It's Friday!

I cannot believe how fast the week went by! We kept pretty busy which helps the time pass.

Wednesday morning we awoke to the sounds of someone mowing our grass! It was Timmermans Landscaping! Our friend, Josh, from church owns his own company and offered to take care of our lawn while Darrick is gone. They mowed, edged, trimmed the bushes and sprayed the weeds all in about 20 minutes. So much faster then I ever could of done all that work. Such a blessing!

Wednesday night we were invited over to the Medema's house for dinner, along with Pastor Jim and his wife Pam. The Medemas live so close to us we walked. Debbie prepared for us our first really northwest meal. Her husband cooked salmon on the grill and she made a crab salad from crabs they caught and a cobbler for dessert. We have never been that big into seafood but I was surprised how good the kids did. Naomi ate everything up and asked for seconds. The boys each politely tried the salmon, and I liked it.

To be sure we didn't make a scene at the dinner table I role played with the kids. We all sat down and I pretended that I was serving them salmon and we practiced polite things to say and do and unacceptable things to say and do. I strongly believe that you cannot just expect kids to always know the right way to act. You have to model it for them. Now you know one of our secrets-we practice how to behave!!!

Thursday the boys played with a boy from Cadets and his grandpa took all 3 boys on a hike.

Today we were blessed to be visited by some dear friends of ours from Hawaii-Jen and Leonard. It has been a year since we have seen them and it was so good to catch up. Naomi and Leonard had a lot of fun playing together and we hope to get together next week again before they leave.

We have also had a rat fiasco going on the past few days. I'm not sure if you remember but we have a squirrel feeder in our back yard and one special squirrel, the kids named Jumpy, always eats from it. A few months ago we noticed a rat in our back yard eating from the feeder too. Usually we would see him under the feeder eating what dropped but one day he crawled inside the feeder.

A man from church offered to set a trap for us and catch it. So yesterday he set the trap and within a half hour we heard the trap go off. But the rat had escaped. So he came and set it again today. And once again it went off not too long after he set it. The boys ran down to check it and we got him. There was no way I was looking! Well I think Jake should not had looked either because he came back in the house looking so sad and he said he felt bad for the rat. I felt bad for Jake because he is such an animal lover. The guy came back and took care of the rat, thankfully. He set the trap again just to see if there are anymore. Man, I hope not!