Ex-Libris

The last week or so have been busy enough now. My cousin Ray, who's home from Australia with his wife and two kids for a vacation, came to visit one afternoon and I ended up entertaining the two girls, aged 2 and 6, on my grandmother's chair lift. They got a real kick of going up and down though at one point, the two year old started getting all excited and jumping up and down in her seat. Good thing I had her severely buckled in. Last Sunday, we invited them, his mum Sheila and his sister and her kids in for Sunday lunch. We got most of what we needed on Saturday but Sunday morning, my mother had a crisis and decided we mightn't have enough and went and bought more food.We were only having salad and cold meats with potatoes and rolls because we wanted something filling but not something that we'd be all day in the kitchen cooking or slaving over. Sunday was a warm day anyway. The kids loved the ice-cream for dessert and everyone seemed to enjoy themselves.
We had a lot of food left over though but it worked out fine because I'd planned to get together with one of my friends and have a DVD day. We used to do that when we were in college, get food, a stack of munchies and watch DVD's, particularly the bad ones that we could snark loudly about. I held the mini soiree in my grandmother's house because we could make as much noise as we wanted and not have some old woman complaining i.e. my grandmother. It was a fun afternoon. We ended up watching Point Break, Dracula 2001 and The 13th Warrior. The snark was mighty.

In other news, I'm going back as a Brownie leader in September. I met Catherine, the woman I used to be a Ranger leader with about ten years ago and she's now doing Brownies. I had been thinking of going back for a while and I just met her by chance on the street the other week and we got to talking and she mentioned about how she'd be the only leader come September and she wasn't much looking forward to doing it all on her own. When I said I'd be interested if she wanted me, she jumped at the suggestion. Yay! I hadn't seen her since before I got sick. Funny how things work out. Catherine is really nice and easy to work with. Some leaders can be very power hungry. It's not about doing things with the kids, it's all about them doing things their way and don't even bother to suggest some new activities for the kids because your input is not required. Then when they "retire" from active guiding, they still stay on all the committees and block all suggestions by younger members who leave because why stay on if that's the way they're treated. Then all you hear is bitching about how there's no young members on the committees and about membership being down. Vicious circle. Sad but not uncommon, I reckon, in many organisations.

The other big news of the week is that Rosie is pregnant. Due in about 1 - 2 weeks, according to the vet this morning. So she was pregnant when we got her. I took her for her second set of shots and the vet was examining her and asked a few questions and suggested a pregnancy scan. There will be puppies!
What is it though about us that whenever anything like this happens, it's always when we have planned to go somewhere. Like my mother and me going to Waterford the weekend after next for my birthday. Rosie will be at home with the family - will she have had them by then? Will she be having them as we go out the door? Should we cancel? I don't know. And also, there's my cousin's wedding in July. Will the pups be thriving by then, enough to give them to good homes? Or do we ask the woman who is pet sitting Rosie that weekend to take on pups as well or find someone new? Or do I stay home? Which I don't mind but at the same time, I think that's a bit of  slap in the face to the family that I don't go and I'd really like to. I don't want to miss out on all the fun. Maybe I should carry the pups with me in a basket or backpack and any odd noises they make, I can say 'oh that's just my ostomy bag' and there'll be no more questions. Plus my dress is a bit big on top (I have to get it adjusted) so I could always shove two of them down there.
Best to play it by ear I suppose. We'll still in a bit of shock here actually. This was a completely unplanned (for us) pregnancy!