Ostrander's Return!

One of the best things we've gotten out of our 3 years of full-timing is some wonderful friends! Dave & Marie Ostrander brought their 8-year old grandson, Ben with them during their visit this time! They didn't stay long but we had a great day out on the lake with them having a lot of "firsts" with Ben! :-)

Ben had never been out on a lake with a ski/speed boat and he'd never been knee boarding. He'd also never swam in the middle of a lake before! :-) At first he was more than a little leery, but by the end of the day he was having a great time! It was great to have Ben visit while we had our 9-year old grandson, Shae with us! They both had a great time together! Ben decided after watching Shae at his first attempt to wake board that it might be a bit much for him (I have to agree) but after watching Shaw nail knee boarding he did decide to give it a try!

We had lots of fun swimming in the lake, even getting Dave in there for a brief respite from the heat (well, I won't say what the REAL reason was)! After spending the day on the water...it was a beautiful day with great water...we put the boat away and then stopped for some pizza! It was also Marie's birthday, but she didn't tell anyone until AFTER the fact so we couldn't even surprise her with cake! We felt honored that she would want to spend her birthday with US!

Happy Birthday, Marie!

Shae...

Nothing better than a visit from your grandkids, even if it's only one of them! Shae is our 9-year old grandson who lives in Dover, DE. We last saw him two summers ago when we had him fly to Denver, CO and took him from Denver to Rapid City, SD where his mom lived. We didn't get a chance to see him last summer since we started building the house at that time. We thought we would see him around Thanksgiving, but that never worked out. We had planned on having him visit this summer but really thought it would be IN the house. We decided that house or no house, we needed to see him! :-)

Shae and I have always shared a special bond. He stayed with us for a month when he was just a year old while both his parents were off with thier respective jobs. He took his first steps with us! :-) When his mom was stationed in Okinawa, Japan it was me that picked him up in Dover and flew with him to Okinawa for the summer. We have so many memories of that time and always have such fun when we are together! In fact, when we delivered him to his mom's...he cried because he wanted to stay with us! :-( That about broke my heart, but I told him he couldn't cry every time we saw him during that stay or we wouldn't be able to come see him. He was brave, but he really wanted to be with us!

Shae must have grown 2 feet in the last two years! He's always been very tall for his age...I can remember people commenting about how much older he looked when he was still little! The bad thing about that (when he was younger) he would act his age and people thought he should be acting older! He has the sweetest personality and is just an awesome young man! Shae has always loved the water and we have done a lot of "water" things since he's been here! We've taught him to ski, wake board, and knee board. He really wanted to wake board so we borrowed a wake board. The first day we never could get his foot in the boot. Our second try we came equipped with soap and after a time or two...he got it! He really didn't want to knee board, I think he got the impression from his dad that it wasn't very fun, but after one of our friends told him how fun it was (and easy) he decided to try it! You should have seen the smile on his face! :-)

We've played a few games, watched a few movies (when we were in Japan...Shae and I must have watched "Top Gun" a 1,000 times...we've watched in twice this time) and spent lots of time in the water!

He's only here for 12 days so we are trying to enjoy each and every day!!

Sweetpea...what happened?

Today ended up to be a terrible day. It was a day of shock and sadness. I'm still not sure what happened It all started out with a phone call from my mom about her cat, Sweetpea. My mom and I got both of our cats (Sweetpea and Furby) in early March, they were 7 and 8 months old. When my mom called she asked me if I thought it was possible for a cats legs to go to sleep. Sweetpea's legs had been "twitching" since she had jumped out of the bathroom sink a few minutes earlier and she was meowing. For some reason, cats like to lay in the sink. I think it's because it's cool. The only problem, our cats are rather large even though they are young. My mom thought that since Sweetpea might have been cramped in the sink, that might be the reason. I told her that I thought it might be possible, but to watch her and let me know if anything changed. About 5-10 minutes later she called again to tell me that now Sweetpea wasn't using her back legs. I had her call the vet and he agreed to meet us at his office (it was after hours).

I picked them both up and we headed to the vet. Sweetpea was meowing but I figured she was upset because (1) she was in her carrier and (2) we were going in the car. It was a few miles down the road and I thought I heard her vomit. Again, I figured it was because she was so upset...she had been meowing the whole time. I heard her do that several times, with the last time just minutes before we got to the vets. Once we got there, I opened the carrier to see if she was covered in vomit. When I looked at her, I knew she wasn't breathing. I told my mom, "I think she's gone" and she asked me what I meant. I said "I think she's gone". Just then Dr. Sartain arrived and we went inside. I told him that I didn't think she was breathing and he verified it. My mom and I stared at each other in shock. How could this have happened? What caused it? The doctor asked if she could have gotten to a plant but my mom doesn't have any inside. Then he asked if she had been outside at all (thinking that possibly she had gotten bitten by a poisonous snake) but we told him that she was strictly an indoor cat and had never been outside. He did mention a blot clot, said he'd been thinking about it as he was driving over, but he felt that the sudden onset of her symptoms pointed more to poisoning of some kind. We left there not knowing exactly what happened except that Sweetpea was gone and we were leaving without her.

Once we got back to my mom's I looked around for anything that Sweetpea could have gotten into, even checking to see if there was anything wet on the floor that might have spilled and she could have gotten into. There was nothing there. I didn't see any signs of anything that she had eaten. I didn't find anything wet or dry. There was nothing open on the counters or the floor. When I got back to the motorhome I did some quick research on the internet and I personally think she might have had Cardiomyopathy. It's a heart disease that cats can have. Unfortunately, Ragdolls are sometimes more prone to it than others. There are more symptoms that Sweetpea didn't have, but the major one, the weakness in her back legs, is often one of the most critical...and the most likely to cause sudden death.

Since Sweetpea and Furby are related (by their grandfather), I'm thinking I'd like to have him tested to make sure this doesn't happen to him. Even though we haven't had them for years, they quickly capture a place in your heart and become members of your family. I know that my mom will miss Sweetpea! Every time I went to my mom's, Sweetpea was the first to greet me at the door and always expected me to pet her and play with her! She will be greatly missed.