Thursday, June 21, 2012

An Explanation

Being over 40, childless, and living with three cats classifies me as a crazy lady.  Being married doesn't save me from ridicule or judgment.   I could argue that having three cats is not in any way related to being childfree, but I'm not sure I completely buy into my own argument.  

Facts are facts, and I'm not having kids.  So all of my emotion and love and maternal feelings are channeled into my cats.  I am not their "mother".  They are not my "children".  I am always aware that they are cats.  

However, I love these guys.  They are every bit my family as are my parents, my brother, my husband, my friends.   Delilah, Macy and Tigger live with me and I am responsible for keeping them healthy, fed and sheltered.  When I think about them in pain or unhappy, it hurts.  I want them to be happy and, in turn, I feel happiness through them.  All of these things define "family" to me.   As I watch Mr. Grumpbump watching the basketball game, and Miss Macy jump up on the couch to settle in next to him, I feel joy and love in my heart because I'm looking at my family.

I am passionate about my cats and love to talk about them.  I try to contain myself with people who aren't as understanding or enthusiastic about hearing about my cats.  I don't show them the almost 200 pictures of cats on my cell phone, although I am polite enough to oooh and aaah over the many photographs of their children no matter what.  

And, then there are the truly special friends who share the same passion for their pets as me; the ones who get excited over a new brand of cat litter or with whom you can share stories of how amazingly serene your cat looks while sleeping.  It is a pleasure to be in their company.

My cats are unique and so different between themselves as a group.

Tigger is so friendly and gregarious.  He enjoys being in our presence and will follow us around the house, to lie down wherever we are.  As the only male (and declawed cat) in the house, he's got to deal with the female bitchiness and takes it in stride.  He never seems to get mad.  Tigger is also a skilled hunter and is very clever at catching the geckos and lizards that live on our patio.
Tigger
 Delilah is so exquisite.  She knows how beautiful she is, and therefore can be as bitchy as she likes.  She wants to be the queen of the house but is confused by Tigger's failure to bow down to her.  Delilah sleeps all day but you would never call her lazy.  It's beauty sleep.
Delilah
 Macy is the sweetest cat ever, but so quiet and shy and keeps only to herself (and her box).  She absolutely believes that her box is surrounded by a force field and she is impervious to pain or harm while in this magic box.  She hates being touched and she dictates the terms upon which you will approach her or be in her presence.  I wish she felt more confident and comfortable, but until then, she has her box.
Macy
I keep these guys in my heart every day.

Tuesday, June 19, 2012

Chores Are Done; Time to Knit

In my absence from this blog, I finished a baby blanket.  Mr. Grumpbump's niece is expecting her first child, a boy, in September, I believe.  Mr. Grumpbump liked my first Gradient Baby Blanket, so I picked up baby yarn in cute boyish colors (green, blue, purple) and went to work.  I slipped the  first stitch of every row so that the edge would look cleaner.  I toyed with the idea of adding a crochet border, but I was afraid that adding it would take away from the effect of the "bleeding" of one color into other.

Here's the finished product:

For Baby Boy Swanson
I've picked up my ripple afghan to try to finish it.  It's been forever since I've touched it.  I also bought some really cute pink wool yarn for a hat for my sister-in-law.  Apparently, she's got a very small head so I have to force myself to knit it like it was for a child.  For some reason, I always want to knit bigger sizes even in the face of what I'm supposed to do.  It means that everything I knit is always too big (which is why I love blankets, throws, afghans....no sizes to worry about).

Part of my absence from blogging is because I had to get my house organized.  Things were way out of control (laundry, housekeeping, papers everywhere...) and not getting any better until one day I just cleaned one room.  One room.  And all of sudden, I could not stop.  The entire house got  cleaned and organized in a few days.  Mr. Grumpbump helped too (and he is in the process of getting our garage in a manageable state).  And now, I actually make the bed every morning; dishes get done on time; and there are not massive piles of laundry to do every weekend.  We are keeping up with the neat and orderly Grumpbump household.  It is very relaxing in a funny way.  I don't get stressed the second I walk into the house.   Now, I'm not bragging, nor am I saying that my floors are so clean you can eat off of them, because I have three cats and my house will never be completely clean.  I will always have cat hair dust bunnies no matter how much I sweep.  

Miss Macy is the biggest shedder in our house.  It's insane how much hair comes off of her.  The easier way to see evidence of that is to look inside her cat bed.  I wish I could say that she enjoyed the comforts of the soft and overstuffed cat beds we inherited from my stepmother.  No, instead Miss Macy loves her box.  A cardboard box.  I don't know how it's comfortable but Miss Macy runs to that box for safety, for sleep, for her sanity.

Macy-in-the-bo

Finding My Treasure

Now that my shawl is complete (yarn purchased during the Orange Blossom Yarn Crawl in March), it is just hanging out in my foyer until I de...