traveller

One of Jenna's hopes for college was to spend semesters abroad.  This summer she heard about a Romanian internship that matches her major perfectly so she applied even though she didn't think a freshman had a chance.  Today she heard "unofficially" that she got accepted.  She is beyond excited! and quickly added a Romanian language class to her schedule.  She went to class today and said it was really really hard. 

We don't know any details yet but she thinks the cost is the same as a regular semester plus airfare.  The students will work in an orphanage in the morning, have classes in the afternoon, work in a psychiatric hospital some evenings and travel on weekends.  I hope she doesn't run into Dracula!

hAPpY bIrThDAy !!

Today is my brother's birthday!  Happy Happy Birthday Michael! I hope it's a great one :)

24

 You've had a birthday shout hurray!! We're going to sing to you today! One year older and wiser too! Haaaaapppppy Birthday, TO YOU!!

 Today is Dani's 24 birthday!!!  How grateful I am that this beautiful young woman is my daughter.  She is amazing and resilient and wise beyond her years.  I love how honest she is, how open she is to the world and friendships and adventure.  She is an amazing, thoughtful mother, a great big sister, a loving wife and a lovely woman with a great million dollar smile (you are welcome ;) )  She is creative and smart.  She makes good choices.  24 years ago I could never imagined the person she would turn out to be, and if I had tried the reality now is so much better than I could have hoped for.  I love you Dani girl.

 So I spent some fun time looking at photos of Dani on facebook.  Some I had never seen before, like this one with Dumbo and her roommates from the year she was married. 

 and this one of Dani and Greg at a fancy Vivint event.

 And this one of Dani and Tate on the merry -go-round!

 I love the pink! very fun!

Me and Dan and Tate this past spring.

So I have a friend who's mother is turning/or turned 80 this year. In her honor he decided to run 8 marathons this year (which I personally think is cRAzy) but it got me to thinking and I decided in honor of Dani's 24 birthday I have decided to lose 24 lbs.  That should be doable, I think.  Not sure who will have the harder time Bruce or me but none the less I am off (ha ha).  (Don't worry Dani, I sent you a real present as well!)

So have a great day dear girl.  I wish we were celebrating together and I love you forever.

kool aid stand

My friend Jen and I have been saving each other's bacon.  Our kids have been playing together a lot.  This is good.  When children play together the mothers can do laundry :) 

Today they were at Jen's house and she let them set up a kool-aid stand.  Each girl made $2.  Pretty good business. 

Then they came to our house and put on a lot of make up and I took them to the pool.  Lots of kids were out at the park and the pool.  It's beautiful out.

We still have no school, there are many neighborhoods with  no power and many trees and power lines down still.  I am most grateful for our electricity.  Tonight Becky and I went to visit Laurel, she still has no power, or water :(.  We brought ice cream and sat in her dark living room having the best visit. 

August has been quite a month.

mini-flood

Power is back on!! Yeah!! We were all in bed, the kids surrounding our bed in sleeping bags and just falling asleep when all of a sudden we had light!  We all gasped and looked around surprised, then "yeahed".  Someone said "it's like Christmas".  So happy.  We love light!!

Sadly our great joy was short lived because E and R went around turning off lights and checking on things and we found a previously undiscovered flood in Sierra's room.  It was under all her stuff, which was piled everywhere when she left and which I had not yet gotten around to cleaning (in my despair over her unhappy departure I couldn't yet face it).  Bummer.

So today along with lots of laundry, dishes, vacuuming and clean up to get back to normal we also got to drag everything out of her room (making the basement a total tornado) and pull up the carpet, rip out the pad, set up fans and a dehumidifier, make assorted repair guy, insurance guy and builder guy phone calls.

The fun never ends.

electricity withdrawl

Another day has come and gone with no electricity for us.  I've learned some things:

1. I like lights
2. It's a lot harder to cook and keep things clean without power than I thought it would be.
3. Our house is really really dark at night.
4. The stars at night are gorgeous with no city lights to block them.  We saw  the milky way last night.
5. My children are really loud.
6. We  need to buy a generator.
7. Kids get upset even when they  are okay.
8. No power means we have gotten to know our neighbors a lot better.
9. Frogs and crickets are louder than generators when the night is still.
10. My husband is very good in emergencies.  He has helped  a lot of people very happily these  last two days.
11. For Christmas I might buy him his very own chainsaw, maybe he'll buy me some canned goods. We are  romantic that way.
12. Cold  showers are no fun.
13. I heart my smart phone.

post storm

It's been an interesting couple of days. Yesterday R  spent the whole day helping people with their tree removal efforts.  He started at Pete's house, then he and Pete went to Thomas', then they went to David's then to Calvin's.  He said it was crazy out there.  I spent the day at home with the children and their various friends coming in and out, playing games, eating snacks.  It was crazy in here.  Matthew and Sarah from next door came over and we played phase 10.  Julia and Lu played musical houses, as did E, Webb, Luke and John.  I think the kids actually had a lot of fun.  In the evening R came home and we cooked out and ate on the deck.  The weather has been just lovely.  Still after dinner we had some kid meltdowns.  It's been a stressful week with our mock disaster which really upset the kids, going back to school, an earthquake, tornado watch and hurricane and now no power.  Even though they have been fine throughout it all it's caused a toll.

Finally we got everyone settled down and we had a pretty good nights sleep.

This morning R went to help some coworkers with their trees then went to work.  E and H took Millie for a long walk with the Bicknells next door then we had them over for another marathon phase 10  game.

Now Julia is back over playing, E rode off on his bike with Webb and John and Hannah and Matthew and Sarah are in the woods gathering firewood so we can make smores tonight.  I have been very grateful for water, a stove top we can light and cell phones that can be charged in the car, and nice weather.