Leah's Growing Up.

Leah decided this week that she wanted to learn to ride a bike without training wheels. We really hadn't wanted to push her, but when she said that she wanted it, we decided that we needed to work with her on it. I think she decided it was time since our new neighbors include a girl who is probably 9 or 10 and rides without training wheels. Although the process started off as an exercise time for Rod (running after Leah and trying to hold on), Leah picked up quickly. When Rod took a break, next thing we knew, Leah was off riding on her own. She is getting better every time she tries to ride. She is still learning how to turn, but I think that the training wheels may be gone for good. I am hoping for no big crashes. So far we only have had small ones and one where she crashed into Alissa. I am very proud of her. I don't think that I learned to ride without training wheels until I was 8.

We practiced in the next door long drive. It gave Leah a long straight stretch and the other two love to ride over there too.





Since this post is mostly about Leah, I think it is an appropriate place to include Leah's latest fashion idea. She often will make her cat Harvey do more than any cat would want to. She makes him play baby and puts bracelets around his neck. However, the most recent shocked even me.

Yes, Harvey is sporting a lovely pair of barrettes on his ears. They were in there good because I didn't find him until he had been wearing them for around an hour. You can't really tell, but Leah also used quite a bit of hair spray on his head and gave him a spike hair do. When I took the barrettes out, Harvey's ears where rather squished and had barrette marks in them for quite some time. That cat is certainly very tolerant of Leah.

The Cat is Staying

For those of you who may not already know, part of Leah's Christmas present was for us to allow her to have an outside cat become and inside cat. There was one cat outside that Leah was in love with. He was a stray cat that came into our yard and Leah needed to feed and love right away. When it was warmer outside she was outside with him all the time. Then when it got cold she would play in the garage with him and beg to bring him inside. After talking to Rod and convincing him that it wouldn't be the worst idea ever, we agreed that we would do it for Leah.

I hadn't blogged about this story earlier since the cat came in the house on probation. The cat had to be able to accept living in the house and the conditions that came with it. Using the litter box being one of the main conditions. The cat did great for the first week. I was actually very surprised that he didn't try and jump on the table and counters to get food. He also doesn't scratch at the furniture or jump all over it. He was doing so good it was hard to believe. However, that didn't last. He did have several accidents in the house and he almost lost his in house status. However, after a couple of adjustments it seems like he has got it down now and he's probably going to be staying in the house. At this point, I don't think that Leah would ever let us kick him out.

The cat is still very good with the kids. There are times that he's had enough and has to get some time to himself, most of the time he is tolerant of them. When he's been ignored for a few hours he will come and find them so that they can torture him some more. Also surprising, he and my cat seem to being doing pretty well. They fight a lot, but it seems to be all in fun. It actually seems to have made my cat happier and more energetic. My cat does let him know when she has had enough.

Since the cat has come in the house Caleb has mentioned that he would like a dog. I am hoping we can put this off for awhile longer!

Leah and Harvey (yes, she did pick his name)

Alissa has to be part of the picture too. Say Cheese!

Cat Girl

Yes, Leah is the cat girl and we have a cat collection at our house!

Some of you may know that I have an indoor cat. I have had her since I moved to Columbus in 1999. She was our only cat for quite some time. When I was pregnant with Leah a neighborhood cat decided to have kittens in our attic. She got access to our attic because we were doing an addition at the time. She wasn't a friendly cat, but I am a softy for kittens so I had to see them. I gave one of them away, one died and we kept one. The mom cat disappeared, but the cat that we called Pinky stayed and was our outside cat. She was great with Leah and both Leah and Caleb played with her. However, last summer she disappeared and this made Leah very upset. Because we felt sorry for her, we let her get a kitten from my Dad's farm. Ever since last summer we've had this one outside cat.

I am not exactly sure what has happened since then, but this summer one full grown cat decided to take up residence at our house. Any neighbor cat that comes near our house is quickly welcomed by Leah and so we ended up with outdoor cat number two.

All summer we've had two cats and although I haven't been altogether thrilled with the increased number, Leah loves them and two isn't terrible. While Rod was in Colorado another kitten showed up in our yard. Leah was very eager to greet the kitten with open arms. This kitten is extremely loud and meows all the time. She loves it and when I told her that when Dad came how he was going to have to shoot it because I couldn't bear to listen to it meow all the time, she freaked out. She also promised to feed it all the time so it wouldn't meow. She of course started to feed it, so obviously that cat isn't going anywhere and now we are up to outdoor cat #3!

No, that's not the end of the cat girl story! This Sunday we were leaving for church and what is sitting over in the pine trees beside our house meowing, but another kitten! Leah makes a mad dash over to see it. She is very excited that she has found another kitten. Great! We have to pull her away from it to get into the van and head off to church. At this point, I am praying that the kitten decides to keep moving and is long gone by the time we get home. No such luck. As soon as we get home, cat girl runs out and starts calling for it. It comes running and Leah has to feed all four of her wonderful new friends! Yes, we know have 4 outdoor cats and one indoor. If this keeps up we may need to buy stock in cat food!

Here are 3 of the four. The other is near, don't worry!