When you move, you find old pictures.

...And How.

Here is one I took when I was twelve. I remember that when it came back from the developer (way back in the Jurassic age when cameras used film) I took a look and just about died laughing. Now days we look at the back of our cameras and die laughing on the spot. This is the Age of Instant Gratification.
 Location: Phoenix, AZ Look carefully, you probably know him.

And an old friend Charlie Fletcher who passed away in October of 1994. Here's a historical narrative by the man himself. Charles Fletcher Railcar Narrative

And Pepe Craentje is earnestly explaining his favorite ways to eat bacon. He was being really funny, and I'm pretty sure he knew it, too. (Belgium, 2000)

 He was sick with cancer at this time and went to be home with the Lord weeks later.

This makes me really want to rewind life to see these loved ones again in that beautiful summer garden.

 Below is me on an oceanside camping trip with three of Carlotta's relatives, two on the right and one behind the camera. We were all very proud of our tent pitching skills. The expression of the one in the middle reminds me of the first time Carlotta had ice cream. The apple does not fall very far from the tree.  The photography leaves a lot to be desired. (2000)

 (When cultures collide...) One person's face is full of fear, and it's not my brother's. She was told to accompany him, and the fact that she does not even play was the least of her worries. ("GET ME OUT OF HEEEERE!!!")  (1999) Meet the In-Laws.

 Luther Burbank Park: friends enjoying overactive drinking fountains

 Belgium, 1998

 Belgium, 1998

finis - for now

If Only They Sold Patience in Stores

Upon reentering the house after evening lessons a couple of Fridays ago I was greeted enthusiastically by only two children and the smell of dinner cooking on the stove. There is Daddy looking... washed out or something. Daddy gives the evening report: "For Jamin, after math it was an hour of piano practice, for Amber after math it was forty minutes of piano practice and for Lukey... it was an hour and a half of Long Division and for me ...it was five years off my life."


"If only they sold patience in the stores!" Marc said.

Lukey was in recovery mode, finishing his evening playing Legos happily in his room. We are not certain how much division he knows, but we are sure he knows about Legos.

Our kids' dinner conversation was about how we are going to divide the inheritance when we are dead. There was a lot of (premature) arguing until we had to remind them that

1. They would have to assume our debts as well as our assets 
2. We aren't dead yet

Prodigals with wiggly teeth.

Then Jamin wrote out a problem for Luke. His arms were too short to reach it and Marc acted as his scribe. But he gets it!
And now I have some more pictures to catch up with...

 One backward look at the little house we lived in for many years! Looks different without the dark red paint. (And all the stuff we had in there)

 The twins got a morning playing in the sand at the lake when Jamin did 20 miles on his bike with Daddy.

And the twins are surprised with new bicycles...