Year 6, September 6th-9th, 2021: Cousins & Birthdays

 Monday was Labor Day of course. Justin and Keturah had slept over at Gandma's house, so they came around home between 10 and 10:30 am. Grandma went to pick up Grandpa from the airport from his hiking trip about that time as well. And Shauna took the girls to see her grandma. So everyone had some time apart for the day. Jared made himself scarce and we did some schoolwork. Yes, we did. Because we have another crazy busy week and I didn't know when else we would have the time to get some read alouds down. We needed to start our history book again, so I read the first long lesson World War 1. Phew. It's a lot to get through right off the bat. Then Abishai and I got some lunch and the other two started their independent work since they had a late breakfast. They eventually emerged again for lunch. I regrouped with Jared to see what he was up to because I was hoping he could squeeze in some yard work today, but nope, not on his agenda. I started to pull some weeds and pick up some things but I'm sore from all the walking around last week and I'm moody, too, from Sunday, so I had a meltdown and it was pretty ugly for about an hour. Jared then left for an open house for a friend who just graduated from firefighter school and took Abishai with him. Keturah and Justin finished their schoolwork and I checked it, and they got on their screens. And then I sat in the blissful silence finishing up the weekend's blog. That's down now and I'm able to get ahead for a moment before we head off to Gary and Leah's for dinner and seeing Shauna and the girls again, so Gary can see all of us in one place, lol. And then hopefully everyone can have their Bible class IN PERSON before the day ends.

As far as emotions and physical pain and life, who knows. Life is hard. Pain is cruel. Words can be uplifting of demeaning. And when your love language is words of encouragement and you haven't had them consistently for years, there comes a point in your life, you just run dry. And I'm dry. And I get a few drops thrown in my bucket here and there, but they don't last long. And then I'm dry or poured out again. And from somewhere, I have enough water in me to expel them as tears. So, I'll buck up. Put on a smile the best I can and go to dinner again. I might have to come home sooner than I want to. Or just sit on the front porch to cool off. Or, it might come down to a heart to heart. Whatever comes, comes. Relationships are messy. And some people need to know that, embrace that, and accept it. There's no such thing as a neat little Christian relationship box. Not even a pastor's family. There's no such thing. Talking things out involves anger, fear, and tears, too. There may be a perfect way to have a conversation, but it's a theory and it's only written in books. The actual conversation doesn't happen that way. EVER. Trust me. It never does. No matter how much you practice it in your head. So get over it. It's not wrong. It's called being human. I am human. I'm allowed to be angry and I'm allowed to cry. It doesn't make me less of a Christian any more than sitting and listening to my son tell me I can't be a part of his life now that he's 19. For we have ALL sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. So here goes.

 And dinner was fine. Kids played. Adults conversed. Including the young adult. Photo was taken where I looked humongous but hopefully it will only be used to be sent only to the one adult that wasn't there. Kids had their Bible class with Grandpa. Abishai told me what his assignment was, so hopefully he won't argue with me about it tomorrow. He'll go to bed soon after watching Star Wars with Daddy like a normal evening. Justin will hopefully walk Keturah home now that it got dark or someone will drive them home. And tomorrow will begin anew. I'll take Justin to his meet up with Abishai in tow and Grandma will take the girls to the bookstore. Then Shauna will take off to see relatives and I'll do some schoolwork with Abishai. Then we will carry on with our week as planned as Shauna plans to leave on Wednesday. And the men will return to work. Mini staycation over. Thanks Hurricane Ida. Back to normal life. At least we didn't have to worry about masks and all that everywhere we went. 

And I have this to look forward to at the end of this week.

Because my order was probably one of first ones, I think it was one of the first ones packed today. Yeah! Here we go! Put in the stack and ready to go in the mail tomorrow! It should only take a couple of days to get here!

Just waiting for the post office to pick it up in the morning! Way to go MWS team for working on Labor Day! Well, the team that works for a lot of the artists I assume at this point. But, still, woot! Woot! Let's go!

After a couple of weeks of better sleep, I couldn't sleep last night. I either didn't take my medication early enough, or I truly need 900mg and not 600mg of gabapentin. So I'm taking 900mg tonight. And if I run out of refills, I'll just tell the doctor what I did. But literally could not stop moving my legs and my whole body because I was fighting my emotions and thoughts and anxieties and fears and my RLS for several hours. So how I even functioned today is beyond me. Keturah went with Grandma and the cousins to half priced books and picked up some twaddle, although I told her not to. She thought I meant trinkets, but I think she knew what I really meant, and I what I really mean is books that are not good literature. Books that were written more recently that are full of today's political agendas and are not on any of my homeschool book lists. The new Babysitters' Club series or Pony Club's or the one she picked out "Spirit Animals." Blech, blech, blech. Gross. Blech. So much better stuff on our shelves at home. I even had accidentally picked out a book from the library that was twaddle. I thought it was a picture book or something and I guess it was from our Civil War studies that had finally come in, but basically it was on a transgender Civil War hero. This wasn't your typical way of telling of a girl who just wanted to fight so she dressed up like a boy so she could fight and was easily found out a little later. No, this was a book that was celebrating the fact that no one found out until this woman was found out close to her death and throughout the book she was called a man and lots of people kept her secret and she was honored as a man, etc. etc. and under the title it even toted that it was about a transgender Civil War soldier. Blech. I kept the book and put it on the bottom of Keturah's pile so she could read it and we could discuss how a political agenda can creep into a children's picture book. But I will not be reading it to Abishai. So, he got skipped over on this round of history books.

I took him to McDonald's and to the library because Justin went with Kelly and Kya to a coffee shop for a study/hang out time. Kelly was meeting up with a friend so she asked if Justin would like to go along to keep Kya company. She would have asked me, too, and it was a mutual friend of ours, but didn't want to put the pressure on the friend or me and I told her I wasn't at all offended. We all have other friendships and we all need that one on one time with each other. I'm really busy this week anyway. She and I have had some great one on one time lately. By all means, pick up my kid, take him wherever. Go, have fun. I'm good. Abishai picked out 6 new books because he had taken back 6 books he had. I picked up about 24 things I had on hold, including 2 things that they were just putting on the hold shelves to me. A few things are way too thick, so we'll see. I started the new piles of books on the bench behind the couch again. It will be fun to see how this goes again. So the morning was all jumbled up to start our school week.

Keturah got home and finally had lunch, a personal shepherd's pie Grandma had gotten her. But between too much screen time and too much cousin time and too many late nights, you can tell Keturah has gotten very short tempered. Time to get back on track. Justin returned about 30 minutes or so later. Off to our corners to finish off our schoolwork and for Abishai to start and finish. It could have gone a little better but it could have been way worse, so I'll take it. We finished on time before screen time, so I was able to return phone calls and catch up with emails and such, so I called it good for the day. Cousins went to spend time with other family at least towards dinner time. I think at some point Keturah had taken off to Grandma's house and had forgotten to tell me or take her phone, so she got an earful for that. But after that it was quiet for a long while.

I managed to put together hot ham and cheese grilled sandwhiches and veggies and fruit for dinner by 6:05. Chores were done, too. I didn't check over their homework, though. And then we waited for the cousins to come back to play Minecraft but they got back too late from visiting our relatives that we had to decide to just say good bye to them in the morning before they took off back to NOlA. Abishai and Keturah were quite disappointed, but it will help to motivate them to get up in the morning so we aren't late to ASL class. But it does annoy me to sit there for 2 hr waiting on someone and have very little communication as to when they will stop by and why they are late when I could be doing a lot of other things. And to watch your kids wait and wait and wait. And then to be told, via the children texting, that the other child is doing something with Grandpa, that could have waited until after the 6 yr old had gone to bed. Sigh. Communication. Still a problem. Always will be. So, I will keep putting my foot down and will continue to make decisions based on what's right for my family. We made a decision for Christmas and the J6 will adhere for that (or the J5 will at least). We are staying home for Christmas, Christmas vacation and New Year's. We won't be traveling and I am not packing our bags.  Plenty to see and do right here in our own city. I'm good. Someone else needs to learn to plant his feet in his own house for more than a day at a time. 

And now it's late. Again. I already binge watched TV last night and couldn't sleep. Who knows what tonight will bring. There's a pretty big thunderstorm happening outside. Jared is going to help Jim fetch a truck from Illinois tomorrow. He's using a personal day. And because Jared isn't talking to me again, he sent me a gmail calendar invite. Ok, fine, whatever, good to know. At least there's some kind of communication. Ready for mine? I have plenty of things to share. Be ready to accept them onto your calendar. Then you'll realize how busy I am. 

Onwards to the middle of the week.

When I went to bed (really late again) Tuesday night, I thought, how strange, the garage door is open and the light is still on. Justin must be putting his stuff away. He sometimes stays up until midnight, but not until the time I was going to bed. So I called out for him. Well, he wasn't around. The child had gone to bed without finishing his nightly routine! Yes! Some days I think his ADHD is getting worse, not better. He is taking his meds most school days now, but it also wears off. I think next time we see the doctor (which I think is next Tuesday), we are going to bring up maybe trying a non steroid round the clock medication. But Justin left the light on, his water bottle, and the table. I thought that maybe he would be at least thirsty and looking around for his water bottle first thing in the morning, but nope, he came into the kitchen without a clue. I had to show him what he had done. I did shut the light off and closed the door before I went to bed but I left the table and water bottle right where he left them. Oh, Justin, what ARE we going to do with you?

Isn't this the truth? I grieve a lot. I didn't know back in my 20's that I would. But after my parents died, I changed some and then after moving back to Indiana from PEI and that whole crisis, I really learned about it. Not to mention my whole health journey that went along with all of this. Growing up is hard. Grief is part of it.

Oh, just an example of one of those nights I can't sleep because my brain won't shut off or my legs are restless or both. Sometimes I just have to write out my thoughts while I have no interruptions. I think I was using speak to text that night and it worked really, really well. I plan to do that again instead of just talking to God. It helps me process and then I have notes to go over with my counselor.

Oooo, this is interesting to note because as I'm typing this several days later, just a couple of days later, President Biden declared he wants to require all employers with 100 or more employees to mandate that their employees get the Covid shot or be tested weekly for the virus. There is no precedence for this and many governors are protesting this.

Not sure if this is on purpose or not. I think some of it is because well meaning people are actually living together and not getting married, too. It's so sad. So very sad.

I took photos of the bathroom to help me when I go to the home store to buy paint for it. And then, I forgot I took photos and didn't it make it a priority to go because I realized we are out of money. Uh, ok then. But this is one of the biggest fights Jared and I have right now. 4 years of this being like this. I want it done. We've had the money from our tax refunds every single year and then we ended up spending it elsewhere. It's not that hard to do the painting part. Fixing the whole and doing the light fixture is a little more difficult. Doing something with the bottom cabinetry is a little extra side project. But a basic handyman could do it. But really, I'm so over it. For all the chemicals and trees he has bought for the outside, we could have made over this bathroom many times. I can't take photos in here because the yellow and the way the bulbs reflect in the mirror just isn't good. Blech.

Since Grandma took the girls book shopping and Justin went with his friend and her mom to a coffee shop, Abishai and I went to McDonald's for a little lunch treat. He couldn't play on the play equipment, but he was hungry and ate his whole 6 piece chicken nugget happy meal and the pull apart donut I bought him. I had the usual burger without a bun and cafe mocha. No fries this time because the lady didn't hear me right, but I didn't get charged so no worries.

The pull apart donut looks incredible! I can't eat it because of the gluten, but wow!

Going....

....going....

.....going.....

....super yummy....

.....gone!!!! Plus he ate his whole Happy Meal!

Fun table to sit at. Press your hand anywhere and the lights change!

They had the figurine display up again at the library entrance.

They now have the Mandolorian figurines! Sweet!

At least they opened up the tractor again. But they mask mandate is back this week at the library.

We have this poster as bookmarks, and we love them.

He wasn't done looking at his new books so he stayed in the car to finish.

Still not done.

Ok, I'm done with Misfits organic produce delivery service. I know it's still hot out, but whoever they partner with for the actual delivery service is beyond ridiculous. Maybe they don't use a cooling truck. Or maybe it's traveling too far. And this time it sat on the porch for an hour because I forgot. But are you kidding me? Berries shouldn't come to me with mold on them. And they shouldn't leak either. The guy had to turn the box upside down because of the leakage. And everything was sticky and wet and I had to clean it up. I'm going to at least skip the next few weeks. And I might cancel it altogether. I'm so tired of moldy produce. I'm going back to just buying from the grocery store. It won't be organic. I haven't been buying the leafy greens anyway. I got tired of making salads. We have to get milk anyway. And we can always make a pitstop on the way home from ASL on Wednesdays or something. Enough is enough. Gross.

This is not fun to clean up. Ewww.

Wednesday was ASL day. We were all pretty tired, so I think that's all we did. I had reschedule Socks' appointment, so we went home and finished schoolwork and had screentime. Shauna and the girls drove home that day and it took them exactly 12 hrs. They barely stopped, and Shauna said she wasn't speeding. I guess Jared and I take longer stops or something, especially for food. I think our food stops are at least an hour. I am slow. But our backs need it, too. And, we are going to have to continue to remind others for a very long time that we can't drive for more than 4-5 hrs per day for the foreseeable future. No more long trips. I guess I can, but Jared would have to fly. I can't fly without a Covid vaccine or negative Covid test. So Jared could fly while someone else drives the rest of us somewhere. Point is, we have to stick closer to home for awhile. Staycations it is. And that's ok. Anyway, Justin had his small group of course. They decided to start meeting before the official kick off night at church. Oh yeah, Jared went with Jim to Illinois to pick up a special work truck or something near Peoria. They took a little diversion through Waynesville where Gary's first church was and where Gary and Leah and the boys were for about 8 years before coming to Indianapolis. Jared sent a photo and I was the only one who couldn't identify the building in it, lol. I wasn't part of the era obviously. But Jared had fun showing Jim the place that Gary speaks of every so often. But driving that almost 4 hr trip one way and then 4 hr trip back did a number on his back. Well, buddy, you know your limits. I'm not sure why you agreed to do it. Live and learn I guess.

The anticipation is building for the new Michael W. Smith album, Worship Forever, coming out on Friday and the TBN special that is also airing that evening.

Amen. It's not a question about IF kids are getting socialization, it's a question about what KIND of socialization are they getting. And that's the difference the others see, especially employers and professors, in homeschool vs. public schooled kids and young adults. Homeschooled kids typically can converse with a wider range of ages and look adults in the eye while public school kids clam up and hide behind their screens and don't have a clue. It's a fact now.

I do not like car schooling one bit because everything goes everywhere and when you have a wiggly kid, it's even worse. But we managed to get most of the work done today while the older kids were in ASL. We are hoping that next week, if we get our work done on Monday and Tuesday, then we can go to the ball pit place on Wednesday instead of working on homework. We'll see!

Abishai wanted to make his own bowl of oatmeal for lunch. I told him to turn off the water in time, but he didn't obey and now his raisins and oats are nowhere to be found. I made him drink the water and eat everything though. And he did just fine.

I moved this sign I made when Benaiah started high school to the dining room window side because I was sharing it's meaning with the other teens today. Justin was complaining about being hungry after ASL class. Well, if he had gotten up earlier and had a better lunch, he wouldn't have been hangry. He has to learn to use his alarm clocks. I can't keep doing it. It's especially hard on ADHD brains, but we have to keep trying and doing.

Waynesville Christian Church, Waynesville, IL. Jared said there was a towns lady riding up and down on a golf cart looking at them weird like "what are you guys doing looking at the church building?" They didn't want to have to explain themselves, so they just left. But yup, this is it. I don't remember it being like this. I thought I had visited once a long, long time ago. But maybe I went in on the backside. I don't know. I think it was for their 50th anniversary or something. I'm not sure.

Abishai's been into fort making all week.

Well, we never had them there in the first place because of the second reason. Jared isn't 100% on board with this, which is the frustrating part, but at least it's true for me. No way would I send kids to school. Not 15-20 years ago and not this year either. Not while I'm alive. No way.

Thursday was field trip day, just Abishai and I to Homeschool Bug Day, and it was Justin's 16th birthday! Woot! Woot! It was a very busy, crazy day and we crammed a lot of stuff in, leaving us very, very tired. I think it might be easiest if I put a lot of what we did for bug day as captions with the photos but I'll explain a bit here and then tell you what Justin and I did that afternoon. I'm glad it was a bit cooler in the morning so I could wear longer pants and keep any biting things off my legs. I did spray my neck and arms though with some bug spray because I didn't know if we would be in the woods or not. We were super early, which was fine. They split us up into 3 groups, because there were 50 people participating. In our group, we had some church folks, our special needs director, and her 3 kids and her friend with her 3 kids, and of course several other moms and kids. They all had a blast playing and learning together. And the 3 IndyParks leaders knew to keep things moving along. Katy aka "Katydid" and "Corndog" were two of their names. Sweet people. They said they couldn't do the full fledged Bugfest for the public because it attracts 2,000 people and that's two many people to handle with the Covid numbers right now. I don't blame them. We had several stations, the pond for dipping nets into, the prairie for field sweeping, a DIY arts and craft time and a bug show and tell (where Abishai petted a hissing cockroach. Ewww!!! No thank you. Not after watching Fear Factor for years when they dump those things all over you. Nope. Nada. It was a 2 hr program and done very well. Abishai couldn't decide what his favorite part was. He had been skeptical sat first, but he obviously enjoyed it. 

After that, we came home for lunch. Then I took a shower to get the bug spray off. Finally around 2:30, Justin and I hit the streets. I guess I've now started a tradition that I will be the one to take the newly minted 16 yr old to take the written test to get their driver's permit. If you aren't doing private lessons, then you take the written test at age 16 and if you pass it, you get your permit. Then you log 50 hrs on the road, do the actual driving test, and if you pass that, then you get your actually license. Oh and you can't get that until you are also 16 years and 9 months old. So, one step at a time. He had studied hard and felt ready, but got down to the 46th question and had gotten the maximum 6 questions wrong so he failed. Most people fail the first time. So now he has to wait to try again until next week when we have time and the BMV is not crazy busy and/or it's open again. But at least I got him down there on his birthday to give it a try. No big deal. Benaiah didn't pass this test either.

I still took Justin to the next stop, It's a Block Party, as promised. I hadn't been to the buy/sell/trade Lego store yet. You should have seen his eyes pop out when we entered the store. He absolutely loved it! We wondered the teeny tiny store for easily an hour. It's an addiction. I saw a single grown man in there rifling through mini figure pieces like a little kid. I saw an adult our age with a kid about Abishai's age and sounds just like him, telling his Dad to look at this or figuring out how to buy that. It was insane. But oh so much fun. Justin did end up asking if they had any job openings and the young lady said no, and handed us the manager's business card. So Justin plans on calling him on Monday. I would have been embarrassed and left the store immediately. But I'm glad he was bold. That was also part of the agenda as soon as he hit 16. So mission accomplished there, or at least the first step.

After the local Lego store, we made a quick stop at Kroger for some prescriptions and to drop off some recycling, and then headed home. Unfortunately, birthday boy didn't get to play any video games because it was soon time to have birthday dinner with the grandparents. Justin didn't tell me what he had told Grandma to make, so it was a complete surprise. He had picked out Pennsylvania cabbage, which is cabbage, rice, cream cheese, and summer sausage. I think we also had fruit and regular salad, too. And for dessert he wanted not any old cheesecake, but New York cheesecake with the special glaze. So Grandma made it FROM SCRATCH. Oh yes she did! And she made it without a crust for me. Yummy! What she forgot to do was remind Benaiah to be there, so he made plans to go out. Thankfully, he did cancel those plans. I totally didn't think about reminding him. I guess I just assumed that he knows his brother's birthday by heart and that he would think to check with the family first. Or maybe he had been around enough to overhear plans being made because he lives over there? Maybe? Possibly? I guess not. I don't think any of us are used to this young adult thing yet. We all assume it's somebody else's job to remember the other person's social calendar and set up reminders. Nope. You know your brother's birthday is coming up. Put it on your calendar. Memorize it. Family first. Always.I can't emphasize that enough and that's what annoys him. But my parents didn't have to beat it into me. I just knew that from when I was a little kid and I grew up in church, too. "Honor your parents" "Children obey your parents" "Don't rebel" "Respect your parents" "Be nice to your siblings" are all things I heard in Sunday School, at youth group, in books a read, whether as teen devos or as themes in regular books or even on TV shows like Full House. Not so much anymore. It's, "Whatever I want, when I want it, and I don't care what you think." And yes, even in Christian circles. And yes, even in my own social circles. And yes, sometimes out of my own mouth. But AFTER I've spent weeks and months considering all the alternatives and beating myself up for even thinking differently than my peers and elders. Trust me. It's never rebellion on the spot. Never ever. And it's very specific and as discreet as I can make it. 

Anyway, teenagers, young adults. They be the death of my mind. And the newly minted 16 yr old is no different because he's got my anxiety, too. So not only do I carry my own anxiety and adhd and can't figure it out, I carry his as well. He needs a better counselor. Not a behavioral therapist. Not a counselor like mine. Something in between. But that takes money. Money we don't have. So I don't know. It's back to me bearing the burden. And it's exhausting. Poor 16 yr old. And now we have to find the time and space to take him back to the BMV AND apply for a job. The summer is behind us. I said that we would wait until he turned 16. He turned 16, so LET'S GO NOW. Maybe Dad can take him around to some stores not this weekend but perhaps the next or something. I can try or Dad can try to get him down to the BMV a couple of afternoons or first thing in the morning this week. And Dad has to take him to the church parking lot to do the initial driving things. I refuse to do it. I will take him the back roads to Greenfield, fine, but not until he's got a few lessons in with Dad. My anxiety can't take that. Nope. Plus, I don't have time. I get more done than some of the others, so it's more precious. Jared can come home on his lunch hour and teach him every day for a couple of weeks. But alas, will it happen? I don't know. Because with Jared, you don't know if anything will actually get done in a timely fashion. Or maybe I'll drive him to church for his "lesson" and Jared will then have to teach him and then I'll drive him back home. That's an option. After he gets the permit. I'll try to get that done myself. Sigh. It's like molasses over here trying to get the boys aka men to do anything. Drives me insane! Do you think God's been trying to teach me patience all these years? Or is God trying to teach these men to get some "hurry up and go" in their life? Hm,....

Nice! I love preview days!

Ok, then. And it's true. For whatever reason, none of us had any desire to watch the Summer Olympics. I was just too busy to care. And I got enough gymnastics/swimming and even horsemanship during my childhood to last me my whole life. Back in the day, my sister was nearly an Olympic level gymnast so we knew a lot of the big names of the sport in the 1990's. And we watched a lot of the swimming, too, because of the other sister. And of course I would try to watch some of the horsemanship for me. I did see that the Canadian Women won their first Gold Medal in Soccer though. That was cool. I'm not sure what our friend is referring to, though.

Because there would be 2,000 people that would come out for their annual Bugfest, IndyParks didn't do it last year or this year because of Covid. Instead, this year, they just offered a Bug Day for homeschoolers and also a box of stuff you could also rent/buy from them, too. They've had the boxes for a few years now, which is pretty cool. IndyParks has been very good to homeschoolers over the years, so I always try to attend things when I can. Next year, if I can't get into the maple syrup one, I will make my own field trip with them. Anyway, Bug Day is at Southeastway, so it's an easy one for us to get to. I only signed up Abisahi because I knew that the others would be very, very bored and whiny. Abisahi was a bit whiny at first, too. Not sure why. Maybe because we've been gone so much with the cousins and all. But he did say at the end that he did have fun and he couldn't decide which activity was his favorite. Nice angle here with rainbow aura looking out over their pond.

Not tadpoles but little fish down there. Sweet!

Katydid, aka Katy, one of our leaders at the Pond Dip station. She was very enthusiastic about all things bugs! We had kids from 2 yrs old in carriers up to 10 or 12 yr olds, but mostly in the 8 yr old range and they actually knew a lot about bugs already. I was thoroughly impressed with their vocabulary. I don't know that my kids would have been able to come up with the right words.

Time to gear up with some nets!

Careful, don't go to far in! Too late, his shoes were covered in mud! Thank goodness later on we went through the prairie grass and it helped to wipe a lot of it off. I did more of the pond dipping just because I could reach out further. Abishai didn't like getting his hands all muddy either.

We did find some itty bitty creatures and some bigger ones from water striders (spiders) to crayfish to dragonfly nymphs.

There's the water strider.

Our next station was doing a field sweep in the prairie near the big sledding hill. Normally we would leave these areas alone, but today it was ok to take a different large net with a cloth bag on the end of it and bang on the plants to get the insects to drop into the bag. It took a lot of effort, but Abishai was all in for doing it well.

He loved looking through the magnifying cages at the insects like we have at home.

Working on field sweeping.

Gorgeous day to be outside, especially in the cooler morning hours.

So many cool critters were found!

We then did a DIY craft station with coloring pages and making clay insects with googly eyes. Some of the kids are very talented and love working with clay. We, um, don't do it that often, so our dragonfly was pretty simple. After that, we headed to our last station which was show and tell with some live bugs like a hissing cockroach and a monarch butterfly.

Our last leader explained how she caught this monarch and was able to tag it with a special tag through a special program that she registered with as an individual person so if someone finds this monarch and reports it to the website, they can follow the migration patterns. The organization sends you the special tags because obviously butterflies wings are super sensitive. You can hold a monarch though a special way and not hurt them though. You can't do that with the majority of butterflies. You can also grow a special flower garden for butterflies. And on Saturday a Native American was telling us that you can't find milkweed in Indiana anymore so there's a push to give away free seeds to repopulate it here for the monarchs.

Either I'm missing some photos that didn't load or I didn't catch it, but Abishai petted a hissing cockroach, too. Ewwww!!!! I guess they don't bite you or sting you, but still, ewwwww!!!! No thanks! I don't want to go anywhere near those things after seeing way too many episodes of 1,000's of them being dumped on people in clear plexiglass boxes on the Fear Factor TV show. No thank you!

Um, yeah. There's too many curriculum choices, too many co ops and support groups, too many options for everything, too many field trips, too many methods. It can be very overwhelming to the new person.

We bought new dishcloths and towels at Aldi's last night because a lot of ours have worn through (they do that after 20 years of use), so I did take the time to pull the old ones to use as rags and put the new ones in properly.

Same with new oven mitts. It's such a bummer that well water ruins white things. All my stuff looks dingy even after washing it no matter what we use for filters and salt and cleaners. Oh well. Time for new things that aren't white.

Justin's first time in "It's A Block Party" local new/used/trade Lego store. His eyes got really, really big as soon as we walked into the teeny tiny store. The footprint of the store is tiny. The inventory is jam packed to the brim! I'm sure they do plenty of business and we keep spreading the word the best we can. His favorite part was the custom mini figures. He kept going back to them over and over again.

Hey, I know that old set! Actually, did I take a photo of it the last time I was in here? We have that set at home, lol. Justin said that any Lego set with just 4 numbers is an old set, maybe prior to 2000? Anything with 5 digits is much newer. Good to know, Justin. You ARE the Lego expert.

Grandpa said, "They were on sale!" Grandma said, "I was saving those for Keturah's birthday NEXT year!" Grandpa was kind of rushing dessert because he knew Jared had to leave. But Justin wasn't done with his dinner quite yet. And he didn't even have the cheesecake in front of Justin before he let it. Slow down! Wait for Grandma to find the right candles next time and the right NUMBER of candles. Granted, they don't know that I don't normally do anything at home anymore for dessert because we always get leftover cake and such and we don't have parties for the big kids anymore, but still, he's 16, not 6, and he's a HE not a SHE. Justin claimed he was ok with it, but he was just trying to keep the peace, too, unlike me or threw a fit on my birthday.  He's better than me, that's for sure.

Happy 16th birthday to the goofiest, most compassionate, most compliant, most peace loving, friendliest, nerdiest, geekiest, tender hearted, dreamer I know.

Midnight has come! (And you are only getting to see the midnight pics because I loaded these the next day of course). "Worship Forever" has finally been released! Not that it's been a long time coming because 6 weeks is a very, very, very short turn around time, lol. But time to give it a spin!

Countdown is over! Ok, fine, it wasn't midnight anymore, it was more like 2am, because it was quiet. I need quiet. And I sacrifice sleep for it being quiet and not being able to see all the dust and clutter.  Some moms will understand this.

The End