Nothin' Better

Nothing better than being asked if you want to go fishing.

Nothing better than fishing where you know there are a lot of fish!

Nothing better than missing out on chores to go fishing.

Nothing better than water, fish, canoe, brothers and Dad.

Nothing better than being the youngest person there and the only one to catch the fish. Sawyer's first. Beechfork Lake.

Is it Friday Yet?

My oven element burned out, so for the time being I'm limited to stove top and crock pot. Which is why making my assigned dessert for the cross country dinner, chocolate mint brownies, posed a little problem. While I'm borrowing some one else's oven, lets make a pizza and banana muffins as well!

Don't even ask. It's not what it looks like, that would be much worse. Banana muffins all over the rug is bad enough. I'm counting my blessings it wasn't brownie batter or pizza as well. Any suggestions?

I Am What?

I was playing Pictionary with my boys, and one of them picked Arrhenotoky: To only give birth to boys. They were so excited to find a word that describes me! I was starting to feel a little of their excitement thinking I was a scientific category unto myself. Until I looked it up. "It is a form of parthenogenesis in which unfertilized eggs develop into haploid males, observed in some marine invertebrates, beetles, scorpions, mites, bees." GROSS. I'm feeling just a little annoyed with the Pictionary people.

Running Across Country Wearing Hardly Anything!

Tanner was less than thrilled with his uniform - and added spandex shorts to cover up. But his first race day excitement made up for what wasn't covered.

It was an invitational meet, and four or five other schools attended.

On your mark!

Waiting for the race to begin.

Close to the one mile mark.

Right at the finish line determined to not let three girls finish before him. He succeeded. Two miles in 13:35.

We Are...Marshall: Go Herd!

Mr. Brown Sign's not happy. He can't spend the day out discovering. He has to stand. And talk sport management. The clubs on the Marshall campus are all competing for members. From the new herd of incoming freshmen. For SIX hours! His green poster is eye catching, slightly jaw dropping, and even pulsating.

But what was really unusual was not the poster or the granola that got handed out, or the type of sports questions you had to answer to win a tee shirt, it was the five sons that accompanied him to work. How many professors did that? And for bonus points, how many pens, pencils, high lighters, soda bottles, tee shirts, calculators, flash lights, paper weights, balloons, books, videos, cup insulators, cups, pamphlets, candy, ice cream, pizza did my boys bring home from other vendors? ENOUGH TO FILL MY ENTIRE PING PONG TABLE!

It's Toasty

It's been hot in my kitchen lately! I never turn on my ceiling fans, unlike my husband, but I've been pulling that cord all day. It wasn't until 10:30 p.m., while sweeping, that I heard a click, and realized my oven had been on since 6:30 a.m! I had turned it on low to keep the french toast toasty warm, and never turned it off. Good grief! Why can't I make this mistake in the winter?

Z A C H A R Y - Happy Birthday!

Since you're such a word enthusiast, we've presented you with some words worthy of your attention, equal to your intelligence, useful for your future writings and zany enough to make you smile. Alexia you do not have!

Z - zooid: resembling an animal

A - alopecia: disease causing loss of hair

C - costive: having sluggish motion; constipated

H - hircine: strong-smelling like a goat

A - augur: priests in Rome who claimed to be able to foretell events by observing the flight or other actions of birds

R - rodomont: a braggart

Y - yoicks: an old fox-hunting cry

Sorry this is sideways. I should have known better, but it is a great video of Zachary singing for a free hot dog at Hill Billy Hotdog, here in Huntington, West Virginia. Bon Appetit!

Back to School

In case you think you're perusing the latest catalog for boys' clothes, or backpacks, or shoes, you're mistaken, "Mr. I'm to Cool to Smile" Cooper starting 3rd.

If you think these boys look well rested, think again, "Mr. Too Excited to Stop Doing Summer Chores and Homework" Tanner entering 11th.

It's the annual starting school today photos accompanied by school's beginning jitters. Hunter and Porter are in the same middle school this year (Mr. "I Want to Be Homeschooled Please" Hunter going into 8th and "Mr. Can't Wait to Get Back to the Action" Porter beginning 6th).

Mr. "Is it Time Yet?" Sawyer starts kindergarten today. It hasn't hit me yet. Maybe tomorrow when he has a full day. I'll miss him the most.

The 100 Acre Woods

This is a BIG pig. This daddy pig is longer than I am tall. Imagine me laying on top of this beast! He weights five hundred pounds. I couldn't find anything to show size comparison, and my chicken exited before my camera was ready. But a good size chicken goes from the pig's eye to his snout. Mammoth big, massive big, freezer full of pork big.

We were invited to a West Virginia farm. It was a beauty! This chicken's feathers glistened like fire in the sun. Cooper was the only boy to go, and enjoyed the animals.

The baby rabbits were adorable, and if we work hard and build our cage, one can be ours!

This is today's hero. Stephanie's an amazing mother of four, caretaker of many animals, and gardener extraordinaire. She offered to share her extra produce with us today. How could we say no to that?

Beans a plenty, beans galore!

This is Susan and her gang. She shared her invitation with me. She's my friend. They outpicked us 3:1.

Mrs. Farmer has grown huge sunflowers, and they needed to be cut as the birds were eating the seeds. We've brushed away some of the flower pollen. Can you see the black seeds underneath?

Sawyer cleaned those heads up, and the seeds are ready to dry. Anyone up for home grown, roasted sunflower seeds? I'm assuming Chef Tom will come through with a recipe for me ;-).

Sharing and Storing

“Laying up in store that they perish not” is a thought I ponder on a bit. I struggle to keep up with the demands of feeding six hungry boys and one Dad, never mind keeping the cupboards stocked with a little extra.

This week we were GIVEN apples that had fallen off a tree, cucumbers and tomatoes.

We spent most of yesterday working together and processing all this food.

We canned 7 quarts of tomatoes, using that handy gift mentioned here.

We also used it on cucumbers to make relish, and tried a few spears and slices for pickles, all of the dill variety: 8 pints.

And after much love, pruning and peeling, we got 11 quarts of applesauce.

Much thanks to Willa, Charlotte and Jean for thinking of us and sharing what I could not grow this summer. It will go a long way in filling those bottomless pits! And having the boys help prepare the food to store is always a great teaching moment.

The Cross Country Journey

Tanner bought some new cross country shoes yesterday. They made me think of our cross country adventures this summer. It was quite a journey. He paid for these shoes by himself, having been able to earn money while visiting his aunt or uncle or grandparents. I appreciate family for that. He's running this year, for the first time, to stay in shape for basketball. He's up against some runners who have been doing this for seven years! He's on his third day. I keep reminding him: It's not about the race, it's all about the journey. It's good advice for me as well. Sometimes I race through my day, inside my house, and forget the little people with me on my journey. So here's to cross country, new running shoes, and enough quiet time to ponder.

Why Boys Need Sports: Hard-Wired to Compete and Win

I loved reading this article and realizing some of the things my boys do are normal, natural. Not that I need an explanation, but it was good to be educated, SINCE I HAVE SIX!

Team Sports Mirror Primitive Warfare, Teach Social Skills for Adulthood
By Brooke de Lench

http://www.momsteam.com/

To understand why a successful sports experience is so critical to a boy's emotional and social development and why boys behave the way they do requires at least a rudimentary understanding of the science of evolutionary biology.

Many of the ways boys behave - particularly their love of sports and rough and tumble play - are rooted in the distant past. Boys are hard-wired to form large social groups in which to compete against other boys and sort out winners and losers (like the game "King of the Hill") because their ancestors did the same thing during childhood and adolescence in preparation for the more serious competition - for food, for mates, to survive - they would face as adults. The rough-and-tumble play boys are so fond of, which experts say begins around age three and peaks between ages eight and ten, also contributes to formation of dominance hierarchies in boys' groups. A male's greater acceptance of - indeed attraction to - risk-taking may also explain why boys are, more than girls, attracted to extreme sports (skateboards, snowboards, rock climbing, BMX bikes etc.).

An interesting 1987 study of boys attending summer camp found that boys, once assigned to cabins, organized themselves into teams led by the strongest, most athletic boys, and that once formed, the teams resulted in reduced conflict and led to an increase in sports competition with boys from other cabins. By the end of summer, the dominant boys were almost always spending time with their cabin-mates and spending most of their free time directing the group in competitive athletic activities.

This evolutionary perspective may explain why boys on sports teams, more than girls, are able to figure out who should play what position and who should be captain without the help of the coach. It may also explain why boys seem to be more comfortable than girls in unequal relationships, even if they are the one who is "low man on the totem pole." A third-string linebacker is able to be the star quarterback's best buddy because he doesn't resent the quarterback's higher status.

As Dr. Leonard Sax observes in his book, Why Gender Matters, "This male characteristic has roots that go very deep. If you know the stories of Jesse and Jonathan son of Saul, or for that matter Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, then you've heard this story before. Those friendships were not less strong because of the difference in status between the friends. On the contrary, the hierarchical character of the relationship defined and even ennobled the friendship." Because boys, like their ancestors, recognize the importance of strong coalitions to their individual and collective survival, boys more than girls prefer to have the best players on their team, not necessarily their friends.

A 2003 article in Developmental Review suggests that one of the functions of team sports for boys is to help them develop the social skills needed to form competitive groups or coalitions in adulthood, such as business organizations. Many of these developmental activities also mirror and provide practice for specific behavioral skills associated with primitive warfare, such as throwing and tracking the trajectory of projectiles. This might explain why fathers seem so intent on spending so much time with their sons practicing throwing and catching - they are hard-wired to pass these skills on to their sons to prepare them for warfare - and seem far less interested in teaching their daughters these same skills.

The relation between physical aggression and social dominance becomes more obvious and serious in late childhood and early adolescence. Between ages 8 and 10, bullying by boys increases at the beginning of each school year and decreases later in year after the social pecking order is established. By grade school, boys' games are more competitive, longer in duration, with more rules and interdependence between players and with clear winners and losers. By contrast, girls avoid games where winning means someone must lose; they like turn-taking games like hopscotch, where competition is less direct. A 2002 study of fourth and six graders showed, during free time, that boys competed with boys half the time while only one percent of the girls used recess to compete against other girls.

The bottom line: your son is hard-wired to do many of the things that he does. Understanding that hard wiring will help you be a better parent.

Hip to Be Square

I got this contraption from a dear friend. I might admit I rolled my eyes just a tad. I'm not one to have a kitchen full of contraptions with a single purpose which, as explained on the box and in the pamphlet, is to chop onions into mini squares.

But as you can see, I've repented of my eye rolling. It also did tomatoes and cilantro beautifully. Instant salsa. Definitely worthy of my recommendation. Anything that helps make boy food this quickly deserves a rave review: 5 stars, two thumbs up, and 7 burps.

Tractors: Just What the Friends Ordered

We went to a small engine and tractor show in Barboursville, WV.

I've never been to one before. This was a really small exhibit I'm sure, but engines like this made it very interesting.

Some people have a thing for engines! I guess we all have different kinds of hobbies ;-)

We each picked out our favorite tractor. This dandy Minneapolis Moline put a gleam in Jarrod's eye.

Hunter liked this 1939 Sears Reliable.

I liked this BLUE Ford beauty.

Porter likes yellow and loved the International mini.

Cooper fell for the old fashioned look.

Good old John Deere

Farmall was a great vision of patriotism!

Sawyer was all over this tractor, the only one with a flap that opened and shut while driving in the parade.

Since the owner was so generous, we used this one for the whole gang.

We have a special friend that likes tractors, and who has shared a few with us, and we wanted to let him know we were thinking of him today. We hope you can feel the vibrations of our little hearts, and know we love you.