Animal Pics

1) "Our" new puppy Frank (showed up on our doorstep); 2) Our other homeless puppy Susan.
3 & 4) Germy, our toad who eventually died.
5, 6, 7) "Our" pet tortoise who we released after just a few days.

Our Pet Toad "Germy"

My kids have always wanted a pet, and for the past 6 weeks they have finally "owned" one ... well off and on, you might say. At the end of May Steve and I captured a toad and brought it home for the kids who thoroughly enjoyed playing with it. However, Toad escaped within a few days. Since then we have caught, lost, and caught Toad again numerous times. In fact, our current toad "Germy" is not the same as our first one, but it doesn't matter to the kids.

Naomi loves Toad so much, she wantes to greet him first thing every morning, and give hugs and kisses goodnight. She and Josiah both carry him around, play with him in our wading pool, watch him jump around on the lawn, and love him to pieces.

Yesterday I took the kids to a place called Boxerwood Garden, which has a nice exploratory area for young kids. Naomi insisted we bring Germy with us so that he could see someplace new. So we did! The other kids who were also at the garden loved seeing and holding our toad. They all thought we'd caught him there, but Naomi informed them that he is our PET and that we brought him from home.

To keep food costs down but keep Germy from starving, we'll probably have to let him go today. Naomi says she's okay with this, as long as Dad and I promise to keep an eye out for Toad when she's in bed at night (this is the pattern for when we've caught our previous ones) and catch him again soon.

Zookeeper Josiah

My 4 year old son wants to be a zookeeper when he grows up. He’s been saying this for a couple months now. His favorite activity is taking all his stuffed and plastic animals, sorting them, and giving them all places to “live” in his own homemade “zoo.” The lions might be under a chair, the water animals behind a box. He’s very particular about his arrangements. And if someone else (like Ethan or Naomi) tries to take an animal away to play with it, Josiah gets upset, saying that his animals are REAL.

Josiah looked like he had a mustache tonight, after drinking a mug of cocoa. I commented on it and said that one day he’ll have real hair on his face and need to shave like Daddy. He didn’t reply at all to the issue of hair, but said adamantly that when he was older, he was going to be a zookeeper. I said, “Okay, you can be a zookeeper who shaves!” He answered by saying that he was going to scoop up poop when he was a zookeeper. The kid thinks of stuff like that and still wants the job. Wow!!! He must really like animals.

Country Living – Oct. 27

I love my home. I love seeing Ethan look out every window in the hope of seeing a cow and I love hearing him say his first word “bbb” (which means “animal” and sounds like a mooing cow). I love driving to a school playground and stopping on the way to see and pet horses. I love waking up on Saturday morning and seeing thirty cows out my kitchen window. I love watching my husband and kids pet them.

I love the rolling hills and being in the Shenandoah Valley. I love the woods, with the leaves changing colors, and I love the farm fields – wide, empty spaces that breathe life back into me after years of crowded urban living. I love the quiet, the stars, the singing birds. I love watching my kids catch crickets, chase butterflies, and hold frogs.

I’m enjoying it while it lasts, for I don’t know when we’ll leave. Thank you, Lord, for your amazing creation.

A Snake Visits Us

Last Friday I went on our front porch with the kids to water our many plants. Just as I leaned over a potted flower to reach my basil plants, I noticed a green head suspended in the air just below me. I thought at first that it must be one of the kids’ rubber snakes. But my kids don’t have a green rubber snake. Theirs are pink and purple. No, this was a real snake, right on our own front porch!

I drew the kids’ attention to it and we spent many minutes gazing in fascination at this thin green snake in our flower pot. His body was wrapped around the large flower and about 7 inches of him was raised above the flower. He was very still. We kept waiting for him to move, but he didn’t want to, maybe because he sensed we were near. I let Naomi prod the neighboring flower stalk with a little stick, just to shake the plant enough to inspire the snake to move.

It worked! We saw him curl his upper body into more of an “S” shape and then he stuck his head through our little jungle gym door, as if he were playing peekaboo with us. The kids were tickled!

Throughout the morning we kept going back inside to read books and then we’d check the porch again. The snake was probably there for a couple hours. Finally we saw him crossing the porch on his belly, and making his way for a low-branched tree that touches our fence. I looked it up in our nature guide book and it appeared to be a harmless ‘green snake.’ We saw it once more a little while later, up in the tree, very camouflaged. That was the last we saw of it, though every time I’m outside now I glance up in the tree, hoping I’ll spot him again.

It was quite the excitement at our house. We called Papa on the phone and told him all about it. We took pictures and at a family dinner that night, told everyone else of our green visitor. It was the first I’d ever seen a snake in the wild; yes, even after having lived in Africa for 3 years!

Boxerwood Gardens

We discovered a fun place just outside the Lexington city limits called Boxerwood Gardens. They officially opened a new preschool play section on Mother's Day and we were there to check it out! What a delight...

Almost everything was natural, using raw wood or recycled items. There was a "Mud Kitchen" where children could make mud food and serve it on child-sized table and chairs. There was even a sink for them to wash their hands in when they were done. There was a "Willow Tunnel" which will eventually be completely covered with vines and a small grassy mountain with a tunnel going through it. Josiah enjoyed the sand area, where there were rakes and shovels to play with.

The highlight for both kids was a re-circulating creek. There were little plastic frogs, snakes and lizards hidden in the water or under rocks. Josiah loved finding them, throwing them back in the creek and then retrieving them again. Steve spotted a REAL frog and Naomi was occupied with that for the next 45 minutes. She and another little boy played together, catching the frog, touching the frog, chasing the frog, laughing at its antics. I even held it for a few minutes -- my first time ever!

We had such a good time that we went back yesterday, bringing Mimi and cousin Owen with us. This time we also explored some wooded trails in the preschool section, where the kids gathered shells in baskets, got to feel antlers and bones, and made towers from sanded bits of wood. We also watered flowers with watering cans that were provided.

I enjoyed letting the kids play outside in a 'natural' environment where they could explore, but within bounds. I only had to watch a small section of water to make sure they didn't get hurt in the creek. I knew the woods were fenced in. But Naomi and Josiah got to use their imaginations and play in a different way than they do at a playground. Plus I reveled in the gentle breeze, the cool shade, and the lovely sound of babbling water. Almost everything there was shaded since the trees have been growing on this property for a long time.

We still have more to explore in the general gardens. It should be a fun place to visit all summer, and maybe we'll even see that frog again!

Small Joys of Mothering

March 21, 2007

I love the way babies smile with their entire body. When Ethan sees his brother or sister, his mouth opens wide in a huge grin, and his arms and legs move in excitement. It's kind of like a dog wagging his tail, I suppose.

Ethan giggled for the first time today. It wasn't for me, either! It was because Josiah was smiling at him, and for some reason he found that funny. Maybe it's just his joy in being alive and being loved. I'm glad my kids have each other. It's so fun to hear Naomi and Josiah talking together or playing -- building 'tents,' catching ladybugs, gathering sticks, pulling their stuffed animals on 'leads.'

A highlight today was seeing two birds eating the birdseed out of our homemade birdfeeder (an empty cream carton). We've filled the birdfeeder a few times, so we knew someone was eating the food! But we hadn't seen the birds in action until this morning. Naomi and I were sitting in the car for a minute before coming into the house and in our stillness, we saw the two birds. Oh, the small joys of mothering!