Bits of August

Leftover photos off my phone this month.  Nana Susan was eager to see the kiddos after we were gone all summer long!  We met at Ruby Tuesday on the 1st and she had birthday presents for Wesley and Anna Kate.

When the kids are out of school and the cleaning lady is here - All four kids get banished to my bed so she can clean all the floors.  As you can see, they can barely stand the cruel torture.  Friends hangin' trees outside our door:

Promotion Sunday at Heritage!  And then I passed on my sewing expertise to the next generation... replacing buttons.  It's the one thing I can do:

Wes celebrated the end of summer with a tooth extraction.  School started just in time for the ladies to enjoy a kid-free lunch at Harry's to celebrate Christie's birthday.  Chimane, Shireen, Khaysy, Heidi, Christie, me and Daune: 

Love these papers that came home the first week of school.  Carigan's essay about summer was on the bulletin board outside of Mrs. Palm's room all summer:

Nana Susan had surgery on the 9th (the kids' first day of school) and she was ready for visitors by the 11th.  So I picked up the kids from school and headed to the hospital.  We passed a nurse in the hall and she said, "Oh she will be SO happy to see you.  She has been talking about it all day."  We had the Hames' over for dinner on the 14th, the night before we drove to Tennessee for the eclipse.  Tate loved all the attention from Claire and Grace.

We got back from Tennessee late on the 21st, and Tate started his second year of speech with Ms. Holly and Ms. Lauren the next day.  Which also happened to be Erin's birthday!  Happy Birthday, Sis!!

I submitted this picture to The Ledger, and it ran the day after we got back.^  -BELOW-  Picture Day!  First year that all four kids will be in one yearbook! 

Carigan had her pink cast removed on August 25, and she went with green this time (with a little prodding from me, because she wanted blue and she's already done blue twice and I'm shallow enough to care so I bribed her with Panera.  We're only one or two colors away from having used every single one).  And while we're talking about shallow parenting, Wesley really wanted to play the saxophone like his daddy, and I really wanted him to play an instrument we already own so we don't have to cough up another chunk of change.  But saxophone is not offered in 5th grade band.  Wesley had to start with the trombone, and Mr. Fulton said he could try out for saxophone in 6th grade.  So a couple weeks ago, Wesley tried out for saxophone, but they also made him try out for all the other instruments they were holding auditions for.  Next thing I know, Wesley is giddily telling me he's been selected for french horn.  Um, What?  Now not only do we not get to use any of the saxophones Michael already owns, but we've been renting-to-own a trombone for no reason, and now we get to purchase a really REALLY expensive instrument instead (after we rent one from school for awhile, of course, because we want to make sure we're spending enough money here).  Whatever.  I'm told it's a compliment he was chosen for french horn, because it's a really hard instrument, and my friend Mindi (who is the new band director - woohoo!) said it's known for luring scholarships.  So here's to french horn paying Wesleys' way through med school. Seems perfectly reasonable to me.

In other news, it's always amused me that LCS even stamps their preschool library books with their potential non-approval disclaimer.  Then Tate checked out this book last week and suddenly I know why.  We always have to park and wait for Wesley, because he gets out later.  Tate crawled in my lap and pulled out his library book and I started reading.  The girls and I were in tears we were laughing so hard.  Where has this Roald Dahl book been my whole life???  Had we known it existed, I'm sure my dad would have read it to me every single night.

First night of Cotillion for the three amigos!

The kids may be back in school, but Tate is still home on Thursday mornings when the cleaning lady comes, before he goes to speech at noon.  He was one step behind her this week, dust-busting behind her vacuum.  I'm sure Ms. Debbie really appreciated the help.

Spontaneous Saturday

Surprise! Michael bought a new car today. We planned on him driving his truck until Wesley gets his license and then passing it on to him, but one week of taking all four kids to school in the morning with backpacks, instruments, etc. and he realized that the truck just wasn't going to work. I didn't realize he was this serious, but he drove to one dealership on this rainy Saturday and came back with a car. So now in the course of our marriage we've owned a Corolla, a Camry, a 4-Runner, two Siennas, a Tacoma and now a Highlander.  We're going to just keep going until we've owned every car Toyota makes.

Had to take the kids for a quick ride around the block... and of course when you live on Lake Morton, you let a swan ride.

Ribbon-Cutting for Roger

Lightning cancelled the football game, but nothing could stop us from celebrating Coach Evans and his legacy at the ribbon-cutting of the Roger Evans Athletic Center!

I sat with Trisha outside the beautiful new building for over an hour as we waited to see if the game would be cancelled (poor Terri waited in her car as rain poured).  Every flash of lightning meant it would at least another 30 minutes until the game could resume.  Roger and Terri's whole family had flown into town for the occasion, so when the game was called, the ribbon-cutting was just moved to the balcony.

It really was such a beautiful moment with their whole beautiful family.  BayNews9 continually aired a wonderful segment on the ribbon-cutting late Friday night through midday Saturday.  Terri looked absolutely beautiful, and I know Roger would be so proud.

We love you, Coach Evans!!!

The Great American Eclipse!

We made a very last minute decision to drive to Connie's to see The Great American Eclipse!  Michael had a board meeting scheduled the same day, so we couldn't so much as say the word "eclipse" without Michael interrupting to say there was NO way we could go.  But as the time for the eclipse drew closer and the hype increased, Wesley just could not stop talking about it.  His best friend Hyatt was going to see the eclipse, and Wes just could not stop lamenting that we were going to miss this amazing historical event.  Board meetings really are important, and I didn't think there was any way Michael could get out of it, but two days before Wesley's birthday, Michael and I walked the lake and I asked him to help me brainstorm a way to get Wes to Tennessee.  Michael was getting ready to be out of town for Citrus Expo, missing Wesley's birthday.  We couldn't have Wesley's party the week of his birthday, because Hyatt would be in Tennessee for the eclipse.  I was just feeling a little sad for Wesley that his actual birthday would be so disappointing.  The only thing I could think of that would completely surprise him and make his birthday wonderful was figuring out a way to get him to that eclipse! Our first lap around the lake, Michael maintained that there was absolutely no way he could cancel that board meeting, but also said he wasn't comfortable with me taking the kids alone.  On lap two he started to entertain the idea of canceling the meeting, but stressed openly about the fallout.  By lap three, he told me he'd take care of it and told me I could call Connie and tell her we were coming!  I couldn't believe it!  We had so much fun calling Michael before school on Wesley's birthday last week and letting him surprise Wes with the good news! I told Michael I was just worried that his thinking was too locked on the "urgent" things of the here and now, and that 50 years from now he probably won't even be able to remember what kind of work conflict kept us from going, and that we'd likely always regret not going.  Life is too short for regret!  We were a bit paralyzed by fear that traffic would live up to the hype, and we decided to just go expecting the absolute worst - If we went expecting nightmare traffic, we'd just pack lots of snacks and deal.  We actually decided to leave Tate with Grandpa and Mimi to reduce the stress in traffic, and because he's too young to really appreciate or remember the eclipse in the first place.  Although there were reports of enormous traffic jams, we really lucked out in our timing, because we didn't hit a single slowdown all the way from Lakeland to Decatur on Saturday!  We did pass a car that had just burst into flames, so I'm sure a traffic jam formed immediately following. 

So it was a long trip, but we got to Tennessee with no trouble on Saturday, and we had all Sunday after church to bask in Session 3 of Camp Connie!

Sabatoge!^^ We got to see Becca briefly when they stopped by our dock on their boat.  We had perfect weather and another great summer day on the river.  Aunt Connie kept us laughing.  She kept trying to prank the kids.  She really had Wesley worked up hiding one remote behind her back as Wesley tried to navigate the TV with the other... for about 20 minutes he pressed buttons more and more intently and with great concentration.  He kept throwing his arms up in the air and yelling, "What in the  WORLD???"  He never gave up, and Connie never cracked. If Anna Kate hadn't finally noticed and burst into hysterical laughter, it would have gone on for forever! 

Connie took all of us to dinner at Jacob Myers. We got to see Seth and Brittney for the first time since their wedding!  We ordered a million desserts, including every last piece of mink cake they had.  It was amazing!!

Working off our dessert at the park across the street. 

Connie was up early making eclipse treats for Becca's 2nd grade class.  She took all kinds of goodies over there, including Sun Drops and Moon Pies!  We are READY!!!!!!

Anxiously awaiting!!  Constant eclipse news coverage started at noon, and within thirty minutes we could see a partial eclipse with our glasses!  We would run outside, take a look, run back inside and watch the TV, run back outside and look again. We watched the first period of totality in Oregon live on the Science Channel.  The newscaster cried! 

I could not get over the crescent shaped shadows everywhere during several hours spanning a partial eclipse!  I had read something about shadows being altered, but I had NO idea it would be this noticeable... and it was EVERYWHERE!  Absolutely amazing!!!  I was wiggin' out!  With about 30 minutes to go until totality, we headed to the dock. It was hot, so the temperature drop as we approached totality was noticeable!  We watched lots of news coverage in places where people had traveled thousands of miles and the sun was completely obscured by a cloud.  We could not have had a more perfect day.  Not a single cloud high in the sky!  We didn't have to sweat it.

I went back inside to look for a colander (Connie had left to go help Becca corral her 2nd grade class during the eclipse), and I found a straining ladle.  I completely flipped out - Who'd a thunk anyone could ever be that excited about a ladle?!

Getting twilight!!!

I didn't even try to take pictures during the total eclipse, because I just wanted to take it in and not view it from behind a lens.  I did take one quick pic and one 4-second video of the kids to document how dark it was and how loud the cicadas were!  I googled images of the eclipse in Decatur and went through many pics until finding ones that show precisely what we saw. We were all staring up, looking through our glasses in those final moments before totality.  You could see the little sliver of sun getting smaller and smaller, and then we clearly saw "the diamond ring" effect right before the sun went dark.  Then we could see nothing through our glasses and we told the kids it was safe to take them off.  Nothing prepares you for that moment!  None of these images do it justice... we took off our glasses, and the sun was gone and it was instantly dark.  And unlike in these pictures, the corona isn't just a blur of light, but a very defined glow with movement and flares.  We could see red fireballs rolling beneath the bottom right hand side of the moon.  It was absolutely breathtaking.  We were pretty isolated on our dock, but at the moment of totality, we could hear cheers erupt from across the river.  We could only hear people cheer at the beginning and at the end of the 2 minutes and 34 seconds of totality.  During totality all we could hear was the seemingly deafening chorus of cicadas.  All the kids were exclaiming, especially Wesley, before we all fell silent to take it in.  Look how dark it was at 2:32 in the afternoon on a hot and sunny day! 

We could even see planets.  This is the best I could do with my phone.  We sat in absolute awe for 2 minutes and 34 seconds until a tiny sliver of light reemerged and we immediately told the kids to put their glasses back on.  We could not believe how that tiniest sliver of light suddenly flooded us back into light.  The sun is unbelievably powerful!!!  It really was such an emotional reminder of what a powerful God we serve.  We were already packed up and ready to go, and we hopped in the car almost immediately to try to get ahead of traffic on the way home.  It was a smart move and we never hit a huge slowdown, except for the few miles we had to travel on I-75 to get to  Cleveland, where we took backroads all the way to Dalton.  We made it home around 12:45 and everyone went to school the next morning!  I'm so very thankful we were so spontaneous and ultimately decided The Great American Eclipse was not to be missed!  It's truly something we will remember our entire lives.