Lazy Summer Days

Honeybees on a sunflower

The joys of being a boy in the summertime with a bicycle

Getting a little help from Geof

Audrey is reading about the Orphan Train.

Most of our children are the deep chocolate eyed sort. Trevor and Logan are of the hazel variety. Trevor looks very much like Logan did as a baby and seems to have the same whimsical personality.

Clark

A common sight

~Pictures by Shannah

This picture only needs to be described with one word, "Clark"!

Trevor

Poor Maria had herself all psyched to get her driver's license test taken today. We find out upon getting there that the lady behind the counter wasn't listening to my question when I had stopped by there the other week to ask it. I could tell by the look on the woman's face back when I stopped that I had about 15 seconds to get my question out of my mouth, because she was preoccupied with whatever it is that government workers are preoccupied with when no one else is even in the building. I had asked her if Maria would need her driver's permit renewed in order to get her license since it had expired a couple weeks ago. She told me, "Not as long as it isn't over 6 months expired." Had someone else been standing there, she would've then summons them with a, "Next..."

You would think the computer system would've flagged Maria a note when she went online to schedule the appointment to take the test that her permit was expired and therefore was not able to process her request. She had to enter in all the numbers from the permit she had, so apparently there were some records kept by someone somewhere. In these modern times surely it wouldn't be that difficult to write a computer program that would notice these sorts of things.

Sooooooo, this means a couple more drives to town and across town since the powers that be thought it was wise to keep all these offices in separate locations around town to secure the permit and license. It's only time and money, right?????

Lesson learned about permits and driver's licenses for the next children: make sure the last permit they get is renewed so as not to expire before their 18th birthdays!

The preparing for the license was a bunch of fun, though. Logan and she set up milk crates in the driveway to practice maneuverability. Most of us tried our hand at going through, amusing the bystanders! Maria was so determined to pass this part of the test!

I had to chuckle a bit today after all this license disappointment. The girls and I stopped by Blake's shop for a couple minutes. Blake was lying under a small car, parts all around him on the ground. Blake affirmed that I was seeing what I thought I was seeing: quite a few chunks of concrete lying amidst the largish parts he had removed from the underside of the car. Apparently the driver of the car had made some mismove in a Walmart parking lot. Blake shrugged his shoulders as if to say, "Don't ask, I don't know what the guy did either." Opps, I suppose a driver's license doesn't necessarily make you a GOOD driver.....

~Colleen

Maria Nicole Yoder

Her birthday was on the 20th! I guess I am running a bit behind!

Audrey Rosanna Yoder

Sorry, It's a little late! Even though her birthday was on the 6th you can wish her a Happy Birthday anyway!!!=)

The details in these pictures are amazing!

Signs, Signs, everywhere are signs

As a family we go over our collective lists of things to do and creative brainstorming as we sit together at the breakfast table. We discuss all sorts of things---who's going to town, who's staying home, who's turn it is to run the cream separator and when---those sorts of things. One morning the matter of Garth's banty family came up.

Paul's dad has a little shop building where he packages his bed hardware orders to leave for the FedEx truck. It's generally HIS domain and none of the rest of us broach that space (unless we need to borrow his tape, his boxes, his 2 wheeled dolly cart, or his phone book....). Garth's banty family apparently held no regard for that unspoken line of trespass and were making themselves a bit of a cleanup nuisance, if you know what I mean. We all decided we'd better strike upon a workable solution to the problem before Poppy had to resort to some drastic measure.

It's pretty standard thinking at our house that sometimes the most ingenius ideas are born out of the most absurd suggestions. Maybe that's why we ended up with the idea of posting a sign at the door of the building where the chickens would easily see it. We scrapped all the wording combinations until Logan announces with mock finality, "Duh! All's you have to write is: No Shirt, No Shoes, No Service." As chickens have none of these, the prohibition of their admittance would be obvious.

Right?

~Colleen

Degreasing the Weezer

It's funny how some little thing will trigger a memory of something else. Back when our older children were little my dad would call me up and wonder if I was greasing the Weezer. That was his way of asking how things were going. My dad's like that, few words steeped in thought.

Tonight I was peeling Clark's clothes off and putting him into the bathtub. He had spent the evening down at Blake's shop "helping". He was absolutely coated with black grease. That kind of grunge leaves me with but one thing to do: wash him with dish soap. The bottle, afterall, does say "Gentle on hands. Hard on grease".

As I was washing him up (a little less successfully than most mothers would wish) it suddenly occurred to me that I was, this time, DEGREASING the Weezer. LOL. Clark is alive and well even if he's a very busy little person. Actually, I think the child is on his way to future mechanical genius if I don't say so myself.

The baby powder he's been puffing out in great plumes all over the house isn't merely the childish idiocy I initially thought it was. You see, he's been doing it for quite some time and only a week or so ago his vocabulary improved enough that he was able to effectively convey what he's really been thinking about when he does this. It hit me one day that he was saying, "It's smoking, it's smoking!" He's been telling me that Blake's friend Dwayne's truck stacks "Smoke" like that for quite awhile. It took ME a while to make the connection. Clark had it all figured quite some time ago!

There are so many worse things in life than a little grease and baby powder.

~Colleen

So, how does one raise boys without lawn mowers???

The boys have spent literally ALL DAY tinkering with lawn mower engines. Now, as a mom I do NOT understand very much about these things, but it is interesting to watch a bunch of little boys' enthusiasm as they get a non-running engine to run!

Half the fun of mowing the yard around here is fixing up the mower. Ironically, I haven't been able to excite the right people about actually planting a yard where it was dug up with the house basement that went in....ahem....not this past winter but the one before.

Pictured below are the twins with their friend Dante.

~Colleen

We will start out with watching fireworks!



And the tool shed, done on the outside!



The second Blake! =)

Garth and Shannah getting the truck ready for a drive to town.


Fun with the mailbox!


Poppy's new toy!

Some pictures from this past week.....

I think Blake's friends all need to be forewarned when they visit him that Blake has a driving **need** to tear their truck engines out and fiddle with them!


Hilling potatoes


Hey look! Trevor's in the WAPF magazine!


Planting potatoes, they say you can get more planted in a crooked row so Shannah is set to find out! HA!



Steady there, Blake. Not sure what he's doing, but it must take precision for so many guys to have to stand watch.


Kitty making sure Trevor's ok. Trevor LOVES to be parked outside watching everybody.

Sewing as usual. If you can't find Audrey, she's off sewing!



Logan is building a garden shanty out of rough boards and whatever else he's found lying about the place. Pictures to follow about that.


~Audrey, Shannah, and Colleen