Building a cat tower for Toney!

I recently rescued a cute kitten from the pouring rain at my office. I've been wanting a cat for a while now and was just waiting for the right time. This cutie found me so I named him Toney after Saint Anthony.  (Saint Anthony is the patron Sanint of lost items/people, as Catholics, we ask him to interceed on our behalf to The Heavenly Father to find things that are lost) 

He is a kitten and he loves to play all the time, we wanted to give him more stuff to play with since he has to live in the shop, because of our allergies.  I wanted to get him a cat tower to provide hours of entertainment and exercise but they are quite expensive. Being the cheap person I am, I decided we could build one cheaper and it would probably last longer because it would be built out of quality material. Not to mention, I could customize it to what I want. So I looked around the shop and found enough material that we had left over from past projects. The only thing I would need to buy would be the natural fiber rope for a scratching post. 

This is the pile of stuff I had waiting for Eric when he got home. I had an idea of what I wanted and of course he changed a few things to make the design work better. 

We started out using old 3" PVC pipe and some 2x8 boards. 

He cut circles out to slide the pipe inside. This will be the base on one side. 

He then notched the pipe at the top to slide a smaller board in for the top shelf. 

He added another upright board to brace an extra shelf on the side. 

We then put in a smaller piece of PVC pipe to hang toys from. 

Almost complete but first I had to paint it.

 

After the paint dried, the following night we hung the hammock.  Now it is ready for Toney to try it out. 

The rope on the scratching post was less than $7, everything else was extra stuff hanging around the shop (including the toys). 

He is such a curious kitten. 

At least he liked to toys that I hung. Lol

Checking out the hammock. 

Yep, he likes it. 

He even likes the little hiding place made from an old tote. Notice the scratching station on top. Kittens need lots of places to scratch. Lol

A small amount of indoor/outdoor rug, old Rubbermaid tote, old cloth, old pieces of PVC pipe, extra wood and a few screws made for a customized cat tower. The best things about it, with this design, we can add to it at a later date to make it taller for more fun things for him. Most cat towers run anywhere from $100-$400 and sometimes more, I made this one for less than $7.00. 

(Please excuse the messy shop in the back ground of the pictures.)

My Husband, A gift from God

WARNING

This will be a sappy blog about my wonderful husband and how much I love him. So if you don't want to hear about how wonderful I think (know) he is, then stop reading now!

(There are also a few details about illnesses)

Now that that's out of the way, let me explain the reason for this blog. Eric and I have been married for almost 19 years, and from the beginning he has been a God-send. He and I started dating about a year after I lost my mother. Eric had never met my mother nor my father who had passed away 3 years before my mother. I was 19 years old when we met, and Eric filled a void that I had for a long time. He has the same sense of humor as my dad and the loving gentleness of my mother. From the first week we dated, I was head over heals in love with him and there was no turning back. In less than a month we were talking about getting married and decided we would wait until he finished college so he could get a job. A year and a half later we were walking down the aisle. 

Our wedding day, 02/10/96, wow were young or what?!  Lol

Us again with the late Fr. Decoteau who officiated our wedding

A lot of people don't understand our relationship. I will try to explain what I mean by that. We are “real” with each other- always have been, always will be. I don't hold anything back and I don't expect him to either. I believe in perfect honesty and will accept nothing less. We are fortunate enough to share the same likes in hobbies, movies, adventure, travel and even friends. We work next door to each other and ride to work together each day. We very rarely spend any time apart from each other. We have been on vacations where we drove for two weeks straight, camped and hiked in the mountains, ate out of the car the entire time, and we never tired of each other and loved every minute of it. I have had friends tell me that they couldn't spend that much time with their spouse or they would go crazy. I couldn't think of anyone else I would rather spend that much time with. We don't always agree on everything, but we are pretty good at talking it out and coming to an agreement. We very rarely argue though because we feel life is too short. Now, that's not to say we have always gotten things right. We, like most couples, have had our fair share of ups and downs. We have just matured and learned that you really don't sweat the small stuff. Years ago, we stopped buying gifts and cards for each other for birthdays, holidays, and anniversaries. This is a touchy topic for most couples. People generally think that I gave in to Eric's persistence on the subject because what woman would agree to no more gifts? But that couldn't be further from the truth. Eric went along with it after I pushed the subject. We are together almost 24/7 and we both hate to shop-unless it’s at a hardware store. When or how would either of us be able to shop and hide anything from the other?  We discuss big ticket items before purchasing. I think it is silly to give a list of things I want for him to get for me and vise versa. Occasionally when one of us runs to the grocery store without the other, we may pick up a "surprise" for each other, like a candy bar or something we know the other would like. But that is the extent of our gifts to each other.

We currently live on 11 acres of land and have lots of ongoing projects.  We work together on ALL of these projects. That includes building stuff, planting gardens and trees, cutting trees down, trimming trees, working on and maintaining the tractor, cleaning the shop, mowing grass and whatever else we need done around the property. In turn, he and I share the housework duties. We both wash clothes and cook. He hates to clean the kitchen when he cooks, so I happily do that for him. I hate to dust and vacuum since it affects my allergies, so he graciously does that for me. We are completely equal at everything. We both take care of each other when we are sick or have any type of procedures. Since we have no children, I dedicate everything to him when he needs me. I guess the motherly instinct kicks in when I have to take care of him. And even though he would rather be left alone when sick, I try my best to wait on him hand and foot. I probably aggravate the fire out of him! When I am sick, he does the same for me. He makes sure I stay hydrated, take my meds on time (something I am hardheaded about), and he fixes me anything I need.

Now that you have a background on how our relationship works, here is the real reason I am writing this blog. I am writing this to thank him and tell the world how wonderful he is.

I recently had a tonsillectomy, which in children is a minor surgery but for adults, not so much. It can be very painful with many complications for an adult. Eric took a week of vacation to "take care" of me. I didn't think he would really need to be here. After all, I would be in pain and unable to eat or talk, so why would he need to be here? Boy was I wrong! I couldn't have been able to get through this without him. From the time we left the hospital, he was on duty. He drove to 3 pharmacies trying to find a pharmacy that had the pain meds that were prescribed to me. He brought me home, got me tucked in and propped up on the couch, set up a humidifier and diffuser. Then back to the pharmacy to pick up the Rx he went. About an hour after the 1st dose of liquid pain meds, the vomiting started. He was right there- holding my hair, cleaning me and waiting for it to stop. I couldn't hold anything down. The swelling was so bad and the pain from the stomach acid on the open wounds was terrible, but he kept trying to give me different foods that he thought would go down. Nothing helped- pudding, jello, ice cream, yogurt, you name it, he tried. Three hours later, the vomiting was back and continued all night and into the morning. By this time, I was so weak from not eating since the night before the surgery that I couldn't even get off the couch. He brought the trash can to me and sat and helped in anyway he could. When it was all done, he tried once again to find something that I could stomach. I don't think I ate or kept anything down that whole day/night. The next morning, he called the doctor's office to see about a different prescription of pain meds and different anti nausea meds since the ones I had clearly were not working. Because it is classified as a narcotic, he had to go pick up the prescription and drop it off at the pharmacy. Let me add that this was all after a very eventful night which he had gotten little if any sleep. He basically sat on the end of the couch and anytime I moved or made a sound, he was asking if I needed anything. Of course, since I had other meds similar to it filled the day before, the insurance threw it out and he was on the phone back and forth with everyone until they finally worked it out. One more trip to town for him to pick up the meds. This trip, he decided to get me a bag of marshmallows because he thought, if I could at least suck on one every once and a while, I would at least be getting a little sugar in my system if anything else. What do you know, it worked. The marshmallows and broth were the only things I had in my system for 2-3 days. He even started putting a spoonful of instant mashed potatoes in my broth so I would have a little substance. Great idea! He slept on the floor two nights in a row so he could be near me. He set his alarm to go off every 3 1/2 hours so he could wake up and try to get me to eat or drink anything before giving me my next round of meds. By day four, things started getting better, and he started sleeping in our bed. I was still sleeping on the couch so I could be propped up to sleep. He would still set his alarm and come give me my meds, even though I told him I could do it myself. It is now day ten, and he is back to work and I am doing much better but still in quite a bit of pain from time to time. I have started eating a few soft foods and I see light at the end of the tunnel.

I'm usually a very tough person and I don't let ANYTHING bring me down. When I had my hysterectomy, I was up and running real quick and back to work in three weeks. I surprised everyone on that one, but I don't believe in laying around when you don't have to. This time around, it was a much different story. Maybe because I am older and it's a tough surgery to get through, but I can honestly say, with out Eric I don't think I would have made it.

He was, is, and always will be my ROCK. They say every good man comes from a good mother, so I must give credit where credit is due. His mother Cathy Watts taught him well. She is as kind hearted and loving as he is.  I guess the title of this blog should be "My Husband, A gift from God, prepared by his mother"

This past Christmas, in front of the tree at his mother's house.

I hope you enjoyed reading this love story about the love of my life who nursed me back to health.