Geez, the last post was in early March! That’s because of a lot of things, so let me run a quick summary update.

The boys are doing well, and we are all adjusted now to the new family routine. Toby is a gentlemanly prince with a fox tail and could be a professional athletic cat. This boy has jumping acrobatic skills I’ve only seen online, so his favorite game is to catch things out of the air and do summersaults as he lands. He started talking first, but his voice is soft and rarely used.

Meanwhile, Ollie is captain of the Naughty Kitty Club (formally diagnosed at the vet!), and surely a little wizard living in his own weird world. He must be related to PuppyCat (from Bee and PuppyCat) with a little bit of Cubby (from Adventures of the Gummi Bears, hyped up on Gummi Berry Juice) mixed in. Ollie hasn’t grown out of his let-me-chew-on-everything phase so he requires constant diligence (check out that HDMI cable below!). Not to mention the loads of energy he still has that demands extensive active play, or his curiosity that leads him into trouble more often than not. His favorite game is Sideways Pyscho, which is where he spontaneously hi-fives you, hops into the I-am-so-scared pose with arched back and spikey hair, then takes off running for you to chase him. He has recently started talking in a series of tiny meeps and merps (appropriately weird like PuppyCat), and apparently has a lot to say.

Both are so sweet, easy to get the purr motors going, and with all the hugs and faceboops a person could hope for. They have a great mix of independent play, brotherly play, and wishing to engage with people play. I’ve been teaching them how to be hammock cats on the deck, and I hope to upgrade that to going for walks (or even riding bikes!).

We finally decided to tackle the “popcorn” floor of the bedroom, which means we ripped out the closet wall and subfloor to repair the floor joists and rebuild the closet as a walk-in. In doing that, we discovered the wall adjoining the bathroom is sinking, which is not great since it is a load bearing wall. So, we are also tearing out the bathroom (which truly needed to be done anyway) to fix the wall. Opening up the bathroom floor will hopefully help us solve another ongoing problem, which is that sometimes the kitchen sink backs up (not ideal when the water softener runs and then floods the kitchen, obviously..). Hopefully, we can suss out what’s going on with that drain pipe. As you can imagine, things have been a bit chaotic with moving everything into other rooms, and the noise and dust and tool ephemera laying all around. I’m pretty over it, but there is no way out except through.

Thus, I have not been in the creative spirit. Instead, though, we planted some trees so I’ve been doing more gardening and yardwork to keep them alive and happy. Plus, I picked up an e-bike and use it to run around the yard while doing said gardening, or riding with Boy on the bike paths to see how far we can get.

But I guess I have been doing one creative project here and there, at work when I have down time. The ongoing cross stitch that I began in August of 2020 (I think) hadn’t been touched in probably another year, but I pulled it out recently. Can’t say doing all the white in this part of the piece is that thrilling, but it’s all part of the game. And, I’ve been reading a lot more this year, too. Even started Elden Ring back up. The year is not a total loss, just a shift away from a case of the crafties, temporarily. I really miss Stitch Club and creating art, but I’ll get back to that eventually. I always do.

Besides, this weekend I hope to begin a project for my new niece, who is due to arrive in about a week, and while I have the machine out for that, I can finally tackle a project my friend requested from almost a year ago! Eep!