We Partied Like Chicken Lady

We got the best news today! Keagan's diagnosis of hypothyroidism was officially reversed! After years of charting his height and weight and after countless blood samples, we were told he is healthy and growing normally. To celebrate, we had an official "No More Synthroid" party, and we put the store house of meds I had collected the past year in the trash. This was only after we danced around the house shaking the meds like maracas, stomping our feet, and then cheering over Keagan's celebratory break dancing moves. If you are having difficulty visualizing such a melee then let me simplify our celebration by saying it was a cross between a tribal voodoo ceremony and an inner city dance-off. I felt like Chicken Lady on the streets of Chicago.

We also celebrated with a trip to the zoo and an ice cream shop.

This was probably a celebration in which you can better identify.

There's no doubt Keagan is happy with the new diagnosis; he said he feels as strong as SuperMan!

But with all the crazy moves of Chicken Lady!

(By the way, when I was in college I studied voodoo in New Orleans (yes, I attended a liberal arts school)as part of a science in religion course. Our professor planned to take us to meet the "leader" of the voodoo religion, Chicken Man, but since he was incarcerated at the time, we were introduced to his wife and the interim leader known on the streets as Chicken Lady. I remember nothing about the day except that she was crazy as all get-out, and I couldn't wait to get out of the room with her.) 

We Almost Melted

The Farragh family vacation continued yesterday with a stop at one of the local forts. We were all looking longingly at the boats speeding up and down the Savannah River. I bet the ride in the boat was much more enjoyable than our walk in the 110 degree sun.

It was so hot the bugs decided to stay away. I guess that was a good thing, but with sweat running off of my elbows, the lack of bugs was never really acknowledged or celebrated. I did get a picture with all four grandkids looking at the camera, though. That was celebrated with lunch at Five Guys and some much needed AC.

We then visited a small aquarium on one of the local islands.

It was here, at the touch tank, that Mallory learned gentle means don't stick your finger into the shell of the crab to try to retrieve it. Poor crab.

Today the family returned to Texas, and it was especially hard to say good-bye to this little dear. Isn't Caroline just the cutest thing?

Gatorade Stains

We have jumped on the women's soccer band wagon and have been glued to the TV watching the games. This past week we arranged our entire schedule for the day (ie: the time we hit the pool) around game time. We were pretty well near panicked, though, when we turned on the TV at 11:30, and discovered we had no cable service. You know. I don't watch much tv, but when I pay $130 a month for cable, I expect to be able to actually use it. With no tv and no internet service, we left the house and headed for the pool.

Luckily for the people at our local Comcast office, the cable service decided to work again at 5:59, and we were able to watch the 6:00 rebroadcast. My rants about living in this God forsaken town, in the middle of no where Georgia, were temporarily put on hold, and the boys and I settled on the couch to watch the game. Sometime in the middle of the second half, the camera gave us a close up of a throw in from one of the players on the field. She was wearing her white US jersey, but she was wearing a hot pink sports bra under the jersey. Evan clearly noticed it, and he looked over at me, and said, "She really made a mess of her red Gatorade! It's all over the front of her shirt."

This led to a conversation about girls, sports, and various articles of clothing. Evan summarized the fashion faux paus perfectly when he said, "It would have been a better choice for her to wear a white one instead of bright pink." This fashion advice, although sound and true, came from my dear little one who regularly leaves the house with shoes that don't match and/or no underwear.

Wooden Spoon Kind of Day

There has been way too much togetherness the last two weeks. Couple that with Evan's 543rd ear infection and maybe a little of Keagan's mischievious personality, and we have ourselves a touchy situation. With both boys in tow, this is how I walked into the commissary today.

It's amazing how well everyone (retirees as well as young children) will listen to you when you are on the canned good aisle and you pull out a wooden spoon.

I know it is hard to believe that these two angels would require the threat of a wooden spoon spanking to keep them in line.

I assure you it happens rarely.

To All My Followers in India

Our lives this week have been filled with a hodge podge of uninteresting events. However, when I started the blog several years ago, I wanted to remember what normal, every day life was like with the boys then ages 4 and 2. Nothing this week has been earth shattering, and yet it has been exactly what I hoped to document when I started so many years ago. Our simple and yet perfect life.

So here are the highlights of week five of our summer vacation.

1. Wes's deployment date was changed AGAIN. He is now scheduled to leave in January. Someone must be in constant prayer that he not be deployed, and we need to tell whoever that is that it is time to stop the prayers. Wes actually wants to go, and this constant "he is going/he is not going" is wearing me down.

2. I give the boys a night time snack before bed almost every night. It usually includes fruit or crackers. Last night Keagan asked for baked beans. All the fun included with the consumption of beans began just as we snuggled into bed to read the next chapter in "Tales of a Fourth Grade Nothing."

3. The UPS guy delivered a package from Target, and as he walked back to the truck, I said, "Thanks, Hon." Keagan asked, "Do you know that guy? You just called him Hon." Evan replied, "It's okay, Keagan. Everybody does that in Georgia."

4. I purchased a running skirt this week, and it is just so stinkin' cute that I think I might become a PE teacher just so I can wear it everyday. It was either that or go for a run, and it seems like it would be so much easier to go back to school for two years then it would be to go for a run in the summer in Georgia.

5. Evan asked me yesterday to peel some "apfels." He looked at me with a real serious look and asked, "Wait. Was that the right word?" I responded with, "It would if we were living in Germany." We haven't lived in Germany since he was two years old, and he is now eight throwing out German words like that's our household language. CRAZY the way the brain works!

6. I found a stack of surf/swim shirts sitting in the corner of Keagan's room last week, and I made the comment that I had found all of his lost beach shirts. He said, "Well, it looks like they were havin' a party over there. I hope they keep it down because I gotta get some sleep."

7. I am addicted to the stats tab on the dashboard of the blog. I know it has probably been there for a couple of years, but I just found it yesterday. It tells you how many people read the blog and from which sites they are accessing your blog. Fascinating! I had no idea that I had such a huge following in India.

8. There was 0% chance of rain on Wednesday so we made plans to go to the pool. It rained from 2:00 - 9:00. There was 50% chance of rain today so we decided to skip the pool. The sun is shining. If fifteen years ago I had had any idea that meteorologists were such pranksters, I would have considered it more seriously as a career.

9. We took the boys to the drive-in last week to see Cars 2. Yep. The drive in. As we made our way there, Evan said something to the effect, "I don't think this is normal." I explained that it was completely normal fifty years ago, but I am happy to report that we went and had a great time. So much so you would have thought it was a completely normal thing to do.

And so there you have it. My week in review was written for all five of my Dedicated Followers in India.

Red, White and Blue

I tell everyone I see that I absolutely love living here in Georgia for one reason: the beach. This one reason is enough to mask the reality of living in a small military town. Yesterday we spent the holiday at St. Simons and after countless trips to the island, it still takes my breath away. I wonder if I lived there permanently if I would find the huge live oak trees and Spanish moss ordinary.

It's true that we could've stayed at Fort Stewart for the holiday (the military installation with the biggest and best 4th of July celebration) and joined the 50,000people who were there to see the Zac Brown Band, but we decided it was just too crowded, too many people, to actually be fun. So to escape the crowds we hit the beach and joined about 50,000 other people with the same idea of fun: boogey boards, a picnic lunch, and burying your big brother in the sand.

This year we celebrated with our own red, white and blue: our red cheeks from the sun, the white sand in our toes, and the clear blue sky.

Happy 4th of July!

Like Father, Like Son

When Wes was a little boy, he was fascinated with planes and flying. Today he can identify a plane flying hundreds of feet above us and then rattle off specific details about it. I amuse him and shake my head and "ooh" and "aah", but honestly, I don't ever remember what is said. Today, I have learned that Keagan will gladly replace my unenthusiastic claims of interest with his genuine fascination with fighter jets.
This picture was taken today when we toured the Mighty 8th Airforce Museum, and although Keagan might not be able to tell you all about the F-4 Phantom (the plane in the picture), he can tell you anything you want to know about the F-14 Tomcat. Because with his last bit of money saved throughout the past year, he bought a model plane set. It even came with a trading card, and this afternoon, after it had been put together and he tried to get Maybelle (it was determined on Friday that the cat is a Maybelle and not a Merlin) to play fighter jets with him, Keagan declared his new model plane "better than playing the Wii."

Evan was not so easily convinced that learning about planes could be actual fun. He was much more impressed with the go-carts that were conveniently located next door.
Well, really, if truth be told, the other two boys found it pretty fun, too.