I picked the first ripe tomato for this summer off our vines.

It was about the size of a golf ball.  Paul wanted it, and he carried it around and gave it rides in his little red car.  Then, when we had moved on to something else, Hannah climbed into the red car and she played with the tomato for a while.  When she was finished with it, I picked it up and laid it up on the porch, and then I brought it inside when we came inside.  It has the skin broken in two places, and one of those is definite teeth marks which I believe are Hannah’s.  This little tomato has brought two little people a lot of joy today.

Last night I went to tuck Paul in, and his bed was completely empty–no blankets, no critters, no pillow, no Paul–only the white fitted sheet did I see.  I looked around in the dim light and…

Paul had piled everything on top of the blanket chest and was sleeping up there!  He was sound asleep.  I moved him to his bed, because I knew at some point he would stir, and then he would fall off his perch and be crying.  So, he didn’t get to wake up on his high roost.

He’s a silly boy!

Tonight, after playing outside after we got home from church, we brought the kids inside to go to bed.  Well, we decided to try a little walking practice with Hannah, and lo and behold!  She actually did a little walking between Andrew and me!  I’m sure she never did more than 4-5 steps at the most at one time, but she did more and better than she has since.  We were really excited and gave her lots of encouragement.  I don’t know how much difference it made, but she had shoes on and she hasn’t worn shoes for about a month or so.

The reason she had shoes on…well…she was playing outside with Paul and one of her parents decided to tie the red car to the green tractor.  Then, Paul pulled the little red car around the yard with Hannah riding in it and having the time of her life.

The only problem was that Hannah was dragging her feet!!  So, the tops of her toes and right behind them don’t look very good…all sore and “brush-burned” with scabs over them now.  Since she walks on her knees most of the time, with her feet dragging along behind her, it scrapes at the scabs.  So, now she is in socks and shoes while that heals.  Poor little girl, deprived of her barefoot status!  She is even somewhat famous at church for her barefootedness.

Anyway, all this is to say that we might soon see Hannah graduate to walking.  It’s a little bitter-sweet.  I want her to walk, but at the same time, this is our baby, or little girl, and she will be passing that big milestone just once.

The good:

Timothy and Cristy got married today!  Yay!  We went to their wedding in Richmond and enjoyed the ceremony and the reception.  Andrew even helped decorate their car.  We had a safe trip both ways, and our kids did well throughout the whole thing.   Paul and Hannah both took naps during the ceremony!

The bad:

Our camera, which we have only had about 3 years is dying.  At times it won’t turn on.  Other times in won’t focus.  So even though we took it along today, I don’t think we have any good pictures.  For the money we paid for it, it should last 20 years!!!  This is a disappointment.

We managed to leave a diaper bag at the church where the wedding was.  The good thing is that it only had the kids’ pajamas and extra diapers and pull-ups in it.  The even better thing is that is is my sister’s home church.  So, I made a phone call to her this evening with a request to try to find it tomorrow.

I’m still learning with this child-raising thing.  Lesson for tonight:  when the kids are tired, put them to bed.  We got home around 6:30 and ate our Burger King drive-thru supper.  Paul & Hannah were tired.  I wanted to pick the peas.  It was 7:45 by the time we got our clothes changed and were ready to go outside.  I figured they would play, I would pick peas, and then I would zip them to bed.  I figured they didn’t get that dirty today, they could skip baths.  (Are you all laughing yet?  Kids, outside, the rain we’ve been having…)  Amidst the usual squabbles over the slide, Paul getting his tractor stuck and me needing to help him get it unstuck (he pulls up too close to things and doesn’t know how to work the reverse on his own yet), Hannah crawled out into the garden and dumped this pan of juicy mud on herself, and appears to have been eating it too.  *sigh*  At 8:30 when I was done picking peas, I peeled off her clothes on the back porch, and put them both into the tub.  There was lots and lots of crying.  They were too tired.  So, I should have put them to bed at 8:00 and then went out to pick the peas.  It would have saved all of us a bunch of headache.

I hate crooked doorways!  The doorways in this house, a lot of them leave a lot to be desired.  The door doesn’t fit, the door doesn’t latch, the door sticks shut something terrible, etc.  One door, which is our main back door, has a ridiculously crooked doorway.  It is a sliding door, and one end is wider than the other.  So, when you slide the screen over, the hole gets bigger and bigger—and then the screen falls out because it doesn’t reach the tracks on the top any more!!  Lovely!  Also, that doorway is crooked, significantly so.  When the top of the sliding glass door hits the edge and is “shut” there is at least a 1/2 inch of open space at the bottom because the bottom hasn’t gotten to the edge yet.  It lets the flies in in the summer, and the cold air in in the winter.  Right now I am minding the flies.  I have a stick, and I wedge it down in the track to make the door go crooked against the edge.  I know it has to create a crack somewhere else, but I haven’t found that one to be as bad as big one that lets in flies.  So….if we ever buy another house, one thing I want to make certain is that it has good doorways, square doorways, and good doors!

The ugly:

My house is a wreck.  There are toys all over the floor.  Even though I run the vacuum daily, or thrice daily, there are still grass clippings and crumbs on the floor!!!!  Why can’t we live in a clean orderly house?!!  I guess it’s because we’re living and not sitting around like the blimps–err, that’s people, on the Wall-E movie.  I guess it’s also because I don’t get myself motivated to get something done about the clutter that is around here.  And quite frankly, I don’t know what to do with a lot of the stuff because I don’t have a place for it!!  Maybe it needs to leave.

Another ugly thing is that we passed this awful wreck on the way home on 64.  Somebody’s towing camper was ruined and crashed the smithereens, and there was a black cow in the median.  We don’t know what happened or how in the world the cow got there, but it was there.  Anyway, I’m really thankful we only crept past and were not involved in the accident.

Well, there you have it for this evening, folks!  Goodnight!

I just read No Ordinary Moments, a blog I enjoy and a lady I admire.  I admire anyone who has four children.  I admire anyone who has any children, for that matter!  They get blue ribbons and my support.  Anyway, she has these confessions for Friend Makin’ Monday.  Here’s my two cents on the deal.

1.  Use the trash can

2. Go to the dump as often as you can, and scrounge around to get more stuff on the load.

3.  If you don’t use it and can’t bear to send it to the dump, get it to Goodwill as a donation.  And, I will stand in front of my closet, or dig through my dresser drawers when I am about to make a trip to Goodwill to see if I can come up with something else I don’t wear/can’t fit/don’t like to go on that load.  Believe me, if you look around, you can add to the pile to leave your house.

When I am on the rampage, stuff goes!  I dislike clutter, even though there is more and more of it at my house.  I also love to vacuum and love having a clean floor.  That is, I love to vacuum ever since my husband got me an Oreck last summer.  Prior to that, it was hard to make myself vacuum.  One thing I like about vacuuming is that is makes me pick junk up off the floor and put it away.  Usually that is toys.  Then, when I am all finished the house looks so much better because there is clear floor space.

O.k., there’s my two cents’ worth.  And my house is pretty messy right now since Bobby was here most of the day.  Toys everywhere and grass on the floor (my husband mowed the yard this evening), but we had a fun day.

This weekend we did a couple fun things.  On Saturday, Andrew suggested we go to Oakdale Park with our kids.  They really had a good time, and we had fun watching them have fun.

Hannah really enjoyed the swing.  She will swing just as high as you push her.

On Sunday afternoon, we went to a birthday party for my nephew Bobby.  Hannah was tired, having had part of a nap on the way there, and she spent the whole time just hangin’ out with her Daddy.  This is a nice, relaxed picture of them.

On Monday, we were outside in the garden for a little while while I picked the peas and pulled some weeds.  When we came in, Hannah had mud caked on the tops of her feet and of course all over her pants from crawling.  I pulled off her pants, and washed her feet in the kitchen sink.

One of the things that I discovered I really enjoy is going barefoot outside.  The nice green grass is like a soft carpet.  And when I walk in the shade of a tree, it is nice and cool.  The garden dirt is like a soft, warm or cool sponge.  It just feels so nice!  I also enjoy not tracking dirt into the house in the tread of my shoes.

…I ever did was put Hannah on a big mattress on the floor.  Throughout the day whenever she wants to relax, or wants to feel better, she just crawls into her bedroom and up on her big bed, and snuggles with her bear for a little bit.  When she is ready, she comes back out.   Initially, she would get fussy, and I would tell her to go snuggle on her big bear.  She would crawl in there and do that.  Now, she doesn’t even fuss.  I’ll just realize I haven’t seen her for a little bit, and I will look, and sure enough!  She’s in with her big bear.  Once, after lunch, before I had but them down for a nap, she actually went in there and was falling asleep, all on her own accord!  Her big bed is a restful spot for her.  And it sure helps me out because it’s a remedy for fussing.

I just uploaded some really cute pictures from my camera, and I wanted to share some of them with you all.

Andrew made a house/tunnel out of the big cardboard box Paul’s tractor came in.  It was down in the basement, so they didn’t get to play in it very often.  Recently, I brought it up to the living room to see if they would play in it.  They sure did.  I got some pictures.  They don’t use it quite as much now, so at some point I may need to put it down in the basement, and then bring it out again later.

Hannah

Paul

Hannah & Andrew

Paul

Hannah

Paul discovered my winter bed socks by the bed one morning.  He traipsed around with them on for some time.  It sure looked goofy with him wearing shorts!

Hannah often finds her little piano and plays it.  She is really cute with it.

Andrew, Paul, & Hannah

Hannah has graduated from crawling to walking on her knees.  She recently started carrying things around while she does that.  Today she was going in to her big bed and bringing her big bear out to the kitchen.  She looks so funny carrying it!  I tried to capture it with the camera.  (Thanks, Aunt Wendy, for the big bear!)

Paul has discovered a whole new couch under the cushions.  Hannah loves the cushions to be off, because then she can climb up on the couch by herself.  The top picture was last evening, I believe, and the bottom one is from this evening.  This evening, Paul built a little “fort” with the cushions, and he and Hannah each had certain toys behind them on the couch.  They had a ball for quite a while.  (You can tell Hannah was getting a sleepy, she’s sucking her thumb.)

…is bring people together!  This evening we had some of our bloggy friends over for supper, the family from Life on Sylvan Drive.  Davene went to school with my older sister Gail for about 3 years way back in the dark ages when they were in first grade.  Now, she has three wonderful and well-behaved sons and is expecting their fourth child.  It was a real treat to get together and find out that Davene is still as sweet and wonderful as she was when she had long braids of hair and was about half as tall.

We had a wonderful supper that was filled with lots of children.  After supper the kids all played outside for a while, and then we came inside to eat some strawberry pie for dessert.  My sister Gail and her son Bobby came after supper too.  They couldn’t make it in time for supper.  I think the favorite outside toy was Paul’s green tractor, and the favorite inside toy was the box “house” in the living room, which is the box Paul’s tractor came in.  One of my favorite things from the visit was watching little Tobin scoot around on his bottom the way only he can do.  He is so cute!  One thing I know for sure, if I was a little kid, I would want to be in their family.

Thanks, Davene, for spending your evening with us!

Ahhh…you know what’s coming if you’ve ever traveled with little ones.  On Saturday, Gail, Bobby, Lucy, Paul, Hannah, and I went up to PA to our cousin’s wedding.  Google Maps said 3 1/2 hours from Harrisonburg.  We decided we needed to leave here no later than 8:30 in order to get there in time for the 2:00 p.m. wedding.  That meant we had to aim to leave at 8:00.  So we did.  The trip up was largely uneventful, except for stopping for Paul to use the bathroom every hour.  Hannah was fussy, especially at the end, because she needed to have a bowel movement, and she won’t do it in her car seat.  We got to the church between a little before 1:00, and Hannah, freed from the car seat, crawled around the fellowship hall and got things straightened out.

After the wedding, my brother Glen decided to ride with us to the reception area.  And we stood around waiting on Lucy.  Finally, Gail went to look for her.  She had decided to ride with someone else, so we left without her.  It took us a little bit to find the place, but we did with only driving past it once or twice before we turned in.  Hannah had fallen asleep about as soon as we turned on the car.  Since she was sleeping, I stayed at the car with her, and Gail and Glen took Paul and Bobby to the really nice playground that was at the reception area.  About the time for the reception to start, Hannah woke up, and we all went inside.

Things went pretty well for the reception.  Hannah was short on sleep, and she wasn’t very happy.  After a while, Lucy took her out to the playground while I ate.  Then, we were waiting around for them to serve the cake.  Since Miriam, my sister, had made sheet cakes that were chocolate cake with peanut butter icing, we all wanted a taste of it.  Soon, it was served, and then we started talking about going home.  Well, Lucy wanted to dance, and she wanted them to start the dancing soon.  She told us to go ahead, she would catch a ride home with somebody else.  Gail and I were out at the playground with the kids, and we saw Rachel getting ready to leave, and we asked if Lucy was riding with her.  She said no because she was leaving soon, and if Lucy wasn’t riding with us, she would have to ride with Mom who wasn’t coming home until Monday.  So, we talked things over and agreed to stay a little longer so Lucy could join in the dancing.  While we were hanging around for that, we found out that Mom wasn’t staying until Monday, she was going home that night.  She said Lucy could ride with them, so Gail and I loaded up our little ones and headed out.  It was about 6:30 p.m.

I wanted to relieve Gail of driving, since she had driven all the way up.  That didn’t last very long, because Hannah kept pushing Gail away and crying.  Finally, we stopped to let Gail drive.  Then, Gail was driving, and she hadn’t been driving but about 5-10 minutes when Bobby announced he needed to use the bathroom.  So, we pulled into a gas station and I filled up the car while he sat on a little potty in the van and did his business.  I ran it into the bathroom and dumped it while Gail put him back in his car seat.

Then, we mosied down the road some more, until it was time for Paul to use the bathroom again.  We let him use the bathroom (he needs to go every hour to keep his undies dry).  Then, we were going down the road some more, which was north on 83 to get to 81 south.  Well, at some point 83 just splits in two, one part going left, the other right.  I thought we needed to go to the left to get 81 south, but Gail went to the right.  She thought we were o.k., I wasn’t sure, and soon we were crossing the Susquahanna River.  Gail said we didn’t cross that on the way, so we needed to turn around.  We finally got turned around (it was all 1-way streets where we ended up) and were headed got back on 83 going the other way, which was south.  We looked for signs to get off for 81.  We never saw any, but we noticed landmarks that were before that Y in the road when we were going north on 83.  So, once more, we got off 83 south, and then we got back on going north so we could get to that Y that would let us get to 81 south.  Sure enough, we came to it, and we needed to take the left Y fork to get to 81 south.  That actually put us on 581, which took us to interstate 81.  Whew!

Yeah, well, whew! again because by now it was time for Paul to use the bathroom again.  I told Gail to get pull off when it was handy.  She struck off down the very next exit ramp, but lo and behold!  It put us right onto Rt. 15, and not onto a gas station exit-type thingy.  Well, we got off of 15 and let Paul use the bathroom.  Then, we had to get back on 15 the right direction (which I wasn’t sure, but Gail thought she knew, so we went with that, and it was right), and then back onto 581 in the right direction.  We finally got to interstate 81 and headed south.

At some point, both the boys fell asleep simultaneously.  Poor Hannah was fussing and crying and fussing and crying.  Finally, I noticed she had flooded her diaper and her pants were wet.  I hated to do this, but I asked Gail to pull off the road again so I could change her diaper.  As soon as we did that, the boys both woke up.  But, Hannah got dry pants, and she was happier.  Back on the road, and finally, she fell asleep.  She was sleeping just fine, and had slept about 30 minutes or so when Bobby announced he had to use the bathroom.  The first thing Gail came to was a weighing station, and we pulled off there and got both boys out to use the bathroom.  And Hannah woke up, of course.

I think that was the last stop until we got home.  Poor Hannah, she wanted her big bear and her big bed.  She managed to get in another 30-minute nap or two until we got home, but she cried a lot in between her naps.  I would hold her arm, or leg, or lay my head over on her, and so on, trying to give her comfort.  That usually helped her feel better.  Neither of the boys slept any more on the way home.  How they weren’t dead tired and sleeping as tight as rocks, I’ll never know.

We got home around 11:00 p.m., and Andrew and I put both kids to bed pronto.  They only slept until about 8:30 the next morning.  And boy, oh boy!  Things were interesting at church the next day!  For both the morning and evening services, they were both as crabby as could be.  We lived through it, and hopefully things will be better this next Sunday.

I’m glad I went to the wedding.  I got to see a lot of relatives on my Mom’s side of the family that I hadn’t seen in over a year.  And, they got to see our kids, many of them meeting Hannah for the first time.  So, I think it was worth it, and I enjoyed it.  The trip was interesting too!