It's oh so quiet

We're experiencing quiet time today... not a nap, just quiet time. Miles is refusing to sleep so I told him he had to stay quiet in his room until I tell him he can come out. At school they have to nap/lay quietly for 2 hours, so that's what I'm doing too. We'll see how it goes. I still hear him pitter-pattering around in there, I had been hoping he'd eventually go to sleep. He just came out for a bathroom break, but is back in. 45 minutes to go.

Speaking of bathroom breaks, the "potty fairy" came to visit us this weekend. We didn't need the fairy's help in learning how to potty, but in getting rid of the darn Diego potty. Wayne & I were getting tired of cleaning it out! So the P.F. came and whisked away the potty, leaving in exchange a coupon for ice cream. So the tooth fairy may not be too happy with the P.F., but mommy sure likes the result.

Audrey's napping too, so it appears that I've wasted a golden opportunity with both sleeping, but I can never really nap when they do. She's got a few new tricks, I've been trying to keep track of so I can list them.

.: LOVES pulling my hair. Will grab a fistful on both sides of my head and pull me in for a raspberry. If my hair is in a ponytail, she reaches for the fine (tender) nape of the neck and give s a good tug. OUCH!
.: Can do some tricks with her pacifier - she can pop it back into her mouth when she's holding it. If only she could find it on her own in the middle of the night.
.: Still working on the sitting and rolling over.
.: Has eaten Sweet potatoes, green beans, peas, butternut squash. I made the sweet potatoes, it was really easy! I bake them in foil for about an hour, scrape them out into the blender and add a little water, puree, spoon into ice cube trays and freeze. Then pop them out into a bag to store. When it's time to eat, a few seconds in the microwave is all it took. My next food will be applesauce because our neighbor brought us a huge bag of apples (and tomatoes & peppers) from her garden.

Speaking of neighbors, I'd almost forgotten the weekend fun for me! We had social plans for BOTH nights, even including a babysitter. How unheard of. Friday we hosted the neighborhood yard party and had a great turnout. Several girls were demonstrating their babysitting skills and kept up with the toddlers, playing ring around the rosy and tag. We had no less than 50 people in the yard and everyone seemed excited to continue the events well into fall. And on Saturday we had a sitter so we could celebrate Josh's birthday. We didn't last very long, partially because our sitter had a swim meet at 7 the next morning, but we had a great time getting out for once in a blue moon. Happy birthday Josh!

Happy 6th!?!?!?!

Hard to believe but our sweet nephew is now (officially today) a 6 year old kid. He requires two hands to show his age! We celebrated this weekend out at his PaPa's "farm". There's a creek running behind the house, so the kids spent most of the afternoon splashing around, examining crawdads, snails and even a turtle that couldn't escape fast enough. As part of the party, the kids made sailboats and floated them for a while too.

Miles had fun with his boat until he fell backwards and got soaked. No, the tumble didn't upset him. Instead, he realized that he had an audience and proceeded to do pratfalls for a laugh for the next 20 minutes. What a comedian.





He didn't spend much time here, but he got a huge thrill from "driving" the John Deere tractor and riding the Gator. But he didn't last long, it was HOT.

More pictures from the weekend, click HERE.







And while she couldn't be out splashing in the creek, Audrey held audience up on the porch, getting lots of squeezes from YaYa & B. She's 20 weeks old now and really starting to show off her stuff. She is a definite attention hound (is that a 2nd child trait?) We were in a store last week and she cooed at anyone standing nearby. But the person whose attention she wants the most is Miles. Still just loves giggling at him. And he happily obliges.

Smoothie King

I need to learn that I can't take "natural light" photos in our dining room. They just always have a weird yellowy color, guess it's the paint! But it looks so good in real life!!

Anyway, here's Miles enjoying his dinner smoothie last night. Sitting in my lap, which is a BIG thing lately, especially when I've fed Audrey. She's down on the floor in the bouncy seat during this dinner. And yes, all he had for dinner was a smoothie. The kid is super picky these days, none of the old favorites are working. But I was super tricky... this is one of those "deceptive" drinks. Lots of berries, a banana and... wait for it..... a ton of fresh spinach! Oh yes, spinach, just chopped up in there with the yummy goodness. I read a blog about it this week and had to try it. You absolutely could not taste it. Even Wayne reluctantly tried it and liked it. I'm so bad about buying fresh spinach and then not using it all, this will be a great way to get it in. We buy the huge bags of frozen berries at Sams, add a little plain yogurt and some water and it's good to go. So while not the most well-balanced meal, I don't feel as bad about him drinking his dinner. Wayne wondered if we could grind a little ham up in there. Ewwwwww.


I had to get some pictures of Audrey practicing her sitting. It seems that all the photos of her lately are of her eating... we've done the sweet potatoes and now have added peas and pears. LOVES them. She doesn't get the silly face that Miles did, but has this very intense "give it to me NOW" look in her eyes. She'll grab my hand and pull the spoon towards her, usually smearing food in her ear in the process. And the last 3 nights she's eaten an entire jar of whatever we were serving.

Back to the sitting, she's very floppy still, but managed to stay up in the Boppy for a little while this morning. I remember with Miles I hadn't even considered trying to help him sit until I went to pick him up at daycare and there he was sitting up in the Boppy. Wow! I had no clue! Audrey enjoys it, for sure. Yesterday our playgroup was here and she didn't want to lay down, just sit up and watch all the action.

Speaking of action, she'll get a lot this weekend when we celebrate cousin Evan's 6th (!) birthday. Should be lots of crazy fun.

And oh yes, more exciting baby news.... Kennedy joined us this week!! Look at all her beautiful hair!!!

Taste of 'Taters

She's on to the next flavor... sweet potatoes! She's much better with them than the cereal, maybe I just wasn't getting the consistency she wanted. We've gone through a couple of jars already and I think we'll try peas next. I've been tempted by many articles to try making my own baby food, so I may try with sweet potatoes this week. We'll see if I get far beyond that! I'm going to make a lot and freeze some in ice cube trays so that I don't have to be whipping out the food processor all the time. Although it is a fun appliance to use!!

She's doing better overall on the sleep, we've had many nights of just one waking, around 2:30 or 3. But she'll throw us a curve ball after a couple of those and get up several times. We'll try the pacifier first, but if that doesn't do it I will feed her, watching the clock to make sure it's a super short feeding. We don't want to do the cry-it-out trainingat night because we don't want to wake Miles. But I've been "sleep training" at naptime and that has paid off. She's had several days of two 2-hour naps and only cried 30 minutes each time for the first day or so.

Miles needs some sleep training too - How to Stay Asleep Training. He's back to the pre-dawn waking and just will not lay peacefully with us in bed. He wants to watch cartoons which would let us sleep, but I don't want him logging a hour of tube before we've even started the day!! Maybe we'll try sending him back to his room to play quietly. And see if he gets the concept of "quietly."

But enough complaining, it's only sleep, right? There are much more fun things we've done this week, like dressing up for free food! Miles had lots of fun making this cow costume to wear Friday for free Chick-fil-a. But when the time came to parade around as a cow he got a little stage fright. But he made it long enough to get his nuggets, fruit AND an ice cream cone. Lucky kid. And Audrey just watches him thinking "someday.... someday...." Cutie pies!!

Speaking of cutie pies, congratulations to Paula, Rick & Millie who welcomed baby Reed last Thursday. Let us know when you're up for some raucous company!!

A weekend of firsts

Audrey hit the big four month mark this week, so we had the requisite pediatrician visit and weigh-in. She's now 13 lbs 1.5 oz and 24 1/4" long. She's in the 50%ile for both height & weight, dropping off a growth spurt from the last visit. Since she's been waking a couple times during the night still, Dr. B. suggested that we might have a trained night feeder and that I need to try to not feed her every time she wakes at night. I'd been doing it because it seemed to be the easy way to get her back to sleep, but I've known that the time to stop is now. So we're working on scaling back the middle of the night interactions. It's hard to keep track, though, when waking in the delirium of 12am, 2am, 4am, when the last feeding was. Maybe I should start a journal again?

He also said we could start feeding her in the hopes that a little more solid food in the belly might help her stay down longer. So we tried very liquidy rice cereal the last couple of nights. I wouldn't say she loved it, but I think some of her fussiness while trying was that she wasn't getting it fast enough. The spoon was a little awkward too. But she did get most of it down, not all down the front, so I do think she's ready for this. We'll work on the cereals for a couple of weeks, then add in veggies. Miles loved sweet potatoes when he first tasted them, hopefully she'll be just as happy to move beyond the bland rice. Oh, and Miles had to have a taste of her rice cereal and did not like it at all! Or, as he says, "I don't love THAT." [Click on the photo strip to enlarge and see her expressions!]

Miles's big weekend included his very first movie - WALL*E! Wayne stayed home with Audrey and I took Miles to the 10:10am showing. We stopped by Walgreens on the way and got some Chex Mix to snack on then headed to the theater. There were a bunch of other kids there, I could tell he was getting excited. Our first stop was the bathroom - the movie was a reward for potty training, had to make sure the business was done! Unfortunately I didn't think about the auto-flushing toilets until I already sat him up there... quite a surprise for the little guy, and not too fun. Of course it went off about 3 more times before we left the stall, so he was plenty traumatized already when we encountered the tornadic hand dryers of death. I'm sure these things dry your hands like a dream, but since it sounded like a jet taking off and prompted shrieks of terror from Miles, I'll never know. Whew, strike 1.

We ran from the bathroom and went on to the theater, Now he was leery of anything we encountered, so I tried to explain and make light: ooh, look how big the screen is! look at all the kids! He didn't like the pathway-illumination lights, and was a little uncertain about the flip-down seat at first. He just wanted to see WALL*E, even though a couple of previews looked cute. Finally..... the pre-movie cartoon..... and FINALLY..... the movie started. By this point he was so distracted by making the seat open and shut on himself that he wouldn't sit still and watch. He noticed the people near us eating popcorn and said, "Mommy, I want my snack!" So out came the Chex Mix. One he realized there were M&Ms in the mix, that was all he wanted and kept asking for those. So between trying to get him to sit down and finding M&Ms, I missed some of the cute introduction of WALL*E. Thankfully Miles knew who EVE was, and she showed up pretty soon, that started to settle him down. After I told him the snacks were gone, he sat still, then crawled over to sit in my lap. He alternated between leaning forward, seated on my knees and snuggled back under my chin, really sweet. SPOILER ALERT: He even started to cry a little when WALL*E was hurt and non-responsive.

All in all a very fun morning and Miles is excited at the idea of another movie someday. I don't know of any coming out soon, but maybe we'll try a home movie experience next.

twitterpated

Just a quick update with 2 cool techie things I learned today...

.: I signed up for Twitter. Basically it's a mini-blog. Short notes (tweets) about what I'm doing. But instead of me, I'll be capturing the gems that Miles comes up with. I'm trying to figure out how to put it on this blog, but for now find it here: http://twitter.com/nkerwin. BTW, I got the idea from a daddytypes post about ben_yes doing it. UPDATE: It's on the blog - right sidebar.

.: On Google Maps you can add GasBuddy which highlights gas stations and the prices where you're searching. Or just go to gasbuddy.com.

Sorry no exciting kid updates today, although you might get a giggle out of twitter.

HE DID IT!!

In what I hope to be the final post discussing poo for at least a couple of years (months? weeks? days?), I can now share that Miles has finally done the deed. Twice. What a guy! Wayne and I are planning to take him to see Wall*E this weekend to celebrate. See, besides the tools, treats and Diego toothbrush, we've also been showing him the Wall*E trailer as incentive and he LOVES it. Just the trailer. We'll see how a full movie does, but I'm sure he'll get a kick out of it.

In other HUGE news today, we welcome with great joy baby Lizzie. We're so glad she's finally here. She, Audrey and Kennedy will make great pledge sisters (sorry, new member sisters) here in about 18 years!!

You thought I was kidding

In case you doubted, I went ahead and scrapped her 4 month page to capture her cuteness of grabbing her toes. I am a few days early for the 4 month (!) mark, but this is the thing I want to remember and share with her about this time in her life. She's already "outgrowing" the phase, moving on to more exciting things like rolling. When she wakes, I'm starting to hear her banging around on the aquarium, even starting the music with her feet. At least I know what all the banging is this time. We didn't know what to think the first time we heard Miles playing with it!

I added this photo to the album of old scans - me at about her age. Guess she comes by it naturally.

Miles has been doing great - he wore underpants all week long! We had a few #2 accidents - boy, are those fun. He said after the first one, "I don't like the way that feels" but still has not gone on the potty. Not sure what it will take, I feel like we've promised everything: new tools, a trip to get ice cream, special snacks, and a Diego spinning toothbrush is the latest bribe. Still no go. Not sure what to do! But he'll stay dry in the underpants, so we're not going back to Pull-Ups except at night. Although most mornings he wakes up dry, so we may try underpants at bedtime soon.

We're less than two months away from his big 3rd birthday and we've already started talking about it. One of my magazines had a birthday issue and he picked out THE cake that he wants... surprisingly he did NOT want the excavator cake. So now we'll be figuring out the rest of the event based on his must-have cake. Stay tuned....

What they did

Here are some of the laughs from their evening without mom.

Saturdays are HARD

Wayne did quite a bit of clean-up in the yard and she practiced her rollovers a few times. Maybe that's why they're so sleepy! And Miles was napping at this point. What was I thinking? I should have been napping too!

But I was getting ready for a baby shower for my friend Chrissy. It was lots of fun and I didn't even get a call from Wayne. He had to manage the witching hour and get both kids down all by himself. He did great and got some cute video of the kids that I'll post next. I missed her bedtime feeding and pumped when I got home. Today I missed the late afternoon feeding because of an outing with Miles (more on this next) so I needed to pump when I got home. The "mechanics" of nursing require that you pump as close to the same time that you're missing a feeding in order to maintain your milk supply. That's why Will Farrell carried a pump to the Golden Globes last year, and why it's really easier to take her on vacation with us (thanks anyway, mom). Anyway, I started to pump with her playing beside me and she did NOT like it! She knew there was milk and thought there was no reason it should just end up in a bottle. I got to see some of the fiery redhead, uh-oh!

Miles had a BIG BOY day today. We've been working really hard on using the potty and have been wearing underpants for long portions of the day at home. Today we went on an outing and he wore underpants! Miles and I went to Target to pick out some more underpants. He chose Diego ones and was so proud to show the cashier.

We've been trying a new tactic that I read about in Making the Terrible Twos Terrific. Dr. B. (his pediatrician) has "told us" that Miles is a big boy and can go to the potty all by himself. Dr. B. gave us a bell that goes off throughout the day to remind Miles to go do his thing. If he needs our help he can call us. And he does... he can go, pull off his pants, use either potty - but he usually picks the Diego potty, which includes emptying and rinsing the bowl in his routine - and wash his hands all on his own. He sometimes needs help getting back into his pants, but other than that he's self sufficient. That's not saying that he always does it on his own, but he can. We'll try a couple more days at home in underpants and I ask his teacher before I send him to school in underwear, but it shouldn't be long now! We all so proud of him.

Please keep our friend Courtney in your prayers this week... they are going to welcome their new daughter and bring her home. Such a blessing. What an exciting time!!

And finally, I've been going through old albums and scanned some photos that I want to make sure to have - ones with my grandparents and even great-grandparents in them. Tiffany, there are some great ones of you! If you don't have these, let me know and I'll mail them to you too. Here for your viewing pleasure: the 1970s. (click on this picture to see all of them.)

Old Photo Scans

This is what she does:

Holds onto her toes. All day long. In fact, I have to swaddle her body at naptime or she'd be playing with her feet and never go to sleep! Silly girl.









This is what he does:



GOOF. BALL.

Rollin' Rollin' Rollin'

Here we go... mobility! This morning Audrey officially rolled over. Yes it was the "easy" way, from tummy to back, but she's getting there. She can get fully up to her side from her back, so I don't think it will be long until she's flip-flopping like a politician!

And this is a fine example of why I'm so glad I keep this blog... I couldn't remember when Miles rolled over and my notes from that time are sketchy. I have a note that he rolled over in January, so almost 5 months old. If she gets the back-to-front roll soon it will be before she's 4 months old. Already trying to one-up big brother!

Old School Lullaby!

How fun is this! This site lets you make a mix tape like the good old days. I put together some of my favorite bedtime tunes for the kiddos, enjoy!

who is this child?

Miles had Wayne and me exchanging glances filled with shock and amazement all evening. After a day filled with the usual mealtime tantrums and some general ongoing pouting he joined us for dinner, ate our food, tried new things. And liked them. Wait. I need to compose myself after uttering that. Okay. So Wayne had decided to grill some steaks we'd thawed, some shrimp in a new sauce and we threw on the chicken that was in the fridge since the grill was hot. We also roasted potatoes and carrots, and since the oven was hot I made cookies - just break and bake, don't get excited.

Miles was very busy playing with toys, filling up Chelsea's crate with cars and planes, just generally having fun. Audrey was taking her 3rd nap of the day. We called him to dinner. He said, "no, I'm playing." I told Wayne that he (Wayne) could have a cookie if he ate his dinner. As planned, Miles overheard and said, "I want a cookie!" I told him he'd have to eat, so he came to the table without a fuss. (wow) He looked at his plate and started to say I don't want that and I reminded him about the cookies. He ate a potato. He initially said he liked it, but then spit it out. We had seasoned them with pepper, so maybe he got a hot spot. But he got points for tasting it! (Wow) I had only put chicken on his plate, figuring he wouldn't want steak or shrimp, but we offered him bites of ours. He said no to the shrimp but ate the steak. Halfway through chewing he opened his mouth, pointed inside and said, "I Like this!" (WOW) He then ate many more bites of steak, all the chicken I'd given him and even a big bite peas (required for the cookie.) And he was pleasant and charming the whole time!

3 months old

Thank you for all of your confessions support after my traumatic maiming of the infant child. She somehow survived the night and even smiled the next day, which was good as we had her 3 month portraits taken that morning. I was hoping to possibly get an e-mailed sneak peek from the session to share, but since Garvey is busy getting ready to go sailing with my dad he hasn't [hint hint ;)]. She did great and we got lots of beautiful portraits to try and pick from.

Her first three months have flown by. I know with Miles the time seemed much more relaxed. Now with a very energetic kid running, jumping, spinning, galloping around getting into monkey business I don't think I could remember the definition of relaxed, lazy days with a baby. He's going to school 3 days a week in the summer, so hopefully I can dedicate some more attention to Audrey. [She's napping, so I'm only neglecting housework while I blog now.]

I'm trying to keep track of what she's been doing because it changes so fast. She can already sit while supported really well and has started rolling onto her side a lot. A couple of times this week she's worked herself around 360 degrees while laying on her back. She likes grabbing her toes and is often holding her fists out in a driving pose. She's quite chatty, I'm trying to get a video of her jabbering away to share. Oh and she is sucking on her fingers and drooling like mad... could it be teeth already?

And finally... big congrats to our friends Amy & Jason... they're expecting!

Happy Days

We're celebrating two big days this week, Wayne's birthday was Saturday and Audrey hits 3 months on Tuesday. Yippee! Miles loves birthdays, in fact any gathering of many people is called a Birthday party, regardless of the true nature of the event. (Example: a memorial day cookout with the Loebner's = "Eileen's Birthday Party".) He was super excited about daddy's cake: an Oreo cookie pie. Miles made sure we knew by telling us "I like birthday cake!" and "I got a big ol' piece!" I forgot to look at the clock when we pulled out the cake and realized as we scarfed down the deliciousness that it was exactly 10 minutes before Miles's dinner time. Oops. So he held on and waited up for us to grill out burgers and enjoyed his dinner with all of us.

YaYa and B had come for the day so Wayne and I could make it to Indy 4. It was enjoyable, but I'm glad my expectations weren't too high! Friday night's movie, however, was fantastic. It's not often you see a theater filled to capacity with women all dressed up to the heels. And this was a huge theater - at least 800 seats in ours and it played on another screen too!

{These photos of her are from 1 week old and today, 13 weeks old.}

So now I must use the blog as therapy and admit to my mother-of-the-year moments today. Miles almost drank his own pee and I clipped the tip of Audrey's thumb during a manicure. Let the flogging begin. First Miles. We got a Diego potty seat hoping that by sitting securely on the floor he'd be more inclined to do #2 there. He hasn't done that yet, but he has been jumping up to go pee and that's a new development. He saw me pour and flush the first time and later was with Wayne and I saw him (Miles) lift the cup - I thought to the potty but he moved it toward his face. NOOOOOOOOO!!!!! I think I scared him with my shriek from down the hall. Audrey's mishap was much less dramatic but still terrible to see those little eyes welling up. I'm about to cry thinking about it! And it was just before bath and bed time too. Poor little thing. I'm off to drown my sorrows in some iced tea - did you know June is National Iced Tea Month? Too bad we finished that pie, I could use a slice of that too.

We have to go back

In what can only be deemed "inconceivable", I will actually see 3 movies this week. In the theater. I know, hold onto your hat. Since I'd been averaging one per year since Miles was born, this is truly an amazing event. What makes the list? But of course the Sex and the City premier Friday evening, a birthday "bash" for Raven's 30th. And while in Nashville, Elizabeth and I took in Made of Honor, which was very cute & in line with the chick flick genre. And finally for Wayne's birthday we're heading out to see Indy 4.

But tonight we're planted at home, on the edge for the finale of Lost. Dig that crazy show! I made us a new favorite dinner, Chicken with broccoli and garlic sauce, and Miles crawled in bed on his own at 6:50 and hasn't made a peep since. We'll see how it goes...

[Friday morning update] Lost was fantastic, lots of answers, more questions, and 8 months until we get more. Argh! Miles slept until 6:45, he must have been exhausted! The days at YaYa & B's and the 1st day back to school wore him out. He's going three days a week this summer, hope it won't be too much for him. The class changed, with some friends moving on to the 3 year old room, and some younger kids moving into the 2 year old room. He still has the same teacher, but change can be tricky.

Kind of like the change required to share your toys with your baby sister. I've been pulling out old toys and he's glommed onto each one. He even thinks he gets to sit in the Bebe pod. Um, no, you'll get stuck. Crazy kid.

Double trouble

I uploaded these photos over the weekend, but obviously haven't gotten around to posting for a while. We had a sort of rough week last week, bad sleeping from both kiddos. Audrey's back on track, but Miles seems to have decided that it's his duty to wake the rooster, so he starts crowing at 5:30 a.m., with no chance of resting quietly until a decent hour. Several days of that can take a toll on a mama, so I brought them to YaYa & B's for some distraction. Unfortunately for YaYa & B, he's rising at 5 a.m. in central time zone! So we all take naps during the day to recharge.

I'm not sure how this purchase will turn out, but we're a double stroller family now. We like our evening walks, and I like to stroll the mall on rainy days during the week, so it seemed like the best way to keep them both in check. Miles was very excited to sit next to his sister, but hopefully the novelty will wear off and he'll stop reaching over to pet her soon. Probably not.

Front Yard Fridays

Before I get to Friday evening, I have to talk about today. Today we learned that bribery does pay. Sort of. We achieved poopy on the potty!! [The rest of this paragraph will be about poopy, so if you're not inducted into the parenting world and don't understand the necessity of discussing poopy, you have permission to skip forward.] I feel as if I live in the bathroom now, spending literally hours at a time sitting there with Miles. During the week we'd sit for 15-20 minutes, put on a pull-up and he'd go poop in the next 15 minutes somewhere else. So today I decided he couldn't leave the potty until we had poopy. So I {bad mommy alert} held him on the seat when he started getting nervous and tried to leave. Which led to much screaming and crying. But after a looooooooong time, it worked! And then throughout the afternoon he told us a few more times that he had to go, and he did! Yay us! Before we go getting all high and mighty he ran off from his tooth brushing and got us back for a day of great pooping on the potty. Back in the diaper. Oh well. He got his chainsaw earlier and I don't think it would be productive to take it back - yet - so we'll just start fresh tomorrow.

Back to Friday... our great neighbors Beth & Dan started what we hope will be a fun summer tradition: Front Yard Fridays. Basically they invited our entire street and many other families in the neighborhood for an evening social in the front yard. Despite a chilly evening there was a great turn-out and lots of food, drink and fun for all. We met 2 sets of brand new neighbors, one family that had twin girls born just before Audrey. Miles had a big time with all the kids, and chasing another neighbor's cat. Beth got everyone's info and the plan is to rotate homes and have this every 2-3 weeks through the summer.

The most amusing sight of the evening was all the dads sporting their kids around in Baby Bjorns. I think we had three at one time and another dad holding one of the twins. There is a baby boom in our hood - there have been 7 babies born since October within a quarter-mile of our house, and one more is due next month. I'm sure that makes the future babysitters I met happy too - business should be hot. I'm glad there are several babysitters to choose from as well! We'll have to start trying them out, maybe for some good movies coming out soon.

shadrach

Sad news this week... "my" cat Shadrach had to be put to sleep after an onset of cancer. I say "my" cat because although I adopted him in 1995, my mom and Don have been his gracious and loving parents for the last -whew- 10 years!! I think we attempted one time to bring him back to Knoxville and he hid and wasn't seen for their entire visit. He had definitely become accustomed to the new good life! And Wayne's allergies are horrible enough without adding cat dander to the mix.

Shadrach was a sweet cat, very friendly and vocal. We could always hear him when we called home. He did almost get us evicted from the apartment I shared with Erin & Kim in college, but I think he always missed his pal Darby, who Jen adopted at the same time. Miles is now his biggest fan, reminding me at nighttime prayers "we forgot Shadrach!" I think we'll just let it go until we return to visit and see how much explaining is needed then.