Welcome to Gaia! ::

((This is mostly for Morri and Fester and their kits, though there might possibly be a few other family and friends dropped in if we all feel like it.))



Spring was starting to return to the lands, and today seemed reasonably warm and dry. The few times she'd brought the kits down to the HQ grounds there had been... incidents, so Morrigan had decided it might be better to keep them in her lair until they were better able to fend for themselves. It seemed like a good day at least to let them roam around the grassy area between the lair and the treeline, however, and since even she had cabin fever she had no qualms about it.

The lair itself was a small cave she'd found after she'd realized she was pregnant; if anyone was going to be taking any measurements of her children she wanted to do it herself, and with Fester's knowledge. Her home life with her father wasn't going to be particularly conducive to Fester's piece of mind... and so far the kits hadn't exhibited any of the more unusual traits passed down from her mother, so she'd left well enough alone aside from medical check-ups.

Stepping out the door (she had installed a proper door, and lighting, and furniture - she wasn't going to have her family sleeping on the dirt if she could help it) and plopped Daigh down on the grass. He seemed quite glad to be free of her mouth and promptly wiggled every available inch of himself against the pleasant coolness of the greenery below him. "We should outside more, Momma."

Morrigan had to smile at his still imperfect grasp of grammar and nuzzled him. "The weather should be staying warmer for a while, so we can come outside more often now." She turned back to the still open door. "Come children, or Daigh is going to squirm all the grass away before you get to see it."

While the rest of her kin began drifting out of the cave, like leaves in a winter breeze, one particular kit remained in her snooze. With tails the color of mossy trees, she withdrew further into the crinkles of the blanket, hoping to find body heat remaining there. But alas, the chill of the air stole it away all too soon. Scowling with her baby muzzle and mewling in aggitation, the young kit finally rolled over. But only partially, so she lazily rested on her back and was able to see the entrance of the cave upside down. It may have caused her spectacles to topple off her face, but at the moment she was too tired to care.

"Papaaaa. Papaaaa! M' still sleepy." =n= And then she yawned as if to further prove her point.

Daigh finally stopped squirming around and lay absolutely motionless on his belly instead, staring at his striped feet. Or maybe past them? There was a mouse, or a squirrel, he wasn't sure... but in a split second he was a little green blur diving under a fallen branch to try and catch it. He missed and made a miffed face for a moment, then decided to make the best of things and started examining the tree branch to see if it would be useful for playing with. "Whaddya think Phae? Can we do anything with this?" He did value his family's opinions, when he remembered to ask about them before running headlong into something.

Morrigan kept a watchful eye from next to the door, wanting to make sure Daigh didn't wander too far but wanting to keep track of Fester and the kits inside as well. Her ears flicked thoughtfully at the mention of hunting. "Fester, love, that reminds me. I acquired some hunting snares, I thought we could go find some good places to set them up later." She'd also considered setting up some fishing nets in the river. She could hunt sufficiently for herself when she felt the need to, but she simply wasn't much of a hunter and with six mouths to feed it simply wasn't reasonable to expect they'd get to spend much time together if they didn't take advantage of a little mechanical help.

((I'm thinking at the moment that the kids are either going to wind up with a see-saw or a catapult, unless you have another idea. XD))

Daigh examined the stick. it was long, but not excessively so, and broad enough that the kits could sit at either end of the main bough... if they got the sticks and twigs off. "Well. I don't guess we can do a lot with it with all these sticks poking out."

Morri wandered in to nuzzle their other daughter, being careful to keep the door and the two outside in view. "They're relatively simple. All you have to do is find a good place to put them, stick some bait in, and leave them open so the animals can get inside. When they take the bait the snare closes and all we have to do is go back and check on them." She'd turned Fester's world upside down in so many ways since they met, she knew. He was taking it all remarkably well, considering. And he was more intelligent than he gave himself credit for; perhaps he'd never be able to have a "science-talk" with her, but there were other aspects of life where he was the more informed, he just didn't know it. They would find their niche together eventually, and they'd already gotten off to a decent start if she did say so herself.

Morri nuzzled into Fester's cheek fur for a moment with her nose, resting it there briefly and simply breathing him in. Unusual couple though they might be, the little blissful moments like this one far outweighed the awkward ones. "I love you, too." She took a step back and smiled before turning to head toward her work area. "I'll go get one of the cage-traps and show you." Of course just as she took a step forward she heard Phaedra fall and start crying, turning a sedate walk almost instantly into a panicked rush to check on her daughter. "Phaedra! What are you doing in here? What happened?"

Daigh heard Phaedra crying from outside and stumbled over himself in his rush to get inside and make sure everything was ok. "Phae? Phae?" He arrived on the scene to their mother nuzzling Phaedra, and an open drawer atop Morrigan's work desk. His tails drooped and curled half under him as he slunk forward to check on his sister. "We were gonna clean off the branch..." He wasn't really sure what else to say. They were being inventive! Phae falling down definitely hadn't been part of the plan.

Morri quietly checked Phaedra over for injuries, but aside from a bump and the shock of the fall she seemed none the worse for wear. She gently nuzzled both daughter and worried son as she sorted in her mind what had just happened.

"Phaedra, dear, I'm going to have to ask you not to mess with my work things until I'm sure you can handle them. Those clippers are very sharp and are about twice as big as you are right now, you could pull a muscle or cut yourself very easily. If you need one of my tools you are welcome to ask me, but please don't try to get it without me. What am I going to do if you get yourself hurt?" She righted both children and set them on her feet and then fished her clippers out of her work desk. "Here, why don't you both show me what you need done, and I can tell you how the clippers work." Because as long as you didn't need immediate medical attention, the best way to hand an accident was to make it a learning experience. At least that was Morrigan's philosophy.

Daigh brightened when Phaedra nuzzled him back and finally seemed to be feeling better and bounded out behind her. Morrigan shook her head fondly at her offspring and picked the clippers up before moving to follow, pausing in the doorway to glance askance at Fester. He could come watch too. While explaining the why of the clippers working might be a little hard for his understanding, she was quite sure he could grasp the operation of them. If he wanted to. She wanted to help him learn about all of these things she'd simply grown up with, but she also didn't want to push him too fast. It was easy for her to delve a bit too far into the science part of things and confuse him, and while she knew he was no idiot, when that happened he usually seemed to feel like one and it frustrated him.

Kits were easier to teach, really, they at least knew they weren't expected to know everything yet, and were therefore more willing to keep trying and asking for explanations that weren't as complicated as she tended to start with. Fester seemed to feel like he shouldn't bother because he was so out of his depth... Hm. Well she knew he probably didn't have the flair for science that she held, but Morri was still fairly certain he'd enjoy being able to use the tools if he was only willing to learn how. She was quite certain he'd be able to do things with them to surprise them both if he'd give himself half a chance. In a way she almost felt bad for pursuing him so single-mindedly after she'd realized how she felt for him. If she'd taken more time she would have been able to spend more time helping him with these directly; now they had kits to take care of and it would be hard to find time to really spend teaching him for a while yet.

Live and learn, she supposed.

Morri wagged her tails when Fester stepped over to follow her, smiling brightly. She wanted him with her for entirely selfish reasons of simply wanting to be near him, of course, but she had less selfish ones of wanting to help him and share things with him as well. With a little bounce in her step she padded after the children and gave the branch a critical looking over. "A see-saw?" It would be servicable, though after they trimmed the smaller branches and twigs off it would probably still take some work with a saw to finish. Then they should probably find something else to stabilize it and provide a proper pivot point... this might be more than one morning's work to do properly.

She set the clippers down where Daigh, Phaedra, and Fester could get a clear look at it. "It has a safety latch, here, to keep it from opening when it's not being used. Makes it much safer to pick up without risking accidentally snipping off a toe..." She stuck her tongue out at Fester then, this obviously a response to his comment about injuring himself. She proceeded to show how to disengage the safety latch, how to use the specially designed paw-grips on the handles. Then she used the sharp scissor blades to snip a couple of the larger sticks off the fallen branch. "I use it to take plant samples, or to gather the herbs I put in the medicines. Or to trim back the wild plantlife around the yard here so I don't have to worry about vines or little scrub bushes tripping you or I or the kits up when we come out to play more when summer sets in."

Daigh couldn't help thinking that those blades were awfully shiny. But... probably not good to try and bite on like some of the other things around the house.