A Quickish Sum Up of Me

This is a quickish sum up of my life. It started 13 years ago. Where or when I can’t recall off the top of my head. Rapid City is as close as you’ll get. I’ve lived in the same house my whole life. My mom home schools us and gives us skills in gardening, as she herself learns them. So, she learns one day, she tells us ten minutes later. If not we have a pretty good line, Mom mentions to someone on phone, Julie over hears, she tells us the half conversation with adjustments where she thinks they are needed, we all say something the next day and feel completely stupid when Mom corrects us. As I said, pretty good line but not perfect.

Where was I? Oh, yes. A quick sum up. Right, changing that, a longish sum up. Four years ago I started writing, most of which wasn’t good at all. More than a little proud I read it to my family. I’m extremely glad I can’t go back and listen in. At this early in life you don’t know you have such a thing as a passion. I just liked the idea of making up my own stories as I had in my head for so long, only on paper.

Before this, sorry, I’m skipping again, I had come up with plays. They were REALLY bad plays and so ridiculous if I could go back I’d probably die of embarrassment. I’m not going to mention any so as not to embarrass me or my accomplices.

Two years ago I was inspired by Brian Jacques, the author of the Redwall series and others. I just had go for it again. So taking a notebook and a few pencils, for the next two months I wrote by hand a rough draft. A REALLY rough draft. It turned out to be 250 pages, which for a eleven year old is really good.

Then I started typing it out. I have never been a fast typist but I was determined. So, I spent the next year typing, changing, going over it, fixing problems, changing whole sections, nearly giving up and starting over, getting encouraged by me Aunt Miriam and starting the process again. Before the end of September, the year marker, I had read through it 26 times and could practically quote it by heart.

Then I started the second one and the prequel. I didn’t tell anyone at first, well, besides Missy, because I was afraid they’d say I needed more time on the first one. I was so bored of that book I never wanted to read it again in my whole life, even though I was proud I’d done it.

I wrote these next two books without nearly so much trouble. I’d gotten my “feel”, as they say. Don’t ask me who “they” are because I don’t know. They just do. Missy and I, both liked the prequel the best so far and I made up my mind that besides punctuation and spelling errors I want nothing changed.

By now it was February and I had started once more going over my first book. Here was three more read-throughs. My mind was screaming at me, “You know this by heart!” Obviously it didn’t understand that this was my book and it had to be as close to perfect as I could get it so my Mom could read it.

Brief pause to collect my thoughts and ideas and I started the third and the fourth books. This is where I am still at. The third at 77 pages and the fourth at 11. I’m still coming up with scenes in my head even if not the whole thing. I can not take all the credit for these books because we have spent many nights while making dinner, me, Missy and Rose, making up sayings, scenes, characters and predicaments. We have laughed a great deal over these and come up with some of the best scenes. The plots for these books were mainly mine but the third is an exception where in Missy helped one evening.

Sorry about that, it isn’t a quick sum up, is it? Well, I had quite a bit to say. Anyway, there was a lot more. Such as trips with cousins, building tepees with double cousins, camping with cousins, ridiculous plays involving hillbillies with cousins…you get the point. We do a lot with our cousins that is worth telling but for now I’ll let you go.

We like to know what you think of these stories. So, please feel free to comment!

The Eggers

Our "Dragonfly"

This is for anyone who has ever been a kid and I’m sure most of you have. Anyone who might not have been, listen closely and you might learn something or you might not.

We all know a jungle gym is not just a jungle gym and if you didn’t you are most likely in the second group. It’s a roller coaster, a swing, a house, a boat, a life saving instrument or something that might squish you, under the right circumstances.

Us kids, no, not the rest of you, just us Nemo kids and certain relatives, loved our jungle gym but recently it was confiscated by the army! Ok, it wasn’t but the Blackhawk helicopters did eye it for awhile. Mother was the one who took it. Remember those hoop houses I mentioned? Well, our jungle gym is one of them. “Oh,” she says. “That’s perfect!” You can guess what happened next. No, it didn’t magically turning into a boat. It was turned into a strawberry covering tool. Sigh. No more grand adventures there. But, didn’t I say I we are stubborn? Oh, we weren’t finished! Who needs a boat when you can fly? So, we took the big black tube, which is something like fifteen feet long and stuck it through a tire in the front and a rope in the back and hung it from the swing set. Bang! We have a dragonfly.

We had big plans, paints, wings, harnesses. Did I say we were stubborn? Yes, but unfortunately - well, let's just say it wasn’t one of Mom’s projects and didn’t have priority. So, it is still a black tube but it is our black tube and we still think of it as a dragonfly.

Building A Greenhouse

There is one big difference between homeschoolers and public school kids. Alright, there are lots of differences. But I’m going to point out one. We don’t get grades. I’m not saying our teacher doesn’t check our work but if we got something wrong we do it again and if we still get it wrong then we do it AGAIN until we do get it right. So, we always get “A’s” as the public school kids would say.

This, despite my beginning isn’t what my story is about but it does have something to do with it.

Our beloved mother loves to garden. This doesn’t mean us kids like it but we do it anyway. So, about February the seed and gardening catalogues start coming in. For years mother has started at this time of year making up “Brilliant” plans. Her brilliant plans have included: Frames for the beds for hoop houses, wires so we don’t have to build more frames, ten feet tall posts with a board over top for sunflowers, which, by the way, are COLD weather plants and DIDN’T need covering after all.

Well, last year she needed something bigger so she decided we were going to build a green house. Yep, build one. You say, okay order the pieces put them together and BANG! you’re done. Nope. We weren’t going to order pieces we were going to do it from scratch. Twenty degrees, freezing wind and frozen ground and guess where we are. Sorry, but you guessed wrong. We weren’t inside drinking hot chocolate, watching something. We’re homeschoolers remember. We were outside, digging holes in the frozen ground and hoping not to freeze to death in what felt like Artic temperatures. Do you blame me for not concentrating and getting my hole a foot off? How was I supposed to know my hole was supposed to be on the inside of the orange rope and on the X? Well, maybe I should have but I didn’t.

After digging holes, putting poles in the ground. Making an entire frame, putting in a door and window, making beds, hauling manure and dragging plastic over a 10x25 foot green house who could help but feel proud? We were proud. Ever hear the saying, “Pride comes before a fall”? Yep, it’s true. The wind came up, grabbed it and shredded the plastic.

Now this is where the first part of this story comes into play. Us homeschoolers are stubborn and didn’t take the hint that this would be close to impossible. We tried again. We pulled plastic over that green house, nailed it down so tight it could not have moved if it was alive and then tied socks around the connecting pieces of the PVC pipes. You might be wondering by now why we use socks for such strange things and I’ll tell you. It’s because we don’t wear them. Mom and Dad do but us kids hate socks. So, we tied them to the connecters so they wouldn’t rub holes in the plastic. That didn’t work. It shredded again. We, no longer having plastic, taped it back together, using duck tape, of course. If you didn’t guess I’ll tell you, IT DIDN’T WORK. So, we spent the summer struggling with this greenhouse and somehow managed to get a good amount of peppers and tomatoes. We still haven’t solved the problem but I’m sure we’ll try again this year. The up side is, this means Mom won’t need a new “brilliant” idea this year.

God's Grace

It is easy not to be scared of something when it is on the other side of the fence. It’s easy to stand up to it when the gate is between you. It’s easy not to be scared of the dark when the sun is shinning. Yes, it’s easy not to be scared of a gun when that gun is unloaded and locked away in a cabinet. It’s easy not to be scared of the ocean coming in and washing away your home when you live in the middle of a continent.

So many people think they can be brave if something happened and find out when it does that they can’t. They think death wouldn’t effect them if they saw it for real and realize later that it does. They think they are untouchable but they aren’t and one day they will realize, they’re wrong.

It’s easy not to be scared of God when He is just someone somebody speaks of on the street or in a church but you will be scared. You will be scared when you stand in front of God’s seat of judgment and know, there is no fence between you and you refused the light. You only get one life to choose. So, start being afraid. Once you have He will show you the light and take the fear away.

Mandy

Prepositions and AY's

Prepositional phrases are evil and so are AY’s. You might be wondering, "why?" Well, ask any kid why about the prepositional phases, but some kids, all right every kid but I and my sister Missy, will be stumped on the issue of AY’s.

I suppose this story really starts back in third grade or so when I started learning about prepositions. For years I learned to cross them out. ALL of them, every time. So, when I started writing books (yes, I do write books at thirteen. That was NOT a typo), I always wrote them and wanted them, prepositions, to die as they had in my English. In case you didn’t know, you have to have prepositions to write a book. So, mates, why do they teach us this in the first place? I won’t tell you because I don’t know. This also means I don’t want a whole lecture on this subject. I don’t know because I don’t really care.

AY’s on the other hand are a whole new topic. It started when Missy and I were going over my book for things that needed changing. We both like to do this because it is fun to laugh over the funny parts and read the sword fights and so on and so forth. At some point in this process Missy gets up and walks off and in the middle of a page! Me, thinking this quite rude, asked, “What are you doing?”

“Asking mother something,” she replied. I was even more insulted than ever. Not because I don’t love mother and her advice is useful but the least she could have done was ask me first. “Mom, can OK’s be O-K or do they have to be O-K-A-Y.”

“It has to be O-K-A-Y,” she said.

Missy came back and I said, “Fine. Watch this.” I went to the top of the page and pushed the EDIT button. Then I went down to REPLACE and typed the two in. Confidently I pushed the REPLACE ALL. We resumed reading until, to my stunned surprise, we came to the word "looked", which now read, "lookayed". Since there is a O-K in the word the computer helpfully added a AY to it. It had done this through the entire book. I glared at Missy, who was laughing hysterically, and said, “This is your fault.” For the next hour or so we went through it and took out AY’s. By the end of this long, breathless process the two of us had laughed to the point of bursting. From now on, neither of us will ever look at a "looked" the same again and AY’s are never again going to regain their place as normal letters.

So, I conclude with, Prepositional phrases are evil and so are AY’s.

Beans Are Cool

There I was pouring the beans into the crock-pot…ok, Rose was but this is my story and I can write what I want. So, let’s start over… There I was reclined in the chair controlling my Robot Rose who poured the beans into the crock pot. Now, to you people there is a problem. How did I get the beans to my mouth? At this point I could say no one knows but I shalln’t. Instead I shall come up with a even greater fib. So, of course, it was a special bean pulley system shipped all the way from the North Pole via Santa Claus or some other mythological person with a beard and a sleigh but then these stories would no longer be true. So, we’ll start again. Take three.

For starters, third time starters that is, I shall say beans are cool. I will even go so far as to say they are awesome, wonderful, stupendous! I’m talking about kidney beans, just so you know. You can eat them from the can and they are crunch, sweet and salty all at once! I could write a whole page on beans alone but that, despite my extensive beginning, is not what this story is about. It is about my, all right our family’s, forty five minutes of fame. This forty five minutes was the most expensive time I’d ever bought but what can you expect when you are buying time that gets you to be seen by the public. March is Essential Tremor Awareness Month and since my mother is one of the worst cases, she is a great target to be shot at. No, she was not shot with a gun. She was shot with a camera. So, stop assuming and listen closely. As I was saying, it was expensive. We spent three days spotlessly cleaning the house. Yes, I said THREE days.

I know, I’m skipping about. I should go in one complete line but I’m WAY to random for that. That is why I’m going back to Tuesday, the day before Wednesday, the big day.

Mom had a doctor appointment and told us before she left that if the reporter called to tell him to come tomorrow. He called all right. He came right up to the front door and knocked. We told him to come back tomorrow, in the nicest way possible. Half an hours drive and we tell him to come back tomorrow, poor guy. That was what led us to that day. He came, took TONS of pictures and taste tested some home made stuff. Now we will be in the paper. I know this isn’t the greatest thing to lead up to. That is pretty much what us kids thought. Three days work for a few pictures. The up side is I got a new saying: Chocolate, good. Pineapple, cool. Cat… moan heartbrokenly as you realize it left.

God's Courage, Not Mine.

There are talents God gives you and there are ones He doesn’t. He gave me quite a few but He kept several for others, too. I have a problem with rambling too much. To know what to say isn’t one of my talents and I often say the wrong thing. I say too much or too little or stumble over my words so badly my listener can’t understand a word I’m saying. I have a lot to say but never say it right. Oh, how it can be frustrating.

So, instead of saying things, I write them. Sure, I still talk too much but I have another way of disposing of the things whirling inside my head. When I want to say something sentimental I can think of what to say up until the point I should say it. Then it leaves me, lost. So, when I want to do something special to someone I write them a note instead. That way I can erase all the things that come out wrong. I know for a fact that I will not be able to do this forever. There are times I need to be able to say something and say it right and I probably won’t be able to.

Don’t lose heart if you’re like me. God promises, in His Word, that when the most important thing is questioned, our salvation, and our enemies think they have us, He will give us the exact words to say.

I admit, I’m not very brave but I don’t need to be brave. God has enough courage for us all and when I need it most, He’ll give me just enough. For now not being brave just makes me so I’m not too sure of myself and more sure of Him. That’s all David needed, that’s all I need.

You don’t need to be brave, you need God.

Mandy

Counting Dots

Just to show you how oblivious we are I’m going to tell you a true story.

We were in town with Mom and Dad to get groceries and were waiting in the car as she was in the store. Now everybody knows how boring sitting in the car is. Especially when they are taking ten billion hours doing some unknown thing. Jules and Peter were getting restless and climbing over the seats as Rose told them OVER and OVER to sit down. I, on the other hand, was doing something productive. Counting the dots on my seat. No, I’m not kidding. There is exactly 59,150 dots on my chair. No, I didn’t count all of them. I just counted the dots in a line, 350, to be precise and then I counted the lines on my chair, 169, just so you know. Times them up and BANG! You have 59,150 dots.

Well, Mom and Dad did come out, even though we thought they never would and to our disbelief they asked, “Did you see that lady fall?”

“What lady?” we asked. They must have thought us blind, “A elderly lady fell, right in front of our van!” We looked at each other in shock, “We didn’t see her. Are you sure?”
“We saw her from in the store. They called the hospital and they came and picked her up and everything! Right here!” So as you can see, we’re oblivious.

Baking a cake

Despite my dislike for cooking and the fact I almost always was horrible at it, I like chocolate cake. So, one morning around ten I decided to make myself a gluten free one. Thinking that it would be done by “Official lunch time”, 11:00. I got out the recipe and looked at it. It called for a 8”x 8” inch pan. “Well,” I reasoned with myself, “It isn‘t 9”x 13” so I need to double it,” and I did.

I measured every ingredient carefully so I wouldn’t ruin it as I so often do. Then mixed it and poured it into a 9”x 13” pan and put it in the oven. I was sure my cake had no errors and left the kitchen after setting the timer.

If you can remember the story on skiing that I wrote then you will know what I was doing during the waiting process. I was done in plenty of time and went to check on the cake which should have been perfect according to my calculations. My calculations were wrong. Instead of the half way full pan of cake that is normal for a gluten free cake it was to the very brim. I felt it and it wasn’t done. I looked at it and decided that it probably wouldn’t rise anymore and left the kitchen to let it bake some more. That is, until Missy said it smelled like something was burning but it wasn’t my cake, not the cake that was in the pan at least. It was the cake in the bottom of the oven. “Easy fix.” I told myself in my not so expert knowledge. I decided not to call the real expert. I took a specula and scrapped the cake towards me. All was fine until it caught fire and the oven started to blaze. I decided it was now time to call in the expert, and screamed, “Rose!”

She came out of the study where she had been reading my book and looked at my overflowing cake. She shook her head, laughed, stared at the oven fire and got the baking soda. She put it out. I was then ordered to empty the smoking oven of the cake. She then, still laughing, told me to take out some of the batter and switch pans. I did, all the time being laughed at by the “expert“. Julie was more than happy to eat the top layer of half way cooked cake since her motto is, “If it’s sweet, eat it if it’s cooked or not!”

God's Wonder

There is just a certain feeling you get. You don’t know what it is, it’s just there. It comes at the strangest times and you don’t know why but you don’t ever want it to go. It’s a sense of peace and wonder and freedom. You want to cry and laugh all at once. You feel like running, just running as far as you can.

I don’t know when others get it but I get it when the wind blows. Not too hard and not too soft and it feels like rain. The wind is cold but not too cold. Just enough that you can know what is wind and what is air. It makes me feel free, like I could conquer the world if God wanted me to.

I get calm, subdued when I watch the sun set. I don’t want to move or go anywhere, I just want to watch. I want to feel that same wind and just know so deep that no one in the world could ever change my mind even if they all came together. It’s like watching God paint and know that He’s painting for you.

I get it when I sit on the creek bank and watch the water go over the rocks, bubbling, gurgling. For no reason at all you just want to get in and feel the water flowing past because it’s like God’s power flowing by.

It comes when the sun comes up and reflects on the crisp, snow covered white trees and the snow reflects the sun’s brilliance and you feel so close to God that you want to shout and tell every one.

It’s a feeling so wonderful that it can’t be described a any amount of words but you know God gave it to you. You know He is so close and you don’t have to be scared. It’s a feeling so wonderful but if you aren’t saved by God’s grace then you will never know it.

Oh, if you could only feel it too. It’s like a small sliver of heaven’s peace comforted you as you watch God’s beautiful power.

Mandy.

Skiing, a highlight.

As anyone who has gone skiing should know, skiing is one of the highlights of the year. So as I was remembering a few years back I happened to remember a story that HAS be told. Ok, doesn’t have to be but it would be a major crime not to! Or so I think.

We’d only been skiing a few times even though it was our third year, since we only go three times a year with the home school group and all of us thought ourselves pretty good at it, all of us with the exception of Julie. She was only six and hadn’t exactly gotten her balance yet.

We were all quite proud that we could go up the hill and get to the bottom without falling over a hundred times and I had made a record of getting to the bottom five times with no mistakes. There are a few glitches in the art of skiing and one of which is coordination. No, I don’t have any problem with my eye hand coordination as you just assumed, or at least may have. The coordination I was speaking of was friend coordination. We have this rule that on the first day you go skiing every year you must take a lesson so we don’t start going randomly and ending up killing people. So, every year on the first day we take a lesson. This doesn’t always mean our friends do.

So we finished with the lesson and headed to the lodge to get warm and were told the others had been gone for awhile and would be back soon. They didn’t come back as soon as we may have liked. Time for plan two. We got dressed and got coat colors from their parents and headed off to find the missing friends that may or may not have been wrapped around a tree somewhere on the mountain.

We searched and searched and found no sign of them. We went back to the lodge and found that we’d been searching outside well they were in and we’d just missed them. Too cold to go out immediately we stayed and got warm and of course, ate. Then we went back out, got our skis on and went to the lift. We slid down the ramp and out in front of the incoming chair and when we felt it hit our legs sat down. We were off. We went up about twenty or thirty feet on the ski lift and kept our eyes out for our friends. There was no sign of them. We went down and then headed over to Surprise. (Another hill) They weren’t here either.

After a long time looking we went back again, now convinced they had been kidnapped or murdered. On the way down we had to do down the “Bunny Hill” the little kids hill were Julie was. The little kids have a slow moving carpet like a treadmill that you get on and it takes you to the top of the small hill. It only moves a mile an hour or slower so falling off shouldn’t have been a problem. As I said, Julie hadn’t gotten her balance yet.

She tried to turn to see her friends that were behind her and toppled off the “Magic Carpet” as it was called. It was pretty obvious that she had done this before as there was places all along the “Magic Carpet” were you could see her mold in the snow. As her friend passed she said, “Are you ok this time Julie?”

Julie replied quite normally, “Perfectly fine!” and went down the hill starting at the middle where she had fallen.

We did manage to find our friends finally and we set off to have fun, quite relieved that they weren’t wrapped around a tree.

Cooking.

Now, to everyone else in the world making dinner may be easy. For me, not so much. For one thing, I hate cooking, and for the other, I’m horrible at it. The combination can be disastrous.

Our family had just finished watching a TV program for school and we were just sitting there minding our own business. Well, all of us kids know one thing, get up from your seat and you’re dead. OK, not really but the most dangerous time is that critical moment between getting up and getting to the kitchen because when you do Mom always tells you to do something or at least almost always. It’s like you draw attention to yourself and she has to come up with a job of some sort. This time was no exception. Just as I’d got up and began to purposefully walk to the study to write she said, “Time to make dinner.” I look at the clock and then to mom in stunned silence before saying, “But it’s only four!”
“And it will take an hour to make.”
“But we always make dinner at four thirty.” All of us kids looked at her as if she’d just sentenced us to an extra life time in prison, especially me cause as I said, I hate cooking. She ordered us to the kitchen to make the meal. Well, I didn’t want to be stuck doing dinner an extra half hour early for the rest of my life so I informed everyone we had to be done in half an hour. No one else seemed to be bothered but to me this was horrible.

My plan didn’t go very well. I started my noodles, dumping them in a blob in the water and set about getting vegetables and what ever else you do when Rose is giving orders for herbs I can’t find nor know what they are or look like. We rushed about, well, I rushed about, everyone else seemed to be perfectly orderly and unbothered. Much to my disagreement. They had their jobs done in halve an hour but I, who had somehow managed to get three jobs, wasn’t. When I strained the noodles you won’t believe what they did. They literally stuck together. As in they tried to ruin me by making tight little blobs of uncooked noodles that wouldn’t even come apart with a knife.

As I said, it can be disastrous to be both horrible at cooking and dislike it.
Rose and Missy thought it quite funny. I for one didn’t. I had managed to ruin noodles by putting them in water and despite the fact Missy and Rose kept me away from knives I burnt myself twice.

After Rose pried apart the noodles, well, all those that could be the rest they feed to the dog, and cooked them in butter and seasonings they did taste nice but it had been a hour. I’d failed to make my point. Thankfully no one rubbed it in and we didn’t have to cook dinner at four all the time, just half the time. So, as you can see, I am a miserable cook and one that is quite impassionate.

P.S. I still have to cook anyway.

Thoughts on Prayer

I have strong opinions which I don’t mind sharing and defending but I’m also open to other’s ideas. I can’t always be right and I don’t know everything.

I don’t try to hide who I am, what I want and what needs changed. Maybe I’m sometimes too honest about my faults and I see people looking at me as if I’m strange. Well, I don’t mind them calling me so but do it to my face so I can say this back, “Yes, I am strange. I’m a square in a round world and this is why: I believe in God and I know He believes in me and in doing so I can be myself and he’ll change what needs changed.”

I believe in dreams as long as those dreams are for God and God alone. Yes, one of my faults is sometimes looking at my work and taking pride in it. I often have to remind myself that God gave my that talent. It’s easier when I sit down to write a character that a friend requested and wonder how in the world I could do it. Then I’ve got to pray hard, very, very hard, for Him to give me the talent to do it right. I often do this when I draw as well. I pray practically the whole time I draw. I pray HARD and over and over and over. If I don’t, I see the difference. My drawings are flat, lifeless, like a scribble of a five year old.

I find I pray for everything. I pray for the knots in my string as I sew to end up in the same place. I pray for the right words every time I speak to someone. I pray for my cakes to turn out alright. I pray that the sun will shine. I pray there will be a pretty sunset. I pray for so many things and most of them are small prayers but God loves them. He enjoys hearing me ask for things.

Then I pray for people. I try to pray for one person but I can’t. I feel as though I’m favoring that person and then I end up praying for their families, friends and anyone and everyone they have ever mentioned. Then I think of someone else and I then pray for them and their families and on and on.

I don’t only pray for people I know. I pray for actors of TV shows I watch. I pray for people someone mentioned two years ago just because I can and I pray for people on things like Wheel of Fortune and American Idol.

So, praying for me is a very serious thing. I pray because I can and because I want to and because I want more than anything to help people and it’s the only way I know how right now. So, I pray.

There are plenty of things about me that are wrong and need changed so I pray for myself. I pray to be changed.

I pray my books please Him. I pray for Him to be close and to comfort me. I simply pray to feel closer.

I pray just because I can and just because I want to. How long has it been since you prayed?
Mandy.

Mail Walk

The day was rather chilly, like zero degrees, and we’d just finished school. Ok, I hadn’t just finished School since I’m usually done by eight. Unless you count the fifteen minutes with mom or the hour history but those are scattered throughout the day. Anyway, Missy had just finished with school. You may notice that most these stories center on Me and Missy and no this is not on purpose but Missy and I are just constantly doing such things that are good to write about.

Well, there we were in the kitchen again, since this was the main area for us since we think food is vital, eating like usual. We weren’t hungry but since we were bored snacking was the thing to do. After we’d snacked for awhile we were no longer satisfied with eating so we changed tactics, “We could read.” I suggested, referring to my book which we read over together to find mistakes, “No. I don’t feel like reading.” Missy answered, “I’d watch TV,” she added, “But mom is watching something.” I gathered from this that it was something she didn’t like with my highly advanced, or not, skills. We talked for a bit on what to do then stood looking out the window aimlessly, “We could get the mail…” I said aloud. We both stared at the thermometer which said zero and then at the trees swaying in the wind, “It would be cold…” she said,

“But there might be a letter at the end…” I said. We both knew that by the end of the conversation we would go but we had to at least think it over even though we wouldn’t listen to the little voices saying, “You’re nuts! Think about your fingers! Not to mention your toes!”

“And if there is a letter it would be worth it…” my voice trailed off, “There should be at least one…” Missy continued.

“Ok, ask Mom.” I said against the voices now screaming in my head, “Stop! Wait! What are you doing?” I wanted a letter and I’d get frozen for one if necessary, “You ask. I’ll be supportive!” this was the usual argument before asking mother for something. I didn’t argue this time because I really wanted a letter, “Fine.” we walked into the living room and got permission. We put on our coats and boots and gloves and scarves and left to brave the wind and cold temperatures in the hope of a letter. We’d made it too the end of the driveway, which isn’t a short one like those in town, when Missy said, “Do you have the key?”
“No. You were supposed to get it.”
“When did it become my job?” she inquired. So, we went back, “You get the bag for the mail I’ll get the key.”
“Where is the key?” I asked suspiciously,
“I’m getting the key,” she said.
“I know,” I said, “But where is it?”
“In the car,” Missy told me.
“So you gave me the longer walk,” I said.
“Precisely,” she said smiling,
“Fine,” I said. It wasn’t all that much longer of a walk and arguing with my sister when she was in a mean mood was not good. She’d do something like Move my book under a different name so it took me half the morning to find it or something. Her favorite evil deed to do, which she did at lest ten times a day to all of us, was steal your book and hide it. If you weren’t careful she’d even grab it out of your hands as you read.

As I said, I got the bag.
We walked down to the post office talking all the way. When we got to the post office we saw a kid get off the bus and go in. This was strange because we didn’t know of any boys of our age, or any boys at all for that matter. We just ignored him and got the mail. Then we took some candy from the dish and left. The walk home was a bit more cold. My poor legs were stinging and the little voices in my head were saying, “Told you so, told you so!” and I thought back,
“Yes, but I did get a letter!” I was quite pleased and triumphant and that made the cold walk bareable. When we reached the drive way we paused and Missy said, “Look. My legs aren’t cold when I walk.” I stop and found mine were quite warm as well, “That’s strange.”
“It’s our jeans. Every time we walk our skin touches them." This was quite true and we were pleased with our discovery.

We didn‘t delay any longer because, for one, we had letters, and for two, we were freezing!

Sledding

I thought it was going to be another normal January day. For your information, it wasn’t. I woke, forgetting entirely that it was a holiday since holidays don’t concern me. Unless I get gifts. Well, you don’t on Martin Luther King Jr. day. Therefore, I forgot. This Martin Luther King Jr. day wouldn’t be one I’d easily forget. I woke everyone on time and learned, to my complete surprise, that today we were going sledding with our cousins. I couldn’t exactly get a grip on that. No one had cared to inform me! So, as everyone got up and got ready I did chores. There I was, sliding across the ice, trudging through the snow, walking through the rain, and saying to myself, “Sledding with the campfire? We’re nuts.”

Well, believe it or not, we did go sledding with a campfire. Where we went, Hanna campground in case you’re interested, had several feet of snow and though that’s good for sledding, it was also between us and the campfire ring where our lovely fire was to be lit. Three feet of snow didn’t stop us. We’re Eggers’ and Jones’. We dug it out, well I didn’t but the adults did.

Once that fire was started we put the kettle on and us kids trudged off to do some sledding, despite the shortage of sleds. Five or six or even seven of us piled on and went zipping down the hill, leaving a trail of cousins, I’m sorry to say I was almost always one left behind. Several times people had to hang on behind just to get a ride.

We got tired after awhile so we went back to the campfire. We had hot water for hot chocolate and got sticks to roast…socks. I’m not lying, honest! We roasted wet socks. It didn’t exactly dry them but they got hot that way. Yes, indeed, we went sledding with a campfire, drunk hot chocolate, ate hot dogs and chili, and roasted socks. Only our family would do such a thing.

Fixing dinner

There we were in the middle of another evening as we prepared to make dinner. We were going to have left over Spanish Rice but it had been frozen solid by the 32.4 below temperature the night before, since we put it on the porch in the grill as we often do in the winter. We set the pan on the oven and turned the heat on. We waited, me reading and Missy, one of my four siblings, staring at the pan like it would make it heat up faster.

Well, she came up a little bit later and informed me we had to look for the mysterious beeping that was driving them crazy. I, for one, hadn't heard anything. After lots of coaxing she dragged me from the stairs and my book and we set out on our important quest to find the beeping. We spent the next half hour running up and down stairs and through rooms as we attempted to find the cause of this beep before it drove our parents to insanity. We slammed cupboard doors and drawers and soon located the horrible screeching beep. As we all half expected, well everyone but me, it was a smoke alarm. I still can't figure out how they thought of such a thing. Now that we had spent all that energy on our valiant, or at least sucessful, quest - we needed food. Like right then or we might all have died but the Spanish Rice was still a completely solid chunk of ice.

"Time for plan B," Missy said, "Get me a bowl!" I grabbed a bowl from the cupboard and set it on the counter. "Too small!" she exclaimed. I put it back and got the biggest bowl we owned and set it on the counter where the last one had been. She managed to get the contents of the pan, our beloved and most needed dinner, into the bowl and said, "Nuke it!" So I took the big yellow bowl that was the size of three heads and set it on the counter by the microwave. Turning to our center island I got myself the "Magic opening stick" otherwise know as a fork. Since our microwave door now refuses to open by pushing the button, much to our horror. I stabbed the fork between the door and the dialing pannel and pried it open as I am now an expert at doing. For on horrifying moment I wondered if the bowl would fit but it did. I stuck it in and shut the door. I pushed the Minute Plus button three times with the "Magic Opening Stick" and stood staring at it. Time seemed to take forever. Finally it beeped and we tested the food. Most of it wasn't ice anymore so we put that back in the pan and nuked the rest for longer.

About half an hour later we were bored again and our life saving food still wasn't hot. "Time for plan C," Missy said, "Individual plates in the microwave." "Brilliant!" I replied, now on the verge of giving up ever eating the Spanish Rice and starting to think about my left over glutin free pizza in the refrigerator, "Precisely," she said and I got the plates after battling with the cups that had been stack on top for lack of places to put them. We served up the food and I stuck them in the microwave to get nuked. Singing a song that was probably off tune, or as Rose would put it, I was murdering it. I was quite glad for her absence so she wouldn't inform me again. Rose is the cook but she was ill. I, being my usual self, took advantage of the fork in my hand and decided it was a sword with which I was to stab the beast when I had to take the food out. So, I took up what I thought was a opposing stand and told the beast to stop it's numbers or hurry them up before we all starved in our very own kitchen. The "beast" took no heed, being a microwave, so I flashed my fork and cut myself with the prongs.

This was no new experiance for me since I'd stabbed myself with a fork before and this was just a minor wound compared. I was also quite used to getting injured in the kitchen but was proud to know I'd only cut myself three times while chopping carrots last and twice while cutting potatoes. This was a huge improvement! So, when the beast's numbers had stopped I was still at my post and took the food out before putting in the next plate and stabbing the Minute Plus button. After we had heated up all the plates we put Mom's on a shell and added cheese because it's like a crime not to! Then we hauled the plates out and I gave Mom hers and told her what it was, "Beast in a shell." Or so it had become.