I know all of you share relative insanity with me...regardless of your childrens' ages, your situation in life, your schedule...we all run around like maniacs and very rarely sit still. 

Poor Chani.  Today, she began to experience the reality of life in the Frazer household.  Right now, she sits on my lap as though she hasn't truly rested all day.  Very territorial, this puppy...protective and demanding of her Mommy time, that is.  Before I got her, I had this fear that she would attach herself to Seth...after all, Chelsea did (for those of you who don't know her, Chelsea is our 9-year-old Golden Retriever--she is wonderful, but she favors her Daddy).  I don't think I needed to worry about it.  But that last entry about sitting still?  That's why she has decided that my lap is the only lap on which she she wants to sit.  Only my arms hold a body that doesn't tremble just a bit.  And she certainly lacks no attention from my children or my husband...they won't leave her alone!  The whole "socializing the puppy" thing?  We don't worry about that.  Chani has had more visitors in the past week than the Frazer clan has had in the past two months!

So, back to insanity.  We took a serious field trip to the Corning Fire Department today.  I didn't realize until just recently that our City Fire Department was a professional, paid department.  My kids didn't realize there was a difference between our volunteer fire department and the paid Corning City Fire House.  After a morning (starting at 9, when we didn't get up until 8!)(lazy Mommy) of fire prevention conversation, a brainstorming session for questions for our tour guide, a fun fire truck craft, a coloring/review sheet, and a fire safety poem, and a tape of fire safety songs playing in the background throughout the morning, we made the 10 minute trip to the fire house...what a great experience.  The officer who led us around and showed us all the great equipment and even taught us a lot about what to do in a fire situation had obviously presented this material before...the kids were so impressed.  He even got called out on a real call while we were there!!  We had to wait about 20 minutes for him to get back (angel children...seriously).  In their transportable demonstration "house," the kids each practiced what they would do in a real fire situation if they were lying in their beds and the door was too hot to open, they got stickers to put on their bedroom windows, they saw all of the compartments in the city's brand new fire truck, and they got to see the presenter suit up in his whole uniform--so that if they ever needed to be rescued they wouldn't be afraid of the firefighter.   At bedtime, when asked what their favorite part of the day was, all three of my children answered, "The Fire Station!!!"

After the field trip, we all came back (we went with my friend Jessica, her daughter, and her cousins who are also homeschooled), had lunch while watching Flight of the Navigator (any of you who are thinking of watching this with your kids, be forewarned--there is language I didn't remember hearing in that movie when I was a kid), and got Emily down for naps. Chani was out of her crate for a whopping two hours before it was time to take the cherubs to gymnastics.  By the time we got home, it had started to pour.  So much for her walk today!!  She ran around the house for 2 hours, just ramming back and forth, chewing on toes and fingers and anything else she found along the way.  I had to put her in her crate 3 different times to calm her down--those little teeth HURT!!  so, now that she's basically exhausted, she's zonked on my lap.  Have I mentioned that she won't just curl up someplace on the floor and relax?  She needs a lap or feet or something to rest upon.  She will settle for the kids or Seth, but as soon as I walk into the room and sit down, she seeks me out.  I love it.  This is why I chose a puppy.  Eventually, she'll potty train, and at some point, she'll figure out that the floor is an OK place for a doggy to rest, but until then, she's like my newborn...and she loves me. 

I'm sure I could make a deep, insightful connection between what I'm experiencing with life and Chani and some wonderful, life-related spiritual truth, but honestly, I'm not sleeping at night, and I don't have the energy to think that hard.  I would so appreciate your prayers.  I go through these stages in my life, and I'm here again.  I'm exhausted, but as soon as I lay down, my head starts spinning, either with thought or just literal spinning...and once I do fall asleep, I wake up about every hour or so...or my children wake up.  Lainie has had a fever of between 100 and 104.3 for the past two days.  And until tonight, there was no real symptom to go along with that fever...tonight right after dinner (which she didn't eat), she threw up...but I really think it was because I gave her ibuprofen on a basically empty stomach.  We'll see.  I'm praying she sleeps through the night tonight.  And Bryson too.  I think the storms have passed, so that shouldn't be an issue, but you just never know.  :)  Life.  This is how it goes, isn't it?

Having a puppy forces the new owner to sit still.  She no longer has her brothers and sisters to play with her--she has us.  She no longer has mommy to meet her affection/nursing needs--she needs us.  She left her home, everything she knew, and got carried (in a scary, scary plastic and metal crate) into a new home, a new neighborhood, and a new town.  Not that she really cares about the neighborhood/town thing...right now she's more flabergasted by the whole concept of grass (she lived in a kennel all 8 weeks of her little life).  I take her to the back yard when she starts sniffing around and she pads around picking her front feet up really high--think North Korean Military marching style--and as soon as she gets close to my feet, she climbs up on my shoes with her back paws and puts her front paws on my shin.  She has done a good job of doing what she needs to do outside (but puppy training is just like potty training a kid...it's really training Mommy more than it's training the puppy.  You just learn their signals and run them outside), but she prefers the blacktop or the cement patio to the grass.  I don't care, as long as she goes outside.  We've learned that you have to watch very carefully when you walk through our family room.  The carpet is navy blue and she is black.  When the sun doesn't shine directly in the window, you seriously can't see her.  I can just see us spending an afternoon at the vet having a cast put on one of her little legs, or trying to explain to the kids that they crushed her...yes, she's that little.

Anyway, sitting still.  Today, I spent more time on the floor with the kids playing with the puppy than I did doing anything else.  The kids played with the puppy more than they played make-believe.  When she falls asleep, she prefers to sleep in someone's lap, and if you sit down, she will climb right up and nestle in.  I let her sleep on my lap for probably and hour and a half today.  I just sat still.  I crocheted for half an hour while she slept next to me.  At one point, she was so relaxed, she almost rolled off my lap onto the floor from where I was sitting!  The kids had her all the other times she slept.  She has only slept on the floor by herself for a grand total of probably 2 hours since we picked her up.  But I feel so much more relaxed today than I have over the past several weeks.  And the guilt of not accomplishing much is overshadowed by the fact that I got done what I really needed to get done today (with the exception of grocery shopping), the kids had a blast, even Chelsea got a walk, and all three kids took good naps.  Seth is sitting on the couch with her sleeping on his chest right now.  He's a big talker...him and all that "waste of fur" crap.  Softy.

Ahhhhhhh. 

Eventually she'll be house broken.  Or I will train myself to read her puppy mind.  And someday Chelsea will stop eating the other half of the 1/3 of a cup of food Chani forgets is in her bowl.  (Watching her is like watching short attention span theater.  She seriously gets distracted while she's chewing a bit of food and wanders mindlessly away, then suddenly remembers that there was food someplace in the room she is in.  Or was it in the other room?  And as she wanders around to find it, suddenly she finds Chelsea's water dish...lap, lap, lap...oh, there are some toes!!  I need to chew on them...oh, that reminds me...I'm hungry!  Now where is that food again?...wander, wander, wander...)  I'm so glad I chose a puppy.  Lainie told me 15 times today if she told me once, "Mommy, I'm so glad you got your new puppy!  I just love her!"  Me too, kiddo.  Sitting still is a wonderful thing.  I forgot that.

Well, if you haven't guessed it from the pictures, her name is Chani.  She's a cairn terrier/poodle mix, officially called a "poocan" by the american hybrid club or whatever it's called.  She's absolutely adorable.  Adorable.  Even Seth thinks she's sweet.  And if you know my husband, that's an accomplishment.  She's asleep on my lap right now, and she has gone potty outside 3 times (out of 5) today.  And the two inside were totally my fault.    Puppies.  Isn't she cute?

I decided that I couldn't settle.  And I couldn't have my dream camera, as my comment-writing friend so wisely called it, so in 5 years, I'll get my dream camera, and by then, I'll have my lap dog completely lap trained, and she'll walk happily next to me every morning as we walk, and my kids will come home from middle school (argh!!) looking forward to her happy tail wagging to greet them.  And I'll stand there snapping pictures in sepia, black and white, full color, and portrait with my 10x zoom and 8 megapixels.  In the meantime, next month, I'll purchase my kodak easyshare and have nice pictures to upload, print and put on my blog. 

Have I mentioned how cute she is??  The kids absolutely can't let her stay on the ground--they just have to pick her up and carry her around.  I know the novelty will wear off, but the poor thing!!  (she's loving it)

We picked up Chani from an Amish family today...it served as an excellent social studies lesson for the kids.  They have a friend who only speaks Spanish with her Father, and English with her mother, so they understood a child knowing a language other than English, but this family's 2-year-old boy only speaks Pennsylvania Dutch.  He understands English, but not well.  The mother spoke with an accent that they definitely picked up on, and she was dressed very traditionally.  She was very gracious, and very well-spoken and very accepting of us.  We actually chatted for about 25 minutes, and found that we had much in common--she was so impressed that I am homeschooling my children (as hers are all in a one-room schoolhouse)...I was very surprised by the whole situation.  I didn't understand that some Amish groups were liberal enough, so to speak, that electricity, phones, indoor plumbing, etc. were acceptable.  I understood the Amish to be very strict about these types of things.  I'm sure that's something of a stereotype now, but I know so little about the Amish lifestyle...this was a poignant reminder not to judge a book by it's cover.  The kids didn't really find it strange at all.  The only thing they really noticed was the black buggy in the barn--they asked where the car was. 

Well, Miss Chani has just done what she needs to do, and I think it's time for bed.  Seth only has to work a half-day tomorrow, so I think I'll take the cherubs to Walmart in the morning and let them choose a donut while we shop (ooohh...big treat (actually, they will think it is!!)), and we'll figure out something fun for them in the afternoon.  Thanks for listening to my chatter about the puppy.  If you have any wonderful clues about housetraining a dog...I think I kind of know what I'm doing, but I would appreciate hints!!  And pray for Chelsea...she's having a difficult time adjusting today.  It's only the first day, but I hate the thought of hurting her feelings.  She's such a good doggy...

Blessings!

Yeah, I don't know what I'm doing yet.

I've been thinking about this for two days.  Puppy or camera?

There's this little part of me that's going, "Oh, for crying out loud, what do you want a puppy for??  You have to house train it, keep it from chewing on things, feed it, take it outside in the dead of winter (and probably the dead of night for a while), walk it, play with it, find someone to take care of it if you go anywhere, crate it when you're gone, and make sure it doesn't develop any aggressive/obsessive/annoying quirks.  What are you thinking??"  And all of those cynical non-dog people are rooting for the camera.  Seriously.  At worship rehearsal last night when I told people I was praying about a dog or a camera (and then told them how silly I felt for making this an actual matter of prayer--it seems very inconsequential, but I really want to seek God's will about this puppy thing), our worship leader actually said during our prayer time, "...and Lord, please deliver Mindy from wanting a puppy..." and several other people throughout the rehearsal walked past me and just whispered "camera" in my ear.  Some didn't whisper.  See, if this just amounted to the simple issue of puppy or camera, it would be so much easier.  But the actual camera I can buy for the amount I'm getting the puppy for is settling.  It's not the camera I actually want...it's a camera I would accept for now.  I want the 8 megapixel, $1000 camera, and that camera does not fit our budget in any way, shape, or form.  When that camera drops to $300 in 5 years, I will buy it.  Puppy or not.  The camera I could buy right now would be somewhere around 5 megapixels, and would not have the lens I want or some of the features I love--it would be a point-and-shoot easyshare or something.  Call me a camera snob.  I don't care.  I have watched my brothers with their great cameras and drooled.  The pictures are just stunning!  And while the pictures from my mom's 4 megapixel easy share are nice, they just lack the wow factor of Paul and Kevin's pictures.  And when it comes right down to it, I could go to ebay in a couple of weeks and buy a used easyshare for $50...I can make 2 cakes and pay for that. 

So, puppy, right? 

And yet, here I sit, second-guessings myself still.  I don't want to just jump into this without thinking it through well.  Seth thinks I'm totally nuts anyway.  "I thought we were in agreement about this whole 'small puppies are a waste of fur' thing."  Yes, my husband is a big dog man.  The bigger the better.  He thinks our Golden Retriever is too small, despite how much he adores her.  He sees Great Danes and Bull Mastifs and Black and Tan Coonhounds (not that they're huge, but bigger than a Golden) and just nods his head as if to say, "That's my kind of dog."  I understand.  Little dogs often are yippy and annoying and hyperactive.  Then again, so are some big dogs (especially the hyperactive part).  You can have issues with any sized dog.  Just watch a half hour of The Dog Whisperer (which I currently love) (I'm totally obsessed).  I think Seth just needs a dog he can wrestle with.  He has told me he is OK with me getting a little dog, but he doesn't understand why I want one. It comes down to this:  all my life I thought I loved cats.  Then I got one.  And I quickly realized I don't love cats.  I love the idea of cats.  They're warm and soft and snuggly and affectionate.  But really, they only display those behaviors on their terms.  And those terms do not include the times when you want them to be warm and snuggly and affectionate.  Most of the time, they want you to leave them alone.  Dogs love people.  They sincerely hope they never need to leave your side.  And they get sad when they have to.  Little dogs can actually sit in your lap and snuggle with you if you want them to...they're just waiting to be invited!!  Chelsea can't climb her 60 pounds up into your lap (without hurting you), as much as she would love to. 

So there's this selfish part of me that wants a dog to sit in my lap and be mine.  And the fact that she will need a walk every day means that I will have to get my butt (and my kids' and dogs' butts, for that matter) out of the house every morning for a walk around the neighborhood.  Chelsea will get the exercise she has always needed and has never gotten, Reasa will love the idea of walking Chelsea every day, we will start the day with some fresh air and less tv, the kids and I will move our bodies first thing.  These are good things!  What makes me think that I'll actually exercise her every day?  Well...too much Dog Whisperer, probably...I want her tired out and happy.  I want to be a responsible doggie mommy.

Sheesh, this is just not this big of a deal, is it?  I'll let you know what I decide.  And I'll take the crappy digital camera to their house this morning, just in case...

If you read this before 11:00 or so, and you don't think I'm completely ridiculous for praying about a puppy, I would love to have you praying with me.