More pics

Ok, these are pics that are now in random order, from random sources (camera, cellphone) and randomly straight or sideways. Thank you very much, blogger. Anway...

Back to our trip, this is J with the bookstore kitty Emily Grace.

And this is Peanut, the pet squirrel.

I love the live oaks and spanish moss.

It started raining one day and the waves got bigger.


And the next morning there was this gorgeous double rainbow.

And the waves were even bigger.

The boys loved it. Just after this pic a wave picked M up and moved him about 3-4 feet.

Anchors away!

Hunting Island light house.

Why, yes. Yes we did climb it. Well, some of us did. This is the view of the beach from the light house.

Our last day there the boys spent some time looking for shark teeth.

Sunset over the marsh our last night there.

A and her bf brought pumpkins home for them to carve. A had to stand on a chair to get up high enough to work on hers.

T got out a tiny projector so P could work on his. But if anyone asks, he did it free hand.

They did J's with the projector too. But he's man enough to admit it.

And now, thanks to blogger, we are back at the beach. The light house to be exact. And off in the distance is the island we stayed on.

This is standing at the bottom of the light house looking up at the spiral stairs. I can't remember how many for sure but I think it was between 150 and 200 steps. The boys counted and then figured out that they told the number at each landing.

Psych! And now back to pumpkins. This is A's masterpiece in the works.

P wasn't happy with his even after using the projector (but if anyone asks he did it free hand) so he put it on one of our fence posts along the driveway.

The works in progress.

Pumpkins are now interupted to show you pics of sunsets, 'cause you all know how much I love sunsets.

And Diesel. I do love my little Diesel.

And he loves his daddy figure.

And he loves to sleep on the back of the chair.

And now back to pumpkins. Yes, thank you very much blogger. This is A's masterpiece.

And J working on his.

Thank you for coming with us on that bumpy ride where we switched in and out of different parallel universes. I hope you were able to keep up.

Home again, home again, jiggety jog.

Is jiggety really a word? Anyway... we are home again, safe and sound. I missed my Diesel and my bed. And my own toilet. I hate using public restrooms. I missed A too.

I will post pics when I can. We had a great time. The kids (J had a friend with him) travelled well and behaved pretty well. They each earned 50cents one day by being quiet for the last 20-25 min. of a ride in the car. We were in my parents truck and I think my mom was about to flip her lid. J talks incessantly.

A held down the fort while we were gone. The house is still standing. The dishwasher was full and had a strange smell. I ran it for her. Diesel came in for some food and some loving and went back out again. He drooled on T first though. Misty is fat and sassy. The dogs were glad to see us.

J's friend (who happens to be the son of one of the CO ladies) fell asleep in the car and J put a chip in his mouth. I took a pic and sent it to everyone and then thought, omg, he could choke on that. About that time he coughed and moved around but settled back down. The chip flew out when he coughed and we were all laughing. We stopped for lunch and I showed him the pic and he snatched my phone and erased the pic. But I still have it where I sent it to people. Bahahaha!! He said we were mean and I said, J's the one who put a chip in your mouth. I just took the pic. He said, "You put a chip in my mouth?!?" He didn't even know it!

Now the kids are carving pumpkins that A and her bf brought home. I'm going to go roast pumpkin seeds, in between loads of stinky laundry.

Pics

Here are pics from the phone. Remember it's not an iphone so the quality leaves a lot to be desired.

This is Ms. H and the boys. J loves that he's taller than her. And we all agree that she is the nicest lady in the world.

Ok, this is driving out on to the island. Live oaks on both sides of the road. They meet in the middle and the spanish moss hangs off the trees.

And the trees are practically on the road.

We all pile our bedding on my parents bed during the day. We call it the princess and the pea bed. The boys were on it last night watching tv.

Believe it or not J's friend is in there looking for crabs. He has a red shirt on.

Boys in the ocean.

T found a couple of starfish.

Coons got into our cooler last night. They devoured 4 twin packs of sausage and biscuits, a go-gurt, and they tried the english muffins but decided they didn't like those. They stole a whole bag of bagels and carried them off in case they get hungry later. They left the wrappers everywhere and left their dirty little footprints all over our cooler. Too funny.

That's the pics for now.

Going to the beach...

...Going to the beach. Going to the beach, hey, hey, hey, hey.

We left Friday afternoon and had dinner with my brother and his family with my nephew and his wife who now live in the Chattanooga area. We went to Sticky Fingers. Traffic was kind of bad and we were late getting there but we got to see their house and had a nice time with all of them.

Then we headed on to Ms. H's house north of Atlanta. J declared her the nicest lady ever before we even got there.

Sat morning we got up and headed to Edisto Island, SC. Woot! The weather is perfect so far and I will post pics when I can. J has a friend along and they have ridden their bikes all over the campground. We are staying in my parents camper since ours needed the bearings re-packed and the truck needs a few things too.

So far, so good.

Gorgeous

We have had an awesome week here, weather wise. Yesterday was gorgeous, 80 and sunny. We relaxed, got some groceries, T fixed the seat in the van so it goes up and down now too instead of just back and forth, took a walk, played some games. What a gorgeous day! R says it snowed in CO. Glad I'm here.

Today is a little cooler, not as sunny. But it's not raining. I worked and T took the kids fishing. Haven't heard from them since. I hope they catch something cause I don't cook much on Sundays and there are not enough leftovers for everyone.

T played harmonica in church today. I think he made it up as he went but it sounded good. Woot!

All in all, a gorgeous weekend.

Phone pics

We had the meeting at school on Wed regarding how to motivate J to do better, to live up to his full potential. He just doesn't care about his future right now, what 14yo does? I don't know how to make him understand that everything he does now affects his future and there is more to life than tv and video games. He's doing pretty well and has some good characteristics, we just don't know how to push him without frustrating him. He didn't make the basketball team either. They said he could join them in practice if he wanted to but he wouldn't get much, if any, court time during games. He opted out. I really don't think he was trying very hard. He wants to be part of things but he doesn't want to work at it.

We have had some gorgeous days here this week. Sunny and in the 80's. Love it! I plan to wash Vanna Blue today and vacuum it out for our trip. We shall see. 

Here are some pics from my phone. No, I do not have an iphone, just a cheapo thing that (hopefully) gets the job done. I titled this pic "Misty Was Here". She tried to climb into the cabinet and knocked all the movies down. Then I found her sitting, looking the other way like she had done nothing, about 4 feet from the mess.

Like I said, the weather has been awesome and we have had some great sunsets. You know I have a thing about sunsets and last night's was gorgeous. Remember, cheapo phone and taken while driving.

I texted R last week and asked her to send me a pic of Skylar, just because I miss her and she's so stinkin' cute! Well, my mom found me my own lil Skylar at a yard sale and I don't have to feed or bathe or take mine outside. Perfect.

Oreo and Trixie meet me at the car each morning when I get back from taking J to school. How could you not love that face?

And my lil skylar sits on the computer desk and behaves perfectly.

Heavens to mergatroid, A cleaned her room! I took a pic to prove that it can be done. I wonder if she slept in that bed? I didn't go near the closet, just took the pic from the door. It will actually stay clean for 24 hours at least because she finished it last night and she will be gone all day today. J asked her why she changed her room around again and she said she just gets bored easy. She's funny that way.

And I titled this pic, "The Remains of the Day" or in this case the night. Diesel broke another plate last night, sometime in the middle of the night. I had to get up and sweep it up. I threw him in with T so he didn't cut his paw pads. Good thing he's cute!

Odds and ends

We have been busy as usual. J's birthday had a whole 5 days of celebrating, about every other day or so. This is one of the cakes I made for him. We had it on Friday at some friends' house while we were also saying good-bye to a young man who is going to marine boot camp next week.

Then we took J and a friend roller-skating on Sun. That was interesting. J didn't fall much. He kept using his rubber toe stopper to push off with until we got him swaying a pushing off from one foot to the other. He mostly uses his right foot to push off and then kicks it up and out in a funny way. We have no idea where that came from but it's funny to watch.

Then last night we were celebrating my aunt's engagement. Congrats S and L! We also sang to J again and had another cake.

Fibro is still kicking my butt, but I'm a bit better each day. We (doc and I) decided to go back on the doxycycline for a while and see if it will help the "fibro flu" any. It takes time for it to have an effect. I'm still taking the magnesium and malic acid supplement and wouldn't want to be without it.

A is always up early either heading to school or work. I managed to make the kids pancakes this morning. I haven't done that in a while. T got her car going again. It was so funny because he changed the transmission in it and then he was able to get it to go forward and reverse but somehow the steering wheel got unhooked so it turned freely. He had to pull something out and reattach the wheel. That's what happens when a dyslexic computer geek fixes the car. You can get where you're going as long as where you're going is straight ahead!

A's boyfriend saw some flowers when they came into the store where he works. He thought they were pretty so he bought her some. When he unwrapped them he decided that maybe it was the wrapping that made them look so pretty. He's so funny. Well, sometimes he's a pain-like when he updates your FB status with untrue and unbecoming things. But back to the flowers. A likes them and we all think they're pretty even without the wrapping.

Diesel still loves outside. He didn't get real big but he may still grow some more. He's only about 7 months old. He wears himself out outside every day and then he comes in the house after dark and passes out after cuddling up under my chin and drooling on my neck. Here he is sleeping on the back of the chair.

I'm fairly short. I have some pretty tall friends. One friend says I'm not short, that I'm fun sized. Thanks K! So I got some fun size m&m's.

Oh, back to Diesel asleep in my arms. Don't you wish you could sleep like that?

And this is my better pic of the spider web on the fence. That's a leaf in the upper left, not a spider. I thought it looked pretty and this was one of many that morning.

We have a meeting at school today to try to figure out how to encourage J to do his schoolwork on his own and pay attention in class. He understands threats but we don't want to do that. His work needs to be ESL modified but he thinks he has to have one on one to be able to do the work. The most frequent words out of his mouth regarding school work are, I need help. I forgot. and I don't understand. He doesn't even try before he says one of those things. Maybe we've helped him too much and made him dependent on it. Just trying to figure out what might motivate him.

We've had some gorgeous days and cool nights here lately. Def feels like fall.

I'm leading music this Sunday and then I'm planning on taking a break for about a month. We shall see.

My house looks pretty good after cleaning it up for our little party last night. We tried another Door County Fish Boil. One of these days we're going to perfect that thing. If we could only get all the right ingredients at one time.

Those are my odds and ends for today.