By a Thread

Our new little guy has been hard. He is autistic; can't speak at all and bangs his head on floors and walls in frustration. If you try to stop him he hits and bites himself. Apparently he at some time wore a helmet to protect his head but it didn't come with him. He's also a dwarf and is tiny and adorable. Slowly as he's been getting used to us he has calmed down a little and the head banging today has been minimal. It breaks my heart to see him so upset and hurting. He has tiny moments when he looks at us and smiles and today we even got some hugs. Last night I began worrying about how I would homeschool and take care of this little one at the same time. It seemed impossible. This morning in my quiet time the first verse I read was Psalms 41:1, "Blessed is he who has regard for the weak; the Lord delivers him in times of trouble." I don't know how I'll be able to take care of him but for now I'm just going to hang on to that promise.

It's a Boy/Girl

Yesterday our family grew as we welcomed two more into the zoo, I mean family. The little guy is two and his sister is five (which totally blows my whole, "nothing but teenagers policy".) I had to go to Target and buy a diaper bag and wipes and sippy cups and other baby stuff. Grace and Ashley kept squeezing each other screaming, "We have a baby!". Hope this means he continues to be "their" baby when he needs a diaper change. The first night and day went fairly well.... however when telling the five year old a bed time story about a beautiful castle with a King and Queen and their daughter the Princess who had a pony and 3 dogs she said, "Excuse me, but there are no dogs in fairy tales." Other then the dog faux pas I'm doing okay.

Get Down with the Spunky

Despite the hot hot weather, people around here are getting Spunky.

David got a job at at California Tortilla ( to pay off his huge debt from the infamous Big Red killing), and his name tag says "Spunky employee, David". (Yes, nsremom, click on the picture and read his name tag!) He beat out numerous other teens competing for the job by smiling alot, getting there really early for the interview and just generally displaying a spunky attitude. David has very little reason to feel spunky these days but puts on a good show.

Grace has 13 days left before she starts dialysis and is packing in everything she can before then. Her married sister, Aaliyah, had her over for the week-end and she swam and stayed up late watching movies and had a great time. We have two camping trips and a visit to New England scheduled before "D" day. Grace has always been spunky and this is no exception.

Kelly, our very timid 19 year old daughter took public transportation alone for the first time in her life to the next town over to take placement tests for college. She was scared on the bus, got lost walking from the bus to the college and was crying and shaking when she arrived..but she did it! That fact that Kelly is going to college at all is spunk beyond imagination.

All these spunky people are wearing me out.

Giving and Taking

Although teen age boys can, on the one hand be expensive, (as in wrecking your $30,000 car) they have some value as well. You can send them to do dangerous and risky things, as they believe that they know everything and nothing can hurt them. Which is why we send just these very people off to war. This came into good use, when upon our return from France we noted that a piece of trim had come off the very high, very top of the point of our roof. When my husband asked David and Steven to fix it they got this "yippy-yea" look in their eyes and set out to gather ladders. James carefully explained to them how to do it and went over safety procedures with them. After he stopped talking, they proceeded to do it their way. My nurturing side got a little concerned, but my husband assured me with, "I won't break your boy."
He didn't and the roof got fixed and it saved my husband's knees from climbing up and down and


David felt a little better that he could help out and it didn't decrease his grounding by a single day.

Easy Come - Easy Go

It is with deep sorrow that I tell you that Big Red is dead. David's little accident, unfortunately, killed her. I really couldn't believe the news when the insurance adjuster pronounced her "totaled". It was like losing a member of the family and what about my blog header that took me two days to design and my blog name.......
Well, you get over a car real quick when you can't get anywhere and Big Red has been replaced. It's BIG and it's not Red. Here's our new...White Boy.

B is for Botulism

Tomorrow I'll have some rather sad news to write about but today I'll just tell you something alarming I've discovered about myself. I have no fear of non refrigeration. If you went right now and looked inside your refrigerator I know you'll have at least 13 items that say, "refrigerate after opening." And this is the alarming part....I've eaten most of them after they've sat out for say, a whole night. I'll find a food item sitting out in the morning and think, "That doesn't look bad" and then I'll eat it. I haven't ever died or gotten remotely sick from this. Now, I'm not talking a mayonnaise sandwich sitting out at a hot fly infested picnic all day, but a piece of pizza or a hot dog left in the microwave overnight I've eaten. Because of the apparent no ill effect, I've come to question the whole importance of refrigeration panic. I don't plan to expand on this theory, but it does make me wonder. And in case I've invited you over for lunch before and now you feel a little sick about it, I should tell you that I've never served non refrigerated food to anyone else and I never eat food with green on it except for hot dog rolls that you discover have just the tiniest spots on them right before you serve dinner and you don't have any others and everyones really hungry. I sometimes am sceptical about the whole germ deal, but that's been proven by Louis Pasteur and other scientist of note, so I'll think that over some more before stating an opinion.

To France and Back

After a wonderful, busy, incredible visit to France, the family is settling back in at home. Our little chalet in the foothills of the Alps was beautiful. We hiked and swam and just enjoyed the beauty of Savoire. We hugged and kissed our daughter and son-in-law and five grandkids enough to last until we see them again. It was especially awesome to meet the rest of the missionary team of young adults as they made their preparations to go into Africa next year. It was hard to leave, knowing that we may not see them again for a few years but for now our hearts our full and we are so thankful to see them following God's call on their life.
I'll be posting our pictures in the Family Picture link soon or check them out in my son-in-law's smugmug.