Taking Time To Appreciate

Today has been a rough day in so many ways, but I wanted to pause here to reflect on a few pricelessly positive things that are also very mundane.  Josiah stayed home from would have been his sixth day of VPK today.  It seems he’s already caught a bug.  Of course having two kids at home is more difficult than one and I lamented not being able to focus on Elijah, yet again, to make progress on the potty training he’d otherwise so willingly do, but Josiah has been a pleasure in his own ways to have around this morning.  Here’s a couple reasons why:

1.  For whatever reason, Elijah decided to say “no” repetitively when I thought he probably should visit the potty this morning.  Usually he’s a willing spirit where the potty is concerned.  Just when I thought we’d either have an argument or an accident to clean up, Josiah pitched in to “show ‘em how it’s done” and Elijah followed suit.  Situation diffused.

2.  Josiah came to me this morning and said “Elijah wants me to be his brother.”  Um, ok.  I explained that he was whether he wants him to be or not.  Josiah replies, “yeah, but I asked him and he wants me to be.”  That’s pretty sweet, actually :)

3.  Sick kid or not, we had to go to the store.  While there, we saw a girl from his preschool.  Each time we passed her, she got excited and pointed, but he was just nonchalant, though obviously knew her, too.  I asked him details about her but he just wasn’t interested.  As we put groceries in the car I asked him if he even realized that he missed school today and he said he did.  I asked if he minded and he said no.  Discouraged, I asked why.  He said, “just because I love being with you.  I love going to school.  But I just love being with you and Elijah at home.  You are pretty and I love when you are pretty.  And I love the baby.”  The smile I gave him must have been big, because he said something to that effect multiple times throughout the rest of the day just for attention.

4.  While dealing with some potty training on Elijah’s part, Josiah was supposed to be getting the table ready for lunch.  I heard a bang and loud crying, a long break (imagine he’s out of breath and hasn’t recharged yet), then another cry.  I finish the essentials with Elijah while wondering if it is another false alarm with over dramatization (the usual) or a real rare pain.  I rush to him and see a toenail starting to turn purple!  Poor guy.  It felt strangely good to be able to truly empathize with him and tell him how bad I knew it hurt while I held him as he cried rather than having to assure him he’d live and to calm down.  Does that make me bad? :) 

5.  Lastly, Josiah has been learning sign language at church on Sunday nights.  He loves it and teaches us what he learns while we eat dinner afterwards, so we got out our sign language book yesterday.  This is after he pulled up a little chair for Elijah to sit next to him on a stool to learn more sign language.

Now that I’ve focused on the good for a bit, maybe I can face the post-nap afternoon and dinner prep!  Oh, and did I mention that there is the slightest hint of fall in the air today?

FYI: Josiah woke with a fever of 102.2 and I had just been thinking that he seemed to be over it.  But this picture above shows what Elijah continued to do despite us trying to wake him up :)

Day 3

I just thought I’d note this for us:

Josiah really loves school, but when Wednesday morning rolled around he turned grumpy about it.  It turns out he only likes it when he’s not missing out on anything else, but on that day Elijah was going to Mrs. Cindy’s and I was going to work.  He didn’t like the fact that everyone else was going about his old routine without him.  In fact, he insisted that we not tell Mrs. Cindy where he was because he wanted to tell her he was in school because she’d “be so happy”.

Josiah woke up an hour before he needed to and the first thing out of his mouth was that he didn’t want to sleep at school.  He was worried about not taking “Rabbit” so he wouldn’t be comfortable and wanted to know if he could suck his thumb.  Sleep and food are dear to his heart, so doing those things there, since he had to stay all day, pushed him beyond his comfort zone.  He fussed about everything under the sun, including wanting to have both his water bottles (remember his attachment to his water bottle in the last post?)

Well, he had a fabulous day and it was the first time he’s told us much about what he did that day.  He love his lunch – hamburgers, fries, peas, and pears.  He raved about how great the pears were.  Oh, and a pretzel, craisin, M&M, and something else mix for snack – “all mixed together, Mommy!”  Yes, we got the details.  With much enthusiasm :)  As for the nap, he was excited about that, too.  He said he slept behind the cubbies and just pulled his blanket up over his face so they couldn’t see his eyes, which means he hid his thumb sucking :)  I bet it was one of his best naps ever!

It looks like this school thing will be successful after all.  Tonight (day 4) he was pointing out all of letters in his Bible and exclaimed “I love letters!”, which is funny because last week he didn’t.

First Day of School!

Well, our firstborn is starting a new era in our and his life.   Josiah started VPK today!  He was so excited, or at least as excited as Josiah can get over a new, unknown event in life :)  Judging by the drop off, he wasn’t really phased by the process, though he was sure to inform us that some kids cried when their parents left.  He was the second kid to arrive, so he witnessed it all.  While, in true Josiah fashion, he hasn’t told us much about it yet, it seems he had a great time.  He was more interested in telling us over and over that they didn’t want him to take his water bottle home with him (it will stay there for him) and complained incessantly about the thirst that he thought he was dying of at the thought of not having water in the car!  And before you think we were depriving him, it was only about a 5 minute drive to Subway where he chose to eat (and drink) in celebration.  Kids are so funny!

Waiting to leave for school!  He has acted like such a big boy today.  Although he’s perfectly capable of putting on his own clothes, he often likes help.  Today, however, he insisted Jacob leave him alone and Josiah walked out of his room with his shoes already on and had even donned a hat!

We are SO relieved that in the past few weeks Josiah’s attitude about school has completely transformed.  A month ago he was “not never going to school!” and was very insistent about this.  He was also disinterested and miserable every time I tried to have our learning time together.  I tried for months to get him to pick out a book bag or other school supplies in efforts to get him interested, but he’d get upset in the store and refuse to let me put anything in the cart.  I’d given up and just started buying the needed things on my own, then one day as we carted past book bags, he saw one that caught his eye and had to have it.  From then on he was hooked on school and went from just stopping the refusal, but not quite accepting it, to talking about it with interest and excitement.  Yay!  And phew!  In the last 2 weeks, especially, he has been picking out letters and initiating learning time.  Sadly, as it turns out, they don’t need book bags for VPK, but thankfully he was ok with leaving it at home.

On our way to orientation.  He was excited to see his school again.

We had his orientation Thursday night.  His teacher, Ms. Merari, is very no-nonsense and I didn’t get any warm fuzzy feelings from her, but she is very structured and made it clear to the parents what our jobs are.  I think she is a little warmer towards the kids.  My teacher friends assure me this is a great thing and that he will flourish.  The funny thing is that she drilled into us that the first job the kids have each morning is to wash hands, then go their desk and copy their names, then go to rug time.  We reviewed this over and over with Josiah all weekend.  This morning he dutifully washed his hands, then headed to his desk only to find that the chairs were all stacked against the wall and there was nothing to write his name on.  He looked so confused until Ms. Merari told him to go straight to rug time.  He looked like he might disagree that that was the next step, then happily went for the toys on the rug.  Such a cute, dutiful little guy!

As for us, I think Jacob and I are more excited for him than he is.  I guess we aren’t the sentimental types because we haven’t shed a single tear.  It helped that we had several appointments lined up for the morning to keep our minds occupied.  I will admit, though, to becoming sad over the past few weeks as I realized what Josiah starting school means to our family.  Aside from the chaos that daily drop offs and pick ups with two younger siblings in tow will cause, I realized that Elijah and I won’t have a Jeep driver to take walks with in the mornings.  And, when the baby comes, I’d so looked forward to having an older sibling to entertain Elijah while I deal with feeding a baby and putting him down for naps.  Also, Josiah looks out for Elijah when they are outside and I’m keeping an eye out from inside…and the list goes on.  I didn’t realize he had such a vital role of responsibility in our lives.  Then there are the fun things like playdates in the mornings and the freedom of being out of town or keeping our own schedule.  I suppose we’ll survive and I know he’ll thrive.

Still excited just before going into class.  You can see the “castle” on the playground in the background behind him.  That is what he is most excited about,  He loved it and was a dirty, sweaty mess when we picked him up!

Ready or not, here we go into our future of school and all it entails!  I can’t wait to watch our little man grow and learn.

First Performance

Back in May, Josiah had his first ever performance in front of an audience when the Ocean Adventure’s semester came to a close at church.  Since Josiah is so shy and hesitant to perform, we went into it just hoping he’d be willing to get on stage.  He did.  He even performed…but not exactly the way he was supposed to!  Sorry for the picture quality.  I did the best I could being far away, having trouble getting a clear shot, being in the dark, and Elijah squirming on me.

Here he is (in front of the girl wearing orange) during rehearsal.  He didn’t participate, but he did just stand there nicely and paying attention.

But here he is during the performance!  I couldn’t believe he did this because he usually will do anything to not draw attention to himself :)  He definitely got most of the attention!

And when he wasn’t lifting his shirt, he just wasn’t participating.  What you cant see here is that he is the only kid with the entire front of his shirt wet thanks to a pre-performance visit to the water fountain.

All we could do was laugh and hope for an improvement next time.  We were just glad he happily went on stage.  Now he is a few weeks into the fall Imagine program and he’s already mastered a verse that I didn’t dream a 4 year old could conquer.   I have to give recognition to Jacob’s patient and persistent work with him to make this happen.  Josiah does, however, refuse to let even his teacher hear him say the verse.  She does report that he’s much less shy and much more involved this go round, so maybe he’s warming to the whole idea.

Extracting Honey

Jacob has been working some serious hours since the spring began.  He’s been busy with his other ladies…the bees.  He has driven them to 3 honey flows; orange, gallberry, and sourwood and has spent countless hours extracting honey after each flow.  Thankfully the end is here for this year, and he gets to slow down and gear up for next year.  Hopefully then he can start cutting back some on his “day job”.

One afternoon, while he was extracting gallberry honey, the boys, Mom, Bill and I paid Jacob a visit.  We hadn’t been involved in the process because he’d mostly been doing it from late at night to the wee hours of the morning, so the boys were sleeping and somebody had to watch them, so I was off the hook.

The first 3 years, Jacob extracted honey in our barn, using a scraper as an uncapper and a hand crank, then a 12 frame extractor the next year.  Last year he moved up to a real uncapper and two extractors that hold 33 frames each, which was Deda’s.  This year he’s moved up in the world and got to use Deda’s equipment in a nice extracting room owned by Lee, a local beekeeper and mentor.Here, is Lee’s really nice equipment.  It takes up nearly half the room and is all automated, producing about 18 drums of honey a day.

Then there’s Jacob’s equipment, which fits nicely in the corner and produces about 6 drums a day, though we are very happy about that.  Here, he is using the uncapper.  The extractor can be seen to his right (there is another behind the boxes on the left), and the holding tank is raised up behind his head in the corner.

Looking into the holding tank.  This is where the newly extracted honey sits for a little while to allow the small pieces of wax to separate out.

His brand:He has some of Deda’s old boxes, too.  Jacob tells me this isn’t a good picture because the brand isn’t in great shape, but I love it anyway.

I’m trying to come up with an idea for a piece of furniture we can make that will use these frames and boxes with both brands.

Jacob says this is NOT what you want to see: brood with honey.  Below is what you DO want to see: all honey.

Test tasting!  They approved!

The final product.  Not all of these are his.  He produced 29 drums, plus some spare 5 gallon buckets.

Another reason the boys and I had stayed away was to limit their bee stings, which are inevitable to some extent.  We decided to risk it, but poor Josiah got the unlucky end of that stick.  He slipped on a wet spot on the floor and fell on top of a bee, which stung his hand.  Poor guy!  It was his second sting ever.  The first one he got at Gram’s house trying to save a lizard from a bee :)  Oddly enough, the week after this second sting, he got stung by a wasp at Grandma’s, then again the next week!  He must be special!

This doesn’t have to do with extracting, but I got a couple pictures of some bees swarming out of one of his hives at home.  For different reasons, they will all congregate on a branch or something near the hive, then all leave at the same time to make another home elsewhere.  This is them congregating and too high in the tree to retrieve.  If noticed and in a good location, they can be placed in a new box and saved.  It has been a bad year for swarms.

Random Summer Fun!

I haven’t been very good at taking pictures lately, but here are some random ones of some of our activities this summer including blueberry picking, blackberry picking, a visit to “Big Daddy” Don Garlits Museum of Drag Racing, and other randomness.

We had a bit of time to spare on our way south for a funeral, so we stopped at the drag racing museum right off the interstate.  We have lived here for 14 years and have never made the stop because we are always in a rush to get where we are going.  I’ve always heard from Deda that we need to go there because he personally knew Don Garlits.  I don’t care about cars, but I thought of Deda the entire time I was there.   I sure do miss him!  Josiah liked the model cars and trucks the best and really wanted to play with them.

You can tell this was during Josiah’s phase of being willing to smile for the camera, but refusing to look at it.

 

We went blueberry picking with Annie, Henry, and Mom.  Due to weather, the picking wasn’t great this year.  Between the poor picking and the eat-as-you-go method the boys used, we didn’t take too many home :)

On our way to go blackberry picking along our dirt road.  We walk/ride almost daily and the boys love eating berries as we go!I love this action shot!  It is so typical – fireman boots, hats, sunglasses, and cool rides.

I never could get the container full and all the berries in their bellies ruined lunch!

 

Josiah had spied this snake in our yard a number of times at the beginning of the summer.  It seemed to stalk us on our porches, in our outside toys, in the grill of my car (with his head sticking out – totally surpirsed me when I walked by!), and in our yard.  It is a harmless snake, but I had just told Jacob it had to go because it kept surprising us, then Josiah found it dead in the road the next day.While doing yard work, I walked towards the spicket and reached for the handle without looking out of habit, then just happened to glance where I was grabbing right before I did!  This snake was sneaky!

Swimming Fun!

At the end of last summer we bought one of those cheap collapsible framework pools on clearance.  For man reasons, I always balked at the idea whenever Jacob mentioned it in the past, but I could see the boys were not comfortable in deep water, so we wanted to give them routine exposure of some sort...so I broke down and we bought the cheap pool to see if we’d really want a real pool one day.

Well…leveling the ground and putting it up didn’t prove to be as easy as we anticipated, and after assembling it and starting to add water 3 or 4 different times, we (Jacob) finally got the job done.   (It has also been a learning curve for us to figure out pool care, but that’s another story.)   The boys loved it with 1-2 feet of water in in it and begged us not to fill it the rest of the way, but I’m proud to say that after just a few short weeks, they’ve gone from refusing to let go of the ladder or us, to independently floating and “swimming” on their own with floaties.  They love it!  Yay!

I love these two pictures.  Josiah always wants to help whether its scrambling eggs or working on a big project.  He’s going to learn so much from Jacob, except how to put up a pool in one try :)  (Jacob gave me a dirty look when he read this!)

But this is what the boys spent most of their time doing…playing in the dirt and mud created by Daddy leveling the ground.

Only Jacob wasted time putting on a bathing suit!

This is what the boys did when they got too cold in the pool.  They sat on the pool’s packaging and shared the screwdrivers to punch holes in it.  I think they had just as much fun doing that!

Prior the fiasco of setting up the pool, we used our Slip ‘N Slide.  It was spontaneous, hence the lack of bathing suits.  Jacob had to participate to show ‘em how it’s done!

Elijah’s about to get wet!

SLIP n’ slide!

My hubby is ripped! :)

So, so cute!

Elijah didn’t really enjoy learning to slide by Jacob pushing him!

The ham of the family.