Those Little Touches That just say home. Thankfully, in the past seventeen years of marriage I've finally learned to cook. Of course, I've begged, borrowed--okay, shamelessly stolen, some fantastic recipes which I'm quite content to claim as my own. I do, after all, change one or two ingredients. Well, I'm normally missing the ingredients when the time comes to use the recipe, so the end results are all my own. So I'm pleased that my children are developing some artistic culinary skills, too. This is Michael's contribution to food art:

I wasn't allowed to remove this masterpiece from the counter for three days.

Food adds a lot, but what is a house without that decorator's touch? This piece of modern art has not been allowed to be moved from the corner of my front room for about two weeks now.

And finally, what kind of a parent am I if I don't lead by example? Every home needs a great filing system and mine has remained undisturbed for about--well, lets just say slightly longer than Michael's little projects.

Boring In The Morning Is Good.

We have four out of five children at school now, and so this is how our mornings go:

• 5:00am: Brent wakes up
• 5:15am Kimberley wakes up
• 6:00am Seminary starts in our dining room (Brent is the teacher)
• 6:25 Delwyn gets up (she's been awake, just didn't want to get out of bed.)
• 6:30 Kayla, Karina, Matthew wake up.
• 6:40 Breakfast
• 6:50 Seminary done, Brent leaves for work.
• 6:55 Mad scramble to finish hair,brush teeth, and get into the minivan or mom leaves without you.
• 7:00 Michael wakes up/gets carried to the minivan, we all leave for school
• 7:25 Drop off Karina and Matthew at the Elementary School
• 7:35 Drop off Kayla at the Middle School
• 7:50 Drop off Kimberley at High School
• 8:10 Feed Michael breakfast, and begin the day.

Okay, so that's a (relatively) normal day. Today, however, was a little scarier. Matthew woke up at 2:am throwing up, so he didn't actually go to school today, although he still had to ride in the minivan. (Yes, throwing up is scary, but thats not what I meant.)

So, dropping off Kimberley at the high school, I had Kimberley, Matthew and Michael in the car. There is a very busy intersection that really needs a stop light. We have to cross the busy road to get to the high school. Today all four of us witnessed an accident two cars in front of us, where a high school student in a truck and a lady in a compact car, had a head on collision. The truck spun a couple of times (a backpack, among other things, flew out the window). The car, which was travelling very fast, went spinning off into the ditch, and there was lots of steam, and broken car parts.

I had three very quiet children in the car. Accidents are very loud, very fast, and the amount of damage is hard to believe. Luckily everyone walked away from this wreck, but it could have been deadly.

So now I'm answering four year old questions like, "did they die?" (no honey, they were very lucky) and six year old questions "was that real mom?" (yes sweetheart, that was real) and fourteen year old questions 'Why haven't they put in a stop light in that intersection?" (I don't know, but you're right, they need to.) Me? I'm greatful nobody was killed and I'm driving even more carefully than usual. I'm enjoying the little things, like the lush green trees, the flowers, and the weeds thanks to all the rain we're enjoying. I'm hugging my children more. And I want everyone to know that boring in the morning is good. I love my morning schedule, my children, Brent, and my life.