This might be all for a while...

Sure wish I had a little more profundity to go out on.

My second schoolhood begins bright and early tomorrow with a three hour chemistry lab.

I'll try not to get coffee in my battery acid, break my goggles in in a violent manner, deafen my lab partner, light the shrubbery afire, or come to ground-breaking revelations on the first day. Hmmm. I suppose we can strike the last one from my list of worries. That's a load off! Here's to getting through this without losing too much nose skin!

In other headlines, our daughter is officially above average. 100% for weight, >100% for height. 21 lbs 6 oz, 29.5 inches long. Don't have any pictures for you tonight since I can't put my finger on our wide angle lense. Apparantly she's also on the upper end of the decible scale when poked with a needle!! That's what I was told anyway. My man-cave is a sufficient distance from the Dr's office so as to muffle the screaming somewhat.

Best get some beauty sleep. And I should really go to bed also- so I'll let you go.

Videos of Emma

Abridged. (Big sigh of relief.)
The dark mass that you may or may not be able to discern is Scout. Emma has realized that Scout is a most interesting and funny critter. Scout has discovered that Emma is an extremely messy eater. She's never far from where Emma is if Emma has any sort of tray in front of her. What she's not so sure about is Emma's noise level. When Emma starts screeching, Scout has to take a few steps back and cock her head curiously!

Emma wasn't so sure why we'd decided to get her out of bed this morning. Be sure your speakers are turned up. She'll demonstrate to you how she's a chip off the old block. (Again, Scout is in front of her, egging her on.)

Nothing like making sure the plumbing is working in the morning.If she could walk she be shuffling around, yawning, rubbing her head and scratching her rear.

Had a great special meeting. Chris Christopherson Hill was privileged to spend the night with us. We are thinking of getting the church bus loaded up for a trip to Blackfoot on Sunday. Shauna's going great guns with Pampered Chef. I'm cashing in on some good parenting opportunities while she's away at shows. We've been informed that it's NOT called babysitting when dad has to look after the kiddos! It's called parenting. So there you have it. I've duly noted the distinction and now must needs go change some messy britches and get her down for a nap. Parenting... babysitting....  A rose by any name smells just as bad when I've fed her new food!

ps:

Finally home

Five weeks on the road.

It may take us five weeks to get everything put back in order, catch up on the mail, and get things back to a nice lived-in look instead of forlorn and abandoned.

We're sorry to report that our stack of mail was about two feet tall. One foot was catalogs, eight inches were bills, and the remainder is now plastered to our fridge. To those of you who sent holiday cards, we thank you. You're a bunch of overachievers but we thank you none the less. To those of you who didn't, we thank you too. It's nice to have company in the we're-loser-slackers category. If there's any money left when we get caught up on the bills, we might be able to afford a few thank-you letters. Don't hold your breath!

I have a few more days of lazing around while the wife works. School starts the 17th. I've got my backpack and my lunch box. Need to get pencils, books, binders, and something for show and tell.

All for now. Gotta get started on that "What I did when I was skipping fall term" report.

This looks like just another boring picture of a car packed for the trip home. That's because it is. May I just point out, however, that the roof-top bag was filled with a variety of things on the trip out: stroller, suitcases for all three of us, etc. And on the return trip? Completely stuffed with clothes of the female variety. I nearly had to FedEx my sparse belongings home.

ps: I suppose an Emma update should be given. She can sit up, feed herself Cheerios, fly into a flailing rage when she's not keen on going to sleep, pet Scout, squirm like a fish out of water as she tries desperately to get the hang of crawling, fill her pants to epic proportions, smile and look cute while filling said pants, smile and look cute when she's not filling her pants, look exceptionally cute when she's fast asleep, grab anything and everything within reach, and smile and look cute. Right now she's snot nosed and a little out of sorts but she still manages to smile and look cute.

Some cute girl we know

We're having a hard time letting go of Hawaii.

Sometimes a rainy Oregon/sunny Hawaii outfit produces eclectic results!

 Piano lessons and keeping grandpa entertained.

A cooped up child finally set free

Six hours on a plane with a baby who desperately wants to be mobile.

We've had better flights.

But she found new meaning in life the next day when we set up Tabor's old exercise thingymabob.

September, October, November, December...

Wow. We're way behind. Sorry you've been stuck rereading all our old material.
There isn't really any one theme to this post. Just a little wander through the past couple months. Please try not to get lost.

Mom and dad came to visit.

The other mom and dad came a few weeks later but I guess all of those pictures are on grandma's camera. Sorry about that.

Some of the last days of farming

Planting winter grain.

 Fly by wire(s).

 If you can't tell what Jose is congratulating me for, this next picture might help clear things up.

 Watch out for that last corner. It's a doozey- doosy- doosey- dewsey... Anyone know how to spell that? The trailer lost a set of wheels. Across the ditch and off into the desert. Fortunately there were 10 others.

Dead. Again. Sayonara.

Emma, Oregon and beyond.

 September

 At the hospital with C-dif.

October

 Does this Johny-Jump-Up make my butt look big?

 Oregon bound!

Bath in Nanna's sink.

Maui bound!

 "Who is this guy and why did you invite him?" Or maybe that look is saying, "Would you bug off- I'm warming the pool."

 Not sure what their private little joke is.

 Tabor and Emma's head.

I think she got the hang of hangin' out.

 Why do we always find ourselves in vehicles that are bulging at the seams?

 Our minivan in the sky.

 The volcano at night.

 Trekking across an old caldera in the rain.

Packing for home.

We're at Corey and Danica's now. Off to G&G Ramey's tomorrow. Gotta see how much havoc Scout has caused. I'm sure Bella will be glad to have us take our nut-head child back!

Firsts

Our little tank. Four months old on Tuesday!

Had her first taste of rice cereal today.

 Playing tug-of-war with mom. Not fond of that spoon leaving her mouth! It's amazing to watch them figure out what those flailing appendages are for.

Giving it all she's got. She seems a bit disgruntled that her best just isn't quite enough yet. She did roll from her stomach to her back for the first time but, of course, the camera wasn't rolling.