Coffee With Elly

For his 11th birthday Ezra with Judah and his two friends John and Paul went to see Pete's Dragon. This picture has nothing to do with that, but it is a picture of Ezra 3 days after his birthday, so at least it's timely. :-) Ezra is our most thoughtful child, generous to others, especially little kids, and often grateful and appreciative of other people's efforts on his behalf. He's a delight.

Our baby turned four this summer! Hard to believe she's so old! Since Phinehas went off to school full time, it seemed like she might need something else to do while her siblings were all gone every morning, so she goes to preschool one day a week and gets to do preschool crafts, songs, and learning somewhere else (where somebody else cleans up). She loves doing "Circle Time" with Mommy, too, though it seems like less of a circle, and more of a line. (two points, get it?) We love her bunches and she is very well taken care of by her big siblings. It's possible that she's a little spoiled, but probably not too badly. Unlike some of her siblings, she seems to entertain herself quietly quite easily and when we are home together in the mornings I have to stop and make myself do things with her, because she's not very demanding. Would've been a perfect youngest sibling in a homeschooling scenario, I imagine. *sigh* One of her siblings taught her how to write h...

We arranged a weekend vacation with Michael's family and my parents to Sunriver, OR, August 5-8, 2016. We rented two vacation homes within easy walking distance and the cousins ate junk food and had pine cone wars and threw the football and frisbee. On Saturday we made a few expeditions, notably to the Lava River Cave and the SHARC rec center. On Monday, we tried out the activities at the Village on our way out of town. Nobody got hurt and nobody got sick, and our family had a great time! I'm starting to really get into this whole "vacation" thing.  I did an acceptable job packing the kids and the other stuff, but completely flubbed my own packing - I forgot my swimming suit and other essentials! I had to go buy some clothes, including a swimming suit that wasn't really what I wanted and was "highway robbery" expensive - after all, what you gonna do when you're at a resort with a cool water center and you're half an hour away from a Target, ...

Dressed up for church and smiling, "for Grandma." What's better than a living doll to dress up? Monica undertook this project. After a hike at Oneonta Gorge we celebrated surviving with ice cream. Our traveling companion, Jonathan Shaw, bought the "large."  Monica settled for a "small." Reading together on those chilly July mornings. Apparently this is what "spies" wear... my grandma's costume jewelry helps. I'm not sure why there was so much dress up this month! Summer time reading - what ails me and how to fix it! Some good thoughts, but no fast solutions. Darn. ;-) We introduced the kids to Chariots of Fire to mixed reviews - but even they couldn't resist the music..

I can't believe it's been fifteen years! Praise God for his bountiful blessings to us. We celebrated our anniversary by going to the Cavalia circus horse show on our actual anniversary, thanks to my mom and dad coming through on their way back from the coast and offering too watch the kids so we could stay out late.  The show was pretty amazing! I especially enjoyed the acrobats. The horses were beautiful and majestic, of course, but I know relatively little of what goes into training them - but the feats of the acrobats are just incredible and I'm plenty familiar with the normal limits of the human body.  We had a lovely time!

Phinehas loves mini-golf. He wasn't impressed my skills, however. Hiking on free day Down at the beach! The Twin Rocks beach before one of the lovely evening campfires! Elena and Phinehas at dusk. Building a sandcastle for the contest! Monica seemed to enjoy herself! Watching the assembly line at the Tillimook Cheese Factory What can I say? Family Camp was great again this year! The weather wasn't too rainy and nobody got sick at camp! Everybody got sick right after camp with long lasting coughs, but nobody got sick AT camp, so I call that a win, right? For free day we went on a hike down to a beach, and then off to Cannon Beach for lunch and a visit to Bruce's Candy Kitchen. Zane stayed with us in our cabin this year - like Judah and Ezra, we hardly saw him! Family Camp is much, much easier once your youngest is potty-trained, I must say! The four older kids just ran wild and we'd check in on them at meals. Elena still stayed ...

Summer has started, it's time for squirt guns!  Target Practice Hugh has mischievous intent Hey ya, Marcus! Ezra's just watching in the porch