Grieving

I never knew how much I depended on my camera until it had it's unfortunate travels through the laundry.  I suppose such is the case with so many other things in life--we take them for granted until they are gone.  I suppose I have been in denial these past couple weeks in hopes that the camera would come back to life.  But, alas, there was no such miracle, and though I'm angry at the inconvenience, I have come to accept my loss.  See that?  I just went through the entire grieving cycle for my camera. Okay.  Glad that's over.  Time for a new one.

Camping over Labor Day

Better late than never!  Here are some pics of our family camping trip we took over labor day weekend. 

Ashlyn kept putting EVERYTHING in her mouth (as evidenced by her grubby face).

Our little beatle friend.  He kept crawling around our campsite.  It's hard to tell by this picture but he was GINORMOUS. I'd say a good 2-3 inches long.

We only went one night, but I'm not sure we would've lasted another night anyway.   We tried having all of us sleep in the tent, but, as you can imagine, these three little ones were far too excited to go to sleep.  The older two didn't go to sleep until 10:30ish and although Ashlyn fell asleep much earlier, she kept rolling around and waking everyone else up.  So, about 2 am we moved her to sleep in the back of the van and I slept in the passenger seat to make sure she was okay.  There she slept soundly until the sun rose around 6 am.  Both Shiloh and I were pretty wasted with fatigue the next morning.  We had toasted poptarts for breakfast, "Shiloh Style":

 

Overall, it was a decent trip.  The kids loved every minute of it, and Ashlyn got some extra fiber in her diet. So hey!

Kindergarten Pictures

Kindergarten pictures came yesterday.  Not too shabby.  I had her hair all cute and curly the morning these pictures were taken. She had stated that she wanted it in "big curls".  However, I could tell when I finished, that it wasn't what she had in mind.  I loved it.  She did not.  And, within an hour she had ripped out the hair ties and made it a mess because she was certain she looked like a "clown".  I sighed, and very quietly (gritting my teeth), straightened her hair and put a "clip in it" just like she requested.  This is her normal daily hair do. Boring and predictable, but what can I say?  I was ever-so dramatic on the day of my kindergarten pictures as well. Remember this picture of me in Kindergarten:

I HATED this red dress with a passion.  My mom insisted I wear it, though.  I ranted, and yelled, but still I was made to wear the wretched red dress.  I still have this vivid memory of the humiliation I felt wearing the detested frock.  Now, 24 years later, as I look back on this picture, I think the dress is quite cute. In fact, it's my favorite school picture and, if I could go back, I'd tell my mom to make me wear it again if given the chance.  Blog therapy.  Sigh.

Magic rice? Not this time.

My family and I went camping this past weekend.  Fun trip.  I will post later.  That's not what this post is about.  This post is about emptying pockets before the wash.  My husband ended our camping trip with our digital camera in the large pocket of his cargo shorts (in it's small camera case, mind).  Naturally the first thing I do when we get back from camping is wash the campfire out of our clothes.  So, can you guess where the camera remained?  Yes, in his pocket.  In fact, it never resurfaced from it's laundering experience until I went to fold the said cargo shorts and found that there was a large lump in the pocket.  The camera was nice and toasty warm without a spot of water on it when I took it out.  The dryer did it's job well.  In fact, the SD card still works and we were able to get the camping pictures off it, no problem!  My hopes raised that perhaps the camera case protected the camera better than I thought, so I unscrewed the little screws and opened the camera up and stick it in a bag of rice over night. (This method has resurrected Shiloh's phone before after it was sucked on by our infant.)  And yet, this morning as I carefully reassembled the camera and gently touched the power button to assess my handiwork, what did I get?  Nothing.  Blank screen.  Dead camera.  Sigh. Is it worth looking up a camera shop to see if they can repair it?  I can just imagine the employee looking at me in dismay as I ask him if he can repair a camera that was submersed in soapy water for 45 minutes and then dried completely by my impressive clothes dryer. Oh well.   At least cameras aren't nearly as expensive to replace as they used to be, right? 

Wood Block, wood block, will you turn into a Bongo Drum?

So, I am a believer in positive reinforcement.  I recently started doing a "Marble Jar" for Eliza and Ezra to reward various good deeds and behaviors.  Both of them spent that last couple of months working hard to fill them up and at last, they are full!  I told them they could pick a reward of some sort at the beginning of this little Marble-Jar venture and both have had very specific items in mind from day #1.

Eliza wanted a pink recorder.  And, while the sounds that come out of it can be somewhat annoying, I can normally count on Eliza to be considerate.  Done!

Ezra wanted a "drum".  He is young enough that I had some liberty to interpret that in a few different ways.  We shopped online and I showed him various children's drums.  Each one either looked cheap or was too expensive.  My heart wanted to purchase him some sweet bongo drums.   You, know, these kind with the beautiful leather tops that make a deep, rich sound? 

But, after considering that (and showing him a few) he was not that interested, and I realized imported bongo drums are my dream, not his. 

So, after perusing Amazon for awhile, Ezra picked this:

It was only $7, so I thought, "Why not?"  Two words to seal my misery!!  We got this item in the mail this morning and it has been a loud, high pitched pounding noise in my house, in my car, and every where he goes ever since!  Why oh why Mr Wood Block, couldn't you be an imported bongo drum??

My Chocolate Lover

On a scale of 1 to 10, I'd say Chocolate is a 7 for me.  I like it enough, but I'm not obsessed.  My husband Shiloh and my daughter Eliza don't like it at all.  Which must have been inherited--what are the chances I'd have two haters in the family???

On the other hand, at just 13 months, baby Ashlyn adores all things chocolate.

"What? I didn't eat the chocolate.  I'm innocent!"

"Alright, alright. You caught me."

"Don't look at me like that.  Diet starts Monday!"

My brother's keeper

I didn't always like my little brother Jens.  In fact, there were several years of my childhood when I wished he would just "get out and stay out"!  But, before those years started (and for many years hence), I have adored him tenderly.  This picture captures one of those moments of 2-year-old rapture at having a baby of my very own! I loved on him nearly to the point of suffocation (that's both figurative and literal--ask me later and I'll tell you the story).  Fortunately for Jens, now I have my own babies to cuddle and kiss.  And while I don't love Jens any less, I think it would be a little awkward for both of us if I stood over his bed and watched him sleep.