Today I learned something new.  Today I learned how to put together a movie and post it on YouTube.  You can look at my first project here.

Frizz

Today we had a delicious feast over at the Bobwhite house.  It was a Lyons Family Thanksgiving, hosted by Roy & Mary.

You can see photos from our day in my gallery.

The children behaved quite well today, and we are ending the day pleasantly at home.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Last Sunday was a special day for our family. It was the day Lilly was baptized. Since I grew up in the Baptist church, I never even considered the idea of infant baptism until after I married Michael, a dyed-in-the-wool Presbyterian guy. Now that I’m getting used to the idea of baptizing babies, I find that I look forward to the ceremony and the symbolism.

After church, my parents invited us to join them for lunch at a Mexican place. To top it off, they paid for our lunch!

Lilly is the first baby since Laura to wear the beautiful dress that her Grammy made for Laura’s baptism. The dress seemed even more beautiful this time than it did twelve years ago. What a treasure our little Lillian Janice is!

Someday, when we’re rich, I won’t cut hair any more. Until then, every few months I pull out the clippers and torture my boys by cutting their hair. Actually, it’s as much torture for me as it is for them, but they don’t believe that any more than the old line: “This hurts me more than it hurts you.” I’m really not good at cutting hair, and I’m always tired and relieved when the job is done. Then I spend the next day or two peering at the boys’ hair, examining stray bits and muttering and snipping and reminding myself how much money I saved by cutting their hair myself. Someday, that money will be spent very gladly by me, and will be considered money well spent.

This past weekend has been full of both “hits” and “misses”. All in all, I think it ended with a positive net value. But it sure had a few bumps in the road.

Thursday:

Hit–Piano and guitar lessons went great.

Miss–Getting out the door to the guitar lesson was rough with last-minute schedule changes, terrible traffic, and getting there late.

Hit–After the lesson, I was able to get to Meijer and turn in a photo order that was long overdue. Sure felt good to get that done.

Friday:

Hit– Had a quieter morning, and enjoyed a nice nap.

Hit– Looked forward to going scrapbooking with Laura and another friend. Even made yummy cookies to take along and to leave behind for the rest of the fam.

Miss– When it was time to leave, I couldn’t find the keys to the office building where we meet to scrapbook. Was so frustrated and at the point of tears before Isaac finally thought to look in his vest pockets.

Hit– Laura treated the two of us to supper at Avanti’s, using a gift certificate she had won at the Westminster Pumpkin Contest. The food was so delicious.

Hit– Someone offered to bring supper to the family, so I didn’t have to think about cooking Friday afternoon before leaving for the crop.  What a wonderful surprise.

Hit– Got a lot done on my scrapbooking project and had a good time socializing.

Saturday:

Miss– Lilly woke up way too early, and didn’t understand that I wanted to sleep in as late as possible since I’d been up until 1 a.m. the night before. I was grumpy and groggy and wishing the world would leave me alone.

Hit– I enjoyed hurrying off to the church to practice music for Sunday. It’s always fun to sing!

Hit– I got to go to Rockford with my aunt, to a baby shower we originally didn’t think we could get to. At the last minute, Aunt Pat was able to slip away and leave Grandma in the capable hands of the caregiver. Aunt Pat and I had a nice time and good conversation on the trip.

Miss– The trip to Rockford was long. It’s 2.5 hours one way, so it made for a very long day. We arrived home about 6 pm, and I was ready to collapse.

Miss– On the drive home from Aunt Pat’s house, I got a call asking if Laura was still planning to attend the Junior High activity that started at 6 pm. I pulled off the road, made some quick phone calls, and then hurried on my way again, wondering how I could be so forgetful???

Hit– Michael took Laura to her outing, and a good time was had by all.

Hit– I was able to get to bed earlier than usual and I had a nice long night’s sleep.

Sunday:

Hit– Michael rescued me from a fussing Lilly, and I was able to get my shower while he kept her happy in the kitchen.

Miss– Lilly was too sniffly to go to the church nursery, so we had to entertain a fussy baby during church.

Hit– Laura and I had a wonderful time singing at church up in front of everyone. I wondered if this is a sign of things to come, and hope that we’ll get to sing together a lot more.

Miss– Halfway through the Sunday School hour, my niece, Hannah, came and found me and asked if perhaps I was supposed to be teaching the class where she is the assistant. It all came rushing back to me that indeed, I was supposed to be teaching, and I had forgotten completely about it. I didn’t even have the materials with me or anything. I hurried to the class and entertained the kids as best I could, while holding a fussy baby. The kids were fine with it all, but I felt terribly embarrassed by my lapse.

Hit– I used some of our new meat to make both lunch and supper. I filled the house with smoke while grilling hamburgers on the stove top for lunch (What better way to test the smoke alarm???), and the roast in the crock pot made delicious Italian Beef sandwiches for supper. What a treat to have delicious meat to use!

Monday:

Hit– Due to unexpectedly having the day off school, we are having a quiet, slow day today. It’s actually very nice to have almost nothing on the schedule for today. I’ve been able to drag all of Lilly’s clothes out of her drawers and sort through them. Even after making several piles to store away and give away, there are still way too many clothes on the couch to put away. So, I need to re-sort and get rid of more. It’s hard to pare down the piles!

Miss– Due to unexpectedly having the day off school, I’m afraid we will fall behind on my ambitious school schedule. So far I seem to be the only one worried about it. The children are delighted at the break.

Last night we got a call from the meat locker that our 1/4-beef was processed and ready for pick-up. I’ve been so eager to get this beef, since I’ve been disappointed with the beef in the grocery store. Since our menu for tonight was chili, I decided to hurry and get that meat this morning in time to use some to make supper.

As usual, our morning slipped by, and it was noon before we were on the road heading to the small town south of here for the beef. We had to be back in town absolutely no later than 2 pm for Laura’s choir rehearsal, so the rush was on. Through the rain and stiff winds we sped along the highway. Half an hour later, we were in the small town of Atlanta, Illinois, and following the specific directions to find the locker. We pulled up in front of it at 12:40 pm, and I hurried inside to see if the children were allowed to come in to see the work area. The lady shrugged that it was fine, so I helped everyone unload from the van.

We all crowded into the small front office, and Isaac right away cornered the lady and asked if he could have one of the cow hides. She explained to him that there weren’t any he could have, and then she offered to show us the cutting area. She let us walk around the cutting tables, peer into the big bins holding the scraps and fat, and ask all the questions that were popping out of us. We must have been a good audience, because the lady then opened another door and showed us the huge pieces of cow hanging on hooks. We were all astonished at the size of the half-cows waiting to be processed. After we asked more questions, the lady then took us to the back room where on other days the cows are actually brought in alive and then shot, gutted and weighed. Several of the children were horrified at the idea of shooting the poor cows. I reminded them that the next time they have a hamburger, they need to remember what all goes into getting that meat.  Our neighbor girl who had come along with us declared emphatically, “Next time, I’m ordering chicken nuggets!”

After we returned to the main area, we must have inspired even more of a tour, because next thing I knew we were looking around the walk-in freezer where all the packages of meat are kept while waiting for pickup. That place was cold! Then, for good measure, we got to see the storage room, too. Even that room was interesting and provoked more questions from many of us.

Once we had seen all there was to see, we were standing in the front area again, and as if beckoned by a silent bell, the workers all returned to their stations and started cutting meat, stamping labels, wrapping meat, running the meat grinder and making hamburger patties. So now we got to watch the whole thing in operation.

Soon it was time to herd everyone back out to the van and go pick up our meat to take home. Even though we had spent longer at the meat locker than I had anticipated, we still made it to Laura’s choir rehearsal with 15 minutes to spare.

As we were driving back to Bloomington, I mused over the whole unplanned field trip, the low-key tour-guide lady, and the timing of it all. I realized, in hindsight, that we had arrived during lunch hour, which is why none of the workers were in the cutting area. That allowed us to walk all around and see everything up close. Once the workers started back up, we couldn’t walk through that area freely as we had before. I realized that even though I was running behind in my own schedule, God’s hand had guided us to arrive at the perfect time for our tour. I couldn’t have planned it a better way.

Oh, and by the way, the chili we ate for supper tonight was amazingly delicious.

Yesterday a neighbor gave me something to pass along to Isaac. She knows what an odd fellow he is, so she thought immediately of him when she found some rubber dog poop. Isaac wasn’t around when the neighbor stopped by, so the rest of us decided we had to do something more creative than simply handing the yucky thing to Isaac. We pondered several methods of delivery, and finally settled on one that suited us best.

So this morning I prepared a large mug of hot cocoa for Isaac and then called him downstairs for breakfast. Isaac was happy to sip his hot cocoa as he woke up, but he wasn’t very observant as he sipped. Finally I asked him about his mug, and he took a good look at it. He couldn’t decide whether to be upset or intrigued, so I think he settled on a little of both. He carefully examined his cool toy and then put it away in a safe place. Even though he knew the rubber poop wasn’t toxic, he wasn’t able to finish drinking his hot cocoa. And he carefully examined the bowl of grits I handed to him a few minutes later.

Tonight Laura and I were visiting, and she commented that sometimes she looks forward to the exciting things in her future, but other times it seems so far away.  I replied to her that it’s good to look forward to the next stage of your life, but it’s important not to overlook where you are.  (Of course it was easy to give her this motivational speech while conveniently ignoring my own terrible track record with this.)

I explained to her that walking through life is like walking with a child holding each hand.  The child on one side is called “Anticipation”, and he is a happy child, smiling and skipping along, chattering a mile a minute about where you’re going and what he’ll do when you get there. He tugs your hand and urges you to hurry up.

The other child is named “Regret”.  He is moping, scuffing his feet, and constantly looking back.  He is complaining about the things he couldn’t bring along, the things he will never get to do again, and the things he wished he had done before it was time to leave.

As you walk the path of life, you have both Anticipation and Regret as your travel companions.  And somehow, your task is to enjoy the walk, without focusing too much on what is behind, and without thinking exclusively about what is to come.

As I said, it was an easy lecture to give to Laura, but one that I have yet to really understand.

This week started with balmy warm temperatures, and we enjoyed feeling the autumn breezes throughout the house. However, yesterday the beautiful weather was gone, and the winter winds started blowing. Wow, it’s cold! I guess it’s time to say goodbye to warm weather for now.

Both yesterday and today, we’ve worked on various parts of our house to get things cleaned up and looking nicer. And both times Miguel finally asked in puzzlement, “Are we having guests?” I told him no, and he asked, “Then why are you picking up?” I tried to explain that sometimes we clean up just because things are a mess and need to be picked up. I don’t think he believed me.

Today Michael uncovered the bins of winter clothes for Amelia, Miguel, Luke and Judah. They were so excited to dig through their bins and rediscover the clothes that they hadn’t seen for a few months. I think each child changed their clothes several times, and by the time they were done they were wearing several layers. I’ve decided we need to hide the children’s clothes more often.

Tonight we were busy in the kitchen and Lilly took advantage of the lack of supervision. By the time she was discovered, she was thoroughly enjoying herself in the bathroom. She had pulled every bit of toilet paper off the roll, and was tearing the pieces smaller and smaller.

After I took her photo, I picked her up and scolded her, explaining that just because I was smiling and holding a camera, she was not to assume that she was allowed to do this again in the future.

I’m just glad that her idea of a good time is to play with toilet paper, and not to go splashing around in the toilet!

(You can click on the photo here to get a larger view of the carnage. Notice the empty cardboard roll next to Lilly’s head.