Furious Arting

All day, we made things. Things with grains and beans and glue and cardboard.
Things with tissue paper
and glue and glass.
Things with paint brushes.
And paint.
Aleks made a Godzilla on the refrigerator out of the colored mosaic tiles.

I used the bean/grain cardboard to construct a frame for a postcard.

The glass tissue paper jars hold candles.

We are very serious about being properly prepared for this Engagement Party gig. I cleaned off the refrigerator (outside), removing all the magnets and scraps of paper, scrubbing it all down, then putting it all back up with new and improved art by the children. And it took all day somehow. There's so much more to do! Walls to dust! Cobwebs to catch! Mopping! Scrubbing! Painting! Repairing! Everyone thinks I'm pretty crazy to want to do all that (and buy new glasses too!), but I assure you I am merely thorough.

Our Independence Day

While everyone else rushed down to the beach to parades and to fireworks, battling traffic, crowds, and mosquitos, we stayed home and did our usual nothin'. We slept late and shlepped around the house for most of the day. In the evening, we had burgers on the grill with our neighbor Chris and ate Firecrackers Popsicles. I found an old bag of Snap Pops which we threw on the sidewalk, then we all watched the first Transformers movie together. And that was it. We did take a really lovely family photo too.

Oh, and Aleks and Jon did talk a bit about it being the country's birthday, but nothing too elaborate and nothing contrived.

Aleks' Black Eye

Aleks was taking his shirt off while standing on our front steps when he lost his balance and fell on his face on the sidewalk. Jon said it was a sickening thud. It bloodied his nose and gave him quite the shiner.

Three days later, after he'd picked at his scab and it started yellowing.

Updates...

I've been neglecting the blog. We were away and now we are back and there are so many photos from our travels, but not the time to do much more than to upload them. So if you scroll down and look back, I should have by now left a brief summary (in photo form) of many of our adventures. It's not much, but we're busy preparing for an engagement party we'll be hosting by doing lots of cleaning, lots of errand-running, lots of lazing about the house, lots of weeding of the garden, and some crafts. I'll update that as well here at some point and speak at length about the thoughts in my head when I get a moment to have them.


Okay, the best way to do this (if you're gonna) is to start after the Saskatoon post (my last, pre-vacation post) and work backwards, or forward in time. Wait, nevermind. I'll do it for you. Go in this order:

Cherry Pickin'
We Interacted With Nature!
We Moved Heavy Stuff!
We Road-Tripped!
We Went to the Beach!
First Evening at the Beach...
We Swam!
We Did Things We Do Normally!
We Played with a Rhinoceros Beetle!
We Spied Sea Creatures!
We Played in the Sand!
We Spent Time with Family & Friends!
We Road-Tripped Back Home!

We Road-Tripped Back Home!

I discovered that Virginia may be the perfect state for Hobbiton:
We drove under mountains! I held my breath!
We took photos of mountains!
Mountains!
We passed a place called Bastian!

We Spent Time with Family & Friends!

Me in Southport, on the Cape Fear River...Grandma Cat
Uncle Tony
Aunt Natty and Great Aunt/Grandma/Godmother Marty
Bastian and Max, eating pudding (something that never ever ever makes it into my house)...
Natty and Sebastian being crazy, spanking butts (though it's never okay to hurt...unless they like it).
Bastian fell deeply in love with Aunt Lilly's friend Alisha. He spent his time doting on her, fawning over her, petting her, smiling, and whispering "I loooooooove Alisha..."
Bastian and Aunt Lilly
Left to Right...
1st Row: Grandma Cat, anna kiss
2nd Row: Marty, Uncle Tony, Jeri, Grandpa Jim
3rd Row: Jon, Dan, Max, Aleks, Alisha, Bastian, Aunt Lilly, Aunt Natty

We Played in the Sand!

Drip castles!

A shrine that Jon started, I added to, and Bastian destroyed!
Digging the Moat!
Minas Tirith complete!
Then the ocean took it all!