Iv'e decided that Mike is my most favorite child just so that you are all aware ... love mi i mean Mom

Loa goings on.

Friday, Thomas celebrated Veterinarians day!

Saturday we made distilled water for the hermit crabs.

Life is interesting.

Thomas just went home from his tutoring session. I've been going over his math papers and English papers with him to make sure he understands how to do everything. (Then if we have time we make cookies or something.)

He is really feeling good about things now. I said, "So, if you don't know what the teacher wants you to do, What do you do?" He says, "Take it home to Grandma! And if she doesn't know how she'll call Aunt Amy." He already knows you are a Math whiz, Amy.

He really has just come alive! Rides his bike over, 4 x's a recipe, and takes some home to the family. He is also getting 100 %s on spelling tests and math assignments.

Emma lost her teddy bear blankie--horrors! We have no idea where it went. So today she was over here and I have some teddy bear flannel so I whipped her up a "new teddy cush." She loves it--kept saying "thank you" the whole time I was making it. Then she said "It has a moose on it too." Well I said "Where?" cause I sure didn't see any. She pointed to the rocking horses and said "Moose."-- I said "My rocking moose up north?" "Yup", she says.

Then I said, "Do you like your new blanket? Aren't Grandma's silly? We don't go to the store and buy things--we make them!" "It's awesome!" she said, "My Daddy will like it."

So now she has a new blanket to go with her new house, her new bed (They got new bunkbeds for Emma and Silas), and her new Debbie. Her new security blanket is now associated with her new life.

I got pictures on my cell phone, but, siigh.

Progress

I believe we are making progress! Each kid has his own bike and can ride without training wheels except Emma whose bike is a glorified tricycle. She rides it well, though and all the others have scraped knees and band aids to prove their progress. They can be trusted to ride around the block and weather permitting to ride to school--2and 1/2 blocks. Wish I had pictures--sigh.

And Thomas has a 100% in spelling and a couple 97% in math assignments and is doing his reading Log on Goose bumps books.

Miriam is doing very well with piano lessons and Silas has the Alphabet and the sounds they make pretty well with few mistakes and can sound out Bob Book words a little now. He can count to 100 if he has the numbers to look at and is quite proud of himself. He still has reversals in penmanship, but Hey, He couldn't even write his name 6 weeks ago.

And this morning Cathy said they were all singing the songs in Primary and acting like normal kids. Hmmm. I wonder what that means exactly.

It's all kind of exciting really.

Grandkid antics in Loa

Interesting things are happening in Loa. I took the kids to the grocery store and Jasper comes running up to me and says "They're selling Free puppies. Can we have one?"

And it's been fair week and we've had Thank you lunches Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Sloppy joes, hotdogs and bar B qued beef. We rode the train around the block at two of them.

The parade came right by Mikes house so we set up chairs in the shade and the kids all collected more candy than at Halloween. (See Amy's blog for pictures) Then we went to the activities at the Park and Silas got lost--fortunately the car was parked at my house so he just returned to it. Meanwhile Mike had me watch the other kids while he and Debbie went to find Silas so we waited in the rock climbing line and the kids with me went rock climbing. ( See Amy's blog).

We thought the kids were settling down this morning until Silas began selling his collection of vulture feathers that he has collected in the field to Mike's clients. The kid made 5 bucks in 5 minutes. Oh well, you kids used to sell rocks to the neighbors.

We are having fun and school starts Thursday. We've been reviewing a few things. Silas is picking up on his abc's and the sounds they make. He will be in Kindergarten.

P.S. This is Amy adding pictures for her.

odds and ends

OK so now we are getting female blossoms with squashes and cucumbers behind the blossoms. I knew that the male blossoms usually come first but it made a fun blog. I was surprised that a few people didn't know the difference between male and female blossoms. Did you know that if your bees aren't too active that you can insure the squash and cucumbers will develop by pollinating them yourself?

The last couple of days I've been going to Jason and Zak's championship games in baseball. Those boys are GOOD! In Jason's game he was on first and a runner was on third. So Jason acts like he is going to steal second several times, then gets himself "caught" between first and second and the other teams complete attention on him and the runner on third steals home. by the time the other team notices and reacts to the runner stealing home he's in and Jason advances to second. He has connived to get a runner in and had fun doing it.

He is also a great short stop. He dances around and keeps kids from stealing 3rd by trying to tag them out when they try to get back to second. The other team members are good but I'm having fun watching Jason.

Then Zak's game was just as entertaining. He caught a ball in right field with his mitt on the ground when the ball fell in it. And he can also hit that ball when he is batting. It is fun to see how much both boys know about playing baseball. I'm sure Grandpa is sitting on a cloud cheering them on.

So if you can't find me home call David or Erin's Cell phones and see if there is an old Grandma with a floppy hat and a bottle of ice water watching baseball games with them.

Sorry. no pictures. I get too excited to take any even if I do remember to take my cell phone.