Duck Duck Duck! Goodbye Yummy.

Yesterday I found out one of my pet ducks, Yummy, died. I got my two ducks a little over a year ago and when we found out we would be relocating we decided they'd be hard to move and there was a good chance we wouldn't find a new house that was as accommodating to ducks. We did know of a wonderful place to take them though, Turpentine Creek Wildlife Refuge. My husband had been taking his youth group there every spring break for years to build big cat habitats and we had made friends with the people who work there, dedicating their lives to rescuing and loving these animals. They were happy to have them. They had two ducks already but one of them wasn't doing so well and they were worried about having the healthy duck be lonely. We moved Yummy and Dr. Quack and they fit right in. We hear they and the other healthy duck were immediate buddies and would walk the road around the entire habitat loop, not a short walk. They don't know what happened to Yummy, they just found her in the morning cuddled up to the not-so-well duck with an apparently crushed chest. She had a short but good life.
I never expected to become so attached to ducks but should've known better.


Is there anything cuter than a duckling?! Dr. Quack and Yummy all set up in their new home, a dog cage in our laundry room.


I have to admit, Yummy was my favorite from the beginning with her purple bill and feet.


Yes that's me in a nerdy duck related shirt, but I really did chill with me peeps alot.


I didn't know anything about ducks until I had my own. Then I learned they need to be socialized if you want them to be nice and friendly. Birds at close range, especially face level, have always kindof creeped me out, but I sucked it up and every night my husband would play on the computer and my peeps and I would sit next to him on the bed and have quality time together. It never stopped creeping me out, but I really found it wonderful and relaxing.


Here is Yummy swimming in the bathtub, still too young to go outside. Watching them grow was incredible! Ducks will go from baby to full fledged duck in a little over a month so we really watched them grow before our very eyes. Every day they looked different and it got harder and harder to have them living in the house.

Finally moving day arrived. They had enough feathers, the weather was warm enough and we built a pond in our backyard. Doesn't it look like she's smiling! They loved the pond and it was so much fun watching them swim and play like real ducks.

Please carefully consider any pets you get and do your research before you take the plunge! Ducks are wonderful but they are alot of work and very dirty for that first month they have to live inside. Just like any pet, if you are educated first you will be a much happier pet owner. Wanting to give ducklings as cute Easter gifts is tremendously irresponsible. They are pets that need love and care, not to mention commitment, they can live to be 15 years old!

Mr. Golden Curls Hearts Miss Megan

Mr. Golden Curls' Mother's Day Out teacher had her last day this week so we made her a good-bye gift. It turned out pretty darn cute. If I can drum up some motivation I may do something similar for my etsy shop.

First he colored a paper mache heart shaped box. I somewhat reluctantly sacrificed a bunch of my really nice, extra shiny scrapping rhinestones because they're self adhesive and truthfully had just been sitting in the box 'o stuff for a long time. Then we cut heart shapes out of scrapbook paper, one with his picture and the others with notes on the backs of them saying what Mr. Golden Curls liked most about his teacher. Then I ran a ribbon through all the hearts, glued the knotted ends of the ribbon to the box bottom and lid so it streches out like a garland when the box is opened and added some of my extra promo pins. Pretty quick project and the teacher was thrilled declairing it the best gift "really!"

Go Fly A Kite!

The past week or so I've realized I'm getting to where I don't know what to do with myself and the boys. We do the same things at the same places on the same days at the same times. All the rain these days is making it tough too. It's getting boring, even for me, a lover of consistency. Then I remembered, we have kites! Auntie Kristin and my mom both gave the boys little bitty Thomas kites so we each had one of our own, perfect! I knew they wouldn't actually get flown or survive past 5 min. without getting tangled and broken but I also knew they wouldn't really care.

The Bohemian Life Part IV

We haven't ventured far from the downtown area of Hot Springs yet, I think we both like it so much down there that the rest of the town just seems like every other town. We did make it out to ride The Belle though. The Belle is owned by a family in our church and they offered us a free ride. Now, we can't pass up a new experience, especially a free one, so we hopped on board! Even with the wind it was the perfect day and I think we got to see every obnoxiously huge mansion in the area all right there on the lake. Can you tell I fell in love with the freshly painted red benches?

"I'm king of the world!" yes I'm a big goob.

The Big-Ass Book Of Crafts is MINE!

Tuesdays have become my 50% break from motherhood. Lil' Spitfire goes to Mother's Day Out and Mr. Golden Curls and I have have some quality time together. I'm also able to accomplish some of the housework that just doesn't happen when a rambunctious 2 year old is reigning terror throughout the home. Today we went to Barnes and Noble for the four millionth, six hundred fifty four thousand, one hundredth and second time, what can I say, I'm lacking creativity in all areas of my life these days. Mr Golden Curls doesn't mind a bit, he's a man of consistency and routines. He gets that from his mamma.

As part of my routine, I picked up some books to look at while he played trains. This book has been one I've picked up every visit for the past few months. I often get hooked on a book but tired after a few visits when I feel I have it thoroughly looked at. Since this one seems to have stuck I decided it was worth taking home. It's filled with lots of wonderful random crafts and alot of rockin' cool paper crafts, which allowed me to justify it as a business necessity. Ever since I got it home I've been rubbing my hands together mischievously, already anxiously awaiting the boys bedtime so I can dig into making something wonderful!

The Bohemian Life Part III

Back out of the cave and into the light, lets take a look around the Bohemian's new neighborhood.

Oh, so that's where the very loud splashing noise that we can hear from outside the apartment is coming from! A drip that's echoing through the parking garage across the street. There is water all over this town, it oozes constantly from the earth, bubbles up boiling hot (hence the name of the town), drips down cliffs and leaves some parking lots in a constant puddle.

This building is apparently a residence but they often have open house parties with some pretty rockin' garage bands. I want to make it to one before the Bohemian moves and we are back to living in normalsville.The Poet's Loft is only about a block away and is one of our favorite hangouts. It is becoming more and more interesting as I learn about the quirky owner from one of my fellow AREtsians, Ekioart.

I'm very excited about the old theatre, home of the Documentary Film Institute that hosts yearly film festivals. How cool is that! I'm no film maker or actress but I likes me some obnoxiously artsy films and the Bohemian has dabbled in movie making, I'd love to see him get involved.

This is our beautiful new, very old church. You can see in the second pic that the lovely Howard Johnson is butted right up next to our gigantic Jesus mosaic.


Our church's other lovely neighbors down the street include T&A tattoo and the French Quarter, a "gentleman's" club. We are mildly intrigued by a sign on the French Quarter advertising strip karaoke!

Who doesn't start their morning with breakfast and chance encounter with a completely tattooed man with notches cut out of his ears and horn implants? This is our kind of celebrity encounter! Sorry, don't know the guys name but he's all over tattoo mags and other media, he was in town for inksplosion, a tattoo fest happening in Little Rock that weekend. I'm a little jealous that my hubby got to go to this event. We saw our tattoos celeb at the Pancake Shop, my now favorite place for melt-in-your-mouth pancakes and mediocre greasy spoon coffee.

Magical Origami Jumping Frogs

When I received my AREtsy recycled swap gift (a very cute apron made by Julie Anne of Diamondmeenuh with one of her husband's button up shirts) there was an extra surprise for the boys, a ton of brightly colored origami jumping frogs complete with diorama frog habitat! She told me this little concoction had saved her many times in her daycare job by entertaining little ones forever. I got the gift and immediately went out of town so the magic toy was set aside for later. This turned out to be a wonderful turn of events because about a week later we were all back home and I was getting sick. With no hubby I was wondering what the heck I was going to do with my wild children when (picture heavenly ahhhing and soft inexplicable lighting) I remembered Julie Anne's gift! It was a life saver and entertained the boys long enough for me to get a good rest and the second wind I needed to be able to feed them and put them to bed. Thanks Julie Anne!

The boys show off their favorite frogs.

Lil' Spitfire is trying to figure out what the heck a diorama is and how to get in on the action.

Mr. Golden Curls tells little bro all about frogs.