I could be referring to an aquarium visit, or an art project. 

Really, it’s just a fancy way of cutting up hotdogs and serving it over cabbage and noodles.  The kids absolutely love it until they had to eat it.  Sigh.

I’m not sure who loves whom the most in this threesome—Wesley, Spiderman, or Parker.  We’ll call it a tie.

The girl loves to have her picture taken.  And having a reason to have her picture taken!

The Dodge is dead.

The Dodge is dead.

Dead lies the Dodge on the roadside.

A bullet-bolt through its bowels,

A single clunk signaling

The end of Big Red.

Big Red has new friends now, gone to his reward

The “We’ll Take Anything” donation program

Offers complementary towing.

We’ll think of Red next tax season

As he delivers us

One

Final

Payload.

And we will forget that this 1973 model

Is older by only

One Year

Than Dwayne and me.

Lucky’s name turned out to be ironic.  Disobeying all parental guidelines, Lucky was taken out of his deluxe cage to watch TV with the kids…and kitties.  Kids got distracted.  Kitties did not. 

20 hours, my friends.  Lucky, lasted 20 hours. Sorry, cutie.  I liked having a hamster.

Piper is really and truly 8 years old now. After church, we took her to the pet store and got about $70 worth of hamster stuff.  And a hamster.  He was named Lucky before leaving the store. 

Dwayne made me and Jen (Aubrey’s mom) and all the kids the usual spectacular dinner.  Wish I had a picture! 

For her birthday, Piper wanted a hamster and a day at the zoo with Mama (AKA “without the other kids”).  We had a splendid time!  Piper is the perfect child…when she’s the only child.  It is not in her DNA to be a middle kid.  Sorry, Pipes.

 

Admittedly, I’m very biased, but isn’t she beautiful? Happy 8th birthday, darling girl!

To prove that I am a smidgeon smarter than a year ago, we held the Book Fair 2 weeks before Mid-Winter Break (I’m the Fair Chair, for literary and rhyming reasons) and I’m not Room Parent for two classes and therefore responsible for two class Valentine’s parties while celebrating Piper’s birthday.  Wesley didn’t vomit at this party (just good luck on my part, not me getting smarter), and I only had to do one thing at a time that week. 

Just to refresh your memory, over New Years, Dwayne and I decided to update the cabin bath by putting in a new floor and updating the vanity, before discovering that the shower needed to completely be taken down to the logs.  Oh, horrors.  At least, I’ve minimally improved my tiling skills while significantly decreasing our savings.

Before:

Now:

I like it best with the shower curtain closed, but I needed to show off the new tile in the shower. We tiled to the ceiling, and I love it!  And it can never, ever leak.  We did everything we could to make it waterproof, with jetboard between the tile and logs, inner and outer layers of caulk, and everything as tight as we can make it.  Because if water gets through, we’ll have to take out every tile, scrape through lots of mortar, and pry off some well-adhered cement board. 

It’s embarrassing that we’ve been working on this for over a month, but, in all fairness, we can only go over on free weekends. 

Our first renter is coming next weekend.  We need to rent it 16 more nights to break even on the bath.  Another night to pay for the new filter. 125,000 nights to pay for the actual cabin.  Yep, that’s a rabbit hole I just stepped into!

Wesley and Piper’s birthdays are slightly less than a month apart, a mere 4 weekends, so it’s pretty easy to do a combination family birthday party for them.  Even Papa Jim came over for the day!

We hosted a brunch, and Piper got to debut her omelet making skills.  Truly, she is very good—my omelets never turn out as nicely.