Catching Up is Hard to Do!!

Ok, so I admit it. It has been forever since I've posted on here. I've had some spare time but when I did, I just wanted to crash and not work on my blog. Sorry! But, here I am for a few minutes anyway.

First of all, on August 20th, we went to San Diego to visit my daughter, son in law, and 3 grandsons. Usually we do lots of sightseeing while we are there but this time, it was mostly spent working on their new house which they had just moved into a couple of weeks prior to our arrival. There were still boxes to be unpacked, windows (LOTS of them) to be washed, cupboards (LOTS of them) to be washed, kids to be watched while parents ran errands, etc etc etc. They bought a wonderful ranch home on an acre of land in the Mt. Helix section of La Mesa. It has a large pool, a wonderful patio, a small orchard, a small barn (full of spiders right now), and lots and lots of different kinds of vegetation. What a fantastic place to raise three energetic boys. I took lots and lots of pictures. Here are a few.

Oh, and did I mention the pool???

We worked but did take time for some family fun, such as a campfire on the patio. Or a trip to one of my favorite spots--Old Town San Diego.

And a meal in my favorite Old Town restaurant.

We had a great trip but all good things must come to an end. We headed home the day after Labor Day and then the real work began!

As some of you know, there has been a big upheaval at CROW where I have volunteered for almost 9 years now. Our head vet, Dr. PJ, resigned after more than 10 years at CROW. She pretty much made CROW what it is today. A new executive director and assistant were hired last January and in 6 months have kind of made CROW their own leading to the resignation of at least 5 employees, Dr. PJ being one of them. Along with her was the acting Development Director, The Buildings director, the Senior Rehabber and one of the receptionists. That on top of letting one of our other rehabbers go in June and out new intern not showing up has left CROW is a terrible bind! We depend a lot on students and volunteers. The students have all gone back to school so we only have 2 now and many of the volunteers are snowbirds and aren't back yet. We have one vet and 1 full time rehabber in the clinic as well as l full time rehabber/handyman and 2 part time rehabbers outside. Even the receptionists are busy cleaning cages when they aren't answering phones. Sooooo--to make a long story short, I am trying to take up some of the slack myself and am volunteering in the clinic 4 days a week now. I usually work between 6 and 8 hours a day---or as long as my back holds up. My main job right now is taking care of and feeding MANY baby squirrels. Thank goodness baby bird season and baby squirrel season don't happen at the same time!

This is pretty much how I spend my days--and no, I did not take this picture, I borrowed it from online.

So that is pretty much my life right now. Not that I'm complaining. I love working with Dr. Amber, Nikki, my baby animals and most of the rest of my CROW family.