Making a Home

One of Luci's must-do's was "build a bird house with Daddy." I found a kit, and here's the result:


Helping Daddy. LOL!
IT HAS TO BE PURPLE.

Catching Up--The Past Week in Review

Our friends Barry and Diane, and their kids Rachel and Bradley came over for a hamburger cookout. Here are Rachel and Luci, complete with headgear. We had two kids' tables! One just for the boys (our boys, plus Bradley and Josh, another friend from church--both boys spent the night) and one just for the girls.
JT all sideways.
Gran-Je with Luci, in Jemison on Tuesday
Gran-Je and Grandpa, John's folks. They have an incredible view from their house.
Our Upwards Soccer finished up with a big party. It was sort of like a fair, with FOUR of those jumpy-things for the kids, a clown (Luci kept her distance), free food, and fireworks at the end. There were probably 800 people there. The fireworks were incredible--we expected the backyard variety that some folks get around here, but this was 15 solid minutes of beautiful fireworks in the fields behind our church building. I tried to capture some. Luci wore her ear protection and loved it, too. It was wet enough from all the rain, plus the fire department was there in force "just in case."
Luci wanted some more of that Splatter drink that she learned to love in Idaho. Cracked me up! It's called Squirt!
John got to see the final game and a half of Luci's season. So nice! I thought he would miss all of the games, so this was a good thing. Here is (are?) most of the team (missing two boys) with their terrific Coach Crystal. The boy next to Luci (he's the third child from left, next to Luci) is the one who kisses her on the run during the games.
Bryan and Luci watching the stars at the Upwards Soccer party.
John brought home New Testaments for the kids. Luci especially loves hers, and immediately started "reading" Bible stories to us. (I can't find the pictures on my camera! boo hoo)
Luci helped John fix the dryer hose--he needed someone to help him, and Luci was the only one who could fit back there. He's got most of the Honey-Do list completed. :) Just fun stuff is left, like take the boys to the movies, and have a tea party with Luci.

"Now I have my Family!"

Luci's comment today.

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The first hug

We picked John up at the airport on Friday night, what a great evening! Luci was over the moon. The rest of us were pretty happy, too, but Luci was absolutely overjoyed.

We get John until early June sometime, and we are making the most of his presence.

4,338 miles

story later. Maybe get our soldier today! Story on that later, too.

Hotel Time

The kids have lots of fun at our various hotels. This is the one in Boise. Every day on our travels, good behavior is rewarded with swim time--so most of the time the kids do behave, just so they can go swimming. We don't swim much at home, so it's a big treat and a good positive reinforcement tool. Luci's swim vest is great--she can motor all around the pool on her own.

Military Spouse Appreciation Day

That's what today is. John sent me the link to this blog, The Corps of Engineers Blog. It has a nice tribute to the author's wife, Corps spouses, as well as military spouses everywhere.

What nice sentiments. Usually the one serving gets the recognition, so it's nice to get the pats on the back sometimes. Thanks, John, for sending me the blog post, as well as this sweet note:

You are truly a great Military Spouse and greatly appreciated. Thank you
for holding down the home front.

Thanks to my mother, too!

Made It!

And Papa is happy! Last year, Luci would have nothing to do with Papa. She's making up for it on this visit. So far, in one afternoon, she's told jokes, been read to, and fed the squirrels with Papa.

Katie and JT playing checkers.

Luci with Laura and Katie,playing piano, making sure both girls are following her plans.
We almost didn't make it. We had to stop several times. Luci was sure she had to go potty NOW...in places far away from plumbing, so we pulled out the kiddy-port-a-potty. Neat invention, but it did not help Luci. She's an Army kid for three more weeks, until Daddy retires--so I'm calling her not going a Dereliction of Doo-dy.

Travel, with Kids

Day 1:
551 miles
Five states

That translates into 10 hours of rain and drizzle with two agreeable children and one who got a lecture on the side of the road on the loop around St Louis. Motorists there are still talking. We got a glimpse of blue skies at the end of the day, and were thrilled! We left our home with lots of rain and some good neighbors watching the house for safety (thanks, Butlers!) as well as making sure it doesn't wash down the hill. Every river and creek we passed over was scary-full. And, as always, when we passed New Madrid, I was glad to get through without feeling the earth shake.

Day 2:
497 miles
One more state

Sunlight all day long! We feel like moles coming up from their burrows. Made it through Kansas City without any problems--it is a frightening place to drive. I don't take the loop because it is that much longer and, quite frankly, I don't need longer with three kids in the car. I got to listen to Dennis Miller on the radio (instead of video games) as we drove through KC, so it was actually almost enjoyable going through those concrete canyons. This was the first time in several years that we haven't had tornadic weather with us as we go through Kansas. I-70 is long and boring, but gives you a good sunset. We stopped in a town with the same name as our neighbor (Colby) and Luci wonders where her town is. We made today's trip in nine hours.

Day 3:
577 miles
Two more states

15 State Troopers. That's what we saw in the first hour of driving today. We haven't seen any police or troopers on the road since we started, or since this morning. Hmmm. Wonder why they were so concentrated there? My father says they were probably looking for us, but had they stopped us I might have turned the kids over to them and gone on in peace. Truly, though, since that lecture in St. Louis, we've had peace in the van because the kids now have a common enemy--ME. When we got to Colorado and saw the "Welcome to Colorful Colorado!" sign, I asked Luci what colors she could see. She looked all around and said, "I see brown!" It's different out West, isn't it, Luci? It was the longest mileage-day of the trip, but only 9 hours because of the 75 mile speed limit. I love that speed limit! It can be scary, but the miles really zoom by. Oh--and I'm now realizing that when my Dad used to tell corny jokes and sing silly things in the car on trips long-ago, he was not only entertaining us but also probably trying to keep himself awake.

Day 4
approx 484 miles
Two more states

Many of my friends wonder why on earth don't I just fly out to see my folks. I don't like flying, that's why. Scared to death. That's the biggy. The other main reason is that it is cheaper (even was cheaper last year when gas was double what it is now). There is another reason--you get a good sense of the Grandness of the United States of America by driving. You get to see wonderful things, know the geography a lot better, and meet some good people. One song that goes through our heads as we drive West is the first stanza of "America the Beautiful" by Katherine Lee Bates.

O beautiful for spacious skies,
For amber waves of grain,
For purple mountain majesties
Above the fruited plain!
America! America!
God shed his grace on thee
And crown thy good with brotherhood
From sea to shining sea!

Hilarious!

This caused Luci to cackle with glee! She saw this on the grill of a semi and hollered, "HERMIT!"

And we drove for 9 hours to find ourselves back home?? Somewhere on I-70...

4.13

That's how many inches of rain we've had in the last 24 hours, and it's still raining!! We are an orange dot on the CoCoRAHS map (there's only one other color to go!). The weather man just said that the BIG rain will happen tomorrow afternoon...good grief, bigger than 4.13? Apparently so--he said 4-5 inches, some places will get MORE.

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If you don't belong to CoCoRAHS, I hope you consider joining. Very interesting, and perfect if you are a homeschooler.

Luci-Speak

Fobby Lobby: The craft store you might know as "Hobby Lobby"

Female: a girl

Email: a boy

Visit to a University

Today we went on a field trip to UNA. Topic: Water Festival. The kids learned about water and its importance to our environment--aquifers, how the land itself can clean some things out of the water, and a visit from a Wheeler Wildlife Refuge ranger, who had a great display of a red-tailed hawk, a corn snake, as well as some animal artifacts from the Refuge. The kids got free t-shirts, too!
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Amanda set things up for a group of us homeschoolers to take part, and I'm so glad she did. Bryan got a good review, JT learned some things, and Luci was exposed to some great ideas. Thanks, Amanda! Here are Luci and Hannah (Amanda's daughter) in the lecture hall. Bryan (acting like a sleepy college boy), JT and Tyler (Amanda's son).

Working on a craft.Luci took this very seriously!

Tyler, Bryan, Luci and JT. Tyler, you crack me up!

After the program...Luci saw some of the instructors with the "water festival" shirts on...she says her t-shirt says, "I work here!" After the program, she told me that she was ready "to go to the festival now." I told her it was already over. She was expecting something like Ni Hao, Kai-lan's Chinese New Year Festival that she's seen on Nick, Jr. Not a happy camper after that.

I want you to see what our friend did...

Sam is our friend here, and she is a photographer. She's kind of new to the professional scene, but wow, she is really good! I want you all to see her work and possibly use her for your next memory-making event. This is the home page for Samantha Dalton's photography.

Here are the results of a session she did with our kids at the creek behind our house. Love through the Lens (put in "Susan" for the password) This is what the surprise is for June 2, which is John's birthday...I alluded to a secret mission a couple of weeks ago. The secret was the photo session, and some portraits for John. We've never had professional photos taken of the kids--unless you count the volunteer fire department photo we got last year for donating to our local V.F.D. The photos are so gorgeous (thank you SAM!!) that I spilled the beans to John and he's already seen them from Af ghan istan.

It's going to be hard to choose!

From Luci's Province...

Here is an article from National Geographic that Amy Tan wrote...all about the Dong people of Guizhou Province, China. Luci is a Buyi, according to her orphanage director, but information from her province is hard to find, so this is a good look into Guizhou.
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Here is a photo essay from that article.
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And a video from Guizhou. True to National Geographic, there are some shots of swimmers...so you might want to cover the screen a couple of times if you have little ones watching.
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Carla--I thought of you and your words from recent post of yours...so much was lost to our precious daughters. Much was gained coming here, to our homes, but much was lost.
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from the article:

A Guizhou saying:

“Not three feet of flat land, not three days
without rain, not a family with three silver coins.”

Do you question whether the first Lunar Landing was real?

This might clear things up for you:

One Small Step for Man....

"Life is all about ME," says Luci.

Blue's Clues just came on. Joe said, "It's my birthday!" Luci said, "Hey, I have a birthday! He has one like me!"

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At soccer practice Thursday night, the identical twins Mason and Nate had on different colored shirts. Coach, clarifying which boy was which, said, "Mason, you're wearing red, and Nate, you're wearing green." Then Luci (the only Asian on the team, the only one with black hair, and at that moment the only girl) piped up, "And I'm wearing white!"

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Today was all about J.T.--Luci and I took him to Huntsville for a Tang Soo Do clinic at the YMCA. Leave the house at 7 a.m. and home at 6 p.m. Once we got to the YMCA, Luci says, "Come on! I want to go to the mall!" We passed a mall on the way to the Y. She's a shopper through and through. We've only been to that particular mall once before, and Luci remembered the Build a Bear Workshop (we have a lamb in a wedding dress now), and the Chinese food in the food court (their fried rice was our lunch).

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Friday we studied the human body...the skeleton was the topic. A few hours after lessons were over, Luci kept telling me her "skillet" was sore. Finally, in frustration, she said, "You know! My skillet! Where my bones are!"

Luci-Speak and Dreams

In-Port-Nent: important

Bidnight: the time Cinderella has to leave the Ball

Orthodontist: Okay, so she gets this one right every time! I don't know how....

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Over the last week Luci has had several bad dreams. Stuck in a cage with a dragon. Mommy leaving her. Someone taking her away from Mommy. It has just been awful! Makes night-terrors seem like a piece of cake, because these are true fears. (Well, maybe not the dragon--but she is scared of most dogs; maybe that's where that dream originates.)

Then, once she is awake and in my arms, the sobbing goes from scared Mommy has left to "I miss Daddy...." and it goes on.

Thank goodness we will get to see John the third weekend in May! We all miss John, but Luci misses him the most. We still haven't heard what the next 6 months holds (going back? staying here and done with the trips?) so Luci has only been told that Daddy's coming for a vacation and then going back to work. We just don't know if he'll be at work here or in Af ghan istan. So either way, it's the truth.

You have got to see these....

"Patriotic Human Pictures." During World War I and the years following, Arthur S. Mole and John D. Thomas made grand pictures of patriotic themes using thousands of soldiers, sailors and marines. These are fantastic, and in our age of doctoring photos, probably would not be done today. If you know of any recent portrayals like these, please let me know. I find these fascinating.

Please click here and here to see some fantastic images.

Guess what Bryan got today?

Braces! Here he is before.... and after.

Martian! ?

Life, Lately

Today was soccer again--Luci's coach and her daughter could not make it due to a family emergency, so she asked the boys to coach the team today. They said the biggest part of their job was re-tying shoes and telling the kids to "kick the ball the other way!" Four-and-five-year-olds are pretty funny.
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I was in charge of making sure everyone got to play every position and take breaks. It looks easy when the coaches do it, but it was like solving a Sudoku puzzle, in pen, while riding a bike. Crystal, you have all my admiration! We missed you and Tressa this morning.
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Before the game.
JT has had so much fun riding his tractor all over the place. This is our very old riding lawnmower. The blades are removed, so it is truly a little tractor now. He spent Wednesday afternoon riding all over the yard. When JT goes next door to play with Clay, he takes it down the hill and across the creek all the way to the neighbors' front door.

Looking back on our house. The kids and I went to the creek today on a top-secret mission (details on June 2!).

Easter, the Feingold Way

The Easter Bunny left the kids some all natural treats, perfect for a Feingold family--a Palmer chocolate bunny (from Wal-Mart), some Jelly Belly beans (from amazon.com), and all-natural lollipops in a cute barn container (from Simon Candy Shop). The Simon Candy Shop is going out of business, which is bad news--but everything on their site is on sale, so it's good news for you if you would like to try some all natural hard candies. I ordered some of the Halloween lollipops to give out at our Harvest Festival in October, to go along with our family's Oriental Trading give-aways.Luci spent the day watching Toy Story and surprised me with this--"Mama! I'm Buzz Lightyear!"

Boys and Camp

After hearing how miserable he'd be if he had to go to camp, Bryan ended up having a pretty good time and even learned some good things about our world. JT absolutely loved the 3 days and wished it were longer (mom didn't need to worry). JT threw himself into everything and even had a young lady in the group who had a big crush on him!

JT has talked for hours about all he learned and all they did there.

This little video is of the last minutes of the camp--after Luci and I arrived to bring the boys home. Don't tell them it's on the blog! They begged me to not post it. Bryan and JT have on orange shirts in this video.

On the way home, we had some wicked weather to go through. At one point, a tree was down across the roadway and quite a few vehicles were stuck...until one young man drove up and pulled a chainsaw from the bed of his pick up truck. He had that pine tree cut up and several men from other vehicles pulled the tree off the road. Gotta love country boys and their chainsaws.

Heard Today:

Heard on the way to soccer practice. Feel free to sing along.
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Mama, I don't want a hippopotamus for Christmas,

because it won't fit into our house.

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I want a rhino.

Lost and Found

Luci brought this to me today. Apparently her bunny is missing, and she wanted to post this somewhere. Just in case I find her bunny, so I can return it to her.

Going to Camp

The boys went to camp today. McDowell Environmental Center has 3 and 5 day camps available for all age groups. Robin W. got a group of homeschoolers together for a 3 day camp. It was just too good to pass up. The lessons, on the environment, fit right in with our Weaver studies this spring. Usually things like this are out of our budget so that's another blessing to come from John's trip.

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Bryan was not convinced this was a good idea.

Until he found out it was 5 boys to 10 girls....if you look hard, you can see a little grin.When getting directions to the boys' cabin, the counselor said, "Go left at the fork in the road."JT was pretty excited about this camp. It's the first time he's gone on a trip without a parent...so Mom's nervous, but he is not.The cabin. Much nicer than what we had at Ivydale in the '70s!JT and Luci loving on each other.

The camp is in Winston County, Alabama. Winston County seceded from Alabama when Alabama seceded from the Union! The citizens here did not want to fight their Southern brothers or their Northern brothers, and seceded to make the "Free State of Winston."

Later today, Luci "fixed" her bicycle.

What does Daddy eat?

What does Daddy eat in Af ghan istan?
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That was the question Luci asked tonight. So John has an assignment to send Luci an email all about what he eats "over there."
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You shoulda heard the laughter when I told her that Daddy eats in a Mess Hall.
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Is the food messy?

Such Good Friends

Today Luci went for a play date (willingly!) with Hannah and "Hannah-Mom" as Luci calls, well, Hannah's Mom. (duh) This is the first time she's stayed with anyone without a brother being there, too. Wow! I had to drag Luci away from their house. Thank you, Amanda (Hannah-Mom's real name) and Hannah, for that gift.

Hannah last May...These pictures have been posted before, but golly they are so SWEET.

Bryan and JT had a class just for homeschoolers all day, all about World Views--how do people see the world? What is their standard? What is your standard? Apparently JT paid more attention than Bryan. JT was able to tell me quite a bit and he used some new vocabulary (correctly!). I'm so glad that we have opportunities like this, and that this year we are able to take advantage of them.

Thank you again, Hannah-Mom! You are a good friend.