Rest in peace, Zoe.

The Dowager has died at 19.  She had a long and good life, active and content until the end. Eventually the steroids which had kept her in good health for so long did too much damage to her kidneys.

Susan got Zoe has a kitty shortly after her Mom died.  Zoe was herself separated from her mother very early, which probably contributed to her unusual personality. Susan recalls Zoe as a tiny fluffball hissing at the vet during her first visit. She mellowed in her later years.

She was a good cat and will be missed.

Springy out today so we went on a hike.

 

Had to drag Sam there, but during the hike he claimed it was the best. hike. ever.

 

Involved climbing up to wander around some train tracks, walking through a tunnel and seeing a very small waterfall and swift river.

 

 

Josh loved it. Could have run the whole way if I'd let him. In fact, he and Sam had totally different paces--Sam was always 50 paces behind and Josh was 50 paces ahead. That was at 10 seconds, and after that the distance grew linearly until I sprinted ahead to grab Josh and hollered to Sam to hurry up.

 

 

Sam spotted a geocache under an observation platform near the river. He was so excited he swapped in a matchbox car we had on hand for some little toy, and he left a little note in the log.

 

On the way back when we had to hurry so of course Sam went even slower, and at one point lay down on the trail. Josh obligingly followed suit. Josh is going to end up with some weird ideas about what a "hike" is.

 

Speaking of Josh, saw THREE TRAINS GO BY! VERY VERY EXCITING!

 

Oh, and Sam found this, which is now safely in our trash can.

 

 

(Blogger won't let me post the video, so the link to it is here)

 

Okay, and here is the video on verse two of You Are My Sunshine from the Spring Montessori presentation. When they went up on stage Josh looked around the auditorium nervously saying in his extra clear voice, "Where's Daddy?" So I went down front where he could see me. But he was so distracted by me that he didn't sing a word during Itsy Bitsy Spider. Susan tells me the teacher's aid was imploring him to sing, as he was one of their stronger Itsy Bitsy Spiderers. He warmed up during Sunshine and actually sung. However, the boy on the right started oscillating wildly at the resonant frequency of the other toddlers and by the end--well, you saw.

 

The toddlers applauding themselves and bowing all the way to the floor made it all worthwhile. :-)