Oh happy day!

I'm so excited! I have to share this with someone... Laurie's still in her test and I can't wait! Bennett has been using the litter box to pee in!!!!!! YAY! Let me go back a little, yesterday when I came in to clean his cage and feed him and such, I noticed that the paper in the catch bin was pretty dry. There were some old dried out spots but nothing new, so I was a little worried. We were going to the vet anyway, so I thought I'd mention it there. I checked the litter box cursorily and it didn't look wet so I didn't really think he'd been using it. He peed in the carrier at the vet's office, so I was pretty sure that everything was ok (I'll talk more about the vet visit in a second here) and expected a wet mess for me when I got up this morning to take care of things. Mystified, again there was no wet newspaper at the bottom of the catch bin, none, not even anything dried. I was going to change the litter box today anyways, and when I picked up the hay on top, I was in for a big surprise. He'd been using it! The litter below the hay was soaked. I'm so proud of him! I didn't expect it before the neutering surgery, so I'm really happy right now! No more cleaning the whole cage everyday! Just the litter box - whoohoo! We've had him a week and things are already getting easier for me to take care of him!

Anyways, the vet visit went well. I really liked the Dr. and he seemed really knowledgeable about rabbits, which is really good for us. Some vets only do dogs and cats and rabbits are considered exotics, so finding a good rabbit vet can sometimes be a challenge. Luckily for us, there's a great one not that far from our place. We scheduled the neutering for January 20th. I feel a little bad about this because we're going out of town the next evening, just for the weekend. Our old neighbor Eileen is going to be rabbit-sitting for us. But when I really think about it, it might be easier for her to take care of him when he's recovering from surgery because he'll be confined to the cage for a few days until he's feeling himself, which puts that timeline to right when we get home. I think it'll be good. Ok, more on the vet visit... We got his nails trimmed and some of the mats sheared off of his private parts - he didn't not like either of these things because they had to hold him belly up to reach those parts. I am glad that his nails are shorter though! He doesn't have ear mites, what we had thought might have been ear mites looks to have been a scar from a bite or something from before we got him. The vet did say that his muscle tone is not very good, that he feels like he's been caged most of his life and that we need to work on getting him to get some exercise. We've been playing around with the idea of setting up a rabbit run in the backyard, but for now, we'll be exercising him in the pen or playing around with him in the kitchen so he can work on getting buff. The only other worrying thing is that he seems to have some tooth problems, which aren't unusual in rabbits. They are going to get a better look at what's going on with his teeth while he's under anesthesia for the neuter but it might turn out that we'll need to get his teeth filed every once in awhile. We were also concerned with a little bit of sneezing and discharge from his nose, but since we've had him such a short period of time, we'll just wait and see. If it gets any worse, we'll be making another appt sooner that 4 mo out.

Did I mention that yesterday Bennett was licking me? That's the ultimate sign of bunny affection! I am definitely happy to have him around, work and all! I can now attest to how wonderful bunny kisses are!

Life with Bennett

Well, the first week with a new bunny has been... interesting. I really love him and he's been wonderful to cuddle and play with but he still hasn't figured out the whole litter box thing. He seems to want to pee everywhere but the litter box. When I move the box to the new corner in which he's been doing his business, he just switches corners and sometimes, not even corners, just all over. I think that a lot of his "bad" behavior is due to the crazy hormones he's going though as an adolescent boy bunny who's not been neutered. We're going to the vet today to have him checked out and schedule the neutering surgery. It would be fantastic if we could get it done this weekend, but I'm not sure how likely that is. The vet that we're going to says on his website that he supports rabbits being fed a hay only diet. This would be really nice. The pellets we've been giving Bennett are timothy hay pellets and not alfalfa based, so I don't know if they would fit into this regimen. I'm also wondering how to switch over to hay only, because he seems like he's starving when I give him his pellets, but I'm guessing if he only had hay he would probably start eating it. It'll be an interesting vet visit. We're worried that he has ear mites and he came to us awfully thin, I'm worried he might be sick or something.

All in all, I think Bennett is a laid back rabbit. I've been playing with him for short bits of time out of the cage (he'll get longer once he's potty trained) and he loves to cuddle. Last night, we let him have full run of the kitchen when we where making dinner and he was being adorable. The floor is linoleum, so he kept slipping when he was trying to hop around. After he did some exploring, he found a nice little spot under the desk in the kitchen and just hung out there, chilling. Laurie would throw him the occasional scrap of carrot and parsnip (which he LOVED) and he'd go after it, but definitely at a leisurely pace. We got some really cute pictures of him from his little kitchen outing. It's funny because it seemed like he was posing for the camera! I'm definitely loving having him around, but it's been a lot of work this week. More that I was expecting and to be honest there might have been a moment or two when I thought that it was too much work and we should give him back to Susan... and then he cuddles with me and it's all worth it.

Laurie's going to be gone tonight and tomorrow to go take a test she needs to graduate for her masters. She'll be driving to Las Vegas tonight and home tomorrow night. I'll miss her, but it shouldn't be that long of a time away, but I am bummed that I won't be able to go to our LYS tonight for our normal knit night. And last but certainly not least, before I go make myself lunch, I wanted to wish Mandy a very happy birthday!

A new addition

Well, we made it home safe and sound on the 29th from the cabin. We decided to stay a day later that we had actually planned, Laurie didn't have to go into work on the 29th, so we hung out at the cabin a little bit longer. Laurie's parent's friends join us up at the cabin for the weekend after Christmas. John and Shannon are very much connoisseurs of games, which is awesome because they always have a fun game to play. Laurie isn't all that into playing board games, so having people who want to play was a lot of fun. In fact, we borrowed a game from them and it turns out that Laurie really likes playing it. The game is called Carcassonne, it's sort of a cross between a puzzle and a board game. It's a lot of fun AND Laurie asks to play it! Yay for more game playing in our house! We ordered the game for ourselves and there are expansion packs for it, so we can start building our Carassonne collection.

We spent New Year's Eve with my mom and little brother, everyone else went out to a party. So it was a nice, quiet night with a little bit of Champagne at midnight. Nothing too special, but like I said, very normal, just hanging out with my family and playing Carcassonne for the first time.

On New Year's Day we cleaned the bunny cage we bought of Craigslist and set up everything for Bennett's arrival. Saturday morning, we drove down to Vail, AZ and picked him up from the woman we met at the fiber festival in October. The ride home was uneventful for him. Unfortunately, that morning, I started getting really sick to my stomach. By the time we got home, I was doubled over in pain from cramps and made a run to the bathroom. I spent most of the day running from bed to the toilet, which wasn't my idea of the first day we get the bunny home. :( I was too sick to go to church. Towards the end of the night, things were getting a bit better. My stomach is still iffy and I've had a few cramps here and there, but I seem to be recovered other than that, which is very good because bunnies are lots of work.

So far, the litter box training is not going very well. I think this is partially because Bennett is marking his territory and that he's an adolescent male who is not neutered. We're planning on neutering him, so I need to set up a vet appt. He's a very curious and cuddly bunny, he's very very cute. He's even won Laurie over. She was so sweet to take him outside in the pen and hang out on Saturday, when I was sick. He's had some pee accidents when he's then stepped in it, so I tried to give him a little bath today. It went well. I did it just after I finished grooming him and he didn't seem really freaked out about the water. More than anything, I wanted him to get his paws wet so he could finish cleaning them. He really likes knocking his water bowl over. The water bottle I bought isn't working very well. It requires him to push in a little lever in in order for the water to flow, so right now I'm using a little bowl for water with the plan to get a normal bottle with the little ball because all of this knocking the bowl over is not cool. He seems really skinny to Laurie and I. When you pet him, you can feel all of his bones, so we're trying to keep him really well fed, the thinness is another thing I need to bring up with the vet. Here are some of the pictures I have of the new addition of our lives! The first picture is on Saturday, the day we got him and the others are from grooming this morning.

Just one more post

This Christmas has been really lovely. Not only did I get an amazing set of presents from Laurie's parents, I also was able to receive communion. Since it's snowy here at the cabin, it's hard to push the wheelchair uphill and in the slippery wetness. It's doubly hard right now, because my back is still so sensitive and Laurie can't lean into it to push me uphill, like she normally would. So we decided that it would be better for me not to go to Mass today. At home, we have a pyx so that if I cannot go to Mass, Laurie can bring communion home to me, but, alas, we didn't bring it with us. Laurie and her parents left for church promising to ask to see if there was a pyx available to bring to me. When they asked, a very kind couple volunteered to follow them home and bring me communion officially. It was so very nice of them to take time away from their family to come minister to me. It was really touching that they had gone so far out of their way and understood how it was important to me to receive on Christmas. I am very blessed, indeed.

So, some more catching up to do. These pictures are from our drive home from Flagstaff, after we were snowed in at the Bed and Breakfast we stayed at while Laurie was finishing her finals. The drive back with the red rock and the snow was so pretty - I'm not sure what could top snow and red rock. Some of the first pictures didn't show the red rock because there was so much snow. We stopped at a little National Forest trail head area and walked around a little. The path had been plowed, so we took a lovely walk. We even saw a blue jay just perched there on a branch, posing for us. So here are the pictures from that drive (just a few of them, I took a bunch, but most ended up to be blurry trees!)

A week or so later, we went to our Benedictine oblate meeting for December. In December, both the East Valley group and the Phoenix group get together for a little party. We were so excited to see one of our oblate friends who has moved to Ithaca, New York about six months ago! What a wonderful surprise! We grabbed coffee with her a few days later, before she left to go back to New York. It was really good to see her. This picture that is coming up is from that day. We put my freshly washed hair up in rags and this was the result:

Unfortunately, it didn't last for very long. We're trying out new products in my hair. I switched shampoos and conditioners to Burt's Bees, but they are so expensive and there is silicone in the conditioner, which I don't like. We've tried a number of other shampoos and conditioners but haven't found the right combo yet, so my hair has been a little dry lately. Our next experiment will be going back to the Burt's Bees baby shampoo we were using and try jojoba oil as conditioner. If that doesn't work, I'm not sure what our next step will be.

I better be off now, Laurie's making Christmas dinner and it looks like we'll be eating soon. She's making yorkshire pudding, green beans and roast beef. She just served a fancy cranberry/cinnamon/lime sparkler drink so we must be getting close! Homemade pumpkin pie and whipped cream for dessert! I love her whipped cream (and the pumpkin pie, too, come to think of it). The one bummer is that I haven't been able to get ahold of my family. My mom's not returned any calls or picked up her phone. Maybe I'll try just one more time. Merry Christmas to all, I hope you had as good a day as I have. Thank God for many blessings.

Another fiber post

Two fiber posts in one day! Oh my! I found where I had stashed the other pictures I had meant to post earlier and took a few more, so I thought I'd make up for the lack of posting earlier and post again - and again Merry Christmas.

First up is BFL that I bought at Tempe Yarn and Fiber. They are both 4oz. The first picture is a Barbara's Braid, hand dyed by a woman at our LYS. Second is Pagewood Farms in the color "Misty". I actually picked them out separately, but they are so alike and of the same color family that I'm spinning them together. A handful of one here and another there to make a beautiful three ply sock yarn for some socks for me (knee high socks, that is)! On this shopping trip, I also got some lovely dark, dark, almost black looking merino that for some reason I didn't photograph. I got almost 13 oz of it and plan to make Laurie some knee socks for her Christmas present. It's beautiful and they won't be getting this color in again.

We attended Expressions in Spinning just before we left for California. The topic for this month is Ireland. I saw some pictures of monasteries and in a Celtic book that we looked at mentioned Iona Monastery, which is techincally in Scotland. It's even a Benedictine monastery! On my iphone, I found an amazing picture of the monastery, where the stone wall is almost pink with the sun reflecting on it. The picture is copyright of a company called Mysterious Scotland. So, I combined two colors to make the subtle grays and pinks. The gray is Jacob wool, from what I understand, a rare breed of sheep and the pink is merino in the colorway "Begonia". They look really beautiful and very true to the picture, as you can see in the batt.

Lastly, are the pictures of the brand new spindle that I got for Christmas, this morning. I haven't had time to photograph all of the fiber, it takes up a lot of space and I'm already cluttering the coffee table with books, other fiber and my computer. I'll most likely wait until I get home to give you all the wonderful details. Laurie's parents were so very generous to me this Christmas, I can't thank them enough.

On the spindle, is the beginnings of my Ireland yarn. The spindle itself is a Jenkin's Turkish Delight in Striped Ebony, weighing in at 1.2oz. It spins for so long. It's my first low whorl spindle and I'm having a lot of fun with it!

A fibery post

This won't include all the wonderful fiber and new spindle that I got this morning for Christmas. First up is my new spindle set. These are partially to replace the bolivian rosewood one that I broke the tip off of. (I'm still hoping to get that fixed by sending in back to the maker.) Both of these spindles are 12 inch ones in Lignum Vitae wood. You can't really see how beautiful the wood is in the picture, but it has streaks of blue and green and is very pretty. I've already transferred the cashmere/silk that I was spinning on the broken one over.

Next up is the fiber that I spun up for Expressions in Spinning, the My Beard poem. It's 2oz of BFL. About 140 yards of sport weight yarn, Navajo plied. This was my first every three ply and likewise my first time Navajo plying. It was a lot easier that I had initially thought it would be, so I think it will be a regular occurrence. Right now, I'm in the middle of knitting this yarn into fingerless gloves for myself. They are turning out really nice.

I know that I have more pictures of fiber on another card. It may be in the camera. I'll have to get on downloading them to my computer so I can show them off. I'm not sure when I'll photograph the wonderful Christmas presents that I just received, soon I hope!

A couple of big long posts...

Merry Christmas! I've been neglecting blogging recently. Mostly, because there has been so much going on. One example is that Laurie got a job! We found out a few days before we left for California for Christmas. She will be working at the Jewish high school in Scottsdale. The job is almost exactly the same as what she was doing in her previous job and she really likes the people she'll be working with. We think that her being let go earlier was better for her in the long run because she was able to do things like tour the school on a work day and go in for a meeting. We're very excited, she starts on January 4th, but she has some meetings on the 29th and 30th so we are going to go home earlier that we thought.

Right now, we're on the second leg of our Christmas trip. We spent the first few days with Laurie's sister and brother-in-law and their 2 little boys. It was a lot of fun. They have a guest bedroom on the first floor that is perfect for staying in. We got in after bedtime on Saturday night and Sunday morning, I got woken up to be blown a kiss from the oldest (he's 2). We celebrated Christmas dinner a little early, Laurie's sister's family are spending Christmas in Seattle, with her brother-in-law's family. It was delicious and the boys got their gifts from Laurie's parents. The oldest got a balance bike, which was a big hit and both are sharing the Thomas the train set, complete with train table and track and everything. It was really cute to see them so excited!

The next few days have been quiet. Hanging out with the boys and playing with them and lots of reading with them. We went to lunch twice and it was really convenient to get out because Laurie's sister is the proud owner of a new minivan (ok, new to us. They've had it for a little while, but we didn't know about it.) So, we didn't have to load car seats into our car before we could go anywhere.

Now, we're up at Laurie's parent's cabin for a few days before we head home. There is a little snow on the ground, hopefully enough for them to cross country ski on. We're expecting friends to come up tomorrow. We'll leave for home on Monday.

Our neighbors at home have been really nice. I went ahead with my mom's permission to order all the things that I need for the bunny! (Only 7 days left!) Our neighbor is collecting the boxes that were still arriving when we left for CA. I'm really excited to go get Bennett! It's going to be a lot of work, but it will be worth it! (Bunny kisses!)

I hope all are having a good Christmas. I am a blessed girl this year. We do Secret Santas with Laurie's family and Laurie's father drew my name. I got everything on my list, which was extremely generous. I'm planning on doing a knitting and spinning post soon, I've got lots to post about. I'm looking forward to a family tradition - the making and eating of cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning. We're heading to Mass at 11am. Off to see about doing that second fiber post...