well.

I was going to talk about the first day of school and put up the pictures I took.

But the damned kids lost my camera.

They took it to do their funny little hyper videos, and now nobody knows where it is.

And we can't even call it like a lost cell phone and listen for it.

So, nevermind.

It had cute pictures of b.g. blowing out two year old birthday candles stuck in the special cream cheese filled cupcakes his parents sent.

(Dan emailed me for the recipe and they baked the cupcakes themselves.)

Ummm, and some other stuff.

ANNOYING.

Onward. The camera was not in the washing machine and will likely be found some day, and I do have another perfectly good camera.

Grrrrrrr.

Oh, wow. Here is Maria now with my camera! And just as I was about to choose some of Kirsten's summer pictures instead.

She found it in a plant outside. Well, whoop-de-dang-do.

(In a plant? I watered those plants and didn't see it. It didn't get wet?
Good Lor-ED.)

James had his first day of school today, left our little old homeschool and headed out for ninth grade. My mom was here in the afternoon and we were both eager to hear how it went.

"Fine."

He liked it okay, plans to go back tomorrow, said it wasn't as bad as he expected.

And the pictures from today. (Kirsten's pictures to come another day after all.)





That shirt is a pair of Tim's old pajamas from when he was a baby. I love that.

And here they are doing some work. b.g. kept telling us the alphabet and saying, "Twelve, fourteen!" He was working too, even when he crawled over Julia's workbook to reach the guitar.

Lydia, aka Kari also had my help learning how to make lunch--this is a primary job of the oldest kid in homeschool. We worked on it together and soup and sandwiches made it to the table.

My mom came a little later, bearing cookies and twix bars. Lydia had baked a pan of brownies already, so we were way in the chocolate, which none of us mind.

b.g. tends to eat dirt though, sand, horrible. As Lydia was wiping off his face and handing him a drink, she scolded him a little, "You must not eat dirt. Do you hear me? You could get pinworms and nobody wants those."

That's the understatement of the year.

We've never had them, so far. But when I told the kids about them, they were so astonished and horrified they accused me of making it up.

No. This is a true story. WASH YOUR HANDS. You don't want to go to Pinworm City.

On that happy and uplifting note, I will say good night. I hope the second day of school is as good as the first was, and even though it's not June, July, or August, I don't hate September.

May usually disappoints, the rain and cold wind and tendency to mud. September hardly ever lets us down. Today was sunny and gorgeous, and what's not to love?

Onward to Wednesday. love always, Val