9,338 steps

Another full day of work. I had some time with Ivy after school--she was reading and I was working in the same room and/or reading next to her. Then she and Eric went to watch everyone else's soccer games and they were gone for several hours. Seriously, some days I hardly see my children! What is up with that?

I've been waking up in the middle of the night, or very early in the morning. Sometimes for no apparent reason and other times because there's something I'm fretting about and my body decides that 3:30 am is the perfect time to think about it some more. Yay.

12,054 steps

Another busy day full of breech work...My treadmill was scheduled to arrive this morning between a certain time interval, but not a peep from the delivery company.

I had to shuttle people around to various soccer practices and games this evening. While I was in the car, I decided to run errands that had been on my to-do list: lightbulbs and water softener salt at the home improvement store, hair elastics and kitchen utensils at the dollar store, lunch bags and acne scrubs at the big box store. Totally inconsequential errands but necessary nonetheless to keep the household running.

That's about it.

New work space

I put together my standing desk yesterday! It adjusts up and down with the turn of a crank. The top is still slightly tacky more than a week after putting on the final coat. I've had some good experiences with Osmo Oil but this time I am not impressed.

The treadmill arrives today so I will be able to be less sedentary while working. I love having a proper desk to work at. For years I've been sitting on the couch or at the dining table.

Back home

I had an easy travel day--nonstop flight, no delays. Thank you! Eric picked me up, along with Ivy and Inga who had just finished soccer tournaments in the area. It's so nice to be back and to see my kids.

My suitcase, however, did not fare so well. A whole corner broke off on the flight home. I called Baggage Services when I got home and they said I have to go back to the airport. What?!? It's not exactly a quick trip.

I hope to sleep well tonight and recover from the marathan of breech teaching. It was a fruitful trip and nice to catch up with my OB colleague and talk about future directions for BWB.

Breech Week, Day 4

We didn't get back from teaching until 11 pm so that's all I'm going to say. It's bedtime for me!

Breech Week, Day 3

This was our longest day by far, from 7 am - 10 pm. We did get some much-needed down time in the afternoon, though. We started off again with a group of residents, then went to the nearby freestanding birth center and trained a group of around 10 midwives, nurses, and physicians. Our evening session was a one-on-one session with a 3rd year resident from Iran. He was very gracious and benefitted from 2 hours of private instruction!

A few photos from yesterday...it's been so busy that I forgot to take pictures and had to grab them from video still shots. 

Dr. Cammarano, who will be heading the breech team, is learning fundal pressure in the first picture and practicing a Side to Side (Louwen) maneuver in the second picture. One of my favorite quotes from him was, "I've just unlearned 30 years of obstetrics!"

We ate lunch with a few midwives who will be part of the breech team. I had so much fun swapping birth stories and midwifery chat--I miss this so much from my grad school days. We stayed in for dinner (onion, bell pepper, and tomato frittata with white cheddar). All cooked with just a paring knife and a hot plate. This kitchen in under-equipped: no stove or oven! No cutting boards. No knives except the paring knife. No mixing bowls.

Breech week, day 2

5,657 steps

2 (real) breech births
Hundreds of (fake) breech births
A lot of laughter

Our day started at 7 am and didn't finish until 9:30 pm! To be fair, the last few hours were dinner with the head OB and midwife involved in making breech week happen at Reading Tower Health. I don't consider that part work 🙂

David Hayes got called by a midwife during our lunch break; she had a breech in labor and called with some questions. A few hours later David got an update that the baby had been born. Then during dinner, the OB's pager went off: a local direct-entry midwife had a multip breech in labor that needed hospital transport and didn't seem to be a good situation for a vaginal birth. He had to leave dinner early to attend to this birth.

We trained a group of residents first thing, then had a few other simulation sessions with a mixture of attendings and midwives. I'm quite impressed with how the OB department has changed their culture here; they used to be unfriendly to home birth transfers, and now they have cultivated relationships with local midwives and strive to create a supportive, non-judgmental environment to encourage seamless transfers. They were able to give the transferring midwives doula privileges, so the midwives can stay with their clients after transfer.

Anyway so much more to say, but I'm completely exhausted. Time for bed!

Breech week!

6,493 steps and who knows how many births

My life is breech for the next 4 days at Reading Tower Health. We arrived at 6:30 am and left around 8 pm. It's been great over here--such positivity and eagerness to learn.

We had time to eat lunch at a Vietnamese restaurant. Dinner was cooked at home (tilapia, brussels sprouts & avocado salad, and a banana).

And I am wiped out! I'm going to brush my teeth and read in bed until I fall asleep. That will likely not take long. Tomorrow we train a group of residents at 7 am, followed by a few more training sessions and probably some mega-sims in a labor room if L&D isn't way too busy.

Airport day

3,183 steps

I left the house at 7:30 am and arrived at 10:00 pm. The trip shouldn't have taken quite as long, but OF COURSE my first flight was cancelled and I didn't get onto the next flight either (I was on standby). This is probably our new reality post-Covid.

We'll be training residents and staff at Tower Health in Reading PA for the next 4 days, plus a group of midwives at a local birth center. I have a 7:10 am Grand Rounds lecture so I will be up way too early 🙂

Bonne nuit tout le monde!

Quite the fright

12,189 steps

Ivy almost got hit by a car on the way to school. I was running right behind her on the sidewalk when a car pulled out of a driveway right in front of us. I yelled (okay, more like shrieked/screamed) and the woman slammed on her brakes. I then proceeded to yell at the woman and tell her to be more careful, and she had the audacity to be defensive and tell me, "I WAS paying attention." I yelled back at her that she needed to stop *behind* the sidewalk and look before pulling onto the street.

Eric had several aggressive run-ins with cars today while he was on his bike, where they deliberately rev their engines and cut him off or turn in front of him.

It's not even been 2 weeks and already I feel like I want to say very mean and profane things about this town and the people who live in it. And about Americans in general. And about cars and car culture.

I don't know if Ivy has ever heard me yell like that in her entire life. At first she was worried that I was mad at her!

We had lunch with a former student (he took a writing class from me first, and then several creative writing classes with Eric). It was great to catch up several years later. Eric keeps trying to convince him to become a writer--he certainly has the talent for it.

I'm getting ready to teach in Reading, PA for Breech Without Borders. It's going to be a fun, exhausting several days.

Serious Sunday

5,619 steps

Today was lazy, especially in the afternoon. I read a book, took an accidental nap, read a book some more, cooked dinner (corn on the cob and spinach & ricotta cheese tart), and read a bit more with Ivy until bedtime. Eric played Ultimate Frisbee but couldn't convince any of the kids to come with him.

I ended doing a lot of breech-related work in the morning, including a debrief about a recent surprise breech birth (discovered 4 minutes prior to rumping!) where the baby would not have survived had the midwife not trained with Breech Without Borders recently. Stories like these are sobering but also affirming that we're doing good work.

I hardly went outside all day, as evidenced by my lack of steps, until the evening when Eric and I went on a walk. Oh well...back to high gear tomorrow.

Inga is feeling better, other than some lingering headaches. Zari had a brief bout of nausea, too, which passed as quickly as it came on.

A clean(er) house

9,066 steps

We repainted our house when we first bought it 11 years ago. Within a few years, we noticed a blackish grime on the paint, getting worse every year. Finally it was time to take action. We weren't sure what it was--dirt? mildew? stains?--but we assumed mildew was the culprit. We bought a special product meant to remove mold and mildew that you spray on and then rinse off a few minutes later.

It was amazing!

Within 30 seconds of spraying the product, the black grime complete disappeared. We enlisted all the kids to help, putting them to work washing and rinsing after we had sprayed. They even got to go up on the porch roof. We all got wet, sometimes on purpose and sometimes not.

There are very few home projects that work better and go more quickly than expected. This was one of them.

Our family reward after all of this was to watch Avatar. Zari and Inga had never seen it.

Oh, poor Inga woke up in the middle of the night to tell us she was feelingsick. Then she woke us up again a few hours later to tell us she had puked. She spent the day in bed with a fever. So she was excused from today's cleaning.

The picture shows what the change was soon after spraying on the product. It's like magic!

It's off!

12,710 steps

The book is off to the printer and I am awaiting the final proofs tomorrow. All the fiddly last edits took most of the day, right up to dinner time.

We had a rare afternoon all at home at the same time. Being in the US is certainly not good for family togetherness. No 2-hour lunch breaks together, no going to the park or the beach after school...Most school days the kids are gone until 6 or 7 pm at soccer practice, later if there are games. Ivy is home the most, with practices just twice a week.

After the got the kids to bed, we watched part 1 of Untold, the story about Manti Te'o and his girlfried who turned out to be a fake person. Wild story.

Tomorrow will be a home renovation day, probably our only free Saturday the rest of this semester.

Celebration!

I'm celebrating because tomorrow I am sending my book off to the printer (A Guide to Physiological Breech Birth, 250 pages)! I told myself I would get off the computer for the rest of the evening--short as it is. I will say goodnight and take an hour or so off to enjoy NOT working on my book.

Sneak preview of the front and back covers, plus a few of the hundreds of photos in the book.

I'd rather be in bed

14,205 steps

I definitely didn't want to get out of bed this morning. Had I not been obliged to run Ivy to school, I would have stayed in bed. But it's good--I need to be forced to get out and run.

Another busy day working on breech stuff in every spare moment, plus the usual school pickup, dinner prep, and a few errands to the pharmacy to print photos. We're finally doing the kids' Canadian citizenship papers!

I needed to take pictures of a few more illustrations for the breech book I'm writing. Here's how I set it up and here's the finished product. I had to use a timer because there was no one in the house to take the pictures for me. That is Zari's velvet Halloween cloak as my backdrop.

University picnic

10,511 steps

I love days where we realize we don't have to cook dinner! It was the annual university picnic for faculty, staff, and families at the president's house, which is a short walk away. Eric was watching Zari's soccer game so I brought some food home for them.

Other than that, a pretty unremarkable school day for the kids and work day for me and Eric. After the picnic, we did homework on the big dining room table. Inga wrote a short personal essay about going on the Avatar ride at Disney World, which I helped with (mostly in the form of encouraging her and reading through the rough draft).

I had to add a cross-brace on my desk top because of where the legs will attach to the table. Some day...this will be done...some day. I cut, sanded, glued, and screwed the piece of wood in place, then applied one coat of finish.

Back to busy

It's always go-go-go on school days. Inga had her sports physical, so that took most of my morning by time it was done and all the forms were dropped off. Breech-related activities took me all the way to school pickup time.

Ivy left her lunch at home, which neither of us realized until lunchtime. Oops! I had reminded her to put it in her backpack, but didn't verify. Lesson learned. I had an unintended nap once Ivy came home. She was doing homework and I was reading on the couch next to her.

Dio had his first day of soccer and reported that most of the kids weren't very good. He's used to crazy skills levels in France and it's a shock to come here.

Ivy and Eric had soccer practice. I had to play chauffeur becuase Zari still hasn't arranged rides home after practice, so she needed a ride. We'll get things streamlined at some point...

After dinner, Inga requested some family attic time. "I just want us to do something together as a family." So we went up and played pool and foosball. Ivy and I lost to Inga on foosball, despite outnumbering her.

Sporty Sunday

Zari said something about the weekends going by too quickly. I agree!

I had a quiet house to myself this morning. I mixed up a double batch of sourdough bread and folded it over a 2-hour period.

The afternoon was a sporty one for everybody but me: Inga had soccer practice and the rest of the family went to play Ultimate Frisbee. I had to stay behind to be sure someone was home when Inga finished.

Then we watched another episode of Knight Rider. "This is so cheesy!" Zari said. The kids think it's so funny that David Hasselhoff was considered a hunk back then. "His pants are super high up, all the way to his belly button!" Inga said.

We had a huge bowl of popcorn during the episode and I wasn't particularly hungry. So I made a big salad (cucumbers, tomatoes, feta, olives, & balsamic dressing) and deviled eggs.

We asked the kids to pack their own lunches this year, so all the leftovers went into lunchboxes. It's so nice that they can do their own. It's still a lot of work to ensure there's enough food!

My desktop is fully oiled and drying. It's been super humid and the finish seems very slow to dry.

Household tasks and a jump in a lake

Before Eric brought Ivy to her morning soccer match, he helped me cross-cut my desk top on both sides. Next, I sanded both sides down, rounded the corners and edges slightly, and prepped it for Osmo Oil finish. I have two coats on the underside and will do the top side tomorrow. I'm so excited to put my standing desk together!

I did another round of weeding in the afternoon. It's satisfying to feel the roots rip free from the earth. I just wish I had a bit fewer weeds to unearth.

We watched another episode of Knight Rider. I have occasional memories of certain scenes from when I watched it as a child.

In the late afternoon, we went to a friend's house; they live about 8 miles out of town on a lake. We all had a nice swim, jumping right off their dock into the water, then grilled hamburgers for dinner. The lake water is clean, in the sense of not having chemicals or contaminants, but it's extremely murky and slightly stinky. We all showered off once we got home. It was so much fun to relax and socialize. The kids didn't want to leave.

I managed to join Tiktok, upload a video, have the video get flagged, and get myself perma-banned, all in one day. So yay? The offending video had a computer animation of a birth in the upper corner, and Ivy was dancing along making up dance moves to illustrate the 10 Steps of Physiologic Breech (something we teach in our breech workshops).

But never fear! We got the video up on Instagram and Facebook. All is not lost. I'm glad because that 1-minute video took me at least 5 hours to film and edit.

If you're curious, check it out here: https://www.facebook.com/breechwithoutborders/videos/1406661989817472/

A tire, a fire, a Knight Rider

13,040 steps

Eric put a new innertube on one of Ivy's bike tires, and only one day later it popped with an enormous explosion on the way home. We wonder if he may have overinflated the tube since our pressure gauge is broken.

Ivy was already riding a bike that was too small for her, so we switched her up to Inga's old bike and will give her previous one away.

One thing I like about this year's school schedule: it forces me (or rather, I choose) to go running every morning when I drop Ivy off. It's far enough that I need to run her there if I leave at our planned time. Then I walk it again in the afternoon.

Dio had a sports physical this morning and missed the first hour of school. I then ran a quick errand to Home Depot (black steel pipes for a set of pipe clamps). Then it was breech work until school pickup time.

Ivy and I had a quiet hour at home before everyone else arrived, so we worked on a fun breech video project involving dancing. I hope it turns out okay!

I did more work on my desk top: sanded the underside, then sanded and attached the two support pieces. Tomorrow Eric will help me cut the ends off and then I'll clean them up with a router and sand the top. Then finally it will be time to apply the Osmo Oil!

Normal people would just go out and buy a desk top. But not me. I have to do it the hard way.

We had an old rotten picnic table that was collapsing. I hastened its demise by pulling it apart and burning the boards. We'll recycle the old metal supports.

  

We watched Knight Rider--an old series from the 1980s that I remember watching. There was much hilarity as our kids discovered the joys of David Hasselhof and his "high tech" car.

2nd day of school and I'm already worn out

12,760 steps

That's it. I'd like to declare "time out" from school. We already feel run ragged and we're only 2 days in! We do have some quiet hours in the middle of the day, but early mornings, later afternoons, and evenings are go-go-go all the time.

I have driven the car several times a day most days to pick various people up or to run errands. It's crazy! I think I drove our car in France a handful of times in 20+ months (granted, Eric did more of the driving but we still didn't use it much).

To give you a feel, here was my day:

• 6:30 am: wake up before my alarm (not on purpose) and read BBC news
• 7 am alarm: wake up the kids, get Ivy ready
• 7:30 am: out the door and run her to school
• 8 am: back from my morning run, make sure Zari is out on time
• 8:10 am: send Inga and Dio off at 8:15
• Shower and get dressed
• Work on breech things all morning
• 11 am: breech live session
• noon: breech planning meeting
• more breech work in the early afternoon
• 2:15-3 pm: walk to pick up Ivy
• 3-4 pm: some breech work + planning a TikTok breech video with Ivy
• 4-5 pm: Zoom meeting
• 5-5:20 pm: drop off Eric and Inga at soccer practice
• 5:20-5:35 pm: prep dinner (rice, coleslaw, lemon pepper chicken)
• 5:35-6 pm: pick up Zari from soccer practice
• 6-6:30 pm: finish cooking dinner, feed family (minus Eric and Ivy)
• 6:30-7:15 pm: pick up Eric and Ivy from soccer, wait around for a while as they're finishing up
• 7:15-9 pm: pack lunches, help kids with homework, get Ivy and Inga to bed
• 9-10 pm: grocery shopping with Eric
• 10 pm: get Zari and Dio to bed
• Now it's 10:45 and I'm just sitting down to write in my journal

Last day of freedom!

School starts tomorrow. I can't believe how fast the past 4 weeks have gone since we left France. Our poor kids only had 1 month of holidays.

Ivy came home after dinner from a week in Disneyworld with grandparents. She's had 2 straight weeks of fun and sleep deprivation and now reality will hit.

Eric's parents and one more grandchild are staying overnight before they begin the long drive home to Alberta. Eric's friends also leave tomorrow for Alberta (via airplane). Then we'll have a quiet empty house. I like having it filled up with guests and family.

I finished processing the last of the peaches this morning. I'll probably pick another big box tomorrow--we can never have too many!

It was raining most of the day, but we went out for a hike anyway after lunch. The rain was mostly spitting, not even enough to be called a drizzle. We went to a local state park and did a few of the short hikes. Nothing very rigorous, and it was slow going due to the rain making the paths muddy and slippery.

Dinner started as "what do we have in our fridge" and ended up better than expected. We pulled out some of the leftover meat from the family reunion Mexican street tacos. I made a quick run to the Mexican grocery store for a few perishables. We had carne asada and spiced chicken for the meats, fire-toasted corn tortillas, and the usual spread of toppings: lime wedges, cilantro, queso fresco, sour cream, onions, avocados, and 8 different salsas and hot sauces.

We also had corn on the cob (done with an America's Test Kitchen recipe, 10/10) and homemade peach ice creame with the peaches we picked a few days ago.

Then to make it even more fun, we had a bonfire and Smores. The rain had stopped by mid-afternoon and I was able to get a fire going with some coaxing with the blowtorch.

Basement shopping part 1 & 2

I am making myself a standing desk, to be paired with a treadmill (one specialized for walking rather than running). I've been trying to make a desk top without having to buy anything. Today I rummaged around in our basement and found a pair of doors from our 1910 carriage house that I had rescued before we gutted the gardener's quarters (which was completely rotten due to an enormous hole in the roof that the previous owners left unrepaired).

Put together, they would have made a beautiful large desk top. They're made of quartersawn oak and are in really good condition once I cleaned off the dirt and mold. But I realized: they would make a HUGE desk and it was too big.

So with this gorgeous pair of cupboard doors cleaned and set aside, I went back into the basement. We have a few areas that have been partitioned off with old tongue & groove pine boards, prboably done when the house was built in 1900. Some of these areas had "doors" (4 boards fastened together top and bottom with a cross-board). Since one of those doors was hanging off its hinges anyway, I took it off and repurposed it.

I ccut off the top and bottom cross-boards, cleaned everything thoroughly, pulled the boards apart, glued the tongues and grooves, and put them back together. They're drying under tension and under weight to keep them held together snug and to make them dry flat. I'll install new cross-boards tomorrow once I cut the final desktop to size.

It's a bit of work but I really didn't want to buy anything. I'll sand it down and finish it with Osmo Oil. Voila! A desk top! It's more rustic than I was hoping for but people pay a lot of money for this kind of look and mine is 100% authentic rather than the faux-rustic-barnwood look that is all the rage.

We went swimming at the university pool this morning. Afternoon? Some talking, some working, a movie for the kids. During Zari's soccer practice, Eric and I bought school supplies for the kids at our Buy More Big Box store, aka Walmart.

We came home and found our friends cooking dinner! Wow! What a treat. We had a nice post-dinner walk to campus and back, all while a big thunderstorm was rumbling nearby and threatening to douse us. We were sad that the rain missed us!

Peaches

The highlight of the day was picking peaches at a friend's property just outside of town. We filled a large box and called it good. We'll probably come back in a few more days.

I spent much of the afternoon processing peaches with help from Eric and our friends. We have a large batch peeled and quartered and in the freezer. The other batch needs to ripen for a day or two more.

And don't forget the delicious peach cobbler we ate for dessert!

We met our future renter who will be living here when we head back to France.

A wave of exhuastion hit me around 9 pm and I took an involuntary nap.

More visitors

Eric's best friend from high school in Canada is visiting with his family (minus the oldest 3 kids who are adults). I love having the space to host people. Their 2 youngest kids had fun playing in the attic and playing soccer outside with Inga and Dio.

Zari had to wake up early for 7:30 am soccer practice. She was exhausted by the evening and went to bed earlier than usual.

I got Dio and Zari to come shopping with me to the local thrift store. Dio has expressed interest in finding some new clothes. We didn't find anything good at that store, but we did find him a hoodie at a nearby clothes outlet. It was fun to shop with them. Inga chose to stay home and read a book.

We went on a walk downtown and around campus with Eric's friends. A very hot, sweaty walk. It feels like you're entering a sauna when you step out the door.

We got a phone call at 10:30 pm with a very happy Ivy (in Disneyworld with her grandparents). "I didn't even miss you at all!" she told us. She kept talking and talking and eventually I had to cut her off gently and tell her to go to bed.

A wheelbarrow full of weeds

I enlisted all 3 children to help me weed the flower beds this morning. It was sticky, hot, and insect-ridden. Dio eventually got so fed up with the bugs that he went inside for some alternate chores (vacuuming). I called it a day after we had filled a wheelbarrow to overflowing.

I spent a long time on old with various agencies and companies: Paypal, my bank, several NC governmental departments. While I was on hold listening to awful music, I caught up on finances and took care of other life paperwork. What a glamorous life I live.

I've decided to treat myself to a proper office space (in the corner of my bedroom), complete with a treadmill desk. I have to spend a lot of time in front of the computer and I get so antsy having to sit still. This is my solution.

I made a huge bonfire with deadfall we've collected. It was too hot of a day to enjoy a fire, though, even after the sun set. Maybe in a few weeks...

Eric and I had time to go on a walk this evening.

Slow run, physicals, & soccer practice

I went for a run first thing this morning. It was slower than I would have liked, but I also haven't exercised properly for a while. A huge storm rolled in soon after I got back. This is great--the soil will be loose enough to pull weeds tomorrow.

Zari had her soccer physical this afternoon. We were both shivering in the doctor's office, which is kept at 70F (21 C). Way too cold! We keep our house around 78-80 (about 26-27 C), just enough to cut the heat and humidity.

There was an informal get-together for new and current university families so we could meet each other. Someone brought a game involving soft burritos that you throw at each other, which amused the children greatly.

Zari had evening soccer practice with the boy's team because she has to get a certain number of practices in before she can play in a match.

Recovery

Eric had to get up at 3 am to drive a family to the airport. I woke up at 6 and he was still up. He came back to bed and snuggled and eventually I got up and started working.

I didn't hear any noise from the kids for several hours! Inga apparently woke up around 9 am and stayed in bed reading. We had to wake Zari and Dio up close to 10 am.

We needed this down day after all of the excitement. I mostly worked on breech stuff. Eric showed the kids how to mow the lawn. We all helped pick up sticks so that Zari and Dio could mow.

I did 6 loads of laundry and hung most of them outside to dry. I had to take everything off when a storm rolled in this evening.

We're eating yet more leftovers and are getting ready to eat something new.

Reunion wrap-up

We got to camp this morning to say goodbye to a few families who had long drives home. I learned that Dio had stayed up with other teenage cousins until 6 am! They only went to bed because one of the aunts (who woke up for the morning) discovered them still awake and sent them to bed. They had a rude awakening 2 hours later.

It hadn't even occurred to me to tell my kids, "You cannot stay up until 6 am" because they have never done anything like that in their lives! Zari and Inga went to bed at the "early" hour of 12:45 am. Yikes! You can imagine we had some exhausted children today. But...it's vacation and I am so glad they had so much fun with their cousins.

We packed and cleaned and then caravaned over to our house. Ivy and two other cousins her same age headed out in the afternoon with their grandparents to go to Disneyworld. We have 13 people staying overnight at our house, so it was still a bit of pandemonium chez les Freezes. But it's good.

Eric has to drive one family to the airport at 3 am, so he's already in bed. I believe I am the last one awake. I sent all the kids to bed on time tonight with stern instructions to sleep.

Last day of the reunion

Last full day of reunioning! We woke up to a tempest. Sheets of rain blowing sideways, branches dropped all over the streets. I was glad that we were all indoors and not in tents at this camp. (And of course Eric and I were snug in our own bed at home...luxury.)

The rain let up as we were finishing with breakfast. We gathered everyone into our fleet of cars and headed over to the university athletic center for the Freeze Olympics. We did 50m and 200m races among the various age groups, funny jumps (onto the high jump mat), and real high jumps for the bigger kids and adults.

Then...swim time! We were the only people in the entire pool. It's summer break so the facilities tend to be empty.

After lunch the teenagers decided to go "out", which ended up being a trip to WalMart to buy matching flannel pajama pants and then a local ice cream parlor. The almost-teens wanted to go, too, so one of the uncles took another car full for their own excursion.

Dio came home with cactus pants and Zari with camouflage pants.

I went home for an hour of work (and quiet time). I didn't have a book with me and was feeling antsy but also tired--it was either work or nap. Work won out this time.

Dinner was our turn: we ordered Mexican street tacos from a local restaurant, the only place in town I like to eat at. We had 4 choices of meats, corn tortillas, a huge assortment of toppings (limes, 2 kinds of onions, lettuce, cilantro, tomatoes, queso fresco, sour cream), and 2 homemade hot sauces. My taste buds were very happy after this meal.

We had a nice evening around the fire, with hordes of children roaming about on various adventures, including catching toads and doing who-knows-what-else.

Tomorrow we pack up and send most of the families on their way. We have some staying with us for another day or so. It's been so much fun and gone by too quickly.