Rest In Peace Harry

Last night our wonderful Panda Hamster, Harry died. We adopted him on my son's birthday when he turned 8 and from the first moment he was a perfect fit in our family.

He showed no fear (except when my toddler approached). He even went nose to nose with our crazy dog and the two of them even seemed to form a tenuous friendship.

He was my son's hamster but of course I was the one who fed him, cleaned his cage, and took him into the world outside the cage. He'd lift his head during the day when he heard my voice and I fell in love with the little guy.

Harry was our first hamster and I can't imagine another hamster with his personality. He will be missed.

NANOing Again

I'm doing it again. I'm NANOing. For those of you unfamiliar with this phenomenon, NANO stands for National Novel Writing Month. Thousands of insane people pledge to write 50,000 words or more in one month solely for bragging rights and a cool little 'winner' logo.

I've NANOed (yes, I have turned this into a verb) successfully for three years. One year I came up short discovering that nursing and NANOing don't mix. This year I've decided to put a different spin on the experience. Instead of starting a novel, I'm planning on finishing the extremely rough draft of my novel. I figure the excitement of a real deadline and the comraderie from the NANO community will get me to my goal.

Because I just love insane challenges, I will attempt to also blog about my experience during this month. Finishing a novel with three kids, a crazed dog and a very sick hamster; then blogging about it- what am I thinking? I apologize now for all incoherent ramblings.

Prelude to Winter

Each year it creeps up on me. I look forward to the change of season but summer lingers a bit longer each year. Just when I'm astonished to be wearing shorts in the middle of September, the leaves begin their transformation. I'm digging out sweaters, slipping on socks, and snuggling under covers ten extra minutes in the morning.

I understood that winter would be arriving soon. I just did not think it would arrive today with a blast of SNOW!

It started out as rain, a hard driving storm. Then it changed to heavy wet snowflakes that barely left an impression on the ground.




Of course there was just enough evidencefor my boys to begin hurling snow balls (or slush balls) at poor Mom.

Soon we had our own autumnal snow globe.