the ever expanding zoo

yes, that's right. the zoo has grown again. it now includes 5 baby barn swallows. great news, i know. how did this happen? well, alex got a wild hair about wanting to take care of baby birds. being the naive mom i am, i told him about how i took care of baby birds when i was younger. of course mine all died. most because i was not prepared for how much of a responsibility it was. i guess the fact most of the ones i found had taken a 2 story fall from the top of the barn to the concrete floor below didn't help their cases. and of course there was the baby bird i caught and my mom told me to put it back. i did, and it jumped off the branch into the waiting mouth of skipper, the springer spaniel. not a great day, let me tell you.
but i digress. so alex went out and started looking for orphaned baby birds. where do you find those? well apparently in the barn. oh yeah and the chicken coop. he found 3 babies on the floor in the barn, hiding in a corner. the other two he found in the coop, being pecked at by chickens. apparently they had already killed the 3rd in the nest and were going for the other two. now we are feeding these baby birds formula (the baby bird kind), and they have to be fed every 30 minutes. (this hasn't happened by the way). alex has been good about feeding them...when he is home. today is the last day of school and he will be home to do it more. haley has been helping out with them too. so far they are still alive. this has been day 3 i think. so far so good i guess. alex is looking forward to them flying. i don't know why, but he is. i am looking forward to them flying too, but flying away from here to a new life.
zack likes the birds too. i was having a heck of a time keeping him out of the cage. then of course he grabbed one out and tried to feed it to the dog. thank god the dog didn't know what it was and didn't do anything but smell it. that would have been fun explaining it to alex. "hey, your brother thought the dog needed a snack..." baby birds are incredibly resilient. they have withstood several days of being "held" by the kids, all five kids. so now instead of bunny news, i will be providing birdie news. hopefully this will have a much happier ending.

school is out. kids got their awards after mass this morning, and we were done by 9:30. not bad for a last day. haley got awards for excellence in reading, creative writing and music. alex got awards for excellence in science, english and art. i think every kid got at least 2 awards. i don't know how all the kids feel about this last day of school. i know most parents think it's a waste of time. it is, but i don't really care either way. have it or don't, it doesn't matter to me. i don't know how effective this day is. i always felt awards are for kids who deserve the recognition. not that these kids don't deserve it, but when the teachers are just trying to make sure everyone has "X" number of awards, it loses it's meaning to me. but like i said, i don't care either way.