Hoggin Craft now has its own home on the web with nine custom pigs currently for sale. You can also email me your theme and we'll custom-design one for you. 

First, there was rain. From my bed, it sounded nice and dreamy, the kind of rain that makes you want to record it for posterity and secure your mosquito nets as you drift back off to sleep on a peaceful Carribean island. Near a waterfall. And interesting birds. 

Since we've been in Chateau Travolta for six years and haven't had water in the basement since that fateful first week, it didn't occur to me to check the basement for water until the little angel and I had donned our swimsuits to avoid the torrential rain at the local rec center pool. Beloved, unfortunately, caught us before we escaped with the news that Hoggin Craft had flooded and Tiny was a casualty. 

We crashed down the stairs to find two inches of water in the Hoggin Craft headquarters. Tiny was indeed soaked in a way only a giant stuffed gorilla can be soaked, and that is a way in which soaked is soaked and don't even think about keeping him because BLACK MOLD IS REAL. I asked Beloved if we could stick Tiny in the basement shower to drain while we cleaned up the mess. No, we could not, he said, because Tiny is too damn big to fit in a shower for humans.

Farewell, Tiny. I can only imagine your trip to the landfill.

We mopped up the muck and threw the rest of the stuffed animals that were stored in Hoggin Craft (in case of a tornado, extra stuffed animals are required to live in Hoggin Craft full-time by the little angel) were in the washer. Only two hours remained before the indoor pool closed, so Beloved excused the little angel and me, but our joy was short-lived, because an hour or so later, I got a text from Beloved: 

Borrowed ladder. Will need you to hold it when you get home so I can blow out the gutters.

Oh, yay! Can we please spend the rest of our day off from work cleaning out gutters after vacuuming up four bathtubs' worth of water?

Our roof is quite tall. I really hate seeing anyone on very tall ladders, least of all someone to whom I'm related by blood or marriage. But no, we had to do it, and I knew we had to do it, but I very much did not want to do it, anyway. Alas.

Minutes later, there I found myself, holding a ladder, while my husband used a leafblower tied to an extension pole to blow water, dead leaves and helicopters out of the gutter and on to ... me. It was like some unique form of Nickoledean-sponsored torture to close my eyes and grimace as I was spattered with rotting, muddy tree matter as neighbors frolicked about in the sunshine, enjoying their Memorial Days and pretending like they weren't listening to me squawk as I was pelted with feculent foliage.

After the little angel went to bed, we had this conversation.

Beloved: "We're going to have to do that every spring if we don't want more water in the basement, you know."

Me: "I know. I hate ladders."

Beloved: "Maybe we should get those gutter covers."

Me: "That sounds like the least fun way to spend thousands of dollars I can think of. Except maybe mudjacking."

Beloved: (.)

Me: "I am so bored by this conversation I can't even believe I'm continuing to talk."

Adulthood, huzzah!

Beloved may have helped with the basketball net.

Last night I watched a few episodes of Shark Tank with the little angel and the neighbor girl. These two are infamous for starting and rapidly abandoning businesses. The little angel is building up a good inventory at Hoggin Crafts, so I thought we were through with the insane business ideas.

This afternoon they came back from the neighbor's house with a full-on PowerPoint presentation about a pet sitting business they were going to start. Included on the "what we sit" page were: monkeys, horses, turtles and rabbits, in addition to pets they might actually find in our tri-state area.

"You're going to pet sit monkeys?"

"Sure."

"And horses? You know how to take care of horses?"

"Yes! I saw a horse once!"

*headdesk*

I think I created some monsters.

The little angel has been working hard on the Hoggin Craft dynasty. I thought I'd share some pictures of the piggy banks because they are so hilarious. Because the little angel kept three old Harry & David boxes full of every piece of crap plastic she's ever received, we have lots of junk to glue to pigs now.

This is the pig for the jeweler's granddaughter. Notice the accessories. I didn't do any of this except the hot glue.

The little girl's name starts with an "E."

This is the travel pic commissioned by my parents. It's a medium-sized pig. I ended up ordering 24 of the three-inch size from Oriental Trading Company, because it's more in line with both her attention span and people's wallets (not to mention the silent partner's investment). The itsy ones are going to be themed or custom designed and $5 each. I figure she'll get a bunch done by the garage sale and make a kid killing. (Or at least sell a few to people who aren't related to us.)

The artist at work. Tiny has moved down to do security.

The little angel got a book over the holiday break on money management. I thought it was going to be a book about budgeting and saving and all that good eight-year-old stuff, but no, it was a book on MAKING money.

The little angel whipped up a business plan. She was going to sell something. She was talking margins. I remembered the failed craft sales she and the neighbor girl had on our neighborhood's garage sale weekend in the past. The times they tried to sell complete strangers used ribbon for $1. I told her if she was going to sell something, it had to be something GOOD. Something useful. Something one might want to own even if it were not made with her hands. She suggested piggy banks.

And so Hoggin Crafts was born. Here is her logo. She made it herself on the Mac, not that you could tell!

I did offer to be her silent partner. I fronted her seven piggy banks, which I bought at Hobby Lobby. She is customizing them. We were at the jewelry store where I bought my replacement wedding ring getting it ionized or whatever it is you do to make white gold match platinum again (and if you did not know you could do this, it totally rocks, and if you ever buy white gold you should get them to throw this service in every six months for free) and the jeweler started telling us about her 16-month-old granddaughter who was enamored with ... you guessed it! PIGGY BANKS. The little angel got her business card and started designing the custom piggy bank that afternoon. Here is the plan.

The pig saying "oink" is  her trademark. It goes on the stoppers on the pigs' bellies. She's about 3/4 of the way done with the pig pictured above and has taken four more orders, all from extended family. I have no intention of starting an Etsy store, but if anyone wants a custom-designed pig, let me know. The 3-inch-ish size pigs are $8. I'm happy she's developing these entrepreneurial skills now, because by the time she goes to college, a gallon of gas will cost ten whiffle-wind credits, and that will be just chaos.