Saturday, June 18, 2011

Who needs toys when.....


there are Colorado potato bugs in your midst?




My gratitude List:

I'm thankful for...

...an abandoned robin nest getting new tenants.



...new tenants giving life successfully.

....learning to use the macro button.  Now if I could just focus some of these better.


...Colorado potato bugs on seven-year-old toes.


....a lawn mower from the "lawn mower fairy" (aka my Uncle David).  We couldn't fix ours.

....a $10 ladder from a garage sale.  We've needed one for six years. 

....the first night of firefly magic.

....Miss Beth's legs wrapped around me.


...kids engrossed with mirrors and the sun (science learning in action).

...little girls engrossed with magnets and steel balls.


- the way the boys reacted upon looking out the window and finding fireflies.  Palpable glee.  They've never donned shoes so fast, nor been so willing to give up storytime (which they hold sacred).  For the first time ever, I let them catch fireflies for as long as they wanted.  They went to bed at 10:00 PM and then watched the fireflies in a jar in their room until 10:20. So far, no emotional fits today.  They are growing up, these boys.  


....this little arm, looking so kissable (at least when it's bugless)

....carpenter ants to remind me that even if the house gets eaten from the inside out by these awful creatures, we still have an eternal asset called salvation.  And it's portable.  You can take it anywhere.  Even to a tent in your backyard if your house gets eaten. Okay....maybe I'm exaggerating.  There aren't that many.  But we are thinking about an exterminator, since the neighbor told us the previous owners had to replace the dining-room roof after carpenter ants damaged it.  Yikes. 

....the garage-sale resident saying I had a beautiful family.

....sneakers on sale at Walmart for $5.  I think flip flops cause athlete's foot. I've surmised this after two years' experience. They need a pair of sneakers for play and a pair for going places.  Then they have to change their socks promptly, upon feeling any moisture.  I love laundry...and summer.   Or not.

....ice cream...because it's too hot to bake dessert...and because Walmart sells a generic version of Breyer's all natural ice cream.

...Miss Beth and Miss Mary planting radish seeds.....here and there and everywhere.  We're seventeen days late, but we have tomato plants, pepper plants, strawberry plants, squash seeds, radish seeds, corn seeds, sugar snap pea seeds (because Curious George said they were good), and bean seeds....all finally in the ground.  We should be okay, harvesting the latest things in late August.  The morning glory plants are growing well.  We planted those from seed a few weeks ago.  Those we started indoors in March died.

....Mary being so delighted by amphibians that she'll play with a toad for an hour.  I can trust her now, finally.  She just puts him here and there and watches how he moves.  Miss Beth, however, can't be trusted.  She must be sleeping for anyone to play with a toad.

...Paul going outside with paper and pencil, observing the toad while Mary played with it.  Twenty minutes later he brings me a science report all about toads...how they move, their colors, their bumps, their sounds, their eyes.  I love homeschooling!

....spray bottles of water entertaining little ones for hours.  They water this and that, spray each other, "clean" the windows, give the creatures a drink.

....being able to concentrate better when Miss Beth wakes up during my prayer time.  I can finish it, or do the whole routine in bed now when necessary....without falling asleep.  The falling asleep part is one of Satan's tactics.  I'm convinced of this.  He attacks prayer times aggressively.  

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