Miss me? ^_^

Hi! I haven't written in a week! I meant to, at one point. I don't remember what form of interruption presented itself.

This week...I fought with Josh some. It didn't have it's usual recreational feel. For a while, I didn't know what he was mad at. Stress, mostly. But that was no fun. What was fun, though, was seeing all the pictures my buddies in Japan were sending, and reading Amy's account of the trip. Living vicariously through them was frequently the highlight of my day. And I am enormously jealous of Amy's phone. It takes better pictures than my camera! Someday, when I win the lottery..... The kids had a rough week, too. Lots of wild playing that often resulted in injury took place, but, as you might suspect, no listening to Mommy's warnings did. Abbie got her lip bloodied once. I was tearing my hair out most days, and vented my distress by not cleaning the house. Wow. Very frightening.

What I did instead was read The Da Vinci Code. What an exhausting book! Dan Brown jumps right in, head first, into intensity, then waits for a particularly suspenseful moment, and changes perspective. The jumping back and forth between characters and such was, I though, a rather obvious plea for my attention. The fiction part was exciting, I guess. It was kind like reading an adventure movie. As for the religious controversy...it really wasn't any more than taking things that have been said for years, years and years and taking them a step further. Or not even that. More like a half-step. The fact that Brown applied the conspiracy to any and everyone he could reach was more than a little hard to believe, but he's just a fiction writer. I don't know why anyone got offended, really. Anyway, now I've read it. It will not be making my wish list or anything, but I'm glad I did.

Then..the weekend. Josh and I got tired of fighting and decided to be friends again instead. That was Friday. Saturday morning, we got ready and headed off to Little Dixie Lake. My parents were there, and my grandmother came, too, and Nanny. It was the hottest day we've had all summer, worse luck. However, there was a nice wind, most of the day. It was wonderful! It made everything not just tolerable, but enjoyable. We had a picnic lunch of sandwiches (I love my mommy. Can't afford Swiss cheese myself, you know.), Pringles and green grapes. We all brought grapes, and we all brought peanuts. Isn't that funny? Mom brought plain peanuts, Gran brought salt, and Josh brought honey roasted. We had juice and cookies and water and ice pops. We rented a row boat for the day for 5 dollars. I loved it. I love rowing. I knew I would. Grant opened his birthday presents from my mom and Brother. Puzzles, and a DVD of all the early PIXAR short films from Brother, and from Mom a book, a wizard's had with a dragon on it, and....a Transformers fishing pole! So Grant learned to fish. He was much better at casting than we expected, and before long, he'd caught TWO FISH! We let them go, of course.

Wouldn't my grandfather be pleased?

The day was great and everyone had a great time. As we were packing up, Grant mentioned wanting to go to Mimi's house, and Mom said, "Sure! Let's get the car seats switched!" So...my children went to spend the night at my mom and dad's house. At first, I was upset. It was so sudden. My babies! But Josh saw the possibilities immediately. Before we had even got back to the highway, he was calling people to go out. That plan got changed to dinner with Johnny, and then a movie. But then Johnny couldn't make it to dinner after all, so we ate at Applebee's by ourselves, and then went for the first time to our movie theater in Warrenton to see the latest Harry Potter movie. Then, I spent the rest of the evening filling Josh in on what was left out of the last two movies. He actually seemed to enjoy my reading to him.

Sunday was taiko, and I worked hard. Hopefully there will be positive results from that, but who can say? Then the kids came back in the afternoon. Did I tell you that they saw the first Harry Potter for the first time last week? Well, the first time with parental consent. We're watching it right now, in fact. Grant is wearing his new wizard hat, complete with dragon, even though the dragon is removable. Anyway, it makes a nice change from Shaun the Sheep, who has otherwise been filling my days.

Harry Potter seems to be a minor theme in my life lately.

So, weekend was good, and Josh starts his new schedule today. He'll be helping out in the deployment department, just like last year, and is being groomed for the lead position, just like last year. The only difference is that this year he is being told by the owner of the company that he is shortly to have the other guy's job. Well, we'll see. It means a raise, so we're looking forward to it, and the hours can be worked with after Josh has had the job a few months. Maybe. So, probably good things ahead, but we won't know for a month, and I'm not holding my breath, considering that it's just like last year. And next week Josh's classes start, but he hasn't told me that schedule yet.

My mom also starts teaching her evening class today. She called earlier than usual this morning, because she plans to be very busy most of the day writing out her lesson plans for the first few classes.

It rained last night, but I haven't checked to see what that means for the weather this week.

I'm making sloppy joes for dinner tonight. I figure that's something I can make early for the kids, and that will re-heat well enough for Josh when he gets home. And we still have left-over picnic junk food for dessert.

Well, I'm off to check on my Japan correspondents! Hope you have a wonderful and happy day!