I'm telling you......................

I had to use Michael's favorite adage again...it's just been one of those days!!

I got up with the intentions of doing an overhaul on the house as Mom (Grammie) is coming for a visit, YEA!! We pick her up at the S.A. airport tomorrow!! I was going along really well...both bathrooms are clean, bedrooms are clean...Dining room was cleaned last week...I started working on the living room when Jake decided to vomit in the computer/scrap room...which puts Michael in a gagging mood, ugh!! A 4 yr old gagging is worse than the dog vomit!! LOL

I told both of them to go outside...Ergghh!! I get that cleaned up and Michael and Jake come back inside and I look over at Jake and think what in the world...His face was swollen and he had hives all over his Big HUGE nose, Ekk...Now what!! I call my vet to see if she can take a look at Jake...I won't go there but lets just say she's lost all her good help lately and the girl on the phone was none to intelligent...I decided to just take Jake to Dr. Beck in Victoria. He was my vet for several years and I really like him...I call and they said bring him right in as they can tell by what I am describing he is having an allergic reaction to something...So after getting Michael dressed and him and the dog loaded in the truck we are off to Victoria...

Dr. Beck did blood work and checked Jake over and he was definitely reacting to something...we went over the list that I had come up with that could possibly be the culpert...2 things stood out...2 to 3 weeks ago I changed Jakes dog food...and Jake might have possibly been eating wild onions I had growing in the yard....Onions and dogs do not go together well at all...It was definitely an ingested allergen...as poor Jake started vomiting all over the exam room (thank goodness he didn't do it in my truck)...His skin was beet red and blotchy...Dr. Beck gave him a quick acting steroid shot for the itching...Jake was going nuts with itching...and all the blood work came back fine...no kidney or liver damage...He sent us home with a different dog food...antibiotics and anti-vomiting meds...So far so good!! Poor Jake he is just having a rough time of it...Hopefully with this dog food things will calm down...I decided to mow the lawn and pull up the wild onions...I think Jake was sick from the new dog food and trying to eat grass for his upset stomach but instead of eating just grass he was eating wild onions too...ugh!! Live and learn...and fingers crossed that is what he was reacting too!!

So we get home and I get Michael situated in front of the tv with juice and cookies. Jake is in the kitchen eating ice cubes and resting...I decide to go get the yard ready to mow and grab my camera for some photo therapy...

Okay now I am WARNING MY MOTHER...Stop reading here MOM!! DO NOT GO ANY FURTHER INTO THIS BLOG...Just CLOSE it down MOM and we'll talk to you later and see you tomorrow!!!! Listen to ME!! CLOSE THE BLOG MOM...go check on your flight or finish packing....

See neat Macro photo of the spider, pretty cool!! He's harmless!!

Nice fluffy caterpillar...beautiful colors too!!

A little coal skink...again harmless...this one was dead otherwise I wouldn't have been able to get a photo...they like to go Zoom Zoom and hide...he wasn't Zooming anywhere...

Fire ants...thought I had all the nest out of the yard...missed one under Michael's tractor ramp, Oops!!

Now once again I am telling you MOM...if you haven't left the blog you NEED to NOW!! If you don't leave the blog do NOT call me SCREAMING!!

Well I went over to the tree where the wild onions were growing and mowed around it a bit but noticed there were some onions too close to mow...So I shut the mower off and started pulling those up when I saw something and was like COOL!! I went and grabbed the camera and you know me...Started snapping photos...I yelled at Michael to come out and take a look...and he was like cool Momma is it a bad one!! I said I wasn't sure?

Isn't she pretty....It is a Texas Brown Snake and not very big...about the size of a pencil...and completely harmless...
I was going to leave her alone and then I thought OH SH*T...Mom will have a fit...she won't set foot in the yard!! UGH!! I was NOT going to kill her...as I said she was harmless and not very big at all....So I had Michael get me a bamboo pole and I picked her up and took her out to the pasture....

I hung her on the fence for a photo before carrying her off....So she is no longer in the yard but out in the pasture....

So MOM if you didn't listen and I'm sure you didn't and your probably hyper-ventilating by now...She is NOT in the yard!! But I sure had fun taking photos of her...and teaching Michael that not all snakes in our yard are BAD!!

Now that I've got the Yard mowed...did a little photo therapy and updated my blog I suppose it's time to get back to cleaning the house....and maybe the rest of my day will be A-okay!!