The mouse was successfully dispatched the following night.

Rosie got up in the morning and went in the kitchen.  I heard her scream, “A dead mouse!  Inside our kitchen!”

She grabbed my phone and took a picture of it and brought it in bed to show me.  Indeed, it was a dead mouse on the kitchen floor.

Ada got up to look at it, screamed and ran back in the bedroom to tell me it had tiny eyes/legs/toes and A REAL TAIL.

A REAL MOUSE TAIL, MOM IT HAS A REAL REAL TAIL.

Yep, it does have a tail.

I finally meandered out of the bed to pee and everything, and by the time I walked in the kitchen to throw the mouse away it was…gone.

I know that it was dead.  There’s no mistaking a murdered mouse.

Then Rosie told me that Gus Cat had walked off with it in his mouth.

As in the cat took the dead mouse somewhere else in the house.

Ok so I’m not the least bit bothered by one mouse in the house, or a dead mouse in the house.  No big deal.

But a missing dead mouse in my house, possibly partially dismantled?  That’s a little too gross.

I’ve searched the entire house and haven’t found any sign of the dead mouse.  So that leaves me to hope the cat ate the entire thing.

Otherwise…I’ll smell it?

Pregnancy nose plus dead mouse smell.  Oh, help.

Please say Gus ate it all.  Gus is not a hunter and doesn’t go outside because he’s scared, so he’s never eaten a small animal before.  He was walking around the rest of that day with black eyes and purring loudly.  I hope that’s a sign he was pleased to have eaten a fresh kill, even if Willow killed it and not him.  I’m sure Willow left it as a gift for me.  My lady cats always leave dead things as gifts, though usually outside and not in my kitchen.

One day last year Willow ran straight out the door, grabbed a black bird instantly, and ran straight back to me at the door and dropped it at my feet.  The girls were stunned. The bird’s neck was snapped.  At least it died instantly, poor thing.  I really think Willow expected us to eat it. She just kept staring at me and I didn’t know what to do!  Awkward kitty moment.

There have been no more mouse turd sightings.  Lone mouse is definitely gone.  Tyler can stop freaking out now.  (A little disappointing, it would be kind of funny if another mouse popped up, except for the nastiness of their little poops…)

We have a mouse in our house!  This has never happened before here.

It came in the dryer vent hole, stole my collection of saved garden seeds, and made a nice nest behind the dryer in the corner.  I saw no signs of it and had no idea it was there until our dryer broke and we got it repaired the other day.  When we pulled out the dryer, there was the evidence!

I wondered why my cats had taken to sleeping in the laundry closet area.  I thought they just liked the pile of blankets and sheets on the floor I’d put off washing, warm and cozy by the dryer.

I’d found some fairly good sized blood splatters on my kitchen floor several different mornings over the past few weeks.  I thought maybe it was from Abby’s tail.  (My lab mix, the tip of her tail was missing when we rescued her as a puppy and she thocks her big tail into things and busts the tip open sometimes.)  Except Abby’s tail usually leaves bloody swooshes on the wall at her height, not splatters in the floor, and not quite so much blood.  Her tail drives me insane.  It was horrible before we repainted with washable paint.  At least now it wipes right off.

I guess the cats have been catching and killing the mice every time they tried to venture beyond the laundry closet area.  Earning their keep!

We blocked off the dryer vent hole temporarily, but I think we must have blocked another mouse inside.  Last night Willow, my long haired tortoiseshell maincoone-ish kitty, had her head stuffed behind the set of small plastic drawers next to the washing machine.  I said to Tyler, “Quick, look, it’s the mouse!”  Willow was completely still except for a tiny tick at the tip of her tail.

He rolled his eyes and claimed he wouldn’t fall for that.  (I’m always trying to scare him, it’s so easy!)

I waited until he was standing nearby and then I quickly flung the bottom drawer open.

The mouse shot out jack-in-the-box style and Tyler screamed and screamed while Willow chased it behind the dryer.

Excellent entertainment.

Unfortunately the mouse hid somewhere back there and I don’t think Willow caught it.  When I got up in the middle of the night to get a drink three of my cats were sitting in there staring.

I’m debating whether to set a trap.  Willow will probably get her long fur caught in the trap!  I can close her out of the laundry closet, but she’s sneaky and I’m sure one of the kids or Tyler will leave the door slightly cracked and she’ll get in.  The last thing I need is my cat stuck in a mouse trap behind the dryer where I can’t reach her with my pregnant belly.

I’m going to give the cats a few more days to kill it before I try anything else.

The stupid mouse got in my drawer of cleaning rags in that plastic set of drawers!  At least it hasn’t been able to get to the cabinets or anywhere else, there’s no mouse poop anywhere but right behind the drawers, washing machine, and dryer.  Mouse knows it will be swiftly murdered as soon as it ventures into the open!

It’s only a matter of time, rodent.  Only a matter of time…you chose the wrong domicile to inhabit.  Four cats live here.

Tyler and I both have the cold Ada and Rosie had a few days ago.  Ada is FINALLY getting better from it.  Rosie is, of course, fine.  This feels like the exact same cold I had a few weeks ago.  On its way to sinus infection, pounding cheeks that nothing helps.  Low grade fever, gritty throat, horrible feeling head.  General misery.

I just cannot take being sick any longer.  I haven’t felt like a regular human being since November.  That’s way too long.

It seems like spring is never going to come.  It’s usually somewhat warm here by now.

It was 70 degrees and sunny yesterday. Bliss!  But it was just a fluke.  Today it’s 35 degrees with rain/snow.  The entire ten day forecast is between 30-50 degrees, mostly in the low 40′s.  Crappy.

I NEED warm weather and good health for my sanity. Totally losing it over here.  I could use a beach vacation right about now, but I feel to sick to travel. (Not to mention lack of time and money, hahahaha.)

Where is spring?

Here are a few pictures from our random spring tease yesterday.  They’re watermarked now because I have found the stolen on the internet randomly, not to mention that entire fake Facebook account someone made once.  People are messed up.  I decided to set the gallery to watermark them all automatically.

Speaking of Facebook, I get a lot of friend requests.  I’ve had to start only adding people I know in real life for the most part because I cannot keep track of who all these people are.  I look at my feed and I can’t find my actual real life friends on it.  It’s too much to handle.  People take it personally, but it’s nothing personal.  I just can’t add everyone in the world to my account and still actually use Facebook.  That’s what the blog and this diary are for–to share with more people.

Anyway, pictures…

It looks a tiny bit like spring.  Buds on trees exploded yesterday!  Too bad they’re getting frozen today, and all week.

Something was thinking about actually blooming.

The runny nose and chapped face, and breakfast on her shirt.  Keeping it real again.

I could edit all that out, but it would be way too much effort.

Very tiny snail in my palm.

We dug up little earth worms.

I think you can see its intestines full of worm poop!

Ada enjoyed holding worms.  Rosie isn’t afraid, but wasn’t that interested.

Don’t ask me what my marker covered child is wearing.  She wanted to leave on her baby legs and wear shorts.

Oh, Hank…

I cleaned out the fridge last night and didn’t get a chance to take it out yet.

He ate half a big container of expired yogurt, a box (4 sticks) of expired butter (wtf I’ve never had butter expire before…had a really short date), he also ate half a bowl of really old Panera broccoli and cheddar soup, half a thing of old roast beef deli meat, some wilted spinach, a few bananas, and who knows what else.

Bonus: Most likely I’ll get to clean up this trash again in the form of vomit and/or explosive dog diarrhea in the middle of the night.

Awesome.

I just cleaned up all the trash and vacuumed up the dirt and pistachio shells.  Now I have to get Ada to go play so I can mop and wash the rug.  Fun stuff.

How do I keep running out of time to post here?  I love writing down thoughts and sharing pictures on my blog, if not for any other reason than I enjoy looking back at it years later.  I’ve been doing this for quite some time, since maybe 2002.  I’m too tired to look back and check the date of my very first entry, but it’s been years!

I can’t seem to catch up on anything lately.  I need a pause button.  Or maybe a part time nanny, and while we’re at it I’ll also take a house cleaner and heck, why not a butler too.  Oh and a professional dog walker would be pretty awesome.

Wait.  Then I wouldn’t really be living my life.  I’d just be directing it.  I might have time to post on my blog, but I wouldn’t have much to blog about.

Ah, well.  Conundrum.

I’m over tired and rambling.  Tyler accidentally woke up Ada at 4:30 this morning when he came home.  Tyler then slept until I woke him up to leave for work at 3 in the afternoon.  I feel like my eyeballs are melting in my skull.  I really need to go to bed.

But first, before I go cross eyed, I’ve got to share a couple things.

I met Rachel, a long time blog friend, today!  She has two daughters just a bit younger than Rosie and Ada.  Her daughter Ella and Rosie had a blast playing together at the park.  I think she’s the sixth person from the blog world I’ve met now.  Kind of thrilling. Who wants to meet up next?

(Rachel I hope you don’t mind if I post these pictures!  Feel free to steal them if you want any of them.)

It was super windy and kind of cool today.  I think the girls had fun anyway, despite Rosie not making it out the door with her coat.

Why does Rosie look so very old here!?  (My children are both huge compared to their peers.)

What an awesome “cheese” face!

They really liked that thing.  I think I need one in my backyard.

The sun was blinding today!  Too bad it wasn’t warm at all.  We’re even supposed to have a freeze tonight.

After playing on the playground we walked down to the edge of the lake to look at the geese and ducks.

The water level was abnormally low and there were way less birds than usual.  I’ve never seen the water that low before, it was weird.

We stepped down onto a spot that should have been underwater, but it was now a dry dirt bank.  Ada ran over and scooped up a baby duck.

She’s always trying to pick up wild birds because she thinks they are just like her pet chickens, domesticated. Usually of course the birds all fly away and she is dismayed.

This time the duckling didn’t run away.

See how small it is in comparison to Ada?  It has no feathers at all, so it must have just hatched in the past few days.

Nothing is wrong with it, it’s just tame.  Very, very tame.

Why is it so tame?  I think it was abandoned by someone.  An Easter gift that peeped too loud and pooped a lot.

Really, if you saw this giant toddler running at you, arms outstretched, grinning a la Darla from Finding Nemo…why in the world would you not run for your life?

Not only did it not run, when I put it down it hid underneath of me.  Then it wanted to follow me.

It was cold outside, windy, and there was no mama duck in sight.  No other baby ducks around.  I looked nearby on the lake and no other duck was worried about this poor shivering peeping ball of freaking adorable cute fluff.

WHAT ELSE WAS I SUPPOSED TO DO?

Rosie named it Duck Face Amos.

It’s in a rubbermaid tub under a heat lamp, snuggled up in pine shavings at a nice toasty 100 degrees, basking in my living room.

Either my kids will remember they had an awesome childhood, or they will tell their therapist how crazy their mother was when they were growing up.

Tonight Duck Face Amos fell asleep snuggled up on Rosie’s shoulder by her neck.  When it was time to put Duck Face Amos in the brooder so the girls could go to bed Ada insisted on singing the duck her own version of Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, which is something like this:

Twankle twakle little star, how I wonder who you are.
Up above the noodle so high.
Like a farm in the sky.
Twanke twankle little noodle star
Har har har har har har har.

“Good night Duck Face!”

And she kept blowing it kisses.

I die of teh cute.

Anyway, it was great to meet Rachel and her family.

I wish you all lived closer so our girls could play together!  Rosie loved Ella and has talked about her all night, even calling her by the correct name and not Emma. Haha.  Rosie tried to make us name the duck Emma too, and when I said no she picked Duck Face Amos.  Thinking we might have to change that once we can tell if the duck is male or female in about a month. 

Now, I have to go watch my one trashy TV splurge (16 & Pregnant) and go to sleep before my eyeballs really do melt in my skull.

Tomorrow I’m going to share some of the Easter pictures.  Egg dying first.  Then maybe the next day I’ll share the actual Easter day pictures…

If I survive.  Must force self to go to bed now.  I’m such a procrastinator.

Ok. Saving this.  Really.

Do you realize the summer is nearly half over now?

Soon it’s going to be time for Rosie to start Kindergarten.  We’re homeschooling, so she’s not really going anywhere, but we have to keep an attendance record for the state.

I have to send a letter to the board of education stating our intent to homeschool this August!  For real, it will be official.  I will have accepted the responsibility.

What a huge responsibility it is! 

We’ve been doing schoolish things already–we’re doing Charlotte Mason homeschooling mixed with a dash of Montessori, with a sprinkle of unschooling throughout.  I think that means we are eclectic homeschoolers, right?  However you want to label it, I’m happy with what we’re doing thus far.

We’re taking it slow.  I’m not trying to create super geniuses via teeth pulling and rote memorization or anything.  I guess my main thoughts are that children need to have a very firm grasp on the basics–reading, writing, and arithmetic–then we can explore wildly from there.  Charlotte Mason really starts at age 6-7, so Rosie isn’t quite there yet.  (I’m using the free Ambleside Online curriculum, I love love love the book lists!!  And the science book, that one might be my favorite of all. We just did the section in the book on bird feathers and Rosie got really into it.)

Today Rosie wanted to do Little House on the Prairie School.

Of course, why not?  She even wanted to write with a feather quill, but we didn’t have any liquid ink on hand…darn.  That sound like a mess.  We still might try it one day though.

We settled for bonnets and an oil lamp instead.  Good enough.  Oh and we all had to be Little House Characters.  Rosie was Laura, I was Ma, and Ada was baby Carey.  Mary an imaginary edition, and Pa was off working at the mill.

(This blog post is setting up like a description of weird homeschoolers.  I must be doing something right!)

Rosie loves this board.  Every day we right the new day of the week, the date two different ways, the weather, pick a color of the day, and soon we’ll be marking off the days of school. 

Some of the printouts came from here.  (I laminated them with a $20 laminator I bought at Wally World so now they are dry erase.)  Other printouts I made myself easily.

I used hot glue and velcro to stick it all together on a piece of foam board.

(By the way, did you know you can buy oil lamps for $12 at Lowes?  Thought I’d throw that out there, in case anyone else wants to play Little House on the Prairie…)

(Rosie is doing Miquon Math with wooden cuisanare rods.  Love it so far!)

Ada is practicing her fine motor skills or something.

Short attention spans cause us to move on rather quickly. 

Snack has to be squeezed in between breakfast and lunch!

Build your own fruit pizza, anyone?

Perhaps some intense dance time was in order after that…Ada does love to dance.

Lunch.  Crunchy fail. 

(The car was parked, no worries on that front.)

Hi.

I need an eyebrow wax, a shower, something to calm my raging pimple creating hormones, and 4 hours of uninterrupted sleep. 

ASAP!

Then after lunch we went roller skating in the 90 degree steamy humid weather while listening to rumbles of thunder all around.

I was worried we would get struck by lightening.  Rosie said I was being paranoid. 

Then it was really getting lightening-y outside, so I insisted we go sit on the porch with the dog.

Some of us disagreed.

Just a little.

Not Ada.  She loves dogs almost as much as she loves blueberries and dancing…

But Rosie dislikes dogs.  She says they are annoying.

Know what she prefers instead?

Tea parties with scaly guests.  No fur allowed.

I’ve been neglecting you lately on the picture front.

I’m doing 365, but I’ve found I don’t have time to take creative pictures everyday. Instead my goal is to just take a picture of what we did that day, so I’ll have one year of memories.

For example,

26/365:  We drugged Rintoo with two valiums in order to shave him.  He has to be shaved because he’s so large (21 pounds) and not able to groom his long cottony fur or his bum hole.

He totally went wall-eyed and stumbled around meowing and purring, until we tried to shave him.  Somehow he was drunk but very, very angry.

The next day…

27/365:

Fully recovered and back to his usual self.  His shaving job looks like I did it with a weed wacker, but oh well.  The back was fine, but he kept biting with all of his might when we did his belly.  He wriggled out of a pillow case, a towel, a head lock, and a plastic cone, all while drugged and flailing his claws and yowling.

He’s so happy now!  When he has his long fur he just lays around the house like a 21 pound blob.  After being shaven he plays with the other cats like a wild kitten, and he climbs all over us purring like a loud motor boat all night long.  If he obviously loves his hair cuts so much, why does he resist so hard?

28/365:  I re-arranged my living room again.  We *love* it like this!  It’s as if we have a nice little living room and TV area and then a dining area.  Feels good.

On the 30th we went to the Louisville Zoo with our friends.

Both girls had a great time.  Rosie was excited to run around outside in the sun.  Ada loved seeing everything!

Rosie and Cade have known each other since they were babies, and even though he lives three hours away in the mountains they still remain best friends every time we get together.  Their love for each other is abnormally strong–they talk about each other non-stop and get uncontrollably excited when they are together.  I’ve never known little kids to feel so strongly about each other.  I can’t even describe it.  We think they are some sort of soul mates, seriously…

The zoo was only $5 to get in.  I was a little disappointed because the elephants, giraffes, and gorillas weren’t out.  The polar bear exhibit was under construction.  We did get to see a few things–the horny male tiger, the lions, zebras, camels, lots of reptiles/amphibians and fish, penguins, and birds.  The vampire bats were a creepy highlight.

(Oh, he was so sad.  Broke my heart.)

Oh and the best part?  Since the zoo wasn’t crowded I waited until no one else was around and Tyler was distracted (he’s such a stick in the mud!) and I tried calling a peacock like I do my chickens.  Don’t you know, it worked!  A peacock came running right up to me.  Naturally I had to feed it from my hand…it was so gentle, didn’t even peck my skin like chickens do.  I fed it wild rice cakes.  Carolina took pictures.

I definitely need to own peacocks (and peahens) one day.  When people pull into the driveway of my future farm a peacock will leap out of the bushes fanning his tail feathers…hah!

The Great Dane found his owner!  He belongs to a college student who went on vacation.  A friend was supposed to be caring for him.  Bet she’s pretty pissed at that friend.  He also apparently had on a collar and tags, but they are no where to be found.  She didn’t even realize he was missing–my neighbor had him outside and another neighbor recognized him.  They called the owner who was on her way home from her vacation.

Anyway, I’m so glad he’s back where he belongs.  His owner said he’s so skinny because he has a stomach disorder.  Now I need to Google this, out of curiosity.

Such a sweet dog!  Aaaah!

I’ve been really loving my Kindle lately.  Tyler bought a leather cover with an attached book light and it makes all the difference.  In the past week I’ve started and finished Dawn on a Distant Shore (Tyler makes fun of me, but it was an enjoyable read, and it’s a series…) and tonight I finished Snow Flower and the Secret Fan.

I just finished Snow Flower and the Secret Fan a few minutes ago.  Now I am so depressed.  Thank God I was not born in the 1800′s as a Chinese girl.

Next I’m going to start the third book in the series I’m reading, the one following Dawn on a Distant Shore.  I think there are two more books in the series after that, they are all around 800 pages long, but I read really fast.

Then I have to read some free books, because I can’t keep buying them.  Project Gutenberg is so cool–all of those books are free e-books.  They are all old books, and there are a million to choose from.

I love reading in bed at night.  It was hard to do with actual books, because Ada would find them in the morning and eat the pages or they would get knocked in the floor.  I never found a book light I liked.  The Kindle is so easy, and it’s just like looking at a book page.

I’d much rather read than watch TV, for the most part.  I haven’t watched TV much at all in the past few weeks.  Sometimes I turn it on out of habit and I suddenly realize how completely annoying and shallow everything on it seems, so I turn it right back off.

Ok, I’ll admit I like Teen Mom.  Shh.  I also like Big Love and True Blood.  However, none of those things are on right now.

Today’s photo(s):

4/365

My new lens came today!  So exciting.  I can’t wait until I can test it on the girls outside.  It’s so large, but fast and sharp.  Love it.

I tested it on the chickens outside in the sun.

Isn’t my rooster hilarious looking?  He crows like a dying sheep.

It works pretty good in low light indoors as well.

HAHAHAHHA.

New lens aside, the real story of the day is today’s 365 photo.

Buddy.

3/365…a quick snapshot.

(Note: Ada and Spongebob are making the same face.)

Buddy just showed up on New Year’s Day.  No one knows where he came from.  My neighbor’s daughter was outside and he came running up to her, I think he scared her half to death.  He’s a gigantic Great Dane.

My neighbor named him Buddy.  He’s so sweet and docile!  He’s a lap dog too.  You should have seen him laying in Rosie’s lap.

The best part is, he’s afraid of cats.  Terrified.  Like the elephant and the mouse, I guess.

So far no one seems to be looking for this amazing dog.  He’s clearly been loved by someone–he’s neutered, well mannered, knows basic commands even!  But he’s also sad.  He is so skinny you can count his ribs and see every bump on his spine.  He’s covered in scars, and his tail is totally gone…not even a stub left to wag.  His ear is damaged also, the cartilage is scarred causing the ear to be stuck straight up and flopped inward.

I have a theory that someone couldn’t afford to feed him any longer and they dropped him off.  Either that or he ran off from his house a long time ago and has been wandering around out in the snow.  The funny thing is you can walk him off leash and he just tags along, he’s so well trained.

My neighbor across the street has been keeping him while we look for Buddy’s owners.  Our local humane society and the neighboring counties have notices that we’ve found him, and no one has looked for him at the shelters.  There are posters hanging up, and an ad posted on Craigslist.  I googled lost Great Dane in our area and nothing came up in local classified ads or anything.  It seems like he has no owners, or they don’t want him back.  Who knows.  Poor Buddy.

Yesterday my neighbor left Buddy in his backyard for a few minutes.  When he came back Buddy was gone!  They were so worried about him, they spent several hours searching the neighborhood trying to find him again with no luck.

A few hours later I was laying in bed when I got an email response to my Craigslist posting about Buddy.  Some guy said he lives on my street, and he wanted to know why I let the found Great Dane go free.  Hah.

He brought Buddy back and then we all decided that he should keep the dog because his family loved Buddy and he had a privacy fence Buddy couldn’t escape from.

This afternoon I got an email from the guy saying that his oldest child was allergic and they couldn’t keep him, so Buddy came back again.

Rosie loves him!  She begged and begged me to keep him forever, but we absolutely cannot afford to feed or vet this giant animal on top of our other pets.  He’s so sweet though.  So, so sweet and loving. He’s like the perfect dog.

He’s back at my neighbor’s house tonight, sleeping on the couch in the lap of his wife.  She was so happy when I knocked on her door with Buddy standing there.  They know someone who’s Great Dane recently died and she’s going to find out if they want Buddy.

What a great dog, I’ll never forget him.

Now Great Danes are on my list of dogs to own at some point in my life.  Definitely.

My dog Hank is something special.

He’s an American Foxhound.  We got him from the shelter when Rosie was a baby.  He was biding his time, just about out of days until…you know.  The shelter warned us not to adopt him because he was a handful.

Apparently he escaped one day and ran out of the automatic doors, down a busy four lane road, and no one could catch him.  They gave up.  A few hours later he came right back in through the automatic doors and went back to his cage.  He was given up for adoption at two years old because his owner could no longer handle his antics.

Tyler insisted that we *needed* this dog.  We didn’t own any pets except for my Gus cat.  He swore he would take care of the dog, just like a begging little kid.  I gave in, and so we brought him home.  His name was Muttley, but we quickly renamed him Hank, which came with all kinds of funny names like Hankity Spank.

He was a bad dog.  A loving, adorable, floppy eared, bad dog.  He ripped all of the screens out of the windows one day when we left him outside.  He flipped over his wire crate and busted the top off then ran through the house destroying.  He ripped all of the clothes off of the hangers in the closet and then pooped on them.  He jumped up and knocked me over.  He used his mouth to pull on my shirt and ripped my clothes.  When walking him on a leash I had to grip parked cars and passing trees in order to not fall flat on my face.

He was so terrible!  And then he laid his big huge hound head in my lap and wagged his tail.

I thought about getting rid of him, but I couldn’t do it.

Instead I made the best of him–trained him to sit.  Trained him to lay down to get attention instead of jumping.  Perfected his potty habits so that they only happened outdoors.  It took lots of work.  Tyler didn’t help me, either!  When I dedicate myself to something I stick with it, no matter what.  See it through to the bitter end…or happy ending…

Today Hank is a good boy, mostly…he doesn’t tear stuff up except if he’s alone with the trash.  He’ll counter surf and eat what he can find too–his favorite thing is a banana, he’ll eat the entire bunch including the peel.  It’s a hound thing though, he’s very food motivated.  He can’t help it.  He’s sorry, you can tell by the look on his face.  Silly beast.

He’s laying his big head in my lap right now while I’m writing this.

Last summer we got new neighbors.  A recently divorced middle aged lady and her two sons.  They moved here from New York because her sons are going to our local university.  They have a funny dog named Rosie!  Rosie Dog is a mix between a Basset Hound and a St. Bernard.

For some reason the new neighbor lady loved Hank.  She started feeding my dogs those giant milk bones over the fence.

Abby, my black lab mix, wasn’t really phased.  She likes food but it doesn’t rule her world.

Hank, on the other hand…hounds can be completely controlled with food!  Hank loved the treats so much that he decided he had to beg for them.  First he would run over to that corner of the yard and do this horrible howl/bark/yelp nose non-stop any chance he got.  If I was busy with the baby then he would keep doing it until the neighbor came out and praised him and gave him a treat.  That annoyed me, because it was reinforcing his bad behavior, but I figured it wasn’t that big of a deal in the long run.

Then it escalated.

Hank realized he could climb over the fence and go to the neighbor’s door and beg for treats.

It happened several times and I felt terrible that my dog had escaped and begged at her door.  We tried to only let him out when we were watching, but that’s hard to do with kids to take care of.  So we ended up getting him a chain.  He only goes outside to take care of business, so it’s not like he’s chained for long amounts of time or anything.  Not too bad.  Occasionally we’d leave him out on the chain to lay in the sun on a nice day.  He is a dog after all, he enjoys laying out in the yard and smelling the wind, or treeing squirrels…

One day we came home and he’d hung himself over the fence while on the chain, trying desperately to reach the neighbor.  Luckily the chain was long enough that he was standing on the ground, just trapped against the fence.  I’m telling you, hounds will do absolutely anything for food!  During this time the neighbor was continuing to reward him with treats over the fence…

Now it’s gotten even worse.  The ground keeps freezing, and the chain has lost under mud and snow.  Half of the time it’s iced to the ground.  I let the dogs out and stand in the door way watching them until they come back in.  Sometimes Rosie will accidentally let Hank out, or I’ll get distracted from watching him, or Tyler will let him out and not say anything, and Hank immediately hops the fence and goes to the neighbors house.

I am so frustrated with her right now.  Hank paces my front window and door trying to get out to go to her house!  When he does manage to get out I panic that he’s been hit by a car or something.  We’ve spent hours looking for him only to find out that he’s in the neighbor’s house.  She lets him in!

One day I tried to talk to her about it and she asked me if she could have him.  As in, keep my dog.  Uh, no!

She asked me a second time, when I tried to talk to her about the issue again, if she could have him.  She wants my dog!  She told me the reason he runs away is because we don’t walk him enough.  Yep, I don’t walk him much in cold weather and not as often as I’d like in warm weather.  I have two kids…I’m doing the best I can.

AND the reason he runs away is not because he isn’t walked enough.  We play with him all day, feed him treats and scraps, love on him, he plays chase and ball.  He’s not neglected.  He climbs the fence only because she trained him to do it by rewarding his bad behavior!

Besides, if she really cared and wanted to help then why doesn’t she offer to walk him?  She walks her dog twice a day.  Instead she keeps locking my dog in her house…

Funny side note–during that second conversation she also accused my cat of eating her chipmunks.  She hand feeds them peanuts, but one day they disappeared.  Hahaha.

Today Tyler put Hank outside because he kept throwing up.  (Silly hound beast ate something bad, of course.)  I was asleep and didn’t realize.  A few hours later I noticed he wasn’t asleep in his dog bed like I’d assumed.  He was in the neighbor’s house, in her kitchen, laying on his own dog bed eating a huge $15 rawhide bone.

I just don’t know what to do.  Before she moved in he never climbed the fence.  He might hop over it occasionally and come around to the front door, but he didn’t take off.  He only did that a couple of times in his life.  Now he will go over the fence any chance he gets.  He’s desperate to get to her house, and even though she hears us outside calling for him she doesn’t give him back.  She keeps him until we knock on the door.

It’s kind of weird and really awkward.  Who takes someone’s dog?

She really loves him.  I think she’s just a lonely single middle aged lady, it’s nothing with ill-intent.  It’s just frustrating that she’s trained my hound beast to come to her house.  It causes me lots of extra stress and I don’t know what to do!

I’m considering getting him a shock collar, but that seems so mean.  The chain is only semi-effective at keeping him in.  I can’t afford a taller fence.

I acknowledge that it’s partly my fault because he’s my dog and he’s escaping my yard, but what do you do when someone else keeps luring your dog over the fence?

:(

So far Ada hasn’t tried to harm the tree.  We put the non-breakable ornaments towards the bottom just in case.  My real concern is that she’ll try to use a tree branch to pull to a stand and the whole tree will fall over.  Let’s hope that doesn’t happen!  It’s a small tree, so I’m sure the only real damage would be broken ornaments…

I don’t think we can set up the white tree skirt or train around it, but that’s alright.