Yes, I think DD's summer is going to be exactly like The West Wing. She even has her own cubicle at the FBI. She is staying at and taking classes at George Washington Univ. She has a dining card to cover her whole summer that she can use all over the place. It comes to $20/day. Also she has a metro card for public transportation. It's a sweet deal. What I didn't know until she started the program is that this is the first year that it has run. Although it has been 3 years in the making. So there are a few kinks to work out, like getting all the clearances needed for their work. She actually has Top Secret Clearance Weird.

It's a little less horribly hot today. My sis and I went to a neighbor's house for her Ladies Bible Class Circle meeting tonight. There was wine, snacks and swimming in a lovely salt-water pool. The only requirement was to bring a favorite bible verse. I brought Proverbs 27:14. It seemed appropriate.

My parents are doing well. Mom is getting around no problem in spite of the walker. She'll probably be back driving and off the walker in less than a month. My stepdad is somewhat problematic. He seems to be on the mend with what sent him to the hospital, but is still having wide swings in his blood pressure. He says that absolutely everything is very very hard to do. He who did gardening the same afternoon I brought him home from the hospital. Not exactly a complainer.

Oh I forgot to answer your other question. Who is in the program. Mostly college students, a few high school students who are completely fluent in Arabic and at least one recent college graduate with previous experience interning for the FBI. 20 in all.

Another thing I forgot to tell you, Peaches, Dooce is vacationing in your neck of the woods. Perhaps you have never been a fan of dooce, but I am. If she was vacationing in my neck of the woods I would go see her. Because I think she's very cool. And her daughter is very photogenic. She is visiting the beach town of D____ and today she went parasailing. The internet is a very strange thing.

Peaches, the only excuse I have for not posting is a total snorefest of a life.

What I've been doing lately........ Painting a couple canvasses w/ Vincent and the almost-done-baking-baby's name (Brody)..... kind of like these http://www.shopsmallwords.com/index2.php?v=v1 ..... and shopping for my friend's new baby girl, Ella.... and of course I had to buy something for each of my babies too, and I baked a birthday cake for my nephew and celebrated by eating too much pizza.... and hosting a birthday bbq for my son in law last weekend, and I'm going to my niece's hi skool graduation next Saturday...... oh, and trying to figure out what my plan is for the rest of my life..... and sewing the new baby's crib bed skirt and window valance, plus a bunch more bibs and burp cloths. My son's gf is due any time now. She's a teeny little thing w/ a round little beach ball tummy. DS and she have asked me if I'd babysit one day a week.... I'm considering..... ha - you know I'll say yes.

My niece who is now living w/ me is doing really well. So far, so good, anyway. I went w/ her last week to watch her daughter (my great niece) perform in dance & drill team.... my word, the girls never moved like that when I went to school in the dark ages.

Kiwi, DD will make a lovely Mata Hari. So, you're saying she won't tell even her mother all the Top Secrets??? That would be weird.

Bagzie, we don't generally get tornadoes here. We have volcanoes instead. The last eruption was the year DD was born, so I don't spend too many sleepless nights over it.

Those canvasses are really cool, Wab. I want to see what Vincent's and the new baby's look like!!! I wish I could do something like that. I can letter pretty well, but I just don't have an artistic bent to be able to put together something good looking like those.

ta

Wow. Exciting summer for Kiwiette. DS's program only pays a little more than $100 per week for food. Maybe food is cheaper here? He seems to have no idea where the four girls live or what they do but the guys went to a jazz festival and parade so far with canoeing in the near future. With a kid like DS, it's always been a goal to get him around people "like him" and this seems to be happening now. By "like him" I mean with similar reasoning abilities and who value things like correct spelling.

Wabbo also is having a good productive summer. I wish I had a sweet niece to come live with me. The canvases look fun.

Never heard of Dooce before but will look for her in the store. She has to shop in our store so I've probably already sold her a lottery ticket. When will she leave?

DS and his roommates went out yesterday and returned to find their apartment flooded.

Me: What part was flooded?

DS: the bathroom and kitchen. A toilet was stopped up.

Me: What did you do?

DS: Well, we had a mop but no wringer so there wasn't much we could do.

Me: I would suggest throwing down all the towels you all have, wringing them out and throwing them down again til the water is off the floor.Then wash the towels.

DS: The towels are soaking up the water. (Apparently this takes hours or days or something.)

Me: Just throw them down, get them wet and wring the water out in the sink. Then put them back down. Do this over and over.

End of conversation.

Peaches! your boy's story gave me a giggle. What would they do without their mothers?

I've finished Brody's canvas except for spraying it w/ a coat of matte sealer. It turned out soooo cute! It didn't take any talent, Kiwi. In fact the lettering was even a cheat. I enlarged the font on my word program to 350 (you go to the highest size, highlight it, then type in 350 manually and it will make it huge if you want) then I used carbon paper to transfer it to the canvas. The colors I used were hijacked from his bedding (I made the crib quilt too) so whoever designed the print in the fabric did that job for me. Now I'm working on Vincent's, but the colors in his bedding are more muted, so I hope it turns out as well.

The good news here is that the sun is finally shining. The bad news is that I don't fit into my summer clothes. It depresses me, so I think I'll go have a little snack to make me feel better.

Wabby, I don't have any delusion that the towels are not still on the floor sopping wet. He had no interest in my stupid ideas.

You made the crib quilt??? Have we seen it??? I don't think so!!

I don't fit into anything but elastic waists. What to do?

All my shorts have elastic waists. Well, all the shorts that fit. There's a big surprise. DS's sopping towels made me laugh too. I remember that most boys that age were completely clueless too. And yet somehow appealing.

Speaking of appealing, my nephews and niece are adorable, have I ever mentioned that? The oldest boy had gotten very dark-haired and is quite a strikingly handsome boy; the middle one has this rock hard athlete-type body and is cuter than the day is long with his 2 giant front teeth. Then the little girl who just turned five, with her very cute blonde curls and big brown eyes -- it's a good thing she's cute because she has the most demanding, loudest voice EVER. We all went to the lake today to go swimming and hang out on the beach. It was hot hot hot. Swimming was nice, but the sun was hot hot hot. I'm tahrrrrd.

You make that project sound downright plausible, Wabbit. Did you have to stretch the canvas or did you buy it all mounted?

I have to help my stepfather buy a new TV tomorrow. I think it's going to be a day for patience and teeth grinding.

Kiwi

here is the blog i was talking about dooce I can't really type my puter is on my belly and jiggles a lot. nnight nght

Yes, I found dooce all by myself just by typing in her name.

Update on DS: the water is off the floor. Maintenance people came and fixed the toilet, made all the burners on the stove work and gave them another shower head so they didn't have to unscrew the one and move it back and forth from bathroom to bathroom. He came home yesterday for a few hours to pick up stuff. He seems to be in nerd heaven.

But at least he can spell!! Good to know that all is nearly perfect in nerd heaven now. I bet he's going to have the time of his life.

Hey, wait a minute - did they change our category on us? I had trouble getting here from my usual link and found us on page 2. Weird.

Just spent two days packing ds15's stuff for Outward Bound in Austria. I would have let him do it himself, but he is 15, you know? They have a 7 hour train trip in front of him and we're giving him lots of snacks so he doesn't starve.

Page 2? What is that? I couldn't find the thread, either, without linking to it.

Where is Bagzzzz??? Should I call her? Maybe she can't find us either.

How about that? I had this thread on my User CP, but it looks like we have been moved to Support Groups. I don't know; I don't feel like a support group, do you?

I only have one more day here in Hotland. I think I got sunburned yesterday; I felt like carp all day today. I've done a lot of little things for my parents, plus hung out with the niece and nephews here at my sister's. They are sooo much work -- I'm not even sure whether I'm talking about my parents or my sister's kids. Sitting around at my parents' house makes me just want to go to sleep, whereas the kids are exhausting in an entirely different way.

DD is having a great time apparently. She left an update on her facebook that says "having a great time working for the Man". She is apparently as much in her element as Peach's DS is.

Outward Bound sounds very exciting. Will he be wearing leather shorts?

I forgot to bring my camera here. Today we had Father's Day dinner at my parents' place -- my sis and I brought everything with us to cook. We made a gorgeous scalloped potato casserole. She put sprigs of fresh rosemary on top before it baked: it really was a piece of art. We "borrowed" my dad's camera and took a picture of it. I'm sure he will be somewhat puzzled when he downloads his photos to his computer and finds potatoes.

Talk atcha soon
Kiwi

Okay, I guess I get it. I can't remember where Misc. groups was before, hadn't it been right under Support Groups for a while? But anyway they seem to have done away with the Misc. heading and put us all on the Support Group page, but on the bottom half under the large groups. But there are so many miscellaneous threads that we are drifting to the 2nd page until someone posts. Now we are on the first page again. The best way to find it is to subscribe to the thread (under thread tools) and go to your User CP page.