irielife.net

No, really. I do want to see all family (and other peoples, I suppose) in California.  Which is undoubtedly the most glorious, wonderful, awesome, brilliant, magnificent, marvelous, fantastic, fabulous, glorious, perfect state ever to exist. So glorious and perfect (and everything else) that no words describe.  I’m sure you all agree with me.  If you don’t, exit this blog immediately.  Many strong opinions about such things as West coast beaches being indescribably better than their Eastern counterparts, California being incredibly awesome, and the many reasons why NOT to live ANYWHERE but California will be expressed in this blog.

If you haven’t guessed, it is Camryn writing this post.

So far, a certain Little Mister’s toilet training is greatly improved.  He no longer puts up a fight not to wear underwear. But he does look hilarious in the plastic pants.

Otherwise, nothing is happening. All in all, a very  humdrum Sunday.

Farewell once more friends.  May we reunite on Doran Beach in the glorious state of California.

She fixed the typos. What happened was, she saw me typing the title and wasn’t brave enough to submit to the knowledge that she had actually spelled something wrong. That figures.

I honestly can’t say anything amazing or significant is happening in our lives.

Oh yeah, Caleb is slowly-  s-l-o-w-l-y -(and reluctantly) being toilet trained.

Now, after discovering one post, my first one today, had a title, was published, and was then left titleless for two minutes, I made a shocking discovery.

Allie can edit my posts. And I can edit hers.      That’s just scary, especially if you know us well.  And most of you do.    As for our lives, my birthday is in 2.5 weeks on November 3.  And our usual gargantuan (and that i mean) leaf pile is not very developed. In human life terms, it’s a…well… let’s just say it’s nonexistent. AKA scattered and never previously raked up.  Thanks to a monster mowlawn.  (If you’re not immediate family, then FYI mowlawn is Caleb’s word for lawn mower.)  Well, that’s all…

Oh, one more thing.  My mother thinks I’m already eleven…sort of. The thought pops in sometimes.

However, I am not eleven-at least, not yet.  And that is one of my biggest problems. Or annoyances.

There was a Primary Halloween party yesterday.

In conclusion, I must say one thing.  Allie informed me that it would be best if I inserted the words “leaf pile” after the “and that i mean” parentheses.  SO she can’t spell, but she can tell me if there’s a big error in my blog entry.  Well, that’s typical of her.  And now I am truly done.

Farewell, friends.  May we meet again in the glorious state of California.

THIS WAS CAMRYN WRITING

Well, she’s fixing the typos.

THIS WAS CAMRYN

Did you notice her typos?

THIS WAS CAMRYN

As I am typing this, my play list is on. And Caleb is dancing. And singing. To billy Joel, to be exact.Yeah. He’s really getting into it. Our specific interests:

ME: I mostly listen to Dad’s stuff. I love Natalie Merchant. Others include the cure; the clash; 10,000 maniacs; the Beatles; the Beach Boys; a couple of Green Day songs; and of course Billy Joel. There are plenty of others.

CAMRYN:  Camryn (now I cannot fathom this) HATES Natalie Merchant . Her playlist consists of classical music, Beach Boys, and a few others. She is kind of the odd one out ( no offense meant, but you are the only one who listens to the stuff you do.)

SETH: Seth mostly listens to what I do. Whenever I find a good song, he usually ends up enjoying it too.

RACHEL: Rachel is interesting. She loves to listen to music, and, like Seth, is heavily influenced by my interests. She  also likes classic kid songs, like This Little Light of Mine, and stuff like that. So she will be listening to “I’m a Little Teapot” or something, then suddenly start singing to Billy Joel. It’s amazing what she knows. She can name at least one song by The Smiths, The Cure, Billy Joel, Natalie Merchant, and more. It’s actually quite funny.

Actually, we are actually a musical family in other ways too. Camryn, Seth, and Rachel all play the piano, and Camryn also plays flute. My school schedule is packed. I play violin, french horn, and this year, on a whim, I joined chorus.  So every single day in school I am doing something musical in school, a first for me. After school, I have fencing and art classes. Seth does soccer, and Camryn may do gymnastics.

Camryn again.  OK, Allie has the better title.

However, there is one major factor to my advantage:

My title isn’t a lie.  Hers is.

I would not be too surprised if this blog becomes a convenient way to argue non-verbally.  After all, verbal arguing gets a little old.  Caleb is thrilled that he gets to see Grandma and Lisa and Joshua and Tanner… but he’s sad that Grandpa isn’t coming.  I guess he doesn’t understand that relatives 3000 miles away who work can’t visit often. oh well. Post again later.

This is Allie. Camryn was telling me she took the best title so I decided to prove her wrong. I think someone in Tarzan says it.

I have “sufficient permissions” too now, so you can expect some updates from me.

Camryn basically told what is happening here, so there is not much to say.

Well, it’s nice to be able to post now!

This is Camryn.  I get to update the blog now.  It’s been forever since it was last updated…over a year.  But I guarantee it’ll be updated at least once a week now that I get to update too.  This makes me very happy…plus I don’t think Allie has “sufficient permissions” (this is computer language) to update this blog yet.  Which might make her jealous.  And, for my very first post, this is what is going on in our life……….nothing! What an exciting post!

I have just realized that I am wrong.  Grandma gets here on what is technically Thursday.  Lisa, Joshua, and Tanner arrive late Friday night.  Seth is baptized on Saturday.  Grandma, your arrival is announced on our “Hooray” board. Lisa, Joshua…we weren’t sure you were coming-but now that we know you are , we are super excited.  Caleb can’t wait to see Tanner!  Lucky Seth gets to pick his dinner…this is random for me to remember, but I had to eat at a restaurant where I didn’t like anything…but I got dessert anyway!    Anyway, if you are coming to PA anytime soon, we could not be more excited.  You can probably expect another blog entry on Monday. I love this…

Ice cream at the Purple Cow

Last year for the 4th, we were in D.C. and listened to a reading of the Declaration of Independence at the National Archives and watched the national fireworks.  We thought there was no way to top that.  Still, we said this year we would go to Philadelphia and visit Independence Hall.  But, we found a better way to top that.  Lisa, Joshua and Tanner came to visit.  It really was the best, most memorable 4th of July I think any of us will have.  The 4th happened to be on a Saturday (4 days before Lisa’s next chemo treatment) and we spent it enjoying the beauty of family and rural PA.  We had to take Tanner to our favorite ice cream place, The Purple Cow.  It’s only 2-3 minutes down the road and it sits surrounded by farms.  I managed a snapshot of Joshua extracting Tanner from the neighboring soybean field.  The kids ate lots of ice cream and then played on the swing set.  We had near perfect weather too – not too hot and not humid at all.  That’s a rare treat for PA in July.  Then Lisa gave the kids the best surprise – she let them color her hair with food coloring and then she let everyone take a stab at cutting her hair.  The end result wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be.  In fact, she said she got a few compliments when she got home.  The fireworks shows in our town happened the weekend before, so we spent lots of money on JB’s favorites, ground flowers, and sparklers for the kids.  You almost didn’t need fireworks because of all the fireflies working their magic in the corn fields across the street from our house (and all over our yard).  But we had to play with fire anyway, afterall I am married to JB!

The best part about the whole weekend was watching Lisa’s generosity with our kids.  She’s always had it, but this time I think she could have been very justified in saying she was too tired to play, or that she wanted one final stylish haircut before it starts to fall out.  Instead, she sat for quite a while on a bucket in our driveway while they colored and cut her hair, and she played all the games they wanted to play, and they felt unconditionally loved by her.  Thank you Lisa!!

We have decided next year is Philly, but I know it won’t top this year!

Check out all the photos from the Christensens’ visit – just click on the photos tab above.

Christmas this year was wonderful.  We may not have gotten a fresh dusting of snow as the kids had hoped, but we had such a good time playing together in the house that it didn’t matter.  The best part of all was how excited our kids were to give gifts to each other.  I think their favorite gifts were the ones they gave and received from each other.  They were so busy playing that we didn’t get to aebleskivers (Danish ball pancakes) until dinner time.  Of course, Caleb didn’t want the aebleskivers, he just wanted the whipped cream (thanks to daddy!).  I have intentionally worked it so we have our nice dinner on Christmas eve so that on Christmas day I can relax.  And I did!  The dishes can wait til tomorrow…Check out some of our Christmas pictures.  Click on the Photo heading and then on Susie & JB.