You Don't See That Every Day

Around our house there is a lot of laughter. A lot. My day doesn't feel complete if my husband hasn't made me laugh at least once. And in return it's a good day when I can make him laugh. There was the one time when we went to a grocery store while on vacation, and he decided to talk Irish the whole time. Especially at the checkout counter. Good times. Today we had to go to the bank and deposit a large sum that we had earned over the summer. And we had to get the tuition paid, so there was all that to take care. I needed my personal bouncer as I handled all that cash. So we go into the bank and thankfully! we were the only customers there. As we handed over the $$ to deposit my husband alluded to it as "the drug money." Oh my word! I am sure my eyes were shooting darts at him. And then he says to the teller, There's only one counterfeit in there. And so she obviously has to look at all the bills, and has to put them in the special machine. Oh sure, they a...

As I so often do, I went to the beach on my birthday earlier this week. It was a gorgeous sunny day. But like most days on the Oregon coast, it was windy, and we kept our jackets or sweatshirts on all day. Thankfully it is August and we could wear shorts with minimal goosebumps. This time we went to a 'new' beach (ie. one we hadn't been to that I can remember) It has a huge sand dune mountain that the kids went running for as soon as we got there. I made it up about half way with my youngest. Even that was a wonderful view. The rest of the crew made it to the top and so they took pictures of the other side for me. Maybe next time I will make it up there. It's not so easy when you're as old as I am. After lunch we tried another beach, one you can drive out onto with your auto.  And so we did. And it was a thrill for the passengers as well as the driver. We spent the rest of the afternoon playing on the beach, digging, running, watching the...

Should I start with the good news first or the bad new first? That's probably one question my husband does not want to hear. Today started out like so many other days we've had this summer. My son and I got up at 0 dark thirty while the young 'uns slept in. (Because, really, why wake a 3 year old up before 6 am?) This part I consider the ugly. No one but my husband and baby girl wants to see me at 5.30 am. We drove out to my dad's farm and helped harvest enough garbanzo beans for our morning count. I managed to make it back to our house by 8.15 am and get cleaned up for the next event of my day. So I guess that was a good part. Thankfully my sister could come over and stay with the kids while I was gone. (Good part.) But as I was backing out of the driveway my terrific hard-bumpered pickup introduced itself to her little Subaru's plastic bumper. It wasn't pretty. So file that under the bad and the ugly. And even thought I wanted to stay and DO something abou...

Let me tell you a little story (ok, I took that line from a Veggietales. I know a few of my readers can hear Pa Grape's voice here ... or maybe it's just me.) Back in the day, during the summer my parents would ship me off** to my cousin's house, or sometimes my grandma's. When I got to be in college, I lived at my sister's house during the summer and worked the tourist attractions in their town. So, the summer I turned 16 I was in California at my cousin's. It just so happened that my birthday fell during that time. and it just so happened that my mom said I could get my ears pierced when I turned 16. Well, my cousin has an awesome older brother who took us to the mall that day. His birthday happens to be the day before mine, but I don't know if that is why we were at the mall or not. I'll just continue to think that it was because he is such a great guy. He told me I could pick anything in the mall and he would buy it for me. Can you guess what I ...

Summer is all about water: splashing in it, painting in it, swimming in it, running through it, We've been up early most days, helping out at my dad's farm, then coming back for swim lessons, and the general daily work. But I've tried to get some good times in too. Water play, dress-up, puzzles, fresh produce and driving, Lots of driving. That has been our summer. And it's gone by way too fast.