The New Additions

I realized I forgot to include our puppy's name in my previous post. His name is Oscar. We got him from a family and they had already named him, but I like it. He's used to living on an acreage, but is doing well adjusting to city life.

He's been with us for three days and has already been to see the vet for his shots. He goes on July 6 to have the snippity-snip, and then back two weeks after that for a booster and rabies shots. In his short time with us, he's also taken his first swim in a pool. He ran straight into our friends' yard and headed for the pool. The cover was on and I guess he thought he could walk on water. Craig managed to fish him out.

I took him yesterday to get him a bigger kennel and also got his face shaved and nails clipped. Here's his new look.

I also had to call a tow truck service to come and let me in my car. I had left it running (didn't want the dog to get too hot) with my purse and spare set of keys inside while I quickly ran into the church. Oscar hopped up to see where I was going...and stepped on the locking button. No amount of encouragement could get him to jump up a second time. He just sat there looking pathetic and innocent with this aren't-you-going-to-let-me-out? look on his face. The towing people had a nice laugh, but made me feel better when they said it's not the first time someone had called with the same predicament.

Since I wrote the above, Oscar has been fixed and is back home with us. They sent him home with a cone around his head to keep him from irritating the incision site. That lasted all of 24 hours. By then I was done with following him around to carry him up the stairs. The cone was too big and him too short. Every time he tried to run up, the cone would hit the back of the next stair and send him tumbling backwards. While comical, probably not the best thing after surgery.

Also, I discovered he didn't fit in his kennel when I tried shoving him in and got him stuck. I had to twist the cone - and his head - to get him back out. Connor was also sick that night and sleeping on the floor in our room. It made for a VERY long night, lying awake, worried that Oscar would sneak out of the room and puke on my new living room carpet - which he's done a few times already - or that Connor would end up kicking the dog, starting a chain reaction of events, or need a middle-of-the-night emergency trip to the hospital. THANKFULLY, neither happened and Connor is now feeling better and the cone is gone.

In other exciting news (a little sarcasm there) we have another family that decided to move in with us. There's six or seven of them altogether.

This family has their nest right under our deck on one of the beams. I was outside with Oscar after it rained, and peeked under to see if the eggs had hatched. I had seen the mom and dad coming back to the nest with worms a few days prior. This is what I saw. I sat on the grass and took a bunch of pictures. After about ten minutes I heard a familiar call and turned around to see the dad returning with supper.

The next day I went out to check on them and both parents had left the nest. I was able to capture these pictures.

The chicks have all since left the nest and we see them around every now and then. Today I saw one hop into the weed bed on the side of our house and shortly after, the mamma bird returned with more worms. We're really hoping they will continue to use the nest year after year.