Look Closely In Your Backyard

It is amazing what you can find in your own backyard. A couple of days ago, the kids and I went for a backyard nature walk. There is an untouched piece of wooded property behind our property line that we sneaked around in. This was where the real gems were...purple mushrooms, fallen logs covered in moss, every square inch swarming with little lives.


The children and I were on a hunt to specifically find things to decorate a riker mount with for a fall theme. The bright red seeds, holly berries, and red leaves set off the Golden Rod Grace spied. My favorite find - those purple mushrooms. Jack's favorite find was a real surprise - two surviving morning glory seeds the children had planted a couple of months back, with the first flower in bloom. We left the flower on the vine.

And voila, the finished project.

Eeeny---Meeny----Mighty----Cold

I think we've bought what would qualify as a Mini Mart drugstore. We are a prime example of how panic can set in when everyone in the entire family comes down with a rotten cold. All I wanted was one box. One box of Tylenol's Concentrated Cold Drops for Infants. But the little drops evaded us wherever we looked.

I'm not sure what these drug companies are thinking sometimes. When you are sick, and all of your little ones are hacking up green goo you can barely see straight. However, you find yourself blindly trying to pick the wonder drug of the year, while you read through a small font all of the symptoms on the box that the medicine claims to aid. With chagrin, I picked Dimetapp's Cold & Cough medicine for children, hoping I could sneak the larger liquid amount in Faith's pears or something. The medicine had a laundry list of relief for Nasal Congestion, Runny Nose, Itchy, Watery Eyes, Coughing, and Sneezing. In my stupor, I just assumed a fever would be covered too. Silly me.

Trip 1: My purchased loot.

Ken takes the next shift and goes back to the store, looking for those prized infant drops. He comes back with loads more drugs. But no drops.

Trip 2: Ken's purchased loot.
Three miserable nights, 2 empty Kleenex boxes, and more kiddie throw up later, Ken goes BACK to another store looking for the holy grail of infant cold drops. I swear these drugs can only be found on the black market. You literally need an ID to buy these bad boys.

JACKPOT and Alleluia!!! He finds the drops. In a store I have looked twice in before (when my mommy instinct kicked in and I thought I should be prepared for a week like this). In typical father style, he buys two boxes. And then he buys two boxes of other stuff. And then three more boxes of stuff for good measure. God love him.

Trip 3: Ken's purchased loot w/ the Holy Grail.
This will never, NEVER, happen again. Why? Because next time, we'll be ready. REALLY ready. You think?

So It's Not ALL Ugly

I love my birthday camera! For years, I have been trying to take pictures of my gardens that birthed beautiful flowers every year. Instead, I always ended up with a blurry mess. My old digital just couldn't hack the close ups, and many times I was entirely frustrated with the unobtainable.

I've found inspiration zooming in on God's creation. My new Panasonic (and the words of my daughter) have prompted me to tackle the gardens again and get my hands dirty this fall. Ken spotted me with a stack of gardening books and design plans and voiced an "Oh, Oh."

Oh yes. My resolve to stay in this house will be nursed by raiding local plant nurseries -- I"ll admit it. But who can say no to these beautiful blessings?

Freedom

One week. It happened in one week. On Wednesday, Faith became an accomplished sitter. Thursday, she grabbed my shirt and pulled herself up to a stand. She practices incessantly, leaning on her boppy with her booty up in the air, and her legs poker straight.

Today, practice proved perfect and she graduated from the boppy to a stool. Look at the joy in my baby girl's face! My child has been trapped in her own skin for almost eight months...unable to motor unless someone picked her up or wrapped her for rides around the house. We have endured her pain as a family. But now, she is the happiest little tyke in town.


Now that she is mobile, we are witnessing that she is as fearless as she is mobile. She's a warrior queen who chases down loud vacuum cleaners without flinching and beats them mercilessly with her fist. My own little Roomba is no more. Today, she's just raised the stakes. My Roomba has morphed into a Dyson.