A picture of summer...

Cut flowers from the garden on the eve of the first light frost.

Nature walk

I had been wanting to take the kids back to the Babcock Woods for a nature walk for a while now.  It was a gorgeous day today, and Emily needed something to put in the sharing bag for preschool tomorrow.  To make the trip even more fun, I pulled out two sets of binoculars I had purchased for the kids a long time ago for just such an occasion. 

The trip was mostly successful.  Lincoln enjoyed looking in hollow logs and was proud of the stick and acorn he found.  Emily found some acorns and a cool red berry clump thing for the sharing bag to go along with her binoculars.  We all got some good exercise on the 40 minute stroll.

However, we didn't see much wildlife except for a few butterflies (although I did see one deer darting away).  This probably had a lot to do with the the fact that Emily chattered away at a very high volume most of the time.  Lincoln threw a couple fits when I wouldn't let him run into the woods, so I ended up carrying him about a third of the time.  Emily also got impatient on the last stretch of path along the prairie grass and complained of the long grass scratching her legs (a valid complaint).  All in all, though, it's a nice little outing that will definitely be repeated as the kids get older!

First Sunday School paper

All of the children's ministry programs kicked off this week at church, so today was Lincoln's real first day of two-year-old Sunday school.  They talked about the creation story.  Lincoln was so excited to have a "paper" like a big kid and proudly showed it to everyone.  He also promptly peeled the star sticker off the paper and stuck it to his shirt.  :o)

10th Anniversary of 9/11

 

Today marked the 10th anniversary of 9/11.  I was a junior in college when it happened.  I had just come out of my Intro to Marketing class and remember watching the towers burn on a TV in the lobby of the business building at UNI.  I spent most of the rest of the day glued to the TV in my apartment.  I was caught up in the patriotic swell that followed and bought an American flag to fly from the old house I was living in.  

It still feels a bit surreal, even today.   I was touched by the tolling of all the church bells in Waverly at 8:46am this morning to mark the time of the first plane hitting the World Trade Center.  We also had a fantastic interview and message on grace at church by a member who was and still is an American Airlines pilot.  I don't know anyone personally who was directly affected by the attacks on 9/11/01, but it affected all of us as Americans.  I hope someday we will be able to convey the meaning of it all to our children and the generations to follow.