He closed the book...Luke 4:20

What is this?

a. A pile of books

b. The kid section of the Near-perfect little valley’s public library

c. What The Man found under J’s covers the other night

If you chose “a” you’re taking an easy, albeit correct, route.
If you chose “b” you’re almost right about the number of books in the library smaller than our living room.
If you chose “c” you know that our son takes after his parents.

“I’m having a hard time sleeping because I hear pages turning.” is S’s way of tattling without tattling. When tucking J in at night I know to sweep my hand under his pillow on the top bunk to make sure there aren’t any contraband books. Apparently we need to do a full bed search also.

***

Ants, Part II:

On Monday afternoon the children started complaining that they couldn’t refill their water toys because the faucet outside wasn’t working. I called The Man at work to find out what I had to push or pull to get the well pump restarted. Since I could get reception on the cordless phone just outside the well house, but not inside, I would put the phone down outside while I went in to look at whatever he was trying to explain to me. Nice. On one of my trips inside the wind blew the door shut and in the darkness I could see ants sparking as they were making their trek across the switch to retrieve their dead comrades. Hmph. After using a piece of plastic to brush away all the dead ants and jiggling the switch a bit to get rid of all the others stuck in it, the well pump switched back on and we have water again.

The Man brought home some stuff to make the ants to go away…permanently. I dumped some ground cloves on the cords going into the switch. That is supposed to discourage them from using that route. We shall see. Apparently they are attracted to such electrical things.

***

Tonight we are going to the city for the kid’s final meeting at the church up there. The leaders announced at the last meeting that they are moving away.

All things work together for good...Rom. 8:28

S coined a new word yesterday: Awesomistic.

We have been studying Sword Fighting. In our daily review yesterday S was asked one of the questions, “What will you do when you are tempted to be pessimistic?”

His reply involved a mispronunciation, probably combining the intended word optimistic with pessimistic. “I will be awesomistic because it is written: ‘All things work together for good…’”

Optimistic – Expecting a favorable outcome

Awesomistic – Expecting the very best outcome

Even though it was 102.7° yesterday, the children were awesomistic they would find a way to keep cool.

Even though this was not one of the kids’ lifelike toys that was found in the utility room yesterday. I am awesomistic that it took care of any bugs that happened to be out there. I’m also grateful that I was not the one who discovered it, that it is harmless, and especially that it is now living happily in the flowerbed outside.

One more:

We discovered we had no water right before going to bed last night. The man did a cursory examination of the well house and couldn’t discover a solution. He decided whatever it was could wait until the morning light. I was awesomistic that…that…that…

This morning the man cleaned some dead ants out from around the switch on the well. We have water again. Another happy ending.

Even a child is known by his doings...Prov. 20:11

It is Friday…time to mop skate on the kitchen floor. One bucket of sudsy water + four eager kids + eight holey socks = more fun than should be allowed in the house. My floor is (somewhat) cleaner. The kids had fun. That’s what counts.

The hay appears...Prov. 27:5

Make hay while the sun shines. It sounds easy enough. Nobody ever said it was. It’s not. Most folks around here can get it from the field to barn in 3 days. Cut it one day, rake it the next, then baled and to the barn on the third day.

The man started cutting the hay 2 ½ weeks ago. He thought it was a bit too easy…until the baler broke after the first 5 bales. The parts that were supposed to arrive the next day didn’t. By the time the parts arrived it had rained. I got to re-rake the field a week ago. Since then it has either been too wet or not wet enough when the man was here, so it wasn’t until this morning that the conditions were right to get the rest of the hay baled and to the barn.

~~~

What is this?

a. bird
b. angel
c. Mom’s attempt at making a batch of cupcakes resemble an airplane in 15 minutes

J turned 9 today! His birthday celebration with the whole family was supposed to be for supper tonight, but we found out at 11 a.m. there was a scheduling mix-up and the man had to go to work this afternoon. That meant he might not be home for supper so I only had a few minutes to put the requested airplane together. J was thrilled. I won’t be looking for a job at Boeing.

...A time to plant...Eccl. 3:2

I finally got some of my seedling tomatoes in the ground today. The first batch of seeds I'd planted withered before we made it to the June 1 "safe to plant" date. I also planted a second row of hot pepper seedlings. I probably have enough to plant another 2 or 3 rows, but well...maybe we'll dissect the seedlings and look at them under the microscope.

So far in our garden we have:
onions--left over from last year
peas--planted early, but just now putting out a good crop
lettuce--used very old seed, but it seems to be coming along nicely
green beans, corn, cucumbers, squash, watermelon, cantaloupe, and sunflowers are all showing their stuff

We also have 3 rows of volunteer mystery tomato plants that were given to us. As long as they produce something before the first freeze in September or October it will be an improvement over last year's crop.