37th Street Christmas lights, once more (December 14, 2021)

Cheryl, the unicorn, and me on 37th Street

I'm a babushka doll!  Lee and I brought babushka dolls back from our honeymoon in the Soviet Union in late December 1974, early January 1975.

Taking Christmas universe wide.

 

Everyone's gone home. So quiet! (December 12, 2021)

Zephyr was settling in for a nap until I disturbed her.

 New favorite wine, introduced by Jim and Jan Roberts at Ryder's graduation get together.

Hard to say "until we meet again" (December 11, 2021)

I miss this crew already!  We had a last night together at their Air B&B on West St. Johns.  Sarah Howell came over too.  They left early the next day, Sunday, December 12.  After Papa Tom left for work at around 6:45 a.m., I zoomed over hoping to catch them and was so excited to see the rental car still in the driveway.  Got to spend a few more precious minutes with them.  I'll be in Asheville in March 2022 over part of the kids' Spring Break while Ryder and Brandy join friends and fellow Beto supporters in El Paso.
 

37th Street Christmas lights (December 10, 2021)

The 37th Street Christmas lights are back!  Papa Tom lived in this very house with his brother Jim and several guy roommates when he first moved to Austin from Amarillo around 1971 to attend UT.

Papa Tom's house has its very own Georgie on the doormat, just like we do at our house.

The Stuffed Animal Rescue Foundation headquarters. Yes, SARF is real.  Read all about their mission at thesarf.org.

It's SkeletorClaus!

River and Mya safely hanging with non-abductor aliens on our planet, not their spaceship.

Of course.  It's Texas, y'all!

Sock monkey nativity scene. Remember sock monkeys?

Willie Nelson's Christmas tree.

Live music.  Because.  Austin's the self-proclaimed live music capital of the world.  The world, y'all!

Joy to the Weird from River, Mya, Brandy, Piper, Ryder, and Papa Tom. 

Papa Tom and me under the disco ball.

Remembering Texans who lost their lives in Winter Storm Uri in February 2021. We were without water for 8 days, the first 5 days because we shut it off at the street to prevent pipes from freezing, the last 3 days because City reserves were too low thanks to everyone else (not us!) dripping their faucets for days.  Sigh.  We were only without electricity for about 16 hours but did have natural gas so closed off the kitchen and boiled snow for steamy heat. The temperature in the rest of the house was in the 40s. Austin had below freezing temperatures for 164 hours that week. 

Meanwhile, our esteemed Senator Ted Cruz fled to a sunny resort in Mexico for margaritas on the beach.  He claimed there wasn't anything he could do for his freezing constituents so there was no point in him freezing too. OK, he didn't say that last part. But he didn't stay and try to help.
 

Waiting for Rainbow's furever home (December 10, 2021)

 

Fox and I fostered Mama Rainbow and her 5-day-old kittens starting on September 6.  She was finally clear of ringworm at the beginning of December.  I contacted all who had expressed interest in adopting her to let them know she was clear.  Captain Kai came through!  I didn't take a photo of Rainbow leaving but it was a moment of great relief!  As I write this on January 20, 2022, I can report that Sunny aka Patches (because he lost so much hair due to ringworm) is living happily ever after in cat condo luxury; that Spot aka Sarge aka Surge was adopted at the beginning of January; that Storm aka Twinkletoes aka Tiny Chef aka TC was adopted by me for Fox in November; and that Sunkist aka Tortie aka Sandy/Collette, was adopted by me on January 17 after being returned to APA by her first adopter and getting no takers from the approximately 30 who inquired after they found out she has ringworm.  Currently it's only on her tail but TC pretty much still has it all over.  He's on oral meds for 2 weeks, until January 30.  I've learned to do the lime dips on Tuesdays/Fridays to kill the spores.  

Thank you, Al, Joyce, and Danny! (December 10, 2021)

Thank you so much for remembering us through the year and our baby bees.  We're unconventional beekeepers for sure, counting on Mother Nature and the bees to get it right.  We interfere very little with the hive.  We do supplement with sugar water through the hot, dry summer, and pollen patties in the late fall and winter.  We also treat for varroa mites.  But we don't routinely inspect the frames, believing the bees are happier (do bees experience happiness?) and more productive the less we smoke the hive and pull out frames.  We didn't harvest honey in 2021.  But we'll have two hives in 2022 and be sure to harvest honey and share with y'all.

Hot tea and honey in the bee cup. Tom's in the photo too! :-)

 

Austin's Park and Play (December 8, 2021)

With area kids in school on a Wednesday, we had Austin's Park and Pizza pretty much to ourselves.  Go karts first!  My first time here was for Danny's 12th (I think) birthday party.

We all rode, grown ups on one side and River, Mya, and Piper on the other.  Are their karts more slow?  I don't think so, having raced them around the track with the petal to the metal.  I think an in-shape jogger could have kept up with us.

OK, usually I'm kicking myself for riding a roller coaster.  But this one is a Goldilocks. Not too high, not too fast, nothing upside down or backwards.

Maybe not exciting enough?  

River pretended to be asleep.  

No sleeping on the bumper boats with water cannons!  That water was cold! Papa Tom waited at the fence, holding our hoodies for us.

No mercy!

Mya's got this!

Finished up with putt-putt golf.

River and Mya

 

Day of relaxing (December 7, 2021)

Taking our cue from Collette and TC we took a day off from going, going, going.  Mama Rainbow was adopted sometime during this week leaving the 3-month-old kittens to cuddle by themselves.  Those sillies were still nursing up until the day Rainbow left!

Sigh. This is the closet AFTER we organized things to make room for other things so there'd be room for everyone to visit.  Every closet in the house looks like this. As does the garage.  And the toolshed.  And the storage space under the house. Still so, so much to do!  Not kidding when I say we'll be spending at least a year getting the house cleared.
 

Georgie (December 6, 2021)

 I promise I'm not a crazy cat lady--yet.  But we do feed Georgie.  He frequently shows up for dinner in the late afternoon.  Some neighbors think his people moved and left him behind.  Other neighbors think he's a scammer who chows down at several houses.  He does look healthy, not starved.  Either way, we put his bowl off the porch on the sidewalk.  Otherwise he plops down beside the front door, making himself at home, caring less that Zephyr is puffed up and hissing at him.  The porch is hers! Papa's 21-year-old pickup is on the street.  My brother Charles's 65-year-old toy truck is in the foreground.

Georgie's portrait by Mya.  She used his photo as a guide. Great job, Mya!

Hanging out before Micah and Otis fly back to Portland (December 6, 2021)

The plague cats were returned to sun room isolation after the graduation get together.  So we moved the basketball hoop to the entry way.

Otis, Piper, and River on the tiniest basketball court ever.

Otis and Piper

Piper (8), Otis (13), River (10).  Look how Piper palms that ball!

Annual Mom and the boys photo.

My three sons.  Makes me think of My Three Sons, the 1960s sitcom with Fred MacMurray, who played widower Steve Douglas raising three boys.  He had a good job and live-in help, different circumstances than for most single moms, including me. I love my boys so much!

 

Celebrating Ryder's college graduation (December 5, 2021)

So proud of Ryder's 2021 graduation from Regis University, a private Jesuit university in Denver, Colorado. Accomplished all while working full time and being a very involved Dad.  What's he looking forward to now that college courses are done?  Sleep!  Brandy and Mya came over a little early to decorate for the graduation get together. 

And he was so close to being the 4.0 Man as memorialized on his graduation cake!  He thought his last course was pass/fail so didn't turn in one assignment.  Turns out it was graded because he was an online rather than in-person student.  So he graduated with something like a 3.95 GPA.  Still....

The Howells, the Roberts, and Roy celebrated with us. River, Mya, Lucy, and Piper hang out while Jim thinks.

Plague cats Mama Rainbow, Sunkist and TC had been isolated in the sun room due to their ringworm.  So before the party, I moved the kitties to the master bath and bleached every surface in the sun room so we could all use it during the get together.  I'm writing this 6 weeks later:  no report that anyone got ringworm.  Whew! 

Micah, Sarah, Kirk, Amon, Ryder, and Brandy on the deck.

Jake, Lucy, and Piper shot hoops in the sun room.

Ryder and I are both mid-life college graduates.  I graduated from UT School of Law in May 1994, at age 40, nearly 41.  Maybe life does begin at 40?  I met my landlord Tom that month in what has become the house of light and joy. I rented the room that is now Tom's space for the 2 months that I studied for and took the bar exam. Little did I know I'd stand on the very same doorstep 27 years later with my first-born, celebrating his college graduation.

Brandy and Ryder

Otis and Mya (I think) at the indoor hoop.

Deck talk with Ryder, Brandy, Piper, Tom, Micah, and Mya