Look what I found....

Took a detour from mowing to trim that apple tree. When I started a dove flew out of a tree and started flopping on the ground. Then when I got closer, I realized why. Look what I found???

Cuterebra - Gross (Cool) Case of the Week

Anyone ever heard about when a fly lays an egg under the surface of your skin, and a maggot grows underneath the skin? There was once a case of this on the discovery channel where a woman had a huge maggot growing into the side of her head. This pooch had one growing under his cheek. Pretty graphic pictures, but kinda' cool. At least we think so. :)

Ole Freens.....

Well, Freeney is causing havoc again.....

When we moved into the new house, he just didn't seem to be adjusting well to the move. At all. He was pretty much spastic, and was all over the place, knocking things over and jumping on things, etc. We could tolerate the jumping and being spastic part....but the ONE thing that we were NOT willing to tolerate was him tearing up our new house. Hey, it's a new house, right? And it's really nice. I wasn't really fired up about having scratches everywhere. His new thing that he found to do, (note: he has never done before) was to jump up on the door frames as if he was going to crawl up to the ceiling. Of course, he doesn't have front claws, so his efforts weren't very successful. However, he DOES have back claws.....so upon finding a place to gorge them into the wood, he would then slide down the trim, leaving cat claw marks all the way down our trim. Yeah. No. Not happening. So, upon realizing that he's done it to two or three doors, he promptly went to the clinic to have his back claws removed as well.

The first time that we declawed him, it was because of a lot of the same reasons, but it was our couch and comforter at the old house. He didn't do so well with it. His declaw sites all came open, he chewed on his feet, and he ended up having to wear his bandages for a LONG time, and it didn't heal all that well. (I blamed the veterinarian.) We thought that perhaps he was too young. Well, the same thing happened THIS time.

I went to pick him up at the clinic last night (where he has been for a week now), and when I picked him up out of his cage (with his e-collar on), it was covered in blood, and all of the declaw sites were open with bone showing. He sat there for the whole day shaking and chewing at his feet, and even managed to get them around the front of a 12 inch e-collar. So, to sleep he went again, (of course temporarily) and this time, Dan actually put STITCHES in his feet.....two or three per site. So, now Freeney has stitches in ALL of his back toes, pink bandages on them, and is staying at the clinic longer now. What a pain. Why does our cat have to be a troublemaker? Nothing is easy with this guy. Here are some pictures:

I think he was a little ticked off about his injection here in this picture.

One foot down, one to go......

All finished, with his pink bandages. And yes, those are all of his nails sitting there next to him.

With his little e-collar on. That he somehow managed to get his feet around to chew on them. Crazy cat.

Hopefully he'll be able to come home here in the next couple of days. Dan's colleagues are probably getting tired of babysitting him. :) Stay tuned for details.

Happy Father's Day, Dan!

A recent picture of Dan and Trevor on the golf course.......

I'm a little behind on my posts. I did write this some time ago...... but am just now getting around to sharing. :)

Dear Dan,

Happy Father's Day! Although I cannot pick a "favorite" dad between you and MY dad, I wanted you to know how great I think you are. Not many people in the world are so lucky to have a father like you. Trevor's the only one. I love watching the two of you interact, and helping you guide him along the way, as he grows into a young man, and help shape his future.

The way that the two of you laugh together melts my heart, and I love seeing you smile when you're with him. Even though Trevor is 14 years old, he still says "I Love You, Dad" on a regular basis. I hope he never gets too "big" or too "cool" to do that...... because I know that it means more to you than we all will ever know. Even though I give you a hard time about it, and tell you that he's old enough to make his OWN egg sandwiches, I think it's sweet that you love to make his breakfast for him, and I know he loves that you spoil him with that.

Even though you're not a "dad" or a "father figure" to them, I love the way that you love Olivia, Gage, and Savannah. And they ALL love you to death. I loved last weekend seeing you up at the lake with a baby girl in each arm, and Gage on your lap. The girls wouldn't leave you alone. I smiled inside when I heard my uncle say to a family friend, "Those kids just LOVE Dan. All of them. They think he's the greatest thing ever.....they can't get enough of them. And he loves them, too!"

There are two men who get the "BEST DAD IN THE ENTIRE WORLD" award. You are one of them. I hope you don't mind sharing the award with my Daddy. If there was a "HUSBANDS DAY", I would certainly give you that award, too..... :) I love and admire you, Dan. Happy Father's Day. You're simply the best.

Love Always,

Sarah

To all readers wondering why I didn't mention my OWN father: I wrote him a note in his card..... he doesn't read this blog....so I saved myself all the typing. :) Ha!

Father's Day Weekend

Happy Belated Father's Day to all the Dads out there! I had a great time with my family on Father's Day. We ended up going to my parents house at the lake, and then visited with Dan's family in the evening.....it was a wonderful day. I am truly blessed for all the great Dads in my life, including my own, and Trevor's Dad. :) It's also a remembrance of my three grandfathers, who are all gone now, and what great men they all were, and how they were so special to a lot of people.

Anyways, we had a great time on the lake. Here are some pictures from the day:

Dan, Trevor and I on the boat.....Gager Man with his Grandma Zartman. (Brent's mom!) He's such a happy baby!

Elizabeth, Olivia and Dan swimming. Olivia couldn't wait to get in the water, and although I thought it was kinda' chilly initially, she kept insisting that I "jump off backwards in the water!" Of course, I did. Anything for her!

And I managed to jump in backwards without getting my hair wet! :) Elizabeth, Olivia and I.

Trevor

Olivia LOVES to jump off the side of the boat. She jumps off into the water. Most of the time, going under water, and coming up with a mouth and nose full. But she doesn't care. She gets right back up there and does it again. She's a brave little snot for only being 2 years old. :)

And she swims all around, too.....even with no one holding onto her. :)

She was pooped after all that swimming. Olivia with my sister, Elizabeth, on the boat ride back in to the house.

Trevor again. He loves the lake, too.

Olivia with "Yunkle Dan"..... Hahaha! :)

The kiddos in the kiddie pool. Savannah, Gage and Olivia. Savannah kept dumping water on Gage's head. It was hilarious! :)

Plane Ride......

Trevor has a keen interest in flying. Always has. When he was much younger, he lived in Florida with his mom, and Dan flew him back to Indiana one or two times per month, and he was flying alone when he was very small. (Seriously. Like 4 years old.)

A good friend of ours is a pilot, and has a plane himself......and offered to take Trevor up for a ride sometime. He picked him up last week and took him around. They flew over Benton County to see the windmills......

Trevor couldn't wait for Dan and I to get home from work so he could tell us all about the ride, what happened (yes, we got a play-by-play) and everything that he saw. He even got to fly the plane a little by himself! It was great......

Derek took some pictures, and sent them to us. Here are just a few:

Is it just me or does this kid look like his Dad?

In the photos, the windmills don't really look all that large....but when you compare them to the things on the ground, (ie: houses, trucks, cars, etc.) they're enormous! Pretty impressive.....

Trevor and Dr. Sharvelle. Thank you, Derek, for taking him. He'll remember it forever, and had a great time!

More windmills.....

We're back..... :-)

Well, it's been a while again......we're finally getting settled into the new house, and trying to get everything in place, unpacked, and smoothed out......I've got some catching up to do, huh? :)

Things are starting to slow down a little bit.....in the last couple of weeks, Dan has worked a tremendous amount of hours.... a lot of them unexpectedly, due to another doctor getting injured at work and being unable to work. BUT, that week is over, and we had a great 4th of July! (More about that later!)

Things at the house are coming along nicely. Don't look in the garage (although, Dan indicates that he's going to have the garage cleaned up today!) because there is boxes everywhere, and quite a bit of stuff that we need to put up in the attic....but, other than that, everything in the house has been unpacked, and semi-organized. We did bite the bullet and buy a new plasma tv, which is hung up on the wall, and a good friend of ours, Matt, came over and hid the wires behind the wall for us, to please my obsessive compulsive neatness disorder. :)

Anyway, I have lots of pictures to share, and a lot to write, so look out for more to come.....but, I wanted to share this photo of Trevor. He's in love with our new jacuzzi tub...... I think he'll be visiting more often, even if he does have to mow. :) He loves it. Dad and Mom, however, do NOT love the mess that the bubbles make all over the floor. :)