Sleep

When will I learn to go to bed earlier and not read, or talk with the daughter on the phone, or talk to the rest of the my kids late at night??? I know that sleep will not necessarily happen with zee bebe who unpredictably gets up, the geriatric dog who might need something, the asthma child who might need something, my own sometimes inability to sleep, and then......I regret not getting more sleep. With nothing on my plate this morning I was hoping for the chance to sleep in but then I forget all the rest of the possible interruptions. 4:30am dear little one gets up. Is it teeth again? Asthma child was mad last night so I could not get him to take his allergy meds after he stomped off and fell deeply asleep....non-restful breathing from upstairs.

Well, they are all up once again now. I am contemplating my next move. Hmmmm.....twelve hours till perhaps I behave myself and go to bed!!!?????

Weeding addiction continues

I should post pictures of the result. The kids actually made great headway on the vegetable garden this morning. It is looking pretty good. Now I am trying to tackle the mulching so we don't have to weed quite so often. Buckets of sweat pour off and of course now I have a headache. I still want to get back outside and weed some more. Sweat equals a certain degree of mind weeding too. Helps. There is much on the brain with most of it good so....keep weeding.

We try to chill out at the pool almost every afternoon to cool off a bit. I could just live in the pool. Seeing all the young girls in their bikinis almost makes me want to find one to go.....weed in. Don't drive by. I haven't done nearly enough sit ups.......oops.....perhaps I shouldn't do that.

Daughter dear is back from Aspen or rather back in California. She has had a great summer. Perhaps I am getting used to talking to her on the phone. Sigh. No doubt I need to get pretty used to that.

Missing my slaves

Aka children. Three are at Higher Things this week, which is always very awesome for them, and one if spending her summer away. This week reminds me of the good ol' days when no one was quite old enough to watch the baby, the lawn was a foot high, the dishes were always behind, the floors were disgusting, the laundry piled high. Or.....was it? I don't really remember but my older kids are very helpful and things usually appear more put together than now. I am practicing my "I can't worry too much about this" mode. Oh....my husband has been gone all week too so that just adds to the paralyzing atmosphere. He usually puts most of the short people to bed. He is also good for baby holding and calling the escape artists back to the kitchen to clean up the chaos in there.

When everyone returns they won't know what hit them. I will seriously not care if they don't do anything but watch the little ickle Evans and keep him out of harms way, if I can only move around a bit and attack the needs. Exhausted husband returns this evening and kids tomorrow night. Anna doesn't return till mid August, if only just for a few weeks or less.

My kids dressing the baby

I spend a lot of time weeding out (there is the weeding word again) the clothes which are too small for Evan. Somehow they get back in the laundry and back in his drawer. He has plenty of clothes but when I send my young men to get the little feller dressed, they reappear with clothes which are WAY too small and squished on his body. They pause and look at me, "So Mom, is this outfit okay?" as my eyes glaze over. I do get perplexed they can't see the onesie stretched over his body and him looking nice and content in spite of it all. I will try to reweed the drawer again and quickly remove it.

These clothes also end up in....my drawer, Charley's drawer and everyone else's drawer. Big kids stuff in little kids drawers and then the best thing is.....the kids put these clothes on and don't notice?????!!!!! But Mom! That shirt WAS Martins! Um.....yes, three or four years ago!

Laundry sorting turns into a scavenger hunt. Gotta love it. So ends another post on my exciting life.

Next coffee discovery

I was thinking about coffee with cinnamon and when I was out weeding etc., walked by my chocolate mint plant, it came to mind that crushing up some leaves and putting those in with my coffee might work. It did. It was yummy. Try it. You will like it. If you don't like it, that is okay with me too. :P

Conversation

So Karin has developed a high disdain of gossip and.....I could write a comedy sketch on some aspects. My current cute little, theory is that gossip has been around a long time (duh) but that the internet has compelled us to make the old phrase "none of your business" defunct or something. Guarding ourselves from not having to chime in and give our opinions about everything is certainly a trick but.....things like facebook (which I do enjoy) and blogs (which I do enjoy) can encourage us to stick our nose in more than perhaps is helpful. We don't have to help everyone *get it* in life. We are separate people and separate families and that is okay. I'm beating a dead horse on this theme but seriously, the freedom to bash and form opinions of what is best for other people, other people's vocation choices and how they manage their lives is simply amazing. If we think we are doing the best managing our own lives and are offended by other people saying what they think we are up to, then it just doesn't seem to translate to respecting other people's lives, vocations, family decision etc.

Examples - what music people listen to and enjoy. NOT my problem.

How someone is managing their children and marriage.....feel free to pray but meddling in other people's business during a party for entertainment(????) or to make ourselves feel better about ourselves is just......sort of not recommended.

Healthy boundaries are just a good thing. Be who you are and be happy for yourself??? Repent???? Yep. If someone else does not handle their life as perfectly as you???? Lol!!!!! Repent of your evaluating skills!!! We all do it. This is one reason I love a good bike ride alone where I can reflect on how things are going etc and continue to work on the boundary job. So....when Karin knows everything, make sure to give me the popularity award. Ha ha....I am laughing! If you can't laugh at yourself.....well.....good luck with that.

This is directed at.....ME! Continued reflecting on Mr. Not Always Very Obvious.

Kids coming and going

Last week was um......interesting. I am very happy for my Scouts who had an awesome week at camp though. Matthew was acting up a storm which fortunately was caught on video tape for the final campfire. Martin spent the campfire as Harry Potter himself. I am wondering if any of that got caught on tape. They belong to the most awesome troop in the area and have several friends who also have joined which makes it all the better.

Now they are home for two days including today, and then take off to Higher Things with their older brother Erik. I am sure they will have a wonderful week there too. I am looking forward to having most of our family back together. I can't lie. Anna does not get back till the middle of August so there is something more to look forward to.

I am returning to my old bike route this week as the hills carve off more marble chub than the flat lands. Maybe someday some chub will leave. Argh.

Ba deep, ba deep, that's all! (for now)

Just don't start weeding the woods

Fighting the good fight against poison ivy, daylilies and that wild rose stuff. Evan and Ingrid went to bed pretty early this evening and the rest of the family went to the Boy Scout closing campfire. Being completely alone with Round Up in hand I covered as much of our ten acres as possible. Poison Ivy be gone. It actually was not as bad as I thought it would be but there are a few spots which the kids love which were thick with poison ivy. I probably have not walked up that hill in ten years. Wow. Who would of thunk that ten acres was not traveled all the time. There is a well laid path which the kids have kept clear. I spent time thinking about lots of things. One was of when I would take Anna and Erik in the woods with me. Now they take younger kids into the woods with them. I think I better revisit this little jaunt with my kids.

Feeling rather mellow and frankly sad. Can not elaborate at the moment but being outside in the woods alone can allow for the peace and quiet to think about lots and lots of things. Friends I love and miss. Friends who hurt and I wish I could remove their hurt. I went to coffee with friends last night and we talked about quite a bit of hurt. The irony of much of our hurt and how we handled that. Sigh. Weeding and Round Up time is pretty reflective and not just satisfying in the end result. At any rate both weeding and Round Up have resulted in productive thinking and sometimes not so productive.

So ends another day on the Horner Ranch. I am thankful that one day there will be an end to these sorrows, and right now I am hanging onto the joys I do have in this life. Little Stefan and Ingrid clamoring around me at the pool and fighting over me too. That is not always pleasant but at the same time their little sweet arms and legs bring me deep sighs. Sometimes the reality of their little selves just goes deep and at times, time stands still and I just deeply enjoy watching them play and interact etc. That part of my day was very, very good. Sigh.

Personal Fitness Badge

My dear sons have landed themselves with the Personal Fitness Merit Badge counselor who thinks this badge is a way to fulfill his dream of being a drill sergeant. After twelve weeks of tracking their improvements in particular fitness activities, they now have to bike six out of seven days for another twelve weeks. This badge has become intense.....I think. I am going to attempt to go with them every day or at the very least go with Charley every day for twelve weeks and see what happens. I have never heard of a badge being this.....serious. Perhaps I will finally be able to chip off some more chub through this. Can I get an honorary badge???

Shutting up is hard to do

There is that part of Evening Prayer (I think) which says something about guarding the doors of our lips. Oh yes. SOOOO hard. No wonder we need to pray that often. Keeping to myself and learning habits of shutting up may sound ideal but are frankly the bane of my existence. Challenging. I am somewhat a think outlouder but I see where that does not serve me or mine the best all the time. I have nothing ill to say but sharing personal stuff in a haphazard way does not serve me or my family well either!!!! Is it the internet which gives us some compulsion to let it all hang out??? Sometimes I am asked things about Charley's job and such and I am caught off guard as I haven't even been thinking about it so.....have to figure out what to say on the spot I guess. That is just an example of where shut up is the better plan. I don't HAVE to fill everyone in on our life and there are ways to answer questions without offending too....I think....

My husband also is such a man. Men at times do not get women. Lol! Poor guy. Had hilarious musings about what in the world Solomon did with all those women in the same household who could all be misunderstood at once. Poor, poor Solomon. Poor, poor Charley. So sad. What a bad day dad had. It probably would be simpler for him to just knock me over the head when I am feeling confused. Then everyone else would be confused but it most likely would be more effective communication and put him out of his misery faster. Hmmmm......

So....learning to not let myself and mine hang on my sleeve as if I owe anyone outside of my family something is a hard skill to learn. My first Pastor in my married life was probably too good at this privacy thing and I often wondered why but.....I can see benefits to both ways of living. So confused. I better go weed some more and contemplate how much nicer the garden is looking with my new found weed addiction.