I just finished knitting my very first sock.  Socks are tricky.  I've never used four knitting needles at once before.  About 3/4's of the way through I finally figured out how to hold the needles so I wasn't constantly dropping 6 and 7 stitches off the back end.  I still think needle guards would come in handy.  I'm starting on my second one.  The heel got a bit big on the first one, but its a easy fix for the second one.  I just misjudged how much space I need.  The first one is SUPER duper comfy.

We had our last baton practice before the parade.  It was kind of fun.    I didn't miss the two kids whose mother decided to go on vacation Sunday night and make them miss the parade they've been practicing for since the first of June.  They've been consistently late, and are the two I've fought attitude wise every single solitary practice.  They have serious issues with the word no.  They think it is a personal challenge.  One of them has aspergers, I swear the other one does too...just missed getting diagnosed,  Which I'm learning happens a lot with girls.  I might even bring it up with the mom when she gets back, because seriously their is something not quite right. 

The young lady decided at 12:30 am she wanted a snack while Kaylin was spending the night with her.  Kaylin had been asleep for several hours.  She decided she wanted Kaylin to go downstairs with her and wake her dad.  Kaylin doesn't wake up quickly, and didn't cooperate.  So the young lady took all off Kaylins bedding shook her, and when that didn't work, went downstairs filled a glass of water came back upstairs and poured it all over Kaylin.   She saw absolutely nothing wrong with this behavior.  d'oh.  Kaylin is still her friend which amazes me rather greatly.  I would have killed someone at that age...I'd kill someone now if they did that to me.  LOL

I got suckered into letting Samuel have a friend over.  The friend is...trouble.  I've never wanted to turn a parent in before, but I want to turn his parent in.  BIG time.  Instead I let the friend come over.  I get that he's not trustworthy.  He's a 14 year old boy, they tend to be a bit wild.  But rather then providing him an option of care, a grandparent, something, when she's at work she locks him and his brother out of the house.  And they are just on their own.  They can sit on the front porch or go to the library.  That's NOT okay.

So I guess she's going somewhere over night, and I got a text asking if he could stay here.  This is where the sucker comes in.  I'm fairly sure he asked on his moms phone, not her.  But *shrugs*  its good timing, and I feel sorry for both of the boys.    

Its good timing because he's not very polite to Zeria.  As she's gone right now its not a issue.  *cheers*

I've fallen in love with a new author.  I picked up like 6 of his books at the .25 cent store in town along with about 12 other sci-fi books for $1.00.  The authors name is Mike Shepherd the series is Kris Longknife.  And they are very well done.  Both Rob and I are devouring them.  Which is a perfect thing to do in the sunshine by the river.  Because did Imention we are having our week of summer. 

The sun is shining, and I'm getting a lovely tan.  Reading or knitting or watching birds while the kids splash in the river, or dig beside it.  Now if I could just convince Jeremiah to stop digging in the middle of the trail TO the river.  He must be a boy.

The week of Zeria being gone is whizzing by.  Its been a good relaxing week.  Although a bit of a downer when payday came yesterday we paid the bills, put a wee bit aside for Fun Days this weekend and realized the rest was GONE.  We have *just* enough for one tank of gas between now and next pay day.  I guess the food in our cupboards is going to satisfy us.  No junk food runs.  I can do this right?  But I LOVE the junk food runs.  LOL  And darn it but I've fallen in love with the strwberry smoothy at the espresso stand.  And I don't currently have a blender so I can't make them at home right now.  Must get one soon.

Its funny watching the dynamics of kids friendships with their siblings when one child is removed from the equation.  Lately Rainee and Samuel have been thick, and Jamari and Jeremiah.  And sometimes  Rainee and Zeria.  Kaylin is the peacemaker and just weaves in and out all of them.  This week its back to Samuel and Kaylin, and Rainee is kinda lonesome and a teensy bit ornrey.  Its all good, it will flip again in five minutes.

I think we are going to sleep outside under the stars tonight.  Rainee wanted to know if her and the little boys could, and I said we all could.  Rob will be at work all night.  So let the adventures begin.    I have a lovely mattress I can haul out so I won't even miss my bed.  When we got rid of our hide-a-bed we kept the double mattress for emergency guests, and laying by the river.  Its quite comfy.

I am over 1/2 way through my very first knitted sock.  I've already turned the heel and done the hard part.  I'm just annoyed by the stitches that keep slipping off my needles when I'm not using one of the three needles holding the sock.  I wish I had a knitting guard...I keep trying to come up with something around the house that would work.  But haven't gotten inspired yet. 

The girls got to have their second sewing class of the summer.  Rainee is almost done her pillow case.  She will definitely finish it next week.  And then she wants to make the bag that Kaylin learned how to make last summer.  Kaylin finished cutting out all the pieces for her lap quilt today, so next week she gets to start sewing.  Its going to be very cute, and very Kaylin.  The main fabric is black with red roses & green leaves running through it.   That's the outside square, and on the inside of each square is a bright pop of color.  The back of the quilt is some lovely rainbow fabric I found at a thriftstore that said KAYLIN.  Kaylin is all about the rainbow.

Good morning

Rob is headed back to work after our two week vacation.  He went through the grumpy I don't want tos yesterday morning, and is back to himself.  I can't blame him.  His place of employment does NOT have a good clientele.  But its a job, and in this economy you take what you can get.   

I dealt with some stress in my life.  I don't know that it "fixed" anything.  But at least the person whose been exasperating me greatly no longer is in doubt about it.

In my opinion if you babysit someones child for free at least once a month.  If they say they are going to be back at 4:30 they should be no later then 5.  And if they are going to be later they have to have a pretty darn good reason.  And several I'm on my way texts.  Consistently this individual shows up about 6:30 seven, no apology, honks the horn and her child has to run up the hill.  No texts unless I text her first. 

I also coach her children in baton.  Practice starts at 3.  I text her at 3:05 to ask her where she's at.  She tends to show up at 3:15.  Its a very small team, and we can't do routines until EVERYBODY is there.   The last practice.  She didn't respond to my text until 3:30.  I told her not to bother.  

And last night?  She is planning a impromptu 2 week vacation.  "Does this mean no baton performance on Saturday?"  "Oh yeah I guess it does."  So now I have to totally redo the routine...less then 6 days before the performance.  And she didn't tell me she accidentally remembered after the fact.

She's very bubbly, very sweet, and VERY blonde.

My good friends can tell you I have time control issues.  I believe that if a time is given you should be there...early.  I've learned a ton of flexibility from the past.  I can give you up to forty-five minutes of late time and not be stressed...unless its baton in which case it only goes an hour so about ten minutes late and your RUDE imho.  

I get being late for emergencies it happens.  But emergencies do NOT happen every single solitary week.   On top of that I've caught her in lies on at least two seperate occasions.  "I'm so sorry I was late we have family over."  It wasn't family it was a friend. 

She apologized when she was confronted.  But I'm removing myself from much of the situation if at all possible.  The problem of course is two of my children are VERY good friends with two of hers.  But I can deal with this by inviting them here as friends.  

I suspect this weekend is my last of baton anyhow.  My kids would love to do the Christmas routine.  But we shall see.  The older kids schedules are rediculous and I just don't know how to juggle everything.  I feel bad for the younger kids though, because they have no schedule.  So I'll probably get tricked into a Christmas routine anyhow.  I love doing it.  Its just time, and I only have so much of it.

Just a lot tired tonight.  Worked until 9:15 burning up aldar trees before it gets dry (we still have a TON of puddles, and the ash would land on the grass and immediately fizzle out.  Was hoping to push it until 10, but no our wretched pony decided to go on a tear, so we spent the next 45 minutes trying to get him back in the pasture.  So this morning we woke up, stoked the fire and the 45 minutes burning we would have done last night took 2.5 hours this morning because it took us that long to get a hot fire.  Oh well its done, and looks good.

Rob and I both look like zombies though.  Zeria headed out to camp at 5:40 am, so he got up and said goodbye, I texted her goodbye.  I was toooo tired.  LOL 

She's the one whose going to be tired.  We have to pick her up a day early from camp so she can come back and do an all day volleyball tournament.  OOPS.   Gotta love back-to-back schedules.

We looked ahead on our calendar, and every weekend has something between now and school starting.  Some of it is fun (backpacking)  but its still rediculous to have summer that scheduled. 

Samuel worked like a mad man with a machete last night chopping alder trees up so they were small enough to burn.  I couldn't believe his energy.  Of course today he slept in the hot dust in the driveway for about 2.5 hours.  I think we wore him out as well.

Zeria has been so good in regards to mood for the last 4 months or so, but vacation toasted her.  I'm really hoping when she comes back from camp she's a bit more even kill, because it is very hard to deal with her mood swings.  Enjoying not having to base every decision on wether she's going to erupt or not...knowing that no matter how I make it she'll probably melt anyhow.

In crafting regard I found Jean Greenhowe's knit dolls and have been having fun working up several.  Although I'm currently kind of stuck on one, as the pattern isn't making sense.

maybe back.  I've reallly missed journalling.   We just got back from a two week vacation, well 12 days.  But close enough.  We hit Yellowstone, in-laws, saw two of my sisters in two different states.  And yet it was for the most part extremely relaxing.

There were hitches.  Their always are.  One of them was Zeria's attitude.  When we hit pocatello she got nasty, and it never really went away.  I know part of it was dealing with Grandpa S' colon cancer.  Which is officially in remission.  And the other was wanting to see our mutual sister in Portland.  We will not be doing that again.  I love her, its fun, but my kids are soooooo nasty in the days up to it.  I will wait until Zeria hits 18 and I can do it without her.  LOL  Since she'll be 15 in several weeks its not that far away.

The other hitch was my very very rude brother-in-law.  Just when I was ready to strangle him he went super low blood sugar (29) and we realized some of the reasons he was being a jerk.  But as my friend with bi-polar says it doesn't excuse the rude, he still needs to apologize.  He must of told me I had too many kids 8x that day.  And most of those were HOURS before he was low.  *sigh*  I'm so glad we only see them 3 to 6 days a year. 

Jamari has developed his own endearing quality.  No matter what I ask him to do, he calmly quietly informs me why he won't.  Like its just really no big deal.  He doesn't get belligerent, he's always respectful, but I'm wrong.   Its going to stop.

Those are the irrritating things.

The good things.  It was BEAUTIFUL!  The kids were superb travellers.  God enabled us to see many amazing things. 

My husband and I are already eagerly planning our next vacation next summer.  What can I say we like exploring.  Next year we are going to Lake Cascade, which we really wanted to fit in this time, but couldn't quite pull off. 

Zeria is headed to a week of camp tomorrow at 5:40 a.m.  I'm very greatful we are NOT the ones driving her.  She will be going with a friends daughters.  I'm going to enjoy one more week of not dealing with the stuff we developed on vacation.   If this makes me a wuss so be it.  

I saw 37 new birds this vacation.  I've started birdwatching in a big way.  I keep a daily list of what I saw, and record it on ebird.  Its been fun.