Just Call Me Shera...or Paula Bunyan

Before I write about yesterday, I feel as though I should explain why I didn't post yesterday. I had nothing to say. We had a lovely Fourth of July that was akin to any normal Saturday--except I made the grown ups watch fireworks on TV. We spent some time in the pool, and we had some friends over for a picnic. The neighborhood parade was cancelled because it's roughly the temperature of the sun here, and the kids were falling asleep on the floor well before any fireworks could be viewed. I opted not to bore you with these details yesterday. (Although, I apparently decided to bore you today. So sorry. I could delete all this, but I'm too far in...and now I'm rambling.) Onward.

Saturday night, we had some pretty impressive storms roll through. Brad and I thought we heard a crash, but a quick survey in the dark didn't reveal anything. The major structures were fine and the fence was still standing. We rolled on. Sunday, Issa announced there was a tree in our backyard. Since she is prone to the dramatic, we rolled on. Tuesday, I realized, for once, Issa was not being dramatic:

 A big chunk of tree had fallen near our little pond and into our neighbor's yard:

 Yesterday, Issa and I decided to tackle our side. (Daddy and the neighbor had already talked about tackling his side this weekend. He caught the biggest pieces--like requires a chainsaw pieces.) Since Brad's knee is still bugging him (he's actually going to an orthopedic clinic today), Issa and I decided to tackle the little stuff on our side. There was a lot of little stuff, though, and I spent a lot of time negotiating broken limbs out of bushes and other trees, pulling and twisting as to not have anything come crashing down on my head. At one point, I was struggling with a branch that was about seven feet long, and Issa said we should wait for Daddy. At this point, it was the principle of the thing. That branch was coming out.

"Mommy, are you trying to prove to me that girls can do anything boys can do?"

"No, well I wasn't. Now I am. Because they can. Really, I just want to get this branch out."

"Well...as long as you aren't being stubborn."

Nice. My daughter has mastered sarcasm. But...we got it out:

 There is still a lot of work to be done across the fence, but we were pretty impressed with ourselves.

And in a different storm front, Evan was on the verge of evil all night last night. Too much excitement from Fourth of July parties coupled with a late night and a nap interrupted by storms left us with a puddle of mess. I sent him upstairs to pull himself together at one point, and he came back downstairs with fireman boots:

We thought they were snow boots, but we were clearly mistaken. We also thought they were a bit ridiculous when you are living on the surface of the sun, but we were clearly mistaken again.

Gotta love these kids.