pictures from last weekend and a story from this one

We're up at the lake this weekend, very quiet weekend.  We have been working on the fish house.  Jay fixed the door and replaced a few rotten boards.   We had to go to Menards for paint and boards.  I painted.

 This morning I made scrambled eggs.  I made a huge batch: nine eggs, cheese, sausage crumbles, peppers, and onions.   I melted half a stick of butter and poured it into the pan.

 It smelled lovely, as melting butter always does.   I turned down the heat and stood there turning the eggs over and moving them around.  They started to cook and turn deliciously yellow.  That's when I noticed the frying pan seemed to be giving off flecks.

 I peered into the pan and turned the eggs some more and then I realized what I was seeing.

Oh, Lord Help Me.

 Mouse shit.

 I stared and kind of gagged a little.  Kari said I sounded very sad, "OH dear."

And yeah, they went in the trash.

And I had only 5 more eggs and no cheese, and yeah.

No eggs for you people.

 We have had zero mice in a year.  Zero.   Now, obviously, they are back.

This is war.

 We had fun with these last weekend.  Milanos are Julia's favorite.  Mixed reviews on the Pumpkin Spice.

 Joe had his sailboat in the water, spent some time teaching John how to maneuver.

 Apples to Apples:

Anyway, nobody ate mouse poop, so we're good, though repulsed.

Onward.

Love, Val

happy birthday, dannell

Here's a picture from a long time ago, but you both still look the same.

This is something I wrote back in 2002, back before you guys were married:

Happy New Year! This year our family will be getting bigger though not in the usual way we have.  Our oldest son and his girlfriend of many years have announced their engagement, so we are gaining a wonderful daughter-in-law, Dannell.  They will both graduate college in the spring and are eager to be students no longer, and to move into the next stage of life.  

They stopped by after the dinner John had so carefully planned, ring in his pocket, nervously hoping to get this special question just right, and even though the little kids were in pajamas by then, we had a raucous toast in the dining room and everyone cheered.

                
Later that night I was up with Timothy, walking around in the dark living room.  The dogwood bushes outside the windows are strung with Christmas lights and I turned those on because I like to look at them in the dark.  

I went upstairs and looked at the soft sleeping faces of each of the kids in their beds and then paused in the hallway and pushed the curtain aside to look out over the backyard and park behind, sea of twinkly crystal snow, swooping drifts spread out like frosting.

I think it was the multicolored hazy light coming up the stairway from the living room and the feel of cold glass on my forehead, the gray swirl of snow banks in moonlight, the weight of Timothy in my arms, but all at once, I remembered another night just exactly like this one, this exact time of year, right after Christmas, when I’d been awake because of my pregnant belly full of kicking Kari, and I’d stood right in that spot in the middle of the night and listened to John playing his guitar, tentatively picking out the notes to the theme song from MASH, a favorite program from his childhood.

Dannell had stayed with our family that Christmas too, (and even ended up with a concussion that year from hitting her head on the ice playing hockey) and was asleep in the bunk beds in Maria’s room downstairs. That guitar had been a Christmas gift from her.  

I’d stood there a long time, listening to the sweetly hesitant, but unmistakable tune, and wondered where life would take us soon, new baby coming, old babies growing up and out, having lives of their own, filling our house only sporadically on breaks from school.  And now here we are, planning a wedding, most glorious thing.  Kari is almost three, and we have a Timothy as well.

Here's a picture from now, fourteen years later?  Can that be right?

Well, anyway, thanks for being ours.

We love you dearly, and thank you for being patient with me and the rest of us.

Who has to raise children with their mother-in-law? That's weird, and a little annoying.

But we do it.  And the love is for real.

Happy Birthday, my friend.

We are lucky having you in this family.

Love forever, Jay and Val and Everybody

first day of school, 2016

 On the first day of school, we take First Day of School pictures, and go out for lunch.

It's a lovely tradition we all enjoy.  The kids get to decide where they want their picture taken.

One of Lydia's last homeschool photos she chose to perch on some old toilets in front of the garage--when your dad is a plumber, random broken-down toilets appear and go away all the time.

Here Julia is staging falling into a puddle in our deteriorating driveway.

 He was not creative about choosing a location and staged no performance, just finally stood in front of the garage and managed a pleasant almost-smile.

p.j. posed with the fountain my parents gave us a few years ago.

 He's trying to help the little sister baby choose a spot for her picture.

 There you go!

 We had a fine lunch at Applebees. Food was great, company easy-going.

While we were trying to entertain her while we waited for our food, I handed her the drink menu.  She slapped it away and screeched.

Tim quipped, "Clearly she's not in her Happy Hour."

I cracked up, but she wasn't that bad.   She was actually very, very good.

 She does this thing though where she wants help with the silverware, so she reached for my fork and then took it over.  So then I was eating salad with her spoon. Shortly she was handing me back the fork and we traded again. She wants to be independent, but gets frustrated with the process and wants a hand.

These two:

 This was kind of a wistful lunch in a way because this may be the Last First Day of Homeschool.  p.j. starts Kindergarten tomorrow.  These girls have spent nearly every day together since that little one was born in 2011, Niece and Little Auntie.  Julia was six when she was born.

When I was little, my aunts were teenagers and I adored them.  I still do.

This man in the photo below is going to high school next year, and Julia doesn't want to be home alone without him, and has requested to go to school next year too.

We're going to check out some charter schools, see what we can figure out.

Tim, you half-grown teenager man?

Nothing.   Just love.

Happy First Day of School, 2016.

Love, Mom, aka Grandma

pokemon birthday

Thanks for making us part of this evening.  We were so happy to be there with you.

All these years of loving you?  Since 2009?

When you used to come to my house and we'd have Couch Potato Grandma and nap together?

To now when you're a full-grown guy building Legos with your dad and living it up on your birthday?

I love you.

We all do, always have.

Happy Birthday, Sweetheart.

love forever, Grandma and Grandpa and Everybody

so first of september

This is the house we live in, the early to mid-morning light.

 So some especially cute people have shown up.

And yeah, we get to figure that out

Trying on all the basket of dirty clothes:

Some kind of wild bangs situation I tried to assist with and was rejected.

Ice cream on the patio!

On the roof. Let me pause now.

 Get off the damned roof. You people are not even funny.

Just climb down.

Yes, check out the Pirates:

Okay, good night.

Nothing but love. 

Love, Val