Postcards for Nonny

Dear Nonny,

Thank you for the presents. I like the hair curlers. It makes my hair really curly. I’m going to put them in tonight after I take my shower and see if my hair gets even curlier when it’s wet.

I also like the sticky lizards. If you get them wet, and throw them at the wall, they stick for a really long time.

The watermelon spray was really yummy and I sprayed some at all the kids. When it ws gone, I filled it up with water and sprayed that instead. When I was spraying the water in the air, Mom thought it was dust.

I liked the pen and pencil and the notebook. I like those kind of mechanical pencils.

We went swimming in the creek twice and we might go swimming today. Yesterday it rained so we played board games inside. Today we’re going to the cave.

There is a cat that lives near our cabin and she is very friendly. She has baby kittens, but we haven’t seen them. We named her Oreo because she’s black and white. There is also a dog that comes around every morning to say hello and her name is Shasta. She’s yellow and big.

There is a little tiny creek right by our cabin and there is fish and crayfish in there. We also have a little house with dishes like the greenhouse.

The cows and horses have their pasture right by our cabin. There are 6 cows and two horses.

Love, RoseBud


Dear Nonny,

I really like the snacks you brung. And I really like the really cool lizards which we sticked to the wall. Mine didn’t stick so we added some water and we threw them on the wall in Molly’s room and they stuck. It was raining that day.

I really liked the cool goopy spider. It lighted up. And then Mommy took it away cuz I whacked her with it.

We really had a good time there. I really miss you.


Love, Banana Boy.

More to come.....

Sunday, July 20, 2008

The St. Louis Cardinal


Everyone slept in until 6:15. Whoo hoo! We were on the road at 7:50 am—hot and sunny!

Our first glimpse of the Arch in St Louis was from Illinois and the kids all thought it was cool! Even Sunshine “found” it and oohed over it, copying his siblings.


We pulled into the Arch parking at 8:48 and qualified for Early Bird parking: $4 instead of $6. I had forgotten how big and how small the arch seems all at once.Can you see them? They're pretty tiny!

Pepper makes friends with the Arch

The line was short and after clearing security, Mr. GT bought our tram tickets to the top.

We rode in two groups, Mr. GT with the big 4 and I with Sunshine in a different tram car. When he and I got to the top, the big kids were already pasted to the windows, discovering the views below. “Mommy! Look how little the people are! They’re like ants! Look at the little cars! See the tiny boat! Look at all the logs against the pier in the river!” Sunshine just lay on the window seat and gazed and gazed down.

On the town side, they were fascinated by the pools on the hotel roofs.

After getting our fill of the view, we rode back down the other side of the arch.

The museum of Westward Expansion was pretty cool. They had a stuffed buffalo, horse, beaver, robotic people who told their stories about the settling of the west. The coolest displays, in my opinion, were a series of collections of belongings of the full variety of people who lived in the west. In each collection, they had the person’s footwear, hat, saddle, blanket, cooking gear, weapon and a picture of their beast of burden. So an Indian had moccasins, no hat, a simple saddle, an Indian blanket, a bow and arrow and a horse. The gold miner had boots, a wide hat, a more sophisticated saddle, a tin mess kit, a rifle and a mule. You get the idea. What was neat was that they compiled about 15 collections of different kinds of people who lived in the West, from Indians, to cowboys, to soldiers, to ranchers, to farmers, pioneers and so on.

At the arch, there were also movies about Lewis & Clark and about the building of the arch, but we skipped those.

Sunshine was much better behaved today and enjoyed this adventure. He was so good in the tram and sat very still in his seat, watching out the window in the door as we went up, up, up! He only touched each of the people with us in the car twice. Fortunately, they thought he was cute, and didn’t mind.

Once we left the inner sanctum of the arch, we were steaming again. It was very hot and fairly muggy. The only saving grace was a hot wind blowing. We walked up the hill to stand in the shadow of the arch and then back to the car by 11:30 or so.

Next stop was the Missouri Botanical Gardens. I cannot recommend this place highly enough. It was stupendous, even in the heat! We ate lunch in the parking lot before going in.

The admission was $8 per adult and $3 for each of the kids (all five) and well worth it. The place is overflowing with fountains of all designs, ponds, and plants. Coming from their Green Thumb background, they had a comment for almost every plant. The sycamore tree (hey, that’s what Zaccheus climbed!). The Skunk plant (That stinks!) Catnip (Spider would love it here!) The giant water lily (I wish I could sit on that! It’s so cool!) They even loved the sculptures all over the gardens, some of which they could climb on.
Hey, does anyone have any floss???

The Children’s Garden was awesome! Just before the entrance was a fountain which was a flat brick area with water shooting out from the ground in sprays. Other kids had brought swimsuits and were playing in it. It was so hot, when the kids looked at me with pleading eyes, I just said, go ahead! They came out in various stages of damp from Sunshine and Mr. GT (damp) to Daisy (wringing out her dress!). It was hilarious!

In the Children’s Garden were the promised rope bridges and treehouses, lots of things to climb and explore. There were more water play areas, including a miniature lock and dam to investigate, a music area, an invasive plant jail, little streams, a bee garden (with a giant hive you could enter and inside the hive---giant honeycomb (fake) and it smelled like honey inside the hive!) I wish we lived in St. Louis and it was really the very best choice for our family of all the things to do here.



On the way out we visited the Climatron—one of those big geodesic domes all tropical inside. They loved discovering familiar things in their natural planty state: limes on the tree, bananas growing in a bunch, a coffee bush, dates on a date palm, bromeliads, a bamboo grove (that’s bamboo???!). My personal favorite plant was a curry leaf (tree? bush?) I forgot what they’re called, but I want my own curry leaf plant!

Even hot, sweaty and “zausted,” as Banana Boy kept reminding us, they found more things to look at on the way back to the visitor center. Sunshine fell asleep immediately upon being put in the backpack and missed the whole Climatron.

Back in the van, Sunshine continued his nap and Pepper and Banana Boy joined him. Daisy read the new books I’d bought at the gift shop and Rose Bud rested her eyes.

The drive to the cabin was surprisingly easy. I expected “the middle of nowhere” to be much harder to get to, but it was 4 lane highway much of the way. Even the last stretch, which in the directions was promised as “curvy and hilly—you might want Dramamine,” was not nearly as curvy and hilly as the roads around home! Driving to the land is a much sicker ride.

The cabin is beautiful! They were still cleaning it when we arrived so we just wandered around the yard. At first the kids were really disappointed by the tiny creek—it’s barely 9-12” across in most places. On the website it looked like a small river.

Then they discovered the cat.

Cats make everything better. Tame cats make everything wonderful. As soon as they found out she had no name, they dubbed her Oreo.

Finding out the cat has kittens: Priceless. Hopefully, we’ll get to see (hold, pet, love) the kittens at some point. They are over in the horse barn and I think they’re still pretty small.

The second discovery was the playhouse. Rose Bud about exploded with joy when she walked in. It’s a rustic 8x8’ wood cabin with a half-door and open windows. Scattered all over the floor were bowls and pans and buckets, a school desk, a few utensils. The girls were utterly in heaven! “Daddy! You should build us a house like this! Daddy! Can’t you build us a playhouse???? Daddy, please??” They right away set to work cleaning the place up from its last little inhabitants. Pepper found a broom and started sweeping. Rose Bud organized and arranged the pots and pans. I’m not sure what Daisy was doing.

When Rose Bud walked down to the creek to get water for cleaning, she started screaming, “Crayfish! There are crayfish!!” The other kids came pouring out of the playhouse and down the creek bank to see. They are tiny—maybe only 1 1/2” but crayfish they are.

Then she saw the minnows. More excitement and screaming from everyone.

The cabin was finally clean and I was just as excited to see what a nice place this is. You never really know what you’re going to get when you book a cabin for a week. It could smell musty, be leaking, falling apart, have ratty old furniture and a skuzzy kitchen.

This place is a palace! It’s clean and it’s decorated so cute. (cutely? That’s not a word. See, Word even says it’s not.) She has a lot of antique food packages and spice containers all over and big heavy old furniture. It’s very nice.

Here is where we are staying: Koinania Cottage, Black, MO

The kids started bringing their stuff in and claiming beds. We brought Banana Boy in with his eyes closed to surprise him with the top bunk in his room. And Mr. GT informed me that NO children were sleeping in our room. Sunshine is sound asleep in the bottom bunk as we speak. We’ll see how long that lasts.

There was much exclaiming over the rooms and the beds and the bathrooms (2) and the kitchen.

And then they found the dress-up closet. Oh, my. Here is a fashion show for you.
"Hey, Pardner! Don' mess wi' my sister!"

Have you seen the Kit movie? This is County.

We made spaghetti for supper, all the kids went out to play with the cat and Mr. GT went for a walk.

After supper the kids got into jammies and the girls discovered The Bookshelf. More joy. You can never have too many new books to read or reread your old favorites often enough. Daisy is deep in the Boxcar Children Woodshed Mystery, Rose Bud read all the Dennis the Menace books (a new cartoon for her) and Pepper is enjoying her tried and true old friends, The Family Circus.

And I’m ‘zausted. It’s time for bed.

Saturday, July 19, 2008

7:11 am

Foggy and cloudy in Blue Mounds, 71 degrees. Sunshine is fussing before we’ve even left the garage. Rose Bud is complaining that we’re already behind schedule. Heading out of Wisconsin, the kids are begging for a bag of presents from Nonny. Rose Bud climbs into the back to find a bag

and discovers: A book of Sudoku puzzles for herself, a pony with a hairbrush for Banana Boy (“OOOH, BB, look what YOU get,” Rose Bud says). Banana Boy gets a big grin. Daisy gets a shirt puzzle to keep her busy. “Pepper, you get a window suction monkey!” Rose Bud exclaims. And last but not least, Sunshine gets a pony, too. “Oh! It’s a Lemon Pony!” Rose Bud shouts, sniffing it. “mmm” Sunshine says as he licks it. “Smell it with your nose!” Rose Bud tells him. She helps him comb the hair. “Whoa, there, Pony,” she tells it as a big clump of hair (Purple) comes out in the comb. “He might be bald by the end of the trip,” I tell her. “Can I smell it?” Pepper wants to know. Smelling Sunshine’s pony is proving to be a popular activity.

8:11 am, we cross into Illinois. “Bloop!” Mr. GT says. “Look how flat it is here. You cross the line and Splat! It’s flat!” The kids argue with that fact, since Mr. GT made it up. He does point out that the highest point in Illinois is in the northwest corner, meaning it’s only going to get flatter from here.

“Do we have a map of the United States?” Pepper wants to know. Why, yes, in fact, I do, since they had all sorts of cool stuff in the One Spot at Target this week. I hand her a Grade 2 workbook of the United States, complete with US map. “Are we going around Springfield or through Springfield?” she wants to know. “Actually, we’re stopping in Springfield,” I tell her. “And how are we getting home?” “Up the Mississippi” “Through Iowa?” she wonders. Mr. GT grins at his bright little Pepper.

“Do you have something for ME?” Daisy needs to know. I hand her another One Spot find: a lift the flap book of US facts. “What am I supposed to do with this?” she whines.

“Do you have anything for ME to do?” Rose Bud whines. I offer her Exploring Landmarks or Discovering US Presidents. She declines and wants something that won’t give her a headache. A tin of Lemonheads fit the bill. (also from the One Spot). Mr. GT’s hand is immediately in the back seat. “You can put your hand back up there, I have to open them first,” she tells him. She generously shares a Lemonhead with each of us. I should have got the adults each a tin!

Lunch is bagels with peanut butter and jelly (no turkey for us on THIS vacation!) in the car, M&M cookies and juice boxes.

Sunshine has napped for about an hour from 9:30-10:30 and he’s really doing very well in the car. I sit with him for a bit as Rose Bud complains about having to sit in the front seat.

12:15 Springfield, IL

We let everyone stretch their legs by parking 2 blocks from the museum. On the agenda for the day is the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, the Old State Capitol and Lincoln’s Tomb.

We start at the museum and it’s pretty cool! The library is just for research, but at the museum, there is a neat holographic presentation about the merits of a presidential library. The kids were blown away by the holograms and we’ve promised to look up “how they do that” once we have an internet connection. Also at the museum is a section of artifacts that belonged to the Lincolns, a log cabin replica where the exhibits tell of Lincoln’s life before he became president, a white house section detailing his presidency to his death and funeral, another theater with a film about the Civil War which we didn’t visit and Mary Lincoln’s Attic, a play area for kids with dress-ups, period toys (like Jacob’s Ladders and slates), a play kitchen (cooking done on the fireplace), dollhouse replica of Lincoln’s Springfield home and of course, Lincoln Logs.

The museum is very well done and worth the price ($4 for 5-15 and $10 adults). Sunshine was free and thank goodness, because he was an absolute terror in the museum. He ran, he touched, he screamed and yelled, he set off alarms. He touched the silicon Willie Lincoln and got yelled at by a docent (well, actually she yelled at me—like I don’t KNOW my kid shouldn’t be ripping off Willie’s fingers!)
Will the real Lincoln family please stand up? (Notice the absence of finger-ripping Sunshine)

Part of the problem was that they wouldn’t let us put him in the backpack carrier. Backpacks are against the rules. They did have free strollers, but putting Sunshine in a stroller is like putting milk in a sieve. If I held him, he cried for Daddy. If Daddy held him, he cried for Mama.

Mr. GT and the kids enjoyed the museum. Most interesting things at the museum: Pepper—the displays and the fake people (very lifelike and made of silicon), Daisy & Rose Bud—the holographs. Oh, Pepper and Mr. GT say they liked the holographs too. Banana Boy and Sunshine are sleeping, but I think Sunshine would say the dress-ups.

After they kicked us out of the museum, we walked to the Old State Capital. We had to wait for Mr. GT until he returned from feeding the parking meter. On the lawn of the capitol 3 men were playing baseball in 1860s uniforms with corresponding ball and bat. They invited the kids to have a bat and all but Pepper took a turn. Sunshine enjoyed THIS and had 5 turns. I had to help him bat and he loved when we hit the ball. Banana Boy, an expert T-Ball player after his 5-week stint as an Athletic this summer batted on his own. The players gave each of the kids a pin to remember them by.

The Old State Capitol was interesting. Everyone’s favorite part was the wood carver carving an eagle out of wood. He gave us a demonstration and let the kids pick up all the wood curls they wanted off the floor. Rose Bud wanted to slide down the banister of the stairs. Mr. GT was happy to rediscover the only thing he remembered from our previous visit here (pre-kids): the straw box which holds the candles (I had forgotten all about that). Banana Boy was most fascinated by the staircases leading to the uppermost level, which were roped off. “Why can’t we go up there? What is up there? Who gets to go up there? When do they open it?”

Across the street from the Old State Capitol building is Cold Stone. Mrs. GT (that’s me) made an impassioned plea for ice cream and Mr. GT caved. Plain ice cream was only $1.60 for a kids’ serving and everyone agreed they were happy with that. Everyone being the kids, that is. Mr. GT and I had lots o’ stuff mixed in. BB had cotton candy, Pepper, coffee, Rose Bud, cheesecake (It tastes like a bowl of sweet cream cheese, she complained) & Daisy had mint (I thought it tasted like mouthwash.) I always get For Coffee Lover’s Only and I shared mine with Sunshine. I really have never enjoyed ice cream less as I had to eat it pretty fast to keep him from eating the whole thing!

After ice cream we went to see Lincoln’s Tomb, which was marred for me by the surrounding reconstruction project. Sunshine was excited to see a Bobcat. “Digger!” Rose Bud was fascinated by the graves and deaths of the children (the Lincolns only had one of four sons survive to adulthood and the other three died tragic deaths from sickness). Miraculously, Sunshine observed the requested silence out of respect for the Lincoln family in their tomb.

Now we’re driving to Litchfield where the kids hope and pray there will be a pool to swim in. Daisy & Pepper are having a giggle-fest in the back seat and studying US Geography in Pepper’s workbook. The boys are sleeping and Rose Bud is listening to music. Mr. GT is driving.

9:20 pm Litchfield, IL

Yes, there was a pool. No one was hungry since we pigged out on Cold Stone, so we went swimming right away. Buncha fish! Banana Fish could stand in the shallow, and he spent his whole time swimming around under water. SunFish jumped into the pool over and over and over and over and over and over and….. you get the idea. Like a crazy man. It didn’t even matter if Mr. GT was there to catch him or not. PepperFish jumped and swam and smiled and had a great time. DaisyFish jumped and swam across the pool and swam under water and swam and swam. Rose Fish did all sorts of fancy jumps and then played stealthy shark, swimming under water to attack her family in the ankle. Mom took pictures.

After swimming, everyone was starving. We had had a hankering for Chinese and lo and behold! There was a Chinese restaurant a block away.

Oh. My. Goodness. I have only ever eaten at a Chinese buffet like this one other time. It was amazing. 3 kinds of seafood on ice, 4 kinds of soup, 6 kinds of fruit, 3 kinds of jello, about 45 kinds of actual Chinese food, macaroni and cheese, prime rib and sushi. Plus dessert. Plus fortune cookies.

Oof. We are all stuffed. Pepper had FIVE plates of food! She loves Chinese. It is her favorite foreign food (and next is Indian, she informed me). Sunshine ate more than Rose Bud who is on a teenage “I’m not hungry” kick right now. (unless it’s dessert. Then she’s hungry) We had to pay the adult price for her, but it was ok, because Sunshine more than made up for it. Banana Boy tried all 6 kinds of fruit and then had more fruit. Plus about 10 kinds of chicken. Daisy, she’s always a good eater. At the end, Mr. GT discovered that not only did they have the usual buffet soft serve ice cream, but they also had a freezer full of REAL ice cream in buckets. He made everyone go back and have ice cream, even tho they’d all had Cold Stone already today. Since we were paying for it, you know. Actually, they all begged for ice cream and he said, “yeah, go ahead! Eat ice cream!” 3 adults were $9.45 each and kids 4 – 10 were $3 plus 50 cents per year. The total was $44 with tax. Not so bad for a family of 7, I thought.

Back at the motel, we all put on pajamas and crashed on the bed(s) to watch Freaky Friday (the new one with Jamie Lee Curtis). I had loved the old version as a kid and was really resisting ever seeing this new version, but I love JLC and it was very well done. Cute. She is such a funny actress!

So now they are all asleep. Daisy, Sunshine and Rose Bud are on the floor, Pepper is in bed with me and BB is with Dad. Nighty night!

Oh, and I could have posted this tonight, but the free Wi-Fi at the motel is down. Bummer!

From Bush Baby to Skinhead

Yeah. We had a little accident today.

It was haircut day and Sunshine needs his done frequently because he has these 2 weird swirls on the back of his head. He was pretty bushy.

So I put on the 1/2" clipper and was zooming away while Mr. GT held him down. He doesn't mind a haircut. In fact, he likes it. He just can't hold still for one nanosecond.

So I'm zooming. And suddenly, the clipper guard falls off. Only I keep zooming. Oops.


So now we can't continue with the 1/2" guard because the boy has a big bare spot in the back.

We switch to the 3/8" or something like that and I'm zooming along again, when it occurs to me that this would be cute.

And it is! It's adorable! But Mr. GT immediately vetoes it. So Sunshine got to keep his mohawk for 5 minutes while I buzzed Mr. GT's hair.



And now he's a skinhead. My baby!

For Leslie

You have to read Leslie's post to understand this one.

Granted, I made my bed before I took the pictures. Normally, I NEVER make my bed. Why bother, if you are just going to sleep in it again? My other theory is that if the cat barfs, it is so much easier to wash the sheets than to haul the comfortor down to the laundrymat!

Anyway, Leslie, you can see that our rooms are fairly similar. Notice the teeny little TV? The exercise equipment doubling as a quilt rack? Hubby's desk. Toys Sunshine drags in and doesn't drag back out. I am nothing if not a great multi-tasker, and my rooms are too!

Oh, and I wanted to be sure to mention that after I finshed climbing around on my bed to make it up for this photo, I felt something in between my toes. What squishy thing had gotten caught between my toes in my bed?!?!?

Gum. Sunshine's gum. He must have laid down for his nap with it in his mouth.

Nice.

Crack me up and bless my soul!

This is TOO funny!





But if you want to be truly blessed, read this family's story from the beginning. Angie is an amazing writer and her faith in the storm is a beautiful witness. That they can still laugh in the midst of tragedy is a testimony to the strength of their faith.

Bring the Rain

editing to add: After I posted this, I went to my blog page to make sure the video worked. And here was today's Bible verse in the sidebar:

“As for God, his way is perfect; the word of the LORD is flawless. He is a shield for all who take refuge in him.” (Psalm 18:30)

God is awesome.

Little Brothers

Banana Boy (singing to himself): T-O-N spells flower. N-O-Y spells happy.

Daisy: Stop trying to spell things, Banana Boy! If you want to spell something, ask for help. Don't try to spell things on your own!