Sunday this 'n' that

Well, today is Mother's Day and, for my mom at least, it is a tough one. This past Thursday, she had to make the very difficult decision to put her beloved 15 year old dog, Brandi, to sleep. Her vet told her that with all the medical issues which Brandi had to deal with, she lived longer than most dogs with heart problems because of how well my parents took care of her all these many years. What makes it even harder is the fact that this dog was a major connection to my dad whom we lost only a few years ago.

Picture taken on Christmas Day - 2020.

I was not able to get a day off from my 'lovely job' (insert smirk here) in order to take her and the dog so that she would not be alone and not have to drive herself home in a not-so-good mental state of mind - at her age especially. So, my husband stepped up and took a PTO/vacation day and spent the day with her - talk about a horrid day ...

Anyhow, I picked her up at her house that night on my way home from work at 10;:30PM, and I had her spend the night at my house because I did not want her to be alone and then I took her back home again on my way to work the  next day (Friday).

Speaking of critters, the same night my mom slept over at my house, I heard loud GUT-WRENCHING screams in the middle of the night. There was a very nasty cat fight right outside in our front yard! It was pitch dark and I could not see anything so I got up, ran into the kitchen, and opened up the garage door, (which makes a bit of noise), in order to scare the cats so that they would STOP before I found either a badly injured or perhaps even dead cat in our driveway! The next day, my husband told me that, Chester (the stray cat we have been trying to get inside the house so that we can get him to our vet to get checked out, was definitely in the thick of it and the poor baby got the brunt of it as it would appear. He has a patch of fur missing/pulled out from his back side. I took these pics yesterday morning while he was hanging out in the garage (BTW, you can kind of see his Igloo he sleeps/lays in placed outside the garage door on the right-hand side) ...

My husband also informed me that the poor fella has worms too so we are going to do our best to get him to the vet, but it is difficult because he is only now beginning to trust us "somewhat" and is far too scittish to just capture in a Have A Heart trap and get him into a holding cage we have set up in our basement downstairs until we can get him a vet appointment AND even then we can not even pick him up so ... you get my drift. We will have to try and figure something out.

On the lighter side of this post, I took my mom to The Mint Leaf yesterday afternoon. She had never been there before and they have a lot of wonderful health and beauty products for skin. ALL handmade soaps, shampoos & conditioners, shower gels, hand & body lotions, an awesome array of soap bars to choose from, to name a few items.

They also have dozens of local venders who offer their products there - clothing, jewelry, furniture, wall decorations, specialized stone coasters with a lovely charm, vintage decor, decorative cakes, cookies, and other goodies.

My set of stone Black Cat Coasters with silver cat charm.

More Whipped Soap (This stuff is FANTASTIC!) and a bar of Wild Flowers scented soap made with various oils and minerals as are the whipped soaps and shaving creams.

I also found a cool Kelly Green-colored sweater.

Afterwards, I treated my mom to lunch at Flanagan's Pub. She loves their delicious grilled chicken sandwiches ...

Posing with a long-time patron and friend of many years - Mike (aka "Magoo").

In other news, our favorite gal and Flanagan's Pub bartender, Meg, sharing her latest post regarding "Go Gray in May" ...

Have a blessed Sunday, friends!!