Welcome to the Gentle Jungle

It was a big yard sale weekend in my area, and notices about them kept popping up on the neighborhood Facebook group. As I mentioned, on Saturday, on my morning walk, I spent a whole dollar on some fun new stuff, and picked up a free frisbee (frisbees being a god-send to backpackers, or didn't you know?).

Stryker is the little gray kitty who lives a few houses down, who sometimes comes to visit us. We had not seen him in a month or more. Then Stryker's mom posted a notice that they would be having a yard sale. The next day, Sunday, she posted again: everything was "FREE! Please just leave the white folding tables, blue tarps, and cat."  :-)

So on Sunday morning, I hopped on my bike and went down. There was absolutely nobody there, so I perused the tables to my heart's content, and came home with a SwissGear daysack, a pair of shorts, a pair of pants, several blankets, a few stuffed animals, a hat, a book, some plates, trays, two cornflower blue Corning Ware bowls, a rabbit with an accordion, and a red and white striped duckling!

I stuffed the stuff into my own daysack, and into the new daysack I had picked up, strapped it all on my back, and rode back up the hill. So it was that I acquired a bunch of new "stuff," all at zero cost to me! (My husband joked that we should sneak down some of our OWN stuff to give away, but I told him that's just not proper!)

On Monday morning, I was making the bed - flipping and rotating the mattress, changing into the new summer bamboo sheets which are oh so dreamy! When I suddenly realized that I was badly missing my cat. The tearing apart of the bed (also the sorting of laundry on the bed) was one of Dexter's favorite things, and it often turned into quite a show.

But Dexter is off in Heaven chasing butterflies with my big sister these days, and so I do not have any good help in bed making. So I thought for a minute, and I realized I had NEW CREATURES to help me! So here are the new creatures - along with T. Tiger, who is making them feel welcome - hanging out during the bed making process.

The blankets are soft and floofy, and decorated in a zoo/jungle animal theme. The main blanket has a monkey, a giraffe, and a lion. The folded fleece blankets sport a monkey and a lion. And the stuffed animals I acquired included a really lovely yellow giraffe with a wind-up thing to make music (and a fancy necklace), a small bear/blanket, and a sloth with all kinds of personality!

Well, this is your first viewing of these new creatures, but I suspect it will not be your last! That sloth in particular has stories in it, I can tell! So say Hello to the newbies. And welcome to the very gentle jungle. . . .

The soundtrack song is, of course, Guns N' Roses, with Welcome to the Jungle. Let's include a lullaby version for the babies among us. And here's the original, live version.