Year 2, Day 301 & 302: Musings

We had a relaxing Saturday with nowhere to go, and then a full Sunday, but we were prepared.  Let's see. Justin was picked up at 6:30am on Saturday by his best friend's Grandma who drove him down to Bloomington because his friend's family just moved back to Indiana!  It's the same friend who moved away in August, but unfortunately, things didn't work out down there, and now they are back.  The boys are thrilled!  It was a surprise for Bryce, Justin's best friend, to see him get out of Bryce's grandma's car!  Bloomington is something like a little over an hr south of us.  So, it's still a little far, but not as far as Atlanta!  The boy's went to Bryce's Grandma's house for most of the day, and then Bryce spent the night and day on Sunday with us.  I think the pull out couch in the fireside room has been well used in the past 3 months!  It's a perfect nook for one of the kids and their friend because one takes the twin pull out bed and one takes the other couch.  Then they can leave the light on for awhile and talk without disturbing the rest of the house.  And yet, I am usually still awake until they fall asleep.  It's so neat to be the house that everyone comes to.  I wanted this for my kids.  Woot! Woot!

So, Saturday was quiet with just Keturah and Abishai at home because Benaiah was at church doing tech as normal.  Then, I went to church for 5:30pm because the church had their "dessert nights" on Saturday, Sunday and Monday evenings.  Dessert Nights are basically a church informational meeting where the congregational can come and listen to updates from all areas of the church's ministries.  They can also ask questions afterwards.  It's NOT your typical church meeting where items on an agenda are discussed.  The staff and teams make all the decisions.  There are no votes either.  This is just a time where we can learn about how the succession plan is going, how planning for a new student center is going, a quick financial update on things like debt and other building maintenance and updates, and then some things from each of the children's areas, as well as adults, and finally, an update on the Shelby St. campus.  And this time around, the announcement was made as to whether or not, and how, Saturday and Sunday services will change.  I will not post details here or on social media until Monday night's meeting is over because I believe everyone should attend one of them.  Then we can all be ambassadors of information and stop the rumor mill from working so hard.  There were some dates shared for some of these things, too.   And these meetings happen twice a year I believe.  You also get dessert, but not if you are gluten, dairy, or sugar free, lol.  Oh well.

Because of the meeting at 5:30, there was no regular church service then.  So, instead, we went to church on Sunday at 11.  The Kidustrial Park kids and leaders were all invited to dress up because Halloween is two days away.  I hemmed and hawed over whether or not to let the kids where costumes that we had put together (cheaply) for a harvest party that didn't happen.  I'm a staunch opposer of everything Halloween.  But, I relented this time because they weren't actually trick or treating, and there were no extra Halloween decorations and no one had scary costumes on or were in full make up.  So, yes, I let them dress up.  And it didn't kill me.  Sigh.

Then we had lunch with Gary, Leah, and another friend, who had come the week before when the other guests were there as well.  He lives nearby, but his parents live part of the year in Liberia where they are from and have also had homes in Lincoln, IL and Rhode Island, where they planted a church.  We got to hear more of Edward's story, both of how he grew up in Liberia and then his life as an adult in the USA.  He's a few years older than us, but we can still relate well with him.  Speaking f foreigners, I was also introduced to a Ukranian on Saturday night, who had had Gary as a seminary teacher at Haus Edelweiss.  He's a chaplain for the Ukrainian army and said that men won't come to a church service or even meet for coffee, but get them on a battlefield and they will open to listen to preaching and talking about Christianity.  Both of these men have seen war first hand, and it's fascinating to me at least to hear about it.  And then I can relate those stories to the children as I teach them their history lessons about these places.  For example, all the wars that have been fought and continue to be fought in the Middle East, especially on Asia Minor/Turkey, Lebanon/Israel/Jordan/Canaan/Samaria, Assyria/Babylon, etc etc etc.  At least Egypt hasn't changed much, lol.  It's definitely a privilege to hear these men's stories.

This evening, we all headed back to church again, but to different corners of the building literally!  Justin was in Kidustrial Park for Nerf wars with the middle school (that's in the north wing).  Benaiah was in the East Hall/Chapel for a bonfire/flannel party with the high school, which had moved it from a house to the church because it's literally freezing outside!   Keturah had choir upstairs in the atrium.  I had a homeschool meeting and we met in one of the rooms in the South Wing.  And Jared and Abishai attended dessert night with Gary and Leah in the main auditorium.  It was a busy, busy evening for everyone!  I listened to a podcast recently where the mom described how Sundays were just not relaxing or restful for her because she had to get several little kids ready and get them to sit through church and then they would go back for Sunday evening service, and she would still need to feed everything that day, etc.  I feel like our Sundays are like that.  They are not our true Sabbath.  So the podcaster shifted her expectations of Sunday being a restful day to it being a day of fellowship, and then making another day, like Saturday, her Sabbath.  And not a Sabbath where she doesn't work, but the work she does is different than what she does Monday through Friday.  She's a homeschooler, too, so a lot of her work is focused on that, same as mine.  I don't mind work, but I need to do different work one the weekends so my brain can recharge and I can use other parts of my brain, too.  She had some very insightful advice and I love her podcasts!  She's also mom to a family of 10 kids I think, some with medical issues.  I admire her a lot because she's honest and who will put the blog and podcasts aside when a family issue comes up for months at a time instead of pushing through and performing on a schedule.  She's got a very soothing voice, too.

Ok, enough of all that.  Here's a few pictures:

There's a hawk on the back fence!  It's huge!

Finishing off and winterizing the front flower bed.

Abishai's turn with play dough!  He loved it!  I need to bring it on more often!

Yup, Elsa, from Frozen.  First of all, we both have n oclue how to put on a wig.  Second, I don't know how to braid a wig.  Third, it was a cheap big and the hair was not easy to braid.  Fourth, well, there is no fourth.

Keturah managed to keep the wig on the whole time at church.  Certainly not the most authentic Elsa costume, but it works for us!

Neco and Percy Jackson!  Book characters!  Percy has a pen that turns into a sword when he uncaps it.  And he's from "camp half blood" because he's a demi God.  It's a great book series, or rather sets of series, with lots of fun historical elements like the Greek and Roman gods.  There's even one that is set in Indianapolis!  The books are written by Rick Riordian.

Doll baby!  Ok, I think this sweater my mom made that was probably my brother's is really like a 12-18 month sweater but none of the kids wore it more than once.  It does need to be put away I think.  Sigh.  But at least Abishai looks like a little Russian doll or something.

Abishai avoiding his nap on Saturday by bringing all his cars and trucks in from on the top of his bed to our bed.  Daddy got him to sleep for maybe an hour, but the boys were too loud on the video games and woke them up.

Yes, it's that cold.  Hello, winter! And oh my goodness, yes, I could SMELL SNOW in the air!  Apparently, some saw some flakes today. 

There is a rough date for succession!  Go Monday night and here all about it!  Or ask me later!  And the new student center is going to be awesome!

They left some of the cards up from last week's Sunday evening service, as well as the banners in the main sanctuary.

I have spent the last few days really working on cleaning up the files on my phone.  I still have more to go, but at least I can now get a backup done!

Yeah!  I hadn't backed it up in 2 weeks!

It was 1 am when this picture was taken.  He's working on Bible homework for his Dad that he got way behind on.  But, he has managed to almost caught up by this weekend's end.  He did admit that he thought he could slack off a little because it is a self led independent study with Dad as his overseer, but self leadership is also his weak area (his words, not mine) and this is another test to see how he can step up to the plate and make it happen.  He has to read and discuss a book, report on what he is studying for Bible Bowl, write a weekly essay on current events, write messages for his school's chapel that he is presenting, and type up his devotions for his small group at school.  It's a lot, sure, but great preparation for ministry later.  I'm very proud of him.  And I understand the whole "work late at night thing because the house is never quiet enough" kind of thinking.  Why do you think the blog goes out past midnight most nights?  I expect him to pull all nighters at some point in college, he's that kind of kid. He's learning and that's all that counts.

Pretty view of our street heading north.  This is about how much color we are going to get for the season.  The trees don't all turn color at the same time here in Indiana.  At least I see a bit more reds and not just the yellows.

This is the dessert table for dessert night.  Yum!

Gary's secretary saved this big piece of cake for Gary.  I think it was prearranged, or it could be a joke, but either way, I immediately posted it on social media to entice church members to attend the meetings.  I had permission, of course.

Abishai was such a good boy patiently waiting for his turn for a dessert!  We were there early because the boys needed to be there at 6 and dessert night, choir, and homeschool meeting were at 6:30.  So, little guy had to run around the tables full of drinks and desserts for 30 minutes without touching anything.  And I had him eat a Larabar before dessert as well. He had to be woken up from his nap to come directly to church, so he had no supper.

Today was our niece's Nora's 8th birthday! Happy birthday, Nora! So we got a text first thing this morning from Uncle Aaron complaining about the cold.  I took this screenshot to show him it was still colder here.

Some of our favorite places and their high temps for the day.  Manchester is near my hometown.  Vancouver is where my favorite TV shows are filmed.  New Orleans is where the J4 are.  Cavendish is PEI.  And Toronto is a favorite spot for one of my vloggers and celebrities and friends that visit.  It's definitely time for the winter coats folks!  We were prepared, but it came on suddenly, too.

Benaiah has this massive collection of Nerf guns, so Justin and Bryce borrowed some for their nerf wars at middle school youth group.  Abishai, also, loves the guns and kept asking for bullets.  But it did seem odd that a 2 yr old was wielding a gun at church in a large crowd.  Thankfully, no one blinked an eye.

Tickle fights before bed!

And Daddy got the middle "big" one!  I tickled Keturah, too.

I screenshotted this from Instagram because Justin is ready!  Basically, everybody shots at everybody and no one wins.  And if you don't want to play, you can play board games in a anther room.  They also provide extra bullets.

Year 2, Day 300: Extra post: Videos!

As promised, here are 11 videos in approximately chronological order.  Some of the videos are taken on the DSLR camera, and I can take photos while I'm filming, and that's the click you here and the pause in the video.  I'm going to have to work on that a bit.  I think I'm going to try to add a video per blog post, or maybe a few times a week.  It's hard to believe the temperature difference seen in these videos where just 10 days ago it was 75 degrees F and today is 37 degrees F for a high!!!!!  PEI is experiencing something similar, or will soon since they just had some temps near the 70 degree mark, too.  Brrrr!!!

Sandbox 1

Sand box 2

Abishai pumping legs on swings

Keturah reading to Abishai

Three monkeys swinging

Doggie Playtime

Sand jumping

Reading and snuggling with Noree

Talking to Daddy on the phone

Newest stage designer?

Scaling the playground ladder

Year 2, Day 299: Randomness

Ah, it was your pretty average Friday with a teeanger sleeping in, school to do, an errand, cooking, cleaning, clearing an iPhone of pics and vids because it's so full already, etc, with some blessing along the way like some extra food being dropped off right when we needed it because the paycheck is still a few days away.  The cupboard is definitely not empty but it's time to get creative with what we have.  Here ya go:

After our big day at the park yesterday, we stayed in and watched "Spiderman:Homecoming."  I did mention that yesterday though.  During the movie, though, Abishai was so loud with his playing and all over the place that we had to put the subtitles on!  Here are some of his antics.  He loves Connect 4 and this version was mine growing up, which could be from the 80's or earlier if it was my dad's.

So loud this one is!  We asked him to go play in the sun room or the fire room where Keturah was, but nope, he wanted to be with us.  He was transporting other cars.

Nope.  I'm not going to delete pictures like this because it shows just how fast and crazy this kid can be.  Go, Flash! He was jumping and "yahooing" all over the place.  He even got on the coffee table and started jumping!  Then when I was pulling him down, he cleared the table of it's objects! We laughed and we stopped him, and probably should have put him in time out or something.  Ugh!

Abishai did have some quiet moments where he would watch the movie and say "Spiderman" or "cars hurt" or "bad guys."  He has the cutest way of saying "Spiderman," too.  I think I will try to make tomorrow's blog all video links, as well as make a bunch of our videos on YouTube more accessible.  Right now they are all "unlisted" so you have to have the link to get to them and/or you can't search for them.  But the videos is where you'll see how many more words Abishai says and just how crazy he gets.

The 12 yr old observed the bowls were floating and said, "Oooo, boats!" and put in more bowls as boats.  So random.  So Justin. So preteen brain.

This morning we took a little drive to Greenwood to pick up some clothes I bought on a buy/sell/trade Facebook group for Keturah.  When I saw that she had nothing to wear yesterday to the park that was appropriate and had to double layer some leggings, I immediately went on the group looking for some.  Basically, it's an online garage sale and I love doing it this way! While we were waiting in the parking out of Fresh Thyme, Abishai got to watch the big trucks working on remodeling the building next to Chuck E Cheese.  I can't remember what store it was though.  He was thrilled!  And yes, he's in his pj's.  We left at 9 am, after waking up at 8 am.  He had a clean diaper on at least and had some breakfast, which he finished when we got back.

Trucks!

Big truck!  He didn't want to leave!  We stayed another 15 minutes after the clothing exchange was made because he wanted to watch the trucks.

We stopped at Daddy's office for 2nd breakfast of chips and a couple of truck videos.

Oops, it's a little blurry because I'm pretty shaky.  But, our plants are still going strong!  I did bring them inside two days ago because we had frost this morning.  And now that it's inside where it's warmer than it has been for the last week or so, this tomato is ripening quickly.  There's two more behind it.

And we have two peppers as well and they should turn red, orange or yellow!

Abishai had his pj pants on and was looking for a pocket, so I asked him if he wanted to change into his jeans and he said yes.  And this is why.  He wanted to put the noise machine in his pocket!  So cute!

Took a picture of my FB feed showing just the 5 of us 4 years ago.  We had no idea Abishai would be joining us.  Check out those goofy smiles!  It was taken down by the harbor in Charlottetown, PEI.

Look at how big he is!  He's gained 1.5 lbs in the last couple of months and he's eating a ton!  He's pretty sleepy, too, in this pic watching his TV show while Mommy sneaks in a shower.  He reassured me he wouldn't fall asleep though, and he didn't.

Keturah's haul!  And everything fits!  12 t-shirts, 7 long sleeve shirts, a dozen jeans/pants, another dozen leggings, a couple of shorts, and one fuzzy fleeze sweatshirt type of jacket!  All for.....$60! That's like $1.50 per item!  Score!  Plus, a lot of these are name brand like from Justice or Disney! And one of them is all about gynmanstics!  The lot also included a matching girl size and doll size shirt that says "American Girl" on it so I pulled that out before she could see it and plan to give it to her for Christmas.  She's going to be thrilled!  She needs socks, but I think I have some I can give her from my drawer.  What a blessing!

I made them work together on a project because well, Keturah needed help, and they have to learn to get along with each other.  And they figured it out and got it done.  Not perfect, but they didn't scream at each other either.

Can anyone guess what it is?  It's the walls of Ninevah!  200 ft high towers and 100 ft high walls that were so thick that three chariots could fit across them!  Plus, it was a city of 1 million!  That's crazy! 60 miles in diameter!  It would take a few days just to walk across town!

Keturah doesn't know exactly what all these things mean, but now at least she's seem them once.  The parts of a human body cell.  She also watched a video and I read to her from the science curriculum book about it.  I don't know all the details either, which does make it harder to explain things and/or dumb them down to her understanding.   Each picture has an explanation behind it with the coordinating piece of cell.

 Benaiah slept in, ate breakfast while Abishai ate lunch, went to church for a little bit to practice drums, came home, ate again, then went on his computer for most of the rest of the day.  I'm uploading pictures to Snapfish and he keeps coming in here asking when it will be done so he can have the bandwidth to play his game.  I say "never" because you've played the game a ton today, so my stuff takes priority this evening.  But on a positive note, he's pretty pumped to be playing a trivia game on in his iPod with Mr. Nanney, his school prinicpal and Benaiah is winning!  It's not all pop culture either.  Yes, Mr. Nanney is that cool of a guy.  He sees a lot of potential in all of his students, but he also recognizes Benaiah's abilities to lead and lets him.  And Benaiah is not afraid to go to him to straighten things out between himself and a student or to bring up new ideas.  I call that a huge win!

Year 2, Day 298: We did it!

We actually got a nature hike in at the PEAK of fall foliage season!  Ok, back up for a second.  Why is this important to me?  Well, it's because I grew up where the local people depend partly on fall tourism because of the fall foliage.  And I have always missed New England in the fall.  Always and forever.  PEI was in more beautiful with the red dirt roads.  So, now, every year, yes, I get jealous watching my PEI peeps post their fall pictures.  I have several friends who love going out in nature almost daily, so the pictures come over social media very often.  So, when I got a second chance this week to go out and enjoy it, I dropped everything and made it happen.  Well, not everything.  We did get our work done today, too. 

It was a gorgeous day, perfectly crisp, but not too cold.  No one overheated while we walked the trail, but we weren't all bundled and freezing either.  And no one else was around either.  But the kids made enough noise to make up for it though.  They are such city kids and don't know how to simply be quiet so they can hear what the woods really sound like.  Maybe I'll take each one back there by themselves and really teach them how to soak in the woods like I used to at my friends' house where they had 40 acres, and only lived on 5 of those acres (maybe).  It had a large creek, beaver dam, rocks, and we were allowed to explore on our own.  I think we were like 8-12 years old or something.  Anyway, I love it!  But kids are noisy, and they fight, and they just want to play on the man made playground because they aren't used to anything else.  I make them sound bad, but we did have some great moments as well as I'll explain below.  I'm just saying that we have very city-fied kids despite my efforts to take them to every farm and natural experience I can.  I was city-fied and grew up in a suburb kind of area, but my mom loved the country and we were often enough in other less suburbia towns where we could enjoy my friends' land or horses or the hills of Deerfield and Candia and Raymond, including the Deerfield Fair (New England's "state" fair, which is held on the first weekend of October for the last 120 years or so).  Oh well, I try.  The kids will thank me later.

And yes, school is much more routine and has actually surprised me this week that they kids have buckled down and made some significant progress.  So, that makes my heart happy, too.

And we finished off the day by watching "Spiderman: Homecoming" which we got at the library on Tuesday from the "Lucky Pick" shelf near the checkout counters.  They put some copies of the newer movies there that you can't put on hold or renew.  Wonder Woman was there, too.  But, sshhhh, we will most likely getting that for Christmas, so I can wait to watch it again then.  Spiderman was one of the best Spiderman films out there.  Super, super funny!  Even Jared laughed!  And Benaiah even remarked that this is the way Spiderman is portrayed in the actual comic books because Peter Parker really is just a 15 yr old kid like Benaiah in a lot of ways.  I loved Tony Stark's involvement in it as the Dad figure.  And yes, it has swearing, but it was here and there and not all at once.  And yes, I wish they had said something else other than the "p" word when the "computer guy" friend was looking at computers in the computer lab.  Keturah wasn't allowed to watch it, and Justin has already had "the talk" and we gave him a heads up so it wasn't a shocker.  I'm not sure if we'll own it someday, but it was a really great, funny, light hearted movie, just like another Marvel movie coming out in 8 days! (Thor:Ragnorak for those that aren't into comic book movies.)  Remember, Marvel is the lighter toned more family friendly comic book movie franchise and DC is darker, deeper, more serious comic book movie franchise.  Love them both!  So, I give this movie a two thumbs up with a warning to my friends with younger kids that haven't been exposed to swearing and the other element.

Now, for the pictures of the day.  I wish I had time or even knew how to edit, but, hey, at least I have a decent camera and know kind of how to use it.  All of the pictures I upload on here are raw data files, no editing.  I don't think I would have the creative skill for that either. Onward!

Squirrel!  Justin was way down the path when we saw it though, so we had to call him back.  Huge squirrel and it moved a ton!  Not terribly afraid of us and it went over our heads to another tree!  Even Abishai saw it!

Ah yes, perfect day for a nature hike!  I don't make them get down and try to identify things.  I can't even identify poison ivy.  But I do say, "Oo, look at the shape of this leaf!  Look at those flowers!  What do you think lives there?" I'm just not the best "Charlotte Mason Nature Study" kind of person.  And that's ok!  Just being out there is the important part and being excited about what's around you.

Where did you go Mr. Squirrel?

Not as many different colors as New England, but there was a cloudless beautiful blue sky as the backdrop for the greens and yellows!

I see this backdrop most often from my friends who come down here.  We've been down here once or twice way long ago before going to Canada.  Obviously the creek, which is Buck Creek, is at one of it's lowest points for the year since it's fall.  We should come back in every season to mark the changes.

Big leaf!

There's some colors!

Testing the water to see how cold it is!  Even Abishai wanted to touch it, but barely.  He was OCD about not getting muddy and wanted us to carry him.  Our last nature walk was on vacation through some extremely muddy woods and he was carried the whole time.

The water was pretty clear though and it was flowing well.

I'm sure one of my friends can identify this, and I'm pretty sure it's a large seed like acorns but they were everywhere!  I just have no clue!  Maybe I need to get some field guides for Indiana.  Hm,...that's something to add to the Christmas wish list.

Tree growing out and then up to catch the sunlight and avoid the water.

Keturah did an excellent job of investigating what could have been a den of some kind.  She noticed a big hole in there and said maybe it belongs to a rabbit or something.  So, they do know some things about nature!

End of life for these flowers.

I should have gotten a closer picture.  These were a nice light purple flower, but I don't think they were lavender, lilacs, or lupines and I didn't think to check them.

Well, I guess we do have an official nature hiker that was a little too adventurous.  Keturah went down to the creek several times.  This time, she thought that she was going to step on solid ground underneath the moss, which was really algae, and instead, her boots sank into a foot of water!  Whoops!

Yes, we did pour water out of her boot!  Then she proceeded to go barefoot for the rest of the trail!  And she didn't complain!  Good on her!

Come on, Sissy!  Abishai wanted us to keep going and like I said, he was afraid to get too close the water and get muddy.  He felt he needed to push on though.

One boot on and one boot off.  Yes I let my daughter walk barefoot in the woods.  Be adventurous!

Mini waterfall.

Sunshine!

Justin wanted to carry Abishai, so he did for a little bit.

This position actually did not work out well.  Abishai is used to being up on shoulders and not carried like a backpack.  He didn't know how to hang on or pull himself up.  Oh well, at least they tried.

The trail is one big loop I think around our huge Southeastway Park.  In fact, when I looked it up on maps app on my phone to get our bearings from the satellite image, it looked like we were going to end up next to a farm field.  So we turned around.  There were a couple of other trail heads, too.  And there's a regular bike path around most of the park.  It's a gorgeous park with like a dozen picnic areas, two big playgrounds, and lots and lots of fields to have picnics and get togethers in.  They even have a sledding hill!  And an educational building.  It's the park where we had our wedding reception and had a few get togethers with friends from college all the way through currently.  It's a hidden gem for sure.

Ta da!  Selfie! With kids in the background!

The tree canopy.

There's some red leaves.  I think it's because Indiana has soft maples that most of our maple trees have yellow leaves.  I miss the reds though of Canada and New Hampshire.

Practicing her gymnastics bar skills!

It's at this very same park that we brought Benaiah to at approximately Abishai's age or maybe a little older and we had to coax him to go up this very same element.  Abishai didn't climb it today, but he has climbed one that is very similar to it in the past.  Benaiah screamed bloody murder and Abishai scales all the elements without fear.  This one keeps us all on our toes with his antics.  In fact, it was hard to watch the movie because he wanted to fight over dancing on the coffee table.  We had to have the subtitles on so we could understand the movie, too.  And he'll turn around and give us an evil laugh as well.  He's a handful!

Today I got to sit on the bench for the first time because I wasn't afraid that Abishai was going to fall off of the playground!  That's a big step in the life of toddlerhood when Mommy can finally back off and not shadow him around.  He as pretty please that he could scale the ladder by himself and quickly!

Go, go, go!  "I did it! Look at me, Mom! I did it! I'm big!"

Look, he's actually wearing jeans AND a belt instead of gym pants!  And he's barefoot, too, because the boots he wore are winter boots and very heavy.  And he now gets to wear the "MooTube" shirt from Cows Creamery on PEI.

Around and around she goes, barefoot!

Boo!

I'm Captain Adorable and Trouble with a capital "T"!

Uh oh, Missy got a time out like a toddler because she was fighting like a toddler and even said something very unkind within the earshot of a little girl.  We all need to work on character development.

Up the ladder, down the slide, and repeat.

Barefoot Justin.

Got my "feet in a pile of leaves" box checked off!  If you aren't on social media, then that won't make any sense.  But this a typical shot that someone will take and put up on Instagram (which is what I'm using mostly now).  I tried to get the kids to play in the leaves but they wouldn't do it.

3 kids, all independently playing on the man made playground.  At least they got some fresh air!

The first thing he told Daddy when Daddy came home tonight was that he got to swing at the park.  He swung for like 2 minutes.  But beautiful backdrop!

Typical color of leaves around here.

He's got such long skinny feet and limbs!

I'm a big boy!

Like I said yesterday, Benaiah was at school and the rain is coming tomorrow, so I got what I could.  I totally forgot about doing "first day of school pictures out here.  Oh well, maybe I'll get some against our own trees in the backyard.   No, it isn't the first day of school, but I did take some nice photos one year at the Beech Grove park with the boys leaning up against the tree and posing just right.  I take so many photos, what does it matter, anyway?  I'll put it on the list for next week.

Abishai ran straight across the green space so he could sit on a rock!  And jump from it, too!  It was really late, so I didn't make him do any fancy poses.

Watching a lady bug n the rock!

Beautious!

Ah....perfect!