April, Part 1

Firstly, persevering in my 9th year as the worst fisher-person in MS, I took my rod out to the river to see how many fish I could scare off.  Three managed to bite my hook, ruining my dry spell, and hopefully leading to many fish caught and released in the future.  

Also in my plentiful time, I cleaned the pantry.  It took several hours.  

In the final week leading up to Easter, Caspian came down with a stomach bug.  He missed the egg hunt at school on Friday, and was not up to the egg hunt on Saturday.  Annaliese suited up in a sporty outfit, let me put her hair in a tight ponytail to help with aerodynamics and increase her efficiency as an egg hunter, and promised her brother she would bring back enough eggs for the both of them.  Which she did.

The airstream necessitated a trip to HD for paint, and after walking by this HD sponsored art school thingy twice, I couldn't keep the children from participating.  They put it right next to the check out.  

Dinner on the porch.  Note the homemade bread.  

Then the kids excitedly went to bed, and Annliese left this note on the foot of her bed.

After a morning of Easter baskets and candy, the kids suited up in their new Easter outfits, we all posed for Alexe's picture taking...

And we headed to a little primitive Baptist church in Bruce, MS, for a few hours of Sacred Harp singing.  If you've never heard or witnessed this, I highly recommend.  Don't expect to be able to sing along without lots of practice; it's too loud, too fast paced, and the sheet music is too hard to follow.  But it's powerful, and worth being present for even if you feel foolish every time you try to sing along.

There was a classic church potluck in the middle, which made for a lovely Easter dinner, with no dishes or cleaning required at home.

We made it home for a lazy afternoon of games and reading.  This was the latest addition to the board game cupboard, courtesy of u.Jim and a.Caitlin.

I came home one day to find Annaliese waiting with a pile of materials, a cordless driver, and a pocket full of screws.  She wanted to build a check out bench so she and Caspian could play HD.  I helped knock this together, and they carried it across the yard, donned their orange branded aprons they had picked up on our trip to that box store, and played HD.  Everything about this was fun and cute, except for the corporate branding.

Ah tax season.  Alexe has moved into my office above the BTC.  She doesn't like me having any space that doesn't include a nook for her. 

One of my favorite sights, a parking lot filling up with tenants. All four apartments are occupied, three of the five downstairs spaces are leased, and the hotel is trundling along.

The screened in sleeping porch.  

One afternoon while tinkering on the Airstream, I looked up and saw this troupe walking up the driveway.  Caspian was hanging back, shooting things with his stick.  His sound effects are marvelous.

Fridays are now officially pizza and family movie nights.  The kids talk about it all week.  The last couple weeks features Sister Act and Crocodile Dundee.  Three Men and a Baby is scheduled for this week.

The kids are still working through my Mad Magazine collection.  Our compromise on Saturday mornings, they can join me in bed at 7, but shush while I try to continue sleeping.

We got started on the floor of the Airstream, after turning the inside a lovely blue.  Several sections of the floor had to be replaced.  

We set up our mobile overhaul station...

And started laying down the new floor.

We gathered at Kevin and Carrie's house to celebrate Carrie's completion of her undergraduate work at Cornell, 30 years after starting.  After dinner, when the various musicians started breaking out their instruments, the kids got into the hot tub.

Spring!

Sunday morning, someone found the basket of blocks. 

A family we are very hopeful will move to Water Valley invited us up to Oxford for a Sunday brunch.  The kids had a ball, and Caspian impressed everyone with his basketball skills.  

They seem pretty happy to us.

Instead of doing paperwork in the evening we drove out to the river and took a family walk.  Which included much whining from kids, many ant piles being stomped on, and a number of sword fights.  We also decided to get to the bottom of Caspian's "Dragonsaul" obsession.  We have no idea what he's talking about, a game, or movie, or cartoon.  After much time quizing him on character names and telling us snippets of plot lines, we, and Google, still have no idea what he's on about.  

Round two with the incubator, we have 15 healthy little chicks.

Until this latest cold snap. we've been sleeping on the porch.  

One of our last pictures of Eat Cow.  He's off to a new life with a larger herd to tend.  More on that later.

The floors are in, the painting is done, and the cushion covers have been laundered twice and reinstalled.  After a new telephone pole and transformer were installed, I moved the airstream to it's official resting spot, and we'll finish hooking up the power and water at some point.

Thursday night, with a babysitter locked in until 10pm!, we went to the Chamber of Commerce banquet, where we pondered the absence of diversity in the audience, enjoyed visiting with many of the older folks in town, and listened to a truly soul-crushing speech from an elected official, the lieutenant governor of the state.  

To pick us up, we stopped at our local brewery for some lovely tastings, then headed on to the after party at Snookie and Mary Lou William's house.  This after party has been going on for over 30 years, and attracts more people than the Chamber banquet. 

The next morning I got up to find our first calf had been born earlier that morning. More on that later.