Life is sort of on a schedule!

School started this past Monday. Kirsten was sitting at the counter eating her breakfast when Ethan, Dallin and Hayleigh left to get on the bus. Kyle, Keenan and Tyler were already at school since they have Early Morning Seminary at church and then Tim takes them to school. Brandee was already at work and the TV wasn't on (yet). It was SO quiet, I could hear the ceiling fans! About 2 minutes after the door closed behind Hayleigh, Kirsten looked up and said, "Where everybody go?". Poor baby! She gets to have all the toys to herself and watch what shows she wants on TV (barney, teletubbies, Franklin and Little Bear), but she just wanted her sister home. Funny, isn't it? They argued all summer as best a 7-year old and 2-year old can, and now Kirsten just wanted Hayleigh here.

The second day of school started out lousy. Hayleigh's bus came 20 minutes earlier than it had the first day, so of course she missed it. I had to pack up Kirsten and Hayleigh and drive Hayleigh to school. Kirsten couldn't figure out why she couldn't go in to the school too!

It's Friday now and she seems to have adjusted. She is back to taking 2 or 3 hour naps in the afternoon - which I love!

The other kids have adjusted to being back at school. Kyle, Keenan and Tyler had 3 soccer games in a row this week - Monday (win), Tuesday (win) and Wednesday (loss - but only by 1 to a team we usually get slaughtered by). I've been able to go to some of the games - Dallin's soccer coach is also a high school soccer coach and he understands that we might be missing some practices.

We're hoping for lots of rain and some cooler temperatures soon!

Chicken Story

Happy Birthday Brandee!

A quick note here about the scout camp the boys attended a little while ago - This picture is Kyle and his friend Brent identifying leaves. Guess they took a 'speed identifying' class!

Friends of our from church were looking for a home for their chickens that they no longer wanted. We decided to give them a home. Little did we know that a short couple of weeks later - there would be 4 BABY chicks in the barn. In a couple of months we might be going into the chick selling business!

Okay - enough of the bird stories. How about a cow story? We have one cow that no matter how strong the electricity is on the fence, she likes to get out. When we attempt to put her back in the pasture, we are strongly reminded of the running of the bulls footage we have seen. She tosses her head and paws the ground and RUNS like the wind! She is shortly going to find herself in the cattle trailer on the way to the auction.

More Nature

Happy Birthday Keenan!

Driveway Birds? What bird would ever build a nest in our driveway? Well one did this year! With as many trips in and out of this place that we make, you would think that our driveway would not be considered a safe place to build a nest. Not so with this bird. She laid her eggs in a little low spot on the driveway and ever time we drove past them, she would run across the driveway to the other side - no matter which side she was on. We would have to stop and wait for her to get out of the way. We put cones around her nest so that UPS and FedEx would not drive over the eggs and then hoped for the best. We're not sure if her eggs hatched or not. One day they were there, the next day they weren't, but Brandee saw 4 little birds in the pasture running around with a bigger bird. Maybe when they hatched and the mama realized that they were sure to be run over, she moved to the pasture. That would've been the smart thing to do, although I don't know if this bird had any 'smart' in her!

Chickens are birds too - wait til you hear the next story!

The trouble with nature

Happy Birthday Kyle!

This summer has been very interesting in regards to nature - birds in particular. Every year a bird builds its nest under our back deck. It's all the way on the end and under the grill, so it doesn't bother us too much. Apparently this year the mama bird decided that she wanted to be closer to our family so she built the nest under the deck RIGHT ABOVE THE BACK DOOR. This wasn't too bad to begin with, but then as the babies got older they began to poop - ALOT!! Several times a day, one of the kids would wash down the poop pile right in front of the door. There are lots (like zillions) of mites that live in bird nests and they decided that crawling around on the deck was fun. So, we also gave up hanging up the laundry out back because as soon as we went on the deck, we were covered with mites and had to take showers. Very annoying. We came to the conclusion that as soon as the birds were flying away, the nest would be taken down. Kyle did the honors one morning as all the babies took off for their morning flights. What a bunch of shocked birds when they came back a couple of hours later! Not being happy with being evicted, the birds all started to build their own nests under the deck. We figured that since we pay the mortgage here, the birds had to find somewhere else to live. Every branch, twig and thread that was placed on the boards by the birds was brushed off by one of the kids. The birds did give up - or so we wanted to believe. The birds built a nest in a box in the new carport. How stupid is that? That's like packing a lunch for the dogs that come around here! If that's not enough.....wait til you hear about the driveway birds......stay tuned!

Birthdays!!

Wow! I really can't believe that there will be 4 birthdays coming up in the next couple of weeks - and how old that makes the kids! (Tim and I are not aging - it's just the kids getting older!) On August 15 - Kyle will be 17. On August 16 - Keenan will be 16. On August 22 - Brandee will be 19. On September 4 - Tyler will be 15. Yikes.

It seems like only yesterday that I could solve all of the problems in my house with some balloons, some homemade cookies and a Disney movie. Now there is so much going on in their lives (and thus mine, since I need to drive them around!).

Soon enough though - it will be quiet here and we will be hoping the grandchildren come over to visit their out-of-date, uncool grandparents!