Celebrations

I just walked half a block down the street and around the corner to check on the lemonade stand Kate set up with her Dad.  I came home so hot and exhausted that I can’t get myself to do anything on my list but sit at the computer and write a letter.  In the long run, that’s probably the most important thing on my list anyway.

Kate has been wanting to do a lemonade stand since we lived in Philadelphia.  Lately, the requests have become more frequent and more persistent.  Somehow a lemonade stand does not fit into my subsistence level pregnancy existence, especially as the temperatures have been climbing, so I keep putting her off by telling her to plan it with her Dad.  So today...Dad came through!  Josh, Kate, and Jane went quietly out the back door, climbed the back fence, and disappeared down the golf course path.  A few minutes later they came back in the front door and the girls disappeared up to the art table to make a sign. The girls came down from the play room with a bucket full of golf balls we have collected in our yard and  sign that said “lemonade & golf balls for sale.”  Kate chose the spot for the stand right where the golf path crosses the road so that they could “sell to both cars and golfers.”  We mixed up some raspberry lemonade and golf ball cookies and sent them on their way.  They are red faced out there in the blazing sun, but they seem to be having fun.

We have had a crazy few weeks.  It all started with another dash to Houston to see Nathan before he headed out on his mission to South Korea.  We met the Houston Woodford clan at a blueberry farm on the outskirts of the city and spent a few hours working our way through rows and rows of blueberry bushes.  The farm had just opened  so the bushed were packed with berries.  We had a great time.  Our little family came away with 11 pounds of blueberries, which sounds like a lot!  Todd and Pam’s family blew us out of the water with 47 pounds of fresh blueberries!  We had a great weekend with the Houstonites.  Nathan is such a great kid!  His talk was wonderful--truth taught from the scriptures.  He will be a great missionary.  Look out, Korea, Nathan is on his way and look out, Nathan, Asia is about to capture your heart!

Kate the Indian turned six years old.  She was so excited about her birthday this year.  (I can’t imagine where she learned to love birthdays.)  Grandma Shelly flew in the day before the big day.  The party started when grandma arrived and wrapped up with an American Indian birthday party on the weekend.  We had crepes for breakfast and balloons on her chair to start things off the right way.  Kate requested that I bring frosted donuts with sprinkles as a treat for her class, birthdays ratchet up a level when your kids enter school.  I underestimated how hard it would be to find donuts with sprinkles.  Jane, my mom and I ended up going to four different donuts stores and spent most of the morning hunting before we had enough donuts for her class.  The kids ate the donuts faster than you could believe, except for Kate who came up to me with half on hers wrapped up in the napkin and said, “I didn’t know how yucky these were.”  I threw hers in the garbage trying to convince myself I was glad she didn’t want to eat it even after all that effort.

We had a fun Indian party on Saturday.  Kate invited a group of friends from school, church, and the neighborhood.  Josh was in town and on duty, Grandma Shelly was there to bail me out, as usual, and the girls were really well behaved.  Kate greeted each of her friends as they arrived then we transformed them into an Indian tribe with headbands, feathers, and war paint.  We played a few outdoor games, made dream catchers, went on a nature scavenger hunt and then ate upside down ice cream cones that we had decorated like teepees.  All in all, it was a huge success.  KTI was happy. The rest of us were exhausted.  What we don’t do for our kids.

Jane also had a birthday. She is four years old!  Conveniently, her birthday was on Memorial Day, so Josh was home.  Josh and Kate went out early in the morning to get balloons to tie on Jane’s chair.  We had toast with butter and hot chocolate for breakfast, as requested by the birthday girl.  Kate was determined to make it a special day for Jane.  She made a darling card, told Jane she would be her servant all day, and organized the celebrations.  We topped the day off with a outdoor barbecue with some friends from the ward.  Jane typically isn’t a big fan of little boys and the family we had over has four boys and one girl.  When our neighbor called Jane over to the fence to wish her a happy birthday, Jane ran over saying, “We have our boyfriends over!”   We finished off her big day with a “lemon meringue cake” and ice cream.  Any day that ends with ice cream is a success.

We have been reading Encyclopedia Brown with Kate.  When we started I asked her if she knew what an encyclopedia was.  The best explanation I could come up with was, “It’s like the internet in a book.”  That seemed to make perfect sense to her.  Kate loves the series. She loves to listen carefully for the clues and try to figure out the mystery. One day I noticed a big paper on our door.  When I investigated further I found this:

DETECTIVE

come when emergency

girl detective

not on Sundays

Her first case was a tiny baby bunny that showed up at our door.  It got lost in one of our thunderstorms and was huddled in a corner of our entry way.  I told her it was a perfect case for a girl detective and her dad.  They carefully scooped it into a box and then took it to a safe place in some tall grass on the golf course.  She has also found a few missing items around the house and is anxiously awaiting more cases.  Let us know if you need a detective this summer!

Kate finished her first year of Kindergarten.  She had a great year, a great teacher, and made great friends.  Her teacher says she is ready for the academics of first grade--Whew!  What a relief. They had a cute “Celebration of Learning” the last day of school where Mrs. Moore shared her favorite memory of each child.  She wrote this to Kate:

Kate--I loved watching you make up your own problems to solve.  Once I asked you to make up a story problem with a 2 digit, odd answer.  You were able to do it easily!

She also mentioned that she loved what Kate want to be when she grows up--an Indian, of course!.  Not bad to get a compliment on your math skills at the end of Kindergarten.  Kate was so sad to leave school.  We had a good 15 minutes of uncontrollable sobbing after we left because she was sad to leave her teacher.  That’s my tender hearted Kate.

 I have been keeping a mental list lately of things I like about Texas.  The temperature is going up so you have to work harder to keep on the optimistic side. :) I really like the birds in Texas.  We always have pretty birds singing outside.  I really like the breezes that blow through and ease the heat from the blazing sun.  I really like the stars at night that you can see from horizon to horizon.  I really like the friendly people.  I really like the thunderstorms that come through.  This week, however, Texas seems to be declaring war on my optimism.  The temperature went up into the 90s and my energy level plummeted.  Then we had a storm come through that swirled around our house in the middle of the night and pounded the windows on every side with hail.  Then we started being plagued by itchy bites in very unfortunate places on our bodies, places you would rather not have visitors.  I finally reached my breaking point and began researching what nasty little critters were causing us such grief.  Turns out we have chiggers in our yard.  It turns out everyone has chiggers this year.  We didn’t have much of a winter and then we had a lot of early rain and now we all have chiggers.  Chiggers are now one of my least favorite of God’s creations.  We declared war on them.  We washed all our bedding, all our clothes, and all of our people.  Then we had the yard sprayed and bought bug repellant.  We are now chigger free, at least for the time being.  Oh, Texas.  I think the people who live here have to either love you or hate you.  There are enough reasons to hate you that they have to go a little over the top trying to love you, and thus...Texas pride.

For the last two weeks I’ve been working my way through a tremendous list of things I wanted to get done before we left for the summer.  From wrapping things up for primary, to straightening out pediatric medical records, to taking dinner in to a friend to refinishing a cabinet for the baby’s room, to cleaning the house, we have been running at full tilt to get things done.  My mom has been my lifesaver.  She works like mad right along side me, entertains the girls, ignores the fire ant and chigger bites that could drive her mad, motivates me to pack the lunch before I flop into bed, braves the heat with a smile, magnifies my productivity,  and then reminds me when it’s time to stop and take a rest.  We are almost done with the dreaded list.  I just have to pack and be ready to head out Monday morning.

The girls and I are headed to Idylwolf for most of June, then down to Salt Lake for Woodford celebrations and gatherings at the end of June and beginning of July, then to Roosevlet for a bit, then back to Idlywolf for a few more days of paradise, and then, when my doctor demands I be back in Texas, we’ll head back home and face the heat of August.

Happy Summer!