In Waiting

I’ve been having some camera troubles.  First my camera card goes missing.  I wait a week, and then finally decide it’s an old, outdated card anyway, memory is cheap and I got myself a new card.

When I get the new card, I start taking pictures, and then my camera battery dies.  I reach for my charger to find it wasn’t where I left it.  With 5 little sets of hands in our house, I can’t imagine how that would be.  So I go into one of those common slumps of motherhood when all I can think is “this is why I can’t have nice things.”

I offer a reward for the battery charger, if it is found.  The older kids search.  They find my old camera card.

Well at least I have something.

So here’s some pictures from my camera card that was found and I had intended to post a few weeks ago.

Here’s Missy and Lena hanging out.  Missy has been taking Lena for long walks to the neighbor’s farm and then leaving her.  Lena clings to us normally, so it’s not like her to wander off.  We’ve had to tie Missy up more than I’d like outside because she keeps going over to the neighbor’s farm to inspect their animals as well.  Our neighbor’s dog has made it over to our farm from time to time, so they are very sympathetic to our new dog figuring out where her territory is and isn’t.

So the training continues, and I believe it is going well.

I love this picture.  With the addition of Ingrid to our family, we’ve had to shuffle the kids’ rooms a bit so that it makes more sense and all the beds fit.  We removed all the old wallpaper in the old boys’ room last year, but held off on painting it a girly color for the girls until we were ready to move the boys into the old girls’ room.  The old girls’ room needed to have the walls gutted, re-insulated, put back together, etc. etc.  It was supposed to be our summer project, and we debated whether or not to do it since I couldn’t be much help since the accident.  With everything in chaos upstairs, we decided just to move forward.

Silje and David really wanted to help with the demolition of the walls.  I was so impressed.  Silje mostly liked to take a hammer and just pound holes.  We got her ripping down stuff that way.  David did his work with his well-known intensity.  Knut gave him a crow bar and a hammer, and he just got to work as if he’s been doing it for years, ripping down board after board.  He may be skinny, but this kid has muscles.  My jaw was pretty dropped when I took that picture.  Seriously?  The kid’s only 7.

Knut said that Silje and David worked so fast together that they did everything in the room demo-wise from the waist down, and Knut did everything from the waist up, and gutted the closet, which had some crumbly places.

Right now the room is in a very different state.  All the old walls have been torn down and brought to the dump.  The room is cleaned up and ready for the insulating guy to come sometime today.  The wall in this room is most exposed in the winter time, and the cold subzero prairie winds hit it hard, thus making it by far the coldest room in the house.  So when it comes to putting in new insulation, we’re going a little bit overboard.  We think it’s necessary.

As for me?  I’m working on a cross stitch on the couch downstairs.  I’m teaching a bit of school, and trying to work through about 3 different knitting designs.  I recently finished up about 4 projects at the same time, and I like to have about 4 projects on the needles in various stages.  Having a few all at the beginning stages is frustrating.  So I picked up some embroidery.  The pattern I’m working on is here and it is by far my favorite cross stitch project ever.  I’ll get some traction on the knitting soon…I hope.

Don’t tell the girls, but I’m making a “Miss Maggie Rabbit” for each of them for Christmas, with a few knitted clothing items for their bunnies to wear.  It’s another couch-job I can do, and I’m looking forward to it.  I’m needing the inspiration these days.

I can’t wait to show you pictures.  Sigh.  Soon, I hope.