Pictures Again

 This is my life with three boys...

 We did our lessons on the front porch one lovely morning

and Charlie kept busy parking the tractors.

 Saying 'cheese' with a fudgecicle

 Fudgecicles always remind me of swimming lessons at the Y when I was a kid.

For a quarter we could get one out of the vending machine.

So yum.

 Charlie also enjoys playdough while I formally educate his brothers.

Hammer, hammer.

 Reuben loves to pick from the garden.

Can you guess what he is harvesting?

 Our crop of rainbow carrots.

Orange, purple, yellow, and white.

 Our first trip to Turkey Run since I don't know when.

 Checking out the water under the suspension bridge.

 A sassafras snack

 I am the funnest mom ever!

 Funnest!

And he has a sweet face.

 This week's history lesson was about Mary, Queen of Scots whose husband tried to kill her so he could be king and when she fled to England hoping her cousin, Mary Queen of England, would help her, Mary had her beheaded.  Huh.

So in response, Peter painted plaid fabric...

 ...to make his own Scottish kilt.

So sorry about your pyscho family, Mary, but we enjoyed the project.

In order to balance out the times when my boys wear skirts,
I allow feats of wrestling to keep them tough and manly.

 I missed it when Charlie jumped in...

...but here's the swollen eye as a result.

I offered a little sympathy,

but not enough to weaken him.

He'll be wiser, quicker, smarter for the next wrestling match.

What have I become?

A mother of boys.

Pictures

Back in August we went to the State Fair with our Turkish friends.

We live in farm country so there's lots of farming stuff at our state's fair.

Mrs. O and our boys

She was thrilled when Charlie relaxed enough to let her hold him.

Now for random pics...

Reading The Story of the World, our history book.

A great book for general knowledge-of-the-world reading.

I've learned so much and many parts of my world make so much more sense.

Charlie is a train track-building champion.

Another day

Science with Dad

Something about molecules and whatnot.

I have a great disdain for science and don't even want to know what they're learning about.

This is why Dad as the new science prof is wonderful.

Let's see what else I can find...

 corn starch and water - more science

Science equals mess,

which is great fun for the mess-makers.

But I'm just in a stage of life where mess equals mess, ya know?

And mess means more work for me, the designated mess-cleaner-upper.

But!  As you can see I allow the mess because I value the learning experience.

 This is going to document a history lesson mess.

It started out as burying yellow M&Ms in a bucket of flour to simulate digging for gold.

Here's Rube showing his found gold.

 If there's a mess then that must mean they're learning.

This is what I tell myself.

 Then Reuben asked if he could add water to the flour to see what would happen.

Yes you can.

And then I left the room so as not to have to witness the foreshadowing mess.

If I can't see it then it doesn't exist.

I like this philosophy.

 Upon re-entry to the kitchen I found that Rube had gotten out the rolling pin, cookie cutters, and cookie sheet.

Flour and water cookies.

Peter baked them.

And they ate them.

Paul too.

Good to know they can live on flour  and water if needed.

And then I swept and wiped

and wiped and swept in a silly attempt to rid my kitchen of flour dust.

Reliving these messes has cause my stress level to rise even now.

Which is a shame because I'm sitting in an extremely rare empty house

which should be full of peace.

But for you, I relive the stress.

I hope you liked it.

More pics in a couple days.

Reuben's Birthday

Six!  He's six now, which makes me want to quote from A.A. Milne's When We Were Six.  But instead I will show you how we celebrated our Reuben's day.

The night of September 10th, while he was sleeping,

we hung up streamers and banners and balloons.

This tradition is no longer a surprise to the boys,

but something special they look forward waking up to.

 Peter got to work making a "Reuben style" family portrait as a gift to him.

The kind of drawings where the head is also the body so the arms and legs stick out from the head and it's very cute.

 Good morning!

Let's make cake!

 He ordered a tall rainbow cake.

So here he is mixing small bowls of cake batter with various colors.

We poured it into the pan to bake

then we cut it into squares to stack up.

Look at this cake!

Like no other.

He loved it.

And we did too.

Greetings from Charlie

 Peter made him his birthday crown.

Recognize the shirt, Craig?

Korean snacks we bought last summer while in Korea to meet Charlie.

Past the expiration date, but we still ate them.

The resident Koreans enjoyed the fishy tasting fish crackers the most.

More presents - a bow and arrow set

 It was fun for all.

 Airplane card from Granny and Granpa,

along with dollars for Rube to shop with.

He loves having dollars and spending them as quickly as he can.

 Birthday card turned airplane.

 A grand finale treasure hunt to find a new BIG bike, in the basement.

I sent the camera down with Paul

as I avoid the dead-bird dungeon as much as possible.

 He really wanted a "big bike like Peter's"

and I'm a sucker for making birthdays special.

 A happy birthday Momma

 Now on to Target so he could spend his fresh birthday money.

So many Nerf weapons to choose from.

And then there's the Hot Wheels aisle.

Many moons later we left with Legos, guns, and a race track.

 Charlie's sitting right here next to me, pointing to the screen saying "Granpa, Granpa."

Not Granpa, but Rube is handing over Granpa's money to someone else's Granpa.

This was all in one glorious day.

cake making

present opening

treasure hunting

bike riding

money spending

play, play, playing

love, love, loving

Carolına and Me

The drive to South Carolina was so pretty.  I really liked driving through the Appalacia Mountains.  We drove there Thursday, met with folks all day and night on Friday, met with more folks on Saturday and drove home.  I brought my camera and here are the only pictures I took...

I only took them because Paul was so excited about it.  The guy driving the car was munching on a snack and looked quite bored.  We smiled and waved at his cameras.  So look for us on Google maps.

We didn't get to experience much of the S. Carolına culture ın our short tıme there (and my keyboard just swıtched over to typıng ın Turkısh so the dots on the letter ı have dısappeared).  But here ıs what I know - ıt was humıd and we were warned about scurryıng cockroaches and we had breakfast at a place called The Lızard Thatch or somethıng lıke that.  And I learned that USC ıs not a cool college ın So Cal but the Unıversıty of South Carolına and they play good football.  Oh!  And all theır tea ıs sweet tea - the kınd that ıs thıck lıke syrup and makes you say Whoo!  And they stıll talk about how they lost The War.  Whıch made me thankful that I grew up ın Calıfornıa and do not have to claım allegıance to the North or South - the Cıvıl War was somethıng that happened Over There.  But serıously I cannot understand the Southern mındframe of racısm and whıte supremacy and realızed I have always just consıdered myself on the Northern Team.  Thıs opınıon I just kept to myself whılst there.

But the purpose of our trıp...  We met wıth an organızatıon that helps pastors start churches around the world ın places where there are no churches.  We have already joıned an org that does thıs but ıt ıs now mergıng wıth thıs S. Carolına org so we are checkıng out thıs new org to see ıf we want to merge too.  The conclusıon- we are not so sure.  Whıch ıs frustratıng.  So we are prayıng.

Now lets talk about my haır.  I lıke ıt.  I can style ıt on Monday, freshen ıt wıth the flat ıron on Tuesday and agaın on Wednesday.  Who loves a cute low maıntenance haırstyle?  I do.  Here ıs the pıcture you have been waıtıng for.  It was taken whıle I was at the Malıbu Soap Awards thıs afternoon.  I really lıke how my wardrobe attendant matched my dress to my eyeshadow.  She ıs so good.

Cute rıght?

To bed now so that tomorrow we can traverse Turkey Run - do scıence experıments wıth Paul (who has taken over scıence for me thıs year!!!) - shop for grocerıes all by myself - and accomplısh some ıtems on my to-do lıst lıke add Charlıe to our wıll to make sure he gets hıs part of our mıllıons and maybe get passport pıcs for Reuben and Charlıe.  Whoo!

For Charlene and Peter

Hello Charlene.

And, hi Peter.

This is for them.  Because they want to know.

So we're back in the regular life of the Paul and Stacey family.  Such things are happening like...

• I had most of my hair removed yesterday.  It was one of those cleansing haircuts that took off half of a ruler or so.  No picture.  Yet.  It was my stylist's attempt to redeem my look after I cut my own bangs like a sneaky five-year-old with a pair of blunt scissors.  About a month ago I tried to do the thick bangs look.  But mostly I just ended up pinning them back.  Because the first day I styled them down and I came out of the bathroom, Paul said in aghast confusion, "Who are you?"  That really helped my self confidence.  So I just had all the rest cut off too.  So in about six months or so all should be fine and grown out.

• We are in our third week of homeschooling with three boys in the house.  Charlie is doing well as the third child.  I work with Reuben at the coffee table, Peter works independently at the counter in the laundry room, and Charlie plays with the wooden train tracks, lines up the plastic bugs, dumps out all the pattern blocks, and eats Cheerios.  When I'm done with Reuben he gets to play and I go work with The Pete.  We'll call it The Perfect System.  

• Except that this totally fails when I try to teach Peter and Reuben something at the same time.  Like Bible time.  Holy Canoli.  Charlie recognizes this as Party Time Pow-Wow on the Couch and does his best to fully antagonize Reuben, the weaker-willed of his two choices.  So today, to fully disclose my weaknesses, I found myself reading the very Word of God to my children, then yelling at them (Reuben) in frustration that they (Reuben) could not answer my questions because they (Reuben) were not paying attention because Charlie the Younger was in his face hitting him with a vanilla-filled balloon left over from the last science lesson.  You know what I did?  I canceled school.  Right then.  Because I could see that something was not right with this situation.  Later in the day I figured out what was wrong, apologized to poor Reuben, discussed solutions with Peter, and will give it a retry.  Perhaps tomorrow.  But I also realized that I am really tired today.  Which leads me to my next point.

• I am really tired today. That anemic sort of tired that I'm not supposed to be anymore.  Boo.

•  I was going to say "enough about me," but I have more!  I am taking Perspectives.  Which probably means nothing to you.  What it means to me is that every night I am spread out on my bed with four books (two of them equal in size to a So Cal phone book), a pencil, and a highlighter as I read and read and read.  And read.  Then I have to answer questions and email them to my Grader.  Gosh, it is hard for me.  And I'm going to have to go ahead and blame it on my anemic brain.  I'm supposed to be all better.  My doctor said six months.  It's been six months.  But I still cannot read deep topics.  My brain can't focus.  I read and reread the questions and have no idea what they are asking.

• And you know what?  Two weeks ago I emailed my university to see about finishing my graduate degree.  I was three classes away from an MA in Education and was kind of feeling like finishing it.  They must have received an email from my doctor saying not to let me take any coursework because of my shaky mental status.  The university said it's been over ten years since I took my other classes and now none of those classes count.  I'd have to start all over.  Nice cover.  They knew I'd fail and they didn't want that smearing their reputation.

• I now know I would have failed because my Grader for this Perspectives course returned my first two lessons with a C and a D and the words, "Good effort."  What?!  Doesn't she know I graduated top (TOP!) of my class with ropes around my neck and awards in my pocket?  I don't get C's and D's, lady.  Except, apparently, now I do.  Why even try, you know?  My brain has become mush.  I imagine it a lumpy oatmeal with bits of browning banana and swirls of brown sugar.  But, as is my tradition, I will do my best.  I will!  And I will try to be only a little humiliated when I see my Grader in class, and only cry a little that my best is no longer an A. 

• So, enough about me.  Peter wants to go to an overnight lock-in at the church we go to on Saturday nights.  My first reaction is, "Will he be molested?"  Would you think that too?  It's a church, so it should be safe.  But, I know better than that.  But, do I keep him from all such activities until he moves out and I can no longer protect him?  Seems unlikely and unnecessary.  That is my dilemma.

• Next dilemma.  Peter is going to try out for the county swim club next week.  He's looking forward to learning the breaststroke and butterfly, and how to dive off the starting blocks, and how to do a flip turn, and how to win 22 gold medals.  And do you know what my brain thinks?  "Will he be molested in the locker room?"  And then, "What is my problem?"  Why do I keep worrying about protecting my sons?  I know.  It's because it happens.  And it makes me feel so helpless.  Any thoughts there?

• Paul and I are roadtripping to South Carolina later this week.  Ever been there?  Me neither.  Sadly, we are making a super fast trip and we won't get to enjoy the Smoky Mountains that we'll be driving through.  In the dark.  And in the rain.  We're driving eleven hours, staying there one day, and driving back eleven hours.  Why would we do that?  Because we have a meeting.  It's an important meeting that will shape our future work with our future group in our future place.  You know what I'm saying?

• My sister and her uber cute family are visiting my parents this week.  And it made me wish that Paul worked for an airline so that I could fly to California any time I wanted.  Paul?  Honey?  Let me show you a picture of this baby that I'm not spending time with tonight because Someone is in the wrong profession.

Wouldn't you work for an airline so your wife could hold this baby whenever she needed to?  You would.  I know.  Thank you.