Tuesday morning, Raina taught herself to ride Sadie’s bike (formerly Monica’s bike; thank you, Monica!). I then got the opportunity to take off all the training wheels except on Anna’s princess bike (thank you, Farah!)
Tuesday afternoon, we had a parade. Kindly humor me by clicking on the car to see how fun the photo of the parade entry is. I couldn’t omit the bike riding photo for the sake of the parade photo, and vice versa, though the post would be better with just one.
Having concluded another fair in which we participated in only four events and were in charge of none, I have no idea how the people who run it are able to do so. Many have businesses and/or jobs and also small children. You guys are my heroes.
I’m not sure how I ever lived in a town, lived a very full life on a college campus, even held a full-time job at a place and a part-time job at a different place — the mere idea of being around that many people and being in charge of that much stuff makes me exhausted. It would take a lot of practice before I could do it again. (Also maybe a personality transplant.)
August has determined he needs a bullhorn. To this, I say no.
We have appointments at the dentist’s office for the remainder of the summer. This is another of the “If you have five kids, you’ll have to …” things that didn’t occur to me before having five kids. I’ve never had a cavity. People who remember the Garbage Pail Kids cards of my elementary years may recall the one that gave (and still can give) me nightmares. Let’s not talk about that. Suffice it to say that dentists are nice people and I’m glad they are available.
On the days Jenna has a nap in the afternoon, bedtime is a real joy. Or not. She empties my wallet contents into her bed. She empties Ivy’s jewelry box contents into her bed. Two nights ago, she dragged five rolls of wrapping paper into her bed. The wrapping paper is now put away properly and I believe naptime is a thing of the past.
Ivy and I visited the lovely Ruth the other day. I knew previously that her dad had been on the Bethany College board, but now I know his name (Herman Langholz) and some details about his life, and Ruth’s before she came to marry Raymond and live just up the road from where we are living.
Ruth also showed me her grandson’s scrapbook. This is such a great idea. Each grandkid gets an album after graduation, and it starts with the graduation announcement and photos from that day, and the rest of the book is photos of that child’s visits with Ray and Ruth. I can’t tell you how cool it is.
The other night at supper, Sadie decided it was fun to start imagining her parents as ballerinas. Both parents, both ballerinas. Oh my heck, the hilarity. These are the things I hope my kids remember forever.
We’ve gone several rounds of repairs with our riding lawnmower this summer. I regret to report that it is now fully dead — broken intake valve. The idea of push-mowing this whole area is very unappealing. If you have a Kawasaki FC420V engine just laying around, we would be glad to take that sucker off your hands and plunk it in this mower. Ha.
The Kearney Hub did (or carried) several stories recently that I found to be quite interesting.
• My theory that local ownership and the ability to staff in such a way that the paper could do locally meaningful deep dives is borne out by a story on 5A last weekend about the Berkshire Eagle. I really hope that paper becomes a powerhouse under this concept. This seems to me (a novice) to be the only way local papers will be successful in the future.
• In the same paper, Erika did a story about property valuations. It had a huge chart with it. Talk about an investigative piece with local impact. I absolutely spent half an hour with that chart (even though I would have done the layout in a way to make it more readable, says she who is always most critical of the things she used to be in charge of). There’s a followup in I believe the Tuesday paper.
• Previously, there was a whole bunch of speculation presented in a story about Kearney restaurants. It used to be that Tara, Kristin, Lisa and I would visit all the new restaurants in town. (Could we just get the Dragon Garden back? That’s all I really need.) Here’s the facts, jack: Kearney doesn’t need any more restaurants (though the lack of an Italian restaurant is pretty striking). Kearney needs a real fabric store — the kind where you can buy good fabric for apparel, not just crafts or quilts (both valuable, but limiting).
Here’s how I know I need a four-day vacation consisting of peace and quiet in my own home. I was mid-rant the other day (I rant too much, too often) and was asked, “Mom, is ‘color me annoyed’ like ‘tickle me pink’?”
Yes. Yes, it is.
Happy weekend, y’all. If you’re in wheat country, hope you’re cutting wheat.
This was originally a Facebook post.
This Prairie Life. 