Tristan, Travis and Hannah - getting so big!

My neice and nephews are about 2 1/2 years old now! Time sure flies when you've got such cuties in the family.

Here they are enjoying their new splash pool at their Nana's house...


And after the swim, a light snack...

Mmmmm...toes.

"The Birds"

Here are some photos from our recent bird adventures. These photos involve Bird #3, since birds # 1 and 2 had already come in the house from under the refrigerator and been safely relocated out the back door. The count still stands at four, which means we have had 24 bird-free hours since the last invasion. Keep those fingers crossed, people!

Disclaimer - these photos might make one think that Toby did all the work on bird eradication, but let the record reflect that Bill and I performed a substantial amount of the work while Toby was hiding (he would say seeking refuge from the stress of the day) in the garage. In fact, upon noticing the crazy fluttering noises coming from the chimney and sticking his head in to look around, Bill was kind enough to say something along the lines of, "Toby doesn't like spiders, does he?" prompting a thirty minute pre-bird-eradication spider eradication. Then I spent half an hour with my head up the chimney, having fastened a mirror to the end of a fireplace tool in an attempt to look around the unique angles found only in a 70 year-old brick fireplace. Then, when Toby came in from finishing his work in the garage, he very happily joined in on the action by........


....taking the obvious course of action - donning a full haz-mat suit, goggles and bird-flu prevention mask, and looking around.


......then fashioning a bird net from a laundry hamper, a dust brush, some twist ties and a hanger (a la MacGuyver), and looking around.

....and finally jutting said bird catcher around in the chimney until the bird either escaped or froze in terror only to re-emerge 24 hours later as Bird #4.

Here is a nice shot of Bill enjoying the show.

Sad Sadie at the realization that she was not having birds for dinner.

We've patched the hole under the fridge, blocked the vent into the basement and closed the chimney flue, but we have little doubt that those intrepid birds will figure out another way in. :)

Bird Count

Four. The last one appeared as we were visiting with a neighbor. No clue how it got it. I have visions of returning from our trip to furniture and floors covered with bird poo and feathers.

More wildlife - but this time, in the house

With any luck, I'll soon be posting pictures of our latest adventures at 316 S. Margin Street. Since we returned from Autumn's wedding on Sunday afternoon, we've had no fewer than three birds in the house (or one very persistent bird trying all avenues to gain entrance). We've had up to two birds under the refrigerator (!), one bird in the chimney and all or some of those same birds in the basement.

I took lots of photos of yesterday's bird-eradication event, which involved vacuuming the chimney the remove the 1,000,000 spiders who lived there (Bill and me), flailing at the sound of crazy fluttering wings (mostly me), haz-mat suits (Toby) and Sadie hoping that the bird would escape the chimney and fly directly into her mouth.

Home ownership is such an adventure.

Congratulations Autumn and Dave!

The Coopers had an absolute blast at Autumn and David's wedding at Fall Creek Falls this weekend. The law school crowd was in rowdy attendance, and the dance floor was the place to be. Autumn looked gorgeous in the gown that she designed herself, and she rocked a side-ponytail like nobody's business.

The Coopers fell down in the photo department, but here are links to other folks' blogs with some pictures -

Jess's blog with a great shot of the law school crowd - http://harristelligmen.blogspot.com/

Autumn's blog, with a sampling of photos from the weekend - http://autumnwittboydtobe.blogspot.com/

Best Cinco de Mayo Ever!

I feel like I may have missed telling everybody a vital piece of information - my brother Bill has been in town for almost three weeks for work, and Toby and I have been able to spend quite a lot of time with him recently. As Bill said, we've spent more time together in the last three weeks than in the last ten years, and we are so grateful for the time together.

Bill has been stationed near Murfreesboro, about a 35 minute drive from us, and we finally convinced him to spend the night with us here in Franklin tonight.

Franklin, our new home, is SO FUN. Tonight there was a benefit for autism research, disguised as an attempt to break the Guinness World Record for most people doing a shot of tequila at once. The event was apparently a big success (how could a benefit concert where shots are served be anything other than a big success?), and there was a representative from the Guinness Book of World Records in attendance. Keep your fingers crossed.

Anyway, what made the evening "The Best Cinco de Mayo Ever" was how much fun we had after the benefit. Bill wanted a tour of Franklin, and we made it approximately half a block before we came upon our favorite pub. An hour and a pint later I found myself stepping back and watching my brother and my husband laughing, talking and carrying on like childhood friends. In short, my husband and my brother are true pals, and it warms my heart. Best Cinco de Mayo Ever.

Nature-ific New House

Things have been absolutely crazy around here. Toby and I are keeping our fingers crossed that today will be the first day in the new house that we haven't had strangers tromping through. This week has been full of painters, movers, electricians, plumbers, handy-men and more. Here are a few photos of the plants and animals at the new house...

Here is a mama-bird tending to her baby birds in an old seed-spreader in the garage. Toby was planning on building garage doors already, but we just couldn't shut the mama out of the garage. The babies all took flight this week. They were so cute, just little fluffy things, but all appear to have flown the nest successfully!


We're glad that they left so soon, since the extremely hard rains we had mid-week led to two inches of water in the garage on Friday morning. I was not a happy camper, to say the least. Toby has since installed a wood and gravel water-mitigation system that seems to be doing to trick. Now if it would only stop raining so that we can dry out everything that got wet...

Here are some of our gorgeous roses! These ones are in the back, between the garage and the house. We also have some hostas, grasses, bleeding-hearts and other plants in that area.

Here are our knockout roses in the front yard! They are impressively prolific and just gorgeous. Everyone on our street seems to have these roses, but we have the most by far! We also have lilac, wisteria, lirope, hydrangeas and the remnants of tulips and daffodils in the front yard.

I'm planning to post before and after pictures of the interior soon, just as soon as we have a break to take them. We are having so much fun fixing up the house already!