Christmas Vacation

Lola and I had planned a trip to go see Grandma since August, and the time had finally come! We had made arrangements for Scooter and Petie to be under the care of Chris and Kim so we knew the kitties were going to be SPOILED ROTTEN!!!

We celebrated our Christmas at home on the 21st, so Kimmi and Chris came over, and we had dinner and took turns opening our presents.

We also dressed up the kitties with ribbon, although they didn't seem too happy about it!

The next day we hopped the plane to head for Omaha!

























Since the airline industry is cutting back it was no surprise that the flight we were scheduled to be on at 8pm had been cancelled. They did find us an ‘earlier’ flight at 5:30 pm but it was delayed and was not expected in Atlanta until just about the time our original flight was scheduled to leave…sigh….

But with all of that having been re-arranged, we arrived happily into Omaha at 12:30am on Dec 24. Yes, we were tired and bleary-eyed, but we were so excited to be there and to see snow and visit with my friend Dawn (we spent the night at her house) it was a few hours later that we finally decided sleep was a true necessity. Sleeping until 9am was wonderful, and we had picked up a rental car the night before so we were ready to embark on our trip to Iowa to see Mom/Grandma. I’m not sure how we lucked out at the car rental place, but all of their budget/cheapo cars were rented and all they had was some huge tank of a car (like a Mercury Grand Marquis or whatever) or an SUV to choose from. Of course, we claimed the SUV in a heartbeat!! (Lola and I have the dream that someday we will tell our problem child Cabrio car farewell and replace it with something much more reliable, but not until we have test driven everything out there and have done extensive research on each vehicle we like!)

As we drove to Iowa we noticed the amount of snow increased, so Lola was totally excited.

We did have a wonderful visit with my mom and we played in the snow and ate Christmas dinner and watched TV and played cards and played in the snow some more. We really hated to leave, and every time we do leave we want so much to take my mom home with us!!!

Lola and I would love to have her live with us but we don’t have the proper amount of space / room configuration to allow one more person enough private space (aka an extra bedroom), but I am looking to see if we can possibly re-furbish our townhome to do just that. It will take some thinking, though, but it’s not impossible.

When we left Mom’s house we drove back to Omaha to hang out with Dawn for a couple days. Lola absolutely loves her and especially loves her dogs / cat!! I truly hate being allergic to dogs so I was popping allergy pills and hoping for the best…

One of the evenings during our visit to Omaha we were able to get together with some of my old work buddies and have dinner at Village Inn. It was a BLAST!! I soooooo love Village Inn - - I wish we had them in Atlanta, but unfortunately there are none in the south. Village Inn has the world’s best coffee and their Santa Fe Chicken Skillet with Green Chile sauce is to DIE for!

While in Omaha we found out that a temporary ice rink was set up by Con Agra downtown, so for a donation of $5.00 Lola got to rent skates and have some fun for a couple hours.






We arrived back home mid-afternoon on December 30. Chris came to pick us up and the kitties were so glad to see us!!

Scooter Comes Home

We picked up Scooter from the vet on Tuesday and he seemed much better. He’s been having a few good days, but today we had to drop him off for yet another chemo treatment. He is doing much better this evening, and is resting quietly. He does tire out easily, and when climbing the stairs he has to stop and rest at the landing for a few minutes, then continue on his way up to one of the bedrooms. I have set up a litter box in Lola’s bathroom for him so he doesn’t have to make a trip downstairs, and he seems quite happy with that arrangement.

Lola and I are preparing for our trip to see ‘Babushka’, and from what she has been telling us there is plenty of snow in Iowa! Lola is overjoyed! The last time she saw snow in any quantity was back in Russia last year.

We are so thankful to Chris and Kimmi for coordinating the care of the kitties while we are gone. Scooter needs extra care, and Kimmi is happy to stay at the house while we are away. The plan is for Chris to be there during the daytime and Kimmi to be there at night.

Luckily Scooter doesn’t have to have chemo during that week, so it all works out rather well.

Our Little Green Burrito

I got a phone call from the vet, and the doctor told me they would like to keep Scooter for another night. He gave me the visiting hours schedule and when I picked Lola up from school we decided to go pay Scooter a visit once her homework was finished.

We arrived at the vet building about 8pm and signed in to have Scooter brought to a room for a visitation. We had to wait quite awhile and Lola was getting restless, so we went around the waiting room to pay a little visit to all the pets who were there. Finally they came out and said that we could come back and see Scooter. They ushered us into one of the exam rooms and a few minutes later they brought Scooter in, all wrapped up in a green towel like a burrito. We kept hugging him and kissing him and calling him our “little green burrito”. He was so happy to see us, but it was quite evident he was not feeling well at all. After about 30 minutes of visitation, he fell asleep so we called the tech to come and take him back so he could sleep.

We soooo love our little green burrito!!

Faster Than a Speeding Bullet

Today we went grocery shopping and when we arrived home Kimmi was at the house. We had invited her over for dinner and when we pulled up in the garage she came out to help carry the bags in. She had her arms full and Lola opened the door for her. I was still digging in the trunk of my car to get more bags to take inside when I heard Kimmi say “Petie, NO!! Come back here!! Peeeeeetie!” Right at that moment Petie came flying out the back door saw me and screeched to a halt, with a look of total surprise. He then did an about-face and sped back into the house. This in itself is not so much funny, but to be there and experience the expressions on this cat’s face is PRICELESS! (“Uh,oh, there’s MOM!! I’d better get back in the house NOW before she sees me!!”)

Poor Scooter is sick again. He’s been vomiting and has had a very difficult time in the litter box. We took him back to the vet ER and they were concerned enough to keep him for the night. I am wondering if the chemo treatments are ever going to be easier for him...

Ice-Skating Fever!!

Lola had her horseback riding lesson this morning and afterward we had to scramble to get home, change clothes and prepare to meet with her ESOL teacher to coordinate the day. There were five children who were able to come, so we made the rounds to pick them up for the day’s events.

After lunch at McDonald’s, we made our way to the skating rink, got everyone’s skates on, and watched each other stumble around a bit until most of us had a better comfort level. I watched Lola to see how she would do, and strangely enough, she skated like she had been doing it all her life! She came up to me and expressed total amazement that she could actually skate and it was actually FUN! She is now totally hooked on ice skating and wants that to be one of our main activities from now on. Most of the other kids did quite well skating and it was really very entertaining for all. Lola’s teacher is an ice-skating instructor when she’s not teaching so she was helping each of the children with how to fall properly, how to stand up after a fall, and most of the true basics of skating. Afterward we went to see “Bolt” and I must say, that was quite an impressive 3-D experience! Lola and I took photos as well and put them together to make her teacher a photo-collage computer mouse pad!

Scooter’s had his 2nd chemo treatment – not so good. Poor Scoo is sick and very lethargic. We are keeping him close to us, although he sleeps most of the time.

We are preparing for Lola’s ESOL class party – her teacher is planning it and I have been requested as parent chaperone. The plan is to go pick up all the kids who are going, meet at McDonald’s to have lunch, go ice skating at the local rink and then head to the movie “Bolt”. Lola is so excited, but quite apprehensive about the prospect of ice skating. She told me the first and only time she ever ice skated was when she was about 4 years old and she was horrible. She said she was afraid she wouldn’t be able to stand up long enough to have fun! I assured her that now she is older she may have an easier time of it since she has a better sense of balance now - - I didn’t learn to ice skate until I was 20, and I found it was not as hard as I thought. I’m not fabulous or anything, but can skate around without flailing arms and legs everywhere. I’m always open to learning new things - - like skating backward!