Not My Party-- Thank Goodness!

I spent the wee hours of the day after Millie and Candida's graduation party bleary-eyed, making some costume stuffs. The next night, for the occasion of a chum's 16th birthday party, the oldest three girls were visiting a mansion for a Harry-Potter themed sleepover. This amazing mansion, in fact.  Mary worked out a once-in-lifetime agreement with the owners in which she cleaned it for one week in exchange for their use of it, which made the whole thing possible. I would have had a nervous breakdown hosting such a thing, and I am glad Mary made it through in one piece! It was enormously enjoyable to spend a couple of hours marveling at this mansion and all the touches she added to turn it into Hogwarts. 

I just snapped these as I stared bug-eyed at everything, and they're not the greatest, but you get the idea, and I didn't take pictures of even a quarter of the magic that Mary and Co. worked with the decor.

(photo by Millie)




(photo by Millie)

The only reason I had my camera there at all was because Mary asked me to take a few pictures of the guests in costume. So, at last...these two-- predictably-- were both Quidditch players from Gryffindor. (My favorite part was the Golden Snitch on Annika's head. I figured if I couldn't make the rest of the costume in time, she could just be the Golden Snitch itself! Her lack of enthusiasm for this idea baffled me.)

All the ladies, from left to right: Madame Trelawney, two Gryffindor quidditch stars, Mrs. Weasley (who dyed her hair brown for the occasion), the birthday girl in school uniform herself!, Madame Pince (librarian), Luna Lovegood, Susannah as Hedwig, and Bellatrix. I'm slapping all these on here so you can take your pick, Mary.

Third time's the charm, Corynn!

;)

The whole crew in one shot.

The gentlemen, left to right: Professor Gilderoy Lockhart, Dumbledore, Ollivander (of Ollivander's Wands), and slimy old Filch.

The amazing hosts! McGonegall and Dumbledore (married in secret long ago in the past)

What we never learned from the books is that Trelawney and Filch were ALSO married in secret some time in the past.

I've never seen Filch so happy before!

 Mary, Martha, and Mercy, to round out the bunch.

What On Earth?

Not a bird. 

Not a plane.

Not Superman.






Well...kind of Superman.  My mom hired my cousin's husband Jeff to drill us a new well-- out of the blue and mostly, I think, because she always feels bad in dry spells that we can't water our gardens. The children flocked around him non-stop just like he was a superhero, which, I suppose, he is.

He drilled for almost 2 weeks and reached a depth of 205 feet before he hit sufficient water, which blows our ol' hand-dug 60-foot well out of the...er...out of the water! (Groaning with you.)

It's not hooked up yet, but he finished the drilling, which means that this no longer greets us when we pull up the driveway. More's the pity.

Garlic or Bust

We had a bumper crop of garlic this year, the bumpery-est we may ever have. I planted about 475 cloves, and we reaped just about that many heads, with very few weeds thanks to the thick layer of leaf mulch we laid down after planting last fall.

I was most impressed by their prodigious size. Out of nearly 500 heads, only a handful weren't suitable for seed garlic. 

Ezekiel asked me to take his picture by the garlic. Get ready for a strong-breathed winter. Next year, we'll probably have a more normal haul, but for now, we're enjoying the sight of so much goodness.

Leftovers

One big project we somehow finished in extreme summer heat was clearing a chicken yard and putting in fencing.

Oh, yeah! Now I remember how we finished it. 

Sheer panic.

We were going to host weekly worship at our place for the first time, and I thought it'd be best if people didn't have to sit on layers of dried chicken mess. An hour of power-washing and a fresh coat of stain later, and no one will ever know about the disgusting layers...except for the poor family members we hosted for an impromptu barbeque a few weeks prior. 

Sunday morning bedroom. This is what I saw when I came upstairs to get dressed for church, and it made me happy. We had some Newmans over, and the little girls thought that they needed to dress in costumes immediately upon waking.

Another sleepover, this time with the cousins. Everyone flocks when Candida pulls out the funny videos.

After she shared some, I meant to take pictures of every last one of Deborah's birthday chocolates from Evan and Justin, including the impressive chocolate-coated honeycomb square (yeah, you heard me-- chocolate-coated HONEYCOMB), but all I got was this one of the best raspberry chocolate I've ever eaten.

Millie finally finished Annika's birthday bag, hand embroidered and all.

It was worth the wait!

She doesn't have her ears pierced and doesn't wear makeup, and there's a good reason for both. ;)
(Whatever's on my phone is fair game.)

Pip looking lovely in the garden (photo by Susannah).

All the Owen cousins except for the Nyes together in one place! Aidan was thrilled by forced picture-taking.

Trevor and a baby chick.

One of the children took this picture of Grandma Owen and Zion a week later.

We went blueberry picking.

Zeke bought his own portion so he could binge on berries at his leisure and without permission from higher household authorities.

A true leftover from early spring.  I love these two.

Spring

Joel breaks ground in the lower garden.

  After months of chaos, bare floor appears in the bedroom.

Bare floor does not mean bare shelves, however...ulp.

Millie suffered some hard loss this spring. This is the last picture I took of her with Lewis before his untimely death.

Annika unearths treasure in the upper garden.

Someone needs to help her define treasure better.

Millie uses the camera more than I do. After seeing color ribbon the sky, I later find it stored in the camera.

Nixie tests out a new look.

Millie made a cake. Rude pedestrians photo-bombed it.

Always take a snack to bed. You never know when you might need it.

Lazy boy sits in the sumac.

Richest woman in the world.

 A tornado at rest.

As you can guess from a four-month dearth of snapshots, spring and summer strongholded me and never let go. Even now, blogging instead of Other-ing is probably not the best choice, but I want to catch up before h'learning begins again. I haven't taken many photos except for "duty" ones while M.I.A.-- birthday parties and the like-- but here's to another fresh start.

So it goes...

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p.s. APONI JOI!!! WE CAN'T WAIT TO SEE YOU!!!

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