I begin this blog entry with an updated picture of our kitchen table!!!!!!!!!  Exciting, yes?

It is exciting to me (suzy homemaker that I am) because Rich and I picked up our new chairs and bench today.  Isn’t it fine to be ADDING chairs to a table? 

We bought our set YEARS ago, when we had fewer children…and now that we have seven, we needed more chairs.

As soon as Rich carried them in, I got to work scrubbing the old stuff so it matched the new, and Seth helped me.  We also added another leaf to the table.

With seven chairs and a bench on the end that seats two, there are nine places, just right!

I promptly started another puzzle, and Jacob got out his art stuff…….enjoying the new space together.

A yummy smelling candle and the last remaining flowers from my bouquet that’s been hanging around for weeks~

 

Rich and Grace were standing at the end of the table talking to me as I worked on sorting the pieces to the puzzle, and I saw a photo opportunity with Father and Daughter, both wearing gray.   ((oh I love them))

 

It was in the thirties today with an even COLDER wind blowing but I was restless to get outside.  Grace and Caleb agreed to walk along with me.  Grace took pictures with my cell phone and I took along my big camera, of course~

A Gracie picture~ of one of their most cherished forts ever.  Doesn’t it look snug and cozy?

I love this picture she took, of me taking a picture (of her boots) she was standing on a fallen down tree.

 

Admiring a tree~(the same one pictured above, with the hole in it) it had a crack going all the way up it, quite mysterious and lovely.

 

My boots were wet and my feet got sooooo numb and cold that I had to run back to the house to put different ones on, so I got lots of good exercise.  I found G and C waiting for me on the hill. 

We walked across the stream at this place, we had to hold the railing and step carefully on the rocks.  Grace and Caleb must have done it before because they weren’t nervous like I was.

Caleb made me laugh when he got to this rock (I was right behind him)…and he said, “Oh, watch out, it’s a slimy rock.  Mom, be careful, it’s covered with allergy!”

((((he meant=algae))))  Grace, in her teacher-tone, corrected him promptly.

Oh, how I loved walking and talking with my two little friends.  Caleb is 7 and Grace is 13.  We had such fun out in the cold air.

Half a mile from the house I found one of our garbage can lids.  “WHAT is THIS doing all the way over here?”  I cried.

“Oh, David carried that as a shield when we came here during hunting season,” Caleb explained.

(He was protecting himself from getting shot.)

Caleb jumped off this fallen down tree (on the roots pulled up with the ground).

(Jenny, this is that famous place where you fell down.  )

This, I believe, is a beautiful gall, emptied and hollow.  I tried to pick the branch to bring it home but the gall flew off and we couldn’t find it.

A gull is “an abnormal growth formed in response to the presence of insect larvae, mites, or fungi on plants and trees, esp. oaks.”

When we got back home, I was so hungry that I set to work making a pasta dish (no recipe) with whole grain angel hair pasta, olive oil, garlic, broccoli, and diced tomatoes, seasoned with salt, pepper, parsley, and Parmesan cheese.  Rich and Grace ate it, too.  A delicious early dinner.

And…..I finished Jane Eyre today, what a WONDERFUL STORY, one of my most favorite books ever.  (this was my 2nd reading).  I enjoyed it so much I asked Rich (when we were out today) if I could go into the bookstore and he said “YES” (he hardly ever tells me no to anything, so kind and wonderful) and……

The bottom book is the one I finished today, and the top three are the new ones.  I started Villette today.

(Yes, I intended to read War and Peace next but I have to get the Bronte sisters out of my system first).  Such deliciousness.

 

Rich just left with four of the boys and I am here at home with Grace, Sarah Joy, and Caleb. I am LOVING the longer days, it’s 6:39 and still broad daylight.  I’m going to putter around the house now and do a little cleaning and preparing for Lord’s day tomorrow.

((((much love))))