Introducing the First Mate

Friday, August 30:  Well, well, well. Finally! After two weeks of wanting a bird, I purchased "Matey" here over at Casa La Parrot this afternoon and took him immediately home to the Beach House to his own little haven.

 This particular budgie bird is approximately three months old. Do you see the purple color over his beak? That indicates this bird is a male (hopefully). Males are more inclined to sing pretty songs, and they are able (in some cases) to learn a few words. I've heard that females chatter a bit, but they do not regularly sing; nor do they talk.

 The people at the parrot store were very kind and helpful. They gave me some written instructions for my dear budgie. I'm so excited to have him join me here at my little house.

 I had intended to get a very BLUE bird, because BLUE is Brendan's favorite color ... but if you look carefully, there is BLUE underneath his yellow feathers ... and he just seems so PERFECT for my little place, doesn't he?

 Okay, First Mate! You are going to LOVE it here! I am going to introduce you to all of the grandchildren. They will love you too! I can hardly wait until tomorrow to bring Kaity-Girl over! And Emma tomorrow night!

 Matey has been pretty quiet since I maneuvered him into his cage. He has used his little claws to climb up a few rungs on his bars, but nothing major. So far, he has not gone down either to his food dish or his water dish. I did take out one of those mallet branches and stuck part of one through the bars near his mouth and he took six bites! YES! 

 Presently, I have a half grape stuffed between his bars right by his face--he did open his mouth and I saw his little tongue--it looked like he was laughing at me! He did peck a little bit at the grape, so that's a good thing.

The pet shop folk told me it will take a little bit of time for Matey to get used to his surroundings. I won't pressure him. They did say it was a good idea to touch him every day so that he will get used to me and eventually to the grandchildren too. Won't that be fun? 

 I think you are going to be a beautiful pet, First Mate!

Welcome to the Beach House!

I love you, Kaity

Thursday, August 29:  When I picked Kaity up at her house today (she'd had a 1/2 day of school), she immediately asked if we could go to her school playground to play for awhile. She said one of her classmates was going to be there and she wanted to show him how to do a particular monkeybar, because he was struggling with it. 

 The playground was essentially empty of children when we arrived, and Kaity's friend never showed up while we were there--but then I was not surprised since they had not arranged a particular time. Kaity was a little out of sorts today, a little more high-strung than usual, and not a little snippy!

 She spun herself on this apparatus for so long, that just watching her spin made ME dizzy--I had to look away!

 Kaity is an expert monkey, truly she is!

 Baby Jo-Jo was with us too ... but Kaity was not kind to Jo-Jo today like she usually is. Like I said, Kaity was not quite her usual self. My heart was sad for her.

 We came home to my place and I suggested that Kaity build a track while I fixed lunch for us. She got going right away and did a completely wonderful job of it too. She was anxious to test out her "Lady" battery-powered engine.

 Kaity is an excellent builder of just about everything. She has a very good mind and brain. She has a lot of super good ideas, too. I love watching her play.

 Kaity kept adding toys to her train world. She brought out her little horse, "Nico" and set him up by the tracks, and she got out the wooden blocks for me to make a store for the train people to shop at. I don't have any pictures of my finished store for you to see ... it wasn't much to photograph actually--but Kaity liked it just fine.

Kaity helped me hang two mirrors that I got for Matey's cage, as well as a nice ladder and a swing! She's super excited for me to have a pet. Me too, Kaity!

Birdcages and Bookmarks, etc.

Wednesday, August 28:  SO ... I am embarking on a new adventure here at my Beach House. Inspired by Max and Alex, and instructed by their dear owner and my wonderful niece (Shelley), I've purchased a grande bird cage for my soon-to-be First Mate! Brendan helped me put the crazy thing together Wednesday afternoon. He is a very good builder (like his mama). Matey will sleep in the back toy room, the cage top covered with a nice blue baby blanket. During the day, though, our Mate will be in the main room of my house, hopefully chirping, singing, and entertaining the grandchildren. I'm hoping very much to get a male parakeet--because they DO learn to sing and actually learn to say many words that they hear.

 Brendan is thrilled with the whole adventure! He can hardly wait to meet Matey! I'm SO glad! I think this will be a very wonderful experience for all of us. I was so delighted with Max and Alex, I just KNEW the kiddos would be crazy to have a bird at the Beach House.

It is Kelly O's birthday this coming weekend, so I suggested a small birthday present for Brendan to make for his mama. Several years ago I purchased some very nice totally blank bookmarks made out of sturdy cardstock with a hole punched at the top (for ribbon, I assume). I asked if Brendan wanted to make a picture on one of them, we could put a nice blue ribbon at the top, and then Brendan could give it to his mama so that Kelly wouldn't lose her place in the book(s) she reads. I showed him how I use my bookmarks ALL THE TIME. Brendan thought bookmarks were a cool idea, but "how would you know which WORD you left off with on that page, grandma?" Oh my! I told him I just re-read the entire page to make sure!

 I got out markers, our thumb print book, stamps, etc. Brendan made a thumbprint owl and the used TWO bookmarks together to make a thumbprint WOLF (Brendan's favorite animal, or "antimal" as Brendan pronounces it). Since I had my farm stamps out, Brendan did play with those as well, making a nice picture on plain white paper. This kept us busy and rather happy for quite a long time today.

 We hung up some of the bird toys I purchased inside Matey's cage ...

 AND we played a game of Kerplunk! Brendan was SO funny playing this game! He is so precious.

 Like most kiddos, he DOES like to win most any game he plays ... which he did!

I love you so much, Brendan! I loved having you over to my house today!

Monday's joys

Monday, August 26:  It was Aidan's turn to come over to my house all by himself today. He loves to play over here, and he is the perfect age. On the way to over to my place, we stopped at the bird shop over on 28th street, near Aidan's house. I am going to purchase a parakeet! Yes! I wanted to see some stuff in the bird store, so Aidan and I went inside for a bit. This particular store carries lots of parrotts and they are just "out and about" the place. We walked over to a rather large, deep red parrot and said, "Hello!" And would you believe, that crazy parrot lifted it's claw and waved to us?!?!? Aidan was thrilled.

Aidan is not a difficult child to entertain. He plays and plays and plays. He LOVES trains and spent most of his hours right here on the floor combining different engines and cars and having so much fun.

 Over the weekend, Kaity gave me a little engine we had found out in her garage. It's one that requires a battery, but then it goes! It wasn't working at Kaity's house, so we took it here and put in a fresh AA battery. I designed a layout with not too many hilly places and tested "Lady" out. She did super well! 

 However, Aidan prefered it when "Lady" was taking her nap and not getting in his way. He likes to command his own trains and doesn't like the privilege taken away from him.

 One of the most anticipated events of each and every Monday afternoon is when Aidan hears the garbage truck coming. If we are outside, he waves his little arm off (practically), and the gentleman driving the truck waves back and gives Aidan a huge smile. It's wonderful. Today, it was raining quite hard, so we stayed inside. Look how pleased Aidan is to see the garbage truck.

 Aidan ate an entire bowl of cheesy noodles for me today! It did my heart good. It has sometimes been difficult for me to find something that he really likes to eat while at my house. He has allergies, so it is a little bit trickier to feed him. He also enjoyed playing today on my couch. He would say, "I take a nap now" and then plop himself on the pillow, I would cover him up down to his toes with a baby blanket, rub his little back and his head, kiss him on the cheek and say, "Good night, Aidan!" And then two seconds later, he would wake up laughing.

And look who was home to greet us when we arrived at Aidan's house? L'il darlin' Erin Lucia! Erin LOVES to have her picture taken and then she LOVES to see it on the little camera screen afterwards. She gets a huge amount of delight out of the whole process.

 Sweet little blue-eyed girly ...

 You are precious, dear Erin!

 Oh.my.word. That scrunchy smile ... just for me?!?!?

MMM ... love this little person so much ...

Emma moments

Saturday night/Sunday, August 24 & 25:  Emma has spent just about every Saturday night overnight at my house since mid-March or so. It is my favorite night of the week. I can't begin to put into words how much it means to spend time with Emma. Usually, our time together involves lots of laughing and sharing our thoughts with each other. Emma has become a "good friend" to me. I think she feels somewhat the same about me.

We have been doing a Bible study together on and off for perhaps six years now. We've covered the first five books of the Bible, Joshua and Judges, and then we did the life of Jesus mostly from Mark's Gospel, then we studied the early church in Acts. But for the last year or more, we've been studying the kings and the prophets. It's been super good for me to prepare our story each week--although I will be honest and tell you it is not EVERY single week that I get totally prepared to do a new story. This week was one of those weeks.

 A week ago Saturday night, Emma requested that we re-watch "Anne of Green Gables." I showed it to Emma and the boys the first summer they returned "home" to Michigan from Texas. But Emma had just turned 11 and although she did enjoy watching the series, she never requested to see it again ... until last week! I was very happy she did! I love this series SO MUCH. I'm just going to post a few pictures that I photographed from the internet (i.e. I pointed my camera at my computer and snapped).

 This is Anne in the early years, fresh out of the orphanage and then newly adopted by Marilla and Matthew. 

 Here are Gilbert and Anne now becoming friends ... but it's complicated.

 These are some great pictures of Gilbert. The actor that played this part actually suffered a heart attach about five years ago and died. This series was filmed in 1985 (34 years ago) when these actors (actresses) were probably in their early 20's.

 This is Gilbert talking to Anne after the Rollings Reliable episode ...

 Anne, all grown up and an accomplished teacher and author.

 And finally, Gilbert and Anne pledge their love!

It was really special to watch this series with Emma. L.M. Montgomery is my favorite author EVER. I grew up reading Anne and it means the world to me to have Emma love Anne too!