Emma Turns 8

Happy 8th Birthday, Emma!

Here's Emma leaving the house this morning, for school. She's still a-glow from a weekend's worth of trick or treatin' and birthday parties. Now she gets to bring cupcakes to school!

Our weekend "began" Friday afternoon, when Jon came home from his work-week in northern Minnesota. The next time he makes it home may well be Thanksgiving, so he took today and tomorrow off for an extra long weekend. He has projects he wants to complete here before winter sets in (though today is so warm and beautiful it's hard to imagine that snow and cold may be lurking around the corner).

Right now he's at the Eau Claire house, installing a new back door for our tenants. Here's a picture of him Friday afternoon, introducing Leila to the crunchy fun of fallen leaves.

The kids stayed afterschool on Friday so that they could trick or treat with a larger group of kids from their school. Highschool-age volunteers from one of the school's youth groups led the younger kids around neighborhoods by the school.

After an hour or so, Jon, Leila and I picked the kids up and took them trick or treating ourselves, for a bit longer. It was a nice evening out, so the walk with them was enjoyable. We were surprised to see so many people out and about during Halloween; the nice weather encouraged people to sit outside their homes on lawn chairs to hand out treats.

When you're the parent of young kids, you appreciate the effort that some people make to get into the spirit of the season, whatever that may be. One friendly lady had wind chimes made of "bones" that rattled in her yard, as well as a collection of other interesting and unusual Halloween decorations.

Another house was high-tech: motion-activated fog and hooting owl sounds were set off as soon as kids neared the door. The guy answering the door wore a mask and didn't say much. My kids decided this was the "scariest" place.

Of course, some people go a little too far and get obnoxiously graphic in their Halloween displays. I'm not sure what goes on in these people's heads when they set up scenes of dismembered bodies and implied torture for the little kids walking by, but we just try to hurry on past those.

Still, most of our trick or treating experiences have been positive. For us, it's a community event. It's neat to see people come out of their houses for a while and meet their neighbors. Older community members extend goodwill to younger ones. Different generations meet and interact. Most children we saw trick or treating were accompanied by their parents; it was like that in Eau Claire, too.

Emma pointed out to us the kindergartner who was hit by a car while crossing for the school bus (I mentioned his injury in my last blog). He has a broken leg and is in a wheelchair right now, but his parents had outfitted the wheelchair to look like Thomas the Train, so he didn't have to miss out on trick or treating.

After all that Halloween walking, the kids were exhausted. The next day we had a leisurely morning, to rest and recuperate, before it was on to the next thing... Michael's afternoon basketball tournament.

This was Michael's first tournament with Colfax. His team played three different games, including games against Stanley and Chippewa Falls. We thought Michael did very well (considering he's had only one practice this year).

I must admit we'd had our doubts... while trick or treating the night before, Michael seemed to be dragging his feet and not nearly as enthusiastic in his candy-gathering efforts as Emma was. But during the games, when his team needed him, he did a much better job of keeping his energy up. He showed some hustle and worked hard. We were proud of his effort.

After the games we went to Cornell, for a birthday supper in Emma's honor. You can see the kids dressed in (some of) the presents they received from Grandma Jane, in the photos above. Michael and Emma both received new winter coats and hand-knitted hats. Emma got mittens and a scarf, as well. And Leila was plucky in the new plum-colored ensemble Grandma made her. Lucky kids!

We were glad to see Pat, Ann, and Allison stop by while we were at Bud and Jane's. Our brother-in-law, Pat, has had more than his share of health challenges, lately, but looked well when we saw him. He's been learning to take it easy, take better care of himself, and spend more time at home enjoying his family. We're glad to see him on the mend.

After visiting Bud and Jane's, we stopped by Kristen and Brent's new house in Holcombe. We hadn't been over to see it yet, and were impressed with how spacious and comfortable it was despite its relatively modest size. It has vaulted ceilings and an open floor plan, and Kristen has decorated it very nicely.

At left, Brent contemplates taking the "big plunge", a second time. Go for it, Brent!

The visit provided Michael and Emma with their first chance to try out a Wii (one of those interactive game systems where you move your body to animate the figure on the TV screen). Wii bowling was a big hit with both kids.

So was Kristen's tiny fireball dog, Chloe. Here's Chloe hot doggin' it, for Halloween.

For some reason, Leila decided that this tiny 8-pound dog was a menace... I guess she hadn't seen anything like her before, and maybe didn't know what to make of the ketchup on her back.

Brent and Kristen are a fun, active couple. One of Kristen's sons is still in highschool, but for the most part their kids are grown and on their own, and Brent and Kristen keep busy with lots of physical activity and athletic challenges.

For example, here's Brent white water rafting in Peshtigo this April (think how cold the water must be that time of year! Looks like a Mountain Dew commercial, to me!).

Brent gave me a CD with pictures from different family events this past year. I'll share more of his photos in later postings.

Sunday afternoon we had a birthday party (this time with Emma's friends) at our house. We spent the morning cleaning the house and yard and getting ready for the party. We set up (home-made) carnival games and a treasure hunt in our backyard and woods, and outfitted the little clubhouse Jon made the kids last year with a colorful sign and toys for playing house.

Emma helped in all these preparations, but Jon "borrowed her" for a few minutes to take her over to our neighbor Johnny's, for a "surprise".

Johnny (her name is probably spelled "Jonet"-- she's French Canadian-- but folks around here call her "Johnny") has the farm on top the hill we live on. Saturday morning she gave Emma two small chickens, which Emma named "Pumpkin" and (I forgot the name of the other one). She'll keep the chickens at her farm, alongside her other chickens, until such time as we're able to have them over at our place (no rush and no date set for that!). Meanwhile, Emma can come over and visit the chickens and bring them vegetable scraps.

That's Johnny in the background of the photo at left.

Right now the chickens live in one section of a big 3-story, solar heated greenhouse that Johnny's been constructing. Our whole family, including neighbor girls Makayla and Janetta, walked over there afterschool today to visit the chickens and enjoy the farm. It's beautiful back there! Because of the rolling hills, you can't see the entire property from any one angle... so each hill you go up and each corner you come around leads to more surprises.

Her farm is about 80 acres, with a small simple house that is more impressive when you learn that she built it herself with her own hands, mostly from reading books about house construction, after being unable to find a bank to lend her the money to build (years ago-- when lending practices were different!).

Anyhow, Emma was beside herself with joy and loves those chickens.

Kids started arriving for our party about an hour early (I guess because most of our guests were from Eau Claire, and over-estimated how long it would take to get here). Here's Emma with two of the girls we invited.

Here's the whole group of party guests, seated at our big "new" table. They were a lively crew, but it was controlled chaos. Several of the parents (and Jon) stayed to help serve cake and pour drinks, etc.

I was kind of proud of the 4-layer birthday cake I made Emma. It sliced nicely and didn't fall apart.

One of our guests was former neighbor girl Brittany, who used to come over quite a bit when we lived in Eau Claire. She's a few years older than Emma, but befriended Emma when her and I would walk a kindergarten-age Michael over to Longfellow.

Here's Brittany, at left.

Brittany's grandparents lived just one house away from us. I talked to both of them in passing during the ten plus years we lived there, but didn't really get to know them in any detail.

But it's a small, small world!

After the party, Brittany's father and grandparents stopped to pick her up. We invited them to stay awhile and had a bonfire in the backyard, while the girls continued talking and roasted marshmallows together. In Jon's conversation with Brittany's grandpa, it came out that his family was originally from Ladysmith, and that he was somewhat acquainted with the Braggs of Ladysmith... his 4th grade teacher was none other than MY Grandma Bragg (Dad's mother)!

We confirmed this with the photo at right, borrowed from one of my scrapbooks. That's the Mrs. Bragg he remembers.

In fact, he remembers her very well. A much younger David Berger had come up with a ruse, which she did not appreciate. Without going into unnecessary specifics, it involved dropping a pencil and lying on the floor while looking up (as his female classmates sat at their desks or walked about). A shrewd Mrs. Bragg caught him in the act and knew exactly what he was up to. She was not pleased.

So she got out the... dictionary. And had him start copying, "word for word, pictures and all-!" (you can still hear the dismay in his voice) a page of the dictionary. When she was satisfied that he'd found enough (more suitable) information to occupy his mind at school, she let him stop. David Berger learned a lesson, and (50 years?) later his granddaughter and her great granddaughter became friends.

Isn't it funny, the ways our lives intersect with other people's?