September is for Heroes

Mali ~

We are solidly into autumn now (my favorite time of year) and so I thought it would be a good opportunity for us (just mom and kiddo) to go on an adventure through Ohio. I chose a weekend, piled you into the car, and off we went! On that Saturday, our first stop was Amish country and a really cool, working Amish farm that had 100 different species and 500 different animals! They allowed us to take a wagon ride through the property and hand-feed whoever sauntered (or galloped) up to the wagon. It was a little intimidating, but so neat!

I loved his beard!

longhorn steer! look at that tongue!

you face cracks me up in this picture...you did not
want to look away from this critter for the photo

these had super fuzzy antlers

you told me,
"Mom, make me look bigger than that giraffe!"
done.

these water buffalo were cool

Our next stop was at a nearby town named Sugarcreek where they claim to have the world's largest cuckoo clock. Every hour, music would play and wooden dancers would come out and twirl around.

it sure does look pretty big, doesn't it?

just a random VW beetle all decorated up like it's from Sweden

Rested up on Saturday night and were were off again bright and early on Sunday morning, this time with Lao Lao in tow. We surprised her with a trip to the sunflower fields near Yellow Springs and they did not disappoint. I've always wanted to see them but can never quite time it right, but this year was perfect. Afterwards, we had breakfast at Young's Dairy Farm before heading home. 

you and Lao Lao's heads are just above some of these
sunflowers...can you see yourself?

Aside from our adventures, we also got to play hero this month, too. On September 11th (the 18th anniversary of a horrible tragedy for our country), I was driving home from work and saw something in the middle of Sunbury Rd, flopping around during rush hour. Initially, I thought it was roadkill that the breeze was blowing about, but nope...it was a tiny black kitten that couldn't use it's right hind leg and was in jeopardy of being hit at any moment. Well, the animal lover I am slammed on my brakes, parked the car sideways in the road, got out and scooped him up, placed him in my lap and raced home to get you so you could help me race him to the vet to have him checked out.

Turns out, he was estimated to be a very malnourished 6 week old kitten (.87 of a lb!) and with a likely soft tissue injury to his leg. Other than all of that, he seemed ok. We decided to take him home and nurture him back to health, beginning with you feeding him water from a syringe all the way home. Poor thing was so thirsty and even more hungry.

Suzy was very concerned about this new critter

he's a beauty, isn't he?

snuggling him in the bathroom...his quarantined home until
we could make sure he was FIV/FeLV negative

While we nursed kitty back to health and awaited his test results, the rest of life marched on and you had your first middle school dance! Whoa. How can that be?

we ran into Jos as we dropped you off so we forced
you both to take a picture before heading inside

We actually ended up picking you up early from the dance because it was just too loud and chaotic for your liking. When we showed up, you were hanging out in the office and chatting with the resource officer. And honestly, I don't blame you for wanting to come home early because when Daddy and I walked in the school, it was absolute mayhem. Yikes! Craziness. We were happy to come get you. I'm sure you'll have better luck next time. I'm proud of you for giving it a try.

kitten snuggles and a movie with the family is
just the medicine needed to set things right

While kittens are great for turning around a rough night, they also make great reading buddies when you have an upcoming book report and need to get that book finished.

little monster wrestled Daddy and won!

this is the kitten and Daddy's phone...just to give you
some idea of scale on how tiny this guy is

I thought this tent would be good for him to be able to
safely hang outside with us...yeah, it lasted about 5 minutes

peek-a-boo

this was the photo I shared to announce that...drumroll...
the test results were negative and we can safely keep the kitten!
introducing..."Lucky" (aka Lightening Lucky Knuckles)

learning how to brush human teeth

under close supervision, Lucky and Grizz
were properly introduced...they love each other!

With all of this focus on the kitten, Grizz had to re-stake her claim. On your head!?

all moved from his bathroom quarantine and into
your room...happy with his new digs and the shafts of sunlight

a little size comparison between bunny and kitten

I realized that the bunny outweighs the kitten by 6 lbs!

more sleepy-time with Grizz's favorite human

We also attended the last of our Fourth Fridays and brought Jelysa and Jeffrey with us. They'd never been so it was fun to introduce them to a fun community tradition.

getting to know his big brother, GG

With all of this new hub-bub about another new pet in the home, it must have made you nostalgic. You decided to use your own money to buy a dog tag engraved with Abby's name on it, as a way to honor and remember our beloved angel puppy. So sweet.

so stinkin' sweet

Let me tell you, though...there's not much funnier stuff than when an animal discovers their reflection in the mirror. Abby used to bark and pounce at herself in the mirror at Lao Lao's. Lucky is just about as cute.

On the final day of the month, it was my birthday. I'm a pretty low-key person when it comes to my own birthday (yours? a whole other exciting story, ha). But, as you attended a therapy session, I took a brief walk nearby and found this beautiful slice of woods and thought it the perfect location to capture myself as I stepped into 44. Not sure why I'm including this in your blog. Maybe you'll want to know what your mama looked like at 44 someday. So, here you go.

And finally, with September fading into our rear view mirror, we are setting our sights on October and you know what that means...Halloween! You came up with the idea to be a mailbox for trick-or-treat this year and since there were no pre-made costumes for that crazy idea...it was up to me to make it. Here's my first attempt, which actually turned out mighty good, I think. We still need to find the right postal service stickers, etc...but, damn! I'm proud of this one! You look awesome! And the smile on your face was so worth the effort!

Love you, baby!

Mama