Why Sassy can't let go of her past...

Sassy had a 2 1/2 month stint in the pound, as a dog I probably would want to try to forget this time in my life and move on. Unless your owner is Pantera Hammond, that is. This morning before church I caught her playing "Animal Controller." You play this by dragging a dog by its collar to its crate and telling it over and over that it is going back to the pound. She obviously doesn't work for Pennsylvania's animal control, because they don't pick up strays...even if there is a rabid cat epidemic in our county.

Pantera wanted a picture with her Daddy because she didn't see one in her memory book. After I took it, she looked at her book again and found a picture with him, she seemed a little aggravated that she wasted her time taking a new one. We are all getting antsy for little Ezekiel to arrive 3 1/2 more weeks til he's due!!!

How the Little Mermaid really ends...

Today has been difficult. Pantera was fine until I mentioned that she needed to clean her room. All it entails is putting toys back into a toy box! She fussed and whined for over an hour, then she told me it was finished. We went to the store and she begged me to get her a new princess crown, I reluctantly agreed (I am SO STUPID!!!). Then we get home, I make the venture upstairs to start some laundry. Low and behold she had not touched her room! Hysterics round 2 from Pantera when she was caught and after another hour of whining and a little time in time out, she has no more toys...again.

We were watching the little mermaid the other day. When King Triton destroys Ariel's collection Pantera asked me "Why doesn't her Father like humans?" I told her "He doesn't like humans because they eat fish." This was very thought provoking and a couple of minutes later she asked "Is Eric going to eat Ariel?" I know she made it through the sequel...who knows after that. I cut Paul's hair the other night. The next morning I needed to cut Pantera's bangs. I asked her if she wanted to wear the cape and she excitedly said yes. When I put it on her she said "Ugh, get this off of me, it smells like Paul!"

On Saturday Pantera had a water bottle in her shirt. She was proud to announce to us that this was her "birth canal." She asked me where mine was and I was happy to say that unlike the whole watch incidence, I have one! Jess was the odd one out this time, haha! She stuck a bead up her nose on Saturday morning, then she freaked out when she realized she couldn't get it back out. It was a difficult situation for me to deal with, because of my past. I talked to her about why we don't stick things up her nose and had to tell her the story about when I was little. If you don't know the story, I stuck a piece of foam up my nose before kindergarten and it rotted and I smelled really bad, none of the kids wanted to sit by me in class. I had to sit in the back of our station wagon with the window rolled down so my family could breath...all normal stuff. The doctor finally figured out what was going on and pulled it out with a giant crochet hook. Pantera loved this story and has asked me to retell it about 5 times...oh if I could change the ways of my youth!!!

As you can see Sassy is in a cast. She managed to break her toe. Our mixed up hound has ended up costing more then a purebred puppy. I keep reminding myself that she's housebroken...

She's a mixed up hound!

Jess and I swore that we wouldn't get anymore pets until the kids were older. Then there were the drug deals that Jess witnessed up the street. Oh and the creepy drug dealer that introduced himself to us while we were taking Pantera on a bike ride. About an hour after introducing himself, he walks right into our backyard while we were playing soccer with Pantera...what the heck!!! We caught him pacing back and forth in front of our house the next night, so creepy!!! This is where the dog comes into play. I will be home alone some nights and I would like to sleep without as much fear.

With that we are happy to introduce Sassy. They said in the Humane Society that she was a "Hound mix." Later on Pantera got on the phone with her cousin Ryan and told him "She's a mixed up hound!" She also told me that she thinks Sassy is part Chihuahua...I don't even want to know how that happened! Pantera has been so excited to have a dog around again that she has been making up songs about it. My favorite goes to the tune of "Nephi's Courage" here are her lyrics:

The Lord commanded Samana and Pantera to go and get a dog,
from the hound and bad DiDi,
Sa-uh-uh-mana was afraid to try,
Super Tera was courageous and this was her reply,
I will go, I will do the things the Lord commands,
I know the Lord invites the way, He wants me to obey...

Very clever and mildly sacrilegious. She was petting the dog today and told me "This dog will always be by your side, and that's what family's like." Touching. She's a good dog so far, but I think she has some issues with her legs we get to go to the vet tomorrow to find out.

The backfire of the century!

I am an idiot!!! My great plan to show Pantera that she wouldn't like "Hannah Bontana" totally backfired! The above picture is of her pretending to be Hannah playing her guitar. She is crying right now because she thought I was getting on the computer to turn the show on for her. She is 3 not 13!!! She sat through an entire episode, then told me that "I am Hannah Botana and you be Hannah Bontana's friend." I hate me.

As you have probably not heard, Pantera was injured Saturday night. She was jumping on the bed and she hit her mouth and started "blooding." She was fine until I told her that I needed to wipe her mouth because there was blood. She freaked out and ran around looking for a mirror to see the blood. Then she wanted to keep the bloody tissue so she could "take it different places and people would know she was blooding." So dramatic.

This morning Pantera informed me that she likes "Hannah Bontana." We don't have TV in our house so I asked her how she knew who that was. She told me that "Lexi and Skyla like Hannah Bontana" and so does she. Maybe I will have her try and watch part of an episode on Youtube, we'll see if she really likes Hannah Bontana!

The boots with the fur...

This morning I told Pantera to go get socks so i could put her shoes on. She was upstairs for a while and she finally came down wearing her "Boots wif da fuw." She finds these pink boots from time to time, and when she gets them on you can tell she feels HOTTT! It is so funny to watch her strut her stuff and sings a weird rap song about herself. After playing nearly all morning, I told her that we needed to clean up the house. I gave her the option of playing in her room or helping me clean. She to my surprise wanted to help me clean. While I was folding laundry on the middle floor, she went downstairs and picked up almost all of her toys and brought them upstairs. I was shocked. She never cleans up her toys that easily! So I went down to clean the main level, and she was playing on the stairs with her shoes. This was keeping her entertained so I kept cleaning. Then she showed me her "great surprise" all of the shoes in the house stacked on the stairs. Why do I even bother cleaning???

On Wednesday we went to the pet store to buy nail clippers for Humper. They had two bunnies there one was huge and one was tiny. I asked the pet store girl how old they were and she said they were close to the same age, just different breeds. I told her that our bunny has stayed pretty small even though he is reaching maturity. She asked what kind of bunny he is, I honestly have no idea...he's a rabbit (I think) and that's good enough for me. Pantera was a little bothered that I didn't know what kind of rabbit Humper is. Later that day she informed me that "He is a Lowercase Rabbit, that's why he is little." She cracks me up.

Lies, lies all LIES!!!

I took Pantera to the park today. She wanted to swing, but she wanted me to push her really high. Unfortunately for her it was in a big kid swing and she doesn't know how to hold on right, so I would only push her to the point that if she fell she wouldn't break her neck. This was not good enough for her and she started telling me to push her higher in a really snotty voice. So I told her that because she can't talk nice she has to get down. She refused, so I told her we would leave to go to time out. She got down and I walked away from the swing. She then picked up a handful of dirt and threw it in my direction. I must have given her the glare of death, because she suddenly says "There was a little man by you and he called me a little boy, so I threw dirt at him!" Very clever, to bad we were the only ones at the park.

Tonight she was giving me attitude again because I was talking about her sleeping in her own bed. She got really upset with me and ended up hitting me in the face with a piece of fabric from the couch. When Jess was talking to her about what she did and telling her that we don't hit she said "I saw a squirrel on moms face and I was trying to get it off." If we were still in Colorado, I just might have believed her.

Why do people smoke???

Has anyone else had a young child who is obsessed with why people smoke cigarettes. It is driving me crazy! Pantera asks me everyday (especially if we pass someone who is smoking) why do people smoke? I try explaining to her that while everyone knows it is bad for their bodies, it is hard for some people to stop doing it and this is why we never start. She then asks why it is bad for our bodies. I explain that it makes our eyes and nails yellow, it hurts our lungs, it makes us smell and it eventually kills us. Her reply is always "Kills us...then why do people smoke?" AAAAAHHHHH!!!! Then it starts all over again. She has been talking about this for over a month now with no end in sight. Jess is worried that she is going to start smoking by 5. Does anyone have any ideas so I can explain this to her better so she will understand? Is it normal for this to bother her so much? On a less frusterated note, she loved primary today!!! She was so excited because she got her first CTR ring, and because (SURPRISE!!!) "class wasn't boring today."

That's my shower!

It's been a fun week. Pantera has enjoyed playing with Lexi and Skyla. She does ask to go to Andrew and RyRy's house from time to time. We have had dinner with people every night this past week. Pantera loves the socialization. She has also discovered the shower which apparantly is really fun. We have a detachable shower head in our shower, so she dances and sings and sprays the ceiling...much more fun then a bath!!! Although she has become very territorial over her bathroom. I was taking a shower in her bathroom the other night and she says to Jess "Were you in my shower?" He told no, she says "Who's in there then?" He said that I was, "What is she doing in my shower?" I was informed upon exiting the shower that I was no longer allowed to use it.

I picked up a local newspaper and found this ad in the classifieds, it made me laugh. If you can't read it from the scan it says "Wanted: Little Red Riding Hood ceramic items, figurines, Shakers, any ceramic item in the shape of Little Red Riding Hood. Call 724-439-3663" It's to bad that they want them to be ceramic, because I have a ton of Little Red Riding Hood figurines, but they are wood...what the heck!!!

Pennsylvania

It is beautiful here! The little town that we live in is interesting. They have decided to leave most of the houses as original as possible (on the outside) to keep the "mystique" of the old coal mining town. Some are very cute, some are not. There definately has never been an HOA here. Our house is cute outside and gorgeous inside!!! The landlord was so nervous that we weren't going to like it. I feel like I'm living in a nice hotel, everything is so white and clean! I can't believe that we live here, I am so used to our ghetto places. And our fridge was stocked with lunchmeat, bread, milk, juice, apples, popsicles, and other things. Did I mention our landlord is amazingly nice?

Pantera is very excited about her new pet cat, his name is Pluto. The best part is that we don't have to feed him or change his litter box. I walked outside yesterday morning and there were about 5 cats in our yard. They live in the trees and just come and go. As long as we don't get ticks that's fine with me and Pantera thinks she has a new pet.

New house!!!