Fun Times

I warned everyone that I was horrible at blogging. For our 4th anniversary this year, we decided to go to Lagoon (an amusement park). I had never been so it was fun to go, but it was definitely small compared to some amusement parks. It was so hot that I developed heat stroke by about 5 pm, so Greg went on one ride by himself. He loved it, though I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have. Here are a couple pictures:

The ride Greg went on without me. It rotated in nearly every direction and the seats rotated as well.

This is a view from the 100-year-old Ferris Wheel. The ride in the picture is another ride we went on. It is a few stories high and one of those rides where it drops suddenly from the top, but this ride can also go up really fast from the bottom. It was fun.

The Adventures of Rajah

Okay, since I don't have kids, I have to do a cat post. Feel free to completely ignore. So Rajah is no longer afraid of us. At all. In fact, he likes to attack us. Luckily, training with a water spray bottle works brilliantly on him. He no longer attacks with claws (and I clipped his toenails), but he hasn't quite learned not to bite. He's becoming much gentler, but it takes time. He is VERY active and he does NOT like to be alone. At first, we were afraid of him destroying the condo, so we barricaded him in the hallway, with the only access to his litter box, food, and the impromptu house Greg made. It looked like this:

He couldn't quite jump the laundry baskets :) Now, the only place he isn't allowed is our bedroom. He meows when we go to bed at night and if we don't get up early enough in the morning. We figured out he sleeps longer if we keep the curtains shut in the bedrooms he has access to. As soon as we step out the door, he attacks your legs (no claws so it's really rather funny) the whole way you walk down the hallway. As soon as we come home, he meows if we don't play with him soon enough. We have a Cat Tips book from the vet and they claim 10-15 minutes a day is enough time to play with your kitten. Ha! The book also has pictures of different behaviors which indicate different personalities. Well, according to the book, we have an overdependent, overattentive cat. Great.

He loves playing peek-a-boo. Seriously. You hide behind one side of the couch, and he'll go to the other, then when you go one way, he'll either jump out and attack, or he'll sneak around behind the other way and attack from behind! Then after he attacks (which is really more jumping towards you once), he goes back to the other side to do it again. I've never seen a kitten do stuff like that. He's also discovered he likes human food more than cat food. Go figure. This could have happened from me slipping him a piece (it was tiny) of ham one day. Then Greg gave him a sour cream and onion potato chip. He loved both. He also likes cheese (he got some that had fallen on the floor). He tries to get the ice cream, but then he doesn't eat it. We really don't feed him off our plates or anything, we know what he likes based off what he tries to get when we make something. He also has this crazy sideways attack. I've tried video taping it, but I can't get it well. He jumps sideways until he gets to whatever he's attacking. He also recently discovered the refrigerator:

He wouldn't come out once so we shut the door until we heard him meowing and something in the shelf fell over (it was one minute). He hasn't tried since :) All in all, I'm in love with him and Greg is warming up. He certainly makes life more interesting!

Cat House Upgrade!!!!

Remember the impromptu cat house Greg made when we first got Rajah?

Well, we started looking for an actual cat tree/house so we could train him to scratch something other than the furniture (side note: he's indoors all day and I feel bad for him, and the training is working). If you've ever looked for cat trees, you'll find they range anywhere from $100 to $250. Um, he's a cat. I'm not spending that much money on a toy he might not even like! I can barely stand to spend that much on his vaccinations. So, Greg decided to make him one. This should have been posted a while ago, considering it was done a few weeks ago, but it's been a crazy couple weeks. Greg really brought out his engineering side and came up with several different designs, and we eventually settled on one. This is it in progress:

In case you didn't see it, he has a stuffed baseball to play with which he LOVES.

And the finished product:

I think he likes it :)

The toy he's playing with is another one we bought. It's a crab (a homage to Maryland) and he loves it, too, since he can carry it in his mouth. As you can see, he's slowly tearing it apart. It has 5% catnip in it; whoever says that kittens under 6 months old don't respond to catnip needs to meet Rajah.

Greg was very motivated to do this considering he got a jigsaw and staple gun out of the deal. Not counting those purchases (since they are long-term investments), the whole thing cost us under $40. I think we're in the wrong business!

Independence Day!

Yes, I'm aware the fourth of July was almost three weeks ago. But this year was the last year that Sugar House Park did fireworks, and I took some really cool pictures. I'd never been to Sugar House Park, but Cori (sister-in-law) grew up going there, so we went early to get seats, then were joined by Greg's brother, Jeff (Cori's husband), and his sister, Kimberly and her boyfriend, Josh. It was really fun and we got a nice spot in the shade so it wasn't even too hot.

Left to right: Josh, Kimberly, Cori, Me

The Finale

Our 4th Anniversary

Today is our 4th wedding anniversary! We are really celebrating on Friday but we went out to dinner tonight. It's funny to think that I've been married the majority of my adult life :) While 4 years doesn't feel like a particularly long time, it's still worth saying that I love Greg more each day and am so happy I married him!

Adjusting...

Please note the below post has been edited for accuracy. Our kitten is much friendlier and VERY active. After a few days, we could walk right up to it and hold it....and I noticed something. Look for the edits in the below post, can you figure out what I noticed?

Another Surprise

No, I'm not pregnant. But remember how I said, just a few days ago, that I wondered what other strange things June had in store for me? Well, Friday after work I came home and started talking to Greg. After a while, I went into our bedroom for a minute and when I came out, Greg asked me to open the extra bedroom door because "it was too dark in the hallway." I thought he was acting very strange but opened the door to placate him. As I started to walk away, something caught my eye. I went into the bedroom and there was a styrofoam box with a door cut out and a blanket, a food and water dish (with food and water in the dishes), and a cardboard box I hadn't seen before, with a bag of food inside it. I looked at Greg and he just smiled at me. I looked at the food closer and realized it looked like cat food. I asked him if it was and he said yes. At this point I became quite confused because 1) I couldn't understand why these things were in my back room when there was no cat in sight, 2) Greg does NOT like cats. At all. In fact, I was pretty sure the only thing that would ever get him to agree to getting a cat would be our kids begging for most of their childhood. So I asked him what was going on and he said "It looks like it's a game of hide and seek." Huh? So I carefully lift up the blanket in the styrofoam box, nothing there. I look behind one curtain and don't see anything, so I lift it up and out jumps this:

Yep, he got me a kitten!! Our friend, Stephanie, has a brother whose cat had kittens and asked if we wanted one. I wanted one but Greg said no, as expected. But here he is. I stood there in shock for a minute and then tried to hold him. Except he was TERRIFIED of anyone, anything, any noise, any movement. He just crouched in the corner and was shaking. He finally hid behind the toilet and we put a towel back there and let him stay there until he was ready to come out. I named him Rajah (RAW-juh). Like the tiger in Aladdin. Greg spent all day with him on Saturday because I was visiting a friend, and he got him to come out and play a little. Today, he was even more friendly. He played and wants to be pet but still hides occassionally. Greg built this for him:

He likes it, but has trouble climbing the styrofoam.

Two other pictures of him playing.

Isn't he cute? Greg and I are working on training him not to chew any cords, scratch the furniture, or be so scared of loud noises. I feel bad leaving him alone in our condo all day (barricaded, of course) but I don't trust him over the whole condo yet and he's way too little to be outside all day. Now, the only problem is that Greg might be allergic to him. I really hope it's a cold and not allergies!!