In the land of "Awwww"

Those of you who don't like cute blog entries, run now. Consider yourself warned.

Here's an excerpt from a recent e-mail I received from nephew J. (3 years old)

c,cfd fff'
s
'////////cXc? cX????Cv... '/x/d''ee'dfdd'ddd'xddxs'
[sizable snip]
jj j j jj j j j j j j jj j j j j j j j jj jjicxZ
z"
Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzx
xxxxxooooooooooooxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
xoxoxoxoxopxoxoxoxoxoxoxooxo Love, J

I'll admit things got a bit repetitious at the end, but that's pretty much how three-year-olds are, isn't it? ("but why? why?")

Here's a recent picture of my nephew E. Some kids get cars when they turn 16; E. got his first car at age one (a birthday gift from my parents). My nephews live in the country of Texas (aka God's Country), but I don't let that stop me from visiting as often as I can. Who can blame me? Look at that gorgeous smile. And J is well on his way to a fantastic blogging career; that's obvious. When I don't visit I keep up with both of these guys on the phone. I tend to have to monologue a bit more with E than with J. Although I spend a lot of time saying, "Hmmm? Auntie's not sure what you're saying. Could you say that again? [giving up] oh? Wow!"

Moving onto the kitties:
My kitties have been a challenge lately. They've gone from sleeping curled up together and grooming each other regularly to hating each other's guts. This in all of about 2 or 3 weeks time. Troubling (to say the least) for this doting mom. I took them both to the vet, and had $120 worth of blood tests run on Max but he's healthy as...a cat...

My vet suggested I keep them indoors (they're 99% indoor cats anyway, but when the weather gets nice I let them outside, supervised, of course) because maybe another cat's markings are troubling Max, who is suddenly feeling territorial and taking it out on Sophie. Who the heck knows. So I've been trying to keep them indoors, but failing miserably.

The first pic is Sophie today, who snuck out as I was on my way in. I didn't even notice she was outside until I came back into the kitchen a half-hour later and saw her on the other side of the window, looking at me kind of quizzically. Typical indoor cat, she had no idea what to do when she got her freedom.

Next is a pic of Max hanging out with one of my perennials that is actually growing back (a whole bunch aren't - not sure what I did wrong? I'm still learning the gardening thing).

One last kitty pic. No, I'm not strangling Sophie. She's actually letting me pet her chest and sort of hugging my arm (she used to be a ferral, skinny, sick homeless kitty I adopted right before she was about to be put down, so she's not the most huggable kitty in the whole world). Awww.