I want to remember:

I spent forty minutes a week ago composing a Mother’s Day post, and blogspot ate it.
So, I am composing this in Word, and will copy and paste like a good girl.
Mother’s Day was wonderful in that I heard from all three of my sons. James called from A-stan, and sent two dozen roses!!! Rose report---the red ones lasted eleven days! The orange and white pooped out much sooner. So, red roses are best!
On the 14th, the firstborn brought us his animals as he was on the way to the east coast for pre-deployment training. I am so glad they are conferencing with who they replace over there. Whew. He is deploying to one of the most dangerous places in A-stan on my birthday. What is it about my birthday that attracts deployments?? (middle son deployed last year on my birthday)
Our youngest, and college student studying to be an electrician (graduating Aug. 19th) built a kitty door and kitty climbing tower in the hall closet for Emma cat. This gives her a place of retreat and reflection from big Tifa dog. I was told and observed during skype calls that Emma cat was rather standoffish. But, she has warmed up to us and our house so smoothly. She loves the birdfeeder action, and jumping from table to counter. Her favorite place to sit is here on the computer table, which makes reading the screen a bit of a challenge. And she rolls around. Flops—as if almost into my lap, laying her head back on this keyboard. Where to scratch?? Not the ears nor tummy. And the poor thing is shedding as she walks. She is used to Alaska. We keep the AC at 76 degrees---which is comfortable for us, but has the cat stretched out like a kitty thermometer.
Tifa’s favorite game is chase/herd the kitty. So, when I hear Emma’s warning voice, I have to turn and say, unto Tifa: leave the cat alone. Shortened to: cat-lone. (which is what we used to tell middle son when visiting friends with a not toddler safe cat) And he would repeat in his cute little voice: cat-lone.
Tifa is amazing. We had observed her licking and needing petted on skype, so we were not sure how she would do here with boring old folks. She does not bark. I have only heard one deep-from-the-chest wolf for some reason while out driving. Yes. She loves to ride in the car! Fun! We just got back from mailing some bills at the post office and driving through McDonalds for a sausage biscuit for my snack.
Tifa is a big black dog with white feet---border collie markings and the type of hair. With an undercoat which speaks of her huskie mix, and a Rhodesian Ridgeback ridge of hair which makes her look like she is having a bad hair day. But, she is beautiful, friendly, energetic, loving, sweet, with the fastest legs, and body of a greyhound. She can run like the wind. And thankfully, God provided a seven year old neighbor boy to come play ball in the back yard with Tifa. It helps wear her out. Tifa loves to fetch and play keep-away with tennis balls. And I think she was so relieved to see the smaller version of people when she met Pedro.
Tifa does have the attention span of a toddler, however, and has sailed over the fence. Twice. So, she must be constantly watched when in our back yard. It is scary. Because we don’t want to lose her on our watch. She loves to run up and down the fence and “play” with the neighbor’s big dog and little wiener dog, but dogs one more yard over barked one day, and before we could stop her, she had sailed over the fence to investigate. And play. We hollered, and she came back---after a few minutes.
Then, when the new neighbors of the dogs was outside with her one year old baby, and doing a little sandbox play in the green turtle with a lid sandbox, something spooked Tifa, and she sailed over the fence again, and headed STRAIGHT for the baby, as I yelled, and shouted---“she is good with children”. And thankfully, the lady did not freak out. I would have freaked out if a strange dog sailed over my fence and licked my baby on the face. Yikes. The lady even helped push her back over the fence! And Tifa is big. We should have met the neighbors before this---I should have baked cookies. It is not too late, but, oh, my. Those were some scary moments.
So, I take her in the back yard, and try to look for the clues she is thinking about fence jumping. I wish I could trust her out there. I wish I could let her enjoy the yard. She loves to flush birds from the bushes, and examine every bug. She is very co-ordinated. She can use her front claws and paws as hands and investigate a huge black ant crawling up the wall. When we keep Brody, our other daughter-in-law’s little Yorkie, we can let him roam in the back yard, and he will come scratch at the back door, as he loves to be with us.
We will either have to put up an electric fence, or use the shock collar for a while. I don’t know. If we had the super tall privacy fence, that would be the best. Ours is just a chain link. Might as well be a ladder. Ha
We are so thankful that the animals traveled so well, and the airlines were so nice to haul the crates to our car, and since our son was here for the handoff---we got to enjoy seeing him face to face for 18 hours, and his animals then knew we were safe people.
We can’t wait for the next stage: once our son travels to his next pre-deployment training, his dear wife, brave woman, will fly to Seattle and start driving to Texas with her brother and our four year old granddaughter and 8 month old grandson. We are so blessed to get to see them on skype, but what fun to have them here! Here where it is warmer, and where we have more shopping and eating choices. Here, where we can watch them grow up before our eyes for a while. The brave daughter-in-law will probably find a place closer to her folks and grandparents and friends in Houston, but we will enjoy them as long as we can.
Yesterday was like a three ring circus---I had just gotten back from lunch with my friend who lives one street over. She is an animal person, so she had come inside to see Tifa and Emma. I saw the mail lady start up the drive with a box from our daughter-in-law which she had told us contained the treats, brush, etc., but I was not sure how the mail lady would enjoy being licked and jumped up on, so as Tifa charged the door to say hello, I motioned for her to put the box on the step, and the skype call sounded---doodeedoo. Doo. Doo. Dooodeedo, doo. Do. So, we got to see the granddaughter wearing her gossamer wings from her Halloween outfit when she was 2 years old. She was wanting to check on her dog. Tifa so enjoyed hearing their voices, that she felt comfortable enough to go finish off her food. She lets her food sit all day, and then about 10 pm, when we are headed to bed, gives up on getting people food, and eats. I turned the camera so that the granddaughter could see her dog chowing down, but a black dog against a black frig…
What a hoot. Never a dull moment. When you pet the kitty, here comes the dog for her turn. And we bought this huge rope thingy toy for Tifa to chew on instead of the carpet edges by the front door. Ha. It is an old, old carpet. And these kong toys are great, too, to help her with the boredom.
We could not figure out whatall the items in the box were for. The Christmas Vacation ornament is so wonderful ! Cute!!! Halelujah Chorus with lights! But, there were these two rubber and wire thingies, which we thought maybe went with the doggie backpack. Bob tried them on his head, kinda like a hat frame, however. Ben, our youngest, and gifted son---he figured it out quickly when he came home last night. Then we remembered back to how we had remarked to the Alaska folks how treacherous our driveway was when iced over, and working for the power company, my husband can’t call in unless he is dying. After slip-sliding down the drive in his cowboy boots last January, February, March and April---the Alaska folks took pity upon him, and sent him these contraptions that strap over your shoes!!! YAY! Now we are ready for winter…and where shall we stash these things for seven months?? I am all for tacking them to the wall because I am afraid they might get lost in a closet. I guess I could nail them to the inside of the closet where we’d still see them. In our old age we are forgetting where we stash stuff.
More later. But, I shall end today with a prayer: Dear Heavenly Father, please protect Israel. Please send bad weather and plague upon the muslims who rush their borders, hate, and insanely think all their problems would be solved if Israel was destroyed. Please give Israel the spine and strength to push the arabs and muslims into the sea. I say, restore the borders YOU promised King David, Moses, and Abraham. Your will be done. Please open obama’s eyes or remove the asshole from office. In Jesus Name I pray. Amen.