Help!

As you can see by the top left corner of this blog I am sadly in need of some help. I need to stretch that photo across the whole top of the page. I cannot figure out how to do that. Can anyone help me? Please? With whipped cream and a huckleberry on top, as my 5 year old says?

Starting again!

I obviously haven't been keeping up with this...my new Thanksgiving resolution (you make those too, right? Much easier to keep these than New Year's resolutions) is to post at least 5 times per week. We'll see...

For today, I'm very proud to announce the partnership between my business (I run a traveling children's bookstore for Barefoot Books) and a wonderful organization, Books For Africa. I am proud to have initiated this partnership when I met BFA's Director of International Relations last summer, and when I couldn't stop thinking about the potential for a partnership between the two companies, I called her and we met to talk about the possibilities and things have just gone on from there. I have a lifelong passion for all things Africa even though I haven't been there (yet!) so this means a great deal to me. To see more about Books For Africa watch this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSnWZyB7v9o

For more information about Barefoot Books go to my website, http://www.barefootbooksnorth.com/.

I'm collecting used books for Books For Africa...if you're within 2 hours of the twin Cities I will come pick up any books that you would like to donate. We're looking for anything from board books for babies to adult books and textbooks. If you watch the video, you will see why they are so desperately needed. Thank you!

Happy Thanksgiving!

The Birds and the Bees

Note: This was supposed to post on Sept. 29th and I just noticed it was accidentally saved as a draft so it may show that it is posting on Nov. 27th instead of Sept. 29th. Oops!

My friend Kathy and I got together at Betty's Pies tonight. I still can't figure out why the world-famous North Shore restaurant decided to open their second location in Mahtomedi, next to an Aldi and Snyder's. But I digress.

Kathy and I met several years ago on a Glacier National Park chat page. Yes, a chat page. That phrase has a lot of negative connotations but in many cases a chat page is a wonderful online community of people with a common passion. In this case, its Glacier. I remember discovering that Kathy was from St. Paul and thinking it would be fun to get together but also afraid she'd think it was weird if I suggested it. But I did, and we decided where and when to meet. Other people thought we were a bit crazy (more than a bit, in some cases). But Rosie, Kathy and I met for coffee one Sunday afternoon and when we looked at the clock we had been there for something like 3 and a half hours. It was so fun to meet someone who "gets" Glacier like I do. That was the beginning. Kathy's now one of my dearest friends and as our online community has grown its been pure joy to meet up with her and other fellow Glacier lovers both out in Montana and here in Minnesota.

Kathy has a thing about pie and is a regular at the world-famous Park Cafe just outside of Glacier. SO of course, it had to be Betty's this time. The blackberry peach is delicious. Not as good as the Park Cafe pie, but very good!

Tonight we were getting together a week after Kathy got back from a fall trip to Glacier with some other "Glacier friends". I was supposed to go but with the timing - Rosie just started middle school in a few district, etc. - I just couldn't go. I was with them in spirit the whole time though, that's for sure, and even tried the ruby slipper "There's no place like home" thing (although with hiking boots...no ruby slippers in this woman's closet!)...but sadly, it did not work.

Tonight Kathy brought me a WONDERFUL gift though...CHIEF MOUNTAIN HONEY!

You will notice that the label says "Babb, Montana". Do you know what that means? It means, the bees who made this honey were GLACIER BEES. That's GLACIER FLOWER NECTAR in that honey! I was THRILLED to receive this! When Kathy was in Glacier I heard from another Glacier friend, Jen, about this honey and wanted to ask Kathy to bring me some but I didn't. Jen got to her though. THANKS KATHY, and Jen! I have written my name of this honey and will make sure my children know this is MOM'S honey and they better not touch it. I'm not usually a selfish mom but I will be with this, I am ashamed to admit. It will be months before I can get more. If you think I'm weird for getting excited enough about honey to post about it, you have obviously not spent enough time in a place you love. I suggest you rectify that as soon as possible.

There's no place like home...

Sometimes you feel like a bad mom...

My 5 year old, Jack, is quite the "drama king". He's a happy, adventurous boy with little fear of anything but also has quite the overactive imagination. Today he happily went off to his first day of Sunday School at our new church...which involved following someone carrying a flag through the sanctuary, meeting people he'd never seen before and following them to a different building. No problem, he took it all in stride and had a great time.

He went to his brother's soccer game this afternoon and played hard with a friend, no sign of anything wrong. Then at dinner he was falling asleep, whiny, crying, not wanting to eat. He described in great detail that he wasn't hungry because there were "fireworks in his head and his brain got twisted and broke". I thought, "Wow, his excuses are getting pretty elaborate!" and laughed to myself.

An hour later I saw him sitting despondently in a chair on the verge of tears, with bright red cheeks and eyes that looked strange. Sure enough, he had a pretty good(high) fever, and a bad headache. I felt TERRIBLE...but how was I to know, after he acted just fine all day? I called the nurseline worried about meningitis after he complained about more pain in the back of his head when he put his chin to his chest but they aren't too worried, its not his neck that hurts.

I learned my lesson though. The next time he gets that descriptive about anything to do with his body, I will ask a lot of questions and not just think its his vivid imagination!

So, how DO you pluck a cougar?

I turned 41 on Tuesday and spent the day at the Wildlife Science Center. Part of the day I spent plucking a cougar. "How does THAT work?" someone asked me tonight. Well, let me tell you all about it! The Wildlife Science Center has two cougars that came to us a few years ago from a zoo that closed in Michigan. They were due for vaccinations and we try to take that opportunity to incorporate the educational component of our mission by having students there. Tuesday there were students from an ALC high school and students from Argosy University who had participated in a wildlife handling class the past weekend and were so enthralled that they came back today to help.

The first step was to sedate the cougar. Peggy (the Executive Director) does this with a pole syringe. The cougars are used to people so one staff member, Matt, got Sunny, the female, to pay attention to him at one end and Peggy was able to jab her in the leg to get the medication in.

Once she was asleep, about 20 minutes later, we carried her out of the enclosure to have enough space for everyone, and got to work. Body temperature and breathing must be monitored, various vaccinations given and blood needs to be drawn for tests. Our wonderful vet, Dr. Dave Enright, was on hand to supervise and help instruct students.

My job today was plucking. Not the word you usually use with a cougar but she had lots of small, hard mats of fur along her back and they needed to come out. So, I plucked...I don't know what else you'd call it! The photo below is me working on the mats while the vet attended to Sunny before letting the students step in.

While we were working on this, another group was sedating and then working with the male cougar, Spike. He is one cool cat...but scary. He was not happy when we were working on Sunny when she first fell asleep near the holding area where he had been shut in. Have you ever heard a cougar growl? You sure don't want to hear a wild one growl, trust me. If you hear it, you're way too close. He locks eyes with you sometimes and doesn't blink. It's fascinating but eerie!

It can be a bit unnerving to handle a wild animal that you know could do some serious damage if it woke up too soon, but with Peggy and Dr. Dave in charge of the med doses, I never worry. I do stay away from their mouths though!

The rain put an early end to our day...we were supposed to also catch and vaccinate the bobcats, who apparently are much more "fun" to deal with. Example? You walk up to the cougar enclosure and Sunny purrs. You approach the bobcat enclosure and they hiss. Watch for the "bobcat wrangling" post soon.

I was very surprised by a birthday cake and all the students and staff singing happy birthday to me when we were finished. What a great way to spend my birthday!

I intended to start this blog back in June but was so busy planning our 4 week road trip to Montana that I didn't finish. I've been trying for the past month to figure out how to get back to the "dashboard"...none of my passwords, user names, etc. would work and I was lost in the land of "no actual person to contact". I had a brainstorm last week and - VOILA! We have a blog! I can't imagine this will really be interesting to anyone except maybe my parents but am going to give it a try anyway. Happy reading!