Thursday

While Travis and Ed were visiting the orthodontist this afternoon, Katie and I walked over to the field behind our house, right next to the cemetary, to do a little nature study.
Her assignment was to pick an area, one meter square, and note down all the plants, critters, and non-living stuff within it.  Picking a good square wasn't easy.  She wanted it to include every pretty flower she saw.  But finally she did settle on a square.

Then it turned out that even with our book on wildflowers I couldn't identify any of the scrubby little weeds growing in it.  And our instructions actually stated, "Do not just put "weed.""  Phooey.  So we did our best.  I think we had goldenrod (of some sort), white topped aster, and frost aster, plus what I rebelliously identified as "grass" and "small shrubby plant."  We also had a butterfly, a 2 spotted ladybug, and a large plastic leaf.  Plus a spider.

She took good notes & we had a good time.

Then we came home and Katie repaired the seat of her baby doll stroller and played house with Harry.  He was surprisingly good tempered about it.

Tuesday

Today was beautiful.  Cool and pretty.  I planted my little garden patch with lettuce and spinach seeds.  Probably too late, of course, but a friend from church gave me the seeds a few weeks ago and this was the first time weather and opportunity favored me at the same time.

Katie thought she would be helpful by raking leaves, but then Travis came out and showed her that there were more fun things to do with leaves than gather them into neat piles. 

Happy All Saints Day!

Today in church we sang one of the songs in our hymnal which always makes me chuckle.  It is just so very, very British -- all I can think of while we sing it is a church full of English children warbling away.  But at least everyone knew it, which was more than you could say for the first hymn.
And here, for your edification, "I Sing a Song of the Saints of God" (#293 in the 1982 Hymnal)

"I sing a song of the saints of God
Patient and brave and true,
Who toiled and fought and lived and died
For the Lord they loved and knew.
And one was a doctor, and one was a queen,
And one was a shepherdess on the green:
They were all of them saints of God --- and I mean
God helping, to be one too.

They loved their Lord so dear, so dear,
And his love made them strong;
And they followed the right for Jesus' sake,
The whole of their good lives long.
And one was a soldier, and one was a priest,
And one was slain by a fierce wild beast;
And there's not any reason --- no not the least
Why I shouldn't be one too.

They lived not only in ages past,
There are hundreds of thousands still,
The world is bright with the joyous saints
Who love to do Jesus' will.
You can meet them in school, or in lanes, or at sea,
In church, or in trains, or in shops, or at tea,
For the saints of God are just folk like me,
And I mean to be one too. "

Isn't that just jolly?  And if you click on the title link it will take you to a YouTube video of a church choir actually singing it!
 

The kids had a good Halloween.  It drizzled all day and all evening, but we didn't let that slow us down.  Travis dressed as a black cloaked character with a silver, skeleton-y sort of face, and Katie was Hermione Granger.

Travis was eager to carve his pumpkin, but he did not enjoy reaching in to pull out the seeds & goopy.

Katie, on the other hand, does not object to slimy pumpkin goop.

Watching Travis carve made me nervous, but he did it, and finished with the same number of fingers he started with.

Here Ed is giving fatherly advice.

Katie's scowl here is not due to touching pumpkin slime, but because she suspects (rightly) that her daddy is horning in on her picture.  Ed loves having his picture taken.So here we'll let him have all the glory.Travis did not give his pumpkin a nose.  I don't know why, but judging by its expression the pumpkin was not pleased.

Last Wednesday we got home from a lovely week in Maine with my parents.Mostly the weather was beautiful, if a tad on the coolish side.  We got in some beautiful hikes.  Above is the view from Blueberry Hill, and also Katie, dressed so as Not to look like a turkey.  My mom served us fabulous gourmet meals every night, and wonderful desserts too.  Here she is bravely letting Travis sift ingredients together for Whoopie Pies.

And Katie, with a fingerful of Whoopie Pie dough...

My parents and I climbed Hornbeam Mountain.  The path up was a bit iffy, but the view from the top was glorious!

During our visit my poor dad was dealing with a defective table saw (actually a couple defective table saws).  The saw saga did not have a happy ending, but Katie had a great time helping tighten screws.

My parents took us to lunch at a very yuppie little restaurant in their little town.  Delicious and substantial as the lunch was, it still did not fortify Travis and Katie enough so that they could walk the three miles homes without complaining.  Fortunately my dad, who drove home, knows his grandchildren well, and met us partway home with the car to give my little wimps a ride home.  My mom and I had a much more pleasant walk without them.

Did I mention that my mom made us wonderful meals?  We had Beef Wellington, a rib roast, turkey, ham, brisket, etc.  So good.

Here Travis is eyeing the Wellington lustfully.

My daddy took Travis kayaking on Long Pond.  I have no pictures, but apparently Travis kayaks as though he is playing bumper cars.  He says this is how they did it at camp.  Katie was too young for kayaking, but tackled her Paba every time he thought he might sit down for a little peaceful reading.  He read us half of The Little White Horse, and I am looking forward to finishing it.

A friend of my parents recommended the view from Belgrade Lakes golf course.  None of us golf, but it is a beautiful course, and the views were beautiful.  (And there was a very sweet yellow lab puppy named Tonka who would have liked to come home with us.) 

My parents have a stream running through their property, and Katie would happily have spent hours playing in the water, despite the chill.  Here she is, inviting disaster by standing on a log.

Actually, both children enjoyed teetering on rocks at the edge of the pond, filling my head with visions of hypothermia.Good thing they're cute.

Here we are, dressed up all puffy.And the kids, perpetually goofy.

And that was our trip to Maine.  The cats and Bo seem to have forgiven us for abandoning them.

Saturdays are for Decadence

I stayed in bed late this morning, reading.  Around 9:30 I looked in on the children, who were in the living room watching Saturday morning television.  They each had a doughnut this morning for breakfast, and Katie followed hers up with the dish of pudding that she wasn't allowed to have last night for dessert because she didn't eat her dinner.

I mentioned that she was still wearing a fair lot of the doughnut or the pudding or both, but she was undismayed...

Aside from the fact that it was cold, gray, and rainy from Wednesday on, weather which makes me want to hibernate, we had a pretty good week.  My Uncle Dave stopped by for a visit on Tuesday and we had a lovely time!  The kids showed him all the wonders of Mountain Park (chiefly our new general store), and he took us out to a delicious lunch at an Italian/Greek place in town which had been recommended to me.  Then the kids showed him the Wii.

All the fun of a bowling alley without the ickiness of rented shoes.  What more could one ask?

He is excellent company and a very good listener.  Also a good patter!  He left with a very generous quantity of Bo's hair stuck to his trousers.

We hope he comes back soon!

School went pretty well this week.  Travis crossed another bridge in Fred, Katie learned all her spelling words, and the usual grammar, Latin, history, etc. was studied and more or less learned.  Literature this week was particularly fun, featuring Beowulf, King Arthur, and the gods and goddesses of Norse mythology. 

New Love

We spent Saturday morning and part of the afternoon at our church, serving up food at the "Barbeque and Brunswick Stew" which was held to raise money for our priest's discretionary fund.  I think the priest's fund is now pretty comfortable, and we had a good time slinging barbeque, stew, and beans.  Katie even got a couple tips for carrying food out to people's cars!  And afterward Ed drove us up to a place in Virginia that sells boots and he and the kids waited very patiently while I tried on a hundred pairs of boots and finally bought these lovelies with my birthday money!

For the past three winters I have mostly worn these

with the thickest socks I can find.  Fashionable as this look is, I have been thinking for a while now that it would be nice to have some new cold-weather footwear.  Since my feet have become increasingly duck shaped with age, finding a comfortable pair of shoes is not an easy task (which is why I have been wearing those excellent sandals pretty much non-stop for the past five years). Thus the trip to the boot emporium, recommended by a boot-wearing friend, in Virginia.  And in the end, after sorely testing the dedication of the young and not-terribly-enthusiastic salesgirl, I found my Perfect Boots.  They are Fabulously Comfortable.  Nice arch support.  No sliding around at the heel.  And not tight in the toes.  I am In Love!

The raised patches under the writing (which says "waterproof") are to cushion the side of my feet in the stirrups.  Since I don't have stirrups (or a saddle.  or a horse.), this feature might seem unnecessary, but it is good to be prepared, eh?

Finding fabulously wonderful boots was pretty much the extent of my industry this weekend, but I did also manage to get the dog washed.  This probably fell more into the category of "self-preservation" than "industry," as he had gotten very ripe.  But anyway, now he is much more pleasant to be around.  I wanted to get a picture to show how pretty he looks clean, but he wouldn't smile for me.

He looks pretty hard done by, doesn't he?  Being bathed makes him feel terribly martyred, but he loves being dried off afterwards so that face he is making is pure drama.

Katie tried to get him to smile (with treats), but he is stubborn.

Harry would have liked a treat, but the last time I gave him one it made him ill.  Indoor pets should Not have delicate digestions.

Will Wonders Never Cease?

The kids visited the dentist today, and, maintaining their record, have no cavities! Given the care with which they brush, this has to qualify as a minor miracle (right up there with the mango, Daddy!).  And I am very grateful.

Another thing to be grateful for arrived by FedEx yesterday:

Katie noticed right away that it was still warm!  Hot off the press, or hot off the truck, either way, we can hardly wait to read it!

And finally, the cats still like playing in boxes.

A Perfect Day

"Was this the Best Birthday Ever?" my kids keep asking me. 
Yup.  It was.  The best Ever.  With all the love and enthusiasm they've been pouring out on me all day, how could it have been anything else?

Our book group friends got here at 8:30 this morning and we had a productive session, with the kids presenting their papers, playing a game with the history cards they are memorizing, having a writing lesson, and working logic puzzles.  They sang "Happy Birthday" to me and we all ate cake.  (Unfortunately, one of our families, five people, couldn't make it, so there is still quite a lot of cake left.)  One of the moms brought me this beautiful jar of cinnamon sweet pickles:

I'd never had cinnamon pickles before, and, to be absolutely honest (though I wasn't with my friend), I was a wee bit skeptical.  After everyone left, though, I opened the jar and tried some, and they are delicious!  I called my friend right away and told her how good they were, just in case any of my doubtfulness had been apparent.  (And now maybe I'll get a jar at Christmas -- they really are yummy!)

My wonderful, sweet parents gave me those glorious stacks of books, and it was a great test of character for me to leave them and do lessons with the kids after lunch.  I worked the "it's my birthday" angle shamelessly with the children while we did schoolwork, and they did finish in much better than the usual time, and with more than the usual cheerfulness.  And then we went out to dinner at the Chinese buffet.  No dishes to wash and very full, happy tummies.

And now all I have to do is decide whether to start on the new Garrison Keillor or the Patricia Wrede which has been tempting me on my Amazon list for several years and is now mine!  It just doesn't get any better than this.