Rain, Rain, Rain.

Let me give you a glimpse of our weather today.

Don't you wish you were here?

It's raining.  It's pouring.

The old man is snoring.

Or something like that.

It's raining.  A lot.  And it's dark.

And all my little, pretty, twinkly lights are on because it's so dark and gray.

It was so wet and windy that I almost told Gunnar we wouldn't go walking today,

but there was something I wanted to show you.

But first, this is how dark it was, midmorning.

I took this photo in the woods, with the flash:

The original photo is the one above, then I asked the software to "enhance" and got this:

But when I over-rode the flash and tried to hand-hold the camera for

a rather long exposure (hence the blurriness) I got this:

The first pic is by far the most realistic.

Maybe that means nothing to you, but I find it all kind of interesting.

I'm always amazed how greatly superior the human eye is to any camera,

no matter how fancy, that man can invent.

But I digress.

I do that a lot.

What I meant to show you is this:

Are you amazed?

No?

It's a bunch of trees, what's the big deal, right?

Same spot, just a few days ago:

Notice something different?

Yah, the big tree is DOWN.

And kudos to our local parks and rec maintenance crew.

Gunnar and I walked this trail on Tuesday morning

and the old snag was still hanging up there.

Wednesday morning it was on the ground, blocking the trail.

I called parks and rec to see if it's a trail they maintain.

It is.

And today the tree is gone.

Okay, not actually gone, but helpfully and efficiently off the trail.

And I hope you appreciate our dedication in bringing this earth-shaking news.

(It probably really was earth-shaking!)

Because oh-my-gracious, because

did I mention it was raining?

I know, it looks like he's standing in a patch of sunlight.

But he's not.

That's sawdust on the ground.

It was POURING and I was trying to shelter my camera

with the hood of my coat with one hand,

and take the pictures with the other hand.

So that's my excuse for why they're kind of blurry.

I know, you're thinking

HELLO, umbrella?

But, no, people in Washington rarely use umbrellas.

Don't ask me why.

But it was too windy for an umbrella anyway.

Which is probably why people in Washington rarely use umbrellas.

And look at this!  Look how big those trunks are!

And there were four of them.

Four enormous trunks that could

fairly efficiently rearrange your body parts

if they fell on you.

Every single time we walked that trail we passed under that tree with all the caution

crossing a four-lane highway would require.

Maybe that's paranoid.

But why did it come down when it did?

It wasn't particularly windy on Tuesday night.

You just never know.

And now that I've rambled on for over 400 words

about a dead tree that 99.9% of you don't care about

and will never see,

(as well as my dubious photography skills),

we'll move on.

Tate left his Wordly Wise paper out for me to correct.

If you're not familiar with Wordly Wise it's a vocabulary program.

Each week the student gets fifteen words he works on.

The student finishes the week by reading a story or article that uses all the words,

and answering comprehension questions about the story, using all the words.

Tate's article this week was about manatees,

and the hazards they face from recreational boaters.

It included words like ponderous, blithe, aquatic, and docile.

He did a great job, as usual, and then ad libbed at the bottom of the page,

Oh, the huge-manatee!

(If you don't get the pun, look up the Hindenburg tragedy.)

And this is why we homeschool.  (*eyes roll*)

Meanwhile, this...

has given way to this...

And in other news, I'll have pictures as soon as I have good light in which to take them...

my quilt is done!

Got it back from the quilter Tuesday night, got it bound last night,

and washed and dried for that wrinkly-crinkly-quilty-goodness this morning.

Yippee!