Company, company. Where would we be without company?

This past weekend we had some of Dad's old highschool friends down from NY. The Giardinas and Dad go wayyyyy back, and they come often in their huge long bus and visit us. Dad and Mr. Mark ended up taking off the entire counter-top, lifting it over the wall into the living room, putting on the back-splash, and then putting it back on. In the meantime the rest of us went berry-picking.

It started to rain right as we were wrapping up so we dashed to the van...only to see that it had died. It's a common problem in our home, actually. All you have to do is bang the battery with something and wiggle the wires. So I did that [in the pouring rain] to no avail [in the pouring rain.]

It was fun, by the way, though there was some danger, I suppose, of getting electrocuted. In the end we finally managed to pull a Damsel-in-Distress moment and the nice Blueberry Man gave us a jump as well as 4 bags of tomatoes, 3 bags of okra, and 4 pints of blueberries for free. :)

*win* ;)

Last night we ended up going out to dinner at the local pizza-place--a very rare treat for us! It was delicious. Absolutely delicious. All the more delicious because I knew that the next morning (this morning) I'd begin "shrinkage" and not be eating flour or sugar. 

(All right...I'm hungry now and this is looking even better than it did last night!)

Of course sitting next to the baby insures you a prime opportunity to snag the free packets of crackers for yourself...

"I'm innocent! Rah-ly I am." ;)

Sarah's 18 now...that means she gets to start wearing makeup. :)

Benj, Grace, and Abby chillin' on the front porch.

He's almost walking! Still needs a little help, but he's getting bolder.

"Would you like to see my mask?" ;)

It was a great weekend and I was so blessed that the Giardinas could come, that we could go berry-picking, that we could hang out, and then top it all off with pizza! :)

a lesson in grammar. :)

Although I'm not the world's best grammar-ist, I do have a beef about the use of "well" and "good," and I like my family to use the words properly. Nothing grates on my literary ear as much as someone saying, "Oh yeah--I was doing good until..." or "That really tastes well." *shuddering*
But I got a little over-ambitious in trying to teach the proper usage to Grace. (Age 5) Our conversation went something like this:

Me: "Gracie. You know the words 'well' and 'good?'"
Grace: "Yeah."
Me: "You say 'I'm doing well' but you don't say 'I'm doing good.' But you can say 'This food is good.' and you wouldn't say 'This food is well.'" (I am already a tad confused at this point.)
Grace: "Why?" (looks confused too)
Me: "Because that's proper English."
Grace: "What's proper English?"
Me: "The way you're supposed to say things."

A few minutes later and I decided to see if any of my slap-dash lesson stuck with her....

Me: "So Gracie...what's proper English?"
Grace: "Um....I'm not allowed to say I'm doing fine?"

Yeah...I guess 5 years old is a bit too young to teach proper grammar. :D

Playing Mama ;)

It's been a long day today...Mama, Sarah, Leah, and Levi were gone thrift-store shopping to stock up on fall clothes and take advantage of half-price Wednesday. I needed all of my butchering, bakering, and candle-stick makering skills because I had a Mama-load of tasks to do:

• Watch the kids and make sure no one Disappears or Chokes. ;)
• School the kids. I know this isn't news to you gals who have been homeschooled your whole lives but to any strangers to the idea, this means a 5th grader, a 3rd grader, a 1st grader, and a Pre-K student...all at once. I managed to cover reading The Secret Garden aloud to them, (And yes, I attempted a Yorkshire accent for Martha) science, vocabulary and spelling, and handwriting.
• Bake for the co-op--this included concocting a custom ginger-cookie recipe by combining two seperate ones, experimenting with results, and turning out 5 dozen, baking 3 dozen cinnamon rolls, (I had to make a second batch due to some being too large. *who can say, "breakfast!" ;) and 3 knotted bread loaves. It was a relatively small week, actually.
• Summon up a batch of brilliancy to get energy out of children who have been cooped up inside a lot due to excess rain in the area. (It isn't the rain, but the thunder and lightening that makes me keep them inside.)
• Make a pot of chili
• Keep the house clean
• Etc.

Of course it was tiring, and of course I had to blare Celtic folk-songs on Pandora to keep a stream of awareness in my mind, and of course there were a few discipline sessions and more than a few raised eyebrows and "You'd better not do that again" but there was a moment when I realized that it was all way worth it, and that I had been riding on God's wings of energy. That moment?
I was reading a letter aloud to the younger ones and Gracie was sitting on my lap. Her chubby little arms stole around my neck and she kissed me loudly, then proclaimed. "I'm so glad you're part of my family!"
It is totally worth the work. What better reward could I ask for? :) ~Rachel