That's right--we have two new members of the Sawyer household. Meet our two guinea pigs.

Patches, our short-hair:
and Skunk, the obviously long-haired guinea pig:

And yes, they did come with those names. Probably a good thing, since Adriana has been a little too eager to use various forms of "poop" in names lately.

I noticed last night that someone was giving away two guinea pigs on KSL classifieds, along with cages and all supplies (i.e. bedding, food, vitamin drops, guinea pig shampoo, etc.). I've actually called a few times when someone was giving away gerbils, and then some fish, but I've never been the first one to call and I didn't think I would be this time. Surprise, the guinea pigs were mine. Adriana was ecstatic when I told her this morning that we were going to pick up her very own pets this afternoon. She didn't stop chattering the whole way home from Riverton, nearly 45 minutes away. Miriam is much more skittish around animals than Adriana, but she does seem fascinated by our new "innies! innies!" as she calls the guinea pigs. As long as they don't get too close.

For now the guinea pigs are in Adriana's room, but they may end up in the laundry room if the smell bothers me. It's not bad at the moment, with freshly bathed guinea pigs and new bedding, but we'll see in a few days. Not suprisingly, it took Adriana a while to calm down enough tonight to fall asleep.These are actually my first furry pets (only had a lizard and the family had a bird). I do realize that the bulk of the taking care of the guinea pigs will fall on me, but I am adding some pet tending activities to Adriana's daily chore chart. And hey, they were free, so if it really doesn't work out I wouldn't feel too bad giving them away to someone on Craig's list. The only bad thing would be my three-year-old would disown me.

Did that get your attention? Kenny had a great reaction when I told him, too. (What?!?!? WHAT?!?!?!?) That's right, it is true. I did take a pregnancy test last week that was positive. But if I were pregnant I can guarantee that I would not be announcing it on our blog like that, and definitely not right after finding out.

So no, I am NOT pregnant, or trying to be (sorry, grandparents, and sorry for everyone else that that was more information than you wanted to know). Last week I was cleaning out the vanity under the sink in our bathroom. I'm embarrassed to admit how long it had been since that had been organized or completely cleaned out, but suffice it to say that I wasn't that surprised to find an old pregnancy test that expired in 2007. Being the compulsive pregnancy-test taker that I am, rather than just throwing it in the trash I went ahead and took the test first.

Imagine my shock when I saw that little pink line showing a positive result. With my basic understanding of biology and timing of cycles and such (I know, again with more information than you wanted), I really didn't think there was any way I could actually be pregnant. Even so, I knew that false positives were more rare than false negatives with pregnancy tests, and I did feel better after going out and getting another pregnancy test that was, of course, negative. Nope, no baby announcements for the Sawyers. Maybe in 2010?

Hmmmm, maybe. Yep, I'm still dragging my feet on the whole pet issue, and Adriana is still faithfully trying to wear me down by asking every day for a pet. She likes to remind me that I got to have two pets when I was growing up (a lizard and a bird, although I remind her back that I was twelve before we had a pet).

Her love of animals and all things living reached a new level today, though. There was a gnat flying near her today during lunch, and when I reached out and caught it with my hand Adriana burst in to actual tears. "Did you squish it?!" (Yes.) "But he liked me! [puts on indignant voice] You should have waited for Daddy to come home. He catches bugs and then puts them outside to find their home." She was really upset and put out with me. I suppose I shouldn't have been surprised, since this is the same child who finds snails, potato bugs, worms, and other various creepy crawlies outside and them creates "homes" for them (with buggy friends, things to eat, places to crawl on, etc.) in our backyard; we've had more than one disagreement about what "pets" or "friends" we should bring in to our house.

I was also advised this afternoon (make that ordered) to wait for Daddy to get the spider crawling up the wall in the bathroom. Too bad. If there's an insect, arachnid, or rodent in my home of any kind, it will be disposed of. I'm just waiting until Adriana is not in the room to give me guilt trips when I do the necessary squishing, catching, or poisoning. I know--I'm heartless. And I still don't really want a pet. I have a feeling that it's going to be inevitable and I will give in someday. How long will she be satisfied with a fish?

This evening Kendall remarked, "We have the weirdest kids." The context? Adriana had been begging for a treat after dinner. And what exactly did she want for a special treat? Frozen corn. That's right--corn straight out of the freezer. She calls them her "corn popsicles." (She's also a fan of "broccoli popsicles" and any kind of frozen fruit. Crazy kid.) She had to eat the rest of her dinner before being allowed to have a treat, of course. :)

Well, we sold our Corolla last night. I'm thrilled--we got our asking price, and now I should be able to get the fence for our backyard that we have wanted since we first moved in. It is a little bittersweet, though. That was the car I learned to drive with, and then my dad sold us (OK, gave us since he only charged us $1) right before we were married, we used it to move across the country after the wedding, and that was the car we used to bring Adriana home from the hospital. The pins from Kenny's corsage from the day we got married were still stuck in the side of the front seat, and when we cleaned out the glove compartment we found hotel receipts from our honeymoon.

Even so, it was time for the car to go. It has been sitting in our garage for a year and a half, unused, and the work it needed to get it to pass safety and emissions was going to cost more than we estimated the car was worth. So while I will be a little sad to see the car go, I'm looking forward to being able to use our garage again for a car we actually drive (no more scraping windshields in the winter or having a sweltering car in the summer!), and I am really, really excited to have a fenced backyard. When we go outside, Miriam is just too good at watching to see when I am distracted, sneaking around to the side of our house, and then running as fast as she can to get to the front yard. Yikes. Now we just need to officially ask the Elder's Quorum to come help us clear our backyard....

("Old Abe" is what we used to call the car when I was growing up, because it had the letters "ABE" on its license plate.)