Our New "Pets"

Well Christmas has come and gone - always amazing how fast it all goes. On one hand I hate taking everything down but on the other, I'm ready for my apartment to get back to normal! Christmas was lots of fun - on Christmas Eve Nicholas left out a plate for Santa and I'm sorry to say he chose 6 cookies, a candy bar and two Hershey's kisses to leave for him. I ate one of the cookies completely, took a bite out of another and managed the two Hershey's kisses - the rest went into the trash. Santa was feeling a bit sickly after that! Anyhow, Nicholas got tons of stuff and was very happy with his gifts but there are two new ones I need to mention specifically. Thanks to my sister Becky we now have a fish again. I will admit that she did ask my permission at first and I begrudgingly said yes but I added a "When this fish dies Larry better be coming to town to dispose of the body for me". Anyhow, Nicholas got a very cool Pirate aquarium and a very pretty red, blue and purple beta fish he named GI Joe. That name lasted exactly one day - on Friday his name was switched to Jedi. Nicholas is on a bit of a Star Wars kick, more on that in a minute. Anyhow, we got the tank set up and Jedi now lives in Nick's room. I'm a little panicked that on the days Nicholas is at his father's house I will forget all about Jedi but so far I'm aware he is there and feeding him accordingly! When I came home yesterday I let our dog Peanut out of his cage and did the whole "Mommy's home!" dance with him. I sat on the couch and a few minutes later started feeling kinda bad so I went to Nick's room and walked up to the fish tank. I bent down eye level to Jedi and said "I'm home! Mommy's home, did you miss me?" and sure enough, that fish didn't give a damn. Didn't even know I was ever gone lol! Having a fish again is going to be an experience! All that hard work and no love in return!!! Anyhow, as I said earlier, Nicholas is all about Star Wars! And I think it's really cool because I was when I was little too. He was a Storm Trooper this year for Halloween and I realized that many, many light years ago, when I was a 6 year old I went as Princess Leia! How cool is that? Well his big gift from me was this voice controlled R2-D2 that I ordered online and it is the coolest thing ever! It's about two feet tall and when you turn him on he does all kinds of things! He is programmed to do a bunch of stuff (although Nicholas asked him what 10+10 was and of course, that is not something he is programmed to do!) This little guy was expensive but I'm already very sure he was worth the money as I have been playing with him even though Nicholas is gone this week! It's really fun to see Peanut react to him - it freaks him out! R2 can even dance and play light tag and when he "found me" during a game and sang a happy little song I blurted out "Good boy, you found me!" before I could even stop myself! Uh yeah, that's why I am considering him a pet too, he is capable of making grown adults treat him as if he were real! So Michelle and Nicholas Craven are now the proud owners of Peanut the dog, Jedi the beta fish, and R2-D2 the robot! It's pretty crazy around our house but it's lots of fun!!!