IN TOKYO!!!

My parents, that is. They are in Tokyo right now!!! Is that not the most bizarre thing in the world?!?!? If you would have told me that my folks would ever be in such a place I would have laughed myself silly. We are just NOT the kind of people who up and go to Tokyo. Canada would be pretty exotic in our book. Ha! And Dad, especially, is ANYTHING but a world traveller. He hates flying and used to always get airsick. He's never had any sense of adventure that would cause him to desire to go anywhere he couldn't reach by car in a day or two! But he's always sooooo blessed when he makes these trips and is able to be with the Church people from all around the world. And he hates sitting behind a desk, so even though he has to travel to GET there I know he enjoys preaching and being with the people far more than he enjoys being in the office for another 8-5 day. Anyway, Mom and Dad are on their way to the Philippines for Convention. They had a 14 hour flight from Atlanta to Japan (weird!!!) and now they've got a 6 hour lay-over before going on to Manilla. It's just sooooo crazy. I told Dad to bring me a Godzilla souvenir from Tokyo. :-)

It's been a good, full day around here. Can't remember much about yesterday. School and laundry is all that comes to mind. James built a deck for his office yesterday, then finished up the stairs for it today.

This morning the kids and I cleaned all of the tools and trash out of the office while James went to town for more supplies. (He got the carpet installed tonight! Wa-Hoo!!!) Then we headed to the library where we came away with 40+ books (!) and went directly to horse lessons. Katie and Joe are both trotting very well--with no stirrups. Staci wants them to be able to balance and hold on to the horse with their legs (without being able to stand in the stirrups) while they're trotting before they learn to canter. They're doing great! I got to ride Daisy for a few minutes again today. :-) IT'S JUST SO FUN!!! Staci lets me try to canter and gives lots of instructions on everything I'm doing wrong. "Keep your heels down... feet back... sit up--don't lean forward... hold your legs still, don't let them flop around..." Ha! I apparently have lots of problems, but it doesn't matter--it's such a blast! And I did much, much better today. I've been trying to really concentrate on "rolling" with the horse and all that, but it seemed like I was just working against her or something. So I decided that I wasn't going to THINK about it today, I was just going to try to ride it out and see if I would naturally (instead of consciously) fall into her rhythm. It actually felt much better and smoother than when I THINK about it. And Staci said it was better, so apparently I've been thinking to much. So from now on I officially stop. No more thinking from me! :-)

We came home and I did some housework while the kids played outside. Katie, our self-motivator, came in and pulled her school books out. Joe managed to skip school entirely today, what, with our office project this morning. I never found time to sit down with him to do it. He'll be sorry when we have to make up for it tomorrow!

James mentioned tonight that we should drive up to the National Park and have a picnic for dinner. But we only had a tiny bit of ham and are completely out of peanutbutter, so I fried up the chicken I had planned on cooking anyway, cooked some mac-n-cheese, grabbed the little bit of Sister Galaviz's potato salad that was left from Sunday, mixed up some lemonade and threw it all in a basket and we were off! We stopped by Charlie's and picked up some cookies for dessert. I remember my Mom telling me how her Mom used to fry up a whole bunch of chicken and they'd go for a picnic. I've never had anything but a sandwhich kind of picnic before, so it was fun! But it was COLD. My blood never has thickened up to its original state since thinning out in west Texas for 5 years, I guess. The sun had just dropped behind the mountain and I was freezing! We ate fast, then the kids climbed up and down the mountain for a while. I went and sat in the van (is that wimpy, or what?!) while James arranged some races for them. But even from the van it was a great night! Ha!

Came home and had all of the smelly kids take showers (they stink so much sooner than they used to when they were younger--they're going to need showers every day come summertime!) and just got them put to bed. For some reason, I'm feeling pretty sleepy myself. That never happens! I am SUCH a night owl. I usually MAKE myself go to bed at midnight, otherwise I'd be up until 2:00 easily and then regret it the next day. Not tonight. I think I'm going to try to be asleep by 10:00. We'll see!