Kevin found it yesterday, bark blasted off the tree in ginormous pieces and thrown several yards away from the tree.

And, worse still, the tree is splitting in two right down the middle of the trunk. We’ve already sent out an SOS to our arborist. I hope we can save the tree. It provides so much shade in our yard, and lots of birds and squirrels live there.

Also? Our dryer and dishwasher are both on the fritz, so I’ll be calling about those tomorrow as well. And there goes the July budget just.like.that.

On the other hand, it’s still better than renting and waiting for a landlord to take action. I think.

Evening update – The arborist was fairly alarmed at the sight of the tree, saying it could come down at any moment, even in the light breeze we had today. The tree unfortunately has to go for safety reasons. Since more severe weather is predicted here for Thursday, and Wednesday is a holiday, the crew will be here tomorrow bright and early to take it down. On the plus side, all the equipment will keep Liam entertained. On the down side, the estimate is $2200. Ouch.

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Poor Leonard. Gran-Gran left on Thursday, and between having had her to himself for a month and the fact that I am not instantly available to him 24/7, it’s been a very hard last couple of days. This sweet little boy who had previously thrown maybe five tantrums in his life has been melting down every half-hour or so. I feel so bad for the kid, but with wacky post-partum guilt hormones, I’m not handling the meltdowns well. My reactions range from wanting to give him the world as an apology for ending life as he knew it all the way to wanting to tell him he’s a big kid and the whininess is killing me so deal with life already…

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It bothers me when people make a big deal out of the baby while discounting the presence of his very cute older brother. Not that the baby isn’t a big deal, but doesn’t his brother count anymore? Poor Leonard’s had a few encounters with folks who pretty much blew him off this week, and the big brother gig is wearing a bit thin. I suspect those of you with more than one child have seen this in action, but here’s a typical scenario:

At Friendly’s, we were mobbed by a bunch of biddies:

Biddies: “Oh, oh, oh, look at the baby! How CUTE!! How old is he?”

Me: “He’s two weeks old.”

Biddies (spying Liam): “Oh, oh, oh, and this must be the lucky Big Brother!!”

Liam: “No.”

Biddies: “Oh, you’ve got it made with such a cute baby. How much fun is it to be the Big Brother??”

Liam: “No, I’m not-”

Biddies: “Is the baby a boy or a girl?? So, so cute! Cute! Aren’t you happy to be the big brother?”

Liam: “NO! I’M NOT THE BIG BROTHER! I AM LEONARD!!!!!”

So at least I’m not the only cranky member of the family. Sigh.

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But Gran-Gran is coming back next week. There is hope. And lookie the Easter eggs she and Leonard made this week:

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And? Since when do they stamp expiration dates right on the eggs? Look between the sticker and the “Mommy,” and there’s an expiration date.

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Thought we were through with various tummy bugs? Nope. Now the ferrets have GI issues. There’s nothing like a couple of ferrets with diarrhea to create quite the mess, I tell you. Thankfully our vet was able to phone in some Bactrim to the pharmacy, so we didn’t have to take five ferrets, a newborn, and a cranky 3-year-old to the vet’s office.

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How’s Kieran, you ask? He’s doing incredibly well. So well, in fact, that he managed to gain 12 ounces in his first 10 days on Earth. The baby is a natural-born nurser. And he sleeps at night. Both of which are wonderful things, truly, but in the perverse world of post-partum hormones, it’s only adding to my guilt at my parenting of Liam. Liam was not a natural born nurser, and we spent the first six weeks of his life trying to get him to nurse enough to gain any weight at all. He cried a lot, and slept little. As did Kevin and I. Now that we’ve got Kieran around, I’m realizing how hungry Liam was in his first weeks. And I feel bad.

But, gosh, Kieran’s a cutie:

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What’s this? Snow for Easter?

Hmph!

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On a non-whiny note, lots of you have sent cards and gifts, made dinner, and phoned with congratulations. I fully intend to get Thank You notes out sometime before the first college tuition payment falls due, but in the meantime, know that we appreciate all of your help, good wishes, and generosity. Thank you!

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And Thank You for sticking out the post this far. I hope to be back soon in a less cranky/less exhausted frame of mind. In the meantime, Leonard wants to know:

“Gran-Gran? Will you come back soon? I miss you and Mommy and Daddy are tired and cranky and Kieran isn’t but he doesn’t play trains, either.”

Leonard the Great Big Doggie Who Goes WOOF! still lives here. But, thanks to Gran-Gran, he’s got himself a proper doghouse. Woo-hoo!

Spring is still here. There is no snowstorm going on as we speak. School was not cancelled today.

(OK, I lied. There’s four inches of sleet and snow outside, and this picture was taken on Wednesday. But it will be as nice as the picture shows soon, I hope, and it’s a cute picture. )

Also? My mother-in-law is a saint. Not only has she entertained Leonard pretty much single-handedly this entire week and done most of the laundry and dishes, but she also manages not to roll her eyes when I’m lazing around on the couch complaining about being overdue and robbing her photo album of cute kid pictures.

Thanks for saving my sanity, Mom. Hopefully things will liven up here in short order. Preferably after the roads get plowed tomorrow.

We’ve spent a lot of time outside in the last couple of days, and I’ve realized that sometime over the winter the great big doggie reached some milestones. He can reach the mailbox and take out the mail without being lifted up first. He can turn the hose nozzle on and off by himself and thereby spray the driveway to his heart’s content – the lack of this skill was the source of much frustration last year. And finally, he can pedal his own trike and go all the way around the block without tiring. Don’t tell Leonard, but he’s looking more and more like a big boy these days despite his certainty that he is a dog.

No baby yet! We’re all getting bored and tired of waiting, but it’s hard to be too cranky with weather like this. The only fly in the ointment is that supposedly there is a snow/freezing rain/sleet storm “mixed precipitation event” looming on the horizon for Friday night, but I guess that’s par for the course for March. I saw some daffodils in bloom today, so now I’m willing to bet that we’re due for more and more warm weather in the next few weeks.

I think it’s time for nice Spring nap…aaaahhhhhh!

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Bonus Cute Conversation:

Gran-Gran: “Can we put my shirt in the washer?”

Liam: “Yup, we can!”

Gran-Gran: “Can we put your big boy underwear in the washer?”

Liam: “Yup, sure we can!”

Me: “Can we put your dump truck shirt in the washer?”

Liam: “Yup, we can!”

Me (teasing): “Can we put Casey in the washer?”

Liam: “Um, no. He’s too big and the lid wouldn’t close.”

Gran-Gran: “You need to blog this.”

If you have two sick adults who need to entertain a small boy with a minimum of physical exertion, and you can’t really go anywhere, what should you do? We simply declared today to be a holiday after all and baked a cake. So in the picture above we have Donald the Great Big Shark Who Tickles People and his first ever effort at decorating a Valentine’s Day cake. It turned out to be quite cute, and quite tasty! The only sad part was telling Donald that his new goldfish Gold, Goldie, and Orangey aren’t really meant to share his cake…