Lydie in the Laundry

The laundry basket is currently Lydia's favorite place to hang out.  She has gotten bored with lying down.  In the basket, she doesn't fall over and she doesn't push her toys out of reach.  Works well!  I'd say she seems quite happy with the set-up!

Lydia has started "dancing" when music is playing or someone is singing.  And the head-bobbing thing...Well, does it look dangerous?  It gets a little out of control when she's excited.  I just don't want her to get whip-lash or anything... :)

Snow Day

Today the buses were cancelled because of bad roads. The boys stayed at home with Lydia and me.  They found some...um....creative ways to play in the snow.
Enjoy:

And here, Evan battles an unseen assailant.  Eli gives the commentary:

 

Lydia and I pulled up a lawn chair and enjoyed the show:

 

The Annual Christmas Tree Expedition

A free ride

Happy girl

Timberrrrrrr!

Mmm...Rice Cereal

How To Handle Strangers on the Telephone: A Guide

Evan was learning about stranger safety in school yesterday.  He brought home an unfinished worksheet to work on at home.  He was supposed to finish sentences.  I found one he had already completed.  The sentence was "If you answer the phone when you are home without an adult, never say that you are alone.  Tell the callers that ________________________."

Evan had filled in the blank this way:  Tell the callers that "my mom and dad are in ther bedrom with the door loked."

Awesome.  I laughed so hard.  I didn't have him change it.  I think it will give his teacher a chuckle too.  In fact, come to think of it, the whole teachers' lounge may be laughing at Evan's parents this very moment!

And here is what happens when mom and dad go in their bedroom with the door "loked": 

Along comes Lydia in a baby carriage!

(Stuffing her in a doll carriage would be her big brothers' idea, of course.)

The Amazing Lydie!

Warning to you grandmothers:  You will not approve of the following outfit.  It is not pink enough. 

(And when Kendall stopped in over his lunch break, I could tell he didn't "approve" either.  I heard him tell Lydia, "You look like a boy."  Seriously, this man has more opinions on baby clothes than I do!  I secretly love that, by the way.  One night we were getting ready to go to friends' house.  He thought her outfit was silly.  So I decided to amuse myself by changing her into something else he would inwardly roll his eyes at.  It was a brown teddy bear outfit that she inherited from Evan.  She was so cute and looked like her big brother.  It made me laugh at our get-together that people really thought about it that she looked like a boy.  Especially 4-year old Hannah!  She definitely did not approve of my little girl lacking all pink and purple!)

Anyway, I show these photos because our little boy girl is amazing!  Just 10 days ago, she would not have been able to do either of these things as well as she can today!

Sitting supported by a pillow-

And standing with me-

I find it utterly amazing (and scary) how quickly she is changing!  I love it and I really don't like it.

By the way, Mom and Dad, does she look like me in the first picture?  Maybe if she was wearing a pink dress?

Lucky Girl

Yes, he is reading to his little sister.  Yes, she enjoyed the storytime.

I love it!

I recently told Evan that one of the things that makes me happiest in the world is how much my kids love each other.  It's the best.

Catchin' Some Rays

So yesterday Lydia and I got all dressed up to go to the pool for Aquatots.  We had our bathing suits on, along with various layers for the cold, snowy weather.  Our road was super-icy.  I drove slowly, hoping that they would be cleared once I got into town.  Made it to town and the roads still looked bad.  I still had a ways to go to get to the pool, so I decided it would be smarter for me to go back home. :(  So we missed our first day of swimming.

We got home and Lydia was just so stinkin' cute in her bathing suit.  So I put our beach towel on the living room floor and let her catch some rays.  (I know, I'm a dork, but don't judge until you see how cute she is.)

Here she is, pretending it's a hot summer day at the beach:

See?  Totally worth it to let her hang out in her cuteness.  Don't worry, she's appropriately clothed for the season today.

Dance Party!

All dressed up for a late-night dance party.  (Well, 8:00, which is late for us these days.)

We heard that some of our teenage friends were having a blacklight party.  So the kids and I dressed up in our grooviest white clothes and crashed their party.  We danced and ate their snacks for half an hour, then came home.

Fun was had by all.  Well, Lydia seemed a bit weirded out by it all.  Eli claimed he was only going for the snack, but he appeared to be having fun demonstrating gangnam style.  Evan dominated in the
sprinkler dance.  And I dazzled everyone with my Running Man from the 90s.  (Though I was horrified to look up from my awesomeness and see one of them video-taping me.  I was sure the humiliation would show up on facebook, but so far we're good.)

Chaotic Suppertime

All of the sudden, our little girl is just seeming so much older.  She is really enjoying her toys and reaches for them with both hands.  Everything goes straight to her mouth. She watches us eat and reaches for my coffee cup.  She is still nursing and I just feel so happy and fulfilled when I see her getting positively chubby little legs!  We've just started giving her little tastes of food.  She loves it.  Here she is getting a bit of applesauce and sweet potatoes at supper the other night.

We've had to work to get her to laugh, usually with some tickling involved, but in the past week she has been finding humor in the boys. She's learning that laughing is fun. So often before, she would chuckle if we strongly encouraged it, but she always looked like the chuckle startled her and she wasn't sure if it was a good thing or not.  The other night at bedtime I took her into the boys' room. She took one look at Eli and started cracking up. Then bedtime was greatly delayed as they snorted and sniffed and made all manner of noises and contortions to keep her laughing. The next night I took her into their room and she thought it was funny again. So sometimes now she'll start laughing, though it seems to take her a bit to remember how. We think she's thinking, "Oh yeah, I remember those weird noises I made were fun...Now how did I do it?" So she starts out haltingly and then remembers and takes off again.  Enjoy!

Eye Update and Scary Kids

I guess I should give an update on the scary eye situation.  I am happy to report that it is looking much, much better than it did.  When we took the bandage off last week, I knew that the redness and swelling wouldn’t last, but I just couldn’t see how it would ever look anywhere near normal.  It was pulled really   tight to bridge the gap that had been cut out.  Then there was a large bump of skin below that where my upper cheek had been pulled together under the gap.  That makes no sense.  Just know that it made my whole face look misshapen. 

Anyway, it has gotten better every day.  I get the stitches out next Tuesday.  Not really looking forward to that.  Especially since I overheard this one nurse say, “None of the doctors are going to want to take the stitches out.  They’ll probably have to dig.”  DIG!  Anyway, you know nurses, they just get so jaded and medically-minded that they forget that the patient doesn’t want to hear the word “dig” in conjunction with her eye.  But you would think he’d think about it when the patient is his wife!

But anyway, I’m so thankful that the eye seems to be healing well.  I just wish someone at the hospital last Wednesday would have sat me down and said, “It’s going to look awful when you take off the bandage tonight.  But it will get better.”

It's not hurting much anymore.  (Though I did like when I had a good excuse to take a nap- I just needed to close my eye and let it rest.)  I've weaned myself off of the addictive Tylenol with codeine.  (Just kidding- I'm just disappointed that it never gave me a buzz, as long as I needed the drugs anyway.)  And my kids have survived being seen in public with me.  I even showed up at their school twice in the past week.  I told them some kids at the school were being bullies and I just aimed my scary eye at them and told them to bug off!  (That was a joke, but it could come in handy sometime.)  And I wasn't a pirate or a zombie for Halloween.  I was just a Mom.

My kids were scary, though.

And this is how sweet little Evan came home from school:

 

Grateful and Sad

Yesterday was the day of the fateful eye surgery.  Mom and Dad got here Monday, so Tuesday morning after Kendall got home from night shift, we took of for Winnipeg.  No kids.  We had fun Tuesday afternoon and evening.  Wednesday morning we went for a nice breakfast and were at the hospital by 9:00.

Before long I was in the chair as nervous as could be.  They tipped me back and started prepping me for surgery.  The surgery was traumatic.  All I was given was a local anesthetic, so it was a lot like being at the dentist, except way worse.  You know how you look away from scary instruments and needles?  Well, that's a little difficult when it's the eye that's being worked on and they keep telling you to open your eye.  Yes, those instruments of torture healing loomed large in my vision as they neared my eye.  The sound of snipping and the smell of cauterizing right by my nose were sickening.  I won't go into greater detail, but it was horrible. 

Finally they covered my eye and took the piece they removed down to pathology to have it tested.  If we heard back that it was all clear, then they would take me in and do the reconstruction.  If the lab said that the cancer was at the edge of the piece, then I would go back in for round two.  They would do that as often as they needed to in order to get it all.  I sat in a waiting area.  When they brought Kendall in, he asked how it was.  I just started crying. 

We waited an hour or so until I heard the phone ring.  The nurse picked it up.  I heard her say, "Negative?  So it's all clear?  Great!"  Thank you, Jesus!  And soon I was back on the chair having my eyelid put back together.  They had to put in some local anesthetic again, but I was still mostly numb, so the needle was less traumatic that time.  The stitches were not nice at all, but less sickening that the cutting.  And the string tickled my face.  By the way.

My eye is not stitched closed.  Thank you, Jesus, again!  The nurse told Kendall that they took around half an inch out.  Somehow, they were able to pull it closed. 

We got home and a group of fellow pirates greeted me at the door.  That cheered me up.  I was happy to see my kids again!

After supper we took off the bandage.  I was not prepared for what was underneath.  I was terribly disappointed to see the results of the reconstruction.  My eye does not look nice.  I couldn't believe it when I looked in the mirror.  I know we aren't yet seeing the final result.  There is redness, swelling and stitches that won't be there.  But it will look quite different.

The boys were also unprepared for what they saw.  It seemed to shake them.  If I would have known how it was going to look, I would not have removed the bandages in front of them.  Kendall, on the other hand, was quite relieved with what he saw.  I didn't know, but he had spoken with our family doctor and she had talked about all that could go wrong. 

So, I am thankful that the surgery went as well as it did.  I am grappling with how it changed my eye and trying to accept that.  I am concerned about the boys.  One of them quietly said it was creepy.  When I reassured him that it would get better, he wondered if it would be better by the time we go to church.  It will be something for them to get used to too.

I am thankful that I am comfortable enough with who I am that this doesn't destroy me, but it is a loss.  I am thankful that it was taken care of with a simple (though traumatic) surgery and will not have long-term effects on my health.  I am thankful that it was only my eyelid and doesn't affect my vision.  I am thankful that it was me and not one of my kids.  I have so much to be thankful for and I don't want to lose sight of that. 

I am sad.  I am grateful.

Arrrrgh, Matey!

Thank you to this wonderful group of pirates who welcomed me at the door when I got home from my eye surgery last night!  (2 happy, grandparently pirates, 2 mean and scary pirates and 1 baby pirate who's not so happy with the eye patch situation.)

Here Kendall takes off my eye patch for the first time last night.  He was relieved to see it looking so "good."

I had been squeezing Kendall's knee while he took off the tape.  Evan didn't want me to do that, so he took my hand and held it.  At first I was gently holding it, then I decided "Well, if he wants me to squeeze his hand, I'll squeeze for all it's worth!"  Here Kendall got impatient with gently taking off the tape and gave it a final rip!

My Superhero, Poop and Scalpels

Dawn's first light this morning revealed an incredibly handsome specimen of a man shirtless in our backyard.  I would have taken a photo, but I am not sure the studmuffin would have appreciated it.

You see, he was being my superhero and saving the day, but in order to do that, he was reaching into a pit of poop.  Literally.

He took off his shirt so that it wouldn't get dirty and reached into the septic tank to pull out the clogged filter.  I felt very bad for him.  And very grateful.  I had asked him if he wanted my help.  He offered me $200 to do it, but then retracted his offer and said he wouldn't let me do it.  (My offer to help was a mere formality, so that was a close call.)

Anyway, Kendall saved the day.  The basement has an aroma of poop now, though, so that has us concerned.  But my parents are getting here today and tomorrow morning Kendall and I are leaving for 2 days, so I guess any new sewage issues won't be our problem.  (Just kidding, Dad.)

Speaking of poop, what is it with boys and poop?!  The other night after bedtime, Eli and Evan were in their room giggling and giggling.  Finally, Evan ran out to the living room and threw a whole bunch of folded papers at us and said, "Look what Eli did!" and ran back to his room before he could get in trouble.  We unfolded all the papers to see drawing after drawing of poop.  I just don't get it.

Also, speaking of Kendall and me leaving for a couple days, I should give an update on something that's been going on with my eye.  I have had a weird bump on my lower eyelid for a couple years.  Finally, a month ago it was diagnosed as basal cell carcinoma, a form of skin cancer.  Basal cell carcinoma is not as scary as the word "cancer."  I am having the lump removed on Wednesday in Winnipeg.  After that, it should be taken care of.  No further treatment should be needed.

The major part of this surgery for me is the reconstruction involved.  It doesn't sound pretty and there is a possibility of having my eye stitched closed for 2 months.  So we'll see what happens.  Maybe I'll be a pirate for Halloween.  And U.S. Thanksgiving.  And Advent.

At first after I got the diagnosis and information about removal and reconstruction, I was angry.  Why my eye?  I kind of like my face the way it is.  But since then, I've mostly been grateful.  I'm so grateful that it doesn't appear to be life-threatening.  I'm so thankful that treatment will not involve things like radiation or chemo.  And I'm so thankful that it will probably be done with in a short time.

Anyway, I would appreciate prayers on Wednesday morning.  I would love if it would be a simpler reconstruction and my eye wouldn't be stitched closed.  And I would love to not feel too anxious about the procedure.  (Needles!  Scalpels!  Awake!)

Thanks!  And Happy Monday!

Are you sure?

I just liked this series of photos.  I don't know what Evan is telling Lydia, but I'm not sure she believes him.

Sweetness!

I just can't get over how sweet this girl is!

She currently sucks and chews on anything possible. So, when she folded over from a sitting position, she found her foot near her mouth and took advantage of her situation.

More examples:

This Morning

This is where I found the kids when I got out of the shower this morning:

This boy loves reading.  He is hard to communicate with for a full week after each library trip.

Birthday Party

I'm wimpy when it comes to birthday parties and houses full of boys.  We had fun, though.  (It helped that Kendall took them to the pool for half the time.)  Eli and Evan each invited 2 friends and they had a great time.  We did a sub bar with real cans of pop and real bags of chips. (!)

Notice the 1 lone girl in the background.  She was completely entertained.  And, perhaps, shocked into silence.

These are some of the boys' best buddies right now.  They are some good kids and we're thankful for good friends.

Seven!

Is it just me, or is it CRAZY how old my kids are?!

Here Evan reads his card from Kendall and me.  He's getting to be a great reader! 

He requested cinnamon rolls for his birthday, so I obliged.  His supper request was rice and beans or Kraft Dinner.  I was disappointed that it was something so normal until Thursday evening rolled around.  It had been a busy week and I was so happy to just cook up a pot of mac 'n cheese and steamed broccoli!

Here the boys play Evan's new Battleship game while Lydia gives pointers.  And yes, I do believe Eli is peeking.

Sent to the Office

Today after school I gave the boys their snack and asked them what was interesting at school today.  They looked at each other.  Evan got a sly smile on his face.  Eli looked at Evan with a bit of pleading in his eyes.  Hmmm...  I was definitely more interested now than I was 30 seconds earlier.

Evan said, "Well, we got a 15-minute time-out.  Because of Eli!"

Yes, my perfect little angels were sent to the office.  But as the story came out, I could only laugh.  A lot.

As the story went, Eli went up to Evan at recess.  He opened his arms wide to give him a hug.  Evan wasn't prepared for the hug and the hug turned into a tackle.  (Imagine that.)  They landed on the ground and the "grouchy" playground monitor looked at them and barked, "To the office!  Now!"

So they went to the office.  No one was there.  Eli said he was just wishing for a "judge" with whom to plead his case:  "He's my brother!"  So they waited in the office with 2 other buddies who happened to be there for throwing snowballs.  No judge or other authority figure ever showed up to pronounce them innocent, so they waited until the bell rang and then went back to class.  The end.

I found great humor in that story.  I told them it was the funniest thing I had heard all day.  But, of course, even brotherly tackling is not a good idea at school.

Lydia Being Her Cute Self

 

Waking Up

Hide and Go Seek

Evan and His Sister

Evan loves his little sister.  In fact, I overheard him telling her, "I love you more than Eli, Mom or Dad."  I just let it slide.

The Poodle Shirt

Just in case you couldn't hear the conversation, here it is:

Kendall: How about you don't wear that poodle shirt anymore?  'kay?

Evan:  Why?  She doesn't look good in it?

Kendall:  I don't like poodles.

After the camera turned off the conversation continued:
Evan:  If we get a poodle, I want to cut it's hair like that.

Kendall:  If we get a poodle, I want to make it into a shirt.

Personally, I think Kendall's style advice is rather interesting, considering the little bit you can see of his choice of outfit.

9 Years Old!

Sunday was Eli's 9th birthday.  Crazy!  How has this happened?!

Here he starts the day out right: baked oatmeal and a liter of Dr. Pepper.

Lunchtime and the Dr. Pepper's still goin'!  He chose hot wings, cesar salad and poutine.  (Kendall deep-fried everything in his propane fryer.  Once again- delicious!  Why don't we deep-fry everything?!)

And even after the Dr. Pepper was all gone, the bottle stayed around.  It became a water bottle because what's cooler than drinking out of a huge pop bottle while listening to Toby Mac on your new discman!  (It's true- Eli got a discman for his birthday.  That was just an accessory for the new CD we gave him.  I feel a little bit bad about the discman, but Eli totally loves it.  And now that I think about it, it is kind of nice to not have Toby Mac blaring at all times.)

We watched a movie in the evening.  Isn't Miss Lydia such a cutie?  Notice her shirt from Aunt Karissa.  Kendall got her dressed before church and wanted her to wear a moose in honor of opening weekend for moose hunting.

 

And finally, a giggly gift-opening session:

Snow

So the Winter Storm Warning proved true.  We got lots of snow.  Lots of heavy snow.  Heavy enough that trees fell over and power lines were affected.  The power lines were affected enough that we lost hydro.  (That's what we call electricity up in these parts.)  We were without hydro for 27 hours.

That's a long time when it's cold.

Thankfully, we have a wood stove.  It's small, but it kept the house from getting too cold.  It also gave us a place to heat up soup and water for too many cups of hot chocolate.

The power went out Thursday afternoon, which made for an exciting last hour of school.  Kendall was at the hospital until 9:00, so the kids and I entertained ourselves downstairs by the woodstove.  I am assuming there was no school on Friday, since I couldn't actually check my email or listen to the radio.  At any rate, the boys didn't go.  On Friday a friend came over to commiserate and warm herself by our fire.  We had no water, so we had piles of dishes on the counter and some smelly toilets.  Yucky.

Thursday evening downstairs.

Preparing for a snowball fight.

All of Red Lake and the surrounding communities were without hydro.  I was sad that my husband's job didn't shut down like so many others.  But, it sounds like he was very needed at the hospital.  They, of course, kept going by generators.  People on home oxygen stayed at the hospital to continue with the oxygen.  There were already lots of patients and more weather-related accidents came in.
I can't say I was happy about the snow.  But Eli said, "I think I know why we lost power on Thanksgiving. (Thanksgiving was Monday.)  It was to see if we'd be thankful for the old way of doing things."  So that helped me to keep my complaining in check.

Winter Storm Warning

It's cold and it's snowing.  And there is a lot of snow in the forecast for the next few days.  Check this out. 

4 days ago we spent the day on the lake.  It was lovely.  And we knew that it was most likely our last chance like that.  Over the weekend there were still quite a few yellow leaves on the poplar trees in our back yard.  They're gone now.  One windy day was all it took.

So here I sit in the basement by a cozy fire while my new cloth diapers finish drying by the woodstove.  (What was I thinking?!  Cloth diapers are soggy and stinky!)  I sit here and watch the snow falling outside the window while listening to the crackling of a hot fire in the woodstove.  Sounds so cozy and peaceful, doesn't it?

Actually, I'm trying to not be mad at Kendall for this whole weather situation.  After all, the rational part of me knows he didn't make it snow on purpose. :)  Poor guy.  He has to take my wrath when Red Lake's weather is less than ideal.  For his sake, I'll try to work that wrath out by working on the annual closet switch.  Time to sort and purge and exchange the tank tops for sweaters...

P.S.  It is now 2 1/2 hours later.  Now that I have met friends for lunch and have my cup of Tim Horton's coffee, I am better equipped to enjoy the thought of a crackling fire and tolerate the thought of snow.

Superhero Baby-Proofing

This morning I am babysitting an 18-month old.  (I love having little people close to Kai's age in my life!  It gives me a reference point for my long-distance nephew, though I'm pretty sure Kai's awesomeness is unrivaled.)  Anyway, the boys were up a bit before she came and they had their game out on the living room floor.  (So not baby-proofed.)  I told them they better clean it up because how are they gonna keep Elise out of it?  Evan had the answer: "A force field?"  Yes, my sons, please work your superhero powers and create a force field around your stuff to protect it.  I'm pretty sure that will work with your little sister in a few months.

Yesterday I spent some time reading back over my earliest blog posts.  Eli and Evan were 2 and 4 when we moved up here.  They were hilarious!  Grandparents, if you need a little smile in your day, I recommend going back and finding some silly stories about them.  So glad we're not done with toddlerhood.  Well, then again, I was clearly frazzled in some of the things I recorded.  We'll see if I'm up for the challenge again...

Bad Hair Day

Little Miss Cockatoo when I saw how the sun was catching her hair this morning:

She was oblivious.

Kendall Gets Worked Up

Most people that know Kendall and me know that our personalities are pretty different.  When I get worked up, it's a bit difficult to hide from those closest to me.  Oh, and I get worked up about a large variety of things, from other people's political views to what we're having for supper, from angry theology to my hair driving me crazy, from landscaping decisions to dart guns in the house.

Anyway, I've been learning about Kendall's "worked up style" for years now.  It's just so different from mine.  And it's triggered so differently. 

So the other day, the electrical inspector came to inspect the wiring in the garage.  Kendall was on top of everything.  The inspector was here for a short time, then left.  Kendall, of course, passed the inspection.  But apparently, he was rattled by the whole thing.  I went out and talked to him after the inspection.  In the course of the conversation, I asked if he was going to take a nap, as he had a night shift coming up that evening. 

"No," he said, "I'm too worked up." 

Then, to demonstrate for me, he said, "This is me worked up:"  And he calmly picked up his tool belt and resumed his work.

 

The Trouble With the Truck

This here's a little story about a series of events that took place last night.  To better understand the story, you may need to know that Kendall has a love-hate relationship with his truck.  Well, maybe it's more of a necessity-hate relationship.  He needs the truck, but doesn't like it.  (It is aqua with a purple stripe, after all.)  I think his reasons for not liking it run more along the lines of the 4-wheel drive not working and it not being big enough for the whole family and things like that.  Oh yeah, and last week he made a difficult decision to put a bit more than $1000 into it to get the dying clutch repaired.  He would have much preferred a new truck, but financially, this made more sense for this point in our lives. 

I actually got Kendall to do a guest post by offering to type while he talked.  So here is our co-authored post ( And I took the liberty of adding my comments in italics- It is my blog, after all.):

Someone wanted to borrow the pontoon boat.  Since the pontoons have slow leaks, we wanted to pull it out and drain them, which requires putting it on the trailer and pulling it out of the water.  Now you'll have to understand that my truck isn't the springiest chicken.  It tends to roll even when it's parked in gear.  I backed the trailer into the water to load the pontoon boat up, knowing my fickle truck.  I pushed in my parking brake as far as I could, all the while knowing it doesn't work.  It seems like the right thing to do when you have a truck that rolls.  I tentatively let off the brake and it held it's ground deceptively. 

I then proceeded to load the boat on the trailer as Karen and Lydia looked on from their perch on the boat.  I didn't just LOOK ON.  I was very helpful in getting the trailer correctly aligned under the boat. 

Suddenly the truck lurched.  All of the following happened in the matter of a few seconds, but I will put it into slow motion for you:  I sprung from the boat to the dock in one flying leap.  It was 20 feet away.  No it wasn't.  I frantically reached for the passenger door as the truck slowly rolled past me standing there on the dock.  It was locked.  My question is "Why was it locked?"  We're in Red Lake. At the boat launch.  I ran around the front of the truck and into the water on the other side, not even stopping to take the phone out of my pocket. That fact alone is pretty amazing.  

Fortunately, the driver's side was unlocked.  I flung the door open and jumped into the truck along with a wave of water.  I shoved my foot deep into the brake pedal, stopping the truck.  Wishing for my snorkel, I decided to try starting the truck.  My truck was nearly lost, but I realized that I had an obligation to my wife and daughter who were naive to the peril they were in. Thank you for your loving sense of obligation.  And I wasn't so naive- I just didn't think about getting off the boat at the time. The boat was attached to the truck, which was quickly becoming an oversized anchor.  They were sitting on the boat, idly watching the show. Idly?!  I anxiously motioned them off the boat and on to the dock.  I nervously turned the key and listened as my truck sputtered.  Things weren't looking good.  I tried again.  This time it coughed and started blowing bubbles from the muffler, which was well under water.  Encouraged by this new sign of life, I quickly let off the brake and gave it the gas.  The truck slowly crept out of the water, dragging the trailer and the boat with it.  Somehow the boat ended up on the trailer, even though it had been drifting off to the side during the whole fiasco.  I soggily proceeded to drain the pontoons with mixed emotions of gratitude and hatred disappointment.  The truck had survived.

Trail Cam

Kendall got a trail cam for his birthday. You put it on a tree and when an animal comes by, the video is triggered.  Here are some videos from our backyard:

These are 2 fawns that have been coming around with their Mama, "Beatrice."

In case you're wondering, the trail cam was close to where Kendall and the boys were burning brush and scraps.

 

By the way, today the trail cam wasn't turned on and lo and behold, a bear came through the yard!  Maybe being able to see everything that walks through our yard isn't such a good idea after all...

Gurgling Baby

Last night we got home and started working on painting the garage. I got about as far as changing into painting clothes and brushing a few strokes before Lydia decided she was done sitting and watching.  So I brought her inside and put her to bed. She was so not impressed.  Finally she convinced me that she deserved to get back out of bed. I took her outside and sat on the deck. She was very impressed with the trees above. So she decided to sing a song about it:

 

After sitting on the deck serenading the trees and enjoying the attention, we came inside and I laid Lydia on the living room floor.  There was lots of action in the house.  Evan and I made popcorn while Eli showered.  Then while Evan showered, I sat down at the keyboard and played and sang.  Lydia just laid there on the floor content with the noise around her.  After a half an hour or so of action, here was our sweet, relaxed Little Missy:

(Notice the remnants of Grandma's package that came in the mail.  Thanks Grandma!)

 

Sleeping Under the Stars

Once again I convinced my family that we needed to sleep on the deck.  The moon was so bright and full.  It was beautiful.  Except for the mosquitoes which even found the inside of my ear.  Grrr. 

 

I include the following photo to point out the security fence erected in front of the stairway going down to the yard.  See that flimsy white laundry rack lying on it's side?  That's supposed to keep the bears and wolves away from us.  And it was put there by my Mighty Bushman.  (He's a softy deep down inside.)  However, to give him the credit he deserves, he slept on the side by the other stairway.  I only mocked a little about the laundry rack because I knew there was no way I was sleeping closest to the other stairway!

DC Talk, Anyone?

So I went back in the archives today, looking for an old DC Talk cassette.  Turns out, I didn't save any of their good ones!  Woe is me!  Why didn't I think ahead to the day when I would have an 8-year old son who might think I was cool if I listened to rap!  Eli has recently become very attached to a Toby Mac song on a CD that Jen gave us.  (This song has been listened to so much that my top goal for today was to get it out of my head.)  Anyway, I was excited to tell Eli that I'm so awesome that I knew Toby Mac when he was a part of another (cooler) band.  I came across a box of cassettes and CDs in the basement and eagerly tore through it, looking for my oldies but goodies.  But, alas, they were not there.  I only found their Jesus Freak CD.  I brought it up to the kitchen anyway and rocked out while Eli folded his laundry.  Deep down, he thought I was cool.

This cutie, on the other hand, always thinks I'm cool:

Lydia loves loves it when I sing anything, whether an old hymn or a silly camp song.  And sometimes when someone else is holding her, I glance up to find her staring lovingly at me or just smiling a huge "I-think-you're-cool-Mom" smile.

 

By the way, any other cool music suggestions for a son with a growing appreciation for music?

This kid may have some sleep issues.  He is one sleepy dude.  It is not uncommon for us to find him in strange sleeping positions.  And when we sleep in the same room as him, we hear him say lots of interesting things.  But tonight tops it all...

The boys are in bed.  Kendall and I are sitting in the living room.  A bit ago, we heard a faint crying sound.  (I thought it was a wolf and I was freaked out.)  I went and stood outside Eli and Evan's bedroom door and I could hear someone sniffling.  I was surprised that one was still awake because they were super-tired tonight.  Kendall and I went into the bedroom just as Evan was crawling back into bed.  "What are you doing?" I asked.  In a rather forlorn voice, Evan replied, "I don't know."  I asked him if he had to go to the bathroom.  He refused to get up and go.  I asked him again if he needed to go pee.  He said no.  He wanted me to cover him up. 

Uh oh.  Something was not quite right.  Kendall got a flashlight.  I peered into the corner by his bed.  Nothing.  I ran my hand across the carpet.  Wet!  Aghh!  It would seem that in his sleepy stupor, Evan was confused as to which room he was in.  No wonder he didn't need to go pee.  Anymore.

(P.S.  I love that Evan is sleeping under his handmade poster.  It reads: "You are my hiding place.  You protect me from trouble.  You surround me with songs of victory.  Psalm 32:7")

An Afternoon on the Lake