spiritsong’s blog

It's been decided that there is no possible way we can keep JoJo permanently (we're at the city's max pet limit) and no one seems to be looking for her, so the search is on to find her a good home.  She's such a sweet, affectionate girl that I know she'll make an amazing companion for someone!  If anyone is interested in adopting her, or knows someone who is, please let me know.  My mom sent these pictures out to our homeschool group, http://www.simplicitystouch.com/jojo.html, along with this message,

"We found a female Australian Shepherd mix wandering around our front yard
Tuesday, July 15th. She is probably between 6 and 8 months old. She walks
well on a leash and enjoys being with other dogs. She is good-natured --
friendly, gentle, playful -- energetic but not hyper. She is generally
well-behaved indoors but does need to be house-trained. She needs
vaccinations and probably has not been spayed.

She is not microchipped and had no collar. We've checked with the Burleson
Animal Shelter and Joshua Animal Shelter, and she has not been reported
lost. We've also been checking Pet Finder, Craig's List, and other lost pet
ads online. We need to find her family or a new home for her as soon as
possible as we are at our maximum pet limit. Please let us know if you would
like to give "JoJo" a home, or please pass this information along to anyone
you think may be interested."

It may be hard to believe, but she's actually much cuter in person!  She has the most expressive ears I've ever seen.  They seem to work independently and often do the one up, one down pose I've come to associate with a certain diva's doggie.  She also loves to snuggle and give kisses!

Nothing is definite yet, but I have a feeling she's here to stay.  Sophie is attatched.  I saw her wandering around our front yard through my bedroom window and went to investigate.  There was no owner, no collar, and the poor baby looked scared to death.  My little brother named her Johanna (Jojo for short) within minutes of taking her in.  She's obviously still a pup, probably about 8 months or so.  I think she has some Australian shepherd in her but she's very much a mutt.  A very darling mutt!  Once she met Sophie (who was delighted to have a new playmate!), Jojo completely relaxed.  We'll look for the owner, but I don't have high hopes of finding one.  I have a feeling she was dumped somewhere around here, possibly by the lake.  I just hope everything works out!  

I've tried to write about Saturday night twice now, and both times I've deleted it without posting.  It just comes out sounding so terribly negative and whiny!  It really wasn't that bad I guess.  My dad and brother, Toby, went on a caving trip with a Venture crew from San Antonio.  They spent a week exploring caves in Alabama and Tennessee, and the plan was for them to spend Saturday night at Cedar Hill State Park before continuing on to San Antonio.  Unfortunately, by the end of the week there were now forecasts for severe storms, and camping in tents during a thunderstorm was out of the question.  So what does my dad do?  He offers nine cavers our living room floor.  Then he calls mom on Friday to let us know they're going to crash here.  Oh, joy!  Mom didn't think she could handle the chaos, so she and Jeremy spent the night at my gramma's house since she was out of town anyway.  I decided to stay to make sure the cats and dogs were cared for.  And frankly, to make sure Dad didn't borrow my bedroom out of desperation!  I wasn't at all sure that everyone would fit in the living room.  They had to move furniture, but they did manage.  It was rather uncomfortable having nine strangers take over my home for the night, but I survived.  Still, I hope Dad has learned better!

I spent this past weekend camping with my family at Brazos Bend State Park near Houston, and I simply cannot express the amazingness (is that a real word?) of the place.  The trees, the marshes, the wildlife, the birds.  OMG the birds!  Never in my life have I seen such a huge variety of spectacular birds in one place, except perhaps the zoo aviary.  We've been to many beautiful state parks in several states, but this one stole our hearts like no other.  By the time we left we were already forming a plan to escape there for Christmas!  I don't have any pictures on my computer to upload here, but my mom made a lovely webpage for the trip.  http://www.simplicitystouch.com/brazosbendsp.html

This post is probably better saved for Halloween, but I'm bound to forget by then so here we go.

Here in Burleson there is a railroad track reported to be haunted by the souls of school children who died many years ago when their school bus stalled on the tracks.  (My brother swears this is a true story, but since he's my only source on this don't quote me on that.)  According to the story, if a car stalls on the tracks where the children died, the ghosts will push it off the tracks to safety.  Spooky right? Well according to my brother this is absolutely true.  He and a friend of ours decided to test this out last Halloween night.  They stopped the truck on the tracks (windows down to listen for trains), and waited.  Nothing happened.  Then they had the bright idea to shut off the engine.  After all, they'll only push you off the track if you've stalled remember?  Amazingly enough, the moment the engine went off the truck began to roll off the tracks.  I remain sceptical, but I have to admit that's spooky.  They swear their going to drag me along this Halloween to prove their not nuts.

According to the rest of the story, there is a tree a little ways down the road (right in front of Mainstay Farm) where the parents of the dead children hung the kids' shoes as a memorial.  Ever since then people have been adding shoes to the collection.  We drove past the tracks and the tree Thursday afternoon, I swear it looks like the tree is growing shoes.  I even saw an iceskate up there!  Most of the shoes looked very modern, but a few of them looked like they could be the "original" shoes, if they even exist.

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Goodness!  A lot has happened since my last post.  Now I feel overwhelmed.  Where to start?  I suppose I'll just cover the basics to catch up.

1. I AM NOW A TEXAS WESLEYAN STUDENT!  It's official.  I went to orientation on Sunday and got a student ID (which looks a bit better than the one I got at TCC, thank heavens) and a parking permit, and I registered for my classes.  I'll be taking:

Recital Lab

Music Theory

Choir

Voice

Piano

Music History

Elements of the Arts

Opera Workshop

English Comp. II

I'm in awe of the fact that I only have one class that is completely non-music oriented!  I'm incredibly excited to be going to Wesleyan, but also very sad.  TCC has become a second home and family over the last two years.  It's one of only a very few places I've found where I felt completely accepted and loved without feeling like I had to change or hide anything about myself.  I will visit.  Often!

2. Finals are in full swing with three down and two to go.  The two I was most dreading, history and algebra, were both yesterday.  I passed both with an A in history and a C in algebra.  Normally, anything below a B would be enough to make me shed tears, however algebra is in exception.  I passed, it will transfer, therefore I am a very happy woman!

3. We had to rescue a baby cardinal today after the poor thing fell out of the nest during this morning's storms.  The poor baby was huddled in a corner of the front yard while the parents fluttered around in the tree looking on anxiously.  The nest was in a large photinia plant, and just out of our reach.  We carefully got the bird into a container and were about to attempt to reach the nest with the aid of a step-ladder when we had an unexpected visitor.  Our ex-neighbor, Tim had come by to pick up a computer he's left with my dad.  Tim has been in Louisiana for several months, so we were not at all expecting him!  My brother was glad to gave a chat with him, but more importantly, Tim is a TALL man!  He was glad to help us with our bird rescue effort and was able to carefully place the baby back into the nest without the use of the ladder.  Funny how the universe sends you exactly what you need, just when you need it!

Toby got some cute pictures this afternoon while I was spending some cuddle time with our new sweetie, Sophie.  She's been with us for over a month now and it's already becoming hard to imagine our home without her!  Sophie went to the vet this week and they said she's only a year old.  Still just a pup!

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My recital dress!  And it was really quite painless.  Mom and I headed out the door with two pages worth of resale and consignment stores around Fort Worth, but we never even had to leave Burleson!  There was only one place in Burleson on our list.  It's called Gypsy Trunk, and we'd never been there before.  It's nestled among the other shops in Old Town.  Anyway, they had a whole wall full of formal dresses and before I knew it, I had a whole armfull of dresses to try on.  This one fit perfectly, and it was only $17!!!!!  Mom and I were completely prepared to spend the entire day searching for a dress, and we found one right here in town.  In just over an hour.  Miracles do happen.

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My recital with Rachel is on Monday after next, and the search for the perfect recital dress how now begun.  I looked at every store I could think of in Burleson today with no success (who decided that eye-straining flower prints should be "in" this spring anyway?).  

Later, at home, I got a huge surprise when my mom suggested that I could wear one of her old prom dresses (she has two.  one from her prom and one from my dad's).  I think I've had a secret desire to try those dresses on ever since I first spotted them in her closet as a little girl, so I'll admit I felt a thrill of excitement at the prospect.  It would have been so neat to wear my mom's prom dress in the recital!  Unfortunately, it didn't work out.  Apparently mom was a size smaller at my age than I am.  I actually managed to get one of the dresses zipped, but I feel quite sure that any attempt to draw a breath adequate for singing would have resulted in some popped seams! 

So, the plan is to spend tomorrow dress hunting (and hopefully it won't take anywhere near the full day!).  We'll be armed with a list of every promising resale and consignment store in Fort Worth, and plenty of music to keep us going.  Now to fuel up on sleep...

Introducing my "Memory Box."  This is where I keep the small treasures that remind me of special people and special times.  I painted it myself and started filling it up when I was 12 or 13.

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Take a peak inside!

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This is a stamp from Thailand.  When I worked at Camp Timberlake in 2005, one of the other councelors I worked with was from Thailand.  When she received mail from home she would cut out the stamps to give to her friends.  It was so fun working with her!  She even spent several weekends at my house over the summer, which was really neat.

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My baby teeth.  Enough said.

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This came off of a plastic ring given to me by my best friend in kindergarten. 

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When I was very little, Toby had to be admitted into the hospital with severe asthma.  While my parents were dealing with that, some family friends of ours took me to spend the day in Dallas.  We ate at that restaurant in that building that looks like a skinny tower with a ball sitting on top (gosh, I don't know what it's called!)  I thought it was completely cool that it was actually spinning.  They also took me to the mall and I remember going into a store full of pretty rocks and stones.  They told me to pick something to take home with me, and I chose this one little green stone.  It wasn't as impressive a choice as they hoped I would make, but I thought it was pretty!

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This is one of my favorite items in the whole box.  It was given to me by Tim, "the bug guy" while I was volunteering at the Dallas Zoo.  There's a place in the Children's Zoo called the Nature Exchange, where kids (and adults) can bring in nature items for points, which they then use to get other nature items.  Apparently, while Tim was working the Nature Exchange that day a kid brought in a worthless piece of old wood from a fence or something (I'm sure he/she got points just for effort though).  I was standing in the office one day when Tim comes out of nowhere and sticks this inch-long piece of wood into my hand, saying, "Now you can't say I never gave you anything."   I asked him what it was and he said, "antique wood!"  I don't think he ever expected me to keep it, but I cherish this sliver of wood as a reminder of a place close to my heart.

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