Children

Children
"God is love, and he who abides in love abides in God, and God abides in him."
(1 Jn 4:16)

Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Olympic Game Farm

In addition to visiting the Dungeness Spit National Wildlife Refuge on Friday, we also thoroughly enjoyed going to the Olympic Game Farm in Sequim. The children were thrilled to see llamas, rabbits, peacocks, elk, zebras, horses, prairie dogs, yaks, a rhinoceros, bison, deer, tigers, lions, coyotes, wolves, and bears.

Little Black Rabbit

Prairie Dog

Tibetan Yak

Peacock

Llama

Niece Feeding Yak

Spotted Fallow Deer

Kodiak Bear

Black Bear


Elk

Fallow Deer

American Bison (aka Buffalo)
Buffalo's tongues are huge! Needless to say, I was panicking a little bit as my son fed this big guy. The wheat bread would sometimes slide off his tongue and land on my sandaled foot. I also couldn't help but think, "Don't lick the camera and pleeease don't lick me!"

Monday, July 25, 2011

He's Still Got It



Growing up, my brother would occasionally walk on his hands. Even though he is over 40, he still does so sometimes. More importantly, he still has a strong faith. He and my sister-in-law are trying their best to pass on the Catholic Faith to their five children, assisting at Mass regularly and praying the Rosary as a family.

We have been happy to have my brother and sister-in-law visit, and I have appreciated seeing what wonderful parents they are to my nieces and nephews. The love in their family and the spiritual and physical care that they show for their children is inspirational.

One of my brother's favorite quotes is from St. Therese of Lisieux. She said, "I am not dying. I am entering into Eternal Life." My brother says, "I am living, so that I may hopefully enter into Eternal Life." I pray that he and his family may all one day enter into Eternal Life.

Saturday, July 23, 2011

The Dungeness Spit

My brother, sister-in-law, and their five children are visiting us from Switzerland. Yesterday, we all had a great time at the Dungeness Spit National Wildlife Refuge. The drive out to Clallam County was beautiful.


















I was in awe as I looked at the natural beauty of the Spit and couldn't help but marvel at how amazing God is.

Friday, July 22, 2011

Horsing Around


Before pinning Brendan to the ground and riding him like a horse, my nephew, Pierre, assured me by saying, "I am not really kicking Brendan hard. I will not hurt him. If I used all my strength, he would be like this." Pierre fell to the ground and pretended that he was dead.

Monday, July 11, 2011

Corpus Christi 2011



Unfortunately, I wasn't able to go to our parish for the external feast of Corpus Christi this year, but I am happy to see some of the procession.

Friday, July 01, 2011

Murphy's Law: Raccoon Style

We used to think that raccoons walking along ours and our neighbor's back fence were cute and try to take photos and video of them until last month.

We were surprised and pleased to find that starlings weren't nesting in our attic this spring.

A few weeks ago, our neighbors knocked on the door and told us that we had a raccoon walking on our roof. My husband chased it away.

We started hearing noises in the attic and I assumed that the birds had returned.

I noticed a wood shingle in our gutter on the chimney side of the house. My husband and son went up into the attic and found Mrs. Raccoon and three kits living up there. Our neighbor, who happens to work as a roofer, climbed up onto the roof and found that Mrs. Raccoon had ripped into our roof where the backside of the chimney meets the roof line.

We realized that starling eggs, and maybe birds, make tasty treats for the raccoons. Score one for the raccoons.

We called Darrin, a.k.a. the professional "raccoon man". Darrin came and set up traps.

One night, Mrs. Raccoon, or her kits, decided to start clawing its way into our living room through the ceiling. This got a little too personal for my husband and so he went up to take care of the raccoons. He succeeded in chasing them out of the attic.

The raccoon man came, looked in the attic and found that Mrs. Raccoon and her kits were no longer there. He gave instructions to have the roof repaired. The roof was repaired by our kind neighbor.

We contacted Mike, a homeschooling father, who happens to be a contractor/handyman and asked him if he could clean up the mess in our attic and properly repair the hole in our ceiling (my husband's temporary patch job was browning). He waited a week or two before coming to do the repairs in order to make sure Mrs. Raccoon was not going to return.

On Monday of this week, Mike came to our house and spent a large portion of his day cleaning up our attic and repairing our ceiling.

Yesterday, Thursday, as I was doing my daily gardening, I noticed a wood shingle on the ground and a roof shingle in the gutter. Brendan asked our neighbor, Rick, if he could take a look at our roof. He did so and found that Mrs. Raccoon had ripped into it again. I called my husband and said, "You're not going to believe this." Then, I called Darrin, the raccoon man, and left a message.

Last night, my husband heard Mrs. Raccoon making her noises above our kitchen.

Hopefully, the raccoon man succeeds in ridding our attic of this menace soon.

I can't believe that Mrs. Raccoon returned two days after the attic was cleaned up. I can't believe we used to think that raccoons walking along our back fence were cute.
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