Pics from Aunt Jena's Birthday

Aunt Jena's 30th birthday was... at least a couple months ago at this point. BUT, these pictures are only... maybe a month or so behind because Aunt Jena's party was nowhere near her birthday because Uncle Thomas planned a surprise party for her while they were visiting St. Louis. This is the party all the kids knew about when we spent the afternoon with Aunt Jena at cousin Matt's wedding the day before the party. It definitely appears that they, and everyone else, managed to keep it a secret because Jena was definitely surprised!

We had lovely weather and Grandma turned her backyard into a party paradise. Catherine asked if she could take pictures, so she had my camera for the entire party. I can't put every picture in here because there are hundreds, but here are some highlights. Thanks Catherine!

One of Jena's friends there had a brand new baby who was adorable. She almost stole the show!

Except how do you steal the show from Mary? You can't.

Since the rocket swing's giant tree came down, it is in a much smaller tree but Edie still loves it.

Hi Grandpa!

Great job scheming and organizing, Uncle Thomas!

I know, you can't miss the brace on his hand. Thomas was involved in a nasty crash (apparently completely unavoidable and not at all his fault) in a bike race, and after several days in the hospital and a couple surgeries, he still lost the top portion of his left thumb. It was really good to see him doing well!

This is Jena's dad enjoying a story of Gigi's. Maybe Papa has heard this one before?

The kids spent a lot of time on things that go fast in the driveway and on the front street.

Sparkler candles!

Catherine got a lot of pictures of various people opening beers.

Edie liked something here (also, it's crazy how much longer her hair is now than is this picture).

Jena and her mama!

And her niece helped her cut the cake.

Hi Aunt Heather!

When they weren't in front, the kids took advantage of all the lawn games.

It was a beautiful afternoon celebrating a beautiful member of the family! And can I just take a minute here to send some extra love to Thomas and Jena? Because let's be honest: you two have been handed a *lot* in recent years, quite more than enough to bring down many a positive outlook, many a person, many a couple, many a marriage; and I probably don't even know the half of it. None of us expect you to plaster on a smile and face every hard thing like it's not, but we are continually bolstered by the manner in which you both live and love. I'm just going to say it whether it sounds cheesy or not: we're proud to know you, and especially thankful to have you in our kids' lives. Carry on.

More Videos!

Grampy T said it would be a great Father's Day if he could just sit and watch videos of the kids, so of course I uploaded more that have been languishing in my files.

Gussie and Mary in particular have shown a renewed interest in the violin recently. Gussie likes to just pick it up and shred the bow with crazy fiddling, but he is surprisingly good at getting a tone out of the strings nonetheless. This is his rendition of "Conjunction Junction" from Schoolhouse Rock.



Edie discovered she can get on and off the swing in the backyard by herself if it is set on the lowest link. Don't try to assist her on a swing; your efforts will not be appreciated. She hasn't figured out pumping yet, but she can twist her stomach just so and get the swing going from side to side. She thinks this is hilarious, obviously.



This is just a super quick video of Gussie's awesome baseball swing.



Mary enjoys composing songs on the violin. I don't remember what Edie was screaming about here, but since I'm ignoring her I assume it was nothing big. Also she insists that I put ponytails in her hair now.

Videos!

If you're one of the people who doesn't watch blog videos, we'll see you at the next post!

Did I tell you that Gussie learned to ride his pedal bike? He wanted to at the beginning of the season, then didn't want to, then wanted to but couldn't for a day, then took off and never looked back. He is on a 12" bike right now which is a little small for him, but it's ok; it means he is always pedalling literally as fast as his feet can whip around the circle and his bike is still barely moving - I kind of love it. This video is from the first day he rode, so siblings were still pushing him up the hill and he was a little timid. It's been about a month now; he can keep up with the big kids, stand on his pedals, steer with one hand, and generally maneuver like a boss.




This is from the same day. I know it's just a video of Edie running, but I could sit around and watch her run to and fro all day long. Sometimes it's a little stressful because she gets going and she looks like she is going to tumble down with every step, but that doesn't happen at all as often as it looks like it should.



Another Edie video. I promise, it only sounds like she is swearing at you. Really she is swearing at the mosquito that I swatted off her knee. Yesterday she started calling Michael Dada instead of Mama, so she might be making progress in the next five years away from the emphatic-but-nonsensical sounds and pointing.

Trees and Turkeys

I guess since it's the middle of June it's about time to catch up on all my pictures from May.

There is an Ecology Center near us whose mission is to host classrooms of kids and their teachers and help the teachers find ways to incorporate nature learning and outdoor settings into their school days. A friend organized a homeschool trip there, and since all of the homeschool teachers in attendance were already well convinced of the benefits of incorporating nature study and outdoor time into the school day, we pretty much just had the run of the place for a few hours and the kids loved it.

There were tons of birds, including woodpeckers and some wild turkeys, and a creek that they could throw rocks into, and lots of paths to follow, and trees to climb and run across, and bugs to watch and flowers to smell and sticks to weild. It was the coolest.

We had a "guide" from the center who basically followed the kids around, pointed out some interesting bugs and plants, and encouraged things like throwing rocks into the creek.

Edie really liked that part.

Michael's favorite thing was the abundance of old, fallen trees. It was like Jesus just went around and staged climbing structures at every corner for him.

Gussie was a little more timid with the tree climbing but clambered around quite a bit.

Edie did a lot of climbing also, but I don't have any pictures of that because every time she immediately climbed to a point of requiring a spotter close by. She also enjoyed all the sticks lying around - every few minutes she would abbandon the one in her hands and pick up a new one to tote along the trail.

This was Michael's favorite tree. It had fallen over a little gully and was wide enough to walk, and then run, across.

And then he climbed up a branch at the end as high a he could go.

Plus at the other end, the root ball was sticking up into the air and made a shape quite like a saddle, just asking to be ridden.

Even before we headed off into the woods we saw a few turkeys. At one point we walked through a little prairie and our guide pointed out this to us: it's a turkey nest! Under those twigs is a mama turkey sitting on her eggs, so well hidden that we never would have noticed it without help.

This is the prairie. There's a turkey nest in there somewhere. And two boys.

 A class of eigth graders that had visited for the whole day earlier in the year built several little structure out of fallen branches, and this little hut survived. The kids loved it!

Catherine and Mary were in a different group for most of our exploring time, but we caught up with them in the end. They saw a bunch of tadpoles and a group of five or six turkeys, and loved the tree calmbering as much as Michael.

Mary also found a small skull but we were unable to identify it, even after looking through our guide's book for a while when we returned to the main building.

Catherine loves trees.

Especially trees that you can pretend are horses.

Edie, Wrapped

It just today started getting truly, honestly, St. Louis Summer Hot, and it's going to be in the upper 90s for the next week, which means I'm going to be trying a *lot* harder to get Edie to nap anywhere except wrapped up on me. But up until now it's still been nice, and we've had a few travelling wraps come through, so I have a bunch of pictures of Edie wrapped up again.

[Side Note Mostly To Daddy: "Travelling wraps" are wraps that weavers send around for people to use for a week or two so the weavers can get feedback on the fibers and weave, and the weavers also appreciate a few pictures being posted around to help them get the word out about their work. Because not all wraps are the same, look the same, feel the same, or work the same.]

All of the rest of the kids like helping me take pictures, so they're not even all selfies!

Edie sleeping on the job.

Edie about to fall asleep.

Totally sleeping.

Oh look, she's awake!

But ultimately not that happy about being awake and not being able to run, so I put her down.

But when she's sleeping, there's no where else she wants to be.