First, for the next couple of months, I'll likely have only two to four long posts, as I'm very busy, and I'll just highlight things the best I can, and I won't record things in a day-to-day highlight format. The boys have swimming lessons from June 14 to June 24, and then Jade will continue from the 28th to July 8, Mons.-Thurs. I'll be spending around fifteen minutes a day or so with Trusten to work with him on the Roman alphabet and more with basic counting--language and math skills. During that time Jaden will do his writing. Then I'll sit with Jade as he does his reading lesson and math practice, probably about twenty minutes. He also practices money skills when he buys things, which he does sometimes. I let him count out the money to the clerk. The rest of the regular week days (1st day through 6th day) will go on as usual, learning social skills, science, history, music, art, etc. as things come about, REAL LIFE, as the name of the blog denotes, a lifestyle of learning.
Okay, now for last week's highlights:
*June 6, 2010, Roman calendar: June 3rd was Nathan's and my ten-year marriage anniversary. We went through a lot together in our first ten years of marriage, some really good and some really bad. We've never left each other, even when we felt unloving toward each other. We've kept our promise to each other through better or worse, and we've become stronger for it. I love my husband so much! He's an amazing person. He has his share of faults, but I do mine, too. I hope the next ten years are even better than the last. Anyway, we both agreed it would have been foolish for him to drop things on the 3rd in order to eat a special dinner together or anything. So today the boys stayed with a friend, and we ate together...with Liv. ;-) We're hoping in two years to go somewhere together, just the two of us. Liv is attached to me right now, of course.
*June 7: Jade did a reading lesson, and he started reading a Cul-de Sac Kids book. Trust said he wanted to learn the alphabet. I've not bothered, as it was pointless, as he previously was not paying the least bit of attention, unlike Jade at that age. Jade expressed the desire to stop reading Proverbs, so I told him we'd take a short break. He definitely knows them. He doesn't always live by them, though. We're continuing through the NT scriptures.
Jaden took the binder I compiled years ago on abortion (pictures, statistics, stories, testimonials, types of abortion, etc.) off one of our shelves, and he saw a picture of a fetus clutching a surgeon's gloved finger. The baby's arm was outside of the uterus via a surgical incision. He asked me about it, and I told him that picture actually had a good story and that the surgeon was doing a good thing to help the baby. That baby had spina bifida, I believe. Some women pay a priest of child sacrifice to kill her child, upon learning such a diagnosis. The parents of that child decided to have in-utero surgery. The doctor fixed the baby right up, and the baby was born months later in good condition. So then I talked a little more about surgery and how it can be a good thing, a lifesaving procedure for people. I also briefly mentioned anesthetic drugs and what they did.
Jade tried making an axe while we were outside. I said that our survival guide likely had information on such a thing, so he asked me to get it, and we read about that topic. I then told him that was something he ought to do with his daddy. Ha, ha! At least I know what I need to try to do, if the occasion ever rises. Not so sure my axe would turn out so well, though.
I read a long list of health facts aloud to the boys (as if Trust was really listening--ha, ha) from a book that we got with the rebounder. Very interesting, and Jaden thought some of it was, too.
*June 8: I took the boys to the water park today. They had fun doing that. It was hot outside! During our walk later in the day we investigated and theorized why different fruits are falling prematurely from trees. Some reasons could be: disease epidemics, abundant fruit-producing year so early shedding of some, or lack of pollination that could be caused by lack of bees. All these are very good possibilities, because we are experiencing a huge bee population decline, and the boys and I have seen many trees around here affected by apparent diseases. But, the things that have started fruiting have been fruiting abundantly, so this could be the reason. Some readers may remember that I mentioned last summer a mulberry tree that we have in our front yard. I concluded that it must be a male (because mulberry is a dioecious plant), because it had no fruit last year. This year, however, it's fruiting, so it's obviously a female that just did not put off any fruit last year. Also our dewberries only put off ten or less visible berries last year, and they ripened at a small size and dried and wrinkled before we discovered them. I explained to Jaden that if one year saw a big ruin (like the huge freeze we had in the spring of 2006), the next year tended to produce largely. However, I also wondered whether last year could have been a sabbath year.
We saw some sort of tortoise that day, too, but I can't remember what it looked like. I don't have a picture. We've seen several box tortoises, lately, though, because blackberries and dewberries are fruiting. They love those! The boys ate more dewberries themselves. Jade threw some premature fruits, possibly sproe berries or some sort of plum (not yet id'ed) and called them "cannons." He's so funny.
We saw a rabbit in the road when we got back from our walk, as there are plenty of rabbits out and about at this time of year. So, I started talking about rabbits to Jaden. I explained that the heathens valued the rabbit as a symbol of fertility, as it is well known that rabbits mated a lot and had lots of bunnies. I said that is why "Easter bunnies" in the form of chocolate rabbits and such are popular during the Easter (Ishtar/Astarte) feast in the spring, along with eggs, another symbol of fertility. I asked Jaden why he thought rabbits had a lot of offspring. He was not sure and apparently was not in a thinking mood. I told him that rabbits were prey to just about every predator there is--snakes, coyotes, foxes, hawks, owls, cats, etc. Since so many animals prey upon rabbits, they must bring forth a lot of offspring. But, does all that sex and fertility reap eternal rewards? Of course not. Rather, the very reason the rabbits have so many babies are for the sole purpose of DEATH. No promise of resurrection for those rabbits. Sex and more sex, birth and more birth, death and more death. Such is the earthly life cycle of the flesh, something not worthy of worshiping, in my opinion.
*June 9: We read Luke and some out of the children's book about praying, and I read the boys their story books of the day. Jade wrote his paragraph, and I read some to Jaden about the importance of water. During our walk we saw a dead shrew, and so I talked about maggot eggs, maggots, and the fly life cycle and their purpose (again, as I had this conversation with them several days prior about a tortoise or turtle that had been run over in the road). I then talked briefly about death recycling and the heathen/pagan belief in reincarnation. Indeed everything made from the earth--humans, animals, and plants--returns to the earth and then becomes a part of something else. Our flesh, in that way, does reincarnate. It's a continuous cycle, and in order to keep life sustained, death is required. Otherwise, we'd be overpopulated. The earth can only support so much life at a time. I reminded him, as I'd said the day previously when talking about the rabbits, earthly reincarnation is not worth worshiping, because our spirits are not reincarnated but are collected and kept in hibernation mode until it's decided that they should be resurrected in new bodies (for some spiritual bodies and some physical bodies, depending on the resurrection).
*June 10: We went to buy some groceries on this day, and we did our usual reading. I don't know what else we did. I don't recall.
*June 11: My mother came to visit us on this day, and we all went walking together. Trust fell and gashed his knee, so I returned home with him, upon his request. After I got him cleaned and bandaged, though, he wanted to go walking again, so we went to meet them, and Jade had found a tortoise and an adjustable strap...well, what was left of it with the adjustable part. Oh...I don't know what they're called. Anyway, someone else's junk became his treasure. It's enough strap for him to hold something on the back of his wagon or pedal car. The boys got to enjoy dewberries again. I actually looked up blackberries vs. dewberries when we got home. I'd been meaning to do that, so I could explain to Jaden the difference. My mother wondered, too. Nathan and I looked it up three or four years ago, but I'd forgotten what I'd read. I think dewberries are better! I guess they both have a common ancestor. Now there are a lot of varieties.
*June 12: The sabbath day! I talked to the boys about loving and caring for each other, wrote a blog post on my other blog, and I worked a little on the 7th commandment in God's Law of Love: The Perfect Law of Liberty.
Until next time....peace to you!
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Thursday, June 10, 2010
Spit on Plants, History of Paper, Railroad Switching, and Blimps
May 30, 2010, Roman time: During our walk, the boys and I noticed what looked like spit on the stems of some plants. Jade asked me about it, so I got him to thinking. After seeing two of them, I offered the theory that perhaps an animal came to eat some plants and actually did leave its saliva. He said maybe it was some sort of animals' eggs. We walked a while more, and Jaden spotted another plant that had the "spit," and he said, "Momma, see there is no evidence of the plant or anything around being chewed." I delight greatly whenever I hear things like this. I praised him for his logical thinking, something a good scientist needs.
It may have been this day, but I think it was the week previous, that Jade lost his only arrow when he was practicing his archery skills. I am hoping Nathan gets him some new ones for his seventh birth anniversary. I've ordered everything that I wanted to get him. This will likely be one of his best birth anniversaries ever. I'm so excited! He'll love what he's getting, I'm sure. Of course, they are very practical gifts and will help him grow in knowledge. We have ticket vouchers to a show in Branson with tigers. Jade was asking me more about tigers recently and said that he would like to have a tiger. I told him some do have tigers, and he continued questioning me. We so far did not know where we were going this year for his birthday, but I then knew where we should go. This is actually a show to which I wanted to take the boys last year during the Feast of Tabernacles, God's annual thanksgiving feast, but they had already closed down the show for the winter break.
May 31: Jade did a math page for addition practice. We read the bible, as usual, and I think he wrote his typical paragraph. Some days he has not, but most days he does. He has also skipped some days for his Explode the Code (which I usually have him do the first and sixth days of the week). Well, most of the days he has not skipped, but he's not done the entire lessons, but rather two or three pages. Anyway, he's nearly finished. His penmanship is improving quite well, and I don't have him sitting at a desk writing all day, either.
During our walk we looked again at those purple insects I mentioned in the last post, and we noticed that they appeared to be in different stages. Some hardly had any purple "fluff," and they were smaller and had no wings. The complete ones had purple "fluffy" looking covering all over, with a wispy, curled-up "tail" of the purple stuff, they were larger (though still small), and they had wings.
June 1: We went grocery shopping, and we saw the Goodyear blimp. I drove down a side road so that we could see it better, and I took pictures. I have several of that day and a few days later, on which day was even better, as I got pics of it flying to its landing spot, went down the same side road as I did the last time (Airport Loop), and took pics of it on the ground and then taking back off. Here are just a few:
It may have been this day, but I think it was the week previous, that Jade lost his only arrow when he was practicing his archery skills. I am hoping Nathan gets him some new ones for his seventh birth anniversary. I've ordered everything that I wanted to get him. This will likely be one of his best birth anniversaries ever. I'm so excited! He'll love what he's getting, I'm sure. Of course, they are very practical gifts and will help him grow in knowledge. We have ticket vouchers to a show in Branson with tigers. Jade was asking me more about tigers recently and said that he would like to have a tiger. I told him some do have tigers, and he continued questioning me. We so far did not know where we were going this year for his birthday, but I then knew where we should go. This is actually a show to which I wanted to take the boys last year during the Feast of Tabernacles, God's annual thanksgiving feast, but they had already closed down the show for the winter break.
May 31: Jade did a math page for addition practice. We read the bible, as usual, and I think he wrote his typical paragraph. Some days he has not, but most days he does. He has also skipped some days for his Explode the Code (which I usually have him do the first and sixth days of the week). Well, most of the days he has not skipped, but he's not done the entire lessons, but rather two or three pages. Anyway, he's nearly finished. His penmanship is improving quite well, and I don't have him sitting at a desk writing all day, either.
During our walk we looked again at those purple insects I mentioned in the last post, and we noticed that they appeared to be in different stages. Some hardly had any purple "fluff," and they were smaller and had no wings. The complete ones had purple "fluffy" looking covering all over, with a wispy, curled-up "tail" of the purple stuff, they were larger (though still small), and they had wings.
June 1: We went grocery shopping, and we saw the Goodyear blimp. I drove down a side road so that we could see it better, and I took pictures. I have several of that day and a few days later, on which day was even better, as I got pics of it flying to its landing spot, went down the same side road as I did the last time (Airport Loop), and took pics of it on the ground and then taking back off. Here are just a few:
June 2: This day we read June/July issues of Your Big Backyard and Wild Animal Baby, the boys' magazines to which my grandpa subscribes for them. What do you know? We read about spittle bugs, which explained what the spit was on those plants. In addition to our regular activities, Jade read aloud one reading lesson and answered the questions, from his Grade 2 CC book. Among the many questions Jade asked this week, one was about paper. He said he liked how wrinkled paper looks, because it reminds him of the "old paper." I said he meant papyrus. Another thing he asked about was how trains change tracks, when I explained how they sometimes had to change. He originally asked where was the "end of the railroad" and that it must "go forever." The boys watched Youtube videos on the history of paper, the birth of writing, brief history of written language, manual railroad switches (I explained that it's mostly done by signals now), railroad history map in the U.S., and the African dung beetle.
I tried something different this morning for breakfast. Cinnamon roll muffins. They looked ugly, but they tasted okay. The boys loved them, but I am not in a hurry to make them again.
June 3: Nathan and I celebrated ten years of marriage. :-) We got our new Needak rebounder delivered via UPS this day so we can bounce and jump to good health. It's something we've talked about for about three years, but with almost any large purchase, we usually consider it for quite a while. We really like it so far.
Jade wrote each of us a sweet notes and drew us both a picture. Here are the envelopes:
Nathan had to work this day, so we had a dinner together (minus the boys who stayed with a friend) a few days later. The children and I went out, and the boys and I saw the blimp again. We had to go out to get Jade's glasses and get Liv some clothes from Old Navy. He says they make everything "swirly," so he's not wearing them for now, until I can get him back to the optometrist to figure it all out. I asked whether he answered her questions honestly (this is his second year getting tested), and he said he did.
Right before we left for town, Jaden came to my bathroom where I was brushing my teeth, and he said something quite clever to me. I love listening to him. He said, "Momma, I was just thinking. A company--like a store--is like a father, and employees are like the sons. Then the store is like the mother, and the [goods] are like the fruits." While I may not agree 100% with this analogy, I liked what he said, and I'm glad his little wheels are turning.
June 4: During out walk today, I assisted Jade in uncovering a spittle bug underneath all the spit. The boys liked seeing how the bug hid underneath the spit while it feasted on the plant juices.
I was inside nursing Liv, and I let Jade go outside before the rest of us did, and he came rushing in excitedly, because he rescued a chipmunk from Sylvester (our cat). So we all got to pet a chipmunk!
June 5: On the sabbath day we enjoyed a good portion of the day outdoors in the nice weather. The boys' lesson was about Paul and Silas and how they were thankful, even while enduring hardship. Toward the end of the sabbath we roasted hot dogs and marshmallows outside, much to the boys' delight.
Until next time...
Peace. :-)
Friday, June 4, 2010
Pentecost, Trusten's 3rd Birthday, Plants and Insects
*May 23, 2010 (Sivan 10, 5770): Pentecost. I helped Jade decorate outside with balloons and streamers, but it was really windy, so it didn't work out too well. Since the Holy Spirit was poured freely upon thousands of believers on the first Pentecost following Jesus' resurrection and ascension (not the first Pentecost ever, but the first after these events), and the Church of God, the Body of Christ, was born, I think Pentecost--also called the Feast of Weeks--is a great holy day to give our children gifts that boost their biblical knowledge and/or help their spiritual growth in hopes that they will choose God's way and one day receive the Holy Spirit themselves. This year I bought them two 4-dvd sets of Old Testament bible stories. They're called Under God's Rainbow "The Old Testament." It's the first time I got any of these particular videos, and the ones they've watched so far are super, in my opinion. On the sabbath days, the only videos I let them watch are bible-related or creation-related, but they sometimes watch them on regular days, too. Some of the stories they have on other dvds, but this varies it up some. Plus there are some that they don't have on dvd at all.
We fixed a beef brisket, the first one since sometime last summer, I think. Nathan fixed it on an outside homemade grill, and I made some roasted potatoes in the oven and fixed a salad. I also made a punch with ginger ale, orange juice, and frozen strawberries and pineapple chunks. Everything was so good!
Only Jaden sat to listen to the lesson of the day. We sat outside. I discussed Pentecost, and as I usually do on each annual feast holy day, I went through all seven feasts and reviewed how they taught the true plan of salvation. When discussing Pentecost, I used the punch we had as an illustration, the punch being the Spirit of God, and the cups in which the punch is poured are us.
*May 24: Don't know. :-)
*May 25: All I know is that this is the day we ended our week-long abstinence of wheat and all gluten. I already talked about that in my previous post. As to what else happened, I don't remember, nor did I record it.
*May 26: This was Trusten's 3rd birthday, as figured on the Roman calendar. My sister came to stay the night. We ate lunch together and then went to Wild Wilderness Drive-Through Safari in Gentry, AR. I took pictures and posted them on our Shutterfly website. Anyone reading this who does not have access to that and wishes to have should contact me for the site and password. We all had a lot of fun. I laughed so much that I was just about drunk on endorphins. I'm not kidding. We did the petting section first, and then we did the driving part. When I got out of the truck to go around and get back in the driver's side (b/c Nathan took his own truck so he could run a service call afterward) I was quite light-headed. We got to pet kangaroos, donkeys, ponies, goats, monkeys, and tigers...and I may be leaving out something. There were parrots and peacocks. We saw things like spotted deer, longhorn cattle, tigers, and lions on the driving part. Oh, they even had an alligator. Anyway, Nathan turned around to lean over the seat and unbuckle Trusten so that he could get up in his seat to see out the window. Without permission (and Na really should have locked the doors), Trusten opened the door. I think he must have misunderstood. I'm not sure. Anyway, he fell out of the truck and landed in a big pile of animal feces. I think it was cow's, thankfully. He did have a small wound on the back of his head. It's GOOD, actually, that he feel in poop, because the back of his head landed on the ground, and if the poop hadn't been there... We had some wipes and a blanket in the truck, so Nathan cleaned him up the best he could. I washed him in the shower when we got home. He happened to fall right outside some of the cats' cages, and they paced quickly back and forth, staring at them with killer eyes. Trusten loves poop, though. Jaden actually told him at some point during the drive, "Well, Trusten, you've been saying you want to eat poop. I guess you got your wish." (No, he didn't really get any in his mouth.) He didn't seem to be too upset, though. He kept laughing and saying it was his birthday poop. Crazy...
*May 27: During our walk we saw mysterious growths on the leaves of a tree, different than the previous growths I recently mentioned, an on a different type of tree. They were little pink things that stuck straight up like tiny fingers. I took pictures of these, but I'm missing a few pictures. My iPhoto is not doing me right, I don't guess. What had been in my "Last Import" never moved to my "Last 12 Months," and so basically one import just totally replaced another import. Thankfully, most of those pictures were not totally lost, since I had uploaded them to Shutterfly and Facebook before I uploaded the last pictures. However, there were some pictures that I did not upload to either of those, so they are just GONE, it seems. I'll be sure to upload my latest "last import" to Shutterfly before I upload more pics from my camera into iPhoto, in case the same thing happens again. I just don't understand what the deal is.
Anyway, there is this plant that I've wondered about for awhile now. I have no idea what it is, and I've never seen it before, anywhere else, in my life, of which I'm aware. So, then I was really startled to discover the strange insects on it this day. Actually, Jaden saw them first and summoned me to the plant. Now, at the time I write this, I realize I saw one fly around our front porch around this time last year, but at the time I saw these on the plant, I didn't remember that. I do not know what they are, and I cannot get a good picture of them. They have purple "fluff" on them. Both they and the plant look like they belong more in the Amazon than in the Ozarks.
Jade was carrying one of Trusten's wooden pop guns that he got for his birthday (from their Aunt Meg), and he was "shooting" the cork over and over along the walk. When we emerged from the forest-surrounding stretch, we heard an echo bouncing from the mountains back across the pasture. They were delighted and asked me about it, so I explained about how sound waves travel and can echo, just like many other things bounce back or ricochet when it meets a barrier. I then shouted so they could hear my voice echo. I told them my favorite place to play with echoes, as a child, was down at the river, just a short walk from my parents' house. I'd call from the one bank and I would hear the echo bounce back from the other side. I hope I can remember to take them down there to shout the next time we go visit.
Jade copies a paragraph from a book or something else nearly every day. Here's a picture of sitting on the couch to write, and he's using a feather pen that his daddy made for him about a year ago, from a feather Jaden found, though I usually make him use a pencil:
*March 28: Jade and I both had optometrist appointments. My last year's visit and this year's visit found my left eye (my master eye, even though I'm right-handed) getting worse, though both my eyes remained stable for several years, since my teens. My right eye has recently started bothering me again, as it had before my last year's visit. What is happening is my right eye is overcompensating for my left eye, and so it is becoming strained. Both of my eyes had also shared the same prescription for as long as I can remember, until last year. My contacts are now a -7.50 and a -8.50. I did not get a new glasses prescription. It slipped my mind. The current one, which I got last year, is a -9.25 for both eyes. The reason for that is that is my eyes last year for contacts could have both been -7.75, except when your eyes are afflicted with such high degree myopia as mine as that, they do not make in-between numbers like that. Two years ago, my optometrist wanted to move my left eye to a -8.00, but I did not agree to it until last year, because I tried the -8.00 for a week, and it was too much. I'd really needed a -7.75, except they don't make it. So, I was able to stay with the same prescription for both eyes. My ears make up for eyes, though, I believe. I have exceptional hearing, and I wonder sometimes whether that is why others have a hard time hearing me. Many say I speak too softly, but I hear myself loudly and clearly. I think I just have better ears than most. I hope I never go blind. I'm thankful for modern medical technology so that I can wear contacts. I am totally useless without these aids. I would love to cure my eyesight (naturally, rather than surgery, of which I've decided against for now), and I believe it is possible, but it requires that I go without my lenses for most of the time, which is impossible at this season in my life. I tried it a few years ago, when I only had William, but it was hard enough then. I had to wear glasses to cook and do other tasks.
As for Jaden, he is still far-sighted (normal from birth), and he has an astigmatism in one eye, whereas from birth both eyes have it. So, she said they should be grown out of at a certain rate, and she's afraid he may develop a lazy eye in one of his eyes (forget which), if he doesn't have lenses. He's not particularly thrilled, and I don't blame him.
I took a picture of this moth in our kitchen, at night:
We have plenty of these, but I'm not sure what kind of moth it is. We like the look of them, though.
*May 29: The sabbath day. A much-needed rest. I did a sabbath school lesson with the boys, about the parable Jesus told about the workers in the vineyard and how they all were paid the same amount for different lengths of time of working and how the ones who had worked all day complained, even though they had agreed to the wage which they were paid. I also worked on the seventh commandment in God's Law of Love: The Perfect Law of Liberty.
Until next time...
We fixed a beef brisket, the first one since sometime last summer, I think. Nathan fixed it on an outside homemade grill, and I made some roasted potatoes in the oven and fixed a salad. I also made a punch with ginger ale, orange juice, and frozen strawberries and pineapple chunks. Everything was so good!
Only Jaden sat to listen to the lesson of the day. We sat outside. I discussed Pentecost, and as I usually do on each annual feast holy day, I went through all seven feasts and reviewed how they taught the true plan of salvation. When discussing Pentecost, I used the punch we had as an illustration, the punch being the Spirit of God, and the cups in which the punch is poured are us.
*May 24: Don't know. :-)
*May 25: All I know is that this is the day we ended our week-long abstinence of wheat and all gluten. I already talked about that in my previous post. As to what else happened, I don't remember, nor did I record it.
*May 26: This was Trusten's 3rd birthday, as figured on the Roman calendar. My sister came to stay the night. We ate lunch together and then went to Wild Wilderness Drive-Through Safari in Gentry, AR. I took pictures and posted them on our Shutterfly website. Anyone reading this who does not have access to that and wishes to have should contact me for the site and password. We all had a lot of fun. I laughed so much that I was just about drunk on endorphins. I'm not kidding. We did the petting section first, and then we did the driving part. When I got out of the truck to go around and get back in the driver's side (b/c Nathan took his own truck so he could run a service call afterward) I was quite light-headed. We got to pet kangaroos, donkeys, ponies, goats, monkeys, and tigers...and I may be leaving out something. There were parrots and peacocks. We saw things like spotted deer, longhorn cattle, tigers, and lions on the driving part. Oh, they even had an alligator. Anyway, Nathan turned around to lean over the seat and unbuckle Trusten so that he could get up in his seat to see out the window. Without permission (and Na really should have locked the doors), Trusten opened the door. I think he must have misunderstood. I'm not sure. Anyway, he fell out of the truck and landed in a big pile of animal feces. I think it was cow's, thankfully. He did have a small wound on the back of his head. It's GOOD, actually, that he feel in poop, because the back of his head landed on the ground, and if the poop hadn't been there... We had some wipes and a blanket in the truck, so Nathan cleaned him up the best he could. I washed him in the shower when we got home. He happened to fall right outside some of the cats' cages, and they paced quickly back and forth, staring at them with killer eyes. Trusten loves poop, though. Jaden actually told him at some point during the drive, "Well, Trusten, you've been saying you want to eat poop. I guess you got your wish." (No, he didn't really get any in his mouth.) He didn't seem to be too upset, though. He kept laughing and saying it was his birthday poop. Crazy...
*May 27: During our walk we saw mysterious growths on the leaves of a tree, different than the previous growths I recently mentioned, an on a different type of tree. They were little pink things that stuck straight up like tiny fingers. I took pictures of these, but I'm missing a few pictures. My iPhoto is not doing me right, I don't guess. What had been in my "Last Import" never moved to my "Last 12 Months," and so basically one import just totally replaced another import. Thankfully, most of those pictures were not totally lost, since I had uploaded them to Shutterfly and Facebook before I uploaded the last pictures. However, there were some pictures that I did not upload to either of those, so they are just GONE, it seems. I'll be sure to upload my latest "last import" to Shutterfly before I upload more pics from my camera into iPhoto, in case the same thing happens again. I just don't understand what the deal is.
Anyway, there is this plant that I've wondered about for awhile now. I have no idea what it is, and I've never seen it before, anywhere else, in my life, of which I'm aware. So, then I was really startled to discover the strange insects on it this day. Actually, Jaden saw them first and summoned me to the plant. Now, at the time I write this, I realize I saw one fly around our front porch around this time last year, but at the time I saw these on the plant, I didn't remember that. I do not know what they are, and I cannot get a good picture of them. They have purple "fluff" on them. Both they and the plant look like they belong more in the Amazon than in the Ozarks.
Jade was carrying one of Trusten's wooden pop guns that he got for his birthday (from their Aunt Meg), and he was "shooting" the cork over and over along the walk. When we emerged from the forest-surrounding stretch, we heard an echo bouncing from the mountains back across the pasture. They were delighted and asked me about it, so I explained about how sound waves travel and can echo, just like many other things bounce back or ricochet when it meets a barrier. I then shouted so they could hear my voice echo. I told them my favorite place to play with echoes, as a child, was down at the river, just a short walk from my parents' house. I'd call from the one bank and I would hear the echo bounce back from the other side. I hope I can remember to take them down there to shout the next time we go visit.
Jade copies a paragraph from a book or something else nearly every day. Here's a picture of sitting on the couch to write, and he's using a feather pen that his daddy made for him about a year ago, from a feather Jaden found, though I usually make him use a pencil:
*March 28: Jade and I both had optometrist appointments. My last year's visit and this year's visit found my left eye (my master eye, even though I'm right-handed) getting worse, though both my eyes remained stable for several years, since my teens. My right eye has recently started bothering me again, as it had before my last year's visit. What is happening is my right eye is overcompensating for my left eye, and so it is becoming strained. Both of my eyes had also shared the same prescription for as long as I can remember, until last year. My contacts are now a -7.50 and a -8.50. I did not get a new glasses prescription. It slipped my mind. The current one, which I got last year, is a -9.25 for both eyes. The reason for that is that is my eyes last year for contacts could have both been -7.75, except when your eyes are afflicted with such high degree myopia as mine as that, they do not make in-between numbers like that. Two years ago, my optometrist wanted to move my left eye to a -8.00, but I did not agree to it until last year, because I tried the -8.00 for a week, and it was too much. I'd really needed a -7.75, except they don't make it. So, I was able to stay with the same prescription for both eyes. My ears make up for eyes, though, I believe. I have exceptional hearing, and I wonder sometimes whether that is why others have a hard time hearing me. Many say I speak too softly, but I hear myself loudly and clearly. I think I just have better ears than most. I hope I never go blind. I'm thankful for modern medical technology so that I can wear contacts. I am totally useless without these aids. I would love to cure my eyesight (naturally, rather than surgery, of which I've decided against for now), and I believe it is possible, but it requires that I go without my lenses for most of the time, which is impossible at this season in my life. I tried it a few years ago, when I only had William, but it was hard enough then. I had to wear glasses to cook and do other tasks.
As for Jaden, he is still far-sighted (normal from birth), and he has an astigmatism in one eye, whereas from birth both eyes have it. So, she said they should be grown out of at a certain rate, and she's afraid he may develop a lazy eye in one of his eyes (forget which), if he doesn't have lenses. He's not particularly thrilled, and I don't blame him.
I took a picture of this moth in our kitchen, at night:
We have plenty of these, but I'm not sure what kind of moth it is. We like the look of them, though.
*May 29: The sabbath day. A much-needed rest. I did a sabbath school lesson with the boys, about the parable Jesus told about the workers in the vineyard and how they all were paid the same amount for different lengths of time of working and how the ones who had worked all day complained, even though they had agreed to the wage which they were paid. I also worked on the seventh commandment in God's Law of Love: The Perfect Law of Liberty.
Until next time...
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