He was a good boy.

A few days ago our cat Yiminy died. A month ago he stopped eating much and after a few visits to the vet, fluid was found around his heart, and we left with a handful of prescriptions and a tear-inducing prognosis.

It is difficult to explain exactly how Yim-boy was so much more than your average household pet. He wasn’t a typical cat that loved you when it was convenient for him. He’d come when you’d call him. He ran to meet to us at the door every blessed time we came home. He knew what you meant when we said “turkey”. He loved you when it was convenient for you.

He was different things to each of us, and more. To Michelle, he was her snuggle buddy. To Jovie, he was a fixture she grew up with and loved her entire life. To me (Dad), he was my best buddy.

He slowed down his last few weeks but he was still so eager to please. He couldn’t meet us at the door any more. Instead he’d position himself in the living room so he could see us as we came in and raise his head and look at us eagerly to greet him. His last days were spent with him in the living room, surrounding him with the only thing he wanted in life.

Now that he’s gone, our home has a heart aching emptiness. Routine tasks we’ve done for 14 years no longer need to be done. We catch ourselves unnecessarily going to the door to see if he wants to come in. Movement is caught from the corner of eyes, thinking it’s him, only to be quickly reminded of the loneliness that is now within each of us.

As we all struggle to accept his loss, we try to remind ourselves of the happiness he brought to us for so many years.

He was a good boy.

 

 

 

 

 

derailed plans

we are off for the next couple of school days for a mid-winter break.  many months ago, when we didn’t know The Mr.’s schedule, i decided to go to greenville to visit gramma & grampa, as well as my good friend Katherine (jovie’s friend is Kemp).  i planned accordingly.

Yiminy, however, planned against it.

sadly, he spent last weekend not eating or drinking, so on monday we took him to the vet and he was then hospitalized with pancreatitis.  poor boy.  The Mr. and i were sad, but he got more sleep monday night!  we even went to visit him after we went out for a lunch date on tuesday.  this is how we were greeted:

he needed a cone (and hated it!) so he wouldn’t play with his IV.

luckily, he came home a half-day early and we went back again later to pick him up and bring him home.  it took until today for him to be a little more normal with eating and drinking.  he is on meds 2x a day so that derailed our plans to go to g’ville.

luckily, the g’s are coming here instead.  we will have to schedule a new time to play with kemp (and her siblings).

a fun weekend is planned in this bitter cold weather.  in fact, tomorrow is the last chance for a few days to go out and play.  we will celebrate valentine’s day by eating snacks for dinner and watching a movie.  queso, wings, shrimp & edamame…. can’t wait!  and i will make The Mr. a red velvet cake.  sunday we will hole up inside and play games, watch movies and have soup.

i’m pretty sure a fire will be turned on for much of our break.

i hope by the end of it all we won’t be too couped up.

in other news, The Mr. LOVES roller-skating.  so do i.  jovie, maybe not so much…. though on the carpet she digs it:

we look forward to doing it again soon.  maybe once a month could be our new tradition!

 

 

 

a girl & her cats- a second photo story

i had the idea for this post the day before jovie started kindergarten, but, well, you see- there were other things to be posting about.  and when i looked to link up to the other posts, i realize it’s been almost exactly 2 years since we’ve done this.

here is another photo session with yiminy.  the difference this time is the fact that the photographer was jovie.  2 christmases ago, Santa gave jovie a kidzoom camera.  it was at first used for the 2 little games on it.  then it was largely unnoticed & relegated to a toy bin somewhere.

even when she decided she wants to be a photographer (and a florist, and a “show actor”) she didn’t think to actually use the camera for real.

until recently.

she was playing with all the gadgetry of it & thought she found the perfect model in yiminy.   let me share:

it all started with this

and he liked it, so he’s playing with her.

then came all the fun gadgets.  while i was in the kitchen doing something, i kept hearing all these clicks.  overandoverandoverandover.  it was her arranging all the backgrounds and taking new pictures of this patient model:

perfectly framed, if i do say so myself.

there’s a cloud on your head

then she found the psychedelic setting

and she ended with an almost perfect framing:

too bad he was oblivious.  but he’s come a long way in his modeling career!  at least this time he stayed put.

***********************

in sad news, i need to report that on the 2nd day of school, The Mr. & i had to make the horrible decision to put our other cat Doh down.  she had been inexplicably sick for over 6 months.  unfortunately, when i came home from ireland, things got a little worse, & we had to do the only thing we could for our sweet cat.

it was terribly ruf for us.  jovie is OK because Doh was afraid of people & tolerated jovie as much as she could, but she certainly wasn’t the social cat.

she was the softest cat on earth, and i fell in love with her 8 years ago with yiminy in my arms asking The Mr. “can we get two??”

oh we love you doh-doh.

we have her ashes in a (tiny) box and her pawprint (!!!  that made us bawl. we had no idea!) in our closet, where she spent much of her time hiding from life.

The Mr. & i miss our dohhy time, and yim does too.

we’re just very glad jovie handled it with no problem.

October- come & gone

First, there was this.  glad i was able to post about something in october!

then, that weekend was a fabulous birthday weekend for me!  it began with this:

i had an audience!

where i ran the 5k portion of the Peachtree City Classic.  it was my 4th “race” —which also was my FASTEST!  3.1 miles in 30:40!  woohooo.  i think it helped that The Mr. could cheer me on & bring Jovie to her first spectator sport.

the next day was my actual birthday, and we spent it doing this:

Then more of October came and went.  leaves fell, were raked and played in:

i promise in the pic right before, The Mr. looked a little happier to play

parties were attended (and FUN):

on the way to our friends' party!

party at school

the school party was fantastic! their hayride came complete with hay, and even though my girl didn’t want to participate in any of the games, she surprised the heck out of me by doing this:

yes. this is the same girl, who just last week wouldn’t even go see the animals up close on the farm, who decided to wait patiently! to ride a pony!  i really thought she’d end up changing her mind, and she did it all by herself.

i mean, look at that smile!

and when we came home from the party, we just had to wait a little while to meet her cousin sophia! we haven’t seen Stacey & Dave since jovie’s first trip to greenville for thanksgiving.  my, how things have changed:

somethin' tells me they don't get too many LEAVES in phoenix

on the way to the park in gramma & grampa's neighborhood

the girls really did LOVE each other! jovie was just being..... jovie and wouldn't sit next to her for a great shot

after a fun weekend in greenville, spending time with the family (even Uncle Nate flew down from boston!), we came home on halloween to do this:

so yeah….. october is done.  and november will be just as fun……

 

PS- my cute little kittycat has a tail for her costume. seems i could never get a great shot of her from that view.

holiday recap

what a fun holiday we all had!  it certainly helped me that The Mr. was off for 2 weeks+.  we enjoyed some family time.  since he travels so much, it was good to have Daddy focus!

one evening, i hosted a cookie exchange.  The Mr. & Jovie got to enjoy lots of time together.  this is the kind of thing that happens in daddy’s care:

mommy's markers were enjoyed

(thank goodness gramma gave jovie color wonder markers to use now).

jovie also enjoyed some family time watching Frosty the Snowman for the first time.  we learned then how far her sensitivies can reach.  not a fan of the magical.  she watched the rest of the 27 minutes reassuring herself that everything is OK.

it was fun having jovie aware of the holiday.  it is bittersweet that she is not a baby anymore, but it’s great having her be a part of our family traditions:

Eve's dinner consists of appetizers around the coffee table.

enjoying a christmas cookie before leaving some for Santa

christmas dinner at the dining room table!

(that high chair will be picked up very soon for a charity drive.   *sniff)

Christmas morning was a lot of fun.  The Mr. & i have determined that we don’t expect many other 2year olds were as patient as jovie was.  she was appropriately excited and yet still understanding that we can’t open all the toys and gadgets just yet, and to be patient while we open our gifts, too.  (in fact, some of the toys we just recently opened from their box to play).

and in keeping with traditions, no christmas would be the same without yimmy in a box:

jovie got such a kick out of this, that a few days later, she brought the box upstairs to where he was sleeping.  and yes, he did use it.

the adults’ christmas was also good.  i’ll leave it to you guys to decide who had a better christmas:

that would be a soup mug

these- are NOT soup mugs. they are considerably more sparkly.

we had a lot of fun with gramma & grampa, and feel very fortunate that they are willing and able to spend so much time with us.

a girl & her cat- a photo story

here is just a sample of jovie’s desire to be with yiminy, and his tolerance:

july 18th:

minding his own business

i think it started with the cup.  he was just resting.  jovie decided he must be hungry and gave him everything she was playing with from her kitchen.  one at a time.  he allowed it, and stayed put for quite a while.

10 days later:

sleeping on the carpet- at first

jovie decided-what? he wanted to do laundry?? 

well, she was happily playing with her laundry, and maybe thought he’d enjoy the game as well?

"here's more, yim"

10 seconds later…

clearly, he needs more laundry....

 …she doesn’t notice he’s gone.

if you see that bucket of stuff emptied out by the front door, she had already been contentendly playing near him for a good while.  but this game, maybe he’d play with her. 

i guess this is the point it became less about him, and more about the mountain she made:

"climb the mountain"

she's admiring her handiwork. hoping all this will clean itself up.

she spent a lot of time in the hallway while i got work done, putzed around on the computer, probably IM’ing The Mr. 

yim never did come back to play (or help clean up).

she loves him, anyway:

august 1st

a girl & her cats

sometimes it makes me so sad to know how much jovie loves her cats. 

she likes to be aware of what they are doing & where they are.  she loves to find them in the morning to say “good MORNING!” in her high-pitched squeal.  sometimes when she’s still sleepy from nap or bed, she’ll lay her head on my shoulder and quietly say “go see dohhy?” (or yiminy).

jovie likes to talk about the kitties and things they’ve done-  “yim was in the bushes… daddy had to find him”, or “dohhy is hiding??”.  she gives them their treats (under careful supervision), she finds them to say goodnight, & she’ll proudly narrate for me the fact that “i sitting next to yiminy”; especially when he’s resting on the hallway rug. 

problem is, they would usually rather keep their distance.  and now that she is an actual talking, mobile kid, neither one can exactly understand jovie and vice versa.

at the very beginning, we were completely impressed with yim & doh because they seemed to sort of accept this baby we brought home. 

yiminy's first investigation

even doh- who is extremely elusive & skittish.  day one bringing jovie home, once she began to cry, doh shocked me by coming downstairs to investigate, when the more likely scenario would have been for her to turn invisible.  (that’s the term we use when we plain can NOT find her ANYWHERE… it happens often, and it baffles us completely).

doh is investigating why a 4 day old jovie is in this cradle piece in the bathroom (listening to the shower)

they have always been very good with jovie.  and, as they watched her grow,  they learned to stay away for a long time b/c her screams would let them know not to bother.  they even learned sometimes our mood was not to be messed with.  as jovie began to sit up and notice them, she began her love affair.  i remember when she would finally notice yim walk by, she’d stop whatever she was doing (not much) and just watch.

when she started to crawl, she wanted to be near them.  and both of them would let her (tho i have no pix of doh with jovie).  her first word was even “kii kii” . 

buddies. september 09

they always loved all her apparatus in the house. i have so many pix of the kitties in all of her things- snugged up so good. the only thing they’d never been in is her crib.  they seemed to sense that was a definite no-no.

but, now. oh, it makes me sad that all she wants is to be near them.  (she seems to get that there’s less of a chance to be w/ doh, so yim gets most of her attentions).

and although he is great with her, yiminy is becoming a little less accepting.  so it makes me sad to see him get all snugged up somewhere, and then jovie comes and finds him, sits next to him, reaches out to pet him and he gets up and leaves.

sad for yimmy. and sad for jovie.  cuz then we get inundated with “where’s yimmy?  hi, yim!  go see yiminy??”

jovie is relentless, and doesn’t always understand that yim’s in no mood to play. or that he gets feisty and wants to play like he does with daddy.  which, The Mr. calls a “high five”, but it’s really him baiting yim to jump up and claw/bite at his hand.  jovie loves this.  i, however, do not want jovie to be on the other end of a yimmy high-five. 

she doesn’t sense his moods and has been very gentle with him, only for me to suddenly hear “yimmy scratched you?” because she didn’t realize he wanted no pets.  and she’s been great with the very few scratches he’s given…. she’s only cried once, when it scared her.

she knows when they want to go outside.  she will say “it’s ok, buddy. can’t go outside.  it’s too hot” .  she likes to look for doh, and we think it’s a major accomplishment when doh takes a pet or 2 from jovie.  or when she’ll allow me to pet her and make her purrrrpurrr while i’m holding jovie.  (jovie LOVES that!)

they all love each other in their own way.  but it makes me sad that we can’t get her to understand why now is not a good time to play with them.  or follow them.  or let them talk on the phone as one is being THRUST into their face. 

so on days when i watch one always chasing the other- just out of reach- i especially like seeing things like this occur:

clearly she enjoys this, too.

 

*oooh how fitting that in the middle of posting this, i had to go see why it was so quiet.  she had already tracked yim upstairs. so he came downstairs.  she then followed him into the laundry room.  & she’s usually excellent about knowing her boundaries…  but i walked in to her picking the food out of his bowl and dropping it in his water or litter.  awesome.  luckily, she didn’t play in the litter or anything. no worries there. 

but 2 days ago, it became questionable (and i’m about 73% certain that she didn’t) if she ate one of his treats, as she sat next to him with his treat bottle closed next to her and a giant grin on her face.

animals!

a week or two ago, jovie & i went with some other friends to Noah’s Ark which is an animal rehabilitation center & children’s home that is fairly close by us.  it’s pretty neat what they do there- letting both the animals & children rehabilitate each other.

i haven’t been to a zoo in over a decade, and the animals here were close by.  well, if you can look past the double fences.  although, as you’ll soon see, some animals were TRULY close by.

jovie liked it for the most part.  she was not a fan of the peacock who (naturally) got scared (of all the bigger kids trying to chase/hold/pull it).  have y’all ever heard a peacock?  no?  yeah, well i hadn’t either.  maybe they’re not so bad when they’re not so scared.  or maybe that LOUDNESS is their normal voice.  jovie was not a fan.  at all.  and its noise was quite grating.  she loved seeing it strut its stuff.  and she laughed when he jumped on the table.

"look! peacock"

she kept saying “shiny!” because up till now, her only encounter with a peacock has been in the book Tails.

we strolled around a lot and saw a smorgasbord of animals.  though pretty cool in concept, i was a little disturbed that you could hear the electricity in the fences of the lions, tigers, & bears [oh my!]

ostriches are tall (duh) and have no regard for their eggs that they just happen to lay wherever.  and they don’t sit and hatch them like you would imagine.  or even put them in a nest. 

the wolf looked pretty.  much like a husky-dog or something.  so it’s a little odd to try to relate to it and say “big bad wolf…huff & puff etc.”

the monkeys were playful (too playful for my camera to find a good shot).

and jovie thought it would be fun to follow this duck:

but i couldn’t get her out of the stroller fast enough to be near the bunny that somehow escaped where all the other bunnies were.

buffalo & emu aplenty.  plus 2 massive massive snakes, and quite a few parrots/birds.

when asking her about her day and what she saw? …..  “kitty”.

because, yes.  when we went in first thing to give our donation & sign in, the owner’s kitty cat was up on the counter.

guess i coulda just stayed home with these 2 pals: