Teenagers, Trees, and Jello

Here are the turkey vegetable meatloaf cups and sides that my daughters made for dinner last night. They also made chocolate chip cookies, which may have been a more persuasive photo to go with this story: I saw a post on facebook the other day that said, "Raising teenagers is like nailing jello to a tree." Immediately, I defended teens by saying that these are the good years when everything parents had been teaching finally started to stick. As usual, this was followed by other moms posting fatalistic remarks about the teen years. My teens share my facebook page, and they brought up that post in conversation later. Both daughters said that when they saw what our friend posted, they quickly searched to see what I had said. (I felt proud that they suspected me of speaking up on behalf of their age group.) Then Becky said that if she'd had an account, she'd have told them that their low expectations and statements like this were one of the reasons they weren't getting the results they wanted. It was rewarding to hear from the horse's mouth that our high expectations and trust in our teens do help them thrive. But the most rewarding aspect of our parenting is the turkey vegetable meatloaf cups and delicious homemade cookies!

Road Kill Tuesday

Tonight I learned exactly what is meant by the saying, "I jumped out of my skin!" I hadn't understood the full unpleasantness of this phrase until I experienced it first hand. Apparently the girls and neighbor boy found a dead racer snake on their jog today and laid it on my kitchen counter, all the better to google it. Since I'm not the type of homeschool mom who can truthfully participate in "Menu Mondays" and "Submissive to my Husband Wednesdays," I figured I'd start a new trend in Christian homeschool circles with my classy photo.

Nutty Squirrel

Here's Lottie.

Forget Chicken Tractors. Chicken Bikes!

I went outside and saw these girls biking up the driveway, coming home from having taken their chickens for a ride to the mailbox. The chickens like it! Becky went out and got on her bike, and the hens gathered around obviously begging for a bike ride. My camera battery couldn't make it to get that image for you, but trust me, it's hilarious to see chickens who want to ride bikes.

Becky, Sweet Sixteen

Here's beautiful Becky with the cake she made and frosted herself. We had a quiet celebration with Gretchen and Sarah, Katie's friend who's visiting for the week. I've promised Becky a "real" party when things settle down and when Daddy's in town. Thanks Fat Suburbanite Dad (or Mrs. Fat Suburbanite Dad, as the case may be) for the tribute on your blog to our treasure of a daughter.

Bambi

In absolutely no particular order are these photos of our experience with a fawn yesterday morning. I think I'll tell the story in the order in which the pictures should have appeared, and leave it to you to guess which photo should go where. Once upon a time Danny and Mollie were having coffee under the oak tree when suddenly they heard the alarming cry of a baby goat in trouble down in the woods. Mollie checked on the baby goats, which were still safely in the pen, while Big Dan ran to the source of the noise and discovered a fawn being dragged home by Jeb, the puppy, to serve as a new and improved chew toy. Dan grabbed the fawn and brought it to the house. The cute baby deer got rested up, the dogs got tied up, and the girls took him back to where we found him. He went immediately to a flattened place in the grass to wait for his momma like a good boy. She came for him soon afterward and they all lived happily ever after. The End. The sequel will star Fat Suburbanite Dad as "The Deer Slayer" in a year and a half.

The Cat Days of Summer

I had taken a picture of Sirius Black also, sleeping soundly at the back door mat, but it was blurry. How can anyone blur a photo of Sirius? It's not like there's any action in those shots. The cats have been sleeping in the a/c throughout the heat wave over the last week or so. They slept during the derecho, or wind storm, that came through like gang busters on Friday night. They slept through the severe thunderstorm last night which gave us an inch of rain. I hope that looking at this picture of Debbie in repose causes your spirit to become peaceful and relaxed.