Mystic being introduced to Juliet and Cheyanne for the first time.

I don’t think any of them are too impressed with each other.

Mystic is Melissa’s mustang that Ian traded a beef animal for.

Cheyanne is the lighter paint in the front and Juliet is the darker in the back.

I think that horse is going to turn out to be a ham.

My daughter on my brother and sister-in-law’s sailboat.  I never realized before just how beautiful you are.

Layn’s first day of school?

Outside my window…the skys are cloudy which makes for a spectacular sunrise.  The peepers are reluctant to give up the stage to the sounds of the daylight hours.  The scents coming in the window over my desk are an intoxicating combination of fresh air, freshly mown grass, and the rapid approach of fall.

I am thinking…about adventures and time spent discovering the will of God for one’s life.

I am thankful for….long walks with my husband and thunderstorms.

From the schoolroom…I am now on my own with my studies.  Matthew is all graduated and MK is off for the next 8 weeks.

From the kitchen…there will be much deliciousness springing forth. I just don’t have a clue what it is going to be.

I am wearing…shorts and a sweatshirt.

I am creating…not a thing.  It is just not a day for creation.

I am going…to the post office to send off the latest batch of book orders.  After I get home I plan on staying there.

I am reading…The Scarlet Letter by Nathanial Hawthorne

I am hoping…that my daughter has a good time visiting with family and that she finds the answers to the questions that are in her heart.

I am hearing…Layn protesting over getting his diaper changed, little Isabella barking for her turn to go out, and the washer toiling to clean it’s first load of the wash week.

Around the house…it is a disaster! I don’t know how things got that way since no one was home yesterday but that is the nature of this family.  I am not complaining though, I would rather have lived in and loved than a show place that no one feels comfortable in.

One of my favorite things…sitting here at my desk while Layn sits on the floor beside me playing with his fire truck.

A few plans for the rest of the week…school, school and more school.  While I am doing that there is Layn, taking Matthew to and from work, cooking meals and doing laundry.

Here is a picture thought that I am sharing with you…

Someone looks awfully sleepy!

I was in my van on the way to school to teach my first class of the day.  I was teaching Science at a private Catholic highschool about 5 miles from here.  As usual I had the radio on for the ride when a newscaster broke into the music to announce that a plane had just crashed into the World Trade Center in New York.  I can still see the shock and disbelief on the faces of the other drivers on the road around me.  It was like a strangely choreographed dance.  Everyone, including myself, stopped at the same time under the traffic light regardless of the color of the signal.  We all sat there in disbelief at what we had heard.  Then, as if on cue, every simply started going again without any misshap.

I arrived at school and they had already heard what had happened.  I called my husband who was tearing down a barn out in the hills above our farm.  I begged him to meet me at church with the other children after I got off school so that we could pray together for whatever this whole thing meant.

I spent the day at school not teaching classes but holding sorrowing and shocked teens as they sobbed out their fear and disbelief at what they heard.  We watched the news coverage over and over while they waited for parents to come get them and take them home.  There would be no classes that day.  These kids needed to be with family.

When I finally was able to leave school I met my husband, my parents and my other children at our church and we prayed. We prayed for the unknown, for the known and for the possible.  We all went to bed that night wondering what this could all mean  for our family, our country and our world.

Today on this 10th anniversary our prayer is for forgiveness.  Forgiveness for those who perpetrated those acts; “Forgive them Father for they know not what they do!”  We pray for forgiveness for those who hate and we pray for those in ignorance.

Poor Savannah had a dirty diaper last night!  Poor Uncle Matt discovered it.  We have a saying around here, “Peekers pay!”

Only I think Savannah did the paying.  Uncle Matt needs a lot more practice at this diaper changing business.

When it was discovered that she not only had a dirty diaper but she had dirtied her outfit it added a whole new dimension to the process.

Now, how do you get this shirt thing off?

They are so young and trusting at that age.

Now all he has to do is figure out the snaps and she should be good to go.

In the past couple of days, since hurricane Irene passed through, summer and fall have been locked in mortal combat.  The nighttime temperatures plummet into the low 50′s and even some 40′s while the daytime temps have been trying valiantly to regain those hot muggy 80′s that we have known all summer.  The gentle breezes of summer are slowly giving way to the unpredictable gusts and lashing winds of fall.  Winds that are designed for cutting through the thickest of clothing and stripping the trees bare of their raiment.  Even the bright and pungent summer days, days redolent with corn, freshly mowed hay and ripening produce, are slowly giving way to the musky days of fall.  This morning when I stepped outside I saw that this maple tree in the front yard had succumbed to the ravishment of battle and has begun to exchange it’s verdant green robes for the fleeting but more transient hues of fall.