and followed them around to see what they were up to. The babies never shied away from them. They don't try to engage them to play, but they don't avoid or hide from the big cats.

We've been very watchful with Storm when she is around the babies. But they have shown no signs of being scared of her either. They walk past her when she's laying on the floor, they don't freak out when her big black nose is stuck right in their face, and they've even swatted her a couple of times when she didn't back off.

Storm likes them, but she doesn't know how to be easy and gentle with them.

I love my babies so much. They already seem like a part of the family.

Birthday/4th of July

Even with a 3 day weekend, our 4th of July was pretty mellow. I've always loved having my birthday around the 4th of July. After work Thursday, Ken got the trampoline back in working order, we had cake, and opened some presents. My mom found a cool website that will print your blog into a nice hardbound book. Now I have a permanent record of everything on my blog, comments and pictures included. It was a great birthday gift and I'm glad she thought of it.

Ken ordered the parts online and had it all taken apart, and put back together in less than 2 hours. He's such a good fixer.

Earlier in the week Ken asked what kind of cake I wanted. He didn't need to ask to know that my answer would be Boston Cream Pie. Usually we get them from Wal-Mart and they are wonderful. This time he ordered a "real" one from the bakery down the street. It was a good cake, but I think I like the Wal-Mart version better. This one was too chocolatey for me :)

For fireworks on the 4th we went to Matt's lake house. The weather wasn't the perfect 4th of July weather we wanted, but that didn't stop Ken from jumping on the tube again. We had some good food, and had an almost unobstructed half-circle view of all the fireworks people were setting off. The town of Sister Lakes doesn't do a formal production, but most of the people had gone out of state to get the kind that are launched in the sky. There were 5 or 6 different sets of fireworks all going off at the same time in various locations around the lake.

Ken sitting by the fire pit watching the fireworks

Matt always has tunes going at his house. Erica, Tiffany and Melissa started the dance party and the kids joined right in.