L's fourth birthday--a blog in pictures.

T goes to school!

Here is T, ready to head out the door and go to school for the first time. He is attending Freedom Academy, which is a charter school. He's not wearing the school uniform in this picture, because they had only called us to tell us there was a space open the night before. It all happened so quickly! I had put him in the lottery in the spring, and he didn't win a place. So we were planning to homeschool him again this year. When we got the phone call, at first I thought, "No- I just bought our homeschool materials!" But we discussed it, and prayed about it, and decided to try it out this year. After that decision, T went to bed. And J and I went to bed. And I cried.

It has been good so far. But it's hard to send a kid to school!

The cat who comes to visit.

Much to the delight of all the children (well, except B, who doesn't really notice), a young cat in the neighborhood has started coming over to play. He showed up in our yard the first time probably just in the course of exploring the neighborhood, but he's a playful cat and the kids showed him such a good time that now he is a frequent visitor. H loves to tie a bit of string to a stick and "fish" for the cat. T and N are delighted every time he shows up, as well. It has been good for L, too, who (some of you may recall) suffers from an extreme animal phobia. She says she likes cats, but the fact that she usually screams and runs away when they move, and bursts into panicky tears if she can't get far enough away, makes me doubt the sincerity of her protestations of affection. But Mr. Whiskers (as we found out he is called) has been consistently playful yet gentle enough that even she can deal with playing with him (or at least near him) without being reduced to a pitiful, quivering heap. This is great progress! So I say, "Thank you, Mr. Whiskers!"

T and H - summer entrepreneurs!

T and H had been wanting to do a lemonade stand this summer. So a few weeks ago, J got enthusiastic about the idea and helped them set up a stand to sell lemonade, zucchini bread (which J had made) and apricot jam. He set them up with some seed money and they cheerfully awaited their customers. I have to admit I had my doubts about the enterprise. They had done a lemonade stand once before, but that was in conjunction with our neighbor's yard sale. Imagine my surprise when they sold 50 dollars worth! And they had fun doing it. Life is grand!

The prince of the house.

Those of you who know H, know that he loves to make things. A favorite medium is paper held together by lots of tape (the more tape, the better, usually). The other day he made B a crown, and told me that it's because B is "the prince of the house." How true. How true.



H adores B, by the way, and has to be told upon occasion, "All right, he's had enough hugs and kisses for now!"

The same day, he also made B a propeller beanie. I think he got the idea from Calvin and Hobbes.

He might fly away at any moment...

We're swimming in apricots!

The apricot harvest is in, and, as usual, there are thousands of apricots. Way more than we can actually deal with, but we do our best. Our apricot tree, for those who may not know, is massive. Those who owned our home before we bought it must have just ignored the poor tree, because it is simply much bigger than an apricot ought to be, and is so tall that it is impossible to reach all of the fruit. That's fine, though, because the fruit we can reach is plenty. We have dubbed it "The Giving Tree."

This year J allowed T and H to get on the roof with him to pick apricots, which, of course, thrilled them. Here is a picture of the three of them on the roof:

And showing off just a fraction of our harvest:

And here is a picture of N taken that day, posted just for the sake of gratuitous cuteness:

So... anyone want some apricot jam?

A little story about quail.

We have quail in our neighborhood; a great number of quail. The quail like to wander through our yard and garden, and they are pests at the beginning of the gardening season because they will eat the seeds and tender sprouts. But we all like seeing the baby quail scurrying after their parents in the middle summer months.

Last week, I was in the middle of something noisy (I forget what... a sibling argument? L shouting a story at me because she fears she will not be heard if her voice drops below 93 decibels? T interrupting her in order to confirm her fears? Just don't remember...) when H excitedly informed me that there were baby birds on the back patio. What kind of birds? He didn't know? What were they doing? "Just kind of opening their mouths and peeping." I went to the patio to investigate and found three baby quail stuck fast to the concrete, chirping their little heads off and making quite the pitiful sight. You see, we have a hummingbird feeder hanging from the eaves over the patio, at a height convenient both for it to be seen from the window and for it to strike inattentive adults on the head as the walk by. Some of the "nectar" had been knocked out of the feeder and left in a tiny puddle on the patio, where the heat had evidently turned into baby quail-snaring glue.

So I fetched some water, diluted the syrup glue, and managed to free the little birds while T offered worried hope that their parents would find them and H mentioned oh-so casually that it would be nice to keep birds as pets.

The story has a happy ending. We herded the little birds over near that part of the fence where the quail are always coming and going, went inside, and had the pleasure of peeping through the window and seeing the rest of the quail family coming to collect the three stragglers.

Then when J came home he asked why I didn't think to keep them to raise for eggs and food. Ok... sure. (Can you hear my eyes rolling from there?)