Quick As I Can

It's Friday again already! I can hardly believe it! Quick Takes are a great way to catch up, though. Here are mine (below). And here are a whole bunch more over at Conversion Diary.

1) Paul and Nicole were here last weekend, which is always a special treat for everyone. With only two weeks to go until their wedding, there was much to do on this side of the mountains. On Saturday, I got to go with them while they chose their wedding flowers, paid off their wedding cake, tied up the loose ends at the reception hall, and checked in on Nicole's wedding dress where it's being steamed and readied for the big day. We also took a photo of Nicole's dress to send to Father to be sure it passed the modesty codes. Sunday, after Mass, we headed over to celebrate my big brother's birthday. We had Lasagne at Aunt Donya's. That's where this picture (below) was taken. (I got one of the two of them smooching, too, but I really do have some restraint, and will save that for my own files...)

2) Sunday, after the birthday party, I got to walk around this park (below) with my sweetie. All by ourselves! We've walked these shady paths through so many different phases of our lives: from before we were married -- when talked about us; during our first pregnancy -- when we talked about the baby and how our lives were changing forever; through many of our pregnancies -- when we talked about children and finances and and whether we should juggle them or play skeeball with them; and now, as creaky middle-agers -- working out plans for the upcoming wedding of that firstborn son we talked about so many years ago as we walked under the trees in this same park... My, how time flies. Funny how the park looks just the same as it did twenty-two years ago.

3) The tomatoes have finally hit their stride. We have a bazillion cherries and romas. The children pop them in their mouths right off the vine and I don't mind a bit. Any dirt on them is good, clean dirt, and I'd rather they eat God's candy than the gigantic tub of animal crackers I bought in a moment of weakness and "hid" on top of the refrigerator...

4) We grew some Armenian cucumbers, but had given up on them, as all of our cucumbers contracted some kind of cucumber illness, turned yellow, and stopped producing a couple of weeks ago. But today, Gabey went out and found this crazy coily fellow hiding in the dying vines. It's kinda strange though, this Armenian cucumber; it's hairy. I'm a little afraid to eat it...

5. You might recall I got a new camera for my birthday. It's a Sony Cybershot and I love it. Since, therefore, I didn't need my old camera any more and, since it still does work -- though not very well -- I passed it down to Michelle. This is what's been showing up downloaded onto the picture file recently...

They definitely mug differently for Michelle than they mug for me.

6) The boys are all coming home this weekend, and just about everyone else we know is getting into town for the wedding next week. When all is said and done, we'll have all ten of our kids and our good friends, Tim and Carlos, under our roof. Somewhere. Don't ask me where. Scattered throughout the other households of my siblings and parents will be two of my aunts, my cousin, and my brother and his wife and daughter. The rest of the family from both sides, including Nicole I think, will be staying in hotels. There's still so much to do, but most of it can't be done until the day or two before the wedding, so, for now, I'm just making flower girl (or junior bridesmaid, or whatever the little girls should be called) head pieces, cleaning my house, and trying to figure out where people will sleep. But, it's all good. There's going to be one lulu of a party here on top of a mountain next Saturday night. I'll post as I'm able.

7) Now, as requested:

(Here ya go, Marcy!)

Don't you love this little tune? I'm a Little Teapot. I sang it at my kindergarten graduation forty long years ago. The big boys might be apalled by it, but, let's be real... William and Gabe have four big sisters right above them -- they're going to learn more girlie songs than the first four boys did. It can't be helped.

Trust me, though, these little guys are in no danger of growing up effeminate. One of their favorite things is to dig around outside looking for "ghost soldiers," the maimed and wounded army guys their brothers long ago left buried or dangling in the branches of trees. It's always a big score for the two littlest brothers to find these poor, dirt-encrusted guys. The provenence makes them particularly special soldiers to add to new battles played out by William and Gabe.

No worries, really, big brothers, the little brothers are all boy. They love to "rassle" together in the grass, rolling and squirming until someone comes up crying. (That's how you know the rassle is over, doncha know.) Like any real boy, any stick they find instantly becomes a gun or sword. There's no limit to their courage and daring -- and carelessness, either. So typically male, these traits. Not a single one of my girls is like that, even my biggest tomboys, but all the boys, from the top of the pack to the bottom has gotten into "dangerous-boy-adventure" scrapes out here on the farm. For instance, like their big brothers, the little boys climb up and over and into everything. They have no regard, whatsoever, for gravity.

I had a scare yesterday morning because of this. While the girls and I were in the house doing schoolwork, I heard, somewhere outside in the distance, the boys screaming and yelling. I didn't think much of it at first. They're always screaming and yelling. But, as my ear tuned into the sound, my mother's radar realized it was no ordinary squabbling or playing scream. Do you know that feeling? My adrenaline rushed and my feet were under me in a half second. Following the sound, I skirted out to the backyard, where I found William dangling from his shirt on the four-foot-high fence surrounding Grigio's pen. You couldn't see William's face, because he'd hooked the front of his shirt on top of one of the pickets when he was trying to climb over. But you could sure hear him. He was screaming bloody murder, thank the Good Lord -- because that meant his windpipe wasn't being squeezed. Gabe was standing right behind William, inside the pen crying his eyes out, apparently trapped both by the fence and by his fear for his little brother. But, I had the little brother off the fence, scolded and hugged in a jiffy, and William, being the steam engine that he is was rolling around the back yard in a minute, the whole thing forgotten. Gabe, my sensitive child, needed a little more consoling. But all ended well, thank God.

We owe a debt of gratitude to William's Guardian Angel that he wasn't strangled! The boys are now forbidden to climb over the fences. In theory that ought to prevent any more like accidents. In theory.

It's just a good thing their Guardian Angels can be with them every second of the day.

Which reminds me! Blessings to everyone on this feast of the Guardian Angels! Our gratitude to all of our angels, who are, by name: Matthew, Dorian, Louis, Joseph, Anthony, Mark, Barbara, Angela-Catherine, Lucy, Judy, Augustine, and Oliver. And greetings to the angels of all who visit here today! Gloria in excelsis Deo!