04/27/2012

1.   It feels like summer has arrived for good now.  Upper 80's today, maybe even breaking 90.  Ben has been working on the pool the last couple of nights, and today the boys deemed it ready for the first swim of the season (at least in our pool).

2.  Of course, this is just after the whole downstairs was vacuumed and mopped.  So I was a bit aggravated when, inevitably, someone forgot their goggles, came in and left  little footprint-shaped puddles of water behind them on the ground.  That by itself might not be too bad, except that I use a wheelchair in the house, so whenever my wheels go over little drips or puddles of water, they leave dirty track marks all over the floor.  And then someone let the dog in before she was dried off (Sandy is such a water dog-- if there is a body of water available to be jumped into, she will jump into it!), and she shook itty bitty drops of water all over the floor and the patio doors.  And her feet were not entirely clean, so she also left little muddy tracks wherever she went.  At that point I put the dog outside, and locked the door from the inside.  Now they can't come in until I let them in!

3.  But before the swimming, we had to finish some schoolwork leftover from the week.  Joseph and Brigham both went outside to do their math.  Ben finally dragged out the dirty, raggedy, stained, opossum-infested couch to the side of the house to await the next bulk trash day.  So right now all that's out there is a leather rocker/recliner that we got in Florida.  So when two boys both wanted to do math outside, they had to share! 


 While I was out there helping the boys with their math, Joseph looked up at me and gave me this look.  I knew I had seen that exact look before.  And I had!  When I went through my 2006 picture files, I found one of Joseph with a little millipede that he found at Parrot Jungle Island when he was 4 years old.  It's so interesting to see how his face, in particular, has changed, and to note what has stayed the same.