Oh So Right On!

Aunt Cathy - this one's for you and me!

Optional Post IV - Facebook Fan?

This one has been percolating for a bit. As with all optional posts, there's no mention of Owen or Cearra, no fun pictures, so if you choose to skip it, no offense taken. Sometimes I just have to quiet the drip by getting the words down on paper.

I like Facebook. Most mornings when I come home from the school run I settle in front of the computer with breakfast and spend a few minutes happily logged on.

As most of my friends are scattered across the country, I find Facebook a nice way to keep up with their lives. I truly enjoy seeing the photos of babies, proms, grads in shiny gowns, puppies, and new homes. I get a little lift in wishing folks I may not see all year a Happy Birthday and I appreciate when its reciprocated. The inspiring videos and shared stories warm my heart and some of those vintage looking postcards are pretty darn funny.

I've gone to Facebook pleading for prayers, asking for support, requesting donations to help others, and each time my posts have been met abundantly by my friends. Facebook let me earn some pocket change by selling items via virtual yard sales and through my (now idle) page, Sweet Repeats. It's put me back in touch with sorority sisters and helped me connect with a group of fellow Kaz adoptive families. Good stuff.

So yes, I like Facebook. And yet ...

Lately it seems to me that Facebook (and it's cousins Twitter and InstaGram) are contributing to creating a society where we don't talk to each other; we talk at each other. We over share while we isolate. We hide inside or face plant on our iPhones, intent on not missing the latest update from our "friends". Sometimes people post so often I wonder how they have time to  live IRL; time to play with their children or take a walk or perform their job. Often I think it's sad - the cryptic or angry or whining posts; do the people typing actually feel better for baring their souls on a stark white screen rather than sitting with a pal over a cup of coffee and talking? Are they really that alone?

Then there's the side of Facebook that rises in me an unexpected anger. The spouses who rant and rave and demean the very person they promised to love and honor. The folks who seem to boast "look at me, I'm a good Christian!" by posting Bible verses, yet lie and cheat and steal and hurt those closest to them. Or the parents who tag their children in pretty little prepackaged inspirational quotes but don't pick up the phone to actually ask their kids how they are. In those cases, I think Facebook has become a substitute for real relationships.

And I find that very sad.

Zoo Trip

I cherish being a SAHM; for one thing, I get to go on all the field trips! Yesterday's adventure was to the Catoctin Zoo in Thurmont with the Kindergarten and 1st grade class from Carroll Lutheran School.

Great group of kids

Owen loved this bird because the zoo sign said it
was a relative of of his beloved velociraptor

 

Looks like a kindergarten class of monkeys!

Happy belated Mother's Day

Owen and his latest girlfriend, Emma S.

Up close and personal with an alligator

Chinchilla - so soft. It takes 250 of these little beauties to
make one fur coat. I will always think that's a tragedy.

Still loves feeding the deer

and the goats

Well, the girls all posed nicely ...

Beautiful lady (eyeing up some pint-size snacks??)

Owen and his posse! 

Jurassic Park or Close to It

If you know Owen, you also know that when this kid takes an interest in something, he REALLY takes an interest!

First up, John Deere tractors. He learned the names of the all the different makes and models, created elaborate model set-ups on the family room floor, and he and I spent many afternoons wandering around the showroom and outside lot of our local JD dealership (they all knew him by name, and kindly gave him several green and yellow Nerf footballs that we still toss around).

While Owen still appreciates John Deere (and is looking forward once again to the Combine Demolition Derby this summer) his heart was next stolen by Monster Trucks. He knows all the truck names and who drives them, and can tell you who won the National Freestyle and Racing Championships for the last four years. His collection of toy Monster Trucks now numbers over 100. And thanks to this hobby, I got to attend two Monster Truck Jams last year.

But recently a new obsession has come to our household ... dinosaurs!

He has the Jurassic Park trilogy on his Kindle as well as a BBC show on dinosaurs. He knows plant eaters vs. meat eaters. At any given time there are Stegosaurus models and T-Rex skeletons roaming across our great plains of carpets. He's checked every dinosaur book out of his school library at least once, and we're working our way through the public library shelf too.

Yesterday, upon finding him shedding tears that he there wasn't an actual Jurassic Park and that he couldn't see a live dinosaur, I took him to the Baltimore Science Museum in the hopes of cheering him up.

Yep, I think it worked.

"Mom, I am staying here forever!"

Digging up bones

The chase is on

T-Rex attack!

My fav dino is the triceratops

Building a skeleton

So, so happy!

Of course there are other things to do at the museum too, and we enjoyed blowing around clouds, laying on a bed of nails, and catching a show at the planetarium.

Such a beautiful day in Baltimore and so much fun to spend time with my little buddy, watching as he got to see things he loved!