Volunteer Day!

On Friday, we headed to Monte Sano State Park to put in some volunteer time.  I sent out a message to Deb who was able to post it Thursday morning and we had 16 volunteers with that 24 hour notice!  I was happy!

We split into groups, which was efficient, but nearly everyone stayed with their family.  Jake went off with one family with boys his age, but they did not talk much and he rejoined us an hour later.  I had hoped we would meet some new folks!

I found this tiny turtle.  He had a leaf around his neck, it was stuck up under his shell!  I worked that out and he was suddenly in a big hurry to leave.  Ben held him for just a couple minutes so we could check him over.  He's missing a hind leg, but it's a clean stump, already healed.  He had good skin color and his shell looked healthy, claws were clean and strong.  He's tiny, but in good shape.  We put him back where I found him.

We worked a few hours in the Japanese Garden, clearing limbs and repairing the rock and wood borders around the gardens.

I wonder what took a bite?

Yeah!  Limb pile!

Me, SO freaking glad to be up and active!  Even if I am beet red and sweating.

We had another family helping us, but around 10 they went to get some water and never returned.
Jake rejoined us and hung out a while cooling off and then pitched in and helped the final hour or so.  I think we did a good job!

I have always liked the tea house.  The gardens and house were built by Japanese citizens who were living over here, they kept the area clean and the house and gardens maintained and used them for ceremonies and to host guests for tea when they came to visit here.  They have since moved on and the garden has been neglected.  I am feeling compelled to take that on as an ongoing project, it's the first one that has struck a chord.  I enjoy all the work we do, any time we help.  But something about this spot meaning so much to someone and now they are gone-it means nothing to anyone.  It's just this spot off the disc golf course.  Maybe I just have underdog complex.

Anyway, we enjoyed our morning and plan to head back at least once a week while we are up here.  I lost my cell phone, we looked all over the garden and the trail and called it over and over. ("here, phone!")  It's a $15 burner phone, because I don't use one very often, I don't want to put money into one that does anything more than ring and dial out.  So Matt went out and bought another one to move the account over-they will do that, thank goodness.  We decided to take care of it the next day because it was late when he came in and as I was packing us up Saturday morning for the race, I found my phone.  In the freezer. It was DEAD, but charged right up and works just fine.

I had it in the pocket of this little cooler bag we were using to carry our water.  I guess I had dumped the ice packs back in the freezer after we got in and the phone fell out under them. Oh well, one thing less to worry with.  I still can't find my debit card, so I have a new one on the way.  My wedding ring is...currently somewhere else.  That's another thing I decided to not spend much on, it's a $12 ring.  I don't like having to pay a lot of attention to possessions, I never have been all that great about keeping up with things.  Better an annoyance than a financial disaster because crap happens, even if you are careful and worried all the time, which is a big energy drain. And now we can activate the new phone for the kids to use.  So, yay.

Around 4 on Friday, we headed to the pool for a couple hours.  Jake went with us.

I took this awesome selfie, which makes me laugh every time I see it. hahahaha!  

Sunny Sunday

My goodness, it is HOT.  I probably blocked it from my brain, but I don't think it's been THIS hot for THIS long all summer.  I am so glad we are in a house with AC for the duration!  We were just home yesterday to refresh pet food and water and check on the house.

Minor catch-up and then I will catch up events.  I have actually DONE SOMETHING this past week!

Park, who is ever awesome, and I have been chatting about scary movies for months.  We came up with this idea together to use some of the places around the park to film a short version of a 'found footage' movie and to also leave 'clues' about the monster, something very similar to Bigfoot to make it easier on us (hahaha!).  I am going to scout locations with him, have a meeting with the teen group to come up with a production plan, then head up and film!  I am hoping the teens will take over and plan, write, set up scenes and do make-up and such.  If nothing else, it should be fun, even if it is a fiasco.  hahaha!  We will all learn something.

The kids started back ballroom dancing last week, so many teens were there!  I was expecting a dozen kids, but it was closer to 50!  The kids ran into loads of friends, it was like a homeschool reunion!  I did not get any pictures from that because...I was too busy talking.  I know, so unlike me, but there you have it.  I managed to pin down Sammy and convince him to repair Poppy!  He thinks he can, too!  I am THRILLED!  Oh wait, I did take a picture...

I know it's a collage, but damn, that is FUNNY.  Golf in the prison stockade, a building...not the one we were in, a steep downhill bike track, some super duper muddy baseball, swimming while keeping your hair dry (a Southern Woman Thing) and...non-targeted archery.  Unless women with dry hair standing in water is the target!

What else?  I dropped the girls off at Phoenix (formerly known as Britney)'s new apartment for her 16th birthday!

The girls stayed 2 nights and I am sure slept 4 hours total.  Successful party!

Nia loves being a Mountain Hound.  She also loves that she can see deer from where she is in this photo. Look at that face.  She was on guard duty, it was serious business!

1.17 Miles

I walked around the track!!!  I am HEALING!  I am so happy!  Other than finding out about that website where you can check to see if there is puking in a movie you want to watch and discovering an AWESOME field trip spot that does blacksmithing and soap making and candle making AND has baby pigs you can hold (also ponies to ride) this is the best thing to happen all month!

We are continuing the healing by moving to the Mountain of Health for the remainder of this month and the first bit of next month.  While there, I will walk and swim just about every day and my view while resting will be of the valley below and not Matt's desk across the room and the one tree out Chan's window.  I still can't be 'up' more than 3 hours total, but was given the clear to do 'straight line' exercise that involves literally going in one direction and not shifting, such as basketball or soccer (darn). Even vacuuming requires alternating foot position and twisting while on one foot. Did not think about that...I have been vacuuming for a couple weeks!  Biking is okay, which surprised me. Pressing down still hurts a LOT, I have only driven a short distance, but braking is very painful, so Jake does my carting around.  So no biking for me just yet, I doubt it counts the same if Jake does my peddling there,  hehehe

I have decided that swimming time is nearly resting, since there's not full weight on my foot, so it will not count against my 3 hours.  Otherwise,  I will just be swimming and sitting!

We will be back and forth the whole time, I have a couple repair projects I want to get done while we are not here to live in the mess!  The kids have classes that start later this week, too, so we will be in and out fairly often.

In keeping with my new, narrow format of only talking about my foot, the trip and what I have watched: I have not watched anything in days!  Well, not totally true, we are watching Legend of Korra and there's just no need to go into that-Avatar: The Last Airbender and Legend of Korra are probably the two best 'cartoons' ever made. We are in season 3 still catching up.  I still don't LOVE the characters like I did Aang and his crew, but it's still a good story.

Disney front: I have picked out the tent we will buy for the trip to replace our 12 year old family tent that has zipper issues and gorilla taped poles.  Also, I have discovered Tom Bricker's photography and have fallen into a delirious funk both wanting to take exactly some of the very same shots and knowing my 9 year old camera and kit lens will never compete.  I know I say all the time that it's not the camera, it's the photographer, but for some of these, it's the camera along with the eye and phenomenal timing and some photoshop skillz that I seriously don't have.  I can remove a zit or change the contrast level, but that's about it.  But go check him out, the link will open a new window.  He even has Blizzard Beach and Typhoon Lagoon shots.  At the very least, I am inspired to shoot more than the kids and the major landmarks this time around!

That's it for now, I took several photos yesterday but have not resized them yet.  I took one of Ben down a long tube so he's just this little head off in the distance.  He suggested I take photos of everyone I know that way so I can cobble together group photos after the fact.  hahaha. I guess I need to start seeing people I know.

The Week That Started with a Cricket

This was from back in early June and I forgot to publish it.  Must have been waiting to add photos, but it seems we didn't do anything!

Though we have barely left the house, this week has been eventful.

Monday, I woke up to an attack by a camel cricket, it went for my hair first, then a full frontal assault involving my face.  It hid in my blankets afterward before Matt came running naked from the bathroom and saved me. Any time I think, "eh..." about being married, I just have to remember camel crickets and I realize it would take a great deal of idiocy on his part to make me actually want to be on my own.  It's like that scale your soul's heart gets weighed on in Egyptian mythology.  Your soul vs a feather.  That's got to be a HEAVY feather.  It would take a HEAVY amount of dumbassery to outweigh camel cricket removal services.  Osiris runs things, if you want to look that up.

Jake and I tried to set up my new rope swing.  I want it higher than the previous swing on a bigger branch so I can have a longer swing arch.  The cats got involved and after we launched Muta, who kept grabbing the rope as it slid past during our tossing efforts, we gave up for the time being.  Matt came home and totally botched the whole thing.  I now have 50 feet of rope 30 feet in the tree and no way to untangle it.  We go out and look at it now and again.  *sigh*

I FINALLY finished Natchez Burning.  For someone who goes through 3-4 books a week, it took me 3 full weeks to read that one book.  I don't know that I will read the rest.

Britney was over and we ate raw cookie dough and I spent a while trying to convince Ben that if he ran in and laid on the heating pad, the dough would bake in his stomach.  He was more fun when he was younger, that teenage skepticism is seriously ruining my bad parenting.

Jake has discovered some internet monster called The Rake and it has terrified him.  More than Jeepers Creepers and that scared him enough that for YEARS we had to run in a zigzag pattern if we were outside after dark (to avoid capture...I guess it worked!).  More than a scarecrow and they scare both of us about the same amount.  Scarecrows are SCARY.  The kind that come alive and pitchfork you are.  The stuffed kind at Hobby Lobby are not.  We are imaginative, not mental.

The kids had a few friends over to game and go swimming and while they did play nearly the whole time, there was much more yammering than playing.  Once again, we were stood up by a particular family headed by a mother with no ability to let me know she's not going to show.  It's not a lack of response-she will accept the invitation and even say she's on the way at X time.  Then never shows, disappointing all the kids. That to me says, "I don't want to do anything with you and/or lack the ability to say no."  Or she just lacks common courtesy.  Either way, from here on out, she's also lacking in invitations from me.  I am sure she will be relieved!  Again, just SAY what you need to say.  And don't yank people around, especially kids.

Swimming got cancelled so Alex could be in a mountain bike race Thursday afternoon.  With all the rain we have had every single day for a week, I imagined getting swept off to the ocean anyway.

Morning!

LOOK  It's NEARLY the same shade as the house.  Took me 2 years and there's still that purple stripe.
Also, be sad because those are our water shoes in the background and it's been so long since we were at the creek that vines have grown through them!

and the regular old white.  This vine seems resistant to any invasion of color, I can get blushes in ALL the other flowers.  This one-just that pale pink in the ribs, not even all the way through, though at least it's in a constant pattern.

I eat these like candy, I bet I have had 150 little tomatoes in the past 3 months.

My new "chocolate" hair.  I wiped out the summer-induced red and blonde and Jake induced grey in one 45 minute swoop.  I pointed out to Jake that I had no grey before I had him.  Hence, he started it.  He pointed out I was only 20, barely a year older than he is now, and THAT was why I had no grey before he was born.  I about panicked, I swear, having a baby that young!  I still think puberty should be something that happens closer to 30.

I got distracted by MATT (I am all about pointing fingers today) and left it in too long.  It's practically black, hence the hat until it fades a bit into something that doesn't look like a baby doll's wig.
I very nearly went blonde, but that requires a lot of maintaining and I have eyebrows and stuff, not to mention 3 children with very dark hair.  Maybe one day I will do it.

The coveted deep purple with hot pink ribs.

Love this white with the purple star. Morning glories are SO freaking pretty, I don't know why they get treated as weeds!  And that's IT, they don't rebloom the next day, you get a single show and on to a totally new bloom.

I so love this dog.  

About...4 years ago, I got, um...lost in our woods.  There was at least a foot of snow on the ground and I was TOTALLY screwed up on direction-no sun, it was getting dark.  Kuma realized I was an idiot at some point because he started running ahead to break the snow and pack it down, then would come back and press the backs of my legs or else press my side like below and I would hang on to his scruff. He got me home in nearly a straight line, I thought Matt was going to strangle me, he was so worried.  But Kuma never left me unless it was to make the walking easier and ever since, even in the driveway, he stays very near and guides me around if he thinks I am in the slightest danger.  Since I hurt my foot, he's been practically carrying me, I could not even hobble to the van and back unless he was 'helping'.
I know he's a sheep dog and I am basically a sheep with thumbs to him, but I still like feeling protected and safe.  If I could clone any animal in the world, it would be Kuma McCoy.

Muta, Kat, Kuma, Jessie and Nia.  Cleo and Wonder are in the mimosa bushes.
 The whole gang was present for my inaugural walk!

Picked up 2 of these adorable solar lanterns for $5! Love those end of summer sales on outdoor goodies you don't REALLY need.  They shine in various colors via a TEENY led bulb, so illumination is not really the key point to having them-watching the colors morph is.  I was a little bummed about that, I wanted them to make enough light to get in the front door without the porch light attracting all those bugs!

Laughternoon

My very first outing sans Matt!

We headed to Amanda's to meet up with Katy and hang out at the lake and have dinner.

The kids had a blast and actually rafted and swam around the point to another dock and back.  The littles stayed with the mamas for that part of the adventure!

They swam and played for several hours, I know I have said it before, but I love they way all the different ages of kids get along, from the 2 year old to the nearly 19 year old, they play and love on each other.  I looked over at Ben last night and Bird was in his lap and they were hugging and laughing-the side of Ben's face damp from baby kisses. Then Jake came running in with Inde under one arm and Eyrin under the other, all three of them squealing and laughing with Rho and Emma chasing behind.  Chan plays for hours as whatever character the girls assign her to, then just like that the younger kids run off to play vet and the teens hole up in the treehouse and the  boys are off to play Magic it's just the moms again.  The flux and flow of an afternoon.

After our swim, we headed back to the house and made kima and kale salad and had a lovely dinner, finally heading home around 9.

My foot hurt so much by the time I got in that I did not even risk standing in the shower, just got myself in bed.  I will be SO glad to get back to normal, in the meantime, ever grateful for friends willing to hang out with us and long afternoons and lots of laughing.