1-9-10 Life As We Like It

Today was another cold Saturday, which meant it was somewhat slower than some others. Dad and Jacob did Morton errands early this morning, while Levi and Jesse checked their traps down at Mud Creek; nothing there. At some point they also moved some furniture for Grandma Steiner. Tori, Kate, and I spent the morning working on kitchen projects, the biggest being a 15 pound batch of salisbury steaks. We haven't had them in ever so long and so made a bunch for supper and froze the rest for later meals. Ben, Sarah, and Jewel were pretty busy in the basement for awhile, building roads out of the blocks that Jesse gave Ben for Christmas last year (or the year before? can't remember).

I also gave Benjamin his first lessons in photography, and he took a few pictures of the roads they made. He did pretty good for his first time, I thought!

After lunch, I walked with Karol -- very invigorating; I was sweating in my down coat. The girls, Benjamin, and Joshua went to the shed for awhile, and I brought Joshua in for a nap when I was done walking. That's when I grabbed a few minutes to experiment with pictures...I think I'm getting the hang of it...

On to supper and lots of vacation talk. Right after supper Dad made the phone call and the reservations are made! Lord willing, we'll head to Yellowstone National Park this September. It seems so early to be thinking about September, but so many of the cabins were already booked that we're glad to have found one big enough for all of us. After supper... another peaceful evening in the family room (except for the occasional squabble, of course, and the inevitable wrestling that develops when you have all that energy in one small space...). I love these evenings...all 11 of us jammed into the coziest room in the house. Well, Tori was in another room puzzling out the Rubik's cube some of the time. She's kind of getting addicted to solving it (using the solution book); she's got a long way to go but she's having fun! Last week Kate and Ben were pretty impressed that I could solve it...I didn't realize they didn't know I could. Tonight my best time was 3:30 but I'm still guessing at some of the last moves...I'm pretty rusty. Dad read a couple more chapters of Where the Red Fern Grows, and Jesse had us chuckling when he read some old Kaiser Kaos articles out loud. I played with Joshua and colored with Sarah and Jewel, lost a couple games of UNO with Ben; and the others were listening to Dad read and/or reading something of their own. Pretty exciting, huh?? Ahhh...life as we like it, we are so blessed. God is good.