An Island Fourth

Such fun... The kids and I headed downtown yesterday to celebrate the Fourth. We took Papa a picnic lunch and then all headed to Windermere Point for the holiday festivities. We watched the International Stone Skipping Contest (the winner had more than 20 skips!) and the sack races, enjoyed the face painting, and explored the fire trucks before nap time beckoned...

The later-than-usual nap was the only reason S and K made it through the fireworks. (We are above the 45th parallel, so this time of year it is still dusk after 10:00 pm. Our fireworks didn't begin until after 10:30.) This year marks the first time I made a serious attempt to photograph them. I must admit, I am pleased at the result. (For those who are interested: ISO 200, f/11, & approximately a 10 second exposure.)

Liz of Green Gables?

My house may not have gables, but I can imagine it does...

Megan Follows as Anne of Green Gables

BoufMom9 began a Biblical Meme a few weeks ago, she invited Mum-me to play along, who invited me to play along. So here goes:

As my friends know, I am not really a biblical person. So I’ll have to go with literature on this one…

The classic literary character I am most like is Anne of Green Gables. (She is one of my all time favorite characters!) Anne is head strong, hard working, imaginative, and one of those girls others perceive as just a wee bit different. She adapts quickly, is full of joy, she lives on an island, and she hates her hair and her freckles. Anne always seems to get herself into trouble (though unintentionally) but things always seem to work out in the end. Then, there was the time Anne broke a slate on top of a boy’s head after he teased her; I used a social studies book instead...

Here are the rules of the game:

1. Choose a person in the Bible or classic literature who most represents who you are.

2. Post it on your blog and include a visual illustration, scripture or story if you like.

3. Link to the person that tagged you in your post and to this original post if possible so we can track it as it travels across the blogosphere.

4 .Tag five more blogs with links.

5. And don’t forget to leave a comment on the tagged blogs with an invitation to play!

I'm tagging Katie, Maggie, and Susan. I know that isn't five, but it is the best I can do today...

Image from http://greengables.tripod.com/

Practically Perfect in Every Way

What a fantastic weekend...

To start with, everyone who stayed with us shopped for us, which was great since the closest decent shopping is a 20 minute boat ride and a two hour drive away. L & D brought a hose reel from Meijer, K & D brought diapers, spices, and 50 pounds of dog food from Wal-Mart. M & S brought insulbright, more spices, fabric, and shoe bags from Ohio. C brought the mother load - toilet paper, paper towels, laundry detergent, kleenex, bleach, shampoo, dryer sheets and diapers from Costco. All of which made my life much much easier. (Thanks guys!)

The eighteen of us had an absolute blast. Friday night's boat ride may have started out with a downpour but it ended with a rainbow and a lovely sunset.

Saturday's visit to the fort was a hoot. (It was the first time the kids had been there since infancy.) S loved the "Kid's Quarters," specifically the dress-up section. K, on the other hand, loved the Concert of Military Music, which S didn't get to hear because he wanted to try on every outfit.

Then, on the way home for nap time, Papa caught a garter snake. K belly laughed every time that little guy stuck out his tongue. He he he - I'm laughing again just thinking about it. (Don't worry, we let it go after we finished investigating.)

The reunion dinner at the fort on Saturday night was wonderful. We got to reminisce with lots of old friends, we got another spectacular sunset, and...

surprise fireworks.

Not much beats surprise fireworks!

The only bad part of the weekend was Sunday afternoon when everyone had to pack up and head for home. And believe it or not, the only things left behind were two gigantic toothbrushes...

Smiling

Miss Chris over at Pink Picket Fence is posting things that make her smile this week. Right now my gardens are making me smile...

this morning's dew

coral bells

a molting fish fly

a wee daisy

Plus I have 13 people coming to stay with me this weekend for the fort reunion. That will make a total of 18 of us, nine adults and nine children, in my four bedroom house. We may be sleeping like cord wood, but we are going to have so much fun! I hope you have a great weekend too.

Life, the Universe and Everything

1. And the winners are...

Jacquie, Shannon, and Marcia. Email me your addresses so I can get those tulips heading your way. (I know I needed a photo of a tulip, but I am in Indiana spending the week with my in-laws, and I only had pictures of irises on my camera - so it will have to do.)

2. The kids and I are having a BLAST this week with Grandma and Grampie down in Southern Indiana. Partially because it is warm here! When we life the island it was 48 degrees and we could see our breath. Down here it is in the 80s and sunny. We left Northern Michigan at 5:30 am, and got to see a beautiful sunrise.

The next day we went to the Indianapolis Zoo with my MIL, SIL and her three boys. Fun fun fun! S and K favorite part was watching the seals swim.
The next day we were off to Holiday World... more about that another time.

Tulips For Everyone

OK, maybe not for everyone, but for a few... A few posts ago I mentioned how the hotels on the island pull their tulip bulbs each summer, well this year I hit the jackpot! I happened to be riding by on my bike just as one of the gardeners was pulling them out. I filled my basket as well as my cart.
I managed to get so many that I'd like to share. Just leave a comment (and make sure I can email you) and on June 20th I'll draw three names - each of whom will get some flowery goodness. I'd love to ship them to anyone, but I doubt customs will let me ship outside the US... I know a few of the bulbs are purple, but other than that your guess is as good as mine. (Most of the petals blew off in a storm, but I know that hotel had red, orange, white, yellow, purple and salmon.) In my experience most of them come up in the spring, but obviously I can't guarantee it. Even if they all don't come up, they're still worth the price. :)

They Were Everywhere!

Being the geeky science person that I am, I really enjoy a good bug. I like watching them, taking pictures of them, catching them, and showing them to to S and K. But not when they are literally everywhere!

There were so many of them flying around while I was trying to get a picture, I had to hold the neck of my jammies tight so they couldn't fly in (after getting one up my sleeve - yuck!) My dad said they were June Bugs and that they are quite common. I've lived in Michigan my entire life and I can't ever remember seeing a swarm of them!

There were trout everywhere too... We stopped at the fish hatchery on the way home from my parent's house on Sunday to feed the fish. As always, the kids loved it... well most of it. About every three minutes K said, "I go swimmin." She just didn't understand why she just couldn't jump right in with the fish.

We made it back to the island just in time to enjoy the rain... Not that I am complaining mind you - my gardens love the rain!

Spring Cleaning

Over the past two days I have made good progress on my list! Before you look at the "before and after" photos I feel I need some kind of disclaimer or something. We really the giant pigs that the before pictures imply... really, we aren't! The end of the school year gets amazingly crazy around here! Between recovering from the senior trip, being sick, report cards, getting the car fixed, a wedding shower, two productions of the school play (The Magical Land of Oz - which was amazing by the way,) ordering all my school supplies for next year, packing up everything in my classroom, and trying to get my gardens in order, the inside of the house has basically been ignored for the past three weeks. (For some reason Blogger isn't letting me type an enter...So imagine I am starting a new paragraph.) I started by tackling my bedroom. Between my unpacked suitcase, laundry and piles of stuff everywhere - it seemed like the best place to begin...

After

Then it was on to my son's room. He's been itching to have his "baby bed" taken down for some time now. I usually have the kids help when their rooms need to be cleaned, but today I just dove right in and did it myself...

After

The living room was also atrocious! The five of us (we have a friend, M, living with us this summer) spend a lot of time here and it tends to get trashed daily. As I sit in my nice clean room, I can't believe how bad it was! Dear God...

After

In addition to cleaning those rooms I also cleaned the entry way, organized the hall closet, cleaned my bathroom, organized my bedroom closet and the bathroom closet, washed and put away six loads of laundry, got one bag ready for the thrift shop, got another bag ready for the dry cleaners, went through all of S' clothing and packed away the too-small items to hand-down and unpacked all of his handed-down summer things.

I'm not sure how much I'll get done over the next few days as I am headed to Traverse City on Friday (which means I have to leave the island tomorrow) to get my Bernina serviced and to hopefully buy a serger. Then we are off to the Charlevoix Renaissance Festival (we've never been before) on Saturday. Have a great weekend!

Summer?

I took this picture on June first. June first! Even for us this far North, the tulips are usually a lot farther along by the beginning of June. In fact, the hotel where I took this picture usually has the tulips pulled out of the ground before school is out. Not this year... It is wonderful that the hotels in my town rip out their tulips each year. Once they start to look a little ragged the grounds keeping staff pulls them out of the ground - bulb and all - and throws them on the compost pile. Every tulip I have in my garden came from that lovely little pile. Since they pull out the entire flower I can usually tell what color I am getting too. Don't you just love hand-me-downs... Summer for me starts today! For the next two weeks my children are going to the sitter's house so I can get projects done. I hope by blogging about them I am more likely to get everything finished! My plans are:

• clean the entire house, and I mean the entire house
• catch up on the mountain of laundry
• sort through the kid's off season and next-size-up clothes
• paint the kid's bathroom
• paint K's room
• organize my sewing room

Wish me luck and productivity. I'll try to keep everyone posted on my progress. If I get really brave I might even post some before and after photos. (We'll have to see about that one though.)

A Little Gold Mine

Before my mammogram on Friday I had enough time to hit one of my favorite thrift shops and I hit the jackpot! My son is a challenge when it comes to pants. He needs a 3T for the length but 24 month size fits in the waste. Needless to say I have to buy pants with an adjustable waste to fit him, so I rarely find them used. This time I found a pair of Children's Place jeans and two pairs of khakis - all with adjustable wastes and all for $1.50 each! I also found two pair of shorts and two shirts for S, two pair of jeans and two bathing suits for K, a pair of shorts for my husband, a child-size kimono / robe for the dress-up box, a tractor pillowcase (story another day,) and a set of vintage sheets. But the best part is - all of it cost a grand total of $12.00!

Aren't these great sheets? I've been looking for a set like this to use for a pair of Amy Butler's lounge pants. I didn't get them made this weekend since I was working on another project - the cutest little dress made out of a onesie... more on this when I get the tutorial done.

I Just Had to Share...

My daughter broke my nose... Can you see it? Don't feel too bad for me - it happened the day after Thanksgiving, and aside from a small bump (that my husband says only I can notice,) I am completely healed. Actually the worst part of the whole thing was about three days later when the ENT doctor put his thumbs on each side of my nose and pushed the fractured piece back into place... Youch! Try preparing yourself for that. Three-fourths as painful, my ass! Anyway...

I was at the hospital for a mammogram on Friday and I thought I'd look into how much it would cost to get a copy of the X-ray so I could put it in K's baby book. "If you can give me 10 minutes," the lady said, "I'll burn it for you." The hospital doesn't charge for copies and now I have the two X-rays as jpeg files on a CD. How cool is that?

Also cool - Mars Phoenix has successfully landed on Mars. The science geek in me is very excited. We are watching the landing live on the NASA channel...

5-26-08 Edited to add the "Back Story:"

It was totally innocent... Grandma, Grandpa, S, K, and I were all snuggling in Grandma and Grandpa's bed the morning after Thanksgiving (as we often do in the morning since the house is chilly until Grandpa can get the fire going to warm up the house.) K was happy and bouncy and just happened to jump down and smack the back of her head into my nose.

Blood went everywhere... Grandma swooped in and removed K while she covered my face with paper towels - after she took off my glasses. She was worried that the the glasses' nose piece had cut my eye (since it was filled with blood - I couldn't see out of it,) so she took me to the emergency room. Luckily it was just blood in my eye - once they cleaned it up the doctor could see that the eye was fine. Thank Goodness for happy endings.

It's Time...

for morel mushrooms!

Yummy... Each day when A and I are out this time of year we keep our eyes open for these little beauties; they are hard to find but so worth it when you come across a patch. A made the most delicious asparagus and morel risotto the other day. Mmmmmmm so good. Spring is the only time we get to enjoy morels unless there is such a bumper crop that we end up with enough to dry, which unfortunately hasn't happened in a few years. A few black morels are up on the island right now, though it's been really cold this spring so there aren't very many. These little mushrooms are so tasty a friend of mine actually got yelled at by someone who mistakenly thought she picked a few on his property. People pick loads of them (in the hundreds) about an hour south of here, but we never find that many. We just enjoy the fleeting few we are lucky enough to get...

Seven Things

Image borrowed from
http://cultureofbeer.blogspot.com

A couple of weeks back I was tagged by Michelle over at The Mama Chronicles for a Seven Things Meme. I was so engrossed with the senior trip I had to put it off for a while, but I am back so here goes...

According to Michelle these are the rules:
1. Link to your tagger and post these rules on your blog.
2. Share seven facts about yourself on your blog, some random, some weird.
3. Tag seven people at the end of your post by leaving their names as well as links to their blogs.
4. Let them know they are tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

Seven Things About Me

1. I am a total science geek. I love knowing how things work and why things are the way they are. I'm a math geek too, but not as much as science. I guess it is good that I became a math and science teacher... I try really hard to pass on my love of learning to my students.

(Deer heart awaiting dissection in my classroom)

2. I know American Sign Language. I met a deaf girl while I was in college and decided I wanted to be her friend. With her help I learned to sign. I used ASL with both my children before they could speak and it was amazing; it cut down on their frustration so much. Plus now I can cue them to say "please" and "thank you" and 99% of the population does not know it and think they are very polite children. (You'll keep my secret, won't you.)

3. I'm 38 years old and I have never been drunk. Really. I guess I'm just kind of boring... though my friends liked always having a designated driver around.

4. I’m afraid of color. Yep – a quilted who is afraid of color. I have to see the combination somewhere and like it – because I can’t match things on my own. Due to my fears, my entire house is painted off white. That way I’ll know the curtains, etc. will match the walls. Though, I must admit I am getting better in this area. My friend Julie came over and picked paint colors for me this winter. We went through he house and she picked colors that went with the things I already had in the rooms. I’ll post pictures after things are painted…

(Some of my completed quilts)

5. I am an auditory learner. Like amazingly so... In college I would, much to my roommates dismay, record all of my notes and listen to them as I studied. I constantly amaze my husband because I can pick out actor's voices when I only hear a couple of words, I can quickly mimic accents, and I can pretty much remember anything set to music.

6. I love to travel. I've been to Canada, Spain, France, Gibraltar, Ireland, England, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Austria, Puerto Rico, the Bahamas, the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the British Virgin Islands. My mother was a firm believer that traveling to other countries was important. She made sure both my brother and I saw as much of the world as we could.

7. I can sing a children’s song about almost any topic. I use to teach preschool and kindergarten and being so auditory myself, we sang a lot. My friend, Katie, use to challenge me by looking at me and saying a word, like cirrus cloud, and I had to come up with a children’s song about that topic or containing that word. 95% of the time I could do it… I can sing all the nations of the world, too. One summer my friends Michelle, Katie and I decided to learn the Animaniacs song. It took a lot of practice but we managed to do it – back in about 1995... I can still sing it. (Did I mention I was an auditory learner?) Whenever my students complain that they can't memorize something I have assigned , I break out into song. By about the third time in September, they stop complaining...

I am tagging Maggie, Shannon, Katie, Jada, and Lesley. I'm hopeful that ya'll will be willing to play... if not I sincerely apologize.

Senior Trip - Day Four: Old San Juan

Fort El Morrow

I'm a big history buff, so I would have been content walking around the 425 year-old forts and a 400+ year-old city all day... but alas, the seniors were not interested, so we spent very little time in Fort El Morrow and didn't get to Fort San Cristobal at all. (We also wandered around the old city for a couple of hours to shop and eat dinner.) I guess I am just going to have to get back to San Juan again. The weather was kind of overcast the day we spent there, so the pictures really won't do the place justice.

plants growing out of a bastion wall

doorway within El Morrow

cannon touch holeOld San Juan at night

I just loved the city's street lights!

That brings me to the end of my Puerto Rican adventure... The next day we turned in the rental car, hopped on the shuttle to the airport and flew back to Michigan. Despite my worries about the trip, (have I ever mentioned that I am a rather anxious person?) it turned out to be wonderful; the kids were great, the activities were a blast, the other chaperone was super, the weather was fantastic (the kids slept through the only rain we had,) and all the hitches worked out in our favor. Though I must admit, it is good to be home with my family again...

Senior Trip - Day Three: Rainforest

Are you ready for an adventure?

Get your helmet...

don't forget your harness...and lace up your hiking boots, too.Remember to check out the orchids as you hike through the rain forest...the bromeliads are worth noticing, too.

Turn on your light for the first of three caves...

watch your footing...

and climb out carefully.Phew, that was a long morning.
Stop at Jorge's self-sufficient farm for some Puerto Rican home cooking.Be careful at the compost toilet.
You better use it too, because...soon you'll do five zip lines to get back down the mountain.Remember to open your eyes as you zip over the Tanama River...

don't worry if you forgot, we'll cross it again later...

Remember that high school Spanish class? It was useful after all...cross one at a time...Of all of our days in Puerto Rico, this one was, by far, my favorite -
thanks to Raymond and Roqui, our Acampa guides.
Thanks guys! We had an amazing day.