Labor Day Weekend

Although the Labor Day weekend still has a day left I thought I'd write about what we've been doing to keep busy. Gerrit was finally able to have Micah sleep over on Friday night. They slept outside in the tent and made it through the night without coming inside. It did get a little chilly despite all the blanket they had. I made monkey bread and bacon for brunch on Saturday morning.

Saturday we did some shopping and Bruce's parents came for a visit in the afternoon. It was so hot outside. We reached 100 degrees and it broke the old record of 97.

Today we treated ourselves to going to Raging Rivers-an outdoor waterpark. We went two years ago as a family and Aleah and I went last year for Girl Scouts. We had a lot of fun and I'm so glad we chose that over going to the movies. We can go to the movies anytime of the year but Raging Rivers is very seasonal and that time is quickly coming to an end. It was alot easier watching the kids this time too-they were all two years older. Samantha was not quite 16 months the last time we went and Donovan was only four plus Gerrit and Aleah weren't that great of swimmers. Aleah did end up going down one of the really high slides. I can do a lot of different types of waterslides but those really high straight down ones scare me.

Aleah continues with her sleepwalking (she was looking for a towel in the kitchen last night) and tummy pains. I'm now starting to think she might be lactose intolerant. We'll have to experiment with cutting back on milk products (her doctor did suggest that) and see if that helps if not I think we'll be going back to the doctor. I'm going to journal what she eats and what the nights are like for awhile and see if there's any patterns.

The three year olds-2008

Here is a picture of the girls from yesterday. It's not the best picture especially with Samantha's fake smile but it's all I got! Doesn't Sydney's hair look cute cut like that. The funny thing is the girls' first year Sydney's hair was blonde, Grace's hair was red (they both still have the same hair color) and Samantha was a brunette!

Here are the girls Samantha, Grace, and Sydney.

This was actually the first picture I took but Grace wanted nothing to do with it-you can see her mom Karen's hand there trying to get her to sit down.

Here is the link to the photo session from last year.

Hot Air Balloon

This past weekend we took the kids to one of the playgrounds at Cottonwood Park in south Bismarck. Not too long after we left the house we saw a hot air balloon floating over Bismarck - a rarity in most cities I'm sure! We never got very close to the balloon.

The only camera I had with was my cell phone camera, and at the playground we were looking right into the sun.

It is a horrible picture, but you can see the balloon in the center just above the horizon. It was next to South Washington Street east of the mobile home park area. That is south of Wachter Avenue but north of Burleigh Avenue. Here it was coming down. It landed for a minute and then came back up. It floated south for a bit and then landed for good in an area south of Burleigh Avenue - somewhere south of the tree in the middle of the road.

The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins

Leonard Nimoy singing "The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins." According to the video description, it is about one of J.R.R. Tolkiens hobbits and was from the late '60s.

Referring to Wikipedia, The Lord of the Rings is a sequel to The Hobbit and takes place 60 years later. I really would like to, but I have not seen any of The Lord of the Rings movie trilogy.

My hope is that at least one of you gets the tune stuck in your head. Ha!

Bilbo,
Bilbo Baggins,
He's only three feet tall!
Bilbo,
Bilbo Baggins,
The bravest little hobbit of them all!



Just think, without YouTube you probably would never have been able to hear this song!

More spilled milk!

As if the gallon of milk wasn't enough on the floor yesterday Samantha dumped about a quart on the floor today. YIKES! She took the milk out of the fridge and I told her to put it back (since she wasn't suppose to get it in the first place) and she dropped it. Some people do meat free days, I think we're going to try having a milk free day.

After the swim class today (at which I wasn't the youngest person by at least 15 years-there was a lady that use to be Gerrit's student teacher three years ago that was there today as well and I had at least 10 years on her) Samantha and I met Barb and Karen at the play area in Gateway Mall. It took awhile for Grace to warm up to Sydney and Samantha but she did about the time we were ready to leave. We did have lunch at the Rock 'n 50's too. I wanted to post some pictures but have experienced some technical difficulties so I will try again tomorrow since I'm ready for bed!

My Girl Scout meeting scheduled for this afternoon was postponed until tomorrow afternoon unless that changes again. I also had a Sunday School teacher meeting after supper tonight. I'll be teaching the fifth and sixth graders so I'll have Gerrit. There's usually only about six students and they're all really nice kids.

Tomorrow morning I'm meeting Tricia, Vicki, and Barb for coffee. We were planning on doing it last week but Tricia's father-in-law passed away and she was in Minnesota for the funeral. David's dad was a missionary in Africa for many years (David was actually born there) and Tricia said it was a really nice funeral and that a lot of missionaries were there. They had been expecting his death for awhile but that doesn't make it any easier.

80's Video: Jump

In 1984 Van Halen had a big hit with "Jump." The song was #1 on the Billboard Hot 100 for five weeks - from February 25 through March 31. That is pretty impressive. Although they came pretty close with several other songs, this is their only #1 Hot 100 single.



You all should be thankful. I came so close to posting an Olivia Newton-John song!

Don't cry over spilled milk!

The last two days have been so busy! I did make it to and enjoyed the swim aerobics class I went to yesterday. I plan on going again tomorrow. I also am officially done canning cucumbers!! The grand total for the summer is 44 quarts of dill pickles (no need to make relish this year since we still have plenty left from a previous year) and of course I did give some away and we've had cucumber salad, and cucumbers in salad and just plain cucumbers. I made bread and butter pickles a year or two ago and Bruce said they weren't as good as the ones my mom makes so I won't make them again. Everyone in the house loves pickles except Donovan. Also Samantha's friend Sydney LOVES pickles so I'll have to give her some and my mom requested some as well since even we couldn't eat 44 quarts of dill pickles in a year!

I started my day donating plasma at six this morning and came home to get the kids off to school and cleaned the kitchen before Samantha and I headed to my Moms In Touch group. After that we went for a two mile walk (I walked, Samantha rode) and then we made a big trip to Wal-Mart. I dread those. Anyway when we got home I was unloading the van (without my helpers-Gerrit, Aleah, and Donovan) and I put the gallon of milk on the counter (almost $5) and it fell off and splashed all over the cupboards and floor. What a mess but I didn't cry over it! I hate it when milk spills it's so sticky. Donovan once when he was about two spilled almost a whole gallon of milk on the floor-he was very mischievious as a toddler. After that cleanup and lunch Samantha took a long nap and I did sit down for about 45 minutes before I hung two loads of laundry outside and starting making a turkey dinner.

I put the turkey in and got the potatoes peeled (you've got to have mashed potatoes with turkey and gravy) and then the kids came home from school and we went and got Aleah's violin.
We also got more milk and some grapes at the grocery store. I finished making supper when I got home and made a chocolate zucchini cake for dessert. When we went on a walk last night someone in the neighborhood had free zucchini sitting out. Bruce rarely plants so zucchini and we didn't have any this year. We went on a walk after supper and after the cleanup and helping Aleah with homework and reading to Donovan I'm about ready for bed but I still have to clean up the sticky milk floor.

Tomorrow I'm going to the Y for the aerobics class and then meeting Barb and Karen for lunch so we can get our three year old girls together for a picture before they start turning four!! I will have to post pictures. I posted pictures of them last year on September 26 so it will be eleven months to the day! Barb informed me that Sydney got her haircut today so I can't wait to see it. I'm not ready to cut Sam's hair yet. It really isn't bad to comb and I didn't cut Aleah's hair shorter until she was done with Kindergarten. Samantha's hair is already close to what Aleah's hair was in Kindergarten so it will be interesting to see how long it gets-we're not going for Crystal Gayle length though. I think I really like long hair on my girls since I never had long hair ever-it's just too fine to look good at a long length.

Happy Birthday, Duane!

Happy Birthday to my oldest brother - Duane! He turned 48 today, and is a little more than six years older than me. My birthday is in December.

As a kid Duane saved me by using a table knife to remove a hard candy from my throat. I was choking. I don't remember this event - it is what I was told. Here is a picture of Duane driving his tractor in the Hague Centennial Parade earlier this summer.

I feel terrible but I just realized I forgot to wish my sister-in-law, Betty (Duane's wife), Happy Birthday on this blog. Her birthday came and went in early July. So, Happy Belated Birthday to Betty!

First two days of school complete!

The kids enjoyed their first two days of school. Donovan has five new kids in his class-last year he had 17 kids-two moved over the summer and there are five new ones for a total of 20 first graders. That's a good number. There are no new fourth graders and Aleah reports that she has 18 in her class. There are three new sixth graders and Gerrit has two in his class. It's kind of funny that one of them is originally from the Westfield/Pollock area and is a few months younger then Gerrit. I remember when she was born. I guess she will be joining Girl Scouts and is also in both band and orchestra plus plays piano. I wonder if her older sister is as busy as she is??

Aleah has informed us she is interested in playing violin. In the past she said she wanted to do both that and band but we said she'd have to pick since she also plays piano. Orchestra is offered in the fourth grade and band isn't so I guess she's going to try violin. I guess we're trying to start our own strings duo in our house. I told Donovan he should go for the cello when he's old enough assuming Gerrit and Aleah will stick with it and Samantha can play bass someday-ha, ha. I did talk to Aleah's piano teacher about it and she thought it was a great idea and that Aleah would do really well. I feel priveleged to live in Bismarck where orchestra is offered in the school system especially at the elementary level since it isn't offered in many schools statewide. Speaking of orchestra, I took Gerrit to get his viola tuned up, etc. and he had outgrown it and needed a bigger one. I'm guessing Aleah is going to come home this week with the info on when she starts so we'll have to go get a violin for her.

Samantha and I stayed busy while the kids were at school. Thursday morning was sign-up for MOPS and since I'm on the steering committee I was there to help out. It was very quiet that afternoon when Samantha napped. Friday we did some errands and I canned some more cucumbers. Tomorrow I'm finishing my last batch since Bruce pulled the plants. We did enjoy corn on the cob Friday night but it was a poor crop so there isn't much more.

We did find out that mom doesn't have West Nile. That was good but she has some kind of virus and she's still feeling very weak. Her blood tests must have shown some improvement though since Mayo hasn't called her yet. If her tests weren't better and they haven't called her by now they really need to step it up a bit.

Tomorrow I'm going to start doing water aerobics at the Y-I use to do them a long time ago when we moved to Bismarck but it was too hard to get there with so many small children. Now I only have one three year old that loves to go to the child watch so I feel I'm up for the class. I took the three oldest swimming today while Samantha napped and we had a great time. We were able to play in the deep end which we can't do when Samantha is with us.

We watched some of the closing ceremonies for the Olympics tonight. I must say that I've really enjoyed watching them this time. I don't think I've gotten into them so much since they were in Atlanta in 1996 or since Greg Louganis was diving in the 1988 Olympics-strange dream I had last night with him in it-the Olympics were still on at Thanksgiving time and he was trying to make a comeback-so weird. I will miss watching them but finally I can get more done and "TRY" to get to bed earlier now and just 18 more months until the Winter Olympics in Vancouver but four years does seem like a long time until we can watch Michael Phelps swim for more gold!

Sunday Video: Empty Me

Hey, no quartet this week! Instead I picked Chris Sligh singing "Empty Me." The song is from his recent album titled Running Back to You.

If you don't watch American Idol you might not be familiar with Chris. He was on Season 6 of that show and I think he made it to the top 10, but not much further.

The picture says it all

Our van recently turned over to 90,000 miles. It was actually over a month ago already. It was Monday, July 21st, at exactly noon, as we were pulling into the garage probably coming back from tennis. We have a 2002 Dodge Grand Caravan. We bought it used in October 2003. It has been a very good vehicle and we really like it. We hope to keep it for a few more years. My brother had close to 300,000 miles on one of his first vehicles. It was a GMC Jimmy. I can't remember the year it was but he bought it used when he was probably a junior in high school and he kept it a long time. When I talked to him the other night he was saying that my kids only remember him driving the car he has now-a 2000 Honda. He may have to get a different vehicle at some point but for now he's keeping his Honda.

Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With silver bells, and cockle shells,
And pretty maids all in a row.

According to Wikipedia, that English nursery rhyme is probably not about a garden.

Well, I figure it is time for a garden update. It has been a while. The pictures here are kind of mixed up in that I took them on different days and at different times.

The theme in the garden this week is watering. It has been hot and windy and that dries everything out. I've been watering about 1/2 of the garden each evening so that each part gets watered every other day.

I usually try to use a trench to water rows or a moat to water hills or tomatoes. This is more labor intensive than just using a sprinkler or something but I think it gives better results and saves water. Besides, while the trench or moat is filling I grab a hoe and work on the weeds.

Our cucumber hills and the climbing morning glories. Donovan likes morning glories a lot so I planted a bunch this year. I put up some lattice so they would have something to climb.

I planted three colors - this one and the one below and a red. It doesn't look like any of the red ones came up.

Maybe it is hard to see, but these are the tomatoes. I built the cages myself out of fencing. They work pretty well.

Sweet corn and the giant sunflowers (the same as in the photo at the top). The corn should be ready tomorrow.

Here I am filling a moat around a tomato plant. Usually I just lay the watering wand down and fill them that way.

Our pumpkin plants. The wind and the cutworms decimated the plants of two of the four hills I planted and left only three plants in the two remaining hills. Right now there are three pumpkins on the three plants.

This is one of the sunflowers you can see behind the pumpkins in the previous photo. That bumble bee sure was busy.

When there is space left in the garden I'll often plant some flowers. This plant is called Bells of Ireland. As you can see, the flowers are green. Green is commonly associated with Ireland and Irish things.

This is one of the flowers from the bed in the front yard. I don't remember the name of this one, though. It is one of the perennials we planted this year.

Well, I hope you've enjoyed this photo essay!

New Wheels

Today I took delivery of my new company car. This is the 2009 model of the Chevrolet Impala LS. It was ordered by fleet back in July. I never told Nancy the car had been ordered because I wanted to see how long it would take her to notice when I took it home.

I found out yesterday the car was at the dealer so last evening I cleaned it up inside, vacuumed, and took my stuff out. Got a call this afternoon that it was ready and headed right over to Stan's place to get myself some of that intoxicating new car smell.

I parked my old and new cars next to each other to get some pictures. Here my old car, in Glacier Blue color, is in the front. It has almost 66,000 miles on it. We took delivery of this one in January of 2006.

The color of my new car is called Gold Mist Metallic. They no longer offer Glacier Blue - I think it was only available for a short time in 2006. The body on the 2009 models is still the same, but there is one exterior physical difference other than the color . Can you tell what it is?

My 2006 has a very light gray interior. It was the only interior color offered with that exterior color. Unless you really like a light gray interior I would not recommend it. Shows every little stain or dirt mark. On my new car I chose ebony for the interior. Ebony is like a dark charcoal. In 2006 a front split bench seat was the standard option and that is what it has. For 2009 a bench seat is not an option - just bucket seats with a console. No more traveling in this car with the whole family.

Until this year our company fleet manager has deleted the OnStar (one year service free) and XM Radio (three month service free) options from the company cars. These are standard on even the base LS model. For 2009 they decided to change that and keep those options, but neglected to inform the dealership for my order. Oh well, my current car didn't have OnStar so I'm used to not having that service. When my 2006 was ordered they saved $400 by deleting OnStar but I see now it is only $85. I suppose they figured for $85 it was worth if not just for safety reasons.

So, did Nancy notice the new car? She really didn't have time. Just before sitting down for supper Samantha was standing at the sliding patio door by our dining room area. All of sudden she says, "Daddy, you got a new car!" Imagine that, our three year old was the first one to notice. That's funny.

After supper I took the whole family for a drive around the block. A good time was had by all.

80's Video: When I See You Smile

Let's go back to the #1 Billboard Hot 100 format for the 80's video this week. In 1989 "When I See You Smile" by Bad English was #1 for the two weeks of November 11 and November 18.

Bad English was sort of a rock supergroup formed with individuals who had achieved success either as a solo artist or with another band. The lead singer was John Waite, and the band also included Jonathan Cain and Neal Schon from Journey. They were only together from 1989 to 1991 and put out two albums.

Mr. Waite was also both a solo artist and the lead singer for The Babys, a British band active in the late 1970s. The Babys had hits with songs such as "Back On My Feet Again," "Isn't It Time," "Everytime I Think of You," and "Midnight Rendevous." I'm not posting any of those videos right now but feel free to check them out on YouTube if you'd like.

Bad English with "When I See You Smile."



John Waite also had a #1 hit the week of September 22, 1984 as a solo artist with "Missing You." Here is that video.



Thanks again to Wikipedia. I love you. Well, love may be a little too strong. I do like you a lot - you are a good source of information.

Back to School Open House/Picnic

Tonight was the kids back to school open house/picnic. They got to meet their teachers and see their rooms...and their friends. They start school on Thursday and I think they're excited to start. I can't believe the school year is already starting and that Gerrit is in his last year of elementary school. I think I've neglected to mention that Gerrit has the same size feet as me now (and I don't have small feet) and I can wear his shoes if I feel the need to do so-I do like a pair of his flip flops but otherwise I'll pass. I'm sure his feet have a lot of growing left to do too!

Aleah is staying overnight at Zoe's house tonight. I was hesitant about it since we've been getting the kids to bed a little earlier each night and waking them up earlier but Zoe's parents said they're doing the same things so that works. She hadn't stayed overnight at Zoe's house since the beginning of the summer.

Gerrit, Donovan, Samantha, and I went swimming at the Y tonight. I knew we'd be busy getting ready for school tomorrow so I thought it would work better this evening.

I canned 28 quarts of dill pickles last week and Bruce brought in a bunch more tonight. Guess I'll be doing more! Anyone want cucumbers?? Bruce also mentioned that our sweet corn will be ready to eat tomorrow-guess what we're having for supper???

Mom still hasn't heard if she has West Nile or about her new round of blood tests from Mayo. She didn't seem quite as tired tonight and said she only napped once instead of pretty much all day so hopefully she's turning a corner and starting to feel better.

We had our first girl scout meeting yesterday. All but one girl showed up and she had a dentist appointment. I guess we have another fourth grader that signed up just recently so that makes 14 in our troop. I wonder if anymore girls will join? Shelly and I kind of hope not. 14 is a big enough group and nine of the 14 are fourth graders.

Tomorrow the plan is to have lunch at McDonald's with Barb and her kids and finish getting ready for school and probably can some cucumbers??

Men's Synchronized Swimming

In the spirit of the 2008 Olympics: Men's Synchronized Swimming.



My favorite line is "I'm not that . . . strong a swimmer."

This was a skit on Saturday Night Live.

Full Moon

We've had a good full moon for the past couple of nights, so I've been going outside to try to get some pictures of said moon. I initially didn't have much success at all, but I did some more research on camera settings and came a little bit closer.

Below was one of my best attempts and I think it needs a lot of work. Could be much better.

What I really need is a bigger zoom lens. This picture is cropped from 4272 x 2848 to 800 x 533. I've heard, too, that you can mount a camera to a telescope and get good moon photos. That would be ultra cool.

Sunday Video: You Gotta Live Like Jesus

Novie Lister and the Statesmen with " You Gotta Live Like Jesus."



Also with "Count Your Blessings."



I believe they were both done on a TV show, and probably are short to fit within a time slot.

What an athlete!

We've been really into watching the Olympics around here in the evenings. What can one say about Michael Phelps-what an athlete! He's now tied with Mark Spitz for winning seven gold medals in the same Olympic games-will he break the record tomorrow? You can bet we'll be watching. Tonight's race was so close I still can't believe he pulled it off. We've been enjoying the gymnastics as well.

Samantha wasn't feeling well this morning. She was really whiney and said her tummy hurt. Later in the morning she came to me and said she felt like she was going to puke so I rushed her into the bathroom in time for her to throw up all over the bathroom floor-much better then on carpet. She took a good nap this afternoon and seems to be better now so I'm not sure what the problem was-hopefully no one else will get sick.

The doctor called me this morning to say Aleah's tests were normal. There's a couple more we'll know about on Monday. She didn't complain about her stomach tonight so maybe the Prevacid is working.

We don't have any big plans for tomorrow. I'm going to get the boys room organized and do more laundry-today was a big laundry day. Gerrit was going to have a friend sleep over tonight but with Samantha not feeling well we'll try again next Friday night.

The school shopping is done!

Today we are officially done shopping for school! We started doing a bit last week and the last three days we've been getting it done-exhausting about sums it up!! They've all got new shoes, clothes (they seemed to outgrow their jeans this summer) and school supplies. All their backpacks have been loaded already so I think they're pretty excited about starting school-one week from today!

Mom went to the doctor today. She's really not been feeling well lately-I could tell that she wasn't herself when we were there last week. I always think the worst-that the cancer has come back or she's rejecting her liver but right now the doctor suspects she could have West Nile. I hope it's not that either but she certainly has a lot of the symptoms. They did some blood tests today. He also put her on a strong medication for her stomach-it's really been hurting her and she has no appetite. Hopefully it's not West Nile but if it is hopefully it won't make her any more ill.

I also spent the morning at the clinic/hospital with Aleah. I took her in since her stomach is still hurting her and keeping her up at night. The doctor did a bunch of tests and he suspected possible appendicitis but the ultrasound doctor was pretty sure that wasn't it so for now the doctor said for her to try Prevacid but some tests aren't back yet. If the Prevacid doesn't work and her stomach still hurts she may have to have a CT.

Here are some pictures from my cousin Mike's wedding. He is my youngest cousin and I remember that I was in the fourth grade when he was born. I recall changing a few of his diapers!!

Michael and Jessica Pederson (Mike and Jess) posing behind their wedding cake. Aleah took the picture.

Here I am holding Samantha and Summer with Donovan and Aleah. The kids were more excited that Summer was going to be at the reception (Mike is her uncle) then seeing the bride and groom.

Here's a nice picture of Bruce, Aleah, and Gerrit. I think it's a very nice picture and Bruce didn't want me to post but I know how now so here it is!