Fence Hopper

My Kid is Weird (But Pretty Great!)

PS:  She made this by videoing herself four times and timing each part just right.

Thursday

Zach is done!!!  He worked almost all day yesterday to prepare for and take his last Economics test, and he did well.  Today he slept in until 10:30 and thoroughly enjoyed his slow, quiet morning with no school.  Now he's out on a long bike ride.

Drew finished his last physical science test today and got a 94%, which is great!  He messed up a piece of a problem having to do with "beta decay," and because of that a couple more things were calculated wrong...but whatever!  Now we're hoping to fit in an English test around his 4 hours at the SofR this afternoon.  I wish this was his last English test, but it's not.  He still has quite a ways to go in that subject, but starting tomorrow I'm going to turn into a slave driver push him a little harder in a very upbeat, motivating way.  My plan is to make him to do double every day and some on the  weekends, with the goal of having him finish by June 18 (when the public schools are done).  He'll thank me later.  Small Engine Repair is hopeless, though, and will have to be dragged on far into the summer.

Tomorrow Baylee will finish her last writing assignment, which has to do with writing a conversation using sentences of various lengths.  I love that she's learning that, because I think understanding good sentence variety is key to writing things that flow well.  Next week she'll finish math.  Science and English will be finished on June 18, and history, reading, and Bible will have to be done during the summer.  Luckily, those last three are her Sonlight (literature-based) subjects, so they'll just amount to good, focused summer reading.

Speaking of Baylee and school, on a lark today I googled "Calvert School," a real school somewhere in New England that also sends out its stuff to homeschoolers.  I've always been very impressed with them, and I even used their program for Drew's kindergarten year.  Anyway, I googled them, and I found out that they've partnered with some other organization, and now they send their stuff to you for free as part of a virtual academy (that means a "public school at home" situation).  The program is called different things in different states, but here in WA its name is Columbia Virtual Academy.  I can't believe I actually checked it out as a possibility for Baylee, considering I've been so happy with what we've been doing and so has she, but I did.  To be honest, it looks pretty darn good.  They give you several options to choose from, and Calvert is only one.  Ultimately, though, I decided against it.  Programs like that are never really free.  You might not have to pay any money, but you pay in hoops jumped.

Tuesday

a couple more pictures of Baylee's camping trip...

 

Man, this has been a long school week so far, and it's only Tuesday.  Baylee is still doing her regular stuff, which she can largely handle herself (thank goodness), but the boys have been swamped with tests.  Zach is to the point where he mostly studies alone, but Drew does much better if I study with him.  Anyway, all that to say, my brain hurts.  I've been, against my will, learning all about fission and fusion, complicated sentence diagramming, recent world history, and car engines. 

Edited to Add:  Oh, wait.  It's Wednesday.  Doh!  No wonder it felt longer. 

School Plans for Next Year

The other day my friend Kellie posted her tentative plans for next school year, which (just like it did last year) inspired me to write a post of my own.  For me, though, these aren't really all that tentative.  I'm pretty sure this is what we'll be doing.

Drew will be in 11th grade and will continue to be enrolled in South Ridge Christian Academy. 

English III ~ American Literature (ACE)
Algebra II (ACE)
American History (ACE)
New Testament Survey (Bible Instruction Course)
German I (Learnables)
Health (ACE)/PE  (each are 1 semester)
Music (with the SofR.  He gets school credit for that.)

Baylee will be in 8th grade next year, and, just like the last couple years, she'll be doing an eclectic mix of stuff with an emphasis on literature.  In fact, I think next year is going to be really fun, because she'll be taking a break from studying world and United States history, and she'll be doing a study of the Eastern Hemisphere instead.  It'll include tons of really great books.

English (ACE and Daily Language Review)
Writing (Writing Strands)
Earth Science (ACE)
French I (Learnables)
Pre-Algebra (Teaching Textbooks)
Bible (Sonlight)
History (Sonlight)
Reading (Sonlight)

Last Week of School!

It's so quiet right now.  Zach is relaxing, as he has so little left to finish in this last week of high school.  He'll graduate on Friday, then on Monday he officially starts working at the gear shop.  Drew is writing an answer to an essay question for English, so he's totally silent, and Baylee's not home yet.  You could hear a pin drop in here.

Oh, yeah, I should mention that we are doing school today, even though it's Memorial Day.  Mike has to work anyway, so I figured we'd just use this day to keep pushing forward.  I guess I should also mention that, unlike Zach, Drew and Baylee won't be done at the end of the week.  I didn't push them as hard, because there wasn't a need, so they'll finish on June 18, the same day as the Seattle public schools.  They will, however, be mostly done at the end of this week.

On a totally different note, I forgot to show you the Mother's Day card Baylee made for me.  PS:  This only makes sense if you watch Dr. Who.

Outside...

Inside...

Saturday

I miss Baylee!  This is day 3 of her camping trip, and she's having a blast, but it's so quiet around here.  She brings a lot of energy to our home.

Zach's been working at the gear shop the last couple Saturdays, just to get a feel for what it's like and what he'll be doing.  I'm so happy, because he really likes it and it seems to be right up his alley.  Thank you, Father.  (I mean that from the bottom of my heart.)

So I've found a coffee alternative:  chamomile tea.  It's decaf and it's pretty good.

Almost Summer

Baylee's friend Molly posted this on Instagram yesterday.

Can you believe the school year is almost over?  It seems like only a couple months ago that we started.  I remember having trouble motivating Zach at the beginning of the year and finally having a couple come-to-Jesus talks with him.  (One time, early on, he didn't want to write a paper, and he tried telling me that he just wasn't going to do it.  I said, "Okay.  You can sit there not doing it until 11:00 when I go to bed, then you can wake up with me at 6:30 in the morning, sit there, and not do it some more."  I had the paper in my hands in the next couple hours.)  It didn't take too long after that rocky start for him to settle into things and become a really hard, solid worker.  Now he's one week away from being done with homeschooling forever.  It's a strange feeling.

News

Drew got into the house band!  We're all pretty excited for him.  This means he's going to have a busy summer and fall of extra rehearsals (he'll be at the school 7 hours a week now, instead of 4) and shows out in the community.

Baylee left this morning for her 5-day camping trip with our friends from church.  I'm gonna miss her!  I took these pictures of their trailer as they were loading Baylee's suitcase into it and tying her bike down on its roof.  They made that trailer themselves just for these trips.

(They're huge geeks, which is partly why we love them so much. )

Christie (the mom of the family) posted this on FB a little while ago.

Finally, I got a call from the Dr.'s office.  All my blood work is normal.  Woo hoo!

Physical, Part 2

I went, got it checked, and here's what happened:

1.  The doctor heard the weird beating, too, when she listened with her stethoscope.   Plus she noticed that there would be an extra one every few beats. That also showed up on the EKG.

2.  They did some bloodwork to be sure nothing else is going on, and I'll find out the results of that in a couple days, but the doctor said that it's almost for sure because of too much caffeine.  *sheepish grin*   I'm supposed to quit caffeine completely.

Today (not including this morning) is day one of quitting.  So far I'm not loving it.  I keep thinking, "Oh, I should have some coffee!" and then I remember.  Uhhhhhhhhhhhhgggggg....  [that's me dying]

Physical

I'm having my first physical in twelve years today.   I  know.  That's so irresponsible.  The truth is that in that twelve years I'm pretty positive I've only been to the doctor twice:  once for sciatica and once for strep throat.  Other than that I never went.   I know they're going to ask me when my last physical was, too, and I'm going to have to say, "It's been awhile..." and that's going to be embarrassing.

The reason I'm going at all (besides it being a niggling thought in the back of my mind for years now that I really need to start getting check-ups, especially now that I'm in my forties), is that I have a thing going on that I'm not sure about.  No matter what time of day or night it is, no matter if I just had caffeine or if I didn't, my heart always seems to be beating hard enough that I can feel it.  And sometimes it seems like maybe it isn't totally regular.  I don't know.  It's been a couple weeks now, though, and I keep waiting for it to go away, but it isn't, so...

Anyway, we'll see.

Zach's Bulletin Blurb

My name is Zach Harper and my parents are Mike and Sue Harper.  I’m homeschooled, but I’m enrolled in and will be graduating from South Ridge Christian Academy.  While in high school  I’ve been doing Tang Soo Do, which is a Korean form of martial arts.  I’ve been taking it for the last four years, and I’m getting close to my black belt.  I really enjoy the exercise and discipline of it.  Besides that, I’ve worked various part-time jobs since I was fourteen years old.  I cleaned the office building of Environment Control and I worked at R&E Cycles, cleaning, helping to fix bicycles, and building small bike parts. 

I’ve attended Berean since I was twelve, after my family moved here from Grand Rapids, Michigan.  One of the highlights of my time here was the Puerto Rico mission trip I went on between my freshman and sophomore years of high school.  In Puerto Rico I painted a house in the barrio, helped to construct a water slide at a youth camp, and gave my testimony in the church.  The trip was a life-changing experience for me.

After I graduate I’m excited to start working at International Gear Technologies.  I may go to college at some point, but for now I’m looking forward to getting some great work experience. 

Graduation Stuff and False Advertising

This morning I glanced at the calendar and realized it's the day Zach is supposed to have his graduation write-up ready for the church bulletin.  It's Graduation Sunday in a couple weeks.  That means that all the high school seniors get up on stage and the youth pastor talks to/about them individually, and then prays with the group.  Plus, like I said, the bulletin has a few paragraphs about each of them with their senior picture.  There's also a bulletin board out in the hallway leading into the foyer, and on it is all of their graduation announcements.  After church there's a luncheon, and each graduate has a table with stuff on it that represents them...pictures, interests, etc.  It's a really great thing that the church does, but it takes a little bit of work leading up to it.  All that to say, Zach spent his lunch break today writing his blurb.  It sounds nice, I think!

So the other day I made this based on a post I saw on FB:

source

It's called "salted caramel pretzel brownies" and that picture lies.  Mine didn't look a dang thing like that.  With mine everything was melted together in one big, brown, sticky mess.  Of course, I was making them for a picnic we were going to with several other families.  The worst disasters always happen when you're trying to impress other people, don't they?  Argh.  Anyway, I was so embarrassed that my contribution resembled the poop of someone who recently ate a lot of pretzels that we ended up stopping at Costco and getting a pineapple upside-down cake instead. 

Today Stuff

Here's a little piece of the other song Drew will be playing at the audition today.

Yesterday there was a rainbow right outside our front door.  I've seen more rainbows since living in WA than I did in the whole 35 years I lived in MI.

Last night I had a dream that I was a leader at one of those Pioneer Girl sleepovers that I used to be a part of.  It was me, several other women, and all the girls.  When it was time for the girls to get into their sleeping bags and go to bed for the night, one of them wouldn't stop pretending to snore.  The other adults and I were annoyed, because this kid was really laying it on thick, but we thought it would stop sooner if we just ignored it.  I mean, who can keep that up?  But this girl did!  She sounded like a Russian warhorse, and it just went on and on. Finally I walked over to her to give her a piece of my mind for keeping everyone awake, and I realized she really was sleeping and that noise was actually coming out of her involuntarily.

Soon after that I woke up from my dream and guess what?  (You know already, don't you?)  Mike was the one who was snoring, and to deal with it my brain made it part of a storyline.  You know how people sometimes have to develop a split personality to handle extreme trauma?  It was kinda like that.  Anyway, I woke him up and asked him to turn onto his side, and he finally stopped. I must not have been completely awake, though, because I remember thinking, "Oh good!  Everyone is going to be so happy!"

Audition Song

Well, Drew's audition for the house band is tomorrow at 3:15.  Tonight he let me video him practicing one of his songs.

Different Things

So this happened to me today:

I was totally counting on the map app on my phone to tell me exactly how to get somewhere, and just when she (it's got a woman's voice) got me really far away from home and totally dependent on her, she told me she "lost GPS." And then she was silent. I became one of those crazy I-talk-to-inanimate-objects kinds of people. "What?! Wait! No! Come back!"

And this was taken by Baylee recently:

And here's a memory:

When we were growing up my brother's motto (which was unspoken, but I figured it out) was:  Never do a chore properly the first time it's given to you, or it will become your job for life.

He got out of so much work that way!  The only time he let it lapse was the time my mom told him to clean the oven.  He accidentally did a great job and, sure enough, that became his permanent duty forevermore.  Amen. 

Wafers and Nails and Unpleasant Odors

About a week or so ago Baylee babysat Connor and Ollie, the two little boys who live down the street.  While she was there Conner, who's a 1st grader at a Catholic school, said, "Oh!  I know!  Let's play Jesus!"  He ran and got some Cheezits out of the kitchen cupboard and told Baylee to stand on the other side of the room.  Then he said, "Okay, now walk over to me, and when you get here I'll give you some body of Christ!"

Tonight a girl painted Drew's nails at the SofR.  He's pretty pleased with it, but I'm not sure if that's because of the attention from the girl or the rocker look. 

Despite spending hours with an ominously gurgling stomach, the dog didn't end up having any accidents on the carpet.  He did, however, go through much of the day smelling like he died and just hadn't realized it yet. 

Quick Stuff

Drew made me laugh this morning.  We were standing in the kitchen making breakfast, and he mentioned that he needed someone to take him to the guitar store to get more strings.  Then he started talking about his new guitar and its "Floyd Rose."  Here's the Wikipedia article on what that means, but the short version is that it's a special thingie (a "locking tremolo" if you want to get technical) on some electric guitars that keeps them in tune, but makes them very difficult to string.  Drew said, "If you think I got mad the first time I tried to put strings on my new guitar, you should hear some other people's stories!"  (That first time it took Drew, who had been restringing his own guitar since he was eleven years old with no problem, 6 hours.  He was furious.  LOL)  He went on to add, "I watched a YouTube video about it, and the guy in the video said that if you're going to own a Floyd Rose you need to be at least eighteen, and you need to be enrolled in anger management classes."

Baylee's been doing some of her school outside lately, because the weather is so beautiful.  Here she is reading a biography about the Wright brothers.

As I'm sitting here writing this the dog is lying at my feet, and his stomach is making the weirdest noises almost nonstop.  I'm nervous about what this might mean for our carpet. 
     

Sad

Off the top of my head I can think of three people...two that I know personally and one who I've never met, but whose blog I used to read...who have walked away from their Christianity.  They're on my mind today.  This is my own experience, and maybe it isn't true across the board, and maybe it's just a coincidence that they all happen to be this way, but here's what I've noticed:  None of them seems happy.  They all come across as fighting the world.

It's weird, because the two I know used to be so much fun.  We would laugh to tears.  Some of my best memories, in fact, from childhood, college, and early marriage are with them.  Now?  It's almost like they're not the same people.  It makes me wonder if they were always like that, but they hid it, or if they changed.  And if they changed is it because they're fighting an internal battle or is it because they're defensive?  Or both?

I don't know.  I'm just kinda sad.   

Wordless Wednesday, Except with Words

If I never see this set-up again...

...it'll be too soon.

(Almost finished.  I just have to make it to the end of the month.)

Fingers and Arms

The other day I was cleaning, and I caught the nail of the middle finger of my right hand on a snag in a cloth.  Somehow when I pulled away (not even realizing I was caught) it ripped the entire edge of the nail off, even down into the...how do you say it?...bed?  quick?  The part that's not supposed to come off under any circumstances.  It bled for ages, and now, days later, it still hurts like you can't believe.  You'd be surprised how many things you use the edge of the nail of your middle finger for.  You need it for pretty much everything, actually:  washing your hair, writing, tucking in your shirt, etc.

That reminds me of something that happened when I was a kid.  My mom was upstairs cleaning or maybe dismantling an old-fashioned wooden cradle, when suddenly she started crying out for help.  I ran up there as fast as I could and found her in terrible pain, with her finger caught in the cradle.  You know how they say that in times of emergency you get superhuman strength?  Yeah, that didn't happen.  I just started grabbing and yanking stuff in a panic, and after awhile something gave way and she got out.

My grandma, though?  She really did have one of those superhuman experiences.  When my uncle was really young he was messing around with the wringer and got his arm caught in it.  I guess it was extremely harrowing.  My grandma couldn't get him out, so she ended up pulling the thing apart with her bare hands.  That's always been one of those amazing family stories, and I love it because it makes my grandma seem like Wonder Woman, but it begs the question:  What the heck was my uncle doing putting his arm through the wringer???   I mean, think about it.  Didn't you have to turn the crank to make it work?  That means he was turning it while simultaneously feeding his own body part through the machine.  Either he was a doofus or I'm not understanding that story correctly.  

Kinda...well...Hilarious

My sister, who works in a middle school as a piano accompanist, posted this on FB this morning.

"I received this lovely card yesterday from a sixth grader. Upon closer inspection, I realized that he may not be as fond of me as I thought."

PS:  A conductor's baton?  A pencil? 

What Baylee's Doing Lately in School

It's nearing the end of the school year, and Baylee is chugging away, slowly but surely finishing up all her subjects.  Quite awhile back she started doing 4 days at a time of Daily Language Review, which made it so that she was able to complete it a couple weeks ago.  Last night she took her very last spelling test.  That means she's down to 7 subjects.

English:

She just finished a little unit on dictionary work, which was easy in every way except one.  It took forever for her to wrap her mind around guide words.  That is, she had a hard time answering a question like, "If 'giant' and 'gilt' are the guide words on a dictionary page, would 'ginger' be found on that page?"  It's weird, because she can find anything in a dictionary and put any list of words in alphabetical order, but when she has to think of it in this one way, she freezes.

Now she's on to writing good paragraphs, and that's going to transition into writing good 1-page essays.  Then she'll be done for the year.

Math:

I love these last chapters of math, at least in elementary and Jr. high, because that's where they stick the fun stuff.  Baylee's been working on a graphing chapter, where she's learning about things like mean, median, mode, and range, and how to read some pretty complicated graphs. Have you ever heard of box-and-whisker plots?  That's what we spent yesterday discussing.
  
Writing:

(Her English curriculum includes writing, but not enough in my opinion.  Because of that we've supplemented with this separate program called Writing Strands.)  Baylee's down to her last couple writing assignments.  She just finished one in which she had to tell a story...the same story...twice.  The first time she had to tell it in the past tense from one character's point-of-view, and the second time she had to tell it in the present tense from a different character's point of view.  She did a great job!

History:

Right now Baylee's learning about the Great Depression.  Just as an aside, today I asked Mike a question about the Great Depression.  I asked him why people blamed Hoover, when, really, he had just gotten into office right before everything fell apart.  In my opinion it just doesn't seem like it could be his fault.  Mike and I were standing in the living room discussing this, and within five minutes all three kids had wandered in and listened.  It ended up being a spontaneous family talk about that time period and economics in general. 

Reading:

Baylee's got two books going right now.  One's called Little Britches:  Father and I Were Ranchers, and the other is Great Wheel.

Bible:

Baylee just finished reading through Jonah.  She's also memorizing all of Psalm 19.

Science:

In science she's on a chapter about ecology.  Today she got all excited and called out to me, "Mom!  I finally get why that movie that was out awhile back is called The Host!"  Then she explained the concept of parasitism, and how in the movie the humans were the hosts and the aliens that took over their bodies were like parasites.  lol  Whatever works, I guess.


And that's (almost the end of) 7th grade at our house!

Something Coming Up

In about a week and a half Drew will be auditioning for the "house band."  It's the group of kids the SofR sends out whenever they're asked to perform in the community.  The audition consists of playing one song chosen by the school (they tell the kids which song about a month in advance, so they can learn it) and one chosen by the kid.  Also, the student has to answer one theory question, which they're not told beforehand.

Here's the song the school picked for the guitarists to learn.  It doesn't change much until about 2:05.  At that point it gets kinda fun.

And here's the song Drew chose to play for them.  It gets really fast and crazy at about 40 seconds.  There's also a solo part, which for some reason this guy doesn't do.

Oh, here you go!  This other guy in the rubber ducky pajamas does just the solo part.

 

I'm nervous for Drew, but I'm staying out of it.  He's preparing for this completely by himself, and that's the way he wants it.  And, really, what could any of us do to help?

Bad News

(At least it's bad news for me.  You might not care.)  One True Media, the site I've used for years to format and share almost all my videos, is closing down.  That means I've got to get all my videos off of there by May 31st or they'll be lost, and that's going to be a huge job.  It also means that none of the videos I've posted on this blog will work after that date.  That's the part I'm most bummed about.  I mean, I guess I could go through and fix them all...upload them to YouTube or something and then reshare...but ugh, what a ton of work.  I've tried hard to maintain things here, keep them working properly no matter how many years go by.  There have been a few little issues with pictures from long ago posts that were lost, but this is just on a different level.

Did I mention I'm beyond bummed?

The Intermittent Fasting Diet

I've been doing this for a few days now...close to a week...and here's what I've found:

• The hunger pangs were never really that bad, which was great.  What's even greater is that by about day 4 they were almost gone.  It's weird, but according to the book (The Fast-5 Diet and Fast-5 Lifestyle) and the forum it's normal.  Your body gets used to the schedule.
• During my 5-hour eating window I can't eat anywhere near as much as I did pre-diet.  In fact, that "full sooner" feeling happened really early on.  I've also discovered that if I ignore it I'm uncomfortable and tired for hours. 
• I've lost 6 pounds so far!  I know it'll slow down a lot, but for now I'll take it!

Couple Quick Pics...

...from the weekend

I finally ordered Zach's senior pictures for our home.  I've got an 8x10 hanging in the hallway, and this 5x7-set on the piano.

Baylee's friend Molly came over on Sunday afternoon.  For awhile they went outside bundled up in winter coats and carrying an umbrella.  Our 80-degree weather is long gone, I'm afraid.

Baylee's annual trip to Lake Chelan with Molly's family is almost here.  She's so excited.  She absolutely loves those five days spent camping.  This year she started counting down (with a countdown app on her iPod) while there were still hundreds of days to go.  LOL

Questions

I was talking to my mom on the phone the other day, and she had a couple little questions about Zach's graduation announcement.  It made me think that maybe other people are wondering as well, so I'll go ahead and answer the questions here.  (Of course, I answered my mom already!)

Why does it say "South Ridge Christian Academy," when he's actually homeschooled?

Because for his high school years we chose to homeschool using an "extension school."  South Ridge Christian Academy is a real private school, with students, in Ohio.  Besides being a brick-and-mortar school, though, they also, for a price, send their curriculum out to students to do at home.  Other than the payment, our obligation to them is to have Zach complete all the material, to send in Zach's tests quarterly, and to keep and send in records of attendance and explanations of work done in non-school activities (like karate or music lessons).    The school keeps records and transcripts, and they give report cards quarterly.  After graduation they issue a diploma.

Why does it say May 30th?

I chose that date as his graduation day because that's the last day of his school year.  South Ridge has a calendar, and we have to follow it.   


So there it is! 

The Diet Lately

So you guys are probably wondering whatever became of Nutrisystem.  Here's my report/review:  It works fine, but...

1. It's expensive.  Like sell-your-firstborn expensive.
2. You get sick of the food.  That's not to say that the food isn't good, because most of it is (Some of it really isn't.), but you just get tired of it.

That said, I cancelled my membership after two months.  I got pretty discouraged for awhile as I looked for something else to try, but I'm feeling hopeful now, because Mike and I are doing something new, and we're doing it together:  intermittent fasting.

Have you heard anything about intermittent fasting?  It's kind of the new thing in the dieting world, and we first heard about it through a friend of ours from church.  He tried a form of IF (intermittent fasting) called the 5:2 Diet, and he lost a bunch of weight.  The way 5:2 works is that you eat what you want 5 days of the week, and then on 2 nonconsecutive days you fast.  But even then it's not a total fast.  You get to eat 500 calories on a fasting day if you're a woman, and 600 if you're a man.  Mike's doing this version, and he's doing very well with it.

I'm doing it a different way.  (There are several different ways.  Each works.  You choose one based on what you think fits into your lifestyle the best.)  I'm following something called The Fast-5 Diet.  The entire thing can be summed up in five words:  "Eat within five consecutive hours."  That is, you choose a five-hour window that works for you...it can be any five-hour window...and you only eat within it.  The other nineteen hours of the day you completely fast.  You can have black coffee, water, tea, or anything noncaloric, but that's it.  Anyway, I'm doing well, too!

Maybe this is the ticket for both of us?  I don't know.  I hope so.  The difference between this and everything else I've ever tried is that this is truly more of a "way of eating" than a diet.  It's something a person could follow forever.  And by the way, the benefits from fasting, even intermittent fasting, are huge.  They go beyond weight loss and into overall health.

I'll keep you posted.   

Sibling Love

Yesterday on FB, in honor of "Throwback Thursday," my sister, Lindsey, posted this picture of the two of us.

My response was, "Really?  That's the picture you chose?"  I mean...!  It did end up being a pretty funny thread, though, especially after my brother joined in:

Eric [talking to Lindsey]:  Is that David Cassidy next to you?  Wait...no...it's Chachi from Happy Days, isn't it?
Me:  LOL  You guys suck.
Eric:  I'm just kidding.  You were a very handsome young man.

I can laugh now, but I do want to defend myself somewhat by pointing out that the haircut was my mom's idea.  The whole thing reminds me of a conversation my brother and I had when he was about 8 years old and I was around 11:

Me:  Hey, if I had a different name, what do you think it should be?
Eric:  Chris.
Me:  What do you mean?  Like Christina or Christie?
Eric:  No, like Christopher.

Sigh. 

Thursday

We've been having the most gorgeous summer-like weather here!  It's in the 80s today.  Other than that my only news is that we're swamped with end-of-the-school-year work, which is why I haven't written lately.  Actually, I haven't been online much at all.

I do have a few pictures to show you, which, I'm just realizing, are all Baylee-related.

Last weekend Baylee had her friend Katie over to spend the night.

Enjoying the sunshine...

Baylee took this picture this morning.