They say immitation is the most secere form of flattery...

My sister got married this summer and then spent the summer in Canada, but they left some stuff in storage at my place. That's right when we were putting our house on the market. We didn't have a shower curtain. She had a cute new one. So we worked out a deal and we used her new shower curtain for a time. Then move number one happened, the shower had doors at the new place. Then move number two happened. We were in need of a shower curtain again.
Now let me tell you about her shower curtain. It was bright and whimsical with trees and squirrels and owls and things on it. The littlest girls made friends with those squirrels. They asked me several times if we could have squirrels in our bathroom at move number one. But when move number two happened and we needed a shower curtain, they came out in force for the squirrels.
So, dear sister, we are imitators. We have a new squirrel shower curtain. I hope you are flattered.

So we've moved to the the family farm. (mostly moved) Grandma, right next door, has two dogs, Daisy and Beagle.
My kids can't seem to remember Beagle. It's Bugle or Bagel. I think its histerical! But the poor dog seems confused.

We went to St Louis for the weekend to meet some friends. Even with the chaos of seven kids we had a good visit and a great time. And what is a visit to St Louis if you don't go to the zoo? So we did- go to the zoo. It is taking some time for me to recover though. Today I'm doing laundry and enjoying the fall air coming through the windows.


Tears, what a huge frog!


All the girls and I.


Watching some huge fish.

I have an artist in my house. She would rather be drawing, painting, coloring, beading, crafting than about anything. This is one of her creations this week. I think it is hysterical. Study it a while and tell me what you think. Sorry I can't get it any bigger, the detail on the shirt is really what makes it.

We started home-school a couple of weeks ago. Any spare minute I had to blog is now consumed by phonics and addition. Sorry to leave you hanging.

Over labor day we made applesauce with Grandma Marion.

We added some crab apples for some zip.
Wash them well.
Cut them up.
Cook them and then run them through the magic machine. (Thanks Dianne!)


We got to see Uncle Dell.


And we've been trying to hit some local festivals on the weekends. Sorry no pictures.

Yesterday I made some yummy cinnamon rolls.
We have a bunch of them. I wish you would come help eat them.

One of the most loved sentences a mother can hear..."Momma, can I go poop on the big girl pottie?" Of course, I usually hear this from my two year old after the deed is done. It does give me hope though.

Here are a few pictures from our weekend.


"Mom, my toes aren't dirty!"




This weekend, we took the training wheels off of Scrub's bike. He thinks he's pretty big stuff now, racing down the street. And when he clips a playing card on the back of his bike so that it rubs his wheel, he sounds like he's riding a motorcycle. My baby's growing up.




"Hey mom, look, I found a feather from a zebra bird."


And in non-pictured news... At church this weekend, our family saw Kristina for the first time. Make-up, painted fingernails, v-neck shirt, tight jeans, high heels. You should have seen Scrub staring. Oh, did I forget to mention... Kristina is a man. Yikes! This church is really opening us up for some conversation I'd hoped to prolong for quite a while.

This week we noticed Boo-boo getting heat rash on her neck because she won't keep her hair up in a ponytail.



So I gave her a haircut.

I'm coming to the realization that I do not fully capitalize on the child labor I have available in my home. So this morning I gave it a try. Scrub's job was to empty the trash cans into the large one- it was trash day today. And Tears' job was breakfast dishes. They loved it. As soon as Scrub was finished with his chore, he was right there at the sink helping Tears rinse the dishes. And I loved it. Two household chores I didn't have to do. I'm thinking I'll make a schedule of chores. Do you have any ideas for age appropriate ones for 2, 3, 5 and, 6 year olds?

I love cookbooks. I read cookbooks like some people read romance novels. Before our move we were out of bookshelf space. After the move we have about half the shelf space. So I decided to go through some cookbooks, you know, get rid of the ones I don't use. I can't do it. I looked through four tonight that I haven't opened, maybe ever. And I found things I'd like to make someday. So, I think instead of getting rid of my cookbooks, I think I'll go buy another bookcase.

We had to leave our washer and dryer at our house to sell with the house. So we bought a washer at an auction. And we have clothesline posts in our backyard. So I'm just hanging my clothes to dry. Sounds easy. Not so! I bought some line labeled clothesline. It is a wire with plastic coating. So we strung it up. The weight of the wet clothes makes the plastic stretch. So when it stretches out enough that the knot doesn't have any wire in it, it breaks. And then my clean clothes are laying on the ground until we notice. Grrr... Does anyone know what kind of line to string on a clothesline?

Score one for mom...or 13. We live about half a block from DAV that ran an awesome sale today- every clothing item was $.90. During nap time I took a little walk with a twenty dollar bill stuck in my shoe. I scored 13 items for less than $13. ALL FOR ME! Jeans, skirts, sweaters, a jacket, shorts. ALL FOR ME! Oh, sorry, did I say that already. Its just usually when we go shopping, by the time everyone else has gotten what they need, little tempers don't allow for mom to do any mom shopping. But today, mom shopped all alone. Of course, after the workers shoved my finds in a large black trash bag (that I had to lug home alone), I was sort of wishing I had some company... the strong muscled variety.

We have a bride living at our house. My sister got married in June, and since then Dobber has played wedding non-stop. Her lovie blanket, conveniently, has a hole in one corner that is just the size of her head. So she has taken to wearing it as a veil and tromping around in play high heels. So cute.

As a part of our move, we (Isaac) has decided to adopt some new habits. One of them is getting up at the crack of dawn- all of us- I'm talking early. Okay, I do have to give him some credit- though this habit is only two days old- he has been getting up and getting breakfast ready and then getting me up. But it is still 6:10! I don't even know how early he is getting up.

It is nice to eat breakfast together. And it is very nice that he is the one making the breakfast. But another substantial benefit is how much I'm getting done in the mornings. This morning, we had all eaten, gotten dressed, and then I mowed the yard and showered and re-dressed all before 9am.

How wonderful!

It leaves time for more whimsical things...



like putting the girls hair up in hot rollers.

The hot rollers were rather a disappointment. My older two girls (the younger of the two is on the left) have stick straight hair (from my husband's side). It is beautiful and they can go to bed with wet hair and still have straight hair in the morning. My hair, if slept on wet, looks rather Medusa-ish with chunks sticking out all over- but, I digress... The little one, Boo Boo (on the right), has beautiful natural curls in her hair already. The girl with already curly hair is the only one who saw results from the hot rollers. And, of course, she is not the one who had requested some curls.
Ahh but isn't life always greener on the other side of the fence.

Today is Ike's first day at his new job. I'm giddy for him to get home and tell me all about it. While he is starting something new, I thought I would do something new too.