this used to be our family blog entitled "British Royalty versus the Ramsey Clan" (since i'm descended from King Edward II and jon is a descendant from the Ramsay Clan) but since jon never participated, and my mom is the only one who reads this, it is now a format for writing her letters. I mean, for writing you letters, mom.

Thursday, April 29, 2010

Stuff only my Mom would care about:

AAAhhh, the family blog update. It will be severely boring to you unless you are my mother. So, Margie and Piper will try to take you along on a journey through our latest happenings...

Here we are waiting for Sue to throw the ball. She makes us wait too long, But we'll stand here forever, drooling, until she does:


One evening, she made an oven-roasted chicken and we couldn't stand the torture of being forced to smell it all night without being able to eat all of it. A lousy small treat portion was given:


Here's Leo who, just as he got good at climbing trees, has been quarantined inside after a neighbour complained of the cats pooping in their flower beds:


Here's sassy, jerk Napoleon. He whines a lot when he can't go outside. and whaps us and bites sometimes. what a jerk. but Susan seems to like cuddling with him for some reason:


Here's fat cat Phineas who lies around, eats, and meaows when he gets lost in the basement every 5 minutes:


Here we are running the ball back to susan so she'll throw it again to us for us to chase. our job is hard, but we love doing it:


We got to poop in this area of the yard for a year to get susan's garden all fertilized. then we got to eat all the grass out for her. then she planted her seeds yesterday, so we don't get to go in there anymore. But we do still have to eat all the grass around the fence, so our work is never complete, until winter (then we have the "stick project" to worry about):


Here's soem Spring litter susan found in our front yard after the snow melted. It was the most interesting as of yet! Half a Cinderella doll, a kid army jacket, energy drinks, and meat sticks... mmm, good stuff to chew on i'd say:


Here's all of us pets lying on susan as jon takes the picture. we like to all lie on her because she gets really warm and scratches our backs:


here's the front yard flowers this year. some sort of animal must've eaten all the Black Beauty tulips this year:


but here was a stray black beauty:



and an orange spikey one:


the parrot kind:


purple:


and a home-made hybrid:


The End. We hope you enjoyed our update... Do we get a treat now???

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

my big fat update

last weekend brought heavenly treats of scones with devonshire cream for tea time along with grandmother denbrooke heath's english bone china.
thank you, sharon young!


napoleon liked it too:



Piper (aka Pipermint after she eats my burt's bees peppermint chapstick) gets bored when left out alone at home. Who wouldn't with NOTHING to do besides bark muffledly at passersby through windows while the humans are away?
SO... why not metamorphosize into the tazmanian devil and tornado-ify the entire house?! Yes. Plan made. And, abra-cadabra... Garbage EVERYWheRE! --->


knawed off plunger handle ^


bathroom trash ^


can't quite get to main garbage can! ^


trash be free!!! ^


pyrex measuring cup amongst boxes ^


that lemonade cookbook's gotta be around here somewhere! ^


trying to call for help with recipe ^




all we have is powder mix?!! ^


living room tornado! ^


broken glass in bathtub, broken hearts. ^


luckily, no injuries were sustained.

Piper loves her kennel while humans are away.

and we all need an extra relaxing tea time with scones and cream!

Tuesday, May 26, 2009

a great blue heron summer

Susan's been published!
& her great blue heron painting is the Cover Art for this season's
Minneapolis Observer Quarterly!



To read whole interview, visit http://www.mplsobserver.com/

Painting With Words: Artist Susan Heath Talks About Art, Nature, and Place

May 24, 2009
Painting With Words: Artist Susan Heath Talks About Art, Nature, and Place

The Great Blue Heron on the cover of the summer issue of MOQ was painted by Minneapolis artist Susan Heath. We asked Susan to tell us more about what inspires her and to share her thoughts about art, artmaking, and being a nature-loving artist in the city.

Monday, May 25, 2009

april shower, may flowers

Hi. I'm Leonardo. Leo for short. Lucky Leo sometimes as well. I was out on the front step the other day when i discovered what good my claws are for as i abruptly ran up the front tree.


Piper underwent horticultural training and failed when she achieved mere hole-digging and seed-unearthing, but won the Canine award for "Places to hide a Bone" contest.


After an honest day's work of instigating trouble with Margie, drinking all the water, and stepping all over human's sensitive parts, Piper likes to curl up with Susan (her chosen favorite) and hoard the blankets and bed space.


We all like to go outside and enjoy the miracles of nature, including these lilacs...


Even Napoleon takes time out of his pain-causing-jerk-stuff activities to enjoy the wonders of lawn-munching...


these Bleeding Hearts spouted poetry and prose about the romance of Spring sun...


Phineas watched for birds and whined at the neighbors in his old man voice...


While the rainbows of tulips stood around, wondering which colors would be added to the mix next year.

Monday, April 20, 2009

one morning, when all the animals of the house had finally quieted down from their endless play throughout the night, enough for jon to fall asleep... a man came to our neighbourhood and decided to flush out the fire hydrant in front of our bedroom window:



Margie invited her new friend Piper (Tim's pup) over and showed her her favorite toy ball to play with in the backyard:


Piper begged Margie to show her how to play:


So, Margie brought the ball to Susan, to which Susan said, "Drop it!" and Margie did so. The Susan threw the ball all the way across the yard and Margie began to chase after it... Piper saw the chasing and decided to race Margie:


The exhilerating thrill of running... Piper ran...


and ran...


and ran...


To which Margie said, "That's not how we play the ball game."


So, Piper asked Susan if she could help her with gardening, to which Susan said, "no, get out of the dirt!"


So, Piper ran through the sprinkler, biting at the water sprays, and Susan again said, "No!" And Piper cried, "I was only trying to help."


So, Piper went back to Margie's ball, and Margie growled... so she got put in the kennel. But Piper, loyal to their new friendship, went into the cell as well to show her support:


The next day, Margie showed Piper how to play the play fighting game and said, "If you want to be a true Boxer, you need to learn to fight right!"


To which Piper replied, "Look - Predator attacking Godzilla!" and with her distraction techniques and quick lightness of her feet, won the fight.


Then they all went inside for some treats and lied down for a long nap. The only trouble was, by then, it was night, and Jon's sleeping time was long gone.

Thursday, April 2, 2009

balloon animals

jon recently turned brenden and raisa into his marionette zombies, pretending he had friends for the afternoon:



then... signs of life appeared outside after an unbelievably long winter:


tulips that susan planted six inches underground last fall serendipitously one day before the first november snow.


iris plants reaching for the first april sun and sending their prayers to heaven for the end of the six-month glacial weather.

if only susan could have hibernated along with nature all winter. if only. (only 2 more months of feeling like a balloon animal, twisted, stretched, pulled, poked at, thrown up and down, withering over time, used up, and tossed in the trash. hooray!).