A little taste of England...

I went out to get the mail this morning and found a package from ENGLAND waiting for me...


I recognized (aka recognised) the handwriting on the box immediately to be that of my dear childhood friend Claire. Is it strange that I can still identify her handwriting instantly even though I haven't lived in the same country as her for almost 14 years and haven't seen her in at least 5?

* Note, I realized (aka realised) later that I could have just looked on the side of the box to see who sent it to me and what was in it. Ha!

Anyhoo, I opened it up and found THIS!


Okay, so it was wrapped a lot better than that - but I tore into it fast because I was so excited!

Essentially, it was a box filled with English candy (aka sweets.) AMAZING!

To top it all off Claire had found the perfect birthday card... covered in sweets...


I sat on my porch and cried. Yup, I'm a little emotional these days! I was just so overwhelmed by her thinking of me, especially with everything that's been going on in my life lately.

It got me thinking about how many people I've been able to reconnect with, or connect more with through this blog. I can share a little insight into my life - good and bad - with friends all over the world. That's really pretty amazing! Claire and I have always done a generally decent job of keeping in touch, considering it's been 14 years since we lived and went to school together, and that we were just 12 or 13 when I left and moved to the States, but we've done such a better job through Facebook and this blog. It's so great!

So thank you Claire, and all of those of you that touch my life daily through this blog. Happy Friday!


(I searched for a half hour to find a photo of Claire and I. I was looking for something really old school when we had really old school bangs (aka fringes) and wore sassy vests (aka waistcoats) and leggings (WAIT! Isn't that back in style?!) but all of my old, old pictures are at my parents house. This photo was taken when my brother and I went to England for a visit after I graduated college in 2004 - I think??)

PS) Claire - seriously, when did Opal Fruits become Starburst?! They have always been Starburst here, but the flavors weren't the same. Thank goodness the English Starburst still have the English flavors. YUM!

Kitty Update

I'm trying not to let this blog become all about the kittens - but since so many of you have been asking about them, I figured I'd give you a video update. Enjoy!



PS) I've even contemplated starting an entire new blog - just for the kittens - but I figured that might be a little overboard! : )

PPS) I've added a little kitty ticker at the very bottom of my blog. Scroll all the way down to see!

Adventures in my own back yard

Well, not literally my back yard. But pretty darn close!

You see, we walk Bella to the dog park relatively often. It's about 1.2 miles from our house. Especially now that it's summertime, walking there and letting Bella run around for a half hour and then walking back is just the right amount of exercise to wear her out. And as they say, a good dog is a tired dog!

Yesterday Heather, Lily and I took Bella for a walk down to the dog park. The park is situated right next to a little school that I always knew was there but had never paid much attention to. Heather was curious as to what school it was, so we veered left on our way out to take a look.

As soon as we walked that little bit to the left we made an AMAZING discovery. A huge community garden that I had no idea even existed!




After reading the signage, we discovered we were allowed to walk the trails around the plots as long as we didn't enter actual pots. We had a great time oohing and aahing at all of the wonderful, delicious looking produce that was being grown.

Some plots were very well organized, while others were a little overgrown!



We chatted with this gardener for a few minutes.... he was picking collard greens...


He said that for one huge plot (seriously, they were huge!) for a season it was just $50 to rent, which included access to a water supply. Amazing right? Heather and I mused how great it would be to split a plot and get her kids involved in taking care of it. This coming from me, who can barely keep her six tomato plants + hanging baskets alive... : )

The produce was really amazing. There were a few flowers in there, too...








It was so neat! Not far off the road, it felt miles away from civilization. It was truly magical to stroll around and see all of that locally grown garden-goodness.

Weekend Fun at Taste of Grand Rapids

I was pretty needy this weekend. Thank goodness for the Bylsma's who came over on Friday, and the Hill's who - well - they spent pretty much the entire weekend with us! : )

I needed to stay busy and keep my mind off things - so we headed down to our city zoo on Saturday for an event called "Taste of Grand Rapids."

It was essentially a huge fair of food. All kinds of food booths from local restaurants with samples and food for sale. We bought food and beverage tickets at the door and went to town!

Delish! Thanks for the fun, Hill's! : )

Introducing Our New House Guests...

There have been many tears shed over the past three days. I've gone through emotional ups and downs and sat in the grey area in between the two.

And then everything changed. Sort of.

As Travis was walking Bella yesterday morning, he heard crying coming from the side of our house, where the bushes, weeds, and brush is all piled up in between our house and the neighbor's.

He called me and I came outside to see. We carefully walked back into the bushes to discover a little pile of kittens. Yes, kittens.

And when I say kitten I mean - really - kitten. These little ones had their eyes closed and were squirming around on top of each other.

We had no idea what to do.

Leave them? What would happen to them? Was the mother coming back? When?

So maybe we should bring them inside. But then what? Where would we put them? What should they eat? How do we care for them? What if the mommy came back and her babies were gone?

We called several animal shelters which were all closed. We called the vet who referred us to the animal shelter. We were stuck.

But not so much. You see, our neighbor and her girlfriend work for Carol's Feral's. A non-profit that does trap, spay/neuter and release work with feral cats. They also rehab cats and place them into homes if/when appropriate.

We called them and left a message.

Thinking we could cause more harm than good moving them at this point, we headed out to meet the Hill's (more on that later...)

Carol called us a couple of hours later - and by the time we got home they had retrieved the cats and were beginning to feed them. They explained that their organization and many others are 100% full of cats and kittens right now, and running out of room, foster parents, and homes. I already knew I was going to foster them.

How could I not?

I figured, hey - I'm out of work, I will have all the time in the world. Carol's Feral's provides their food, medicine, and later on their shots and spay/neuter surgery, so it wouldn't cost me anything.

Maybe I'm crazy - but it all felt like a SIGN. A sign to stop moping around and move on already.

And so the madness began. I feed them every 2-3 hours, around the clock. I'm constantly replacing heating bottles and wandering upstairs just to make sure they are still breathing.

After all, the ladies informed us that it is NOT expected that they live. They are about a week old, and very vulnerable. They were cold when we found them, and one even still had its umbilical cord attached. They said we should be prepared to lose one, or all of them.

The grief I was feeling about my job left me the minute these babies entered my home. Sure, I'm still sad, and I'm still processing, and I really have no idea what's in store for me, but just taking care of these kittens is giving me a new sense of focus, something to take my mind off of me and my situation, and a whole lot of perspective.

After all, if these babies can survive THEIR adversity, I can sure as hell survive what I am going through.

So without further ado, here they are: