| 09-22-01 Hello All, Things are well here in the "Great Northwoods". The boys have started back to school! Lorelei took the boys as she usually does on their first day. When they were getting ready Cody got his backpack ready to go also. Lorelei took Jon to his new 4th grade class and said hi to his teacher. As they were leaving the class, Cody says " ok Mom you take me to my class now". He was very upset to find out he was not going to get to stay at school! I just hope he still has that attitude in 2 years, when he really gets to go! Adam started 6th grade and middle school! After the first couple of weeks he has been "cruising" through his homework, especially the spelling. We went to "open house" on Thursday evening and we got a chance to talk to his teacher. I asked if he was going to challenge Adam a bit more in spelling. His teacher said what a great job Adam was doing in spelling and math but he looked a little puzzled. Lorelei then went on to mention that Adam was the spelling B champ for the grade school for the last two years! Adams' teacher then realized that Adam had hornswoggled him! Apparently he had no idea, and Adam was enjoying the easy words for the spelling tests. Both the boys are doing great in school and they like their teachers. In animal news, our favorite new hen died a few weeks ago. She was the most passive of the bunch. She would let all the boys pick her up and would sit and roost on their fingers. The boys were upset, but they have come to an understanding about the circle of life, and how it continues. No tears were shed, but they did make a cross, and etched her name where we buried her. The rest of the animal crew are doing well, though the 8 remaining hens are only producing 2-3 eggs per day. The older ones are molting. Jon came home from school last week and asked Lorelei for something to put frogs in. She said that if he was going to hunt frogs, he needed to change out of his school clothes. Jon insisted that he would be careful and not get the clothes dirty! Well some of you don't know Jon the way I do! His nickname "Bear" to this day fits him so well! Needless to say he came back very excited with three captured frogs and a very muddy shirt. Understand that any water standing around here this time of the year, is because under that water is a layer of clay! Lorelei was not happy. Two of the frogs have since made a short lived escape, only to be captured in the living room and bedroom. We had a fun time camping at the beach in the Yurts. We went on two different occasions to two different spots. We only stayed one night each time. That was long enough to be away from the animals and the garden. The first trip was to "Beachside" State Park. As its name implies it is very close to the beach. Cody had a blast! He got so wet and sandy! At least 4 times we had to clean the sand off of him and change his clothes. By the time we headed for home on the second afternoon, he had no more clean clothes. On the trip home even though he was very tired and could hardly keep his eyes open, he kept asking if we could stop so he could see the water. Unable to resist his pleas any longer, ( I am so lured to the water and the ocean myself) I told him that I would stop, but that we were only going to look at the water, we were not going to get in or near it. Cody said "ok dada I wont". We stopped on the Siletz bay, where they have a small pier. We walked out onto the pier, and Cody instantly looked down and saw the other kids playing near the water and said, " I want to go down dare" I said, "No you agreed to just look at the water remember". He seemed to have already forgotten about our agreement. We didn't let him get near the water. He was not happy. We were soon back on the road, and Cody quickly fell asleep. We used our new canoe several times. Lorelei even went over to Gary's Pond with us once. What a great addition to our "adventure gear". Adam, Jon, and I spent an entire day in a slough near Grand Island. Inaccessible to anyone except by canoe or other hand launchable craft. We fished the entire day. Jon caught a really nice Smallmouth bass. We caught Largemouth and Squwafish also. What a great day. All in all it was a good summer. Because of the economy we stayed close to home, but we managed to do fun stuff together. We cooked out over a campfire, went shooting, bike riding, camping, and fishing. We cut and split wood together. Gardened, cut trails around the property. The older boys are becoming such a good help, I could not keep up with things without them. In the last two weeks we have had visits from family. Lorelei's sister Diane and her husband Corky stayed with us a few days. My Dad was here most of last week. We had a great time. That's about it for now. See Ya, Glynn Jr. |