We are Santa's Elves

Everytime I go to create a journal, my daughter wakes up and the last journal I started on here got erased and I wasn't in the mood to recreate it.  A few days ago, I went to feed my small tank of fish.  They all know what the little yellow can means and they rush to the top.  My male betta saw me coming and I knelt in front of the tank for a moment to make sure everyone was accounted for.  The betta looked strange for a moment, head tilted as if a confused dog.  Suddenly he struck out and swallowed a snail egg sac that was just ready to mature.  I literally gasped and said no, bad fish.  Now, I know I have way to many snails but I don't want to see any of them eaten, at least wait till I walk away from the tank.  I fed everyone and apologized to the snails for their babies being the victim of murder/abortion.  After doing some internet research, I've come to find why they have suddenly mutiplied.  It's all due to the fact that I'm feeding them.  I know, sounds strange.  Well, apparently, they are supposed to survive off what the fish don't eat and algae.  I was feeding them one algae waffer a night along with a small piece of lettuce.  I'm still giving them one waffer a night (there's over fifty of them now, there's no way they can all survive off leftovers) and once a week I put a small piece of lettuce in there too.  I'm such a sucker.  What am I going to do when the entire floor and walls of my tank are literally alive?  I guess we'll deal with that when it happens.  Maybe the betta will start to keep the numbers down.  I had been transplanting some of the larger snails to my big tank and couldn't figure out why I only had a few in there at a time.  Turns out my platty was eating them one by one.  I keep telling myself I won't put water in my 20 gallon tank just for some snails but I'm betting against myself right now.  A good thing about snails is they keep your tank REALLY clean and make your ph levels neutral.  My small tank is always perfect ph and everything else. 

Finished most of my Christmas shopping this past weekend.  Jasmine won't be getting near the amount of crap she got last year but she's two so she really won't know the difference.  Although, somehow I ended up buying more crap for my brother and his girlfriend than I think I ever have.  It's easy to buy for her, I just imagine what I would like and buy that. (we're a lot a like) Boys are harder when they're 20 than girls are.  We like clothes, makeup, cute things and gift cards.  Santa still has to pick out some stocking stuffers for Jasmine but then I'll be totally finished with her.  I didn't get my husband anything.  I know, gasp, the horror.  ;) We have an agreement so he'll get his later.  (either a ps3 or an ipod)  I haven't a clue what he got me as I haven't asked for anything or hinted that I wanted anything as I have years prior.  When he asked me what I wanted I said the only thing I want, I'm not getting and not asking for so that's the end of that.  (ferrets)  He said he ordered something.  I could very easily go on his laptop and find out exactly what it is but I have kept my self control thus far.  If he had ordered it on my computer, he would've deleted the website from the cache but he has windows vista and doesn't know how to do it on there yet.  By the way, DON'T BUY VISTA.  It is the biggest pain in the ass to use.  The more commercials that are on more mac's, the more I'm thinking about making it my next computer.  I'm just concerned because I have NEVER used a mac before and if they're so great, why doesn't everyone have one? 

We had the ratties out for a bit tonight.  The room was a little messy so I didn't leave them out too long in fear that they'd find something to shove in their mouth that I hadn't seen.  Ricky is such a little character and now actually begs when he wants me to pick him up.  Tikki (who Jasmine has renamed Sticky) doesn't do much when he's out except run from one hiding spot to the next and he's even figured out that if he stays near the wall, it's harder to catch him.  I made a big fuss over him tonight when he came when called.  He's NEVER done that before.  He's usually a massive pain in the butt to get back in his cage.  The only thing I need to work on them both with is not trying to commit rat sucide just to be the first one into their room.  As soon as I open that door, they both try to jump from my shoulders to the floor.  (they know they get treats after they've been out of their cage and they know the treats are IN the cage) In the summer we plan to get them both harnesses and take them outdoors for a while.  We do it with the rabbit too and he loves the feel of fresh grass on his feet. 

Jake's eye is finally starting to heal!  He went back to the vet on Friday and had a dye test to see if there was any damage to his eye and it came up clean.  The only thing we have to clear up now is the scar tissue that is over his eye and the very noticeable veins that started going through his eye to bring more blood to the ulcerated area.  He's on steroid drops now and doesn't have to be seen again for two more weeks.  Cash goes in this week to have his staples removed.  I would do it myself but I'd be afraid I would hurt him because he's so wiggly.  Everything is healing very quickly for him and the swelling has went down a lot in the last few days.  He almost looks like a neutered dog.  Rocky on the other hand still looks like he's intact.  Those things just aren't going away as fast as I had hoped. 

The dogs were making all kinds of racket in the backroom tonight.  (it's where we keep all but two dogs at night time otherwise our house would be destroyed and they would keep us up)  Eventually my husband got sick of listening to the barking and went to tell them to shut up.  He put the two aussie boys out for a while, as they were making the most noise.  When I went to let them in, I saw why they had been making noise.  Rocky was in his crate, on his back, growling and rocking back and forth (like a turtle who can't get up) while he had a toy in his mouth.  They probably thought the dog has having a seizure the way he was carrying on.  When he saw me at the door, he tipped his head up and gave me a big pit bull smile.  That dog could melt the heart of any anti-pit bull person.  He's always smiling and happy.  He's one of the friendlist dogs I've ever encountered.  My husband's best friend is still trying to get his wife to let him take Rocky but the longer we have him, the less I want to get rid ofhim.  Our (MY) original reason for wanting to find him a new home was because of the damage he "could" do.  Had he been any other breed, I probably wouldn't have said anything about it.  Now that he's almost full grown and still showing no signs of aggression, it's hard to imagine us without him.  (although heDOES chase cats, which is fine as long as he has a toy in his mouth... once he didn't and he came back with that big dumb grin, carrying a cat instead of a toy... cat was fine... minus a large amount of drool) I hope to get some silly pictures of him soon.  It's really hard to get him to sit still for more than a second before he's off on his next quest.  He thinks he's a shiztu.  He will run across the living room and jump onto the couch (that YOU'RE laying on) and just plop down all the way across you.  Cash does the same thing but without the running.  I'm like, you're the two largest dogs in the house and you want to lay ON me???  Cash is 70lbs and Rocky is 54lbs and they're both gaining weight.  Cash is over a year old but will not be considered full grown till he is two.  And Rocky still isn't full grown.  All my dogs are on puppy food till age 2 for the protein that is in it.  They're also all breeds that are prone to bone problems so we want to make them as stronge as possibly while they're in the course of growing.  It's gotta look strange though when we go into Walmart once every single week to buy a 40lb bag of puppy food.  They've gotta be thinking that is one big mothertruckin dog.  ;)~ Yes, we're starting to tone down the cursing, by making up new words.  Mothertruckin, Fudge striped cookies (that's one of my husbands), snap (instead of the other four letter s word) Cheese and Rice (I say Jesus Christ in excess and I get very sharp looks when we're in the women's department of JcPenney and my two year old shouts Jesus Christ mommy you about gave me a heartattack... yes she said it EXACTLY like that).  We're still not sure on the sex of the two small parakeets.  My husband says we never will be sure since I did such a bad job of  it the first time.  (both my parakeets were males.... until one layed an egg) It was an odd colored cere, I can't be held responsible for that.  Hopefully they will have more normal colors.  As of right now they both have cere's that are exactly in the middle of what's considered male and what's considered female.  It's only a matter of time before they decide to change completely.