A voluntary haircut that included (mostly) short hair! We love it! He loves it! We're hoping the long bangs will help him keep any "coolness" factor he may have lost with the cut. You never know with 7th graders.
He and his father are contemplating colors for the bangs. sigh. We're hoping that by encouraging him to do weird things to his hair we'll build up enough "reverse psychology" points to get us through the first year or so of High School.
Wishful thinking, I know.
Because it is the sworn duty of all parents to completely humiliate their children whenever humanly possible:
http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=9596216292
And kudos to Pepco...our local electric company. A squirrel committed suicide on the transformer in front of the church this morning, blowing our power and the church's and who knows who else's. They came within the hour and had it back on, despite our never actually speaking to a human when we called. Guess they listen to their messages, eh? Wondering when it would come back on made me appreciate a warm house on a cold morning.
And because I don't want 2 posts in a row without a picture, here's the amazing herb garden Todd bought me last month. I've wanted one for forever and he surprised me with this one. It was so beautiful...and handy. I say "was" because I killed it. I'm not sure how. I did what I was supposed to but it turned brown and died. Sigh. The rosemary lived. I guess that counts for something.
We had a great day yesterday! Everything turned out beautifully. And even though there are no shots of the full table, Todd was so inspired that he made a short video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=diSmZo0gLuA
You'll see me dressed up, pearls and all. I was channeling my inner June Cleaver...it worked! Everything was yummy, everyone was happy and the guests left with food in hand...and none of them had to help with dishes.
(Only the Chihuahua is ours. The other two dogs are visiting for the week. They keep us on our toes, let me tell you.)
Today we did a little shopping. Mostly because we promised the boys we'd trim the tree today and we didn't have one. Slight oversight on our part. We went after lunch so the crowds were much thinned and we all survived. We came home and busted out the new tree. Again, Todd was inspired to make a video. Hopefully that one will be posted soon.
Enjoy! And "You're Welcome" for getting the song stuck in your head. :-)
Walk with me, will you? Across the street and down the block to pick the boys up from school.
These were taken about a week ago. The colors are even more intense right now.
This yellow/green is my favorite! This week it is just screaming yellow. I'll try to get another pic for you as soon as I get batteries for my camera.
This is a side street I detoured down to get a picture of the leaf-strewn road. "Streets of gold."
So amazing! I was expecting muted golds and browns and maybe some rust-type colors. I was not expecting the crimsons and brilliant yellows mixed with the still-bright greens.
Of all of God's wonders, I think steady rain ruffling through color-drenched trees is one of the most peaceful. Good stuff!
Our neighbor dropped in for a visit yesterday. She had come by to deliver a belated "welcome to the neighborhood" gift and stayed (with her standard-sized poodle) for a chat. She's a very nice lady who has a cat almost identical to ours (only male). She informed me that Su Chen is not a Burmese (they are short-haired) but is a Maine Coon. I looked it up on Wikipedia, and sure enough she is! Pretty cool. They are an American breed, very smart, very sweet and very large (Ours is bigger than our dog and the largest ever recorded was 4 feet long!). They are considered the easiest to train of the cat breeds and ours is supposedly more likely to play fetch than our Chihuahua....not hard, since he's pretty unlikely to play fetch. It's something I'll have to try soon.
Yay for having official documentation that our cat rocks!
Here's how the punkins turned out this year.
How 'bout that Avatar punkin? And I did not put the ghost kid in there on purpose. I think someone was running by while I shot the photo. It makes for a nice, Halloween-y effect, no?
And this is early-to-rise Sonic in all his glory.
He should technically have bare arms but it's kinda chilly this morning so we left the blue sweatshirt on underneath.
This is the mess that precedes Halloween.
This we did a week ago:
Josiah is not actually as upset as he looks. He just doesn't enjoy slime all that much.
This here is why I'm up so late:
How many of you have ever stayed up til midnight on October 30th finishing up a costume? I must admit that this is not my first time and I'm pretty sure it won't be the last. I've been doing this since 7th grade or so. In my defense, I have been working on this for many weeks now. I started with the body of the costume then altered some gloves and was making the hat/mask tonight. It's a Sonic the Hedgehog costume for Josiah. The hats were too expensive on eBay and I put off making it because I knew it'd be a pain. It wasn't actually all that bad. I took a stuffed...what would it be? action figure?....because there are no dolls in this house! ;-) Anyway, I traced all the pieces of it's considerable head and made a pattern then cut and sewed it out of blue felt. It only took a few hours. I love felt!!!
You don't get to see it until tomorrow, though. When our hero tries it on as soon as he gets out of bed....because you know he will! He actually asked to sleep in it but it wasn't quite finished.
At one of his "fittings" earlier this evening I asked him if he was happy with it. He said, "Y plus E plus S equals 'yes'!" then said, and I quote exactly, "T plus H plus blah-blah-blah equals 'Thank You'!" and gave me a huge hug. Sometimes he's so cute I could puke!
I posted pictures and comments on the huge wind farms in West Texas a while back.
Also....you should totally watch Chuck. Monday nights, NBC.
Classic "nerd accidentally becomes spy" kind of thing done very skillfully.
I'm totally addicted.
Quick! It's only 3 episodes in. You can catch up real quick at NBC's website for free and then be rarin' to go next Monday. It's TOTALLY worth your time. I promise. But be careful, the pics you choose from to pick your episode are listed backwards. The first episode is the last pic. Chapters are the other way 'round. Don't watch backwards. You'll be totally confused. :-)
You know how sometimes you're so clever you just can't stand yourself? Here's my recent moment with my on-line knitting buds. Several of the gals have had things go missing lately and there's been really fun discussion about where it all is: partying together somewhere? under the laundry? on a beach?
Here's my reply:
It's a Hole, ya'll. A hole in the space-time continuum. I have one that circulates around me. Maybe you each have one too. (gasp)
It randomly sucks things (usually small things, but not always) into an alternate dimension then randomly spits them back out again. Sometimes it puts them right back where it sucked them up and sometimes it moves them do a totally different place. This is evidenced by the fact that sometimes my things go missing and reappear somewhere I would NEVER put them. Occasionally I look in a specific place for something, don't find it, go look 14 other places then return only to find it in the exact place I had looked 14 places ago (this is why I look in the same place over and over when something is missing). Holes.
It's all very logical but extremely annoying. The government denies it, but I KNOW.
Holes I tell ya'!
If anyone knows where I can get a transdimensional-hole detector, please let me know.
-Teresa
I must admit to being a little disappointed that I can't always be that clever. Guess I'll just have to wallow in the times I can! 8^D
Went apple picking with a group from church today at Homestead Farms. They had all sorts of apples: Johnagold, Johnathan, Red Delicious, Staymen(?), Empire, Gala. Some ripe, some already gone, some not ready yet. I, myself, am a Gala girl. It's the apple variety I love best. It's the only apple I will willingly choose to nosh on when I'm snacky.
Unfortunately, it's also one that was already "done". Not many left at all and those were waaaayy, waayyy up in the trees (waaayyy being only 10 feet or so, but still out of reach). But. I'm a Gala girl. So I climbed. I told Todd to take pictures.....just in case I broke something and needed photographic documentation for the physicians. :-)
(*note* No, I am not at camp. I am, however, far from home. If this post makes no sense to you don't worry, just skip it and come back for a later post. It'll be o.k. )
Dear Mom,
Camp is going well. I really like my cabin and am making new friends. All the kids in Chapel are really great and we're having fun there. So far we only meet once a week but we are working on meeting more often for different things. The kids on the path don't seem as friendly as the ones at home. I think maybe it's because camp is so crowded here that the kids all feel like they have to take their own space instead of sharing it, you know? It's not too bad, though.
My chore assignment is also not too bad. I only have 2 babies to watch most of the time and they are sweet....and GIRLS! My hours are easy ones and it's so close to the cabin that I'm hardly gone at all.
The brothers seem to really be doing great. Biggest brother is playing tuba now and the others run and squeal and make mayhem whenever he practices. It makes for a loud but happy cabin. Middle brother continues to astound me with all he can do on his own. We had a staff meeting to determine his camp schedule today but we still don't have all our stuff from the old camp so we'll have to meet again but I'm so proud of him! Littlest brother is as he always is, a huge ham and a camp favorite. He is a constant source of both joy and drama.
I think "Cabin Dad" loves it here. His eyes were sparkling tonight when he came back to the cabin from a meeting about chapel time. I really love watching him love his job!
All-in-all I really love it here at Camp Bethesda. The mosquitoes are pretty bad but I hear the weather's about to get really gorgeous so I'll just stay out of the woods until then. Tell Dad I love him and please:
SEND PACE PICANTE!
Love you,
Your distant daughter.
Some pics from Sunday:
Candle on the "birthday baclava" from our fav' deli around the corner. (they have a gluten-free section on their menu!)
My gift from the boys.
My gift from DH!!!
I wore one of my favorite outfits that day because I like to look fab' on my b-day....8^P Really, though, "fairy princess" isn't something one hears often as one gets older and fatter. Oddly enough, I heard it twice on Sunday in relation to my outfit.
Thinkin' we may be seeing this one more often.
Well. Wouldn't you?
If you see me in the next few days and I look a little rumpled, it's because
IRONING SUCKS!
and it hurts too. Though it doesn't look too bad in this pic taken tonight hours and hours later after the angry redness went away and the continuous burning eased up.
I am a weenie. And weenies don't like burns. Especially not right on the spot where their yarn slides over their finger when knitting. grrr/pout
We had a great day at the beach yesterday! We headed to Rehoboth Beach in Delaware. It was a first trip to Delaware for all of us. Delaware is nice. At least the part we saw. The beach was also nice but man that water was cold! And there were people everywhere! The boys had a great time, with minimal scrapes and bruises from the rough seas, and we fulfilled our "beach" requirement for the summer. Unfortunately, the only camera we thought to bring was Todd's cell phone. This is the best I could do for you:
These are a few shots of Todd's from our day at the zoo:
How did I get these shots from Todd? They came on my birthday gift...his laptop!!!!! He'll be using the church's laptop since it's Mac and easier to synch with all the Macs in the office. Yay!!! I have a laptop!....at least a long as he works here....which we hope is way past the life-span of either of these laptops. :-) He set it all up for me with a cute kitty clock widget and my name on everything and a great pic of me and the boys at the zoo for my wallpaper. What a sweetie!
We had birthday cake at church today and everybody sang "Happy Birthday". It was so fun! There are some definite advantages to attending a small church. Afterward, we had lunch at our favorite cafe. The boys got me "Matilda" on DVD, which I LOOOVE, and they helped me pick some yarn out of the bargain bin at AC Moore. I even got birthday baclava. What a fun weekend!
Hope yours was good too.
Just a few more days until school so we're trying to get in all the wonderful things we promised our children when we announced we were dragging them half-way across the country to live somewhere they'd never seen. One of those wonderful things was the zoo. Another was the Metro. This week we walked down to the Metro and rode it to the Zoo....well, we rode it to within a few blocks of the zoo then walked to the zoo....then walked around the zoo....then walked to McDonalds....then walked back to the zoo....then walked most of the zoo some more.....then walked back to the Metro. We rode the trolley home from the Metro after that. We were some seriously tired folk afterward but it really was an amazing day. It was overcast and so cool that I wore my sweatshirt most of the day. In August! How crazy is that?
Here are some shots:
This one is for my Mom. She loves cheetahs.
This is a fun one. They put hay on the other side of this scale so the elephant will periodically wander onto it to snack...and voila! we get to see how much it weighs. Ingenious. I'm seriously hoping no one puts one in front of my fridge.
This was one of my favorite zoo creatures. I dig Rays anyway but this one had bright orange dots!
We had to get the kids stoked on sugar before attempting the long hike out of the zoo and to the Metro.
It was a great day! My legs still hurt, but that's good for me, right?
Tomorrow, the beach! After that I have to sew an Obi Wan Kenobi suit and then I think I'm done with all the promises I made pre-move. I hope.
A few of the things I was taking pictures of for you:
Kaboom shower cleaner, folks. It's good stuff.
Seriously.
We generated a lot of trash that last day. We helped the garbage collectors put it on their truck. They were confused. :-)
And everything had to go somewhere so this is what my dining room looked like until a couple of days ago.
More later.....
We're settling in nicely here in Bethesda. We're still mostly in boxes but we're getting there slowly. Our toilets now flush properly, our doorbells no longer buzz 24-7 and our tile is almost finished! We have phone and internet and I caved in and allowed cable into my home....against my better judgment. Our kids have all of their school supplies and new shoes.....and school doesn't start until the 27th! Everyone is happy and healthy and Todd preaches his first sermon as the official pastor tomorrow morning at 11.
We're here. The only thing not running is my computer. We're looking for a good, narrow computer desk so we can set it up in the living room. So. No desk=no computer=no photos=no real blogging. I am taking pictures.
I'll blog soon!
Hi out there to everybody (anybody?) who has wondered where I am. We're in the midst of our move right now and I'm taking lots of pictures. We're about half-way through a long, drawn-out process and I'm ready to be all in. Todd and I drove the U-Haul out last week and are still in Maryland getting things together for school etc. We can't unpack our boxes because they are painting the house so we are truly in limbo. We fly back to Texas tonight to get our kids and start the 3 day drive back with them on Thursday. I am so ready to have my kids here and start life!
See ya soon, with pics.
Life has been crazy the past couple of weeks. We're packing for our move and trying to visit all our relatives at the same time. Not good. We went to my grandmother's in Kansas this last week and I'll post more about that later but last weekend we were supposed to go to Snyder to hang out with Todd's Dad and family. That was before my Brother-in-Law ended up at the hospital for the 2nd time. He had been TO the hospital for antibiotics and a steroid prescription and later the next week ended up IN the hospital for IV antibiotics and pain control.
Can I just take this moment to say: "If your tooth hurts really bad for a really long time........go to the freakin' dentist people!!!!!" Your teeth can kill you if you don't take care of them. My BIL's abscessed tooth spread infection into his lymph system. He ended up having surgery to drain the infection from his neck. Yeah. ew.
He's fine now. Seriously. That was last weekend and this weekend he was here in town playing foosball like a nut at Hunter's b-day party. (Happy Birthday Hunter, by the way!!!) What happened is this: We drove down to Waxahachie to see him in the hospital (hence, no trip to Snyder) and brought with us a bag of entertaining goodies for the hospital and a balloon and a get well card. We informed the boys that we were going down to see Uncle Shawn and tell him to get better soon. Josiah took this literally. He marched into that hospital room and took one look at his Uncle all strung up with IV's and sporting a huge bandage on his neck and told him we had come to help him get better. See? The balloon even said it.
"Prepare to be healed!" he announced. "This is a card to help you feel better." He then proceeded to empty the bag of goodies one goody at a time. "This is going to make you better and this will help you feel better and these taste good and will help you get well. This is Silly Putty. Is it your favorite? It will make you all better!" ....and so on until the bag was empty. Then he hugged him and got up and headed down the hall (we had to go get him and bring him back). There were several eyes filled with tears but it gets better. When we walked in Shawn was vaguely coherent and fighting a high fever. By the time Josiah finished he sat up and gave him a hug. By the time we left the room (about 10 minutes later) the fever was gone. Within 2 hours he was eating and the next day he went home from the hospital.
Whatever your feelings about timing/coincidence/miracles it was a sweet, sweet family moment that I don't think we'll ever forget. Not because the fever broke, but because of the sheer sweetness of an autistic little boy.
The point? Be sweet to people. You never know what personal ailments you may heal them of.
