The Eyes Have It

Isaac fell at the park and hit his face on a beam. It was the nastiest facial injury I have ever witnessed in one of my children. Even when he split his lip clear up to his nose and looked like a bunny rabbit until the doctor stitched it up. This kept looking worse instead of better each day, until about day 5. He still has a super ball sized hard spot on his cheek bone. I assume he'll get back to normal some day...

August 28 (Day of injury)








August 29 (morning of Day 2) I almost cried when I saw him.







August 29 (Afternoon of day 2)





August 30 (Day 3) Swelling goes down, color abounds!






August 31 (Day 4)








September 1 (Day 5 self portrait) His eyelid turns purple.








September 2 (Day 6) Finally no new bruising.








September 2








September 4 (Day 8) Bruising starts on lower jaw, or we just notice it because his eye looks better.








Septerber 6 (Day 10)








September 11 (Day 15) The scab is finally gone and he looses a tooth! Life just keeps moving.








September 19 (Day 23)

I Am Free!

My parents needed some new pictures of all 10 grand kids together so this past weekend our family camping trip doubled as a photo shoot.

If you need a refresher course on names check out the picture from this post.

Here are some of the pictures that didn't make the cut.






If at all possible, watch it in full screen so you can see their faces!

Were I've Been

Twitter is just so easy. 140 characters. No long, strung together sentances that would require actual time and thought. So easy that I've been finding myself doing that instead of blogging.

But a quick synopsis will bring you all up to speed of what's been going on in our household lately.

It's not tan lines on my face from my sunglasses, it's my super hero mask

Laundry and organizing books today...2 things that are never done. One's the pits, the other's fun.

Funny things I find myself saying #1: Whose underwear is on the table?

http://twitpic.com/dqbq1 - Isaac's first lost tooth!

My calendar is filling up fast. Why does everyone think my summer should be over?

Finally going to finish school planning today...Or maybe the kids will just have a really short year.

Football, Oh how I've missed you.

I didn't finish planning the year, but I'm a whole lot closer than I was this morning.

Just ate some grapes off our grape vine.

Aaah Monday. Back to routine. I'm usually more productive on Monday than any other day of the week. Hope today's not the exception.

I just resorted to rewarding whoever finds our lost copy of Amelia Bedelia, our huge USA map and our "just as big" map of the world.

"Education is a weapon whose effects depend on who holds it in his hands and at whom it is aimed."- Josef Stalin.. Who's teaching your kids?

dons her helmet, inserts her mouthguard and reluctantly limps from the sidelines to face the day without a pat on the behind.

I'm enjoying the oodles tomatoes I harvested from my Mom and Dad's garden this morning!

Hand boys a sense of adventure and you won't see them in the house for hours...digging in the dirt, trying to light fires with only a flint.

Isaac's face vs. Playground equipment. Who will come out ahead? Looks like Isaac will be victorious! We told him black eyes are cool.

http://twitpic.com/fmhje - Looks kinda like a lopsided chipmunk.

http://twitpic.com/fp1in - Looks a little worse this morning, but feels better he says. And he's got a new wiggly tooth.

http://twitpic.com/fwrw9 - Today's look at Isaac's face..."Mom, it doesn't hurt" he says everytime I look at him with what must be a pai ...

(Oops over the limit!!!!!! *pained expression)

Back to reality...Thanks to everyone who helped make it a semi-kidless/KIDLESS/semi-kidless weekend.

Isaac's face is transforming...from the puffy dark purple orb that it was to the decreasing dark purple/greenish/yellowish color of healing.

I want to check into some vitamins/supplements for memory improvement, but I keep forgetting!

When everyone else seems to be packing up their camping gear, we start to dust our off for the season. It's a lot less crowded this way.

I've graduated from the can't-remember-my-locker-combination dream to the can't-text-my-tweet dream. Am I officially a grown up? or a geek?

Camping kidless is very different. Definately less food involved!

Camping with just Matt is going to have to be a annual event! Very relaxing. It is nice to be home though.

Hayden and I are arguing about whether or not a marathon runner with prosthetic legs has an unfair advantage over a runner with real legs.

I don't think we'll ever see eye to eye on this one.

I think I've become invisible. No one here can hear me asking questions and any direction I give goes unnoticed....

Just downloded Posthumus Zone to play tomorrow before we start school. Now for a plan to waylay the tackling of siblings during read-aloud.

Over the first hurdles of the day. Expectations and explanations for 6th, 11th and 12th graders. K & 2nd graders done except Language arts!

Isaac, who "hates school!" slept for 2 hours this afternoon. I think that might have been the problem.

School went much better today, even with a dentist appointment sandwiched in.

Settling down and realizing there are only 24 hours in a day and you can only do what you can do. One foot in front of the other. All day.

Finally on my way. Just Me, Sam, Isaac and the bus! (The rest of the crew will join us tomorrow)

Camp set up &supper "alone" only took an hour & 45 min not bad

"alone" = 5 yo, 8yo, and my dad (helped with awning)

Me and my margarita are watching boys + cousins start a bon fire with pine cones

Me- "isaac, grab your shoes" Isaac- "I didnt bring any"

Cold water, warm sand. Good company.

My little boys have no clean clothes and 1 more day of camping. Hmmm

Raise your hand if you love camp breakfast!

Camping x 2

Yay! Camping season!

Labor day weekend we took the bus onto 40 acres in the middle of nowhere with no water and no electricity.

With the refrigerator running the whole weekend we only had to start the bus to recharge the battery twice.

We weren't sure whether or not we'd fit, but Matt guided her in beautifully. In one particular bend we slipped through with just inches to spare on each side.



The awning has been under negotiation for several weeks. Matt wanted one, I did not.

The sound of tent material flapping wildly in the wind and rain drums up some pretty nasty memories for me. Because, eventually, all tents collapse on me and all awnings fail. I didn't want to hear "cha-ching" every time we encountered weather short of sunny

We compromised and built this cheaply frugally.
PVC pipe and a tarp of standard size. I'll detail the construction more closely next time we put it up.

It drooped a little on the ends and we have since remedied that with cables running from the bus to the corners.

Matt also built removable (obviously) shelves on the side of the bus that serve us well for our outdoor kitchen.


After that excursion we dropped the kids off at home (with plenty of food, instructions and emergency numbers) and headed out ALONE for 3 days 30 minutes from home to our long awaited dreamy tropical paradise vacation.