Wow, what a weekend.  Faron took Friday off to get started on tearing the old roof off, and the backhoe we rented was delivered, and Mel came by to see what projects needed doing, and he ended up jumping right in, and ripped out several tree stumps in the field, as well as the one from my dogwood tree, right outside my window:

And then Mel came back on Saturday and worked for several hours, getting almost all of the tree stumps out of the field - there were about 25 or so - and he dug a large hole in which to bury them.  And before he could finish up, they nabbed him to do some other cool stuff with the backhoe:

Here's Faron and our friend, Peter balancing the trusses which will go over the porches, as they lift them away from the trusses for the main part of the house. 

Then they chained the rest of the trusses onto the bucket and Mel lifted them up to the top of the house, ready for Faron and Peter to set them.

The day ended with Peter, and another friend, Jim, and Faron, using the backhoe and a couple of 4x4s to shove the sagging from wall back into place.  This took much noise, effort, and time to get the wall plumb again.  And, the toll was taken on our living room, when they hollered in for Jason to rip down a row of the ceiling tiles to make room for the wall as it came back into place, after so many years. 

Here's standing on the cedar chest, ripping down plasterboard, and ceiling tiles.  What a mess. Oh, and there in the middle of the room is a hole from when one of the guys missed the rafters and stepped through the ceiling.  It happened in Faron's room, too, but not as far - they can be tacked back into place.  The living room ceiling will now have to be completely replaced - which is not a bad thing.  I hate those acoustic tiles! But the result of all that tile crashing and such:

It was nearing dark when this photo was snapped, but that line of gray/green is daylight.  

Darla very kindly took my camera out yesterday afternoon and took photos of the house and yard that I can't see from my bed or even ay of the windows:

This is the rootball of one of the 80 year old maple trees we had taken down.  Duke worked on it with the backhoe for nearly 3 hours before he could get it out and flip it over.  Then he hacked at it to kill it dead!

This is looking back from where the big trees stood, toward where we used to have n outhouse and a row of lilacs.  All gone now! 

This is the "driveway" side of the house, where the nw carport will be.  You can see how the roofline is changing to go from the peak of the house to go out over th front porch.

And this one is from the front yard.

No front door, one front window patched over and the other barely remaining in place.

And this is the highway/field side. 

We got pizza and wings for dinner Sunday night, and then Hazel and Erik and his fiancee Amber came up, and Paige and her fiencee, Curtis stopped in as well.  We had a good visit, then the kids all left, Duke and Faron went back to work, with Erik's help for a while. Erik loved having a turn at the backhoe. 

Uncle Faron was impressed with how he handled the thing - he'd never used one before but he handled it like a pro!

The watchful eyes of Dad and Uncle Faron.  Note that neither one is looking at the backhoe. 

After Erik left, Duke got back on the backhoe and started back at leveling off the areas where the stumps had been.  He worked steadily until it was dark and it started to rain, and then disaster struck.  As he went for one last scoop of top soil to even out the hole where the old outhouse had been and somehow - we're not exactly sure how - the backhouse rolled. Duke fell to the side and slammed against the side window, shattered glass shredding the skin on his right arm.  Very nasty - he ended up getting four stitches and quite a time in the ER. 

Very traumatic for all of us - Faron and I are deep in guilt that Duke was hurt working out of the goodness of his heart to help us, and Duke for being behind the wheel when the accident happened, but mostly, we're all praising God for protecting Duke.  When we think of what might have happened, and how little he was actually hurt, we all just want to shout for joy and thankfulness.  I spent most of yesterday praying one way and another! 

Here are a couple of photos of the backhoe as it lay on its side. I said it looks like it's sleeping - just takin' a wittle nap. 

This view makes it look as though it could just keep right on rolling, but fortunately, these other views make it clear that, thankfully, Duke wasn't in such potential to keep on going.

Duke's here as I type this, and I'll have to log off and come back on load up the photos of his booboo, along with his big grin to show how well he's coping.

But please, please join is in praising God for Duke's safety, and, for a only a very brief shower when we had no roof!  As I type, Faron, Peter, and Faron's brother Bill are nearing the part where they put the metal roofing on - the last bit!  We'll actually have a roof tonight.  God is good.

me<><

First, Monday was the (former) Princess Rachel's birthday - she's 13 now! (And being called "Princess" is no longer FUN, she says.  Actually, she says she never liked it.)

She had a small gathering of two of her closest friends on the previous Friday for an overnight, and then the Family descended upon the house on Monday, for shrimp alfredo and spaghetti with meat (probably venison) sauce.  We had a good time.  I always love seeing cousins interact, and most of these photos are just that. 

Robin has a small niche above her kitchen sink.  This week, she's got some of her favorite photos of Rachel through the years:

I apologize for the poor photo quality - I'd been taking pictures of some jewelry earlier that day, and forgot to switch off the macro function.  But you can still se the progression from Princess to Prima Donna! That blue polka dot outfit was at her first birthday party and she was a hoot.  She'd just mastered walking, and Hazel'd gotten her a shopping cart, and someone else, I guess, had gotten her a little purse, and she put that purse over her arm and trotted back and forth with that cart, hat in place, of course, and we all laughed and laughed.  She hates that photo. 

Here she is with her cousin Drew, from her daddy's side of the family, for all of you madly trying to place Drew in the Meyer Family Tree! I'm not sure what kind of gaming device that is, but whichever it is, it held the two of them captivated for some time.  Eventually Maggie was drawn in, too.

If there's anything more special than cousins interacting, it's got to be cousins of such different ages interacting, and having cousins from both sides of one's family, that's precious.

Please note: everyone else ate from their laps, but Ron plopped himself down behind the coffee table.  (You know, Tiana, the one David sanded not once but how many times to get that finish?  ) 

There isn't anything much different about this photo - I just like the way Maggie's gazing up at her oh-so-cool cousin, Rachel.

The look of disgust is for me - the nut with the camera. 

Finally she opened gifts.  She had a pile of cards with lots of cash - $100, I guess.  Her parents had given her most of her gifts at her overnight with her friends, but they did reserve one or two things for her actual birthday.  Her Meem (David's mom) got her this pretty pink hoodie:

She got it to get some COLOR into Rachel's life! She got a few other T-shirts, too, and some odds and ends, and then this fun item:

A webcam.  I know!  Some of us were raising our eyebrows at that one!  Just what a 13 year old girl doesn't need!  But it's for when she and her friend Eliza play Maple...street?  Leaf? I never remember what it's called.  Quite innocuous, I'm told. 

Those are Drew's sisters, Kaylee and Mackenzie sitting with Rachel.

People cleared out pretty rapidly after the gifts were opened.  We'd already gorged ourselves with the pasta and bread and 5 different desserts!  But Tiana'd had to work until 7, so she was a late arrival.  She got to get a huge pile of shrimp with her linguini - the rest of us who'd eaten early on, were served when the shrimp were being eked out like precious treasure!  I had ONE! 

Another cousin-photo:

Tiana and Stefan plan to go snowboarding together this winter, and their ultimate EVIL plan is to make Jason go, too.  We keep telling her, "You know Jason's track record with this kind of thing, right?  You know about the rollerblading accident?  About how many bones he's broken?  And you claim to be in LOVE with him???"  She blithely says yes, yes, yes.  And he's going. 

He shakes his head in the negative the whole while.  We shall see.

Poor Daddy was all pooped out.  Actually I was taking a photo of the Japanese lanterns around the mirror.  I'd gotten them and paper fans and longevity cups for Rachel's sleepover, which was preceded by an Oriental dinner around the coffee table. 

Robbie was tired, too.

She and I were enjoying a spot of tea while we chatted.  It was a nice evening. 

The very next day, I had a doctor's appointment - just a check up after blood tests to make sure my liver's not pickled yet from all the meds I take, and to be sure that the thyroid meds are at the right levels. Everyhing's great.  He's even happy that my cholesterol level (which has always been less than 150, but always uneven in a way he didn't like) has leveled out. AND, I lost nearly 14 lbs since I was there in July. 

After seeing Dr Wallace (which took forever - he was way backed up) Stacy and Magaly and I went to Red Lobster for lunch.  We all ate until we were stuffed and there were more than enough leftovers for Faron and Mel to enjoy when they got home.   

And THEN we went to Joann Fabric looking for a couple of coordinating fabrics for the Santa Claus toile I'd gotten on eBay to make new stockings for the four of us now that we have Tiana in our family.  Tell you what, Maggie's got an eye for color!  The red in the toile was a very specific cherry red, on an aged looking creamy background.  Not just every red and white fabric would match.  I pointed that out to Maggie just once and she unerringly found fabrics that were perfectly right in color, if not in pattern. That's not an easy thing for anyone to do, let alone a four year old.  Stacy said, "I've always said she was going to be a doctor, but maybe she'll be an interior decorator instead?"  We finally narrowed it down to two fabrics that made me happy and off home we went. 

I was TIRED!  Wednesday was a washout for me recovering from Tuesday.    And Thursday was just another busy day of phone calls and waiting and such.  Finally, just before Faron was due home at 5:30, two big trucks from Your Building Center showed up:

You can't really see the 2nd truck, but the supplies were on that truck.  The crane truck was along to do the heavy lifting. 

Like I said, Faron got home just in time to help.

He's on the other end of that pile of blue insulation. 

The crane operator was pretty slick.  The claw on the end of his boom was wicked looking. He uses it somewhat like a surgeon with a forceps.

He needed to hook the trusses in just the right place.

He did. 

Here you can see just what makes our trusses so unusual, and such a pain to get across to the builders!

They're much longer on one end than the other, which is why that end dips so heavily.  That's because of the way we want the roof over the porch to be - an extension of the house roof, instead of a hunk of weight that was tacked in place on the edge of the roof the way the old one was - which is what broke the current trusses.

This little guy wasn't much bigger than Faron, but he held the weight of 13 trusses while the crane operator pulled out the claw and hoisted it up. 

Tough kid!

It's so exciting having all the materials here and knowing stuff will actually get finished before snow flies!  As I type, Faron's on the roof, shoveling off the old shingles.  He hopes to have the roof off completely by the end of the day, and in the morning, he's got several friends coming to help cut out the old trusses and get the new ones in place.  And then on Sunday the new roof!  Whoohoo! And hopefully, some of these processes will get finished faster than expected. 

Faron's off until next Friday, and in that time he hopes to get the French doors in front installed, the new kitchen and bathroom windows installed, the insulation applied and the siding on. Pray for him!

me<><

I've been a bit under the weather and editing photos and writing scintillating text has been beyond me for a while.  I am feeling better now that I've been on antibiotics for a week and while I'm kinda backlogged on photogenic events and their results, I'm going to jump in here with the latest family "do", even though I didn't attend. I sent my camera with my gift and so there are photos to share, even if my description might be a bit sketchy.

My great-nephew Erik and his fiancee are expecting their first child (no comments about that particular order of events, ERIK JAMES!) next month, and so we had a small shower for folks at our end of the world last weekend, the co-ed kind.  (Her mother''d had one last month in Berwick, for all the kith and kin out there.)

Here are the parents-to-be arriving for the shower:

Aren't they cute?  It wasn't a surprise - with Erik's work and National Guard schedules, and various other family commitments on all sides, getting a date for this thing was like planning a major event. 

I love the cake - check out the fringe on the bottom.   

Cathy got this great photo of Hazel and her oldest, bestest friend, Jayne:

Jayne and I figured out once that she's known Hazel longer than I have, even though technically I "met" Hazel first. I was born in June and they met their first week of Jr. High in September of the same year.   So Jayne's another of those people who've just always been around for me.

And here are two of the great-grandmothers-to-be, Hazel and Eileen, Darla's mom:

And Great-Aunt Cathy insisted on this photo, the first "4-generation" photo:

And Great-grandma Hazel's got her hands on little Kael James!  They know he's a boy, and so have already named him. 

One of the games they played involved each attendee making their own version of a baby in Play-Doh.  Here are a few entries:

One of them is anatomically correct, although why certain parts had to be highlighted in a different color (CATHERINE) I'll never know.  It makes me think of that life-sized statue of a stallion that used to be for sale at the monument place down the road - remember that one, local folks?  They could never decide how best to deal with his "distinctives."  Sometimes they were painted white like his underbelly, and then they'd be black, drawing WAY too much attention there, and then they'd be painted in some "flesh" color...it was part of the local entertainment for years, to see what they'd paint that poor horse's equipment!    But I digress...

Stacy's entry was ejected from the competition, because of her "Diva attitude," when she said that if hers wasn't chosen, it was discriminating against Kael.

But hers is the best baby from the entries I saw!  They probably wouldn't have let me play had I been able to attend.  Darla specifically didn't have word games, she said.  But I like word games!

Another game had people pairing up and having to down a jar of baby food.

Here something-cousin Terri's (how does one figure out 2nd and 3rd and cousins once-removed?) feeding Great-aunt-to-be Robin.  Rob doesn't seem overly willing, does she? 

The "gag" (get it?) is that all the partners except Erik and Amber were given jars of applesauce, while Erik had to eat a jar of baby-smooshed chicken and some icky veggie.  It was supposed to gross them out.  Backfired though. Erik liked 'em both. 

The gifts came last. 

They got many nice things, but I'll only share a couple of things. First, here's the name sign I made for Kael's room:

Teddy bears are the decorating theme, so I ran with that.  The canvas board is 12x16, LOIS, and each of the bears is about 2.5 inches tall, except for the little guy standing on the M. 

Great-aunt-to-be Stacy, that clever thing, gave them this basket, filled with clothes presented in a unique way:

She had a lot of clothes line filled up with clothes.  Pretty cute, eh?  Note the camo-onesie. 

And Grandma Darla wanted to be sure Daddy has everything he needs to do every job that might come up as a new father.

Does this one remind you of anything?

I don't think Adventurer Erik has quite disappeared from our horizons...

It looks like it was a great success and I'm sorry I had to miss it. I'd have been even sorrier to miss it had they had it when I suggested, which was after Kael makes his entrance.  If I'd missed that opportunity to coo and coddle his sweet little person, this would have been one sad great-great-aunt!

Of course, there were many other great photos, but all I can think about are the other photos I need to share!  I have a whole bunch of my sweet boy to share with you, but that'll have to wait. 

We've placed the order for all the materials and the plan is for there to be a big work day, hopefully two weeks from today, where they'll tear off the roof and replace the trusses and get the new roof on.  And Faron's taking the week after as a vacation week, so he'll do the new front doors, the windows in the kitchen and bathroom, and the siding while he's off.  Thankfully, this is a small house!  But first, next weekend is landscaping.  We're renting a backhoe and moving a hill from one side of the house to the other, more or less.   Hopefully we'll get the new shrubbery and bushes planted around the porch, too.

I guess that catches you up with news.  And I'll work on the photos.  You may notice that I've finally added some new pieces to my Etsy shop.  I have close to a dozen more ready to add, but I knew I had this big piece to do and I pooped out. 

me<><

We are Walking!

For those of you who can't get these videos due to being so far out into the boonies that you can't get a decent high speed connection, or maybe you're too cheap to get one, you're missing out.  Derek's walking!  I love that giant grin that only a small child can get when they've accomplished a major milestone. Every tooth is gleaming white and he's got his arms held high, ready to dive into Daddy's arms.

Now, I was counting on him running into MY arms for his first walk when I see him this weekend, but I'm just happy for him.  He's so doggoned proud.  And I know Joe and Amy are, too.  Joe's voice is just shy of cracking when he is coaxing Derek to him.    And I know this Grandma is definitely proud. 

Whoohoo!

me<><

Our garden is doing pretty well, with tomatoes coming fast enough to keep us in a steady supply of cherry tomatoes, which Faron takes every day in his lunch, and Beefsteak tomatoes, which have kept us in a good supply, as well as Jason and Tiana, and a few for various people Faron works with who've asked.  And the green peppers are beautiful, too, although not quite so plentiful.  The two together made me think of one of my favorite summertime dishes, Pepperoni and Peppers.  I was sure Tiana'd never had it, so invited them up to have it on Saturday.

When I spoke to Jason on about Wednesday, however, I realized that he'd gotten it into his head that we were planning to have Filled Peppers, another dish Tiana's never had.  He said he preferred the latter, so, Ok.  No biggie. We changed menus.  We're easy that way. 

But, on Saturday at noontime, when Faron went to pick peppers for dinner, there were only two of any size - not nearly enough to stuff.  By the time Tiana and Jason arrived, Faron'd whipped up a really big, very tasty batch of pasta salad.  At Tiana's special request, Faron and Jason picked a dozen ears of corn from Peter's garden in our lower field.  Made a right tasty meal.  All that is to say, we started out with an Italian kind of pasta dish, switched to a PA German classic, and ended up with another kind of pasta dish.  So much for planning!

Planning ahead - for all the good it'll do! - I ordered a tour book for Las Vegas, and requested some info from the Las Vegas info center online. It all came last week. I asked the kids if they wanted to borrow the stuff.  "Nope, not interested."  Yeah.  Right.

This is how not interested they were. 

When Faron came into the room, this is the look Tiana gave him:

And this is the look she gave me when I asked about her wedding dress, which she purchased on Friday...

Little stinker.   

She says, "It's a secret!  No one's supposed to know!"  I said, "Jason's the only one not supposed to know!  SOME brides even take their mothers-in-law-to-be shopping for their dresses!"  And then I was quick to discount that, assuring her that I'd never have stood the day shopping anyway.  So I only have the very vaguest of ideas about her dress.  So far...

Then somehow we got onto a discussion about the date for the reception in Minnesota, which was planned for June 27.  Jason said, after talking about having to do any "touristy stuff" the week before, as they had to be back to work the 4th, that he thought that weekend was to be their "work" weekend.  (Soon after they started seeing one another, Tiana got their schedules "synched" so they're both off the same weekends.)  He pulled out his trusty iPhone to prove it, and it ended up in her hot little hands.  She loves that phone.  Jason's gotten all kinds of game packages and doodads for it.  As she doodled, she came up with this:

I like this photo better:

Check it out, for all of you who haven't seen him in a while - he's got hair!  He let it grow out longer than 1/4 of an inch long.

They are so cute together.  (Jason's gonna love that line, I'm sure, but it's true - they are!) 

me<><

Sometimes that what I feel like I should be saying when I do these entries.    And to start with, there is some stuff that I got while frolicking (did you know I frolick??  If not, I apologize for any shock this may cause...) in the pool the other day with Jakob, my nephew David's (Hazel's middle son) youngest.  Jake's 6, and will start first grade this week.  He is ALL energy, ALL boy and so much fun. He was more than happy to "perform" for the waterproof camera.

He was just bouncing around there, holding his nose and then going under a bit.  I took several videos of him that day, but this was my favorite, and it's not even a minute long.  BTW, I should tell you that you need at least DSL to see these videos.  I have frustrated my sisters completely - neither of whom have a high-speed connection - by posting videos of all of these kids we love so much, and they can only see them at someone else's house. 

We call it "Cannonball."  If you don't know why, you didn't see the video.

While Jake was having a ball (cannon and otherwise) Hazel and I did our best to get Maggie in trouble.  Poor thing ended up in timeout because of us.  See, she likes to take her beach towel, and her mom's, usually, and a couple of rafts and various other accoutrement to make what she calls a "cave," at the entrance to the garage sitting area.  There's plenty of room on the other side, usually, so that's fine.

But the other day, after we'd all been doing our thing for quite some time, Hazel said she was ready to play "Bananas," and so she started scooping up Maggie's stuff so that I could wheel my wheelchair out through there to get to the picnic table.  I can't sit on the benches for more than about 2 minutes without a lot of pain, so it has to be the wheelchair.  Well, Magaly Hazel did not appreciate Hazel moving that stuff!  And there was no way, short of moving all of the outdoor furniture, to get that chair through on the other side.  Maggie pitched a fit, and started hitting her gram with her towel, saying "You broke my cave!"  She wasn't hurting Hazel, and she'd never done anything like that before that Haz and I knew, so really, we thought it was kind of funny.  But I did say, after it went on several times, "Maggie, you really shouldn't hit Grandma." 

Before I'd finished the sentence, Stacy was up from the other end of the pool, taking hold of Miss Temper Tantrum and saying, "You should never hit your grandmother, ever again.  You shouldn't hit anyone, but especially an adult," then she was put in time out.  Maggie was heartbroken and embarrassed and Hazel and I felt like we'd murdered someone! 

Here's our Maggie suffering the indignity of timeout, with Jakob and Grammy and Aunt Cin, all of us, knowing!

She was over it before we old folks were.  Joe and Amy, I warn you, no matter what it is, when you have to correct Derrick in front of me it's gonna rip my guts out.  You'd better have the smelling salts ready!

Just to make it clear - as parents, we applauded the way Stacy handled it - can't imagine how she might have handled it better.  Maggie's four years old, and she's still trying things out every now and again, and she has to know immediately that a behavior like that isn't acceptable.  Of course we know that.  But we felt somewhat complicit, and we felt guilty!  Where was our timeout? 

But on to other things.  Later, when Ron got home from work, he came out to take a dip.  Kim had stopped in by this time, and she and I were still at the picnic table.  Hazel had gone in to get some dry clothes for Jake, so he wouldn't get a rash from his wet swim trunks.  Poor little fair-skinned bugger.   

Right from the start, Ron was riled up.  We probably ought to have moved right away, but usually, he doesn't push like he did the other night.

See that splash?  He made that with the back of his hand, and he was kind of mid-pool, not really close enough to get us wet.  We didn't say anything about it - in fact, I took a photo.  We were talking to him, not at all ignoring him like is sometimes the cause of his wilder behaviors - when he feels left out of things.  Nope, we don't know what got him going, but he has this sideways kick he does with his foot when he's swimming, that can dump about a gallon of water on his intended victim(s). He's incredibly accurate.  And he got Kim and me.  I didn't mind - I still had my swimsuit on.  But Kim was in work clothes, and the chlorine isn't really beneficial to street clothes!  So she spoke to him rather sharply and told him not to do it again, please. 

Huh!  Within 5 minutes, he'd drenched us, even harder.  So Kim jumped up and shouted his name and said, "I know how to get him," and she walked over and got his beach towel from where he hangs it on the handle of the garage doors.  Then she walked over to him, holding it over the pool and said, "Ronald, if you splash me again like that, I'm putting your towel in the pool."  He shouted, "NOOOOOO!" and splashed her, HARD!  She let it go, and he was STEAMED!  He muttered and grumbled about his towel being wet for a good 20 minutes.  But he didn't get out of the pool for nearly an hour.  We figured he was waiting for his towel to dry from where Aunt Kim had hung it on the fence. 

Sure enough, when he did come out, he went for the towel, which was still wringing wet. Hazel was back outside by this time and she yelled at him to leave it alone, and Kim tried to hand him a dry towel she'd brought out for him.  NO WAY!  He stomped past us, twisting his hand at us in the same dismissive gesture his mother always used, and told us to go stuff ourselves, or something of that order. It was hard to tell, but that's what Helen might have said.    Times like that it's hard to believe she's been gone for nine years.

All in all, it was a lovely afternoon.  Those two incidents took much longer to tell than they did to happen, and in the way of aunts/great-aunts/grandmas, we really kind of thought they were cute.  Well, Maggie was cute.  Ron was funny.  Both were dealt with as suited their situations. 

I have some photos I took of Jason and Tiana when they came up for dinner last night, but this has gone on too long already.  You'll have to wait until tomorrow...

me<><

Today was the day we sisters went out to celebrate. We went first to Susquehanna Valley Mobility in a teeny town called Montandon, about 30 miles from here.  And I picked out a scooter.  First, we have to be sure my insurance is going to pay for it, and 2nd, we'll have to wait til it arrives, but I'm excited.  I'll keep you posted...

We didn't know where to go down there, so I went on line and checked out restaurants for Lewisburg first, which is on the other side of the river from Montandon, and then for Montandon itself.  Lewisburg is where Bucknell University is, so it's a beautiful college town, with several upscale restaurants, just about every chain imaginable, and lots of ethnic places - well, a lot for a tiny town like Lewisburg. 

But when I'd mentioned it to Faron, he'd mentioned a place where he and his running buddies have grabbed breakfast, and then we asked the tech at SVM about a place to eat, and he suggested the same place, saying they have terrific desserts, so that's where we went - GoodWil's. 

It's a red-painted log cabin with more knotty pine paneling than I've seen in a coon's age, and lots of fake ivy and that sort of thing, but the food really was good.  We all had their specialty, broasted chicken.  Excellent. 

I decided I'd better take a couple of photos - this is Hazel's "underwater" shot:

 

And then a nice one of her and Kim:

And then Haz took one of me:

We had a great time together, as usual, but on the drive back home, we all started getting really tired - none of us are used to eating a big meal in the middle of the day, I guess. 

Happy birthday, big sister!  I love you!

me<><

Darla dropped in this afternoon to play Bananagrams.  She hasn't been up for a while, so it was nice to visit, then we cleared my over-bed table of the computer and the assorted other stuff that accumulates there, ready to set up the game. 

Before we got started though, she looked around the bedroom for my Scrabble dictionary.  I told her it was in one of the crates in the dining room.  (Waiting for me to get proper bookshelves of some kind in my room...but that's another story.)  I haven't used the book in ages. It's been packed away in that box for at least a year.  So she went and got it and she put in on the bed between us.  She sat at the foot of the bed and we played with the table between us.

A few minutes into the game, she needed help, so she grabbed the book.  She wanted to know if "yo-yo," was an acceptable word.  I didn't think it was, but hey, she had the book, and I figured she'd be happier knowing for sure.  She started at the back of the book, and suddenly she said, "Nice place to store money!" 

I said, "What do you mean?  How much did I stick in there?" 

This is what she dropped on to the table:

I have no idea where it came from.  I'm certainly not in the habit of tucking brand new $100 bills in random books!  And as I don't remember when I last used the book, I have no clue who might have gifted it to me.  Wowsers.  Whoever you might be, thank you!  What a surprise!

Darla looks mighty pleased with herself, doesn't she? 

I guess I would, too, if I'd managed to find a nice chunk of money for someone I care about! 

We've decided to use it toward porch furniture of some kind, since it's unexpected and we didn't budget it in any way.  We'd planned to wait until we've at least got the house finished before we started to buy stuff to furnish the porch, but maybe now we can get something on an end-of-season sale, that we can enjoy until the weather turns on us. 

So again, thank you to our mystery benefactor!

And thank you, Jesus, for giving us such wonderful friends and family that I really don't know who might have done it.  There are too many possibilities.

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Aaron's party was Saturday afternoon, at the pool, of course.  I'm not sure why I dawdled at posting photos, except that I knew I had to edit a video to do it, and I wasn't sure just how to do it.  It was much easier than I thought!  I'd video'd all of his present-opening-session, which was at least 15 minutes, just to see how the camera and battery would do.  It did just fine.  And somehow, I had no other photos of Aaron where you could see his face. 

So here's that clip:

He got lots of "Thomas" stuff, including the stuff in the video clip, of course.  He was just as enthusiastic about the clothes he got (two T-shirts from Mom & Dad, both of which had graphics of drum sets.  Aaron's LOVES to play the drums.  And Gram got him a wild pair of long shorts - multi-colored plaid and two shirts to match.  He was VERY excited over the cash he got, too.  Yeehah!

His cake was a Thomas-Masterpiece - no errors in the writing on it, either.  And, it was delicious.  Recently, we've had some cakes that weren't so good.  This was from Wegman's, I think.  Velly nice!

One photo of Aaron was taken in the pool - Rachel was entrusted with getting some underwater shots, since most adults were too sissy to get in the pool - it was COLD!  Rachel was busy with her cousins - the girls, that is, and we had to remind her to take some shots of the birthday boy.  She did!

Among the other water photos she took was this one of Zoe.

There was a kind of cute idea she had for taking a video while she and the other two raced from one end to the other.  What you see is mostly bubbles, with quick glimpses of Zoe and Jennie, and what you hear is splashing and Rachel breathing.  I decided not to upload that. 

You've seen lots of photos of our Jakob recently, since he's been spending a lot of time with Magaly (or, as Aaron says it, "Magodi.") but you don't often see photos of his big brother, Austin. 

One thing both boys have in common is a disdain for that gorgeous red hair.  They'd prefer it hadn't been blessed upon them.  Austin's got his eye on the car his cousins Erik and Phillip spent quite some time rebuilding a couple of years ago.  It sits next to the garage at Hazel's, and Austin would love for it to be his in time for his 16th birthday.  I think, from what I've heard from E & P, that it's a dream unlikely to come true.  And Gram's been on the guys' (I'd first typed "boys", but since they're both young men now, I decided I'd best change that.) case to make the car disappear.  She's tired of it junking up her yard.  (There guys, I've said it public - now you gotta do it! )

I like this "Mother-Daughter" moment.

It's very difficult for me to get good shots of the girls - Rachel, Jennie and Zoe - these days.  Attitude is most often what I get.

Not that I haven't always gotten attitude from Princess Rachel.  The the other two older princesses (not leaving out Maggie) have usually been pretty good about photos.  But attitude, I've found, is contagious.

This is Emmie, granddaughter of Hazel's neighbor, Karen, and niece of Kelly, Karen's daughter and our cleaning lady.
 

She's so tiny!  She's four, and, I think, a few months older than Maggie - or maybe I've reversed that.  Anyway she's enjoying her cake, and couldn't be bothered to smile, either.  Kids!

And the last shot I have to share is a "candid" snap I got of the girls.

They're doing "something" to Rachel.  It went on for quite some time.  I have video of that, too, but the girls are shrieking the whole time.  I've spared you that, too.  

It was a very nice party, indeed.  I even forced myself to eat some of Robin's venison soup.  I didn't do very well with it, but I did try!  I said, "Why did you tell me it's venison?  If you'd not said anything, I'd probably have been able to eat it.  Now I know it's deer and it'll stick in my throat!"  

Hazel's not wild about venison either.  We were both raised on it, and I guess it's our big rebellion to not like it now.    

Warmer weather is approaching.  I'm told today is the warmest it's been in more than a week.  I hope I can get swimming tomorrow - I've missed it.  But not enough to swim when it's hovering around 70 degrees.

The house stuff is driving me crazy.  Peter measured for the trusses, and we sent the sketch out for quotes, and yesterday I thought I'd ordered them, but found out today that the place we ordered them from outsources them, and when they saw the sketch, they said they can't make them that way.  So now we're all out of sorts about that, and Peter's coming down this evening to talk it over with us.  Grrr!  

After we get all of that settled, and all of the materials ordered, it'll be time to make our hotel and plane reservations for Jason and Tiana's wedding.  And train reservations - isn't that cool? - to go to the reception her parents are giving at the end of June next year, in Minnesota.  Jason and Tiana decided on the train thing, and Faron, especially, loves the idea, so we'll travel with them.  Even though Faron at first said it'd be rude for us to go with them since, technically, it'd be part of their honeymoon.  Hardly.  

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Studs!

Isn't he a gorgeous lad?  My oh my.  I've reconciled myself to the fact that no matter if I'm standing or sitting, his photos will always have that "bent over" appearance.  Thasaloooooooong way up! 

He was here on a flying visit the other day, picking up a bank deposit Hazel was dropping off for me.  Then he went to Jason's to collect Jason's old mattress and box spring set.  Robin called that night to say that her son might not be suitably grateful, but she realizes that it's a beautiful set and are we sure that Jason just wants to GIVE it to Ethan.  I said, "They wanted to just be rid of it - they don't need two, and hers is a queen, so yes, I'd sooner have Ethan have it than it go to the dump or to someone I don't know."  We got it for Jason for Christmas a few years ago. 

And I noticed this the other day:

It's not the clearest photo - I took it through my bedroom window, but you can see what I saw - that the dogwood is one of the first trees to know that it's near the end of summer. Jeepers.  I must say though, this week has felt like it.  It's barely been warm enough to want to swim.  It was a good week, therefore, for me to have been tied to the house waiting for truss manufacturers to CALL BACK!!

 

It's always frustrating waiting for calls.  For the first time I've really wanted a cell phone so I could have gone down to the pool.  Oh well.  I'd have been too cold anyway.

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