Holmes Family

A Post Well Deserved

2012-01-14T16:10:00.005-06:00

I think Larry, as my faithful photography helper, has deserved a post all his own. He loves to 'help' me take pictures, climbing all over my lap and shoulders, playing with my skirt, begging to be held and petted, etc. :)

God's Artwork

2012-01-14T14:45:00.002-06:00

Frost

2011-11-14T14:54:00.003-06:00

The tomato that ate the hornworm

2011-11-14T14:50:00.000-06:00

First Snow!

2011-11-14T14:46:00.002-06:00

Video

2011-10-27T15:42:00.001-05:00

A friend of ours recently made this video and is trying to spread it around. It's very interesting. The girl in the video is our friend's adopted sister.

www.thelittleadoptionmovie.wordpress.com

It's official!

2011-10-22T18:41:00.002-05:00

Eli and I are officially courting! For those of you in Illinois, you probably aren't very familiar with Eli McGowan. We met online about 2 2/3 years ago, and met in person for the first time last winter. And now..... *big smile*

I'm very thankful to have parents involved! It just makes things better. For one reason because they provide lots of advice and helpful comments sprung from 26 years of their own marriage.

Thank You, Jesus! Maybe it seems a little odd to begin a courtship at 17 and 18, but the whole way, we've been able to see Him working very clearly. It's..... oh, I don't know what it is.... it makes Jesus seem ever so much nearer and interested in our lives to see Him working so closely.

"Raindrops on Roses, and Whiskers on Kittens..."

2011-10-02T16:28:00.005-05:00

Ecca caught me laying on the wet ground takin' this picture.

Peppers are finally blooming!!

And growing, too! *big smile* Ah, I love green peppers!

Canst guess whatever this is?

"Look at the camera!" Calista wanted pictures of Sammy, and Matthias was my willing helper.

Care Group

2011-10-01T14:52:00.003-05:00

A couple weeks ago, we got moved to a different care group in our church. (a small group that gets together, occasionally with another group, mostly for fellowship and food) Morgan and I brought our cameras and took pictures together. Morgan's camera batteries got low, so she took pictures on my, er, Daddy's camera.

"Where on earth did Morgan go??"

"Oh, there she is!" Below "see level." :)

Guess who was Morgan's first target was?

Doesn't Camille look like Erica in this picture?

Daddy thinks that this looks like Mommy.

Morgan with the camera again. Can't you tell? My pictures are always weird, not so nice, like this.

Matthias and Caitlin blowing bubbles.

Oh, and I guess Seth, too!

Morgan had Kristen blow some bubbles for her, since the younger kids weren't holding still long enough.

Badminton!

View from a tree. That was a nice climbing tree! A bit difficult though, with a camera.

Lauren the Cheerleader. She does it really well too!

Hi Daddy!!

There were a whole bunch of monarch butterflies gathered on one of the trees.

Isn't this leaf so pretty with the sun behind it?

After supper, and badminton, and butterflies, and photography, the Hildebrand and Holmes girls got together for a game of soccer! It was so much fun! But no pictures, because I was too busy running around out of breath having fun! And the camera was having difficulty with the light growing dark.

A splendid evening!

Leaf Storm

2011-08-14T14:29:00.013-05:00

Pictures from big storm! It was definitely a big storm! The trees still look a little naked.

These elms are very old. I think that was the only tree to lose that big of a branch, but several smaller branches were blown down, too. The goats were very happy! There are only a couple in the picture, cause this was 7:00 in the morning.

Little rivers.

And a bridge, even!

The first time in a looong time that we've had puddles at the end of the driveway!

The poor half-stripped trees on the east side of the... trees! The wind was from the east.

The ground was plenty green to make up for no green grass!
And after chores, I had to grab the camera again. :) The sun and clouds (and puddles...) were too picturesque.

The sun flares were not intentional! Actually, the sun wasn't even supposed to be in the picture. I've discovered that the view finder doesn't show everything that'll show up in the picture.

I love how water ripples in the wind...

Fun sequence:

Have a great day everyone!!!! :)

RAIN!!!!!!

2011-08-09T19:14:00.002-05:00

We've had a very hot, dry summer this year. Actually, I rather think a significant space over the U.S. has. BUT! It's been raining a little over this past week or so! It's very nice! Sunday evening, I took the camera out to take pictures of the clouds and rain over north.

This cloud rather looks like the surface of the moon, or another planet.

Rain!!! It's so funny to be able to see it raining in the distance. Especially when the wind is blowing different directions at different heights above the ground. (that sounds wrong. My internal thesaurus is failing me just now.)

Towards the east. The contrast between the clouds and sky was more obvious in real life.

I know, I do take too many pictures of the same thing!

Sky.....

Lightning!!! (I am so positively thrilled over these lightning pictures! I never imagined that I'd ever photograph it!)

I came back to the house after a while, and just a few seconds after I reached the yard, the wind picked up real nice. Obviously, the storm was coming up fast, and it was about to rain... I got several more pictures before the rain, though. The shutter speed was slow, as it was dark, so the trees are mostly blurry. If you look at the edges of the clouds, in most of these pictures, there is light, from lightning.

That point is part of the roof. Must have been holding the camera funny.

This is pretty close to the actual color of the sky, when there were no flashes.

It got to blowing pretty hard out there, so we all came in, and Mommy and Daddy turned on the weather. That red spot on the screen is right over us! :)

The next morning, it sprinkled a little during chores, and we stayed out extra long. Erica spotted this enormous frog that had hopped part-way down our stair-well. We had to take pictures of it. I've never seen a frog that big before!

I think this picture is soooo cute! Don't I just have the cutest brother ever? :)

And last, the photographer gets to hold the frog. It was soft! Not as in squishy soft, though it was squishy, but it's skin was very soft!

The end! More to come soon. We had a bad storm last night, and I took pictures this morning. I don't have them uploaded to the computer yet, though, or I would have tacked them on the end of this.

Portfolio

2011-05-04T18:56:00.007-05:00

Ok. I don't remember if I said anything about my taking a photography class this semester. It's been a ton of fun! Especially because i have such a great camera to work with! I guess this is the first time I've been able to post pictures taken on that camera. Anyway, I'm posting a few pictures I took for class.

Matthias holding one of our Silver-Laced Wyandotte chicks that we got to stick under some broody hens.

The stained glass window at church, in the evening when the sun is shining straight through it.

The maple tree...

One of our young hens...

Hehe... A chicken flying out of the horse trailer. No, I wasn't in the trailer. I poked the camera through a hole in the front.

Fire!

Purple flowers in our yard. (I noticed that I haven't been seeing the henbit in the yard this year. I'm guessing our 120 chickens have been eating it. Maybe that's why it's called henbit!)

I took this on the Pratt Community College campus before class started.

Dewdrops. It looks better in a larger size... I made the matting around it on Photoshop during class. I think somehow I only have the framed pictures saved on this computer...

Spoiled dog!

Mommy's Christmas cactus.

The American Elm tree by the house (not that you can see the house :) The colors really were that bright, but I had to touch the picture up in Photoshop for the picture to match real life.

There! Hope you enjoyed!

Finally!!! (in other words, here are the pictures, after a longer delay than intended)

2011-04-14T15:20:00.019-05:00

Our trip to D.C. took us 2 1/2 days (the same on the way back). We visited the Dahls in Illinois for supper on the way up, which was very special, being able to see them twice in one year. We traveled from their place in Springfield to Indianapolis after supper. Once entering Indianapolis, things were somewhat entertaining, at least for me. Right off we got lost. :) So we drove around and around and around, even ending up the wrong way on a one way road! I don't know how long we drove around but however long it was, we had a midnight tour of the city. (The switch from central to eastern time accounted for one hour of that, but we did drive around for a long time.)

The next evening we, guess what, got lost in D.C.! Washington D.C. really is a beautiful city. The buildings are old fashioned, and pretty fancy. Our hotel was I think the cheapest one Mommy could find, but it was definitely the nicest hotel I've ever been in! The style of the rooms and the view from our seventh story windows made it pretty easy to imagine we were in England, maybe London (not that any of us have ever seen England, except Mommy).

The following day, Mommy had lined up a tour of all the monuments and memorials. It met in the Department of Interior building, which had a totem pole in it, which kept us occupied until the tour arrived. :) The first memorial was the:

WWII memorial! It's quite interesting, and the picture doesn't show it very well. It at least shows the fountain display. ;) Which happens to be the center of the memorial. (notice that the pillar thingy on the far side is half wet. It drizzled on us about all of our first day, then rained on us the second day.)

This is the Washington monument as seen from the WWII memorial. I didn't realize I'd taken so many pictures of it till I was uploading them to the blog! Oh well.

This is one of the pillar thingys encircling the fountain part of the World War II memorial. I think there was one for every U.S. state and territory that fought in the war. I'm not posting the picture Daddy took of us four standing in front of it! Almost all of us are making weird faces (especially me!).

This was off to one side of the fountains. Each star represents 100 Americans that died in the war. I don't remember how many stars there were, but it was a couple or so thousand.

Outside the memorial, a ranger was setting up these costumes (not including Erica ;). There are two, but you can only really see one. The white one is the costume of the Finns, and the brown that just barely got included in the picture is of the Russians. It was between these two that the war officially started.

The Washington monument from the path leading up. It really is huge! One can't tell that from pictures! It's 55 feet square (rounded down) and 555 ft 5 1/8 inches tall. The outside is all white marble, and the inside granite. The very tip at the top (is that redundant?) is aluminum. It has writing on all four sides, and there's a replica inside the monument so that people can read the writing. There are two windows on each of the four sides at the top so that people can look out. I'm only posting the pictures from three, since you really can't see much from the last, due to the water drops on the window.

This one shows the White House.

The Lincoln memorial, and the WWII memorial at the end of the reflecting pool.

One can see both Virginia and Maryland from here...

Yup, the widows got pretty crowded! The sign above the window points out different points of interest that can be seen out the window.

The Arlington Cemetary was part of the tour, but it's in Virginia, not Washington D.C. It's a military cemetary, so all the headstones have to be lined up perfectly, which made it fun to watch as we drove by on the paths.

The changing of the guard (and Erica's hair. My improvement with digital photography did not carry over to film! There are a multiple pictures that I took on the trip that I am not posting!) at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. It was rather interesting to watch.

Next came the Jefferson Memorial. We did not go up the steps in the front, but down into a basement and up an elevator. It was fun when the door opened. It looked like we had just stepped out into a forest of pillars! The picture doesn't compare.

The view from the steps.

I just call this Calista's squirrel. It was obviously spoiled by visitors, and was real friendly, especially to Calista.

This would have been a really pretty picture, but the colors aren't quite right. I can't figure out if it's the camera or the film that's giving me grainy/grayish tinted pictures.

Airplanes flew by pretty frequently, so I took a picture of one for Matthias.

A pretty memorial.

This is one of the many waterfalls at the FDR memorial. We were walking around and I didn't see much picture worthy till we paused somewhere and I had time to stop and think about what exactly was around me and notice the details. Water looks neat paused in midair, doesn't it?

The Korean War memorial. It almost, or maybe actually does, look better in the picture than in person. I think it does, but Erica disagreed with me.

The Washington monument from the Lincoln memorial.

We had to walk back to our hotel after our tour guide took us as far as he could. The city was all lighted up for Christmas already, so it was very pretty to walk through. We sat along a boardwalk to eat our supper sandwiches (originally for lunch, but we ate Indian food in a cafeteria-like area). Naughty me is posting a picture of everyone looking funny. :D

Wrestling before bed...

The second day of touring took us to the White House, on the first day of it's being decorated for Christmas (and quite possibly overdone, but I can't be quite sure on that point), the Capitol (or Capital? I never can remember...), and the Library of Congress. In the White House it was sooo neat to see things we've heard about for so long, like the picture of George Washington that Dolly Madison saved from the building when the city was burned. I'm not surprised they only took the picture and left the frame! It's a pretty big picture! One room, I don't remember if it was circular or oval, looked as if the ceiling was slanted the opposite way from which it was viewed. It was really strange! The Capitol is much more closed in than the Kansas Capitol, and I got completely mixed up concerning where I was in respect to other rooms. There are a lot more pillars there, too. it was interesting to see and touch pillars from the original building that survived the fire. There was security positively everywhere! (and I'm not surprised! It makes the Kansas Capitol's look so.... unthorough!) I thought it was fun, particularly when it went off from Calista's glasses and watch, and Camille and Daddy's belt buckles! :D The Library of Congress apparently has two buildings, but we only visited the Jefferson building. It's very very fancy/pretty, but I don't think I have much to report on it. It has been four and a half months since then, so I've forgotten any interesting little tidbits that might have happened there.

We went back to our hotel after the Library of Congress. Mommy and Daddy were moving from their room to ours (the shower in theirs didn't work), and we girls were packing up our things to go to a hotel in Colonial Heights, VA. We had gone to D.C. for an ALEC convention, so we girls were going to spend a couple days with another homeschooling family, who we met online, while Mommy and Daddy attended the convention.

We stayed in the hotel till about 3:00 the next day, when the McGowans came to pick us up. Shortly before they were to arrive, three of us (except Camille, who was too busy with her book and thought we were "boops" for being nervous) couldn't keep doing anything and stood at the window looking out watching every passing car. They finally arrived and we raced down to the ground floor as fast as the slow elevator would take us (which made the excitement/nervousness even worse!). It was awkward during the first few minutes, but they are a very outgoing family, and we've gotten to know each other pretty well online, so it wore off pretty fast. We went to their house and mostly just walked around their little 5-acre farm and sat around in the house and talked. The usual things one does with friends for the first few hours. :)

Eli, Lydia, and three strange girls. ;) That's a little, very low quality (it's just for kids) video camera that Lydia has there. I don't think anyone really realized that she was actually videotaping us.

Eli is 6' 4", and that is a very small chair. It was funny when he picked that one particularly to sit in. That's a really weird angle that I happened to take that at, too...

They picked us up pretty early the next morning, I think it was about 9:00, and took us to tour a Civil War park/museum where Eli and Isaac volunteer. It's on the site of one of the battles.

Looking at the cannon. Actually, more likely listening to Eli's stories... He's very talkative! Those earthworks were not real, however real they look! It was so mean, knowing that you're not going to touch sand, but expecting it unconsciously anyway because it looks so real, and then touching something completely unlike it!

Real earthworks from the Civil War!!! I thought it was so neat seeing something from back then!

Standing on the steps of the plantation house. As a plantation house, I really did expect it to be a lot bigger than it was, but it's really pretty small. Smaller than our house, even.

Looking at the sheep. I didn't realize till after taking this picture that Eli had been sneakily videotaping. I was very careful to walk behind him after that! ;)

Eli described the different punishments for various offenses in the army. It was funny how he told about it, but I'm sure it was not funny then! Such a sad little theif, isn't she?

Not really anymore.....

We went back to the house for lunch. After lunch, we sat down to think of a little movie we could make together, then we ran around all over the place filming. Eli just got the finished video on YouTube a couple days ago. It's called The McHolmes at Home. :D Here's the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEfBuzXnkH4

Mommy and Daddy drove down from their convention while we were working on our video and everyone flooded outside to greet them. So after we kids got back to our filming, the adults had company, too. The first picture I took of the adults wasn't very good, but this one is, however strange it makes the people in it look. :) This is the McGowan parents, Paul and Sarah, and Miss Sarah's mom, who was visiting them.

This is (some of) us watching the clips for our little video. I didn't realize till after having them printed that I let the camera focus on Calista's ponytail... (pardon all my comments on the photography.... I think taking a photography class is getting to me...)

This is Jordan. She was born a few days before our visit. She's cute. :)

So, we started our trip back home the next day. The mountains are beautiful, even in winter. I can only imagine what they must look like now, in the spring!

These particular mountains were a very pretty misty blue. The picture doesn't show it though. :(

It started snowing on us almost exactly as we crossed the border into West Virginia. It was exciting being snowed on in the mountains! I kind of wished that it would get more exciting and that we would get snowed in (which was probably very silly, from a reasonable person's point of view, but I am not a reasonable person!).

It felt so good to get back to Kansas, back to familiar territory! I couldn't decide to myself whether it was strange to be seeing Kansas tags all over the place on the vehicles or not. But that's probably of no interest to you.....

(random note: notice that somehow, when the pictures were printed, a piece of the preceding picture got printed on the last one's allotted sheet of photo paper...)

Anyway, the end! I'm considering downloading pictures from the camcorder to post for additional pictures.

WARNING!!!!!!!!!

2011-03-09T16:15:00.003-06:00

PICTURES COMING SOON!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Our computer picked up a bug several months ago, preventing me from doing anything with pictures on the internet. Now, I'm tired of not posting pictures, and I've been taking a photography class so I have a flash drive in my use, so I'm taking pictures over to a different computer!!!!! *evil grin shot towards computer* Mwahahahaha!!!!!!!!!! I shall prevail over you evil technology!!!!!! (Note: I'm not saying technology in general, just calling the computer that. :P) Though thou hast delayed me three months, I shall yet post of our trip to Washington!!!!!!!! Or maybe it's my fault that I didn't think of this sooner..... Thou wilt learn to do thy work, brain, whatever it takes! If thou canst not learn the easy way, it must be the hard way!!! Oh, nevermind... y'all are probably laughing your heads off at me, anyway.... hey, I needed some place to be dramatic! There are only three of us home right now, so I haven't been able to talk much! (Actually, I think it's more of a way to relieve myself of the aggravation acquired trying to transfer pictures from the camera to the computer.......) I'd better leave before I make you all crazy, too.... Begone from here, Noelle, thou art laughingstock for thy friends and whoever happeneth to stumble across thee on Google! And you, fair (not!!!) computer: do thy work with a good will! Trouble thyself not to freeze up programs and crash Firefox (groan...) and pretend not to find pictures on the memory card... ermp!!! Better go.... :)

Happy Christmas and Merry New Year!

2011-01-02T16:05:00.003-06:00

Hope y'all had a good Christmas and New Year! We did. Random thought: it seems to me that people make a bigger deal about New Year's Eve than New Year's Day itself...

For Christmas, we went to Grandma and Grandpa Holmes' house, along with two of their other children (Aunt Jo and Uncle Marshall... and their families). It was too bad Uncle Monte couldn't come. We still had fun, though, especially with Uncle Brent to keep us all laughing. We like you Uncle Brent! Wish you could join us more often! I'll let Aunt Jo give you the message. :) At 4:00, Grandpa Asher came and picked Calista and me up to go to Leonardville, for the Moody Christmas gathering (for those not familiar with our extended family, that's Grandma Asher's family). In Leonardville, Calista and I had quite a while to converse with the Aunts, Great Aunts, actually, before any cousins showed up. Aunt Evie got her portable typewriter out for Calista and me to see. The ink ribbon still worked, so we typed quite a while, and Calista and all the cousins kept it working pretty much the whole time we were there. Typewriter keyboards are much cleverer than computer keyboards! :)

We didn't do much for New Year's or New Year's Eve. We watched a movie Dec. 31, and stayed up a little late (10:00 at the latest), but that's all. I was typing out and sent in a story for the Vision Forum story contest, which is the only reason I stayed up late. :) I don't like staying up too late. For New Year's we did..... nothing, as one might expect from a family who doesn't make much of holidays, besides birthdays.

I highly doubt the computer made any new years resolutions to be good, but I'll try uploading some pics just in case...

EDIT: Still doesn't work...

Our Special Trip

2010-12-19T16:47:00.002-06:00

The end of November, early December, we all, excepting Matthias, went on a trip to Washington D. C.!!! Matthias stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Asher and Uncle Daniel and Aunt Amy over the nine days we were gone. The trip was so totally great!!! Unfortunately, we forgot all cameras besides my film camera and the video camera, so y'all will have to wait for pictures. It may be awhile till you get them, because I currently can't afford to print the film. ;) But we had such a splendiferous time, and I can't wait to share it with you! I guess Erica took some still shot pictures with the video camera (we finally have a digital video camera! :), but they may have to be uploaded from her computer. If they ever do...

Recent Occupation...

2010-10-17T16:57:00.001-05:00

Of late, I've been really interested in Scotland. I'm not sure exactly why, though... My family would say that I was 'obsessed,' as they do whenever I'm really interested in something and begin to research it and think about it a lot. Anyway, I've been looking it up on the internet, trying to find out more about it and the like. I've been listening to Scottish songs on YouTube (the closest thing we have to Scottish songs on CD are Celtic :( ). I found some really great songs that all who read this absolutely MUST watch, whether or not you like bagpipes!!!!!!

O Waly, Waly:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49McH1hjUpE

Amazing Grace:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M8AeV8Jbx6M&feature=related

Time to Say Goodbye:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0QD8kZMYDvA&feature=related

Wild Rural Kansas Farm Life...

2010-08-17T18:34:00.002-05:00

It's not every day one is able to catch one of those things. They're fast!

Most of the lizards around here are brown or brown with blue stripes along the sides. I think this was the first green one we've seen.

True farm girl!

This was the culprit who was stealing eggs from the chicken coop. A bull snake.

M-A-T-T-H-I-A-S

2010-08-16T17:06:00.003-05:00

Matthias wrote his name using his crayons. It's really good! Notice how he dotted the "I". :)

Horse Competition

2010-08-14T11:00:00.002-05:00

Miss Judy, who lives four miles north of us, invited us girls to go with her to a horse competition down in Medicine Lodge. None of my sisters wanted to go, but I didn't want to miss the chance to go with her somewhere, and especially to something to do with horses, so it was just Miss Judy and me going. I'm really glad I went, because we had a lot of fun! Before leaving, Mommy and Daddy told me, "Now don't come back thinking you absolutely have to have a horse!" (they know I love horses and wish I had one of my own! :)

Miss Judy told a lot of fun stories on the way down, and later back home, which makes me think that the trip would have been fun, even if we hadn't been going anywhere.

We got there a little late. The fifth out of sixteen horses was going. This competition was to see which trainer did the best. They drew for 2-year-old colts (or fillies), and had I believe it was 45 days in which to train them. They would have to trot them around the arena in a figure 8, then lope around in the same pattern. The trainers had to teach their horse to switch leads (the front hoof that gets put down second), because they can't continue in the same lead turning a different direction. There was only one girl competing, and her horse did a flying lead change, changing leads in midair, instead of slowing to a trot to change.

After all sixteen horses had done what the trainers were required to teach them, they each had five minutes to show off what else they had taught the horse. Some of it didn't seem so great, but if I had a better idea of what it takes to teach a horse something, it probably would be more impressive. During those five minutes, the trainers would rope cattle, have the horse walk on tarps (I think most horses would spook at that), walk up a ramp that would tip when the horse got to the other side, and various other things. One of my favorites was where the rider had the horse pick up the rope attached to the tarp, so he could hold it as they galloped around.

One man's hat flew off as he was galloping around, so he had the horse stop by his hat and pick it up for him. It took the horse a couple tries to find a place to hold it by, but it got it! Everyone loved it and clapped wonderfully. I wish I could have taken a little video of it, but I didn't even have the camera on at the time, so you will just have to be satisfied with the video I did take (below). It's of the one horse who was taught to jump over a hurdle. After the man had ridden the horse over it, he put a little kid in the saddle, and the horse walked up to the hurdle and hopped over. It was cute!

We got back at the farm at 11:45 p.m. I'm pretty sure I got to sleep before 12:00, though.

Harvest

2010-08-14T10:53:00.002-05:00

This year's harvest is huge! We had tons of apricots, then peaches, sandhill plums, Asian pears (which are still going), and now the apples have started! We use mostly galas for applesauce, and they've begun to ripen, so it's applesauce season now. We've probably been canning jams/jellies/butters and sliced fruit (and now applesauce) for about two months, now.

Pickles (Michelle)

2010-07-26T16:32:00.001-05:00

24 Hour Dill Pickles

Brine: 4 cups cold water
¾ cup white vinegar
4 T Kosher salt

1 clove garlic
Dill to taste
4# cucumbers, sliced
Put in gallon jar and let sit for 24 hours, then refrigerate.

This is the first year we have tried this recipe. It sure is easy!

Allergies by Michelle

2010-07-21T16:54:00.002-05:00

Since Noelle has taught me how to post, I thought I would write about allergies and how to get rid of them.
A year ago I learned about a new (to the US) allergy treatment. It is called Advanced Allergy Therapeutics and you can learn more about it at www.aaeworldwide.com or find out if there are any clinics in your area. I go to one in Wichita, KS, so if you go there mention my name so I get a discount on my next treatment! (316-636-4444)
I have usually had terrible allergy symptoms in the fall, so when I went to the clinic that is what I was wanting treated first. They did the allergy test, which takes 1/2 hour, so that we would know what all I was allergic to (a lot). The test is done first by putting a cuff (which is connected to the computer) around my arm. Next she transmitted the electrical frequency of the allergen to me through that cuff. I held up my other arm for her to press down on. If I was able to resist the pressure, I wasn't allergic to that particular allergen. If my arm was weak, then she marked it down as an allergy. After the test she did a treatment on me. We chose one of the plant allergies to treat first. There are a lot of plant allergens and I was allergic to most of them. We only had a few treated last fall, but they made a big difference in me being able to be outside without stuffing up and sneezing my head off. (I do not like to use over-the-counter or prescription meds if I can stand it.) Since then I have had other treatments that have made a difference. I got treated for mold/mildew and sugar allergies all on one day. I have been somewhat hypoglycemic for years and the sugar treatment made a big difference in my blood sugar swings. I have also had several more plant allergy treatments so I'm planning on a very good fall!
We had Mitch and Camille tested as well and they have had some treatments. Camille had several nutritional allergies that were keeping her from absorbing those nutrients. Among them were Calcium, Iodine, Vit B, Vit A, Iron & Vit D. It is no wonder she is so short since she was allergic to both Calcium and Vit D. My grandmother had osteoporosis even though she drank lots of milk. I'm betting she was allergic to calcium so she couldn't use what she was taking. Camille has not sunburned as easily since being treated for Vit D. (We had her treated for all of the above.)
I would encourage any of you with allergies to try out this kind of treatment.

25th Anniversary!

2010-07-16T15:40:00.010-05:00

Mitch and I had our 25th anniversary on July 13th. We booked a riverboat cruise on the Twilight. It took us a day to drive to LeClaire, IA. We spent the night in a hotel right by the river. We boarded the ship the next morning and pushed away from the dock at 8:30. We traveled at 8-10 mph up river (12-14mph down river).

Along the way we saw several barges, some loaded, some not. They often had 12 or 15 barges fastened together and pushed by a tug boat. They are usually 1000ft long. The locks are only 600ft long, so they have to unfasten some of the barges and put the whole thing through in 2 pieces. The whole process can take 2 hours from start to finish.

This is lock and dam 13. We had to go through 2 of them each direction. I believe the river level was 2 ft different at one of them.

This railroad bridge was built in 1906. One section of it swivels so that boats can get through. It is a narrow enough opening that the barges have some trouble getting through partly because the current goes sideways at that point.

The inside of our ship.

A musician entertaining us.

We had a table assigned to us for all meals and snacks. They fed us often.

Here is the captain talking with a passenger. He bought the ship in '06, helped build it in '86 and has been piloting for 28 yrs. His son and daughter help with the trips during their summer breaks and his wife takes the reservations. He told us bits of history and pointed out wildlife (bald eagles mostly) during the trip.

When the captain turns around and looks backwards, this is what he sees.

Some houses on stilts.

A bunch of birds on a little island. There were lots of little islands. The captain said that if the islands are long there is a good chance that it had a sunken ship (steam) under it. The life expectancy of ships on the Mississippi used to be 5 years before they got the channel markers. The channel is clearly marked now with a depth guarantee of 9 ft. Some places are 100 ft or more deep.

Some beautiful cliffs. At one point the captain played some music and then stopped to let us hear the echo.

There was a train track right next to the river part of the time.

Shortly after getting to Dubuque we went on a 1 1/2 hr trolly car tour of the area. We all stayed at a hotel right by the river. They knew it was our anniversary and gave us a very nice suite with a jaccuzi in the bathroom.

On the tour we drove by the first log cabin in Iowa pictured below.

We also went to a museum/aquarium for a couple of hours before boarding the ship for the return trip. The fish in the picture is a catfish.

We drove to a bed and breakfast in Davenport for the night. We found out that it was heated and cooled with a geothermal system, so Mitch and the husband had to talk about that for quite a while.

We only drove as far as Topeka the next day because Mitch had a committee meeting the following day and it didn't make any sense to go home and then right back. It was short and we got home by 4:30 Wednesday.

We had quite a welcoming. There were gifts on the table waiting for us. They also had a treasure hunt ready for us. One of the clues took us down the lane to where we had been working on fence so we could see that they had made a lot of progress on the fence line while we were gone. Clues around the house showed us that Noelle had done a lot of work neatening up the place. The next to last clue took us to the mail box and there were papers for a registered Nubian buck in it! So we went to the barn and found a handsome, 15 month old, Nubian buck named Token waiting there! Erica had bought him several months ago and had been hiding him at a neighbor's house up the road. (Judy is a special friend!) We felt loved.

The Egypt File, "Professor Plum," Scary Pictures, Birdie, and various other random things...

2010-07-08T17:45:00.001-05:00

This year's VBS was The Egypt File (as I'm sure you probably guessed by the title of the post). All of us, with the exception of Camille, were active in it this year. All three of us girls were teacher helpers, and I was also in the skits. It was new for me, because we started helping with VBS the year that I was too old, and each year since then, I've only been in the skits, and helped with crafts. I kind of wish I hadn't missed it. ;)

Morgan and Zachary Tracy acting. Or maybe it's McKenzie Ross and Detective Carson Hughes...

Miss Theresa during the... I believe it was the closing assembly.

This is a really bad picture (the camera and I have troubles together...), but Seth (Morgan's youngest brother) was so cute! He's never really smiled at me, but he smiled at me all week! He looks just like Morgan and Alex.

Practicing performing the songs for the Friday night program. Miss Carrie is the special music person, teaching the kids all the motions. She's such a fun person that one looks forward to music time!

If you look really close, you can see Matthias. He's the little boy with a purple shirt in the second row, farther to the left.

Back row: Morgan, me, Ellen Kenworthy, Jasper Jacks, Chad Hildebrand, Michael Gilbert. Front row: Nathan Lowther, Zachary Tracy.

All except Nathan in costume.

One of the walls in the sanctuary.

While making decorations for VBS, Morgan mentioned to a friend that we were putting Egyptian gods and goddesses in the sanctuary. His reaction was fun.

Matthias performing the songs. His little wristbands and neck-thingy distracted him the whole time. (At one point during one of the songs, while still on stage in the front row, he took one of the armbands off and pretended to drink out of it!)

I just had to get a picture of this; two brothers sleeping in almost exactly the same position (that doesn't include Matthias, by the way).

The eggs were just sitting in the mixing bowl, while Mommy left the room for something, and it suddenly hit me that they looked very interesting...

I saw this through the window and thought it was neat, the sun shining on the field across the road, and the darker sky, then when I got out there, I discovered a rainbow. I was quite surprised at how bright it was! None of the pictures show it, unfortunately, but the next picture does show it somewhat.

It got dark really fast! You can see it in the difference between the first picture and this one.

Mommy makes us banana lussees sometimes. Ever experimenting with what she makes, she decided to try making a mulberry lussee! We loved it!

"I look very older in the picture!"

Mommy made it again when we had friends over (the mom is very careful not to say who she is or mention any names on their blog, so I shall refrain from mentioning any names). Matthias decided to make himself even messier, because everyone thought it was so funny last time. Of course, he managed to get a picture taken of himself, because of the amount he got stuck to his face.

Erica noticed her goat, Tanya sleeping in the feeder. You can probably guess why she took the pictures.

Little Gray was laying in a picture-worthy state, as well.

Matthias, ever our entertainment, was posing in 'scary' positions for Daddy to take pictures of. As soon as the picture was taken, Matthias would ask to see it, so Daddy would turn the camera around "AH!" and make it jump towards him, making M scream! Then the memory card ran out of space, so the last pose was "too scary! The camera won't be able to take it, it's so scary!" Personally, I find them more cute than scary, so I'm posting them. :)

Matthias enjoys Ivan, even if Ivan doesn't enjoy Matthias.

Erica found a little baby barn swallow that fell out of a nest in the barn, a while back. She put it up for the parents to find it, where the cats couldn't (or so we thought...), but they never did come to claim it.

She fed it every hour, and everyone loved it. It was so cute! Ec would go out and catch grasshoppers, or swat flies on the milking stand to feed it. It's beak was so wide, it could fit your entire fingertip in it! When it wanted fed, it would open it's beak, and often times shake so violently in it's eagerness, that the flies we were trying to feed it would fall right back out.

But, oh! one fateful morn..... Erica was in St. John selling eggs, and Calista went out to feed Birdie for her. Calista came back with a couple grasshoppers, and her cat, Sammy, was sitting in Birdie's little 'nest' licking his lips with no Birdie in sight! According to Calista, he got a dunking in the pool for his murderous deed.

About a week ago, Daddy was working with our steer, Flower (Matthias named him), and got his foot stepped on. :( The day after it happened, Mommy and Daddy decided they'd better get an X-ray, so Mommy drove Daddy to the Stafford Hospital to have it x-rayed. They had to wait for a couple hours for the doctor to call back and tell them anything. Poor Mommy was so frustrated with the medical people when they came home. The doctor called and said that one of the bones in his foot was fractured. So, the next morning, Mommy and Daddy went off to the Pratt Hospital, and now Daddy has a boot that he has to wear for four weeks. After they came home, Matthias had to try on Daddy's new boot. It came all the way up his leg, and Daddy called him his "little bootlegger." Camille made a little sign to be taped onto the boot, Sunday morning, so that Daddy wouldn't have so many questions at church.

Take Time

2010-06-13T14:16:00.004-05:00

Life wouldn't be worth living if we didn't take time to stop and listen to the frogs.

Dew

2010-05-28T19:47:00.002-05:00

I discovered that dewdrops are very sweet, in a watery way. (Guess who was licking the grass while she was out this morning! :)

The Pictures

2010-05-22T13:26:00.019-05:00

Sitting in the car, on the way there; taken somewhere in the lower part of Illinois or near the edge of Iowa. Matthias was looking and acting very grown up. He had Mommy's sunglasses, and put his arm behind my back. Then he wanted a picture taken. :D

Sunday afternoon: the Gambills took us all on a train ride down to Chicago, a couple hours after Mommy and Daddy took the train down there for their conference. Matthias loved it! As far as I know, that was the first train ride for Matthias, Calista, and me.

Jaimie.

Yup, it was loud up so close to moving trains.

Happily seated, waiting for the train to start moving.

Lake Michigan. No, Illinois is not that green looking. The windows were green.

Daddy had me take the video camera, since he couldn't be there for Matthias's first train ride. It's dangerous to put me in charge of any kind of camera. I used it! (Camille said she thought I overdid the videoing :P) I captured a really funny conversation between the conductor, Matthias, and Erica, though.

The river we went to see. The first water taxi we saw looked like a bus and Matthias called it a "bus boat". It really did look like a bus, it was yellow, and the same shape, just lacking in wheels.

This was neat.

There were lots of seagulls flying and walking around, right next to the river. Erica called them Daddy's favorite bird, because for years after we moved, Daddy called every single bird he saw a seagull.

We went and stood on that bridge and watched a boat come out beneath us.

Chicago has lots of reeeeeally tall buildings. Kansas is definitely a much more rural state. We don't have anything like this. Even the taller buildings in Topeka and Wichita aren't near like this. I don't think Kansas has any buildings made almost completely out of glass, either (at least that's what these ones looked like! Poor birds!).

We went between the buildings where the wind in concentrated and experienced why Chicago is called the windy city ('bout as windy as Kansas! ;).

The opera house.

Back in the train. We sat in the top level that time!

Matthias fell asleep shortly before we got back to Waukegan. Actually, if you look real close, his eyes aren't quite closed in the picture.

Everyone back out of the train.

We went to see Lake Michigan up close, since it wasn't quite dark yet. It was windy and a bit cold, though. It was interesting to see lighthouses other than in pictures.

There were lots of seagulls at the beach.

The girls (or maybe I should say the other girls) decided to run at the ones sitting on the beach and make them fly up.

Large bodies of water are so pretty...

Especially the waves.

We went to stay at the Sissons Monday morning. After a little while of getting to feel comfortable with them, after being gone so long, (which didn't take very long, with Haley being who she is!) and seeing their place, we went inside to play with them. Not exactly the way we would have 11 years ago, though...

Cards! We played Nerts at the table, then moved to the rug in the living room (much more comfortable and easier to play on). We played Egyptian Rat Race, and everyone fell out but Erica and Matthew, but after a while of neither getting any closer to winning, they just quit the game.

Haley and Matthias played.....something......off to the side, after Haley got out of the game.

Then Haley and Matthew taught us Scum! That was fun!!! Matthew and I were King and Queen a lot, and I think Haley was Scum the most (which is what we were when this picture was taken).

A piano! Camille and Erica were very glad to have a piano to play while we were gone.

Hmm... I wonder if I picture sorta like this one will show up on the Sissons blog sometime soon...

I forget what Nate said this was called. Matthias loved it. He played that he was in jail and couldn't get out, or stand up in it and let it shrink on his legs, or put it on his head. :)

Making supper.

Matthias and Matthew appeared to enjoy playing together. Here's Matthew reading a boyish book to Matthias.

Tuesday afternoon, Mommy and Daddy came from their conference in Chicago, all dressed up still. Mrs. Sisson wanted a picture of them, so Camille took a picture, too. You can see they're each looking at different cameras.

After supper on Tuesday, we went back over to the Gambills, who were hosting a dessert (sorta, that's what Mommy and Daddy called it) with several of our friends from 11 years ago.

Mommy and Miss Vickie.

The Bogues (I'm not sure if that's how their name is spelled...).

There were some others, but I guess no one took pictures of them. I'm not really sure who some of them were. The Burns were there, but I only knew who they were after my sisters told me.

Matthias and Jaimie.

All the Gambills.

"Everyone lean towards Erica!"

Oh no! There are ants on Matthias's stump!

Don't drop Calista!

There, much better!

The Holmes family. "Oh wow, they look just like us!" *I wonder why* :)

The Sissons.

The parents.

We had arranged to meet a couple other homeschoolers that morning, on the way down to Springfield. We've only met them online, so it was interesting to see them in person.

The Benevolent Dictator, also wielder of the ban hammer, Alexander Meyer, and his older sister, Samantha. Alexander is actually a little younger than me (by three months), which was a little weird to think about when we saw them, because he's so much taller than all of us.

I guess there isn't that much difference, but it sure felt like it...

We stayed at the Dahl's house in Springfield on the way back home. We stayed at their house overnight when we moved, too. (I remember seeing that they had a four-hole toaster! That was back before we got one ourselves.) After supper, as it was not yet dark, we went to see the cemetary where Abraham Lincoln was buried, and his house (just the outside, though) and the others on the same street.

It was funny seeing this. Everyone has to rub his nose as they go by, and now it's all shiny!

This is where Lincoln was kept before he was buried. Those "steps" along the side were awfully tempting...

Us with Molly and Anna.

This is the Lincoln monument thingy. We didn't get any pictures of it while we were up at it, so this was taken from the bottom of the hill. It does look pretty this way, though.

The front of Lincoln's house.

This is somewhat blurry, but it shows more of the house. It looks like it was very nice, but would have been a lot of work to clean.

Somehow in the conversation, we discovered that the Dahls knew the Rices (other people we met on the same forum where we knew the Meyers from), which is where we were going after we left the Dahls in the morning. We found it rather humorous that the Rices and Dahls knew each other (those of you who are familiar with Nepali food will be able to see why).

Mommy and Mrs. Dahl. It was a surprise for me to discover that Mrs. Dahl and Mrs. Wiltberger (Aunt Amy's mother) were sisters. I guess that explains why I recognized her right off, though I couldn't figure out why at the time.

Daddy took the picture, and Mr. Dahl had gone off to work, so it's just the girls. ...and boy.

Then we went to the Rices, of whom we knew Seth and Caleb, the two oldest. Cara Duncan, a friend of theirs who is also on the forum, was at their house, too.

First thing as soon as we got there, Matthias ran off with Joseph, who is sitting on Erica's lap in the picture. I don't remember all the kids names (which is a little surprising, since I remember names like Daddy). There were Seth, Caleb, Micah, Esther, Grace, Ruth... I guess I'm just missing one of the girls names.

Well. I think that about covers our trip. We got back at about 10:30 p.m. Thursday night. Clover was very happy to see us. Ivan (our indoor cat who trained himself to go outside instead of using a littler box) was too, since he'd been locked out. He actually wanted in before we left!

There's no place like home!

2010-05-21T15:50:00.002-05:00

We're back home again from Illinois. We took a bunch of pictures, but now I can't find the cord to hook the camera up to the computer, so they'll have to wait a while. We stayed Friday night at Aunt Evie's house in Omaha, Nebraska, and got to Waukegan Saturday evening. We stayed with the Gambills (found out how their name is spelled!) Saturday and Sunday night, then with the Sissons Monday and Tuesday nights, then drove down to the Dahls in Springfield to stay overnight on the way back. We got to see most of our old friends (we didn't see Heather and Alyssa or Stacy and April) and some that we've only met over the internet. I would tell a lot more about our trip here, but then that wouldn't leave much of interest to go along with the pictures I hope to post soon. It was good to get back home. After all, there really is no place like home! And that goes right along with our living in Kansas.... :)

Illinois

2010-05-13T15:18:00.002-05:00

We're going to Illinois!!!!!!! Daddy has some conference thing up in Chicago this coming weekend, so we're all going with him to visit with old friends. We're leaving tomorrow afternoon (!), and coming back next Thursday. We'll be staying Friday night at Uncle Tom and Aunt Evie's in Nebraska, another place we haven't been in ages, then we'll be staying with the Dahls on the way back, the same as we did moving down here. We'll be staying with Jamie's family(I honestly don't know how to spell their last name!). We girls are learning some sign language, and are excited to have a chance to use it, and the idea has encouraged us to work on it more often. It'll be nice to see the Haley, Jamie, and Molly again, the only people I really remember much from when we lived there. Maybe we'll even get to see Alaina, Gretchen's girl!

Happy Mothers Day!

2010-05-09T20:48:00.003-05:00

Happy Mothers Day, Mommy! We all love you!

One Decade Plus One

2010-05-04T20:25:00.046-05:00

Well, we've been in Kansas for 11 years! I was going to do this post last year, but I forgot.... and forgot.... and forgot, and ended up starting it somewhere near the end of the year.... then I forgot to finish it, and by the time I remembered, I figured it was close enough to 11 years to wait till then. Here are some (or lots. some compared to the number I had to look through) pictures from throughout the years.

Above: Calista with her froggy umbrella, which is finally done in after Matthias had his fun with it. ;)

My actual fifth birthday I had in Indiana, while we were there for a Holmes family reunion, so this picture was either after or before my birthday.

Our little princess.... or fairy. I love this picture.

All in our Singapore shirts from Grandma and Grandpa Asher. Except for Heidi.

In Leonardville, sitting on the basement stairs with our Christmas presents. (Haha, I used to be afraid of those stairs because I could see through the back. :)

Our matching nightclothes. Two pajamas, two nighties, two red, two blue.

Riding Fancy, Uncle Brian's horse.

Flower girls at Uncle Daniel and Aunt Amy's wedding. And as in most of the pictures from the wedding, I'm making a weird face...

Erica and Haley Sisson. This was taken the only time any of us have been back to Illinois since we moved. Mommy and Erica went up for Alice Dahl's wedding.

In the Stafford County Fair parade. Camille and Erica have Rosemary and Dahlia, and Calista and I (with the chickens) have Hickety Pickety and Golden. Golden went in a lot of fair parades.

Grandpa took this picture by setting his camera on the boards in the ceiling, before (years before!) we ever got that ceiling put back in.

Jumping on the trampoline in our swimsuits, with the sprinkler underneath. We had a lot of fun games that way.

Yummy breadstick!

Dahlia slobbered all over Camille's chin the whole time they tried to get a picture of us.

A blue jay (I think) that we found.

Calista working at her desk shortly after she started school. (notice the picture of Abigail Adams from Liberty's Kids sitting on the desk)

Posing on the propane tank with Golden. Mommy planted cannas around the propane tank every year, until the tubors got ruined over the winter.

I got a camera for my eighth or ninth birthday, and I took a lot of pictures like this. A lot worse than this! (such as only someones body, but the head cut off)

Summer of 2004 was quite rainy. We played in the mud in the road several times that year. Believe it or not, I started us covering ourselves with mud, pretending I was a black person, then we all covered as much of ourselves as possible. Do we look cold there? We were!

An imitation of Norman Rockwell's 'Music Man'.

All dressed up for the Valentines Day ball at the Hildebrands house. We went as pairs, Calista and Ecca, and Camille and me.

The outfits Calista and me are wearing in the pictures Camille made for us some time before.

Matthias was born in September of '05. Several times after he was born, people would comment 'poor boy, with four older sisters'. Quite a few of the next pictures to show a 'poor boy', but we don't do things like this anymore, most of the time, as he'd old enough to protest.

Doctor Camille E. Holmes.

That was Camille and Erica that time, too.

I got the bright idea to wrap him up in my coat and scarf after coming in from outside and take a picture...

As unbelievable as it seems, I really do remember sitting in that bouncy seat, though everyone else in the family says there's no way I could remember something that early. But I do remember a few other things from at that age as well.

Practicing for the Christmas Eve program at the church. This was only five months after I'd finally gotten a flute, and three after I'd finally gotten it to make any sound! (it looks easier than it is!)

Comfy, Ivan? We do our schoolwork on the floor in front of the wood stove sometimes in the winter.

Glasses are kind of necessary for this feat. Camille got the idea to take a chunk of llama wool and make a beard out of it, and we all make one. They're hooked over the glasses.

I only did that because his onesie looked like a ballet outfit... Why must I defend myself? Yes, I was the culprit.

Looks dangerous, huh? Don't worry, nothing happened. ;)

Caught offguard.

Baby Shrek!

That chicken got a lot love.

Ecca with her wether, Leibe.

Holding Gunga.

Matthias in his playpen.

Calista and I were working in the blue room and had to keep Matthias where we could see him.

Daddy got Matthias started early.

A full tractor, just back from the orchard.
Ivan was playing with my yarn here just before the picture was taken, but he must have been too tired to keep it up.

Erica's half-trained goat pulled the goat cart in the parade. Erica still had to lead him, since he wasn't all the way trained.

Camille and I were hillbillies! Notice the sink in the wagon in front of the chickens. That was one tiring setup. Our legs were really tired by the time we got back to Great Grandma's house!

Matthias liked being in the pool, unless he was put down low enough for the water to come much above his waist. We can't all four girls fit very comfortably in the pool anymore.

Matthias used to love the little area under his highchair.

Camille and Erica dressed up for a ro-tic (romantic minus the man) dinner that they went to at a friends house.

Daddy's in the Air National Guard, and he was gone at a school in Texas over the whole summer of 2007. This is his summer uniform, minus the boy and Elephant. ;)

The picture Daddy had taken for the background on his laptop while he was in Texas.

That tractor has had a lot of use. Unfortunately the battery refuses to hold a charge, so we have to charge it every time we want to use it.

Wow. Our kitchen has changed a lot since that picture...

Matthias after he banged his head during the night. Mommy wrapped his head with the blue bandage thingy, but he wouldn't keep it on, so it didn't stay.

Sweet Daisy... and Matthias, of course. She was a good dog.

Someone with his role model.

Working by candle light while the power was out during the...

...ice storm!

Matthias is always copying Calista. It's nice she's still young enough to play. It's a big help for those of us who have grown out of it.

Camille and Erica are our goat midwives. Camille has the smallest hands of us, with the exception of Matthias', (yes, even Calista's are at least the same size as hers!) so she always gets that job when it's necessary.

Usually we just get small hail, but this was really big. You can see the size of it compared to their hands there.

The three Ms modeling the swing. Mommy got it for Mothers Day back in '08.

Dusty liked it, too!

We've had two girls graduate. I'm left the oldest one still doing school, and if I work hard enough, I might graduate next year! (Mommy's thinking she might want me to go through 12 grades instead of 11, because she thinks she let Erica graduate too early.)

We started helping with VBS in 2007, and up till then, we didn't know what it was, really. In 2008, I got to act in the skits (which is what the picture is of), which was my first real chance at acting, and now I love being on stage. I'm really looking forward to this years skits. Morgan volunteered me for the main part, and I got it!

Our little helper.

Hmm... We have pictures of us doing this years ago, with Grandpa turning the handle.

Puppy...

...and playmate.

Mommy has been our ever faithful cook for 19 years (well, I guess almost 25, if Daddy's counted in us ;). She's beginning to get more of a break from it, with her girls getting old enough, and Camille and Erica have taken over a lot of the cooking, so Mommy only cooks now on weekends, or when they're gone. I do every now and then, but I'm not the 'help make supper girl', so it's only every now and then. I'm waiting for one of them to get married and move away so I can fill in. ;)

We all went to the Exploration Place and took a lot of pictures, but Erica asked to be the one to blog about it, and it never got done. We took sandwiches along with us and ate in the car. Such a boy...

Matthias loves being strong enough to pick up the chickens and cats. Or maybe it's big enough, considering how light that small of an animal is. Ivan gets picked on the most, being an indoor cat, and of the chickens, Sami, my 4-5 year old Ameraucana gets picked on the most.

Calista, Avery, Morgan, and Anne.

Calista and Morgan, my two playmates... that I've grown out of playing with.

Mommy still tickles us sometimes. We're getting a little big to lay on her lap for it, though.

March '09: great big snowstorm, biggest I've seen, probably the biggest in Kansas in a looooong time, took lots of pictures for the blog, forgot to post them. It was about 2 feet deep, several spots where there were drifts were more. After it had gotten a crust on it, Calista and I were able to walk over a goat fence on a drift! (Thankfully, all the goats were locked in the barn by it, so they couldn't escape the pen. Not that they could do much damage by doing so.)

Erica looooves goats!

And Matthias loves toads! The window wells collect lots of frogs and toads and a few salamanders and sometimes snakes, so Matthias likes to get in the small one and play with ( or maybe squish?) the toads.

Such a cute little boy! I love my brother!

Matthias wearing Calista's jacket.

Daddy advertising himself in his favorite PT Cruiser, making his appearance as a State Representative, and hoping everyone will vote for him in the next election.

We've butchered a few goats in the past.... This guy's sister, Nadie, is going to be, soon. We were originally going to butcher a different kid, but Camille wanted a matching pelt.

Working on the Christmas Pageant for the church's Christmas Eve program. Erica's contributed the pageants, or maybe they ought to be called plays, for the past two years.

Playing Descent. Daddy played that with us when we were little, then we all learned how to play. And now we play with Matthias on our laps. He does the shooting, sometimes even when there aren't any robots to shoot!

Matthias in his Larry Boy hat. He likes to come up to us with it on and stick the "super-suction ears" on us, pretending he's got us, and we can't get away.

We girls all worked together to buy ourselves a zipline from Vision Forum. It gets pretty good use when younger friends or cousins come over. This is Calista's favorite way to ride.

Hmm. Do I have four pictures of Daddy playing guitar on here? Or is it more? Can you tell what his favorite instrument is?

Camille still pretends to shave!

Matthias in the tent he and Calista made.

Well, we've had some interesting times here in Kansas. All of us have developed a love for the state, and don't want to move away, at least not permanently. We love the quiet, rural life, and don't want to ever move back to the city. Mommy's taught us a lot: gardening, cooking, sewing, knitting (Calista and I are the only ones who really did much with that), and lots of other skills and finer arts women should know. I'm not sure how else to conclude the post, so I'll just say THE END!!!

Spring!

2010-04-21T16:37:00.008-05:00

Wonderful spring is here again! I had more pictures to post, and I had them uploaded, but blogger was really mixing up what I had up, and I could not figure out what the problem was, so there are fewer pictures here. Oh, well. Still have the prettier ones. :)

There's a bee in the center of the above picture, in case you didn't see and were wondering what it was of.

The apricot tree in bloom! Last year, with the snowstorm that I forgot to post about, we didn't get any apricots. Matthias is anxious for the fruits to ripen so he can know what an apricot is like.

There were lots of bees flying around, enjoying all the blossoms that day. They were fun to watch. Once a strong gust of wind came along and blew all of them out of their flowers. I had to laugh seeing them all fighting against the wind to get back to the tree. :)

Here you can see a bee in one of the blossoms. I had to try a while to get one before it left.

The daffodils were all blooming and pretty.

I had fun trying to get this picture; laying on the wet ground trying to get the camera pointed up at the right angle.

The least I can now do is put up a few pictures of Larry. As soon as I had turned on the camera and started taking pictures, he came yowling up, apparently decided that I hadn't paid him enough attention that morning. He kept rubbing on my hands while I was trying to hold the camera still and get a good picture. He deserves a fair amount of attention, for all the trouble he gave me. :D

He did look very nice posing among the apricot blossoms.

I was originally trying to get a picture of the buds, there, Larry...

Better...

The maple flowers. I've never really thought of them as flowers, before, but looking close, they really are.

Very Belated Christmas

2010-03-11T20:15:00.007-06:00

We were going to have our usually annual Leonardville Christmas gathering in December, but we couldn't, due to bad weather up farther north. We were planning on having it in January, but it ended up being the last weekend in February. :/ We went up Friday afternoon, and came back Saturday afternoon. On Saturday, I got a little bored, and since I had the camera with me, I got it out and started attacking everyone. *grin* The above picture is Calista and Joanna trying to lay in the same "bed", with Joanna comfortably laying on it, and Calista only off the floor because she was holding herself off!

Okay, maybe it's time to get up...

Isaac.

Hannah.

Calista stayed on that bed a long time telling Hannah, Abigail, and sometimes Isaac, Joanna, and Matthias the stories that she's writing. She finished one, and she's writing another, so she had a lot to tell them.

Hannah's falling out! Catch her, quick!

Um, I don't think tickling her helped any, Calista. :)

Brother's-in-law reading the papers together.

Grandma in the kitchen.

(Can you tell by the random order of the pictures that I was up and down the stairs a lot?)

We actually had three generations sitting on that couch at once. Unfortunately, I was one of them, so I didn't get a picture of it.

Is Lydia helping Mommy read, or is Mommy helping Lydia read?

Grandpa found the internet!

a full kitchen. Yeah, I could have gotten a better picture, but this was just an experiment, holding the camera up as high as I could while sitting down. :P

Me holding Lydia... from Abigail's point of view.

The guys taking advantage of Grandpa's 'discovery.'

Hannah and Abigail attacking Heidi, who happened to be using me as a shield! Those are her legs under Abby's broom.

Ah, I remember when I was little enough to ride on that rocking horse. We've been going there a long time!

Everyone was commenting on how tall I've gotten. I guess we hadn't gone to the Christmas gatherings for the past couple years, and I hadn't gone to either Josh or Jared's weddings, so I've had plenty of time to grow!

The end! :)

Rather random collection of pictures (and words ;)

2010-02-15T16:29:00.004-06:00

Here are some more pictures to catch up what I haven't been posting about since November. The above picture is Matthias wearing the Larry Boy hat I gave him for Thanksgiving (we do presents at Thanksgiving instead of Christmas). He likes to go around touching people with his "super suction ears".

Erica playing Descent with Matthias. He sits on our lap and shoots the robots, or shoots flares to light up the room when it's too dark. But you have to tell him when to stop......

Daddy being a good husband, washing dishes for Mommy to help get ready for family coming over the day after Thanksgiving.

And Calista riding the zip line. You can see Uncle Marshall in the background with his camera.

Daddy reading to Matthias. Looks like he's enjoying the book doesn't it? :)

Calista's birthday on Dec. 1.

Matthias wearing a cereal box. He didn't like it when people took is off as they walked by. (mean sisters! .... myself included)

Kissing Mommy.

Camille and Matthias must have been shaving with Daddy here.

Calista and Matthias fighting with spanksticks and morahs (spelling?) on their heads.

A while back, I found Matthias sitting in these boxes looking at a book.

The boxes also fit together. And he fits inside! I had him stick his hand out to show that he was in there.

It was a little dark in the room (but it doesn't look like it in the previous picture because of the flash), and I stuck the camera through the hole in the top. It was funny to hear Matthias when it flashed, exclaiming at the light.

Beautiful Kansas!!!

2010-02-12T16:19:00.010-06:00

I think Kansas is the best state in the union! Of course, I'm biased, but it really is pretty. Here are a few pictures of the sky and things related to it. The above picture Erica took. Mommy printed it and framed it, and it looks soooooo nice!

Back in 2008, when Daddy was just starting his music store, we were running outside to take pictures of the sunset for several days, to get a picture to go behind "Thunder Grove Music." These are just a couple.

I like this one, though you can't see it very well.

Bright blue sky! I love bright blue sky.

A rainbow.

Actually, it turned out to be a double rainbow!

Another rainbow, on the front of a storm. We saw a rainbow, then is started raining! Oh, wait, just now looking closer at the picture, this one is also a double rainbow!

We had a frost recently that made all the trees white. The white trees with the sun shining on them looked nice against the purplish sky.

The "fluffy" grass looked very nice, too.

The house and surrounding trees.

I took these last pictures during the last snowfall, after chores. We ended up doing chores in the dark, because we had been gone, and the snow falling in the beams the lights sent, I had to get the camera out. None of the pictures quite show the beauty of it, sadly.

The front yard... kind of (I'm not exactly sure where the front yard is. I guess this would count, since it isn't the back...). Without the flash.

With the flash. You can see that the previous snow hadn't melted all the way yet, and M, CB, and Clover had been playing.

Christmas Letter 2009

2009-12-19T13:50:00.005-06:00

December 13, 2009
Dear Friends and Family,
This year, as others in the recent past, has been extremely busy for us. We’ll let each girl write a bit about their respective year.

painting the bathroom wall

Camille: This year has been a good bit more fulfilling than most for me. In the absence of formal school and college classes, I have been free to pursue my own personal interests, and I have done a lot of that. Chief among my interests has been working on a novel I have been writing. I began in January of this year, and have completed the (lengthy) first draft, and now am working on the revision. Other things I have been doing this year are: art class, gardening, cooking, helping out with church events, and generally taking care of and improving the farm. Another thing my new schedule leaves me free to do is work for my Grandparents’ Commercial Laundry business in Wichita, which I have done quite frequently in the past months. I also bought my first sewing machine this year, which is an exciting thing for me.

debating friends on the computer

Erica: This year the Lord has been working a lot in my life to refine my character and cause me to mature. He has helped me to step outside my comfort zone and deal with uncertainty and discomfort in more ways than one. He also undertook the task of teaching me a long and laborious lesson on loving heavenly treasures more than earthly ones. This lesson I took with tears and pleadings as He took six of my precious goats from this earth one by one; but I did learn, and now that it’s over I am actually thankful for it. Next, Jesus began to teach me about submission – pointing out references and sources, one on top of another, until I took the hint, and He showed me how to deal with it. From this lesson I have found a significant drop in conflict with family, and all the embarrassment that goes with it. God has also had me practicing more domestic arts, through the encouragement of Mommy, and He’s beginning to suggest to me that perhaps my prayer life is next on the list of improvements to make – that it really could be more dedicated than it has been. I find these personal transformations fascinating to behold (though sometimes painful), for the hand of the Lord has been very busy in my life.

on Post-ConLaw

Noelle: This year, I took a Constitutional Law course through HSLDA. I enjoyed the course (though I didn’t figure I would when Mommy signed me up), but I think my favorite part was meeting and making friends with other home schooled students from all over the U.S. on the student forum, and debating about any and all controversial subjects that popped up. A few of the other students really loved computers and liked to work with them, and they created another forum where we continue to talk together, and I’ve “dragged” Erica, Calista and another friend in on it. In May, Erica and I went to a Science and Computer Camp at the Hesston College. This was my first time there, and it was interesting taking a class taught by the same person who taught Mommy while she was there! In June, I took Driver’s Ed, which I kind of enjoyed, though I got a little tired of it after a couple weeks of it. It’s nice to be able to drive, now, and I can’t wait till I’m 16! Over the summer, I read aloud The Hobbit and Lord of the Rings to Calista… and Camille, who would sit just outside the room and correct my pronunciation every now and then. I am in 10th grade, now, and it’s hard to think that in just a couple years I’ll be graduating! One thing that I’ve been enjoying recently is Matthias found out that it’s fun to sit on someone’s lap and shoot robots when they play Descent. I’m learning to play it at the same time. Just the other day, I hooked up an older computer and played the older Descent game with Calista. It was fun zooming through the mines remembering sitting on Daddy’s lap shooting all the robots for him.

writing on her book

Calista: This year has been a very productive one for me. Early this year I spent a few days in Topeka with Daddy and Noelle, and got to meet another representative’s daughter, who has become a good friend of ours. I worked on quite a few projects (eg. Drawings, paintings, jewelry, wooden crafts, crocheting, etc.) for the Stafford County fair, and won several prizes for them. Over the summer, I’ve also had time to work on the novel I’m writing, in between helping around the house, entertaining Matthias, babysitting for a friend with Noelle, and such.

looks happy, doesn't he?

Matthias turned 4 years old this past September. It seems like he’s been in the family a lot longer than that! He loves cars, trucks, and machinery. He likes to visit his grandparents in Sedgwick, partly because they live near a train track and he gets to watch the trains. He enjoys watching DVDs of the “Thunderbirds”, which is a series that his Daddy loved to watch back in the ‘60s. (It has spaceships, explosions and adventure.) He loves our dog, Clover, and our 5 farm cats. It’s quite obvious that he, like his sisters, loves music.

Michelle stays home most of the time Mitch is in Topeka except for a week now and then when I go up with him and tag along and enjoy the receptions or sit in on his committee meetings. My main jobs at home seems to be organizing schedules, delegating jobs, making sure they get done (reminding everyone), making sure we don’t overbook our number of vehicles at any time and generally keeping things running somewhat smoothly. I have found a bit of time to do some sewing and reading, especially since Camille and Erica have taken over planning and cooking more of the evening meals.

playin' guitar!

Mitch is in his 3rd term as a state representative. The 2009 legislative session (last winter) was extremely difficult with all the budget cuts that had to be made. In the fall, he taught remedial English and some computer classes at Pratt Community College. His favorite class has been a computer programming course. He lost track of the time consistently while teaching his students how to program a game involving spaceships. He drills with the KS Air National Guard the first weekend of each month at McConnell AFB in Wichita. For stress relief, he likes to cut firewood from our groves of Black Locust and Mulberry. This year he took out about 80 trees in order to build a new fence for our goats. His eBay music store (Thunder Grove Music) has taken a lot of time when he’s “not busy” with other things.

So....... to catch up now...

2009-11-24T15:15:00.011-06:00

I haven't posted for too long. Now to catch up... again...

I'm posting this using Firefox for the first time, and it also looks like the last time, too... I just now discovered that I can't rearrange the pictures that were uploaded in the wrong order! Arg. So, you'll just kinda have to bear with me...
Several weeks ago, I don't remember how long, Camille and I went to Grandma and Grandpa Asher's house to help with their Open House. The above picture is Grandpa and someone else (not sure who he was) giving a presentation.

Mommy and Grandma (Mommy came for the Open House, but didn't stay overnight at Grandma and Grandpa's house like Camille and I did) made popcorn for everyone. If you look, you can see some falling in the popcorn maker.

Before the open house, we had an Asher birthdays get together, which is when we were dropped off.

Uncle Daniel with his present, which I wrapped. Below is him unwrapping it. Mommy had me wrap it as I have a reputation for doing: lots of layers! Later I learned that Uncle Daniel is their businesses shipping person and he told me, "I pack things better than you do!", referring to how I had wrapped his present. I rather doubt that. I'm Daddy's shipping person, and I do pack them pretty well...

Aunt Amy had requested Mommy's Litterbox Cake for the get together, and everyone loved it. The younger kids kept asking "When do we get to eat the cat poop?". It's a good thing we made sure there were lots of them in there!

Hmm... Think she's his daughter?

Heidi was trying to get me to make a face, but I didn't hold it long enough to get a picture taken. Oh well, makes for a pretty natural picture there.

The kids were playing a game (and I played too, though I'm NOT posting the pictures of me) where you are shot and have to think of a creative way to die. Here are a few pics.

Splat!

Heidi "dying."

We almost always have Nepali food at out Asher gatherings, and here it is! lol

Recently, we've butchered a couple goats. I took pictures the first time. You can see Daddy pointing the pistol at Alfie's head there, but that wasn't when he actually shot him. It was funny to watch them, they would struggle around for a while, then when he was in the right position, Daddy would pull the trigger and *click*... "bother, now we have to do it all over again!" I won't give you any more details on the actual killing...

Yes, Matthias was in on it, too. He enjoyed watching and commenting.

Skinning.

All done. Now how do we open him?

The stomachs. Can you tell he had been out grazing just before?

There're the lungs.

Camille blew then up for us.

They felt really strange, and yet so familiar. Kind of like foam and kind of like sponge. It looks just like it felt.

Camille and Erica cut open one of the eyes to expose the pretty blue at the back (which is why a goat's eyes reflect blue when you shine a light into them).

Working on this years Christmas Pageant for the church. All squished around Erica's computer in the little tiny space.

Working in the kitchen the night before. Camille was working on sewing a dress while helping.

Matthias has been learning to read using the same book we girls used. It's kinda fun to read the stories and look at the pictures. Brings back memories from 10 years ago.

A while back I walked into the kitchen to see this. The picture doesn't do it justice. Mommy had just moved the plant up there and had the light on, and it has a nice effect, especially with the uh... thingy (what's it called anyway) at the top of the window, over the shade.

Squished into the music room to practice together. Daddy, Calista, and I are planning on playing the Drummer Boy for the Christmas program.

A while back, Mommy sent Matthias to go find some pants and put them on. He did, and ended up with half-shorts!

On Saturday, all of us except Daddy and Camille (and everyone asked where they were) went to Aunt Renae's 50th birthday party in Hesston. I took the camera along... but left it in the car. It was fun. Probably the only reason I ever got around to posting this is because Grandma Holmes asked me while we were there if I had posted recently, and I had to say no. Anyway, we won one of these little "ice cream sodas" (that's what I think of when you say soda, Eli) for traveling the second farthest to get there, then two other people who sat at out table gave their to us as we were leaving. I only have a picture of two, because the other got kind of... squished... on the way home. Amy made them.

Yesterday evening, Calista and I had a pillow fight (literally!). We tied Mommy's shawls around two pillows, one each, for shields, and fought with two others, and used those two boxes for "helmets" (they actually hurt worse than they protected when they were hit, and mine got hit a lot!).

View from inside a helmet.

Soldier #1

Soldier #2

No, this isn't fighting, I know. We decided to dance to the music in the middle of fighting. ;)

Later, we decided to borrow Camille's sword for pictures.

Those helmets are so funny!

We decided to try to video out fighting, since taking pictures was so hard. We made four attempts at it, but the first got deleted, since all you could see was Calista swinging her pillow at me, but no me. So here are the three.

Second try. It worked a little better, but not quite good enough. For the third, we moved down to my room where we had more room to move farther away from the camera, so we could be seen better. Too bad it's so dark.

AAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2009-11-13T20:44:00.002-06:00

I have a ton of things I need to post about, and it's been over a month since I posted last (though I did start one in between then and now), but I can't post everything I want to until it's not approaching bed time. So, just to hold you by...

Oktoberfest

2009-10-04T17:27:00.005-05:00

Every first Saturday in October Stafford has an Oktoberfest. This year we girls decided to dress up for the fun of it. Just about everyone we came in close encounter with asked us if we were in the parade or some special program. In church this morning we got a few comments, as well. It was kind of fun to walk around and notice all the people staring at us. ;)

Three of us wore the outfits we wore to the Homesteaders Tea a couple years ago. I've grown quite a lot since I last wore my dress; now a couple inches of my legs show where at first the hem covered the tops of my shoes. ;)

It was fairly cold at first (we got our coats out to do chores!), so Camille and I wore shawls, and Erica's dress was plenty warm. Calista stuck her hands under her apron to keep them warm.

There were several groups of people who graduated from Stafford High School in the parade. Grandpa was in the class of '59. The class was fairly large, and some of them walked (Grandpa included, which is what the picture is). I don't think they all fit on the float.

Daddy was in the parade in his PT Cruiser.

There were some old cars in the parade. I was kind of wishing Grandpa Holmes was there to tell me what kind they were and from what year. :)

Some demolition derby cars.

Here's a fancy modern-ish car. Yes, in case you haven't noticed, I have developed an interest in cars and especially how they work.

This was an interesting thing, a bale stacker, if I remember correctly.

And, of course, the horses.

After the parade, we went to a book sale at the Methodist church with the Hildebrands and got a few books. We lost Daddy for a while, since he left before we were done, so we ate lunch with Great Grandma and G'ma and G'pa Asher.

After lunch, there were several performances, and a wiener dog race. :) My favorite group that played was the Wrinkle Box Players; five ladies playing accordions. They played a lot of songs that made you want to jump up and dance, even if you didn't know how.

At the Ashers

2009-10-02T17:49:00.004-05:00

Last Friday, Calista and I stayed overnight at Uncle Daniel and Aunt Amy's house with their kids, while they went to marriage conference thing with Mommy and Daddy and G'ma and G'pa Asher. I think they really enjoyed it, from what we heard about it.

Calista and I enjoyed ourselves, as well.

Goofing around in the bedroom waiting for bedtime.

The Little Ballerina.

The next morning, I played around with the camera a lot, using my ever active subjects. All of the pictures here are "edited" on the camera.

I thought this plant looked nice like this.

They have a keyboard in their basement, and we played on it a little bit, or Calista played on it a little bit, I played on it a lot bit, while the others were upstairs watching a video.

Somehow I managed to get a satisfactory picture of myself!

After lunch before Uncle Daniel and aunt Amy had got back, we went over to the nearby park (with permission). I didn't really get any pictures, except the one below, because the batteries decided to go dead, but they worked for quite a while, afterward for Abby. She took a bunch of goofy pictures. She discovered the video setting and *surprise* videoed us. We deleted the one of me right away, but the one of Calista is funny and kept that, though I'm not posting it, since the last two posts already have videos.

September 26... er 23

2009-09-30T14:58:00.002-05:00

Matthias's birthday is September 26, but we celebrated it on the 23rd, since Great Grandma was going to be in Texas with Aunt Barbara and Uncle Jerry over the 26th.

He surprised us all by wanting a pink(!) cake. As you can see in the picture, he turned 4. It's hard to think he's that's old, but it seems like he's been here forever.

I only got one picture, because the batteries were getting low on the camera, but it worked out okay and they lasted longer than I expected.

Yes, I know this is the second video in a row, but I wanted to show an example of what I have a reputation for. ;)

He got through almost all the layers, then asked Mommy to finish opening it for him, shortly after the memory card on the camera got full (which is why he doesn't actually finish unwrapping it in the video).

Barn Cleaning

2009-09-24T16:42:00.004-05:00

Last Saturday we cleaned out the floor in the goat pens. We rented a skid loader for the job, and I'm pretty sure Daddy really enjoyed driving it around. We also smoothed out the driveway with it, while it was here, but I don't have pics of it. The middle of the floor in the goat pen was about 2 feet above the floor outside the pen. Daddy dug down to the dirt, which ended up being around 2 ft. or more on the edges and a lot more in the middle.

This is the pile of "barn floor", with Calista and Matthias to model it.

The pile got so huge that he had to pile more on top of the pile from last time.

Skid loaders really spin their wheels a lot, and really tore up the ground. Believe it or not, the ground here was very green, covered with knee high weeds and grass when we started.

I discovered that taking pictures in the barn is a little difficult; the dust reflects the flash!

Calista and Matthias got to ride with Daddy (one at a time ;).

Does he look happy, or what?

Here's a video of scooping. It's the first video I've posted so far, so it's also a little bit of an experiment (I love experimenting with computers and cameras :).

September 11

2009-09-13T15:06:00.005-05:00

Most people remember 9-11 for the attack on the World Trade Center, but we remember it for another reason.

Erica turned 17 (!) on Friday.

I think Matthias got to put the candles in the cake.

Presents. No, we don't use wrapping paper any more. :D

Modeling her present for the camera. She had been using the same night cap for almost 17 years, and Camille made her a new one.

Her favorite present: a tattoo kit (don't worry, it's for goats, so she can register them).

I disguised my present for her to search for. Our house is (naturally, with 5 kids) a mess a lot of the time, and since Daddy became a Representative, the mail really gets ahead of us. Anyway, I wrapped up her present really good, as I have a reputation for doing, and then stuck it in a box that would blend in with the mess. I packed it up so it looked like it was a box that Daddy had gotten, but hadn't gotten around to opening yet. It was funny watching her look for it. I stuck it in a spot where there have previously been several packages waiting to be opened. I know she looked at it at least 3 or 4 times before picking it up and looking at it. She didn't appreciate my refined packing skills. :D I'm sure it was worth it.

Oh, by the way, it was a CD, Acappella Hymns, if you wanted to know.

Sunday School Picnic/Centennial Sunday

2009-09-12T14:35:00.009-05:00

Last Sunday, our Church had it's Centennial celebration. They were preparing for it for weeks. I think it turned out satisfactorily. Everyone who had been a part of the church in the past 100 years was invited, so it was very crowded. The picture below barely shows it. When we were sitting down outside during the lunch, Nathan Kenworthy (our "adopted" brother, since we don't have any our age) came over and asked us: "Have you tried getting around in the Church?" "No." "Don't!" It was that crowded. If you wanted to get across the church, you had to either go outside, or upstairs. It was rather fun navigating around, though.

Anne.

We had to hurry through lunch to help with the fishing pond.

Seeing what there is before the rush starts... (and Taylor peeking out :)

I thought I had another picture of working "back-stage", but I guess not. Usually we have the fishing pond on the stage in the fellowship hall, but all the room in the church was already used up, so we used the pastor's garage, with a cloth hung on a string (which didn't work too well with the wind).

The concession stand outside.

Examining the list...

Each year there are jars of mostly candy for people to guess the number of. Lauren thinking...

The Moonwalk. Each year they rent the moonwalk, and it always has a pretty big crown in front of it. Mommy signed up to help with it this year. She didn't have a watch or a timer to keep track of how long the kids were in there, so she watched and had them come out when they looked like they were getting tired. ;)

There were some interesting contests. For the girls, there was a nail-hammering contest. I was in it, so I didn't get really any pictures, except this one, and I'm not sure there was a competition going on at the time. The prize was a box of band-aids.

For the guys, there was a pie dough rolling contest. It was very entertaining to watch, though I must say, I wouldn't be able to make a crust much better than most of them. They had a much bigger crowd than the girls did.

First round. They had three minutes to roll out the dough and get in in the pan. A lot of the guys just ended up piecing it together in the pan.

Mr. Jason was funny. He had a hard time with the dough, but drew a picture in the middle of the "1909 church".

I rather suspect Mr. Kenworthy cooks. He just rolled the dough a couple times and stuck it in the pan leisurely made it look nice. He drew a picture of a cross in the middle and had CB on it (for Calvary Baptist).

The winning pie crusts.

Second round!

Mr. Spare had a hard time rolling his out, so he beat it out (that's what he's doing in the picture).

It must not have had enough flour underneath it. He had to scrape it up and start over. :)

The winning pie crusts.

We would have had Daddy in the contest, but he was helping in the concession stand during that time.

The dunk tank!

Looks cold, doesn't he?

Another of the games. It looked interesting.

The water balloon toss. Erica and I helped to fill the water balloons before church started. They rang the bell (yeah!) when it was time for the service to start.

I managed to get a picture with a balloon flying, surprisingly enough.

Lauren and Morgan helped with the concession stand. Talking while no one's there.

I helped push the merry-go-round for quite a while, until my arms and legs were sore.

This year was the first year we'd stayed for the hamburger fry. We girls helped with the supper.

After supper the guys (and one girl) played base-ball; married against unmarried. It was interesting to watch, despite the fact that I don't know the rules. ;) We weren't cheering for any particular team, just whoever was batting.

I thought it was funny that I caught him just as he dropped the bat and started running.

Anyway, after quite a while of watching the game, we got a little tired of it and played a game that the Hildebrands made up, called Gauntlet (a little like tag), and I have no idea if I spelled that right. After a few rounds, the Senior Pastor joined us. He played a couple rounds with us. I think that was the highlight of the day for me.

That's all for now. Yesterday was Erica's birthday, and I'll try to get the pics up soon.

~Noelle

Experiments and other

2009-08-30T14:27:00.007-05:00

Ok. I've been going through some magazines of mine, and got this sudden interest in photography. They had pictures of dewdrops in a couple issues, so I thought I would try it. I went out with the camera after chores and got myself all wet kneeling in the grass, but it was fun. This first pic really isn't that good, but I thought it was neat.

Some rose moss buds. I can't decide which of these two I like better.

Then I got the idea from a friend's blog and tried taking pictures through a magnifying glass, since I was having so much trouble focusing so close up. it didn't work all that well, with the reflection. :P

There was a bull snake on the front porch Friday evening. It had a lump in the middle (as you can see). Some poor unfortunate toad must have been sitting nearby.

It was actually fairly small, compared to the ones we usually find around here.

Erica and I are going to get the telescope out soon (we were going to last night, but it didn't work out) and try to get pictures of the moon, and possibly some stars or constellations. It would be neat if we could get a planet, too.

Yesterday, I worked in the barn all day. A couple weeks ago, I took down the pen you see in the picture, to clean it out. It looked pretty bad. Anyway, I scooped out the floor, which was pretty close to a foot thick in some spots, and put the fence back up. It was a lot harder than it sounds. I have to admit, I was rather proud of myself for doing it by myself. I was very grateful for the experience I've had fencing with everyone else.

This is the pen right next to it. It shows a little bit how the other one looked.

Photography

2009-08-22T15:35:00.003-05:00

Lately, I've been helping Daddy take pictures for his store (he has his website set up now! not just an eBay store). It's been fun, experimenting with the flash and different positioning. He got a tripod for the camera, which makes it really nice. He also got a couple lights from Angela (our cousin), so it's more "professional" and the lighting is usually better. We were taking pictures in the kitchen this afternoon. We had one of the lights set up and the camera on it's tripod and everything... and the windows reflecting in the guitars (it's a music store)! We stuck shawls over the windows and a towel over the door. I'm including some of our results here. The light blue and the brown (or tobacco burst) guitar were the hardest.

This is a sunburst.The back of the same guitar. It's such a pretty red.

This is a redburst.

The tobacco burst.

Daddy really likes this one. It's Himalayan Blue.

Zoo

2009-08-15T19:42:00.019-05:00

The Thursday before last (I haven't been able to get this up till now) we went to the Wichita zoo with Grandma Asher and Uncle Daniel and Aunt Amy's kids. Aunt Amy was at the Birth Inn at the time. More about that at the end of the post (haha, now you'll have to read the whole thing! lol).

Every now and then, Camille goes to work for G'ma and G'pa at their business, and so we picked her up over there.

Not very good, but I hadn't figured out taking pics through glass.

A goose grazing just outside the penguins.

We got to the tortoises during their meal time. One of them decided to take over another's bowl.

This turtle looks rather like a baby one we found in Emma Creek while we were staying and G'ma and G'pa Holmes's house.

Poison dart frogs.

Gigantic frog (or toad, it's hard to tell and I don't remember). It looks rather like one Uncle Daniel had years ago. :)

King Cobra

A bunch of Newts. You can't really see how many there were in the picture.

An iguana. I would have gotten him from the front, except he was facing away from all possible views.

River rays. It's fun to watch them "ripple" along.

A couple birds.

This bird was being very friendly. It came right up to us and just stood there looking at us.

The picture taken just before this one was of Matthias sticking his arms out, which rather shows how "unafraid" it was.

Hannah wanted me to take a picture of this little guy. So, here's for you, Hannah!

Fishies. There were gigantic fish farther back in the picture, and just as I took the picture, these two swam in front. Oh well, the reflection is neat.

Everyone wanted me to take a picture of the catfish, and this is the only picture of it... with Grandma and Erica reflected in the glass.

I think this duck was sitting on the rail until a few seconds before I got there with the camera.

Scarlet macaws. A couple years ago when we went there, there was someone holding one and having it talk for us.

All of us in front of the waterfall (which you really can't see in this picture), which Erica and me wearing our bright orange hats.

This tree leaning almost horizontally. You can see the roots or whatever you call them sticking off the side to hold it up.

Calista with Hannah and Abigail behind the waterfall.

Caught!

These geese were walking around real close to us while we were eating lunch. I didn't think to get them while they were there. It was funny seeing the adults walking around with their neck stretched out as far as they would go to see what was on the table.

Camille and Isaac under Isaac's umbrella, even though it wasn't raining. Camille gets along with her cousins very well.

After lunch we went to see an elephant training thing. Anyway, they were washing the elephants and having them do things, such as hold one foot up or whatever. Suddenly, I want to ride an elephant again. ;)

Here she's putting soap on.

Here it's holding it's foot up for her.

Waiting for her to clean under it's nails.

At one point, the male giraffe was sticking his nose over the top of the fence. It was rather amusing watching the giraffes, since we've had so little experience around them.

This is one of the younger giraffes.

Rhinos.

Grizzly bear.

Black bear.

We went to the otter feeding after the elephants. I think Daddy really liked them. He said they were cuter than cats. :) You really can't see the otters very well, because of the glass being its usual reflective self and the otters diving around after the crayfish.

Tapir.

There was one place with lots of birds around it. You can get an idea of the amount by the ones in the background.

Hannah and Calista were teasing this bird with the umbrellas (it was raining off and on that day).

Sleeping bird.

They had orange (the picture makes it look yellow) canna like flowers all over the place.

I think this is my favorite picture of all of them. I never realized how much I really like tigers until we went to the zoo. It looks so much like a, well... big cat! Lions, who have been my favorite big cat, now have rivalry!

I don't remember what these are called. The sign there said that they're as velvety as they look. And it looked very soft.

Camille said that sometimes the gorillas would bang on the window just to see the people jump.

The lions were hiding that day.

I almost got Joanna talking on the phone on Grandma's shoulders, but I was a little too late, and she handed it off to it looks like Hannah. Cute picture anyway. Aunt Amy had her baby while we were there, and they were talking to their kids over the phone.

Everyone's feet were sore by this time, and we wanted to see our new cousin, so we left after the zebras.

We stopped by Braums and got some ice cream and cones to share with them.

This is only a couple hours after she was born. They named her Lydia Faith. I think she looks like Aunt Amy. Grandpa left the business and came to the Birth Inn for ice cream, and to see Lydia.

We keep telling Mommy we need to have another kid to keep ahead of the Ashers. She's not very enthusiastic about it. :)