A few of my favorite things

Mother's Day presents

My children know what makes me happy.

Well, first of all, they make me happy. And second, the Mother's Day presents made me happy: flowers from the garden, tennis balls, coffee and a gift certificate for a book.

Katie joked that I could fill up on the coffee so I would have the energy to play tennis.

Ben came home for a day, and I was especially happy to have all of them there. We went over the tennis courts to "hit a few" (my father's coinage), and I could have used some of that coffee trying to keep up with him. He beat me 6-2*. Why the asterix? Because he had to hit in the singles court and I got the doubles lines, and he had to get his first serve in and I could take as many serves as I wanted. Well, he is very young and athletic...and fun to watch.

The weekend included dinner out and breakfast in, made very special by sitting at the table with the three of them. I got in a Mother's Day run and a dog walk.

The dog, alas, ended up stinking up the day.

She hadn't seemed to get into anything, but she smelled awful. Joe went around spraying Febreeze, with me running around after him and yelling at him to stop. We kept her in the kitchen while we ate dinner in the den, and although she had mostly dried off, she still smelled.What to do?

If you wash her in the bathtub, she makes a real mess. So I took her in the back, hooked the end of her leash onto the edge of a bench, grabbed the dog shampoo, pulled out the hose and got to work shampooing her and hosing her down. Needless to say, she was not happy. She yanked hard and got away, pulled down the bench and ran in circles. Luckily by then she was clean enough.

Katie caught the dog and Joe righted the bench. I was exhausted and soaked but pleased with my work.

I sat at the table and lit an "Orchard Pear" candle. The dog konked out, and the evening ended peacefully.