This is What Productivity Looks Like

Megan made headway on getting off to India: we finally decided (and got approved) on a departure date (September 23rd, mostly so she can take the ACT again on the 21st, but also because flights were cheaper) which means she finally got her student visa application filled out. It goes in the mail to the Houston consulate tomorrow (hopefully). Sometimes, it’s hard to believe that she’s really truly going. Other times, it’s all to real. She also hung out with her friends on Friday, and ended up attending a Jewish Sabbath service. She thought it was interesting (at least the part she understood; half of it was in Hebrew) and really liked the rabbi.

Caitlyn went to her second-to-last week as a volunteer at the library. She also went to see Betty Blue Eyes on Saturday with her Girl Scout friends. She was underwhelmed by the musical. I guess she wasn’t all that productive. I’m sure that’ll change in 2 1/2 weeks when school starts up. (An aside: we got a phone call from the middle school tonight, and I realized I’ve  kind of missed the recorded voice of the principal saying, “GOOD EVENING FROM WILBUR MIDDLE SCHOOL!” I’m ready for school to start.)

Alison had a busy week, logging the most swimming hours (the rest of us did make it to the pool as well, but not as much as her), and going climbing. She also had a sleepover and played outside a lot.

Kristen gets grumpy because she says two things: 1) nothing ever happens to her (she did have a very long play date with her best friend, Sarah) and 2) she doesn’t understand what’s being said around her. So she storms off. I finally lost patience and said if she’d stop storming out and actually sit and tried to listen, maybe she’d LEARN what was going on. *grumble* She did talk us into going swimming. And she was the best Waldo spotter on Friday. We also went out and played in the fountains at Riverside park, which was fun.

Russell spent the week (well, the second half anyway) running back and forth to the hardware store as three of his students worked on building our fence. They did a great job (it’s mostly done). He also finished his application for a Fulbright to teach at McGill University in Montreal. Getting it is a long shot (as is getting the sabbatical that he’d have to get to go), but hey: he applied.

And I messed around at work, reorganizing and cleaning things (we were abysmally slow; I think the entire town is on vacation), went to “book group” (just a couple friends and I sitting and talking books. I guess that counts), and hung out with my kids. Must be life.

Riverside Park

On Friday, Alison, Kristen, and I were out looking for Waldos at local stores when we hit Old Town, and discovered the fountains were on.

As an aside, we discovered a store called Lucinda's, where we found these:

There's something about huge googly eyes that crack me up.

They were having so much fun that I was reminded of one of our favorite places: Riverside Park. And I felt ashamed: it was the end of July, and we haven't gone to play in the fountains. So, we remedied that immediately: we went home, changed into swimsuits, and went to the park.

Sometimes, I really like this town.

Fence Building

As you may know, neither Russell nor I are very handy. In fact, we're probably the opposite of handy. Which is why, when our fence fell down a few weeks ago, we were thinking we'd have to hire out a contractor and spend oodles of money on getting it replaced.

Then Russell mentioned something on Facebook (it does have its uses) and three of his students (two football players and a business major whose foot is in a cast; he fell out of a tree) volunteered to come do the work in exchange for food (though I think we'll pay them something). They said, "We're not doing anything else interesting this summer." And so this week, we got a new fence.

I told Alison and Kristen to stay out of their way, and this is what they came up with to do:

The finished product, this morning in the rain:

While the back is done -- there's a gate in the middle so we can still leave out the back to walk to school -- we're still working on the damaged sections of the sides. They were going to come by and finish the south side today, but it's raining so that's going to have to wait. And our neighbors to the north said they'd do the work on that side if we replaced the materials that were damaged, and they're slowly working on that. But, it's good to have the main part done.

I'm grateful Russell has made some good relationships with young, healthy, willing, good young men and that they're willing to help us inexperienced bookish people out. There's some good people out there.

We're Not at Comic Con

That’s been a recurring lament all weekend.  We’re not in San Diego with the 80 bajillion other nerds and geeks and fangirls dressed up in some costume (I’d go as Mal from Firefly) sitting in huge auditoriums listening to famous people be entertaining and interesting. and funny. Sure, we get fall out from Twitter and  YouTube and Tumblr, but it’s just not the same. I think Megan and Caitlyn are planning something someday. But until then, we’ll just have to be on the fringes of the coolest nerd happening in the world.

That said, we did get out for our own nerdy event this week: Drums Across Kansas. Megan and I had such a great time last year, that I decided everyone needed to this year. We headed across town to Caitlyn’s boxing class (which turned out to be an EPIC failure), had a picnic, and then went to the show. It got started slow, but when the show really got going, everyone had a grand time. Kristen spent most of the show conducting and pretending to play, which was pretty cute. Our two favorite bands were the middle ones, and they put on a really good, fun show.

Alison spent a good amount of time with her friend Sophia this week. She had a great time, but after a while she said, “Mom, I’m done with Sophia for a while.”

Caitlyn acted in the library’s mystery play again this year, and for the second year in a row was accused of committing the crime, even though she was innocent.

Kristen got people to play several rounds of Harry Potter scene it with her.

Megan discovered that having money means that she can Buy Stuff which made her happy.

Friday, Alison, Kristen and I went around to a bunch of local shops playing a Where’s Waldo game. The idea is that there’s a cardboard cutout in each of the stores, you find it, have someone sign it, and then the bookstore’s having a party at the end of the month with prizes and such. Alison decided that she wanted to play, and Kristen didn’t want to be left out. We need 15 out of 20 to be eligible, and after 2 1/2 hours, had 13. Then the girls started bickering so we abandoned things. We do hope to get the last 2 before the end of the month...

We had a lot going afternoon as well. A friend’s son is leaving on his mission and they had  a farewell we went to (which was a lot of fun), and then a former colleague of Russell's had an 80th birthday party. We took Megan (the colleague is Indian and he wanted to meet Megan), and were only going to go for the food and to say hi, but got roped into a program honoring Chako, which meant we missed the ward party. Oh, well. Next time.

And I had to give a talk today in church. On pioneers. *groan* I complained and stressed (and cried a bit) about it during the week, but it turned out okay. I suppose I can get out from behind the organ once in a while to talk, but I really, really dislike doing so. At least it went well.

And that’s about it for us. Here’s to surviving the 3 1/2 weeks until school starts again.

P.S. We’re thinking of, after 7 years with them, AT&T as a cell provider. Caitlyn wants a phone, and we’re thinking that it’s just getting too unreasonable (with her phone it’ll be $150 with unlimited texting, no data). Is there a better carrier out there. More reasonable, anyway, with decent coverage, for four lines??

What Crawled into Our Garage

Wednesday, we came home from Zumba and discovered a turtle had wandered into his garage.  I'm surprised I didn't run over it on my way out....

We tried to figure out what to do with it, and figured when we were done running around for the day, we'd take it to a creek. So, we put it in a box.

And left the garage door open. When we went out a couple hours later, the turtle was gone. I guess all we had to do was get out of the way.

A Curiosity

We get our eggs from a local farmer, and the other day when Kristen was helping make pancakes the other day. She thought it was a hilarious: an egg with two tops and no bottoms! So we took a picture of it.

Drums Across Kansas

This week was Drums Across Kansas. Since Megan and I had a great time last year, I decided to convince everyone else to come. They grumbled and complained (and our picnic beforehand was a bit rained out). It was a bit of a slow start -- the first couple of bands were pretty lame -- but after that, it really kicked up and we had a grand time. 

Us and our Nerdfighter gang sign.

I don't know how we managed NOT to get a picture of Alison, but she was there. And this is what Kristen would often do during the bands' performances. Pretty cool.

In all, we had a grand evening.

Here's to going again next year!

While We're At It....

We’ve had one of those kinds of summers. You know, when everything is just already a complete hack, so you say, “Well, while we’re at it, we might as well...”  Yeah, we’ll probably regret it later. But then, the house did need fixing up.

So, the insurance guy came out for the fence (we might as well get the whole fence replaced) and the roof (we found out that it’s going to be expensive to replace mostly because the former owners, in their infinite wisdom, last time they “repaired” the roof, they just stuck a second layer on.). We need to do some checking around and pricing, but hopefully we can get the ball rolling (on the fence anyway) sooner rather than later. And while we’re at it, the dishwasher broke, and since the city’s giving rebates on that, we decided to go ahead a just get a new one. Let’s hope that one lasts a mite longer than 7 years. (They don’t make ‘em like they used to.)

And we finally got word about Megan’s India plans. So, next step: get a student visa and a departure date.

Alison and Kristen spent the week swimming at lessons; they both passed their level and Alison said she wants to do the swim team next summer. Cool that. Kristen went to a friend’s house a couple of times, and Alison had a sleepover. On top of that, we went swimming at the Y a couple of times, even making it all the way across town to the only wave pool. Alison and Kristen thought that was a lot of fun. However, all of this added together to make kids (and mom) cranky.

And since they were bickering about not EVER doing ANYTHING interesting (while we’re at it),  so I took them out to Color Me Mine to do some ceramic painting. We decided on practical things: Caitlyn and Alison did plates, and Kristen did a “jumbo cup”. We spent a good two hours there with only a minimum of stress and bickering. I call that a good thing.

Caitlyn’s big event for the week was going to a local production of Hairspray. We bought the tickets back in March for her birthday and went Friday night. She brought a friend from choir, and we had a fabulous experience. It’s just a happy play, and the production was well-done, and Caitlyn was thrilled to see it. A good experience all around.

And church today was surprisingly good, especially considering I’m Done with People today.

That’s about it for us. Stay cool.

You Need a Trident?

We've got one.

Swim Lessons 2013

It's that time of year again. Kristen passed level 2 with flying colors, and Alison passed level 5. They're both quite the water sprites. No surprise, there. The pictures are from their last day of classes on Friday.

News About India! (Finally!!)

After waiting and waiting and waiting we finally got NEWS.

We got news that the hard copy of Megan's guarantee (and family/city/school assignment) is on it's way. We got it electronically, so here's what we know: she'll be in Durgapur, West Bengal (it's about 160 miles northwest of Kolkata) and attending DSMS Group of Institutions (here: http://dsmsindia.org/; they stuck her in a technical school!).

We also got word of a host family. All we know -- right now; more later -- is that they have 2 adult children; a girl, age 18, and a boy age 21.

Now it's on to figuring out visas and plane tickets. It looks like this is going to happen.

She's VERY excited!

Quintessential Summer

I am sitting here, listening to my Pandora mix, eating a root beer float (why is it that my children reject this goodness??), enjoying the air conditioning on this hot July day, while Russell does the dishes, and all the girls are in various corners of the house reading, sleeping, or watching a movie, and I don’t have to worry about anything except getting myself up early enough to open the store.

Yeah, it's summer.

In fact our week was all that way. Russell took off for Spokane on Monday (why yes, it was to play D&D with his brothers), and so we completely flaked out. I went to work, Megan went to work, Caitlyn volunteered. And the rest of the time, we just vegged. Aside from swimming lessons, which Alison and Kristen started. I really don't have a memory of what we did before Russell got home Wednesday evening. It’s summer. I’m not sure it matters if anything was done.

(As an aside: yes, we are still waiting on word from India. They’re India: they do things when they want to. We’re waiting for them to assign cities/families before we can get tickets and visas. Her sponsor here is quite frustrated, especially since he’s placed 15 kids from this district in India here. Hopefully, we’ll know soon, but we’re tentatively looking at September now.)

Thursday was the fourth, and we were... well, lazy. We did get out to see Monsters University, which was your basic nerds make good story. It was cute, but the short beforehand was remarkable. You could hardly tell it was animated at all. Amazing. And then, after a quick trip to the pool, we headed out to Bradley Fair for a picnic and fireworks. Nominally, we were going to hear a concert as well, but we got there late enough and were far enough away that the concert was faint strains rather than actual music. The fireworks, while not as good as Riverfest, made for a good show. At any rate, we had a good day. The best thing, though, was driving home and seeing all the various small firework displays light up the sky.

Friday, I had to work all day (so many people on vacation), but Russell and the girls were lazy here at home. I’m sure something was done, but I don’t know what it was. We did watch Galaxy Quest (and ate ice cream!)Friday night; it had recently come to our attention that our girls hadn’t seen it, so we declared a movie night. Aside from occasional frustration that she didn’t know what was happening on Kristen’s part, they all loved it. Never give up. Never surrender.

Yesterday, we were actually productive (breaking our streak of lazy summer days), getting rain barrels installed (the city’s giving us a rebate, which is why we finally got around to getting them) and cleaning house. Russell took everyone but Megan to Exploration Place to see the dinosaurs. Caitlyn wasn’t impressed. And Megan and I went to the store for our Mortal Instruments book group. (Which was fun.)

And today’s been, well, lazy. It’s been nice.

That’s about it. If I had watermelon to share, I would.

Happy Independence Day?

I am pretty sure there's a joke about what Canadians call the fourth of July, but I can't remember it now.

We had a lazy day. Megan saw a tshirt project on Pinterest and wanted to do it, so I bought the supplies and she had a blast spray painting.

They also decided they needed to spray paint the fence, since we're getting it fixed. Eventually.

I didn't take pictures of the movie we went to see, or of swimming at the pool. But we did head out to Bradley Fair across town for a picnic and fireworks, and I did snap a couple there.

They're reading and talking about Paradise Lost. Yes. You did read that right.

Alison, for whom there is very little she won't put ketchup on.

 Waiting in the (very long) line for ice cream.

Playing catch.

We really didn't do anything exciting. But it was nice to lay back and be lazy and it was a wonderful evening to be out celebrating.