Tales of a Shoebox Princess

Not the kind you see at a baseball game retrieving Louisville Sluggers or game balls. Other Jim brought home a bat from The-Place-Where-He-Works Mart. He caught it in a cup, stashed it in his car, and brought it into THE HOUSE. A LIVE BAT. The kind that sucks blood and turns into vampires! Yes, I got pictures. Other Jim transferred it from the cup to a little mesh container that Hayley and Matt have used to collect bugs. The pictures aren't great, but I was NOT going to let the bat out of its temporary cage in the house just to get a few good pictures. I don't trust bats. They're cute and all, but I just don't trust them ever since one whacked me good on the head in Wind Cave. Plus there's the whole rabies thing. Not my cup 0' hot chocolate. The body was perhaps two to three inches long. I petted his belly through the mesh and he didn't seem to mind. Other Jim and Matt felt his toenails that were protruding through the mesh. Then we let him go outs...

A Violet is cute First the blessing, then time for to shoot. Bad poetry, how I love thee! This baby is so even-tempered! She didn't cry at all during her blessing. Vi and Grandma Mike wanted to get at least one shooting session in while we were there. He patiently showed Hayley and Matt how to shoot a pellet gun. An orange juice carton served as a target and both kids hit the target a couple of times. Hayley discovered that she has to shoot left-handed because it's hard to close her left eye to use her right eye to get the sights lined up. Get that? Neither did I. Anyway, she has an easier time shooting left-handed. Even though she does everything else right-handed. Matt's arms aren't quite long enough. This does not bode well for trombone playing. Oh well. He did hit the target. It looks like he is crying in this picture, but let me assure you that he is not. He just has his face mooshed up against the stock. My turn. I took three shots and hit the target...

So I'm in Wisconsin today and tomorrow with Jim, Hayley and Matt and Mom. I wanted to meet Violet (new niece) so we arranged to come out for her blessing at church. Violet is so very nibble-able! And such a sweet little girl!n Her eyes are open wide in the attitude of permanent surprise most of the time. And she has the funniest little cowlicks right on her prominent widow's peak. She has smiled a couple of times and fell asleep once while we watched. Right now we are getting ready to roast marshmallows for s'mores so I'm not going to make this long. In fact, this is as much as I'm going to post, especially because there is a baby to be held!

First of all, let me tell a story about the Lemonade Incident that happened just a few short months ago. Hayley and Matt had a lemonade stand one day. While filling up a glass pitcher, which had a nozzle for juice dispensing action, (and can you see where I'm going with this, the pitcher being GLASS?) Hayley somehow jostled it or knocked it or something while it was FULL of sugary sweet lemonade and popped a hole in the glass pitcher low enough to effect a full-scale lemonadey deluge in the kitchen. I happened to be writing a talk I was going to give at church at the time and was somewhat stressed out even before the juice made its way to the floor (and subsequently THROUGH the floor to the bathroom below as well). So when the breakage occurred, Jim, ever considerate of my fragile state during talk-writing times, helped Hayley clean up the mess. Today was my turn, only with CranRaspberry juice. I was driving home from taking Paul to an ortho appointment. I had Fake Child with ...

Ten things I did or someone else did that I didn't post about for a whole week. 1. Jim stained the deck--a two day process. 2. Paul ran a personal best at the Lakeville CC meet. He was 5th in on the team--it was a FAST race. Top runner came in under 16 minutes. 3. Wrangled Mom for a few hours post-surgery. The woman will not sit still. Mike, I know where you got your not-sitting-still from. Honestly! "No, we will not be going to the thrift store half an hour after you were discharged from surgery, Mother!" We did stop by the arboretum apple store, though. PS--she's fine. 4. Thought about renting a car for my upcoming trip to CA for my grandmother's 90th birthday. Postponed any action on the thought until later. 5. Saw Sr. Beck speak at a fireside and a training meeting on Saturday (I sat from 3 til 7:30 in the same chair). Learned that all you need to know to be fluent in Spanish is "Hola. Mucho gusto" and kissing Spanish women on the left cheek...

Well, THAT went well! I floated through the pasta dinner on fluffy white clouds of easiness and danced through glittery rainbows of I-can-handle-this. What made this dinner so easy compared to the last one? Two things: other people and Dan Brown's The Lost Symbol. Five other families signed up to contribute to the food so there was no underabundance and frantic casting about for spaghetti sauce. I prepped for the lasagna yesterday by grating cheese and browning the meat. Early this afternoon I made the four lasagnas and then after I washed the dishes necessary for the lasagna prep, I filled two pots with water and sat them on the stove, ready at a moment's notice (or 4:30 p.m.) to boil for spaghetti noodles. I heated up spaghetti sauce in the crock pot (on the deck--no sense in heating up the house more than I had already). Then I sat for 15 minutes to read The Lost Symbol . After 15 minutes, I cleaned for half an hour. Then I read for another 15 minutes. Then I cle...