VBS and Anniversary Trip

 

Firstly, what's going on with farming around our house.

They sprayed the fields around our house. 

I wanted to show how massive this sprayer was. But I guess the land and sky and trees are even more massive, because this looks like a little toy tractor in the picture. 

I took this picture on my walk back home. 

On this day I walked toward the Embree's on Nadine Lane. Which I guess I'm not supposed to call it a lane because it's always been called The Gravel Road, and the gravel drive leading up to our house was called The Lane, and the road now named "Montana" is definitely not "Montana" because no one else around here would call it that. It's just The Road with perhaps something like "West of the House" tacked on. 

Anyway, I was walking The Gravel Road back home from the Embree's, and I thought the juxtaposition of the fields ~ green soybeans and sandy yellow corn tops ~ and just beyond that, the bins behind our house ~ it was very pretty.

Some kind of leafy vine growing up the corn. 

We were wanting to visit Mark Twain Lake and do some swimming, but we found out the water was too high and therefore closed. So we went to visit Mark Twain Cave instead.

By the way, Jesse James is the kids' distant cousin via Mimi's family.

This is the cave Mark Twain visited often and featured in Tom Sawyer. It's a labyrinth cave instead of the wide open cavernous ones we visited in Texas. 

Christy Franke Photography

Our church had VBS this week. This boy is also in my Sunday school class. 

Christy Franke Photography

We had a lot of really great volunteers and leaders putting it on. Jonathan was a crew leader as soon as he could get off of work. Phoebe was in the nursery and changed her first diaper.

Christy Franke Photography

Harrison and I were helpers in the kitchen. I got to work with this lovely group of ladies behind the food table there. They were a hoot to work with.

And Phillip and I celebrated our 21st Anniversary this weekend!

I had him take a picture of us at Taco Bell because Taco Bell seems to be our go-to for our Anniversary. We were gonna do something big for our 10th, and we had a baby instead. So we went to Taco Bell. We thought maybe for our 20th we'd do something big, but we had a closed-down country instead. And we were taking Liz to college. We just happened to stop at a Taco Bell as we were driving to Missouri last year, and it turned out perfect to be at Taco Bell right on the anniversary day when we had practically forgotten it was even the day.

So this year we also stopped for lunch at Taco Bell.

Phillip planned a fun trip with our first night being at The Elms in Excelsior Springs. 

The shades of night were falling fast, 

As through an Alpine village passed 

A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice, 

A banner with the strange device, 

      Excelsior! 

I had to look up this poem and read it to Phillip. I've always wondered what kind of mission that guy thought he was on that he had to keep going further up 'mid snow and ice. Anyway, it was not cold this weekend. But we did have a storm! 

The hotel was built around the 1920's and is supposedly haunted. We had gotten some late night Waffle House bowls and were driving back in the rain when we noticed all the lights around were out. Sure enough, the electricity was out in the 'haunted' hotel. It was plenty spooky walking down those long, low hallways back to our room. 

But isn't it amazing that we all have flashlights on us these days. At least until the phone battery dies.

We also went to a production at the Lyceum Theatre in Arrow Rock. It was fun to see a live play with all the stage decoration and costuming. There were a lot of little girls there because it was The Little Mermaid. We will definitely have to go back for more, and I would love for Phoebe to be able to see where they make their costumes.

Dinner was at the newly re-opened J. Huston Tavern ~ the oldest continuously operating restaurant west of the Mississippi. I guess they had a kitchen fire and had to remodel the kitchen, and this was their first week back. They did well!

I had to get succotash as my side because you just never see succotash on a menu.

We stayed at a lovely bed and breakfast in Arrow Rock. It is really a cute little town. I could totally see us retiring there and running some kind of small business. They're pretty much a tourist town. We met a young couple who moved there three years ago from North California. They run the ice cream shop and make their own ice cream (and grow what ingredients they can). They really like it in Missouri.

That was an awesome week to end off the summer. We start school, Lord willing, on Monday. 

The kids can't wait to do Math.

Jon Turns 17 and Liz Visits

 

The sunflowers are blooming! They are so fun. We saw a yellow Goldfinch sitting on top of the tall sunflower the other day. He was bending over to maybe poke seeds out of the middle. Bright yellow on bright yellow was delightful! 

A sad story for our little kittens. Momma cat got scared by a dog the other day, and we didn't see the cats for a while and Abigail wasn't eating either. They are starting to come out from under the house now, but we haven't seen the soft gray ones ~ only the two little tabbies. So I'm really afraid they are not with us anymore. 

Sad face.

Jonathan invited kids over for his birthday. 

They played games and ate food. They are a fun, rambunctious crowd, and we're always pleased to have them.

And Elizabeth was here this weekend too! 

It's so much fun to have all the kids together. They are hilarious to listen to. She'll be starting her sophomore year of college in a couple of weeks. She's had a good summer doing paintings and photography around Joplin, making more knitting patterns, working at the dry cleaner, hanging out with her summer-home family. 

Our before-bed hangouts are a joy for us parents. We love you, kids.

Galen and John Visit

Phillip's siblings travelled back home, so we got to spend some time with them this weekend. 

Our wildflowers behind the house have been blooming well. They look better close up than far away though. There's a lot of green, so it can look weedy from far away. We do have several sunflowers coming into bloom, so I'll try to get a picture of those soon. 

The kittens have been playing "Jungle Attack" in the flower bed, so there are a lot of flattened spots now. But they're cute, so we'll allow it.

I'm trying to give my new pile of school books as low a profile as I can so Phillip won't notice how many I've purchased. The number of books did sneak up on me..... But we are truly going to read them all.

We have a misty fog over the fields many mornings.

Galen flew up from Florida, and we were so happy to have her over to see the house she grew up in. I love to hear them tell stories about living here.

We haven't been around for Mimi's birthday in many, many years. We were glad to be able to celebrate with you, Mimi!

John, Galen, and Phillip, with Mimi and Papa.

Jonathan got to shoot Uncle John's gun this time.

 

The Harris' Visit Vandalia and Other Summer Stuff

This is the busiest summer we've had in a long time! 

We are settling into our town and church and enjoying life with people.

Harrison did swim lessons last week. He and another boy were the oldest ones there, so I thought for a minute that they wouldn't learn much. The first day they seemed to just be diving for toys. But the second day...... The second day they were supposed to jump off the diving board and then off the high dive. 

This was a major nerve-wracking experience for both older boys. And I noticed Harrison did a lot of sitting by the side of the pool. So after some talking and lots of encouragement from everyone at home and some talks about courage and "You can't just sit out. You have to at least try, even if you fail....", he did it. The third day he did an actual dive off the diving board and then jumped off the high dive. And the fourth day he passed the swim test to be able to "be in the deep end." 

We were proud of him for getting back up there while afraid. 

That last day he made a keen observation: "The scariest time is right before you do the thing. When you actually do the thing, it's not scary."

The church had a picnic and pool party last Sunday night. These kids were playing Go Fishing after supper. Adorable. One of the boys is in my Sunday school class this summer. It's been a great way for me to get to know some families at church.

Paul and Elayne dropping in to say 'Hi.' (I love it when they do!)

I think Papa was telling Jon something about growing up in this house or farming. I love all those family stories.

We have seen kittens from our cat Abigail! 

There are four: two gray with white paws and two gray tabbies. They come out to play but are pretty skittish. Abigail has gotten friendlier though and will let us pet her and such. She's very awkward at affection, so it's funny to watch her try. But she's trying. 

Some kids helping out for VBS workday. 

We wrapped a bunch of boxes and the kids painted them to look like suitcases.

We had a gorgeous lightening storm the other night. 

The storm did damage to a nearby town though. 

One of the library programs was a lady from town who just had a middle school fiction book published by Harper-Collins. She read a chapter and talked to us about getting published and such. It was a fun time, especially for us adults. Harrison was one of the kids who won one of her books though, so he's working on reading it right now.

Look at this monstrous thing in our backyard. Those tires are taller than I am! I think that's a sprayer.

The field of beans to the east of us. 

This has been a very wet year; the wettest Papa remembers having seen. I don't know what that means for crops. Every time Phillip steps outside he says, "Yep, it's just a swamp out here." We've had a lot of standing water around our place. 

And we just finished having Cody Harris and his kids over for the weekend. Emmey was going to attend a friend's wedding an hour from us, so they stayed here while she attended the wedding and came back. 

And Cody's birthday was this past week, so we decided it was time to acknowledge his birthday somewhere adjacent to the actual day. 

There's an ongoing joke with Phillip and Cody because Phillip never remembers his birthday and Cody always calls or texts for Phillip's. We didn't even have Cody's birthday on our calendar till last year. So since he was going to be here, Phillip decided to get 28 cards (that's how many years he's known Cody) and sign them and date them for all the past birthdays. 

And then Cody had 28 cards to open and read in front of all of us. 

It was a lot of fun on our part. Now if we can just keep it up and remember next year.....

Happy Birthday, Cody!

This pie was a joint Harris-Gore effort. 

I made pie crust, Cody provided cherries from his Aunt's (?) cherry tree. And Emmey rolled out the dough to make a cherry pie and some cute little tarts.

Chris Harley came to visit us since he lives not too far away. He's good friends with Cody too. 

We had good visiting time ~ talking about ministry, reminiscing about college days. It was a lot of fun to have them all here.

Cody, Chris and the older kids shooting guns in the backyard. 

Jonathan enjoys this a lot, and I think he's fairly good at it.

We played our traditional Scrabble game. 

Emmey won, Jon was second, and Phoebe and I were somewhere down the line. 

Liz just texted me this picture of her and Nana. Apparently my parents stopped today to take her to lunch in Joplin as they make their way down to Louisiana with their moving truck. My parents are moving back down south. 

Whew! What a week of activity! I'm so grateful to be living here.