This & That...Happy Birthday, Matt!

Last Friday, the day before the big reunion, our grandson Matthew had his second birthday. We celebrated at our favorite Chinese restaurant.

Matt was sleepy and a wee bit bemused that all the attention was focused on him.

Sister Lauren got everyone going by telling us what we should do.

Cousin Kaitlyn kept things peaceful and on an even keel.

Cousin Gaige thoroughly enjoyed the many buffet offerings.

Cousin Nathan provided the evening's entertainment.

Finally, it was time to get down to business!

There was even singing by a lovely duo.

The very exciting finale!

Lauren was giving more help than was actually needed very helpful.

Happy Birthday, dear Matthew! Happy Birthday to you!

Randomness...

too small for a post, too good to pass up.

Been braiding some garlic.

Picking blackberries and making pies and cobblers.

Little Feather has decided the best place to lay her eggs is on a chair in my 3-season room. I leave Lucy the dog out there with the door slightly propped open when I'm away for more than a few hours, and twice I've come home and found an egg lying in the chair.

Well, it's one I don't have to bring in from the coop, I guess.

It's official....

....Gaige and Nathan are now Cub Scouts.

We missed the first two meetings, so the night they joined we got a lot of Scout stuff thrust upon us. Every year the Boy Scouts of America sells Trail's End popcorn. It is the only fund-raising event for Scouts, much like Girl Scouts sell cookies. When our boys were in Scouts umpteen years ago, and David was a Scout Leader and I was a Den Mother, the popcorn sales were pretty simple. There was one choice, the kind you put in a pan with oil and popped on the old range. It was really good popcorn...think Orville Redenbacher good. Now, of course, there is microwave popcorn and gift tins filled with popcorn goodies. One really nice feature in the sales, for people who don't care for popcorn but who still want to make a contribution and also help our men and women in the armed services, is the Military Donation program that sends gift tins to our troops.

The other thing that was an immediate rush-to-get-done item was the fall campout happening on Saturday! Four days hence! We decided that the boys would just go for the afternoon and evening, but not spend the night. They were fine with that plan. I think they were a little apprehensive about staying in a tent away from home. And that was really fine with Poppy, because he wasn't relishing spending the night in a tent either.

It had rained the night before and Saturday morning, too, so we weren't sure they were even going, even though there was a "no cancellation, if rain" policy in effect. Luckily, just about the time to leave for the camp, the sun came out and it turned out to be a lovely afternoon.

The guys need to work on their salutes/signs...I'm not sure which one they were going for here, but both of them need work. Gaige seems to have the Scout sign confused with the "peace" sign. Two fingers together, Gaige, and not quite so high in the sky. And, Nathan, the salute is at the right front of your cap brim. Nathan is a Tiger Cub and Gaige is a Wolf Cub.

 

Nathan and another Tiger Cub checking out a daddy long-legs.

Fishing was the highlight of the day. Poppy said they learned to cast fairly well for first-timers.

Nathan even caught a good-sized bluegill, but Poppy insisted on throwing it back. Nathan was not. too. threw a screaming, crying fit happy. about this turn of events, and that is the reason he is not in the picture.

Gaige got to help cut up peppers for the chili cooking in the Dutch oven.

Nathan cut up apples for a tinfoil dessert that was cooked on the fire.

Sung at the end of Scout meetings.....Taps

"Day is done.

Gone the sun

From the lake,

From the hills,

From the sky.

All is well,

Safely rest.

God is nigh."

Make a wish

Last Sunday was Gaige's seventh birthday. We celebrated by taking the whole gang to The Maize at Little Darby Creek. There were lots of activities for the little ones, and they had a great time. Afterward, we went to Aimee's and had pizza and cake and presents for the birthday boy.

Cute babes

A few pictures of the cutie-pies who were visiting this weekend.

Warning! Meltdown!

I picked up Gaige from school yesterday and was met in the carpool line by one of the teachers explaining why Gaige was crying. She said he had felt a little ill earlier, but that he wasn't running a fever. As Gaige entered the van, the trickle of tears turned into a torrent with dramatic sobbing following closely. Trying to deduce the cause of the meltdown while maneuvering out of the school parking lot was a little tricky. Between sobs and moans, I finally managed to glean the following information: everyone disrespected him, his leg bone was "twisted", and he was "really, really tired".

The total disrespect by his classmates was the result of them not wanting to play what Gaige suggested, so they went off and did their own thing while he stubbornly refused to change his position, as he is wont to do. The twisting of the leg bone (the opposite one was twisted the day before) I attributed to growing pains and was relieved after an hour's rest on the sofa and a dose of ibuprofen. So relieved, in fact, that he was able to chase his brother around the house and drive me crazy.

I'm pretty sure that exhaustion was the biggest factor in the meltdown. Adjusting to first grade takes a toll on a six-year-old boy. That, combined with not getting to sleep until 9:30 p.m. on the average night and waking up by 6:30 or 7:00, equates to not enough rest. Having homework every night for the first time has been a big adjustment as well. I'm hoping that in a few weeks all these new developments will be old hat to him and will make for smoother sailing.

I didn't have the camera with me to record the meltdown, but I found a picture of a similar one when Gaige was four.



When Jaye, Kelly and the kids were here last weekend, they went to the zoo. Lauren and Kelly are exploring the Habitat House.



Matthew was doing a little computer work with his dad, but then he got sleepy.

Sleeping bags are for dumb people

Aimee asked if the kids could spend the night on Tuesday. This a little rundown of how the evening went.

4:00 p.m. Picked up Gaige, Nathan and Kaitlyn.
4:03 p.m. Yelled at said boys who immediately started bickering in the rear seat.
4:15 p.m. Arrive at Bear Swamp location.
4:16 p.m. Yell at Nathan for letting the dog into the backyard where the chickens are running around.

For about an hour, they play outside peacefully. Of course, I forgot to put Off on Kaitlyn, so she gets 4 huge mosquito bites on her leg.

5:30 p.m. David calls to say he's coming home early because he is feeling sick from a cold. Oh great, no help from that quarter! At least when he's sick he doesn't require a lot of attention. Just kind of crawls into his den and disappears until he feels better.

The rest of the evening goes fairly well. We have bathtime, we have storytime, we eat ice cream and brush teeth. Here comes the fun part--bedtime!

9:30 p.m. While the children are bathing, I put the boys' sleeping bags on the floor of the front guest room. Normally, they sleep in the bed, but my sister-in-law and her son are visiting this weekend and I had already put clean sheets on the beds and didn't want to go through another change. Silly me to think that a six-and-a-half-year-old would think it was cool to sleep on the floor! No, no, no! Nathan was fine with it and climbed right in. On the other hand, Gaige defiantly crossed his arms and glared at me with an evil look in his eye and declared, "Sleeping on the floor is for dumb people!"

No amount of reasoning, explaining that this is what kids do when they have a sleepover, threatening, would change his mind. He was adamant that he was not sleeping on the floor. Of course, the whole time this is going on, David is blissfully snoring away in his drugged slumber, while I am sweating and frustrated that a six-year-old is winning the battle of the wills.

10:30 p.m. I finally give it up as a lost cause and let them sleep on the bed on top of the quilt. I suppose, if you look at it in a skewed sort of way, it was a compromise.

11:00 p.m. I take a shower in the guest bath, because there's no way I can go to sleep caked in sweat from 10 rounds with a six-year-old.

12:00 midnight. I fall asleep on the sofa, exhausted.

6:30 a.m. Kaitlyn wakes up. The coffee isn't even ready yet. Here we go again!

Big Darby Creek Headwaters Nature Preserve

On a recent visit, my sister-in-law, Anita, who works for The Nature Conservancy in Virginia, took us to see the newly completed Big Darby Creek Headwaters Nature Preserve. It is only a few miles from our house and was a perfect hike for my mother and father-in-law and three little boys, my nephew Xan and grandson Gaige who are both six years old, and grandson Nathan who is five. The trail is flat and over the wetlands is a decking trail. The boys had great fun trying to see who could spit and hit a spider that was sitting on a rock in the water.

Since 1999, The Conservancy has been gradually acquiring 800 acres of land encompassing Big Darby Creek Headwaters. This includes wetlands, floodplain forests and prairies that provide important habitat for plants and animals. The Big Darby Creek has been threatened in recent years by development, pollution and changes to the natural stream flow. Restoring the headwaters to its natural meandering flow will help reverse the damage done by highway construction and channel modifications made for farm drainage.