First of all, we have a new little resident at our house. Her name is Lucy.
This picture doesn't do justice to the bright blue eyes that she has.
She came wandering up to the deck one evening when we were all sitting around the fire pit. She was very tentative and needed a lot of encouragement, but Lovely Daughter finally got ahold of her. She was skin and bone - you could see every rib and her backbone stuck out. Poor little thing was so hungry. I suppose someone dumped her off. What usually happens is the poor dumped animals find a haven in our storage building to get out of the weather and eventually due to loneliness make their way up to the house to find some human companionship. That's how Senior Citizen Simon arrived about 12 years ago.
My guess is that she's only about six months old - just a baby yet. She's very loving and appreciative of anything you do for her. For the first few days I fed her in the screen room and put an old blanket in a chair for her to sleep in. She snarfed her food down so fast I thought for sure it was all going to come back up. I don't think she slept in the screen room at all, because every time I would see her outside she was coming from the river in a heavily wooded area. She always had muddy feet from being on the river bank and her fur was full of leaves and seeds. I'm surmising that she was living in some brush pile or a hollow tree or something down there.
I eventually allowed her in the house and she very tentatively went through the patio door and investigated the entire house then wanted out again. Senior Citizen Simon was very much a gentleman, touched noses with her and then followed her around from a distance. It was like he just wanted to make sure she didn't get herself into any trouble of any kind. The first couple of evenings that she spent in the house, but along about midnight she always went to the door and wanted out. It was like she just wasn't sure about being in the house. Like her escape route had been shut off. Last night was the first night she spent the entire night in the house. When she got up she wanted out immediately and went to the screen room to find HER food bowl. She absolutely will not eat out of Simon's bowl and he's very willing to share. I've even tried to feed her from a separate bowl in a different area of the kitchen but she prefers to eat in the screen room by herself.
There's already five cats on this property. Lovely Daughter has four and I have one, so I'd really like to find a good home for her. Big Brother is coming to visit in September and would like to have her, but that means I have to keep her until then. I'm afraid if I do that I probably won't be able to give her up. She's already wormed her way far to deeply into my heart. I'm such a sucker for animals that haven't been treated properly. I guess we'll see what happens. As of this moment Lucy is tucked deeply into a wooly afghan on my bed, sound asleep.
The YaYa's met again yesterday. Our group is growing. It started way last fall with three of us and now we're up to seven. One of the gals drove all the way across the state to get together - and we do have fun.
We're tossing around some fun ideas - like a 50 year reunion for our 6th grade class. So far we haven't gotten the guys from the 6th grade involved yet, but they all live within an easy driving distance, so it certainly would be possible.
One of the gals who hasn't been able to join us yet runs a restaurant in a little town about 50 miles from here. So yesterday we decided if she can't come to our gathering we'll bring the gathering to her. We'll all hop into the YaYa Mobile and make an afternoon of it. Drop in on her for lunch and a bit of chatting.
We're all big into gardening also with the exception of one gal who lives in an apartment. So we decided we're going to have a garden tour and go to everyone's house. The gal in the apartment says she has a big flower pot on her deck so we'll go to see that too. Anyway, we'll end up at my house, Ole can cook us some burgers on the grill and we'll have a fire in the firepit that night - even if it's warm it will at least chase away the bugs.
We had to take a large tree down in our backyard. It had so many weak branches, and with the storms we've been having lately we were afraid it would come down on the house. And having just replaced the roof, I don't think our insurance company would appreciate having a tree come through. So down it came. The young man who helped Ole take it down was 19 years old (bullet proof at that age, you know) and was like a monkey with a chainsaw. He climbed in the bucket of the tractor and just stood there hanging onto nothing while Ole raised the bucket. And there he stood - stretching out with this running chain saw in his hands to reach the lowest branches and cut them down. My insides were tied in knots the whole time he was up there.
Then the main trunk came down. The tree was approximately 75 feet tall, so it made quite a crash when it hit the ground. I had my very own Axemen that day. 
Well, guys, suppose I better go accomplish something.
Later, okay?
Lena
