We Remember

Memorial Day

by Joyce Kilmer

The bugle echoes shrill and sweet,
But not of war it sings to-day.
The road is rhythmic with the feet
Of men-at-arms who come to pray.

The roses blossom white and red
On tombs where weary soldiers lie;
Flags wave above the honored dead
And martial music cleaves the sky.

Above their wreath-strewn graves we kneel,
They kept the faith and fought the fight.
Through flying lead and crimson steel
They plunged for Freedom and the Right.

May we, their grateful children, learn
Their strength, who lie beneath this sod,
Who went through fire and death to earn
At last the accolade of God.

In shining rank on rank arrayed
They march, the legions of the Lord;
He is their Captain unafraid,
The Prince of Peace...Who brought a sword.

Drama In and Around the Pool

We've been spending lots of time in the pool. It's fun to watch the kids as they begin to realize that going underwater won't hurt them, and then eventually it becomes lots of fun. Reece is at that point now. He isn't quite swimming, but will glide underwater to me off the steps, and loves it. He just needs to learn to kick and he will be swimming.

Camryn sputters and makes awful faces when she comes up, but then she wants to do it again. :o) She still panics a little bit, but she likes it and is learning.

Aubrey tells me in no uncertain terms that she does not want to go underwater. So we'll just play around the steps and wait 'til she's ready.

Yesterday I was in the bedroom, and Ron came in and said he had to jump in the pool. The first thing I thought was that the bees that drink from our birdbath had gotten after him. But he said no, he had to jump in to get Aubrey out.

He was doing something in the yard and she was riding the little Crazy Coupe car around the pool. He had just told her not to get too close to the edge and turned back to what he was doing. He said he heard a splash and turned to see her in the pool, sitting in the little car. It floated, so her head didn't go underwater, but he couldn't reach it. He said he took off his jeans and jumped in and got her. When I told Kelly about it she said, "I knew you were going to say Dad took off his jeans before he jumped in." :o) He knew he had time, and didn't want to jump in with his wallet and phone. He's always practical and calm. :o)

Later my daughter-in-law made me laugh so hard. She said that she had looked outside and saw Ron in his t-shirt and underwear and thought, "What the heck?!!" I can imagine her confusion. Then she saw Aubrey standing next to the little car all soaking wet and realized what happened.

It was funny, but it also reminds us that we have to be ever vigilant with the kids around the pool. It's one reason I'm eager for them to learn to swim as soon as possible. With four adults there is always someone to keep an eye on them, but things can happen in a flash, just like Aubrey driving into the pool.

Yesterday Reece and Aubrey opened the skimmer and found a dead bird in it. Cyrise said Aubrey came running to her, crying. Josh said Reece was standing by the skimmer with a hurt look on his face, then he started crying. A few days ago the puppies got one of the baby mockingbirds that were learning to fly, and they saw that, too. :o( Traumatic.

I'm going to pick up Kelly today, after I go to Gran's, and we are finally going to have our little shopping trip. So I'd better get off the computer and get moving.

Have a great weekend!

Aubrey

And now she's three.

Happy Birthday, Aubrey!

Today you are three years old!

We love you very much.

Heavenly Father, please bless Aubrey on her birthday and always.

Please keep her safely under your protection all the days of her life and into eternity.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Amen

Camryn

And now she's two.

A May Monday

I'm out on the patio. Just had fresh tomatoes, cheese and crackers for lunch--yum.

Reece is in the pool. I was out here earlier, picking beans and tomatoes. I turned around to see what he was doing, and he had already stripped off his shorts and was trying to get his shirt off. He's having fun playing with his plastic dinosaurs on the steps going down into the water. He just said to me, "Just call me Grandpa Wimmon." That's Grandpa Lemon to those of you who might not know. :o) Yeah, Annoying Orange reference.

I have got to do something about my hair. It has grown in all curly/wavy and I can't stand it. Right now it's all the same length and needs some shaping. It looks like old lady hair. (And yes, I know I'm an old lady, but I don't want old lady hair).

Today is Josh's day off, and wouldn't you know, he has jury duty. I hope he doesn't get chosen for a jury. It's not a good time to take days off from work, when he's just getting started.

We'll celebrate Camryn's birthday tonight when everyone is home with cake and ice cream, candles and presents. She and Aubrey are napping right now. So is Gina. It's so peaceful when they are all asleep.

***Later***

And now the little girls are up and playing in the water. Reece and Aubrey are in the spa, and Cammie is playing around the edge of it. The birthday girl just got a bucket of water poured on her head. She didn't care. :o)

Their mommy is inside, getting some of the birthday presents wrapped or bagged.

We had a nest of mockingbirds in the grape arbor. The parents have moved them to a hedge on the other side of the fence and are teaching them to fly. They are sooo noisy!

Hope you're having a great Monday.

Happy Birthday, Camryn!

Today you are two years old!

We love you very much.

Heavenly Father, please bless Cammie on her birthday and always.

Please keep her safely under your protection all the days of her life and into eternity.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.

Amen

Happy Birthday, Ron!

I love you.

Wednesday With Reece

Reecism: Something is "scrap-ted." It means that something is messed up. It might be his shorts are pulled up crooked, a pillow is sliding off the chair he's sitting in, a paper cut-out got torn. We don't know where he came up with it, but he uses "scrap-ted" pretty often. :o) Variation: Something is "all scrapped up." Hmmm.

Daily conversation at our house:

Gramma: Reece, did you throw plastic toys in the dog yard? (Or any other naughty thing).

Reece: No, Aubrey did it.

Gramma: Aubrey, did you throw that in the dog yard?

Aubrey: No, Cammie dood it.

Gramma: Cammie, did you throw the toy in the dog yard?

Cammie: *Grin*

Still don't know who keeps throwing stuff into the dog yard, but I suspect all of them.

Ron and I took Reece to Mass with us Sunday evening. I was standing and he was sitting beside me in the pew. I felt him rubbing the wrinkled skin on my elbow. Then suddenly he was pinching the skin and rubbing his face on it! He's a weird little kid, but he sure makes me laugh. :o)

I've been picking quite a few tomatoes the past few days. We've had them in salads, sliced, and today I made fresh salsa using the black krim tomatoes, one of my cowhorn peppers, some onion and salt and pepper. Oh my goodness, it is so delicious! I didn't put in much of the cowhorn pepper because it was hot. I didn't notice the heat while I was eating the salsa, but afterwards I could feel my lips burning a little. Yummy!

Josh is working again. I hope they will stay with us for awhile, until they've saved up a good amount of money and are on their feet. They'll need money for a deposit on a rental house, rent, utilities, and they also need a good used van and truck. Prayers that this job works out would be so appreciated. Thank you!

Looks like we might get some rain. Reece said he heard thunder earlier, and there are big, puffy dark clouds. Come on rain! We really, really need it.

For Mike

Happy Birthday to our favorite son-in-law. :o)

May this new year of life be the best one ever, and may God continue to bless you always.

We love you, Mike.

Quiet Sunday Afternoon

I started a post yesterday, got interrupted and thought I'd saved it as a draft, but instead I accidentally published it. When I saw that it was published today, I tried to delete it, but it's still in the Google Reader. I don't know how to delete things from there. Oh well, if you find the post you'll see that I use stream of consciousness writing, then I go back and edit out most of it. :o)

Anyway, Ron's been in the middle of some big exercise, so he had to work yesterday (Saturday), which made it seem like it wasn't the weekend. He said that he would have to work today, too, so we decided to go to the evening Mass. Then he didn't go in after all. So Reece and I went to Gran's at lunch time to give her her meds and because I was driving the truck instead of the car, I didn't have her meds with me when I got there. (Ron had been taking them to her, so he had them in the car).

I took Mom a bunch of leftovers--pasta from Friday, part of a pork roast, broccoli and roasted fingerling potatoes, french bread and sliced tomatoes from yesterday. She enjoyed a big lunch on her patio. Reece kept her company out there while I cleaned up inside.

The tomato in the picture is one of my Cherokee purples. They aren't very pretty--from what I've read they usually have those cracks in the top. But it doesn't affect the taste, and they are very delicious. Not as acidic as most tomatoes.

That's one of my morning glories that I planted in March. The blue ones are big and pretty, but the pink and white ones are smaller. I like all of them, though.

Yesterday Reece and I went looking for a drawing book and pencils and he found a windmill that works by solar power. It looks like the old windmill that he loves so much, so of course we had to buy it (Hobby Lobby in the crafts aisle). His daddy put it together for him when we got home, and he is learning about solar energy and how it works. :o) As we were walking into Hobby Lobby, a lady coming out asked me if I had a coupon. When I said no, she gave me a 40% off coupon, so we got a good deal on the windmill. Wasn't that sweet of her? :o)

Guess I'll go see what is going on downstairs. It's hard to get a minute to post as Reece is always looking for me! And when he finds me on the computer, he always wants to watch a video.

Happy Birthday, Josh!

Wishing you all the happiness in the world.

You are so blessed, and you are a blessing.

I love you.

Mom

Happy Birthday, Caelen!

Don't you just love it when Gramma posts your goofy pictures on her blog? :o)

I love you with all my heart.

Wednesday With Reece

Sorry for the blog slowdown. Time gets away from me these days.

Mother's Day was fun, but I didn't take any pictures. Sometimes I just want to enjoy the day without my camera. We all gathered here after Mass for a cookout, and everything was delicious.

The kids are beginning to settle in. They enjoy playing in the yard, the pool and the sprinkler. They are back into a more normal nap and bedtime routine. Reece doesn't nap, but the little girls do, thank goodness.

My little container garden is thriving. I've been picking a few tomatoes and peppers. We had sliced tomatoes with dinner last night. I counted more than 30 tomatoes of all different sizes yesterday. The onions are getting big. I put some more dirt on them yesterday since the tops were showing above ground. The pole beans are finally blooming, so we should have clusters of beans soon. The leeks are doing okay, but probably need to be thinned. I love leeks.

Reece and I stopped at Academy on the way home from Great Gran's and I got two pair of flipflops. You can tell summer is here (almost) when I buy flipflops. :o) They are cute.

Reece is in here pestering me to look at pictures on the computer, so I'll sign off. Happy Wednesday!

Thursday With Kelly

Kelly and I went to Gruene on Thursday. We ate lunch at Cantina del Rio and ice cream cones at the General Store, where I got some little surprises for the grandkids.

We saw the most enormous wind chimes I've ever seen hanging in a tree in front of one of the shops. They sounded like church bells, and the tone rang on forever. Beautiful!

Kelly bought a jar of pickles from the Fickle Pickle. She loves pickles. :o) The guy also had some old dishes and things that he was selling for ridiculously high prices. I could have bought the same things in a thrift store for a dollar or two. Kelly said she didn't think he was from here. We decided he was probably a Yankee. :o)

Thirsty, we went into Gruene Hall and ordered diet cokes. I didn't realize that it was cash only and I had no cash, so the sweet young man behind the bar treated us since he had already served the drinks. Definitely from here.

We sat at a table in the dance hall drinking our cokes, talking and people watching. And listening to Dwight Yoakum (on a CD) singing song after song.

A sweet old couple dressed in their Harley gear came in and danced one dance, then left.

A family came in with their sweet little boy, about three or four years old. He was wearing a tee shirt, shorts and tennies and a big cowboy hat. His mom and gramma danced around, trying to get him to dance, but he just looked at them as if they were weird. So cute!

We stopped on the way home at a new store called Supplize. It's a big warehouse full of all kinds of supplies--janitorial supplies, party supplies, office supplies. Interesting.

We also stopped at Hobby Lobby, where Kelly bought some jewelry making supplies and I bought a ball of yarn. Big spenders. :o)

She dropped me off at home and picked up her dogs and was on her way before rush hour started. She will be back on Sunday for Mother's Day. She's such a sweetheart. I love her.

Klutzy Gramma

I'm a klutz. I fell over one of the baby gates Monday night while I was holding Camryn.

We were going up to bed, and I had just lifted Aubrey over. I should have put Camryn over, too, but stupidly tried to carry her as I stepped over. I was so terrified that she would be hurt that I held her up and away from me, so my whole weight hit the floor, knees first.

The right knee/leg is not too painful, but the left one still hurts. I twisted it as well as hitting my knee on the tile floor. It was swollen and tight Tuesday, but is better this evening. Thank goodness Cammie was not hurt at all.

This is the second time I've banged my knees on something in a week. I was climbing out of the spa several days ago, slipped and banged them on the edge of the spa. I still had the scabs from that when I fell on Monday. Good grief. :o\

Other than that, all is well here. We had some cold weather, but it is warming up and will be back in the high 90s by Sunday.

Some of my tomatoes are ripe and I'll be picking them tomorrow, and probably the cowhorn peppers, too. Aubrey has already "helped" me pick a couple of hard green tomatoes. She can't keep her little paws off anything.

*yawn*

I'm ready for bed. Good night.

Monday Morning

It's 53 degrees this morning--a more than 40 degree drop from yesterday's high temperature. We came out of Mass yesterday evening just after a cold front came through, and the wind was blowing like crazy! Weird weather. But we may get rain today, which we desperately need. The weather man predicts a high of 59. No swimming today!

Our weekend was unremarkable, except for the beatification of Pope John Paul II. And the news of the capture of Osama bin Laden. Does anyone else think the timing of that announcement is odd? It happened a week ago, and we hear about it a week later, late on a Sunday night? Just seems strange.

Gran has been sick, so she didn't go to Mass with us yesterday. She was feeling better when I saw her around noon, but not 100%.

Reece still loves going, and I am still amazed at how he loves Mass. I looked at him at one point yesterday, and he was sitting very still, just gazing at the altar. We went to Atonement. On Easter we went to St. Pius X. I wasn't sure if he would act the same way there, but he did, and it was a High Mass, lasting an hour an a half. I feel a bit adrift, floating back and forth from one Mass to another. My constant prayer is that we can have a Traditional Latin Mass in a church of our own. And I miss Father Kloster so much.

One of the things that Reece always wants to do when we go to Atonement is visit the little Mary chapel. We kneel there in front of the blue candles, and I pray a Hail Mary with him. Yesterday I told him to ask Mary to pray for his little sisters, and he did. It was so sweet.

I was able to receive the Eucharist for the first time in several weeks, because I finally went to confession on Saturday. Reece went up with me to receive a blessing. Also very sweet. :o)

Ron trimmed the hedges in the front over the weekend, and Josh trimmed some in the back. He does everything so quickly! He and Cyrise have done the cooking since they moved in. I especially like it when Josh grills. :o) A few days ago he came in and asked me if I wanted some breakfast. I said "Sure," and he made me scrambled eggs with cheese, sausages and toast. Yum, what a treat! I usually just grab a piece of toast or a bowl of oatmeal (or sometimes a cookie).

Speaking of breakfast, I'm hungry!