The crew goes to the zoo

School is quickly wrapping up for my gang. We will be done next Thursday. Each spring their go on a field trip and this year was the Toledo Zoo. In the past, I have either driven or ridden with other parents to attend these field trips, but this year, with the price of gas, I decided the $3 to ride the bus was a good deal. But consider 40 kids, excited to be on a bus, and how loud they can get. I kept reminding myself of the savings, but my ears didn't think it was a bargan.

First up, was pictures for the yearbook. The lower picture is the 3rd and 4th graders. Sorry, they thought they were done when I snapped it. The upper picture is the 5th and 6th graders. From here it was off to view the zoo.

The kids and I joined up with two other families and off we went to see the sights. Suzanna had

been to this zoo before, so she was "the expert". It was a first for Thomas and Kathryn, and they were thrilled with everything. Each look at things so differently. Suzanna is a "stroller", and likes to read the information the zoo provides about the animals. Thomas on the other hand is on a speed tour. He would fly through and look at everything all at once and be done and ready to go to the next display. Kathryn, as is typical, was somewhere in the middle of the two, taking her time in some places and rushing along with a freind at the next display.

We saw all there was to see, made the necessary stop at the souvenier shop and headed back to the bus. We were all tired and Kathryn managed to fall asleep on the way home. We were able to praise the Lord that the rain that had treated to ruin the day held off until we were in the buses and on our way home.

I really appreciated that the teachers and principal tied all that we had seen to Gods wonderful creation. You can't look at a hippo or a rhino and not recognize that God has a sense of humor. God wants us to enjoy his creation and the zoo was a wonderful way to do just that. Of course, many in the world would like to say that all we saw there evolved from something else, but what on earth was a rhino before it became a rhino????

How do they do that????

As I have confessed in the past, I can't back a truck and trailer. Well, I can, but it would take me about 45 minutes to go 10 feet and I couldn't have anyone watching me while I try. So far the pray for a circular driveway or find a man to help me out system has worked. I can remember my dad backing the truck and goose neck livestock trailer into spots that were so narrow he'd have inches on either side. My hubby is the same way.

Sunday afternoon, hubby and I need to move equipment around in the storage barn so that the tractor way in the back was in the front. I am the watch the sides and help back up and hitch person in these projects. Hubby can back up to stuff to hitch up and have it right there on one try. Me, it would be back and forth at least three times. The haybine is very wide, compared to the barn door and is awkward to work with. Never fear, he still knows just how to shimmy it back and forth to get it through the doorway...leaving the doors and trim on the barn and all the shields on the haybine.

Then it was time to put it all back. Quick and easy, everything was backed back into a spot. It didn't take 20 tries. He knew how much to move the wheel one way or the other to get it right where he wanted it. So is it instinct or practice, practice, practice????? I suspect it is a little of both, plus he is so much more patient then I will ever be.

Auction Shocker.....

My moms folks went to estate auctions for years. It was a favorite thing for them to do and my brother and I loved going along with them. We had a group of auction friends, who all came with parents and grandparents like us, and had a great time running around, being silly, like kids can be.

A common purchase at these auctions were boxes of stuff. It could be the stuff from some one's junk drawer, a bunch of odds and ends, soaps and cleaners, old tin cans full of nails. You just never knew all the goodies you had until you got home and went through them. Grandma loved costume jewelry, so she usually grabbed up boxes of that sort of stuff. When we went through grandma and grandpa's house after they had passed away, we got to make new boxes of stuff that the auctioneer who had probably sold most of it to them got to sell to someone else. Mom did keep most of her jewelry, and through the years has sorted through it and given different items to the kids.

Kathryn recently came home with a few new items. She took one ring to school yesterday morning and when she got in the car in the afternoon, she was grumbling about the ring. She told me the ring had a picture of a naked lady inside it. Mind you, this ring didn't look like anything special, a simple clear stone on a ring of very worn metal with a bent band. I said "what are you talking about?" She explained that there is a little hole on the side of the ring that when you look inside you can see a naked lady. I asked for the ring, looked inside the hole and OH MY, she was right! It was a peepshow ring. I had no idea such things even existed!! Of course the other two in the car instantly caught on to what was up and requested an opportunity to look and see as well. NO! was my answer. We headed to moms for an afternoon visit, and I sent all the kids off to various places in the house and then showed mom the offending object. She was equally as shocked, having no idea what she had sent home with Kathryn. Needless to say, the ring is gone and the shock has begun to wear off.

Modesty in a world that doesn't care.....

I am frustrated. I have an 11 year old daughter that needs spring clothes and the world thinks she should show her midriff, chest and most of her legs! I don't happen to agree. It is impossible to find clothes that will fit her and cover her appropriately. This is not a new problem. For some reason the fashion powers-that-be decided when girls go from 6X to 7-8, they no longer need to be covered up. It is time to be provocative, and to be quite frank, TRASHY! We are trying to raise daughters that are modest, and unworldly. It just isn't easy in a world which puts value in all the wrong things.

In the past, I have been able to find patterns and make a few dresses that work for church. This year a run through four pattern books yeilded nothing but frustration. I couldn't even find one that with some alterations, would be acceptable. Thankfully, school clothes are never an issue, they wear uniforms and the company they come from is a Christian-owned company and they have the modesty thing covered. Everyday clothes aren't a huge deal. She is happy in jeans and a tee shirt. It all comes down to church clothes.

So what am I doing to remedy this situation? I am resizing a nice dress pattern that I have made for her in the past and hopefully it will work. Have I ever done this before? No, but you know what they say, desperate times lead to desperate measures.

Maybe someday there will be a mass fashion revolt and hems will get longer, shirts will cover belly buttons, jeans waistlines will be at the waist and shirts will actually cover what they were meant to cover. No I really don't expect it, but I will fight it in my own way in my little corner of the world.

Truck repair.....as explained by Thomas

Our big work truck has a problem, a BIG problem. After overheating on the way to a job yesterday, Mike put antifreeze and water in it and hustled to the dealership. Within a couple hours the bad news was delivered. It has a blown head gasket. I don't know a lot about vehicles, but I do know that that is not a good thing. And puts the truck out of service for at least a week. Thankfully, that isn't the only truck in the fleet, so work will go on.

Mike and Thomas went to the dealership last night to get stuff off the truck that will be needed while it is under the weather. Thomas described the scene this morning. He said the truck had been executed. WHAT???? I asked. And he repeated that it looked like it had been executed. You know, its head has been chopped off!!! It seems that the easiest way to repair the engine is to remove the entire cab from the truck. According to Thomas they had unhooked everything from the engine and it was suspended above the engine. What can you do but laugh at moments like that.

Did you miss me?????

Wow, its been a while since I have blogged. Many exciting things have happened since my last time on. One major issue was that my internet service was down for about four days. That cramps my style, as I enjoy surfing the 'net.

Last Tuesday, Thomas and Kathryn turned 9!!!! They are growing up WAY too fast! Here are a few pictures of their weekend celebrating. They each had a friend over Sunday afternoon and had a great time with Jacob and Meghan. The weather was nice, so they spent most of their time outdoors. They all slept well that night.

They each took cupcakes to school Tuesday morning to share with their class and teachers. It was my chance to pretend I was Martha Stewart. Thomas had white frosting on his, then I added 3/8in pieces of red licorice whips on the top to form "laces" of a baseball. Believe me, they would have looked better if someone on Martha's staff had done them for me, but Thomas was happy and that is what counts. Kathryn's were decorated with color sprinkles, and a lollipop on top to look like a flower growing. Again, Martha's were perfect, mine were.....mine. Kathryn loved them.

Here they are blowing out their birthday candles.

Typical Thomas....he is all about the show. Kathryn played it a bit more coy. She managed to get all nine out on the first try. Thomas, for all his "bluster" took a couple tries to finish the job.

I spent a lot of the week sleeping on the couch with one eye shut and the other on the stable monitor. Christy was showing all the signs of being close to having her foal. Yes, horses have been having foals for centuries on their own, but I still like to get on the scene early and spend some time handling the foals when they are first born. It is called imprinting by the experts and seems to make a more human friendly foal. So finally Saturday morning at about 3:45AM, my patience and lack of sleep paid off. Christy had a beautiful filly. Meet Holly! Haven't figured out what her fancy, registered name will be. That will come later. Needless to say, Saturday night, I slept.....hard. And I have a couple weeks break before Breezy is due. Then it will be back to the couch for more not so restful nights.

The whole process of birth really amazes me. The strong instinct that the foal has to get up on its feet within such a short time of their birth is miraculous. The fact that they know where their dinner is located, that their mother is their protector, all those things are not learned over time, but a part of them since their creation. Nothing is evolutionary in them. Gods creation is truly amazing.

Where there's smoke.....

There's my brother.

This afternoon I noticed smoke across the field at mom and dads. I had just been shopping with my mom so I knew it had nothing to do with her. But, I also knew that my brother and his wife were home for the weekend. They have a small log cabin in the woods behind my folks and spend a lot of weekends relaxing there.

My phone rang a few minutes later and it was mom, jokingly saying that I should disregard the smoke I was seeing, it was just my brother burning off a little bit of yard trash. Then she paused and said, "actually, he is doing an awful lot of stomping." She then saw my sister-in-law run down the driveway toward where my brother was stomping. Mom hollered out to them to see if everything was under control and found out that they had called the fire department.

From there it got really crazy. My cell phone rang, it was a friend from church that is on another area fire department. He had heard the call through central dispatch, recognized the road, looked it up in the phone book and knew it was my brothers. Oh, and just to add to the excitement, he said they were calling it a structure fire!

The kids headed out to the swing set to get the best vantage point to observe the fire trucks. Soon we could hear the sirens, and then they all drove right on by. PROBLEM!!! Cindy had called from their home phone number, which is a different house number then the actual driveway to get to the house. They share a driveway with mom and dad, so the address Cindy told them to come to was right (mom and dads), however, the system registered the wrong place. On up the road they went, finally turning around and coming back slower, trying to figure out where they were suppose to be. By then, Terry had gotten the fire out himself, so there was no smoke to help guide their way. The fire department started to turn into the neighbors driveway, but she told them where they needed to be and they finally rolled up the driveway about 5 minutes after the fire was out.

A couple minutes later, down the road came the grass unit, as they had been updated that it was a grass fire rather than structural. They flew on by, went up the road, turned around and headed back to the station. I am sure one of the other trucks told them they were no longer needed.

My sister-in-law called me shortly after it all settled down to discuss the upcoming birthday party we were planning for the twins. Earlier in the week, a cookout sounded really good, but that has changed. Cindy is more inclined to head to Saucy Dogs for supper and leave the fires out for awhile. I think that is a good idea too.

In the meantime, my brother told my mom that people really should burn the dead grass and weeds each year, to which mom replied "but can you do it without the fire department?"