The Bird Hunter

I'm pretty sure that this post won't come across as funny as Grant has been lately about hunting but I'll give it a try...
This all goes back to the end of Oct when the hubs came back from Elk Hunting in Colorado. Their group didn't end up getting any Elk and when Grant found out that they didn't bring home any meat, he decided to take it upon himself to put a little meat in the freezer by way of trapping birds. YES, you heard me right. Trapping birds.
I have always loved to feed the birds. It makes me think of my Grandma Barb because she always had the most beautiful birds at her feeder. I guess Grant figured the birds would be an easy target since they were right outside the window. After he told me his master plan, my comment to him was, 'I sure hope you catch one of those Blue Jays so we at least get some breast meat." (Notice that there actually is a Blue Jay on the ground by the trap in the picture below :)
The part that makes me giggle the most is that he bugged his Dad for 2 days to help him set a trap. He even drew pictures of what the trap was going to look like and how it would work. Finally, Duke broke down and helped him set a live trap with bread in it for bait. The first 4 days the trap was set, it rained. But Grant checked that trap religiously. Once the rain had stopped, we took a good look at the trap and to every one's dismay, the camouflage on top of the trap had been knocked off and the bread somehow disappeared but the trap empty.
His next attempt at baiting was to put bird seed in the bird trap. Sounds logical. Until the very next morning when much of the seed was gone and still nothing in the trap. I kinda figured that we may end up with a squirrel in the trap but nada!
The cat, on the other hand has been doing a stellar job of thinning the flock. Don't get me wrong, I love having a cat, but I hate that when I feed the birds it is more like baiting them for her! See her 'hiding' behind the tree above and below.
She's pretty sneaky, isn't she! I keep telling her if she ever gets one of this she's in BIG trouble! You see, we love our Cardinals around here as they are always a sign that a Grandma who has passed is watching over us.
The snow has begun to fall in MN so I have a feeling that bird trapping season will be coming to an end soon, but until then, wish my little man much luck!

Poor Punkin' {and a funny story}

My poor little punkin' got an owie at daycare yesterday.
Apparently, she walked in front of a little boy that was swinging and got a shoe to the face. Actually, it is the little boy named Boone whom she calls her boyfriend.
Actually, here is a picture of the cute couple from back in June at our little town's festival, Spunktacular Days. Aren't they adorable together!
The poor little guy felt so bad, this morning when I dropped the kids off at daycare, he almost had tears in his eyes when he was telling me it was an accident. He said, "I gave her a hug and told her I was sorry." What a little sweetie :)
It doesn't seem to be bothering her much, though. She really didn't know there was a scab or that her eye was swollen until last night when she was brushing her teeth. She looked in the mirror and asked what happened! I told her it was from when Boone's foot hit her and she replied, "Well, I'm gonna tell on Boone!" Funny how easily they forget!
For those of you who are my facebook friends, this was my awesome GW (Goodwill) find!
Can you believe this was only $6.99!?! Now we have to clean out the kid's room so we can find a home for this little beauty!
In other completely unrelated news, I have a funny story to tell you. This little guy says some of the FUNNIEST things you could ever imagine! We call the funnies 'Grantisms'.
His most recent one came tonight and went a little something like this: I asked Grant what he did at his last day of daycare before Kindergarten starts next Tues. His reply was, "Well, we played cars, we played computer, we went outside and swinged and played in the sand, we got stoned...oh, and we ate brownies." I about fell off my chair! Duke and I looked at each other and had to bite our lips to hold back laughter. Once I composed myself, I asked him what 'stoned' meant and he said, 'It's when you get all dusty and dirty from playing in the dirt." The brownies were the treat that WE brought to share for it being his last day of daycare. I promise, they were just plain brownies!
Some day he is going to laugh his kiester off when I share this story with him and I am going to keep giggling to myself for years to come!

i heart faces - 'Pets'

This weeks theme over at iheartfaces is 'Pets'. I'll give you one chance to guess which pet below is mine...Tom or Jerry?
If you guessed Tom Trixie you are correct!

The story of how this picture came to be is almost as funny as the picture itself. This very afternoon, I was moving three bags of top soil and when I picked up the last one, a furry little baby mouse was scurrying around. Grant wanted me to catch it so I told him to grab one of his butterfly nets. He did, and I was able to capture this little feller (not without a couple of high-pitched squeals and shrieks, mind you!) Since we had actually managed to catch it, I figured we had better at least take a couple of pictures of it. I told Grant to hold the net while I tried to get a picture of him. The mouse ran to the top of the net and sat there while I snapped away. Meanwhile, our cat was enjoying a peaceful nap in the sunshine. Grant decided the cat should 'get' the mouse since that is why we have her (to keep mice out of the garage) and she is usually quite good at it. In this case, she was sleeping so soundly, she didn't even know that a mouse was right under her nose...literally!!!
For those of you who are wondering the fate of little Jerry...well he ended up running up the handle of the net, Grant screamed like a girl and dropped the net right on the cat. At that point the mouse ran right over the cat and up the back of the chair she was lying on and took an Evil Knievel leap from the top rung into an evergreen shrub, never to be seen again. The End.

Make sure to head over to www.iheartfaces.blogspot.com to check out all of the other furry little friends.

They work hard for their money!

My children are learning, at a young age, the value of working hard for their money.
Okay, you got me. They WANTED to help me clean so I let them take over and I thoroughly enjoyed taking pictures of them work while sipping on a margarita.
Wait! Kidding again...about the margarita!
Who knew cleaning could be such fun.
I am sure it is even more enjoyable when you get to torment the cat who was perfectly content, minding her own business, while lying in a sunbeam.
I'll share another tidbit with you. Audrey looks a lot like her Mommy does while cleaning...pantsless that is!
You see, most of the time when I am cleaning, I take my pants off (I KNOW...TMI), while cleaning the tub/shower so I don't get them wet. Then I continue on my cleaning binge and forget to put my pants back on!
Hey, when I am on a roll, it is best to just let me go! That is harmless enough, right?! {Please say YES!}
Don't fret...no plans of me posting pantsless cleaning pictures of myself any time soon! Besides, Audrey pulls it off much better than I ;)

Land Update

Who knew buying property and building a storage shed could turn out to be so complicated. Not me! Maybe I am a little naive (okay, I am naive) to all that goes into getting building permits, driveway permits, etc, but after this experience I can assure you I can define exactly what constitutes a wetland and when you do and don't need a driveway permit in the township we live in.

Yes, you haven't heard about much progress on the land we purchased back in February but that is mostly because there hasn't been any real (visual) progress to speak of yet. This lack of progress has been due to a few hurdles we have encountered.

The first bump in the road we ran into was that when the county came out to inspect the location we had chosen to build our pole building. The inspector felt that the particular which we had chosen for the structure was possibly a wetland. As a result, a lady from Environmental Services came out and tested the soil for saturation and her initial findings were that that particular area was indeed a Type 1 wetland. For simplicity sake, a Type 1 wetland is basically an area that supports wetland plant growth and is wet for a short time in the spring but dries up substantially in the summer months. Yes, to be considered a wetland it doesn't even need to have water above the surface and it doesn't even have to look like a wetland. Take a look for yourself. To me, it pretty much looks like a field. Shows you what I know, huh!

It is a LONG story but basically Duke called the county and yelled at them and then I called them and smoothed things over. I got Environmental Services to agree to come back out two weeks later to recheck the soil saturation. We thought we had a good shot at it drying up enough but since we had so much snow and such a fast melt this spring, it was still saturated around 10 inches below the surface and it needed to be greater than 12 inches. The good part is that with a little research I found that with a Type 1 wetland we are able to impact the wetland up to 2000 sq feet without having to replace the wetland at a 2:1 ratio. In the end, we had to move the stakes for the shed 30 feet to the West (Duke wasn't really happy about that either but he'll have to live with it) and didn't have to pay any other fees, etc. To me, that was a pretty favorable outcome because at least they weren't saying we couldn't build at all.

We have now chosen our building contractor but are teetering between building a stick frame structure (which requires a block foundation so it is a little more expensive) and a pole barn. The contractor thinks we would be better off doing the stick frame, and that is what Duke initially wanted to build, but Duke has reservations about the cost since this is going to turn out to be one spendy shed in order to get it just the way he wants it.

On a positive note, last night we found out that we do not need to get a permit to have the driveway put in, as long as we use the approach that the township put in when they tarred the road years ago. That is a bonus because Duke has someone lined up to come out early next week to do the dirt work for the driveway and to push in and cover up and old house foundation that is in the woods (for safety reasons). I personally would have rather used the original approach that was used many many years ago, but since it had been abandoned and would need rebuilding, we are opting to use the newer one to avoid all of the red tape we would have to go through to get a second approach approved by the township.

Sorry if I am boring you with all of this land/shed mumbo-jumbo. Hopefully throughout the post you were a bit entertained with these pictures I took of Audrey when we stopped by the land a few weeks ago to just look around. Check out this deer trail that is running smack through the middle of where our shed will be. I am guessing a garden will be out of the question for me unless I put up a BIG fence. On the bright side, maybe Duke won't have to go up to the Shack anymore to deer hunt!
Speaking of wildlife, let me tell you about a funny story from this very day. When Audrey and I got to the land and were standing back by the old fence line all of a sudden taking some pictures, we heard a turkey gobble loudly and ruffle it's feathers. Audrey turned to me with a look of fright and said 'What was dat?' I smiled and told her not to worry because it was just a Turkey in the woods. She responded by running to me so I would pick her up and she exclaimed, "Mama hold me! That chicken gonna get me!" This is how she looked for pretty much the rest of our visit to the land:
God help us if we now have to fear man-eating chickens!!!

Spongebob Intervention

I fear that the time has come for a serious Spongebob Intervention!

A little someone, who shall remain nameless...

(hint, hint)
...has developed a minor addiction to watching Spongebob (specifically the 'Ripped Pants' episode) while lying in her blow up princess bed in her room. (And yes, she has a real bed, but just prefers to sleep on her blow up bed occasionally.) And this request often comes multiple times in a day.
Okay, well maybe it is a little more than a minor addiction. One of the first things she asks me when she gets home is if she can put on her jammies and then says 'Me watch Spongebobby Whipped Pants'. I know someday I am so going to miss her using 'me' instead of 'I' but for now I refuse to correct her because I think it is so stinkin' cute! So I digress...
Back to the intervention...Her other obsession is obviously sleeping in her princess blow-up bed. These pics were from last weekend when she wanted to take a nappy in her room and watch a little Spongebobby first. I couldn't help myself from snapping couple of pics of her adorable little sleepy self.
So what do you think? Does this addiction warrant an intervention with a 2 1/2 year old Spongebob addict? Or should I just relish in the 20 minutes of rest my hip gets from holding her??? That is one tough question!

Naughty Mommy!

I am such a naughty mommy.

So this past Monday we got dumped on with snow. I was at work and the snow hadn't stopped all day so when it was time to go home I decided to grab my laptop just in case we were snowed in and I couldn't make it to work the next day. Then it occurred to me that we didn't have much in the fridge so I swung by the grocery store quick to pick up a few things. By the way, only I can swing by the grocery store and in a mere 20 min spend $150. Yep, just a quick trip to the grocery store for a couple things.

When I got home I was busily trying to put everything away so I could get dinner started but my vulture-like children kept wanting to eat a little of everything I had bought. First it was some blueberries. Then some celery with peanut butter, then sugar snap peas dipped in ranch and finally they wanted strawberries with sugar sprinkled on them. Not all together bad snacks but they sure didn't save much room for the spaghetti I was about to make.

You are probably wondering where the 'naughty mommy' part enters this story, right?

Gimmie a minute... I am getting to that part.

I happily prepared the kids each of their (mostly) healthy snacks, the last being the strawberries sprinkled with sugar. The kids took their loot and I ushered them out to eat at the coffee table by their Dad so I could get a move on. I finished putting the groceries away and got started on dinner. All of the sudden, Grant came out of the porch proclaiming that the strawberries tasted like poop.

"Poop?" I said.

"Yes , POOP! These strawberries taste nasty, Mom." as he wrinkled up his nose and puckered his lips with a face of pure disgust. Next he proceeded to spit out the half chewed strawberry into the garbage. Next, Audrey emerged from the porch with the same face of disgust, carrying her bowl of strawberries and said "These berries yucky!"

I was completely confused. The berries looked nice, red and ripe. And I had sprinkled plenty of sugar on them to take away any bitterness, if there was any.

Of course, I had to try one to see what all the fuss was about. And you know what?! They DID taste NASTY. Not necessarily like POOP, but pretty darn NASTY!

Wanna know why?

Because I had mistakenly sprinkled SALT on them instead of sugar! ISH, ISH, ISHY!!

I had a little Tupperware with what I thought was sugar in it because the bag of sugar doesn't always all fit into the canister.

Silly me!

Now I remember that I had emptied the container of Morton salt into the Tupperware because the bottom of the cardboard container had gotten wet and I didn't want the salt to get all stuck together from moisture.

Ooops! I felt terrible so I explained what had happened, apologized, and did what any good mother would do...rinsed the salt coated strawberries off with cold water, and then made sure that they were sprinkled with REAL sugar.

All of this apparently was not good enough because Audrey scowled at me and said "Naughty Mommy" and Grant echoed with "Yeah, Naughty Mommy!

Poor kiddos! I think I may have scarred them for life.

Baiting the Birds

This is the blog post that was supposed have the funny title of 'Baiting Feeding the Birds' but since I am html and formatting illiterate, it will just have to be 'Baiting the Birds.'
Why call it 'Baiting the Birds' and not just call it 'Feeding the Birds', you ask?

The simple answer is...

This is why:
Yep, our cat's new favorite past time is to sit directly under the bird feeder and wait for a cute little unsuspecting tweetie like this one:
And then...WHAMO! When that cute little unsuspecting birdie lands on the bird baiter feeder she strikes with her catlike reflexes (HA! Catlike. Get it? Ha, I say! HA!)
*Notice the bird feeder appears to be 'swinging' in the picture and that is because it was. As I was snapping my zoom lens onto my camera Trixie really did jump up and attempt to snatch a little birdie right off of the feeder. I was super bummed I missed the action shot but glad the little birdie got away.

And here is Trixie Pie looking completely busted!
And then she began slinking back towards the house, knowing full well she was gonna be in trouble.
And this is the 'Is it okay to come in the house now or should I wait a few more minutes out here in the freezing cold while you cool down a little in there?' face.
I'd say she's forgiven this time, especially since she is an awesome mouser. Although, I did just fill the bird feeder this evening so we'll see if I am singing the same tune tomorrow when she inevitably 'assumes the position' again.