Weekend Wrap

This weekend was a bit jarring and violent for my tastes.  The 2 earthquakes - especially the Big One Saturday night - were unsettling and I could not let my mind relax last night when trying to go to sleep. Remember what happened the last time I was relaxed and thisclose to sleep? Every time the house creaked or a neighbor threw something in their polycart or a kid got up to pee, my heart was racing and bracing for another earthquake.

It wasn't a horrible weekend in toto (just the time periods before sleep). Saturday morning, we hustled to Emi's soccer game which is held in the coldest/windiest part of town, and I was single momming it while Scott was working (home game). Poor little birthday girl's nose was running like a faucet so we dropped Emi off and hung out in the Disco reading and playing until halftime when we ventured out to deliver post game root beer. We thought it might have warmed up enough to hang outside, but not so. I got out of the car periodically to toss out our breakfast trash and the squillion wipes used on the Little Ones' noses but that was it. After the game (Emi's team won!), we headed home for lunch and naps and laundry.

The day got better progressively. Emi parked 2 cars in our drive earning another $20 for her bank account and I made some wonderful pumpkin delights that we all feasted on. Ketiesha came over to work on Emi's hair while the game was on (we won that game too but we lost a key player to a torn ACL). While Ketiesha was over, one of our kitties was doing this weird thing where it looks like she's wiping the window (obviously begging to come in) and I was convinced that she knew that Ketiesha was a cat person, but in hindsight, maybe she knew that there was a big earthquake coming.


Sunday morning we were up early so we thought we'd hit an earlier service at church and we ended up getting there 45 minutes too early. With a 9 year old we might have been able to grab a coffee and donut and keep ourselves entertained, but with a 3 and 4 yr old now, we decided to cruise Norman for little while. We drove past the burned up apartment buildings just off the highway...it still looks like a crime scene to me. We also pointed out the "punch buggies" along the way (David and Aubri are learning the nuances of this game and properly identifying the VW Beetles).

We drove around campus looking for signs of earthquake damage or coins/bills lost after the game (David ended up with a quarter and a penny, both found on heads!). We wandered around and took in the views.

Looking North from the stadium parking garage

Words to live by...



East of stadium (looking for our house)



Where's David?

OU Practice Field

Can you see the National Weather Center?

After church we went home for lunch. and then we headed out to the soccer fields for Emi's 2nd game of the weekend. They won again (yay!) and we celebrated by grabbing some Hot Chocolate Ice Cream from Braum's (good recommendation from a friend). After we got back home, we put a whole chicken on the rotisserie (set it and forget it) and decided to get outside and tend to some yard work while our pet chickens free ranged. This is where the weekend got violent.

I went into the back yard to grab my garden cart so I could transport concrete rocks to the back drive, when I saw a chicken fly across the back yard. Only this chicken flew a bit further than our chickens. Then I realized that it was a hawk and I saw that it had attacked one of our chickens. I called out to Scott to come back to me and scanned the yard for the rest of the chickens. As I got closer to Brown Sugar, I saw that she was not dead, but she was very torn up and I could hear Ozzie crowing on the other side of the shed.

We had to do the humane thing for her as she obviously wasn't going to make it and it was a very sad situation.  We found 4 hens with Ozzie but one was still missing. We were starting to think the hawk had carried off one of our Buff Orpingtons when Friendly (aka Kitty) came out of her hiding place close to the sun room. What a smart girl.

We weren't sure what to do with Brown Sugar so we ended up cremating her via the fire bowl. One bird in the house and another outside in the fire bowl (tragic irony). Emi was very upset and learned another lesson about the circle of life (and that everything in nature eats chicken). She said a few words for her lost friend and was able to disconnect from the violence enough to eat some dinner (chicken!). I wasn't.