Fall Pictures

My sweet sister called me up a few weeks ago and said, "let's go take some pictures of your kids". Gotta love her. She sent me scrambling for the next hour trying to get some clean clothes for them to wear that all "sort of" matched. I grabbed what I could and jumped in the car. She picked up Taco Bell for us and met us at the park. Fall is my favorite time for family pictures. The colored leaves make the perfect backdrop... And I'm thinkin' that I just might have 6 of the cutest kids ever... Though, I am a bit bias.

For real???

Paul and the three older boys headed about 3 hours south to a Father/Son camp. Hopefully, they are having a lot of fun despite the two days of down-pouring...

It has been funny that everytime they leave to go camping and just the girls are left to fend for themselves, something happens. Last spring, our property flooded out and 30 of our chickens drown and our fences were washed down, so we spent the week fixing and cleaning. A year ago, when they were at last year's Father/Son camp, our well went out and we had to haul water from other houses to even flush the toilets.... So, this time, I was actually expecting something...

Well, I wasn't disappointed. For the past 2 weeks or so, our mini-van has been running with the service engine light on. It would sputter every time I started it, but after driving for 15 seconds or so, it would run normal. Let me reiterate, it was running like that for over 2 WEEKS. This is nothing new. But, hey, my car decided to wait until my dear husband was gone to give me trouble. Yesterday, the "low coolant" light came on. Fine, I can handle that. I found an automotive store and they fixed me up with the right stuff and even filled it for me. They tried to check why the service engine light was on, but my car wouldn't talk to his little machine for some reason. So, today, the girls and I had a tea party to attend in Dwight (about an hour south). I think I may have been asking for trouble by driving that far, but, again, it's been running this way for a while... Needless to say, I got about 15 miles from my friend's house on I-55 and it died. It was actually still running, but the gas pedal wouldn't work anymore, so it just coasted to a stop on the side of the highway. I grabbed my cell to call someone, and because I had spent the last 2 nights at a friend's house, I had forgot to charge it. It was kind of laughing as it flashed "low battery" at me. I quickly called a friend and told her the situation in about 15 seconds before it went dead. In that time, she managed to get enough info to borrow a van and head out to pick me up. She had to borrow a van because, silly me, I agreed to carpool a different friend's 4 daughters along with my 3 kids. My mini-van was packed to capacity, so we needed a large vehicle to take us anywhere... I managed to revive my phone long enough to scare my dad out of his wits and leave him wondering what kind of danger I was in.

Ok, so, we did make it to the tea party. A tow-truck was called and my van is sitting at a service station in Dwight. I took every scrap of personal information out of it in case someone wanted to steal my identity, but completely forgot my garage door opener. Duh. We hitched a ride home (minus the friend's 4 daughters) and will NOT be going anywhere until my hubby gets home.

Metro Open House

We went to Paul's work on Saturday for their annual Open House. The have it every October for the employees to show thier family and friends thier workplace. They do several things throughout the year to show appreciation to their workers. The kids love going to the Open House. It is heavily geared for the kids fun. This year was no different. The kids get their faces painted, get goodie-bags, jump in a big jumpy thing, play games, and we ALL play BINGO with lots of fun prizes for everyone.

Gracie managed to conquer her fear of clowns and let Skiddles paint her face this year. Ellie, on the other hand, still has glitter stuck in her hair from all of the decoration on her face. I tried to talk her into getting a pretty princess thing on her face to match her outfit, but after seeing Noah get his tiger, she was convinced that "the more paint, the better". At least it was a pink tiger...

We made it through teething!

See this expression? That is the continual look Nathan has given me for the past week. It's been intersperced with a crabby, cranky, "I'm in pain" sort of whine. I don't know if he's even cracked a smile once...

I have had five kids all go through teething before him without so much as a flinch. I ususally knew they were popping teeth because they had a shiny new one poking through their gums. Nathan has been higher maintainance from birth and is not dissappointing me now. (Alright, Jenny, he's not NEARLY as high maintainance as your baby boy.... Now HE'S high maintainance...) But for my family, Nathan wins the medal. Nathan has obliged all of the Pediatric manuels by covering every possible symptom of teething... fever, slobbering, runny nose, crabby, sleeplessness, lack of appetite, crying, whining, messy diapers and swollen, black and blue gums. That's right, people, BLACK AND BLUE! No wonder he's been so cranky. The poor guy was in PAIN! After a few days of fever and incessant crying, I spotted his gums while changing him. It looked like half of a blueish marble stuck on his gums. It was huge. After asking my ever reliable sister and all natural friend what it could be, (Both were perplexed and attributed it to teething), I called my dentist. The receptionist hadn't heard of it, but suggested that I wait it out and if it is still there in DECEMBER??!! (when we have our cleanings scheduled) then I should bring him in to have it looked at. If I didn't like her so much, I'd tell how dumb that idea was... Next, called the pediatrician. (I just wanted to know if it was normal and not some symptom of step, or something that qualifies for the ER). They asked if he's had other symptoms of teething. Yep, fever, nasty diapers, lack of sleeping, ect. "Probably teething, then." Sure, but can't those be symptoms of life threatening illnesses, too??

Relief finally came yesterday when the little white notches of his first molar were seen through the little guys sore gums!! Hip, hip, hooray! ...The bad news is, there is a repeat starting on the other side...

Civil War Days

On Saturday, we went to a Civil War Re-enactment at Dollinger's Farm. It was the kind of fun hands-on homeschooling that we like best. We haven't studied the Civil War yet, so everything was new to the kids. Actually, it was new to Paul and I, too. For all that I learned in school, I really don't remember alot of it. Maybe because it wasn't very interesting at the time, maybe because it was a little blurp in my history book, maybe because I just used my short term memory to pass the tests... It seems like the public school system makes memorizing names and dates the important part (which it is important), but misses giving children a grasp on the whole picture. The why's and the how's. The deeper meanings of war... What would make people give their lives to free slave men? There was a broader ideal of how our Creator endowed each person, regardless of skin color, with inalienable rights. People fought a war and gave their lives while standing on this truth... "There is no greater love than this, that a man lay his life down for his friend." Now, that's some deep schooling.

The boys really enjoyed watching the battle which ended that day's fighting with a truce between the Confederates and the Yanks. In fact, they liked it so much, they went again today to watch the continuation of the battle.

One of Paul's co-workers played an artillery soldier in the re-enactment. We got a quick tour of the Yankee camp and got to check out this working cannon that is an original from the Civil War.