End of July, and August

Mike & Andrea (AUN-dree-uh) invited some church folks out to their place for a Shucking Party, which evidently is a fairly common occurrence in Iowa. I hadn't heard of it before, but of course wasn't surprised to learn of this. ;) Unfortunately, the arrangement for the corn (a truckload!) fell through, but they had the party anyway, and we're so glad they did! A good time was had by all, tho' it was HOT.HOT.HHHHHOT. A cloud came up in the late afternoon and cooled it off a touch, but ... shoo! I stayed inside most of the time.... :\

They have a huge back yard, so a kickball game sprung up, dads v. kids. lol! This picture shows Natasha pitching. She didn't do half-badly, considering her overall lack of physical coordination/skill. Athletics are NOT her thing, but I was proud of her great effort and actually pretty good performance! She's pitching to Darin; Mitch is standing to the side, in red.



Here are the kids shucking the little bit of corn Mike & Andrea bought at the Farmer's Market that afternoon, just so there could be at least a little shucking! lol N & J on the left.



Around the table, L-R, are Katie, Kaden, Kieran, and N. That's Mike (host) in the yellow shirt behind. His father, Ron, is sitting behind and to the right of where Mike's standing (walking!). Jeremy and Mitch are at the back left. [Oh, and yes, I do have readers who request these details, so for the rest of you, thanks for bearing with me. ;) ]



Oh, another kickball picture. Bases (1-tree, 2-chair, 3-sandbox) loaded! (Robert is playing 1st.)



And look who's up to bat! Natasha!! lol (Jeremy pitching)



Justus and Brandon eating, exhausted from the heat and the exercise.



These are Mike & Andrea's ABSOLUTELY AMAZINGLY PRECIOUS daughters, Anna (older, blond) and Maria. Mm, mm, MM! So sweet!



This was the EASTERN sky at sunset on our way home that night.



Next up? A church friend had tickets, and invited us to an Iowa Cubs (minor league) baseball game!!! Our seats were awesome and the weather was just perfect. I took these pictures long before the game started. We had bum information and arrived something like 45 min. before the game started. Team warming up:













Pitcher warming up.



Justus, Jeremy, Mike



Jeremy grilled country-style ribs for the first time. We had over a few people. Here are, L-R, Tim, Stephanie, Michael, Jeremy, and Dora. Right as the shutter clicked Dora realized everyone else was posing with rib to face. Oh, and look, I made it into this picture, too, ha!



Abigail (bigger, farther away) (Tim & Dora's), and Addison in the foreground (Mike & Anne's)



A sunset that struck me as particularly pretty:






Natasha had a dream that included this Pegasus-like animal with flagged feet. She drew her dream. [Now, maybe *I'm* the unusual one, but I've never awakened from a dream and thought, "I'd like to draw what I dreamed"!!!!! (How in the world should the previous sentence be punctuated???!!!] It's kinda hard to see in this picture, but the winged animal is standing on a marble balcony ("My first time trying to draw marble," she said.), complete with columns. The balcony is waaaay high up in the sky, indicated by the dark peaks of mountains that are poking up through the clouds beyond the balcony.



For a couple days she drew birds.





Before bed one night Justus had a laugh attack when Jeremy was being silly with him.



Here are pictures of the kids' 'medieval battle' gear they have worked up. This all stems from the Nerf weapons.... Natasha drew the Chimera on her shield as well as Justus's.





Yes, the helmets are ice cream buckets covered in foil. Yes, they asked permission to use the foil. (How could I say no??! They used the buckets without foil for days, so I knew the idea was a 'keeper'!) And yes, Justus designed a face mask that attaches to his helmet.





Here is the only picture I have taken so far in my knitting adventure. HHHHA! [This will be funny only to those who have seen the knitting work my sister has accomplished in the last few months. Here's me, coming along ... at my own pace.]



We needed a recent, nice picture of Justus for a thank-you gift we made for his Bible class teachers, since he graduated to the 3rd & 4th grade class! I took these pictures and thought I'd toss them up here for your enjoyment. ;)





And here is a picture of Elaine her halo, right after her first haircut in the thing. [She has had another one since then. Her hair grows very quickly, and since I have to clean those four pins every.single.day, it is a blessing that a talented beautician church friend is willing to come over here and cut Elaine's hair as a service.] In case someone reading doesn't know, at the beginning of August, Elaine was very sick one night. At 1:30 a.m. she sat up in bed to lean over and grab the small trash can by her bed, to puke into it, but she passed out and fell to the floor, breaking her C-2 vertebra. It is the "Hangman's Break," most familiar to my generation because of Christopher Reeve's injury. 99% of people with this break DIE, and most who live have very bad life-long problems. So far Elaine seems to have ZERO damage except the broken C-2, which is slowly healing because the halo is keeping her immobile from the torso up. Not.fun. But she is managing. And actually doing quite well!