Monday, January 8, 2002 - Book-looking, Shoes in Rocks, and Head Twinkies

Tuesday afternoon, the first day of the New Year, we finally went ice skating in the afternoon instead of at nighttime.  Many of our friends were there, and we stayed for a while, with a few excursions home for this and that--hats, more mittens, more socks...  It was cold...very cold.  But we stalwart Midwesterners resolutely skated on.

David doesn’t have much work at the moment, so Larry worked for his cousin’s husband, Jerry, most of the week.  He plans to work for him part of this week, too.  That kind of work--auto body repair--is old hat for him, and almost seems like a vacation after the more physically demanding work of setting up forms, pouring cement walls, removing forms, and everything that goes with it.

Wednesday, the kids went back to school after what seemed like an entirely too-short vacation.

That afternoon, Victoria was ever so excited, because Dorcas collected her pictures for her from the Wal-Mart photolab.  She’s been waiting five long, drawn-out days for those pictures.  When Dorcas came home and handed her little sister the packet, she was delighted right down to the tops of her shoes.  As you might expect, the pictures are typical of shots a child would make, but several are pretty good, and a few are downright funny.  Esther had used the camera to take a picture of Victoria, and managed to catch the child blinking.  Victoria, when she found that picture, went into peals of laughter.

I am generally of the opinion that the money spent on film and processing for the children’s cameras is rather a waste of money, so the film they get is a rare treat; but now and then one of them takes a photo to top all photos, and I’m mighty glad I gave them the film.

Friday afternoon, Joseph had a checkup with the doctor.  We were pleased to find that his iron count was 14, up from 10.5 a month and a half ago.  A boy’s iron count should be somewhere between 13 and 15.  He’s gained back all the weight he lost and then some, and he’s at least an inch taller.

By Friday evening, the stack of mending that had been piling up since early December had considerably shrunk, and the dozen or so pairs of jeans--the hardest part of the mending--were patched and put away.

It got up to about 45° that afternoon, but it had been so cold during the first part of the week that the ice around the pond at the park was still nicely intact and just a bit slushy around the edges.  That was the day we should have gone skating, but only Joseph went, with a raft of his friends.  Skating is more enjoyable when it is not so bitterly cold.

Saturday we learned that my Uncle Don had died that morning.  My cousin told my mother that Uncle Don had broken his hip December 7^th, and hadn’t done well since then.  Uncle Don has always been special to me, partly, I suppose, because he reminded me so much of my father.  He was 87.

That afternoon, we took Hester and Lydia to the Barnes and Noble bookstore in Omaha to spend the money Larry and I gave them for Christmas expressly for books.  What a huge store!  There is a nook at the side in which is a cafe, and their specialty is every kind of coffee or cappuccino or espresso known to man.  (No, we didn’t buy any of that expensive stuff.)  We spent almost all of our time in the children’s and young adult’s section.  In one area there is a wooden Thomas the Tank Engine train set, and that’s what occupied Caleb and Victoria almost the duration of the time we were there.  Against one wall was a raised platform, accessible via steps at either side, and on the platform were small chairs for small folk to sit in.  Against the walls and the high arched ceiling of this recessed niche were painted tall, towering trees, so that when one sat in one of the chairs and read his book, he would feel as though he were secluded on a woodsy hill.

I wish I would have had time to look at books in other areas of the store...but then, I think I could spend a year in that store and not be done looking at all those books.  Looking, I said, not even reading; I couldn’t possibly read all those books in one lifetime.

The girls saved some of their money for the Hastings bookstore in Fremont, because they’d seen books there that they wanted, and couldn’t find them in Barnes and Noble.  They got some books that had little gold necklaces with them.  At Hastings bookstore I saw a big book with page after page of copies of newspaper fronts, from all over the United States and many parts of the world, printed immediately after the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center.

We used our last two Christmas gift certificates at the Wal-Mart Supercenter, buying food for supper:  turkey/cheese/lettuce sandwiches and yogurt.

Upon our arrival home, the children were getting ready for baths and showers.

Caleb, removing his shoes, announced, “I have shoes in my rocks,” and he looked quite surprised when everyone laughed.

The whole family came for dinner Sunday.  We had Creamy Broccoli and Pasta Tuna Casserole, baked potatoes with sour cream and bacon bits, peaches, and Chocolatey Fudgy Caramel Brownies--the latter a real departure from my usual fare, as I am not much of a fan of cake and such.  But the children were delighted.  Keith, after walking into the kitchen and seeing that I was making brownies, dashed straight back home for their vanilla ice cream.  The brownies were done just about the time we finished eating, so we had ice cream on hot, moist brownies.  I always bake them for a shorter period of time than what the recipe calls for, because not only am I not very fond of cake, but I especially dislike dry cake.  Bleah.

I stayed with Mama Sunday evening, letting her look at videos from our trip to Chadron and a few other state parks.  She laughed when, as we drove past a large ranch out west, Larry read the sign on the arch over the entrance lane:  “Black Angus Ranch.”  He gazed out across the expanses of prairie grasses, spring-fed lakes and marshes, and sandhills in the distance.  “They raise water buffalo here,” he continued.  He looked into the camera, tipped his head, and shrugged up one shoulder.  “Or at least they should,” he remarked.

A few minutes ago, Victoria was drawing on her MagnaDoodle slate.  Finishing the image, she leaned back and studied it with a critical eye.  She giggled and held it out for Caleb to see.

“Here’s a picture of you and Lydia,” she informed him.  “It’s you when you just got up, ’cause your hair is sticking up.”  She considered the slate again with an air of earnestness.  “See?” she said, pointing out the bristles.  “There’s a twinkie on your head,” she finished, sending Caleb into a spasm of mirth.

Where, I wonder, did she get the notion that a ‘rooster tail’ was a ‘twinkie’?

The sun has just gone down, and the clouds look like a thick sea of purple and fuschia cotton balls against an indigo sky.  Under this bank of clouds, down near the horizon, is clear sky, very light blue, crystalline; and beneath that are thin clouds rising from the ground in strands and plumes of brilliant orange, almost as if the edges of the world are on fire.  What a sunset!

Suppertime...goodbye!