Emma and Diapers, the Cats

Little Emma is finally potty-trained. I made her a chart to put stickers on every time she goes potty. Each row of stickers (6 of them) she gets a prize. I put her picture on the chart so that she knew it was for her. I took her to Dollar Tree to get her her first four prizes and Lindy and Joe wanted to come along. I told them I was only getting prizes for Emma and they said that was okay, but of course they ended up getting some prizes too. Joe kept telling Emma what she should pick out, but Emma held her own and got what she wanted. Such innocent and loving kids.

We went down to Grandma and Grandpa Thurman's house this weekend to hear their talks in church about their mission. Grandma talked about the need to study and know the gospel in order to teach it. She talked about going up to General Conference from California when she was 11 and visiting her uncle Carlos (who later became a General Authority) and watching the Saturday General Conference sessions on TV. He wondered how the speakers do it--how they teach with such a spirit of inspiration. She then recounted seeing him speak in General Conference years later and how he must have figured it out.

While we were there, Lindy looked for her cats. We took the cats down there a few weeks ago after our neighbor kept trapping them and sending them to the pound. Uncle Ray called a couple days later and told Deanne that Caley got run over by the neighbor's car. He saw it happen. He buried her in the back yard next to where they buried all the other cats they had over the years. Poor Caley was my cat. She was simply in new surroundings and unaware of the dangers. The neighbor just pulled out of her driveway when Caley was playing behind the tires. She was a smart cat. I remember lifting the lawn mower in the shed one time and she ran out from under it. She turned to look at me to see who I was and if there was any danger. When she saw it was me, she walked off more slowly. On the way down to Annabella, she sat in the back window of the car and watched the scenery. She took in a lot of experiences, for a cat, in her short life.

Ray said Tieler disappeared shortly after Caley died. They don't know where he went or what happened to him. Caley was the only thing familiar to him so he probably just left. Hopefully he is happy in another home. People in that neighborhood don't normally take cats to the pound.

Lindy looked around for the cats when we first got there on Saturday and looked again on Sunday. She was quite despondent when she couldn't find them Sunday before we left. She didn't spend a long time searching--it was snowy. We said that they hadn't seen them in quite some time and that they probably found a warm house where somebody took them in. They're not allowed in the house at Grandma and Grandpa's. We didn't tell her about Caley. We hope Tieler did find a new home. Deanne looked around in the neighbor's yard where Grandma thinks Tieler might have gone, but with no luck. Poor Lindy. This was her first pet. She was looking forward to seeing him again.