Let's Play Catch Up

Beth is moved!

We have finally got my daughter Beth moved to the Tulsa area. I am so glad to get her here. She still is going back and forth to OKC, but before long that won't have to happen. She has had a couple really good job interviews and I am confident she will have a great job by this next week. She has to finish up a couple things at her current work before she can finally be here full time, but so far that has not been a problem.

This move has not been easy. She has a lot of "stuff" and moving it from her little home to this bigger home, one wonders, how in the world did it all fit!!!???? But slowly, box by box, she is getting unpacked and settling in. We have had a couple crisis' and they were scary at the time. Funny now, but certainly not then. Before she moved here she had a dream "nightmare" that she had moved. She was going to let her dogs outside to do their business and a rabid skunk attacked her. She had a golf club to beat it off with and she said the dream was just so real. We laughed about it till she called me early the first morning after she moved in. She called me in a panic about a "creature" in the yard. I could hear the tension, the near panic in her voice and I asked her what it was. She said "mom, I don't know, but it is huge, brown and looks like a beaver with out a tail." She said it ran under the shed and was just watching her with its beady little eyes. She feared it was going to attack her and the dogs. She was able to get the dogs away but the critter would not leave. I quickly called me dad and he said he was not going, so Scott got up and got his shotgun to go see what was trespassing into her yard. We had tried to guess what this thing was to no avail. She kept it in sight and waited for Scott to arrive at her home armed to removed the threat. But as Scott was pulling into the drive way she said the thing kind of galloped off into the "pasture" behind the house. The house that she lives on has three acres but is kept nicely mowed. There is a dry creek bed that runs through it but the place is all fenced.

Scott arrives and Beth decides she does not want him to shoot the thing. He is kind of cute. I have now called the police department and was advised we are in the city limits, well that means he probably should not be shooting a shotgun at it. And then we decide, we don't know what it is so we better not shoot it since who knows, it could be an endangered animal or something. Scott was not convinced, but I just could not stand the thought of him shooting something for just no reason. It did not attack the dogs, it merely ran under the shed. It was NOT a skunk so the danger of being sprayed with that HORRIBLE odor was not a threat. Scott said he just did not know what it was. I don't know how we determined, but it was an Oklahoma Ground Hog....or a Wood Chuck. I looked it up on the computer and described it to Beth over the phone and she said yes, yes, that is what it is. And this little guy can move 700 pounds of dirt in one night making his home. 700 POUNDS. That is a lot of dirt. They make a tunnel of about 35-40 feet with two chambers. One to sleep in and the other one......to poop in. and when it is full of poop they seal it off and make another one. pretty smart animal if you ask me!!!! So the little guy got to live to see another day. And we have not seen him again.

This weekend, I was just worn out. Oh my goodness I am so tired. I have been staying at Beth's house to take care of her dogs who just don't understand why Beth is gone and why they are stuck there. I am very loving to her dogs, but they just don't want me. They want Beth. Beth gets home Friday and stays there by herself. I am thinking this will be good to sleep in my bed, etc. I am so looking forward to sleeping in the next day. oh yes, you already see this one coming don't you? Of course it happens....she calls the next morning in a horrible panic and yells at me that her dogs are gone. They got out of the yard and are gone. I slam the phone, run into the bedroom and yell at Scott to get up and dressed that Beth's dogs are gone. (I was actually already up, just not around!) I throw some clothes on and drove to her house and she tells me she finds them. Thank goodness they did not get hit by a car or run far away. We go to McDonald's for some breakfast and then to Wal-mart to buy dog tags for Daisy and Jack. Good grief this is stressful.

But really life is good. In the last couple months I have seen my son two times and that is just awesome. We went to a Texas Rangers baseball game and had a WONDERFUL time. I miss him. He is a great son but life is so busy now and he does live about five hours away so any chance I get to see him I will take it. He has not been home in about a year and a half so I know my family misses him as well. The next visit was the OU game in Dallas. His wife decided at the last minute to not go. I had hoped that Beth could go and spend some time with her brother. She really misses him, they had been close growing up and it seems now they just don't have the chance to be as close as they once were. And of course girls value those relationships differently than guys do in my opinion. (just my opinion, but it is my blog!) Well darn it, Beth got sick and could not even hardly talk. She calls me and asks me to go instead. I told her no, we were coming to move her here and she tells me she just can't go. She feels terrible.....I pack my bags and go. I have about one hour before i have to go. But I do it and make it to Dallas in plenty of time. We once again had a wonderful time. Just the two of us, like old times. We went to the game, ate at the stadium (boy was that expensive) and talked about all the OU players. Of course it was not a good outcome, but it was a great time to see my son, my friend.

After staying the night I drove to OKC and helped to pack my daughter's house to move her. She had a girl friend there helping and that was all the help we had. Poor Scott. I have never been so thankful in all my life to have such a wonderful and selfLESS husband as Scott. He worked himself into the ground moving Beth here. it was hot, heavy, and horrible but he did it all. He got to the Tulsa area and then had to unload everything too. Good grief. Luckily my parents showed up and my younger brother showed up just in time to help the last bit. Scott was very grateful. I was still at the other house cleaning it. We have renters needing to move in and I was not going to go back there again any time soon. And that brings us back to now.

Monday is the unveiling of the photographs that is called The Waiting Child Heart Gallery. Fifty photographers in Oklahoma were asked to take pictures of children waiting to be adopted. These children are not the young babies, cute little kids that everyone wants. These are the older, harder to adopt children that need, want and DESIRE a home....a family of their own. They didn't ask for this life but it is what they were dealt. I am so honored to be a part of this. The photographs will travel around the state of Oklahoma all this next year staying at malls and churches for 30 days at a time except for here at the beginning. We start of the Jenks Aquarium, then the Tulsa State Fair and maybe even Octoberfest. Then it will go to the big malls in Tulsa for the Christmas seasons. It will even be in my home town in February, I hope some of my friends will see it. Home town being Enid, where I retired from.

Ok, enough of this. I have not even posted pictures of our trip to Branson, or times with grandkids lately. But that will have to come another time. I hope you are all doing well....until next time, see ya!