It's officially fall! How do I know that? Have the leaves turned autumnal colors and cascaded from the trees? No. Did I glance at the calendar and see the date, September 22, come and go? No. (Anyone who's ever looked at my calendar knows it's still set to July, so that can't be the case.) So how do I know it's fall for sure? That's easy: FLAG FOOTBALL! Bingo! Tyler is playing flag football again this year and has had two games. Although I don't understand one single move in football, I can train my camera on my kid and click. So I don't know if he has played well or not, but he looks good. Here are some neat pictures of Tyler in action.

Obama Is NOT For Mama

Now, I don't want to get all political and what not and turn a perfectly good Blog into a raging political debate, but....

Promise me there's only 6 1/2 more weeks to go.

Happy Birthday, Mr. Tim!

August 29 is a very, very important day! After all, it is Michael Jackson's birthday. That's important! And it is quite near the end of August, which makes Labor Day right around the corner. Labor Day is a national holiday, so that's important. Other than that, I can't think of anything that makes that particular date special at all....unless it would be.....
Mr. Tim's Birthday!!

It is with great excitement that we all anticipate The Opening Of The Gifts on said birthday. I should mention that Tim is very difficult to buy for. He is quite picky about clothes so those are out. He likes music but I can't keep up with what CD he has and which one he would like. I know next to nothing about golf. (This is actually worse than knowing nothing, because it gives me a false sense of security that I MIGHT be able to buy something neat for his golf game.) Finally, he is notorious for simply looking at a carefully wrapped package and intuitively knowing what it is...AND ANNOUNCING IT. That is a real bummer and inspires great rage in me.

This year we outdid ourselves and he was genuinely pleased. We were pleased that he was pleased. He was pleased that we were pleased that he was pleased. And so on and so forth.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!

We Could Be Related To Einstein

Who said I wasn't creative? Who said I couldn't make science come alive for my kidlets? Who said I would mess up every single experiment I ever tried to do and should just spend the money on the video that shows the kids how a pro does it? Well, let me tell you, we did an awesome experiment the other day and, much to my surprise...I mean, satisfaction, it worked like a charm. We were all so pleased that we wanted to share the experience with you.

What we have here is a common, household item called the "empty water bottle." Placed inside said bottle is a challenging mixture of water, sugar and yeast. Atop the bottle is a non-retouched balloon.

Observe.

Oh my! Do we see a little enlargement in said balloon???

And bigger yet.

Isn't that something?? The gases given off by that yeast have completely blown up the balloon!

Think it would work for tires?

Journey Up The Amazon

A couple of weeks ago we were invited over to Orvel and Paula's house for a cookout and a sleepover down by their neat little creek. Well, actually, the KIDS were invited...Tim and I were simply required to drive them there. But we all walked down to the creek which turned out to be just amazing. Somehow, we found ourselves climbing down a very steep bank to go INTO the amazing creek. It must have been the mists rising from the murky depths as we all know I would have better sense than to climb/slide/fall down a steep bank of mud with the ending goal being water, of all things. To be sure, I held tight to my camera so there would never, ever be a photographic memory of my personage manipulating that bank. After we were in the creek it was like we were in the middle of the jungle! Minus the malaria carrying insects and searing heat. It was completely shaded and cool and so fun! We walked down quite a ways until the water got deeper than I thought water should be, then turned around and went the other way.

We saw some really fantastic huge trees growing along the bank, with their roots completely exposed! The boys and our heroic guide climbed up on those roots and let themselves be photographed for all time.

It was just wonderful and we would have stayed there much longer but it was getting dark and who knows what crawls in the deep, still waters after the sun sets?

Plus, it was time for the campfire!! Paula is a pyro, as you well know, so she
can LIGHT A CAMPFIRE. We had hotdogs and marshmallows and potato salad and lots of pop. What a feast for a crew of returning Amazon Explorers. After the campfire died down, the not invited ones left and the invited ones played games and talked until bedtime. It was a great evening! I'm so glad we got to go!