Peaceful Weekend

Michael and the kids went camping yesterday, so I've been enjoying some time to myself. I went to an AWANA leader's house to update some records and look at the 17 scrapbooks she's completed this summer!!! Then made my way to the homeschool planning meeting, which is always so much more fun than it sounds. As we say, "The moms getting together to misuse grammar and laugh about it!!" We had a great time sharing our struggles and joys, and encouraging each other to trudge on! We have several interesting field trips and presentations planned for the upcoming year.
The campers recently returned to clean their catch and clean up themselves! They caught a nice sized channel cat and a very nice sized blue cat. Mom got a lesson in telling catfish apart. Another thing we discussed last night. Why do moms always speak in 3rd person? "Mommy's going to go to the bathroom now, so stay right there and finish your math." I'm sure it makes it hard to tell when I'm talking about me or my mom. I'm never consistent with calling her Mom or Grandma, either. But anyway, the peace has ended and I need to make Kool-aid and get some other things ready for them to leave again! And it's a bakery day so I need to get ready for that, too!

Visitors

These are some folks that needed a home for a couple weeks. First is Minn, a painted turtle. Max, the one stuck to the side of the tank in the bottom right, is the guy who cleans up after him. Talk about the cure being worse than the disease... no, he's a cutie in his own way. The other tank houses Frodo and Sam, a pair of geckos. These guys are just amazing. Matthew and I are just getting nothing done because we're just downstairs all the time playing with the new kids. Minn eats hotdogs. Now that really surprised me, but he's been living on them for a year and a half now, so who am I to question that? Our instructions say that he eats a good sized chunk every day. Then, if he's taking pot shots at Max, we should give him another chunk. Apparently, Max does fine on what Minn leaves behind. The boys were quite impressed by the skull in the bottom of the tank. They probably think Max cleaned that up himself for a trophy. Frodo and Sam came in with a few crickets and now have those all cleaned up. I feel bad because they can't have our crickets. Dad just sprayed around here and we're afraid that's how poor Edward lost his fight. He was a tiny painted turtle that we had for about 3 months. He mostly ate flies, but we'd toss him a June bug or something now and then. Then one day he just stopped eating and died a few days later. So we're getting all of these guys' food from Earl May. The geckos also came with some mealie worms. I was having fun hand feeding them the worms and then Matthew wanted to try. I told him that they'd probably catch his finger, but it didn't hurt and they let go fast. Well, of course that's not what happens when they get a soft, tender little Matthew finger. Sam hung on pretty well. OOOPS!! I could tell it stung because his eyes welled up quite a bit. We found a pair of tweezers and moved on to Plan B!!! Sam ate quite a few, but Frodo didn't eat any. Morgan thought we better call their parents to find out for sure what to do. Diane said that was quite normal and they'd eat when they're hungry and they can pretty much eat all they want. So anyway, we feel better and later did get Frodo to eat a couple worms. I'll have to head to Earl May pretty soon to get some non-bug sprayed crickets.
The final photo is Bugger Man wondering what happened to his role in the family! Ah, nothing replaces a fuzzy face!!!

Huge Loss

However expected some may have seen his death, it was still so huge to me. Steve Irwin added such life and passion to the Animal World that I know he will live on in our imaginations. He took me to exotic places I could never go and showed me fascinating animals I'd never see. And it wasn't the same as seeing them sleeping or pacing in a zoo. He showed off their defenses and their agility and just portrayed a love and excitement of them that truly sparked the love of animals I already had. He may have been the show off that many accused him of being, but his charisma made it clear to me that it was genuine. Many said that Steve was the very same person on and off the camera. I suppose that's what I want to believe and will anyway. I'm glad he packed so much life into his few years so we will have plenty to remember him. I'm sure the DVDs will be pouring out now. He will be missed and his family will need our prayers.

All for just $49.95

But wait!! There's more...

No, really... this is a project Mallory and I were working on this winter, then pretty much had to put aside to start work on the house. It's just some photo note cards scrapped and embellished with some of my favorite new fibres and other fabulous finds... thanks, Carrie!!

We're actually making two of these since I'm blessed with two mothers-in-law. One is coming in to the airport as we speak, so I got hers finished up. And well, I'm pretty sure the other one reads this, too, so it's going to be finished in the next couple of weeks, now, isn't it?? heehee... I was just waiting for another tin box for the other set. It's in and now I just have to paint and embellish that one. I made all the cards at the same time and hope to get back to it if I can ever get another crop together! My life is so out of control, but it will get better. Don't get me wrong... I still want it full, but I'd like to find a place to put my stuff that doesn't drive my mother crazy!! It's so much better to drive my hubby crazy!!

Well, Mom and I are on our way to the Blue House with a load for the pit. Yes, the kids went with Michael to the airport, so we are hauling much stuff off for good!! Must go!!

This is it!

Oh, I was so happy with this one. I hope the bride is, too. She wasn't there when Mallory and I set it up. The gal that was there with us seemed to think it was okay! She was more impressed with how well Mallory knew what she was doing. I'm really not too sure I could do any of this without Mallory. She is such a huge help with these. Mal was even surprised with how fast it went up. I do like the ones that have pedestals. A lot of brides want them stacked straight onto each other. Then you have to double board everything and be ready to finish all the borders and remove the finger indentations from putting it together. This was so much faster!

Mallory also had a lot of fun helping with the fondant rope on this one. She would keep the fondant soft and warm and then roll it out thin when I was ready. We never did find a horseshoe cutter, so I took a tulip from a Walmart set and bent it into a horseshoe. I even looked online to get the right shape, but when I saw all the gal's other stuff at the reception hall, I think mine look more like the game horseshoes than the ones she had everywhere. It's a cute little western reception with washbuckets of flowers with bandanas tied around the buckets. There are also bandanas around the cake table and lots of other places. It's really cute. Hope the rain gives her a break when she needs it! It was pretty wet when we were setting up!

Meanwhile...

Well, the cake's done, just gathering up stuff to load in the car to go set it up. Thought I'd go see what the menfolk were doing and found Matthew cleaning out from underneath the mower. I'm pretty sure it's just to buy himself a chance to drive it again. He's really anxious to mow the lawn, and you know, who wouldn't be, but anyway, we're trying to ease him in to this position. The only hard part is that he's the one who knows all he needs to know about things, so it's usually pretty hard to teach him anything. Mallory's been taking her time, gathering advice, driving it slowly around the yard. Not Matthew. Have to figure out exactly how fast this can go, what kind of a mountain it can clear and what you can run over without stopping. Sounds a lot like the way he learned to walk, climb out of his crib, ride a bike... not sure why I thought this would be any different, but was hoping for some patience and wisdom. Guess I'm still waiting for that in myself, too!!

So far...

Well, I have 2 tiers of the wedding cake done, and all the flowers. Will finish the other 2 tiers in the morning. My back and neck are done for today. I hope this gal likes the cake. It's always hard to get in someone's head and make sure you're getting her what she wants! It's a really nice looking western wedding cake, so I'm pretty sure it's what she's thinking. I'll post one of the finished cake tomorrow, but this is the big bottom tier. The other one is a birthday cake that was lots of fun! Corn and piggies for a nice old farmer. At least I hope he's nice. He could be a grouchy old bugger for all I know, but the part of his family I know is really great, so I'm just going to assume he's great, too. The piggies were fun and Mom said the corn came out better than the last one I tried. Everyone called them dandelions, so these must be a little better. Ok, a little TV and bed. Have to make this cake stand up tall tomorrow!

Oh, and hey, look Belva!! I got the time stamp fixed!! No more 4 am postings unless I'm really up at 4 am posting!!