My Sister and Her Horse (A Story)

My Sister and Her Horse

My sister has a horse.

It has one white foot and a white streak down her forehead.

She is Brown and very very soft.

We can't ride her because it rains all off the time.

When we just got her we rode her all of the time, because it was sunny then but not now.

It rains and rains and her name is skeeter.

She is very pretty.

I would like it to sun so I can ride her.

I can't ride her because It rains and rains.

By Cristy, age 7 or 8

I am guessing 8 because of the neat handwriting, but would like to claim age 7 because of the bad drawing. Although doesn't Skeeter look like she feels pretty on page 7? Personally, I like the variety--I drew the same horse 10 times and none look alike. That's talent.

Anyway, two things. One, I don't remember liking the horse all that much. She was my sister's horse and I remember being just fine with keeping it that way. Two, it really did rain a lot where we lived (approx. 70in. per year). I am not making that up.

Thanks, Mom, for tucking this story into my baby book.

Lost Boy

Daren lost Will at Disneyland. Let it be said that forevermore he will not be able to tease me about "losing" Walter on our last trip to Disneyland, because not only did he lose Will, but Will was missing for a good 30 minutes before we got him back. All I did was walk off and leave a then 10 year old boy looking at his Space Mountain picture. I walked back and there he was, still looking at his picture. Big whoop.

Here's what happened. It was nearing dark on our second day at Disneyland. I took the kids and went to the Indiana Jones ride. Daren decided to take Helen and Will to the Tarzan Treehouse--just a walkthrough thing with some hands on activities at the end. They stopped to play and Daren noticed Helen was talking to a lady so he went to investigate. Looked back a few seconds later and no Will. He looked everywhere, sent Helen through the treehouse again, looked outside. No Will. He talked to several park employees before finding someone to help him (strange that no one knew what to do since I am sure this kind of thing happens many times a day).

In the meantime, we got done with Indiana Jones and saw the stroller still parked in the same spot so we decided to look around in the Indiana Jones store and then sit outside until Daren got back. It was dark by this time, and the park was near closing time. Pretty soon, Allison says "Oh, I see Dad, he's talking to a policeman (security guy). He has Helen, but not Will."

Oh. My.

I went over as Daren is giving a description of Will to the security guard. The guy really didn't seem to know what to do. It was so strange. I went looking around for a while then came back. The guard asked if Will would "freak out" or be calm. I said he would probably just search for his Dad, maybe cry a little. He would definitely leave the area looking. Daren sent the kids through the treehouse again. I paced. A few minutes later the guard came back and said that Will was at Lost Children. Phew.

Daren had to wait for kids to come back so I went with the guard up to the area where Will was. There he was, playing with the other little boy that was lost. The lady he was with said "There's your mommy in the pink tank top!" He gave me a big grin and said, "Mommy! I was looking for Daddy! He was not there!"

I had a long walk back to Daren since I didn't have my phone on me. On the way, I asked Will a few questions to see what he was able to tell people. As it turns out, he knows his parents names: "Mommy is Cristy and Daddy is Daren". He knows he is Will Keeney. He was able to understand that if he loses Daddy or Mommy again he is to SIT DOWN. Why I didn't go over that with him before, I don't know, except I really didn't think he would understand. We told all the other kids if they lose us, stay where they are, we will be back to get them. Don't leave the area. But I guess we missed Will.




He told me that he told the two ladies that helped him, "I am lost. I need to find my parents." Of course, he also told Helen Mae that they were both dressed like Minnie Mouse. I don't care what they were dressed like, I am just glad they saw a little boy wandering around and helped him out.



The next day, we were able to pay it forward. We were walking along, and there went a little boy looking worried. I watched for a minute in case he was headed for someone, but he wasn't so Daren hurried ahead and stopped him. We sat down with him and got a little info so Daren could go look around for his mom. He was about Will's age so I had Will show him his new airplane and the little boy showed him his hot wheels. Pretty soon they were playing. Daren didn't have any luck finding parents, so a maintenance worker took him to the Buzz Lightyear guys who called it in. A lady sitting there mentioned that she had been watching him but we got there first. She then marveled at how many kids we have and how on earth do we keep track of all of them!

Oh, lady, if only you knew.

Shoes and Coats

This house did not have a back porch (covered) or a coat closet when we moved in. We now have a back porch of sorts, but still no coat closet. What a pain!

Last weekend we finally got some shoe shelves and coat racks up in the garage. Finally! The last few years all of the outdoor coats had to be stored in the bedroom closets--most of which were already full to bursting because of the number of people sharing them--and the shoes were put in the mud room. Any idea how many pairs of shoes 10 people can generate? The two teenage girls alone were taking over all of the space.

Now...ahhhhh, shelves.



In case you are counting, there are currently 34 pairs of shoes on the shelves. That comes to almost 4 pairs per person since Nathan hasn't been home to put up his shoes. I only have 2 pairs on the shelf, so someone (probably the person that has 3 pairs of flip flops alone, not to mention the rest of her shoes) is hogging space.

And coat hooks. Oh yes, and painted stairs. All the way up to the bedroom!



Bliss.

My goodness, look at all of those shoes. And they are all important. Boots for mud, sandals for hot weather (or if you are Robyn, for all weather), play shoes for playing. Barn boots for riding. All of the church and going out shoes are NOT on these shelves, thank you very much.

Take a closer look at the top coat rack. The right side in particular. The rack is not, I repeat, NOT, in the shape of a wooden spoon. Or an African spear.



What is it? Can you tell? Fine. It is an EGG. AN EGG. And if you visit me, would you be so kind as to mention said EGG in my husband's hearing so he can be happy that it is recognizable as an EGG? There are speckles and everything.

Revisiting the falls

Last year about this time, we took an afternoon and went to visit Beaver Creek Falls and Sweet Creek Falls up out of Mapleton. We had a picnic and took a bunch of pictures and hiked around.

So this year since we were in the area again we decided to drive up to Beaver Creek Falls for lunch. It was our favorite out of the two falls and has a very quick and easy walk (not even a hike) to the waterfall.

Well. I guess it was our favorite last year. Because this year...



Oh my, what pretty falls. Ummm,what's that I see? No, not the girl in the orange shirt(or the boy in camo--see him?). Let's take a closer look, shall we?



There on the rocks. Are those...can it be...



CENTIPEDES???

(Some people call them millipedes but I call the centipedes because they really aren't even big enough to have a hundred legs so the certainly can't have a thousand. I am so practical. Unlike some people.)



Yep, the place was overrun with worms with legs. They. were. everywhere. Ew, they were stinky too. Goodbye, Centipede Cr...er...Beaver Creek Falls. Maybe we will try again some other time.

I love strawberries

Just sayin'...

If you have a little boy that likes riding bikes, he needs to be extra careful when following close behind someone else. Otherwise said little boy could crash into that person, causing injury to a certain part of his anatomy. You know, down there. He may even need to go to the doctor and get the laceration glued.

P.S. He was wearing his helmet, not that it helped any.
P.P.S. The doctor did say, in a perplexed voice, "This is a very unusual injury."

Art Lesson

I am not an artist. (Note: I am not a writer either so excuse me for that as well) I have a son that loves to draw and as he gets older his drawings become more sophisticated. He has been working on perspective for the last year or so and is coming along nicely. The problem is that he is far beyond what I can help when he needs it.

Last weekend, he got an art lesson from Aunt Judy. She hasn't picked up a paintbrush in quite a long time, but she still has the talent and know-how to give my son a quick lesson on shading and proportion.



Aunt Judy was so gracious and patient with him. She drew with him for a couple of hours.



It is so nice when a kid can get some feedback from someone other than a parent about their drawings. I think they are all great! Lessons from a real artist, though, will go a little farther than a pat on the back from Mom, or even than a blue ribbon at the fair.






I wish I could have gotten some pictures of them drawing together, measuring with pencils, heads together, but by the time I thought of it they had moved on to something a little harder than guitars, lampshades, and teapots. Namely me. A project that was abandoned after about 10 minutes. I was laying (dozing) in an odd position so they gave up. Oh well.




When he went back to drawing his own thing, I could tell a difference.

My Sixth Picture

It appears I have been tagged by Cathy to post the sixth picture in my sixth picture folder. My sixth picture folder is named "Family Pictures 1998-2006". Oh goody.

Now if the picture isn't of me, this will be good. But no such luck.

Here it is:



I think this photo was taken by my now 15 year old daughter. Judging from the other pictures with it, it was taken around May, 2003. Not much else to say about it.

How about I do what Cathy did and go from the bottom?

Much better. From the "scenery" folder:



Taken on an outing with my nature photography class. Brice Creek, up out of Cottage Grove. Very pretty day.

I don't know 6 people that blog, so I am not going to list 6 other people to carry on. I am such a rebel. Or (more likely, heh) a social outcast.

5k Race

I have been wanting to enter a 5k race for a while now--just to see what time I can get. Racing a stand alone 5k is very different from a triathlon 5k, and different than just going for a run, at least for me, so I can't just go out and run 5k (3.1 miles) and record the time. That Wouldn't Work.

Well, a few weeks back we were leaving the pool after family swim time and I saw a flyer for the "Couples Classic 5k" to be held there at the park on (very appropriately) Saturday, February 14. Oh, I wished I could sign up! But it is a couples race, and even though they accept individual entries, I really didn't want to race a couples race without being part of a couple. Not to mention the t-shirt would say "couples classic". No thank you. So I lamented and sighed and whined to Daren a little bit about why can't he just run with me any way because I really don't care about his time, just mine, and I also really don't care how we would place as a couple. Really.

Nope. Not interested.

Until last Wednesday he called me up and asked if I still wanted to enter the race, and if so I had better do it that day because it was the last day to preregister (to guarantee yourself a t-shirt). Shock. Apparently, he had been running a little at work to prepare for the race--to see if he can run. Add the fact that we have been doing Crossfit together for the last 6 weeks and he felt confident enough to enter the race with me!


So we ran the race. It was fun. He was afraid of embarrassing me. ??? My time: 23:40. I was hoping for under 25 minutes, so this was good. His time: 29:42. No training, no hours on end of working out, just a few 1 mile runs and 6 weeks of weight lifting. I am so jealous. Our total time was 53:22, good for 16th place out of 31 couples in our age division. I got 98th place out of 374 entrants, men included. I think I was about 35/207 women.

Next year, we are going to try to get some of the kids involved.

Oh yeah, he is already talking about the next race we will enter. I think he may be hooked. smirk

Yo-yoing

Yoyoing? Yoing? Yo-yos yo-yoing? Lots of that going on at my house.



I have been saying "Whoa, you almost whacked me in the head!" far too often lately. Why do my boys feel the need to play with yo-yos RIGHT NEXT TO ME??? Oh well, they are having fun. What's a little bump on the head, right?

Time to Paint

The last inspection has been passed so now we can finally move on to painting the upstairs room.




The boys picked out the colors so I can't wait to see how it turns out.

Conversations

At the pool while sitting in the hot tub:

Walter: What is that building over there?

Me: A sauna.

Walter: What's it like in there?

Me: I don't know. I have never been in a sauna.

Walter: Is it big? Is it hot? Do you sit down?

Did I miss something? Didn't I just say I don't know? Okay, so I do know somewhat what it might be like in a sauna. I mean, I know it is hot. I think. But the rest--really I don't know.

Me: I don't know. I have never been in there.
-----------------

Still in the hot tub:

Me: Where's Allison? I don't see her.

Helen: Allison? Where is Allison?

Me: Yeah Allison. I don't see her.

Helen: She's right there. Oh wait, that's you.


What is it about a hot tub? Does it adle people's brains? Is it the chemicals? We do enjoy sitting in the hot tub when we go to the family swim nights at the pool, but if my kids continue in this way we may have to stop.