The Seasons Just Keep Changing

Summer's nearly over, baseball will be winding down soon, football season is starting (too soon in my opinion) and now another season is upon us. The School Year. School Season. It began today. It began weeks ago, actually, with school shopping. Today I spent the day at church learning how to be a leader for MOPS. Wednesday we'll visit Archer's and Shelly's schools. Thursday morning Archer starts school, then we go to church for MOPS signup, in the afternoon I'll go to Shelly's school for orientation. Boyscouts will be on Thursday nights, along with PTA meetings, but I'm not sure when that starts. Friday morning Shelly starts school. Some Sundays I'll be helping in the nursery at church. Its going to be a busy season.

Last night Shelly came into our room and said, "I just can't sleep because I'm thinking too about school." I'm excited too, for this new season to start. I've never been this commited to this many different things all at once, I'm feeling like its going to be a challenge. But I also feel its where God wants me. Two schools, MOPS, Awana, Boy Scouts, Sunday School, am I forgetting something? Oh yeah. My home. My husband and children. Don't they come first?

People who have lots of money don't need to shop the sales, they don't need to be disciplined about how much they spend at the grocery store, they can buy the extra bag of potato chips or the expensive steak. And those of us who don't have that luxury learn to watch for sales, snack on something more affordable (and healthy), and stretch the dollars and the food a little further. I have a feeling this new season, the School Year season, is going to teach me to be more thrifty with my time. More frugal, not in what I give to my family and those around me, but more frugal with the luxuries, the extras. Wasting time allowing myself to get distracted by the tv, a magazine, a blog. I think its going to force me to be more organized and disciplined with my time. I can already see it, its going to be hard. Possibly stressful, maybe exhausting. But I'm looking forward to it because I believe its where God wants me. Out there, getting involved, seeing whose lives I can touch. And I'm not getting nervous about it yet because its all a week away. But the night before, I'm sure I'll have those First Day jitters. Archer and Shelly, on the other hand, know no jitters, only excitement. Bring on the friends, the learning, the fun!

Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit's leading in every part of our lives.
~ Galatians 5:25

Elijah: 7 8 9 Months

I have good intentions to be organized but it rarely works. So here's the last three months all lumped together. Sometime in the last three months he has started crawling (like crazy, super fast), babbling lots and lots (Dada, not Mama), clapping when he's hungry, sleeping in his crib (yaay!!! this one's still pretty new). At one point I thought for SURE he'd be a later walker than his brother and sister, they walked so young and he seemed to be taking his sweet time. But now he pulls himself up and walks along the edges of furniture, maybe it won't be too long after all.

Yesterday we went to the beach and he experienced his first mouthful of sand. Poor kid, I never would have let that happen to Archer. With E, I just thought, now he'll learn it doesn't taste good, why wait for that lesson till he's older? Ok, he only got a LITTLE in his mouth, I got most of it off his face right away. But seriously, I'm so much more relaxed about things like that now.There are more important things to worry about now, like helping Shelly make the PERFECT sand-home. David said it looked like a house from Whoville. We even built a stone patio out back, and a pool. Oh yeah, and E tried to eat the rocks.

I can't even find the seven and nine month pictures. Oh well. Here's Eight!

Recap of Mini Golf with a Family of Five

We keep trying this, once a summer or so, and we're optimistic every time that its going to be better than before. After all, Archer's no longer being carried around in a baby carrier strapped to our shoulders, hanging in front of us sleeping as we try to putt the ball. And Shelly isn't either. They're both walking now... Seriously, we've tried this, its hard to swing the club. So, two out of three can walk, swing their clubs on their own, and the third is happy in his stroller. Should be good this time, right?

Holes one and two were ok, sort of. Then we had a potty break. Long walk back to the building. The boys wait patiently for the girls to return and we resume. By hole four its the boys' turn for a potty break, the girls wait. Shelly's already given up putting more than once per hole, she just sort of pushes the ball with the club until it drops in. Somewhere between holes five and seven the girls take another break and when we return we give up completely on the clubs and start rolling the balls with our hands, bowling style. Except for Shelly who THROWS the ball. Considering her aim isn't great, its surprising that it stays on the green. At number eight, two of the four golfers have given up completely and are now just carrying their stuff, and everyone else's too (that's David and me). Did I mention its an 18 hole course? A little too long for this crowd.

Along the way, the kids mostly enjoyed dropping their balls into the holes that had tubes leading out of a rock at some other location, tunnels and ramps were quite exciting and there was lots of running back and for to try it again, and again, and again... Finally, at the last hole, Archer gave it a good try, set his ball down, lined everything up and... HOLE IN ONE!!!

There were four or five potty breaks, one ball in the river, a few skirmishes about taking turns but mostly laughing and shouting and having fun. So, was it worth the $20 and long car ride? Yep, it was. And maybe next year we'll get a little further along in the course before we quit following the rules. Or maybe not, either way, its fun!





Perfect form!

Waiting patiently for the ladies to return... and trying not to fall in!

Vacation Week

This is Day Two of David's vacation week, we went out to lunch at Georgie Porgie's, spent awhile mini-golfing, then went back to Georgie Porgie's for ice cream. And when Archer was getting ready for bed tonight he called out to us, "The chicken flavored ice cream I had today didn't taste like chicken." The flavor of the day... wait for it... drumstick.

Less Than Three Weeks

photo by Fink Studios

"Denise, I just can't believe that I am going to put my little girl on a bus, all alone, and send her into the world all by herself..."

Denise's reply? "Amy, those are the EXACT SAME words you said to me when Archer was about to go to school. 'I can't believe I'm going to put my little boy on a bus...'" (Denise is right, I did say it.)

Shelly's ready, right? I guess so. But I also wonder if that's just what we keep telling ourselves to make it ok that we're sending our little children off without their moms and dads to hold their hands, protect them, teach them about the big bad world. We, the parents, are telling ourselves that, because our society keeps telling us that. "In Japan, they send their kids to school starting at age three. They go to school six days a week for 18 hours a day." (Ok, some of that might not be true, but I'm pretty sure some of it IS true.) Anyway, who CARES what Japan does? Shouldn't I be thinking NOT about what Japan does, or my society, my neighbor, but what's best for MY OWN KID? All I can think to do at this point is pray. Lord, please protect her. Lord, if you want me to keep her home, show me, change my heart, make it clear. In the mean time, please protect her, bring her safely home to me each day. My job as her mother is to protect her. Not send her away. But we're on this track, the train keeps rolling forward, and for now its heading towards 4K for Shelly, arrival time three weeks away.

Here Fishy Fishy!

Yesterday Dad took us fishing in Whitnall Park, and oh were they ever biting! Shelly wasn't nearly as interested as Archer, still she took her turn and caught three or four. Archer... whew! He kept Grandpa busy baiting hooks and taking fish off the hook only moments later, he caught at least a dozen. And Mom was kind enough to keep Eli and Shelly entertained while Arch was mastering his fish-catching skills and I was documenting the event.

You can see from the pictures the following:

1. No matter HOW excited you are to catch your first fish, you definitely DON'T want to TOUCH it!

2. Archer has a limited tolerance for the camera pointing at him. You can practically HEAR him saying "MOM... enough already!"

3. Fishing wears a girl out! She's SO worn out that she Just. Doesn't. Care. that her brother's feet are in her face.

Today we were at Mom and Dad's (surprise! aren't we ALWAYS there???) and though I hadn't planned on staying for supper, it smelled so good, Mom told us to stay, and so we did. I noticed some lightning outside and a severe thunderstorm warning for our county on the tv but didn't pay much attention. The garden could use the water. Yummy supper, then we left. We watched lightning in front of us the whole drive home and on the last leg I started noticing leaves and small branches everywhere, then a police officer in the road moving bigger branches and a very large branch hanging from the power line that crossed the road in front of us. He waved me through, it didn't look safe to me but we prayed and drove under and thanked the Lord for his protection. I'm glad I wasn't driving in the storm that caused THAT, I thought. Just a little further another police car, more flares in the road but this time it wasn't a branch, it was an entire tree leaning on the power lines that run next to the road. Oh Lord! We prayed and thanked God for his protection and asked him to protect those who had to fix it.

We got home and thanked God for brining us safely home and protecting us on the way. So when Archer discovered that our umbrella had blown over, broken in half, smashed our garden, I reminded myself to be thankful that it wasn't worse. But I was a little upset. But still praising God for his grace and protection.

A broken umbrella and flattened bean plants were the worst thing that happened to us today, and for that I'm praising the Lord. Thank You!!!

Worship the Lord with gladness;
come before him with joyful songs.
~Psalm 100:2

Tomatoes Under Attack

The garden has been under attack by a vicious predator. A tomato predator. I don't have enough words to describe how disgusting, gross, YUCK this thing is. First I'll show you the damage. Note the missing leaves. And the half-eaten tomato.

And now... the guilty party.

Bleh. Notice how FAT its gotten off eating all my tomatoes. (Picture doesn't do it justice. Its as big around as my thumb. Six or so inches long.) Many many tomatoes. Not the little ones either. Its eating the fattest tomatoes, so it can get FAT. Ewwwww!

The worst news is that I think there may be another one hiding out somewhere. Nightmare.