What wonderful weather! It has been just beautiful this week. Wilma is visiting and we have been having fun in the sun. Getting ready, now, to go for a walk up to Monument Hill and view 'greater downtown Port Carbon'. Yea!!

First day of school -- Monday, August 25, 2008.

Lining up with classmates from last year: Cameron (new this year), Brigid, Molly, Kierstyn, Morgan and Mason to the right.

Morgan's first soccer game this year was on Saturday, August 27th. His team is the Green Eagles. He had a great time. This is his third year in soccer and I think they are finally getting it. The first year, they were doing good just to get it to the correct end of the field. Now they are starting to pass it to each other instead of fighting over the ball so they could score, like they did last year. It was fun. Not yet competative as far as keeping score, but we still won, unofficially, 12-2.

After the soccer game, we went to Elizabethtown to visit the campers. Morgan LOVED the camp fire. Everything he could find went in. Within reason, of course. He roasted marshmallows, but didn't eat them. To chewy, he said. Thanks again, girls, for your hospitality.

Before school started, we took Morgan to a Reading Phils game. He was one of the first 100 kids there, so he got a free baseball and they let him go out on the field before the game. Can you find the ball he is throwing to Reese? He had a great time. It's really a big field! It was a great day for baseball. The Phils lost, but we had fun. Stayed for the whole game. We watched the bats flying around the stadium lights. When we weren't watching for stray fly balls, that is.

I am really moving along here! Another post this month!!

Talking about the past......Earlier this month, we took Morgan to Trexler Park Zoo. We've been there before, but this was the first time with Reese's new hip. He had a wonderful time. Reese, that is. No pain. The other times he would be in pain just walking from the car to the entrance gate. Not this time. We walked all around. I think Morgan got tired before Reese did. We saw emus, zebras, camels, red kangaroo and many more interesting animals. They have a new display of lorikeets. You can purchase a little cup of nectar and go inside their giant cage. When they see you coming, they inch down the cage and drink it from your hand. Morgan loved it. That's his hand with 2 lorikeets drinking from the same cup. We got there just at the right time. They hadn't been fed yet and were hungry.

The peacocks run around all over the place. They scream and chase each other and beg for attention.

Congratulations are in order for Reese! He graduated from Physical Therapy on Wednesday. Wonderful world! They were very satisified with his progress. There was not much more they could do for him that he cannot do himself at home. He got a T-shirt as a prize. I bugged him until he modeled it for me. Isn't he just the cutest thing?

Waaay back on Sunday the 10th we had a major hail storm in the area. It started about 3:15 and lasted about 15 or 20 minutes. Very scary. I was so afraid the skylight in the bathroom would crack. I walked around the house praying for it to stop. Morgan was down at his grandparents' and Reese was outside looking at it! I said, "Get inside right this minute and I mean it!" It was wild. Made me think of The Ten Commandments, only without the flames. Enjoy the pics and be glad you were not here. We had lots of leaves down and some tomatoes smashed, but that was the extent of it. Thank the Lord!

Look at that! Another post in the same month!

We had two of Morgan's friends and their families over for a cook out on August 1st. Actually, I cooked at 3pm and then put it in the crock pot until time to eat at 6pm. :) That sure was easier than trying to cook hamburgers and hot dogs while kids were running around. I got to visit more, too.

First is Molly and Morgan on the swings. They would swing as high as they could and then jump off and see who could get closest to the sidewalk. Oddly enough, none of them hit the sidewalk and got hurt.

Next is Morgan teaching Brigid to play baseball. She is into tennis and did not play T-ball this year, so she was not really that interested. Didn't keep him from trying...

Then we have Lauren playing in the sand box. They

really loved that. At one time, all 5 of them were in the box. But I didn't have my camera ready so I missed it!

Steph brought cupcakes for dessert, which Catie really enjoyed.

Since life is now all about our children, I only have pictures of them to share. Sorry, but that's how it is. :)

Here are the pictures from our visit with Mom and the Arches.

The boys had a wonderful time in the pool. It sure was hot.

In this photo, Logan is trying to dump water on Morgan as he slides down the slide.

Then when Morgan tried to return the favor of dumping water, Logan was not so excited.

But in the end they all had no problem sharing a nice dry towel.

Looks like I'm behind on the blog. Again. Mom, Darese, Logan and Ben came up to visit last Tuesday. The boys had a great time. I'm waiting for pics from Darese since I was to lazy to run upstairs in the office for my camera. They stayed until 5pm. It was nice that they didn't have to rush off. Darese and I worked on our Valentine gifts while Logan and Ben took a nap in Morgan's room, Reese took a nap in his room and Mom took a nap on the sofa. Morgan played his DS in the kitchen with us and asked when Logan was going to wake up.

Mom made seat covers for our picnic table. The wood was getting splintery so I measured the seats and she made thick covers that have a velcro strap underneath to keep them from sliding off. Waaaay cool! Thanks, Mom! I may even get my lazy self down and take a picture one of these days.

I think this is the last post for tonight and should bring me up to date. As it is 11:06pm, I really should be getting to bed!

We were invited down to Molly's house for dinner on the 4th and to watch the fireworks. They have a wonderful view of Port Carbon's fireworks since they are at the top of the hill on First Street. We had a great time. They have a big back yard and Morgan had fun playing with Molly and Brigid, who was also invited. The fireworks were postponed due to the threat of rain, but Stephanie's brother came by and set some off for our viewing pleasure. The children really enjoyed that, except for Catie. It was too loud for her so she hid inside with her Pappy.

We walked down again on the 5th to see the town fireworks. They did a wonderful job and were beautiful. It is the first time we did not watch them from Reese's parents' backyard. It was a different view. Very nice.

PS Morgan lost his 3rd tooth last night! He lost the 2nd one on May 13th. Weird!

Left to right in the back: Molly, Aislinn, Brigid, Morgan, Johnathan

Left to right in the front: Michael, Rory, Catie (Molly's little sister)

Not pictured: Lauren, Brigid's little sister

We had Morgan's birthday party at Heisler's again this year. Not as many kids were able to come as last year. Probably because it was on June 28th and many people were on vacation. But we still had fun. They played mini golf; boys on one course, girls on the other. The boys won. Well, they finished first. I don't think anyone kept score. They even managed to kill a spider stuck in the cup on hole 10 or thereabouts. Of course they squished it before they all hit the ball in so they had to inspect the ball to make sure there were no spider guts on it. Boys! But it was all good. The most fun they had was punching the empty pinata. They would jump up as high as they could and whack it with their hands. A couple of times, they almost landed on Catie who was running around under the pinata.

I have definately not been keeping up with this site. Things just keep happening and I get distracted!

Morgan's birthday was June 18th. The big 6! Here are some pictures of the small party we had for him that day. He is laughing at us singing "Happy Birthday". His grandparents ordered a Star Wars cake for him. We ordered subs and invited them up for lunch. Usually we have it in the evening for dinner, but Morgan had VBS at 6 that night so we celebrated at lunch instead. He had just as much fun. He got, among many other things, additional LEGOS for his collection. He sure loves to put them together and it teaches me patience to let him do it himself.

June 4th was Morgan's Kindergarten Graduation ceremony. Reese was able to attend in a wheelchair, one week after his surgery. It was still hard for him to get around, but he was there. That was his goal and he achieved it. Amazing.

There were 12 children graduating with Morgan that day. The ceremony was very nice. They sang songs they learned throughout the year and recited poems for each month of the year. Morgan's was August. He received his diploma from the principal, Mrs. Scarbinsky.

We invited Molly and her family for lunch afterward and the kids had fun running around, playing ball, blowing up balloons and drawing pictures. On each other as well as the paper.

It is so hard to believe that Morgan will be 6 tomorrow. We are having Reese's parents up for lunch to celebrate his special day. His party with friends is not until June 28th, at Heisler's. But we have to do something on the day itself. I'll post pictures tomorrow. Really I will.......

The school had their end of year picnic at Knoebel's on May 23rd. Morgan had a great time with his friends Aiden and Matthew. Here they are doing the frog hop. When the ride goes up to the top and 'hops' down, all the kids scream 'ribit' with each hop, at the top of their lungs. Then the man operating the ride says, "Why are you whispering? I can't hear you!!!" It makes them scream all the louder.

On May 28th, I took Reese down to the Reading Hospital for his total hip replacement. That was a long day. We left at 9am and I got home at 11pm. We had this planned since early March and it seemed like it would never get here, but all of a sudden, it was time. He went into surgery at 1:10 and the dr called at 4:10 to say they were just finishing up. His hip was in worse shape than they expected so it took them longer to repair it. He was discharged the following Saturday.

Tomorrow will be 3 weeks and he is walking around with just a cane. We all went for a walk around the block this afternoon and he had no trouble keeping a steady pace. He spends most of his day in the chair with his little friend (the remote) and Morgan. On Father's Day, he was able to go to church with us and he threw the ball to Morgan in the back yard for a few minutes. He gets tired quickly because he has not been able to use those leg muscles for over 5 years. But he is getting better every day.

Where do I start? It has been so long since my last posting, I'll probably have to separate events into 2 or 3 postings.

On May 13th, Morgan lost his second tooth. He walked in the Memorial Day parade with his T-Ball team. None of which showed up, however. So he was an honorary member of Molly and Kierstyn's team and walked with them. He sat for the program at the Library Gazebo afterward and got his picture taken with Molly and her little sister, Catie. We had dinner with Reese's parents. See Morgan happily getting another juice box out of the cooler? It was hot that day! But the food was good and we managed to eat more than necessary.

What beautiful weather. Sure it's been a little cooler and raining these last few days, but spring is here. The sun is shining today. Check out our cherry tree! We planted it when we moved here in 2000. Amazing how it has grown. Yesterday, I cut the grass for the first time this spring. I could still smell fresh cut grass when I got home last night at 9:30. I love that smell. Soon be time to start grilling and having picnics outside. Morgan has off today because there is 2008-2009 Kindergarten testing at school. Hopefully it will be warm enough to spend most of the day outside. We are going down to have lunch with Reese and may have to go to the gstore, but other than that we 'got nothing'.

Big things happening at your house? Feel free to share with the rest of us. I know blue eyes is traveling to LA. We will be traveling to see barnabas on Sunday. Hope to see some of you at church if we get there in time. I will try to keep the boys moving right along so we get an early start.

Saturday was the opening ceremony for the baseball season. It was a disorganized but fun time. We had the opening ceremony at 11, team pictures at 12:15 and a game at 1pm. Too long to stay around but not quite long enough to go anywhere.

The opening ceremony was very nice. All the teams gathered on the field in their team shirts and caps. They played the national anthem and everyone saluted the flag. Then they announced each team, their manager and coaches and each player.

Morgan is on Abdo's again this year. This time he is one of the 'big kids' only he's not so big. There are 10 kids on his team, 3 or 4 returning from last year. I think he has one more year in t-ball and will then move up to minor league, if he is still interested in the game.

The first game of the season was tie 4-4 (they are always ties in t-ball). Morgan was up to bat twice and had 2 great hits. The second was out to the fence because the other team had tiny kids and they couldn't get the ball. They were all so funny, running to third base instead of first and playing in the dirt instead of watching for the ball. Reese got hiccups from laughing.

Another beautiful day. Just like yesterday, only not so hot. It rained this evening, after 6pm. But that was OK. Morgan and I were inside bowling, golfing and playing baseball. It was so nice to have the front door open and feel the breeze coming in through the screen. I am sooooo ready for spring and warmer weather.

Yesterday, Reese, Harold and Morgan went to a Phillies game in Philadelphia. Long bus ride. They didn't get home until after 10pm. Morgan got washed up and fell into bed, fast asleep in under 10 minutes. They had fun, for the most part. But it was a really long day for the little guy. And the bigger guys, too, I think. Strange how tiring it can be just riding in a bus.

Today, Morgan and I got our gloves on and went for a long walk to pick up trash. This weekend was the SKIP clean up and we decided to do our part to Keep It Pretty. (Morgan thot it should be Keep It Perfect. Works for me!) We found lots of trash as well as recycleable material. It was fun until it started to rain on our way home. It's amazing the things people toss along the road. We got a bag full of trash and only cleaned up one side of the road. But what we did looks nice. For now.

I had company today. Mom, Darese, Logan and Benjamin came for a visit. We had a great time. We all took a road trip to WalMart/Subway to pick up lunch. Then I put up the tent in the living room for the little guys to eat their lunch in. While they took a nap, Darese and I played Wii and Mom laughed at us. Darese and I went to pick Morgan up from school (while Mom took a nap) and the boys were awake by the time we got home. They had about 1 hr to play outside with Morgan before they had to leave for home. They enjoyed digging in the garden, kicking the ball, throwing the cloth-bee (a fabric frisbee) and relaxing on the lawn chairs with cherry jello. I'm so glad it was sunny enough for them to be outside. After they left, we ate dinner and went down to watch Morgan's T-Ball practice. It got a bit chilly after the sun started to go down!