Stuff We Did in March

Holy Moly – It’s worse than I thought.  I haven’t updated what we’ve been doing since the first of March.  Here goes nothing (thanks to backtracking through my Facebook posts)…

March 13th ~ Caleb went to LaLa & Pops’ house for the week because we had so much on our evening calendars that it seemed like a good time for him to go for a visit. 

March 15th ~ Nola started running a fever at daycare and I had to go get her.  She ended up having a respiratory infection and an ear infection.  I took her to the ENT to get her ears suctioned…again.

March 16th ~ Caleb’s fish, Ronnie died.  We went through the classic 80’s sitcom dilemma of whether or not to replace him with a look-alike and decided against it.  When I told him, he was fine.  After a day or two, though, it because a major issue.  He wouldn’t sleep in his bed because he missed Ronnie.  He sobbed one night because he didn’t get to say goodbye to Ronnie.  He told me that he had prayed that Ronnie would come back to life and he didn’t understand why it didn’t happen.  Ronnie was soon replaced with a goldfish named Swimmy.  All is well in the tank again.

March 17th ~ Caleb and my parents went to the St. Patrick’s Day parade in Hot Springs.  These showed up on my phone via text: 

 

March 19th ~ I met my parents to bring Caleb home.  We sang Justin Bieber’s song “Baby” about 25 times between Waldron and Rogers. 

March 19th ~ Rudy and I cringed when we found out that Caleb was playing on the Cubs t-ball team.  I nearly killed our Cardinals fan hearts.

March 20-27 ~ SPRING BREAK!!!

March 20 ~ I spent hours sorting through the kids’ outgrown stuff to sell/consign/give away.  We have a lot of outgrown stuff!  We spent some time in the afternoon walking the trail at Compton Gardens.

March 21 ~ I spent the day in Branson with my friend Stacy.  We shopped ‘til we dropped and then some. 

March 22 ~ One of Caleb’s friends came over for the day.  I decided for absolutely sure that 2 kids is plenty for me.

March 23 ~ We all packed up and went to Hot Springs for the rest of the week.  Yay!!!

March 24 ~ Rudy and I had a date day while the kids stayed with my mom.  We went to Oaklawn & out for a fabulous dinner.

March 25 ~ Rudy went to deer camp to help out with some work & stayed for the rest of the weekend.

March 26 ~ Aunt Harolyn had us all over for a family dinner.  It was fun to see the Caleb and Maddox playing together & we enjoyed catching up with our whole family!

March 27 ~ Came home to get ready to go back to school.  The end of spring break is always sad. 

March 29 ~ Caleb:  “Thunder is good.  It scares away the lightning.”  I love the logic of a 4 year old.

March 31 ~ Caleb at bedtime:  “My heart beats happy.”  I admit that I got a little choked up at that one.

Buzzy and Ronnie

We got Caleb’s first pet for Christmas.  (Well, the first pet he can remember having.)  He wanted a pet so badly and we’ve sworn off anything with fur.  I refuse to have anything of the reptile group, so we decided to get a fish.  Rudy and Caleb went to the pet store to pick out the perfect fish.  Caleb chose a beautiful turquoise betta fish and named it Buzzy.  (We have no idea why he chose that name.)
The boys set up the tank and got it all ready.  Caleb picked out a fake plant and a sunken ship that he calls a submarine to decorate the tank. 

The water had to condition for 24 hours and then it was time to let the little fella’ swim…

Buzzy lasted less than 48 hours.  We bought him on the 21st and woke up to find him waterlogged on the 23rd.  Caleb took it better than I expected.  He just asked if he could get another one.  Rudy thinks that watching all those wild animal shows on TV have conditioned him to the cycle of life.  Maybe.  Or maybe he just wasn’t all that attached.  Who knows?

The boys went back to the pet store and found out that contrary to what the previous salesperson told Rudy, bettas aren’t supposed to have filters in their tanks.  Cause of death:  Buzzy literally wore himself out.  He swam himself to death trying to escape the pull of the filter.  Read this again to make sure you understand:  Our fish swam himself to death.  Seriously.

The other possible cause of the problem could have been the water temperature.  Just to be on the safe side, Rudy bought a little heater for the tank and removed the filter. 

Buzzy’s replacement is named Ronnie.  We’re pretty sure he’s named after Pops, but Caleb hasn’t fessed up to that little evidence of hero worship.  Ronnie looks almost identical to Buzzy, but he’s not as wavy.  Ronnie is a little on the lazy side.  He hangs out by the heater a lot and seems to prefer floating over swimming.  Ronnie is going to fit in just fine around here.