Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail, Toot and Yummo

Goose now has the taste for blood.

This past Tuesday night, I had a headache so I went to bed early. Around 1:30am, I woke up and saw that Goose wasn't in bed (she normally sleeps in bed with us.) I woke Brian up and asked him where she was. He said she was in the crate b/c he thought she might throw up. Hmmm.

I asked why, and he told me the following story:

Apparently, around midnight, Goose had to pee, so Brian let her outside. Brian was eating peanut butter in the kitchen, waiting on Goose to finish up, and he heard some squealing outside the window. He went outside and saw Goose with something in her mouth, and then when he went to see what it was, she swallowed it. He was confident it was some sort of animal. So, he put her in the crate so she wouldn't puke in our bed if she had buyer's remorse, or, you know, eater's remorse...

I was greatly disturbed by this. At 3:30am, I woke up thinking I heard Goose starting to puke. (She wasn't.) But, I put on her leash and took her outside anyways. I also took a flashlight. She immediately led me to the side of the house, where I saw a nest of sorts with something squirming around.

Side note: several months ago, Brian SWEARS he saw a rat running on the back of the fence in the alley (apparently, with the huge amount of building in Plano and North Dallas, there's a ton of unwanted wildlife in residential areas). He had told me he wondered if she'd eaten a rat. So I ran inside and told Brian I found the nest. He came outside with me, and also saw the nest, but decided there was nothing we could do that night.

The next morning, we went out again, and again, there was squirming. After an unproductive call to animal control (who said they really couldn't do anything to poison the rats b/c it would kill Goose) we decided to unearth the nest and see what we were dealing with. As soon as Brian pulled the grass and hair (what the nest was built with) back, I saw what I thought were baby bunnies! Brian still thought they were rats, so he had me go Google. After seeing pictures, I was pretty confident that they were bunnies.

So, instead of killing them, we put them in a box since I knew Goose would dig up the nest and kill the rest of them. There were 4 babies- who I named Flopsy, Mopsy, Cottontail and Toot (Toot is the runt. Yummo is, well, the bunny that Goose ate.) Animal Control told me to take them to the Outdoor Learning Center.

Look how cute!!

I asked the guy at the Outdoor Learning Center if he wanted to know the names I made up for them. He looked at me like I was a psycho....

My Favorite Things...

Well, I'm kind of like Oprah in that I have favorite things... Except they're not shameless plugs for emerging companies or high-paying advertisers (man, that would be nice, though...)

So, Kelli's favorite things, in no particular order, but rather just as I think of them.

1) Rain. But only when you get to curl up with a good book and blanket and watch it come down.

2) The lake. The most wonderful place on earth, partially because it reminds me so much of my family, and partially because we have free access to it (we're going this weekend!! Yeah!!!)

3) Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Ice Cream. (Need I say more??)

4) My mother's closet. She's never worn any kind of memorable perfume that I remember, so the closet just has her smell. (Jergen's Cherry Almond lotion, mostly, and clean clothes...) When I was in high school, I would sit UNDER her clothes while she was messing around in the bathroom and talk to her. I had an overwhelming sense of calm there, and I still do.

5) Brian. He's my favorite thing.

6) Goose. She's my other favorite. She makes me very happy, even if she doesn't behave as well as I'd like her to.

7) Team Dinner. It's the team. We eat dinner. It's pretty awesome.

8) Life Group. Support system, cannot imagine life without these folks.

9) Airplane travel. It makes some people nervous, but I just love traveling by air. The hustle and bustle of the airport, trying to guess where other people are going and why... It's great!!

10) The first morning on a trip. Waking up to new possibilities, anticipating what this fun day will bring you... Love it!

11) Blogging. I love writing, so my blog is a really fun thing for me. Also, I love finding new blogs to read and follow. I really like the personal look some bloggers let you have into their lives. This fascinates me.

12) Luigi's Spaghetti. Jeezalou, folks. This might make it worthwhile to move back to Midland.

13) Peonies and Stargazer lilies. I think these are the prettiest flowers in the world.

14) Duvets. I love their fluffy feel when I'm snuggling in bed.

15) Sitting in new Morgan's cabana. Except that the stupid Lubbock wind blew it away, so it's not there anymore.

16) Shopping for a house, with a large budget. (Who doesn't like that??!?!)

I think that's it for the day... I would love to know what your favorite things are; I find little details about people's lives and preferences so interesting!!

Have a great day!

A Friendship Story

This is the story of Brooke and Kelli (that's me.) I'm going to visit Brooke this week in North Carolina and I COULDN'T be more excited! We are, after all, the very best of pals. What's funny, though, is that we shouldn't be... What I mean is, we went NINE years without seeing or talking to each other, and then, last February, there she was again. And truly, it's like she was made to be my friend. This girl GETS me.

So. We met in high school when I was a sophomore, I think. She was a freshman, and went to the school across town (and she was fresh out of home school.) I was in Pickwicks, a youth acting troupe associated with the Midland Community Theater, and I guess she auditioned and got in sometime that year. I don't really remember the particulars, just that she was all of a sudden there, and we were friends.

She is the oldest of six children, and I LOVED going to the Shannon household. It was very noisy and there was always someone home getting into something. I am VERY excited about my trip to NC, because we're going to go visit her family's home in Charleston, SC over the weekend, and I will see her siblings for the first time since 2000. (I still remember them as babies, even though I've seen pictures to prove they're all grown up.)

I think I was a bad influence on Brooke when we were growing up because she was a very good little Catholic girl, and I may have uttered the occasional bad word or two. And I forgot to mention a movie I suggested that the Shannon family rent had animated demons that might give the younger kiddos nightmares. And once, I accidentally kicked her youngest brother, John Mark, in the head after playing "airplane" with him. Whoops.

So, after Brooke moved away to Mississippi, and I went to college, we just lost touch. I thought about her at key moments in life, and even sent her a wedding invitation at the last address I had for her, but it came back "return to sender".

One day, when I was new to Facebook, I had just "friended" another old pal on Facebook, and I was looking at her list of friends. There was Brooke. She was wearing a wedding dress in her profile picture so I knew instantly that she was married. And my stomach just dropped to the floor. I can't explain the feeling at all, even to this day. But it was something similar to knowing your sister got married, and didn't tell you or invite you to the wedding. I was devastated that I wasn't there to see it!

So I sent her a friend request, along with the longest message ever. A week later, we chatted on the phone for about 2 hours and got caught up on where life has taken us. (We were both SHOCKED at the similarities our lives now held.) And then a month later, I spent a long weekend with her in NC! I think neither of us knew what we had lost until we found it again. I remember chatting with my mom right before I was headed to NC last year- she was excited for me, but kind of surprised I was so pumped about visiting a friend who I knew for such a short time, almost a decade ago.

I can't explain it- she just gets me! So I'm VERY excited to see her again this week!!! Sometimes friendships are odd, and hard to explain, and sometimes you have to travel hundreds of miles to see each other, but you know that God brought you together for a reason, and all you can do is be grateful.