Yesterday when I picked him up from school, Adam was wearing the cutest little puppy ears, which he'd made at school. After naptime, I wanted him to wear them again so I could get a picture.

"I want to see your puppy ears," I told him.

He showed me his ears.

Then he flat-out refused to wear the puppy ears, throwing them on the floor, etc. Fine, I told him. I won't take the picture. I just wanted a cute picture of you in your puppy ears.

Turned around.

Yeah. Has to do it in his time. He put them on himself and showed me.

HOW CUTE IS THAT?!?!!

"When Adam is a Dad, he can drink coffee," Mark said as Adam was reaching for Tim's coffee mug the other day at Bob Evans.
"What will you drink?" I asked.
"When I'm a dad, I'll drink Sprite!" Mark answered. "AND Dr. Pepper!"

"Head and Shoulders, knees and toes,
Knees and toes, knees and toes.
Head and shoulders, knees and toes,
My Fair La-dy!"

This morning, I heard Adam go into the kitchen, open the door to the trash can, and throw something away. He then closed it and went back to the living room, brushing off his hands in satisfaction. Later, I was putting something in the trash and wondered what he'd thrown away. I discovered that it was the flier with other Thomas the Tank Engine "stuff" that can be purchased, which they always put in the packaging for said toys. This is a cherished item Mark calls his "magazine" and takes to bed to read.
Somebody apparently decided that Mark had had it long enough.

alternately: Mark's ACTUAL Fourth Birthday

We made it to the actual birthday, and in the midst of several exciting things -- one of my very long-time friends from way back in the golden years came for a visit, and Mark and Tim went to a tailgate at church, among other things -- we did celebrate a certain boy's real fourth birthday... though the present-opening will have to continue for more days as he did not finish.

Daddy got him a Bob the Builder DUPLO block set. This was wonderful. This is what contributed to the not-wanting-to-talk-on-the-phone-even-to-accept-birthday-wishes (he threw the phone down when Grandma Sarah called -- sorry BigMama) and the unwillingness to open any more presents.

In showing his true character, he let his brother play with even the best present he got. Serious good brother points here.

Another birthday cake -- and though *I* didn't break the bottom layer OR run out of frosting (ahem!), it pretty much looked the same as last week's (except it was a yellow cake and not chocolate)... and it ate the same, too!

"Mommy, you forgot to put ICE CREAM!" Mark told me. Gulp, I thought. I don't even know if we HAVE suitable ice cream. We did. Mark was pleased, though he still chose not to eat much cake (like last week). He had TOYS to play with.

Adam, however, DID choose to eat the cake again. He was quite pleased with the frosting and all the joy that comes with attempting to pick off all the little sprinkles.

Guess since we have more presents to open, we'll have birthday again tomorrow. Wonder how long he can stretch this out?

Mark desperately wanted Grandma and Grandpa to celebrate his birthday with him, and since they were here last weekend -- and since, as the givers of the most impressive pile of gifts known to man or small boy as my mother is a true gift-giving addict (which works well for me, the picture of greed) -- we decided to let Mark have an early birthday.

He and Grandma made his birthday cake while I was at sewing, commencing the frosting of said cake the next day and living through the disaster that apparently is BigMama putting together a layer cake -- so that's why we never had layer cakes -- and madly attempting to get the remaining frosting to cover the whole thing (which ended up turning out fine. Frosting covers a multitude of accidents, doesn't it).

Then, of course, it was time for Grandma's big pile o'presents. I mean Grandma and Grandpa, of course, as he is certainly along for the ride. :)

Adam didn't want to be more than a few inches away from the man with the presents, hoping and hoping he'd get to play with some.

Mark was very good about sharing his presents with his little brother. Really impressive, since he's just turning 4. (Four! I have a four-year-old, as of tomorrow!!! GLEEPS!)

He also made the appropriate happy faces as he opened the presents and discovered the wonders that were inside. Look at the face in this one!

(Bob the Builder is a can't-lose choice!)

Then it was off to the famous cake that Mark worked so hard on:

He hardly ate any of it, owing to the keen longing he had to get back to his toys and play with them. But his little brother didn't seem to have any trouble tackling the whole cake issue.

"Yommy, Yommy CAKE!" says Adam.

We'll have more birthday this weekend on his actual birthday (tomorrow). But I have heard from some of my loyal fans that they'd appreciate a new posting since the boys started school three weeks ago and I haven't written since. (Sorry.)

This morning was the first day of school! It's hard to believe a year has passed since our first first day! It was so exciting! Of course, getting everyone ready willingly was a bit of a challenge...

We finally all got into the car...

Happily, of course. "I am not going to smile," Mark promised me. Let me assure you, he kept his word.

Okay, guys, hold hands and smile so I can get a picture of this moment.

(please note the effort Mark is putting into looking mad...)

Once in the building, they were off down the hall to their classrooms. I was concerned that Adam might cry a little the first day, but that did not end up being an issue. He was off, into the room without a look back.

And when I came to pick them up, Adam greeted me with a gleeful "Hi, Mommy!" Mark told me he wasn't ready to leave. But he didn't keep frowning.

What a happy day!

My local newspaper is forevermore denying me the joys of its errors (as I noted in this sterling entry, as well as many other times to my family and friends) as of a week ago, when it published its last edition and went out of business, an announcement that left the community "overcome with shock and sadness".

Now. While the above phrase does seem a little strong for the demise of the only local newspaper (no one died, there was no question about the survivors, there was no blood... you get the idea), I am disappointed. Granted, this is where I got most of my copy-editing kicks -- serving as an editor of the MOMCC magazine is a bit more professional and doesn't include the stupid journalistic errors like "Teen: Wreckless Driving is uncool" -- and I made a lot of cracks about the shameful errors that made it past the editors' eagle eyes.

But, at the same time, it was the local newspaper.

Yes. The big-city paper nearby took over publishing the long-time Noblesville paper (we refer to it in 1886) and includes it in its end-of-the-week papers, but that really doesn't count. Sorry, but it's true.

Having worked in a memorable small-town newspaper in my youth, I do feel some loyalty to the paper that does its level best in the face of low funds, outdated technology, and a town full of, er, characters. I subscribed to my local paper despite the glaring editing errors and in the face of occasionally substandard delivery -- from missed papers, confused vacation orders, wadded papers shoved into the box... you get the idea -- because I wanted to read the paper that was produced locally. I didn't want to have to wade through the classifieds for all of the big city nearby. I got some good stuff through the local classifieds. Gramps could use the local classifieds to locate all the best garage sales. Will he care to wade through all of the big-city ones to find the ones near enough to go to? (He's very committed, so he might. :) )

But the thing that really bugs me about this is the "oh so full of regret" column in the big-city-published tabloid included in the big-city paper last week. "A worthy competitor" had stopped publishing, and we're all the worse for it.

Yeah. Cry me a river. Never mind that we subscribed to the big-city paper for Sundays only to get the weekly ads, but perhaps a year after starting our subscription, we received word that, as they would be publishing our "local" paper as an insert three days a week, we'd be getting those papers, too. For free. Oh, and all the rest of the week, too. For free. So for the past three years (anyway), we've been receiving two papers every day. What is the average consumer going to do? They're going to stop subscribing to the one they're paying for (especially since it was sometimes laughable), and they're going to continue to get sort of local news from the big-city paper. This doesn't take an MBA to figure out.

Yet that big-city paper pretends to be sad for the end of a (five-year) era.

Yeah.

Eye thing their knot vary sory.

Copy edit this.

This week is the first week for the boys' school -- it's actually the parents' meeting and then the get-acquainted meetings (tuesday evening and then thursday morning, respectively).

Thursday is the first day of my *NEW* Moms' Bible Study at church, which I am leading. Call me crazy. Yes, indeed, but it only gets worse. But on this subject, I have missed being in a true Bible Study since I had to stop going to the Wednesday morning Ladies' Bible Study, led by the incomparable Joyce Windhorn (I truly respect this lady) because the boys were being too much of a distraction. I joined MOPS, but it didn't fill the need for a real Bible Study. Another one never came along. I just caved to the pressure. :) So Pastor Wade and I have worked on it, I ordered some study guides to consider, and this group will launch Thursday at 4 p.m. (with babysitting!). There are something like 10 women signed up for it. (I think totalling something like 800 kids, though I might be exaggerating.)

Is that enough?

Oh no. Last week Pastor Heather approached me about assisting in Confirmation. Egads, I can't abide junior high kids. I mean, in general. ... Except... They need good leaders (by the way, this is all my thinking, not anyone trying to "work" on me)... Two weeks a month... Eh...

Yeah. so I told Pastor Heather today that I'd give it a try and see if I can make it all work. Heh. Tim is all in favor of it. And Pastor Heather shrieked just a little. (I do so like to feel wanted!)

Am I crazy?

(Signs point to YES.)

The boys were sad about Dad going off on a trip today -- Mark would prefer Daddy to "take the day off" -- so I decided it was the right day to take them to the Indianapolis Zoo. (Sorry, Mel, but it was sort of spur of the moment.) I still can't get over how much it costs -- we dropped $30 and I got in free! -- but upkeep for this sort of thing must be astronomical.

The boys had a blast, though.

There are only a few more days left with the koalas, and we got there right at feeding time, which means that the lazy beasts opened their eyes and momentarily stretched. Evolutionarily, I'm not sure how a useless animal like this survives, unless it tastes as boring as it acts.

But they stretched and yawned and then rested some more. Apparently (according to the sign) they sleep for 18-22 hours a day; due to the low nutritional value of their only food, they have energy for nothing else. What a life.

On to more interesting animals. We were there in time to feed the giraffes!

Adam was too short to hold his piece of food up to the giraffe, so I had to lift him, and was therefore not able to get a picture of it. Only so many hands.

We saw the elephants...

And the seals...

And the penguins...

And the polar bear's behind. (He was eating.)

Mark said, "I LOVED the dolphin show!" Adam kept saying "Dow-fin!"

We also got to see the SHARKS in the new Oceans building, including being able to TOUCH them! I touched them a lot, Adam touched one and liked putting his hands in the water, and Mark pretty much didn't want to touch them at all, though he liked watching. Adam kept calling them, "Shark! Shark!" It was cute. (We also ran into someone I knew there, which is always amusing.) We also rode the train, which goes around the outside of the Plains exhibit. The boys might have died had we not.

Addition I almost forgot: We saw the walrus, but Adam had a hard time with his name. Adam called him the "Carwash."

We saw an airplane fly overhead right about the time Daddy's flight was supposed to take off, so we pretended it was Daddy's flight and waved to him.

The boys had a very nice time and were VERY VERY good. No one ran off, and Adam only got finicky about riding in the stroller when he was too tired to remain reasonable.

They were also super cute. Get a load of this...

That was without even the slightest suggestion from me.

We are home and in our naps now. I imagine they'll be serious naps today.

A birthday's never over until the present Aunt Amanda and Uncle David picked out arrives -- they're always interesting.

Today's arrival did not disappoint.

This little globe has sounds, music, and a joystick that controls a little "plane" that flies over places, which the globe then identifies. It also tells how people speak in some places (China, UK, France, South Africa, USA, Mexico, Australia, India, etc.). Adam is especially impressed with "Salut!" from Canada and France.

After more than 40 hours, I have the grand glory of presenting a major completed project...

This 1857 Promenade Dress is the Patterns of History pattern, in silk, lined in cotton. The undersleeves and collar are from the same pattern, in cotton.

The hooped petticoat (you can't see it; it's underneath!) is Past Patterns' hooped petticoat (without the flounce).

The silk is from Fashion Fabrics Club (.com) and the trims are all from Joann fabric.

The project is for the Wylie House Museum in Bloomington, IN. It will be a supporting character in a theatrical program in September, October and November at the museum, Talk of the Times, Letters from the Wylie Family, 1852-1865.

All in all, I'm quite pleased.