From our anniversary, part 2

Last Spring we celebrated our anniversary with National Penny Day, collecting pennies to give to Heifer Project.

Today, in the continuing spirit of "finishing things", I finally cashed in all those pennies and other coins. I am please to say that we collected $64. So in honor of our friends and families, I just purchased 'a trio of rabbits', and a share of tree saplings.

Thanks to everyone who came and celebrated and gave. Someone's life is going to be greatly impacted because of us.

My friend Mark

My friend Mark is riding a thousand mile bike ride from Seattle to San Francisco to raise money for the American Lung Association (and enjoy the adventure). Here is a link to the event:
Big Ride Pacific Coast.

I was so blessed that Mark asked me to blog for him during his adventure. So once in awhile I get a crackly voicemail that I get to transcribe onto Mark's blog.

I'm so proud of and excited for him.

YAY Mark!

Luke 15:8

"Or suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Does she not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it?"

Here's my version:

Suppose an overtired mother has a thousand piece puzzle that she's been working on for over a year, and she loses four pieces. Does she not grab her swiffer and enlist the strength of her whole family to find the pieces? Does she not move every piece of furniture and dust in corners that never see the light of day? Does she not thoroughly clean the dreaded 'junk' closet from top to bottom, while praying that something won't bite her? And suppose she finds one piece after the manic burst of cleaning? And is still missing three.

Then she thinks about what craft projects can be done with the pieces with her friends and good chunk of chocolate.

Today, we killed our treadmill....

No, we weren't joining some anti-fitness war or any such thing. It had just stopped working, so we tore it apart and sent it off to the junk pile. The only reason we tortured it so much was that it was too heavy to get from the basement to the van any other way. When we put it down there we had hired moving guys.

Of course there was a certain amount of glee in ripping it to pieces.

Finishing things....

This past week I have been making an attempt at finishing some projects. I am a great starter of projects, but if you look closely at my piles you will see many mini-project graveyards.

So this week, in a bit of the spirit of a good purge, I have been tackling the piles, enthusiastically finishing or throwing out projects before I start my slew of Christmas projects.

This puzzle "The Rescuing of Pooh" is one of the many projects. This puzzle has been on the cardboard and coffee tables I don't know how many times over the past 18 months. Thank God for the puzzle mat that I bought.

This is one of the most difficult puzzles I have done.... with about a hundred different shades of green and blue all looking like each other. Yesterday and today I became more and more excited to be finishing one more project.

If you look closely, you will see four pieces missing. Where are they? I don't know. When did they go missing? I don't know. I had hoped to glue the puzzle together and make a poster, but alas. When you take 18 months to finish a puzzle with three kids in a busy home, I guess your pictures sometimes have a few pieces missing.

But it is another project done.

An overheard conversation....

Caleb and Anna to Sofia: We don't want to play with a baby. No babies allowed. (note... mommy internally growls and gets ready to intervene.)

pause.

Caleb to Anna: Wait. We need someone to test the booby trap on.

pause.

Caleb and Anna to Sofia: Sure, you can come play Sofie.

(another note... mommy struggles - do I intervene or not? naaah.)

It is finished....

sort of. All the construction work is finally done on the swing set. I hauled load after load of dirt to build the 'foundation' area for the slide yesterday. All that is left is the retaining wall and wood chips, which we just might leave until next spring. We'll see.

 

Labor Day Photos

A Big Sigh from Maine

We spent a blissful day in MA yesterday with Shelly and Su-San... a picnic on the beach near their home and sea-glass hunting. Then we took a trip onto Gordon and saw some of our favorite Nyland residents. Finally we saw Lisa and Paul as we grabbed one last cup of coffee at Starbucks for the trip home.

As we drove up 95, the traffic going South was AMAZING. And the traffic going North was near to nothing. It was almost as though you could hear Maine giving out a collective *sigh*. As each tourist (thank you for coming and supporting our economy) left, there was a little more oxygen and space for all of to relax and be Mainers.

Pretty good odds

I made just over ten dozen chocolate chip cookies this morning for the Colby Christian Fellowship to put in freshmen boxes. And out of 120, I think only two made it into my mouth. Batting .01666-tremendous improvement for my cookie game.