My life has not been very bloggable this past week. But then again, maybe it has and I haven't had a chance to mentally process the micro-events of our lives and decide how to write about them.

I have been going out of my way to minimize my time on-screen, so much of my absence has been intentional. I am being convicted very much, lately, of the need to reduce screen time. I know I have been so addicted. This means I have gotten serious, once again (after not being serious) about keeping my computer time to weekends and Wednesdays. One the days where I eliminate electronic technology from my life (lovingly referred to as "amish day" here at home, to the disdain of my children) I have had to go to more effort to think of more constructive ways to fill the small voids in my day during which I normally would have slid onto the seat in front of the monitor and keyboard to check on ... whatever.

But I feel the results have been an enrichment of my days. There has been much more reading going on in our house, and more reading aloud as a family, and I am very happy about that.

Aside from this, here are more tidbits from our lives here at MOCS:

• Baby Girl has lost her top two center incisors within the past month. Here are some of the better photos of the results.
  

• We had a lovely Independence Day here at home, attending our local parade and lighting off our own small fireworks in our yard. Baby Girl was all dressed and ready to attend the parade, including a special bag she decorated to collect candy. Turns out I had to turn her around to change her outfit a bit, because this one would certainly have been too hot. The Fourth of July celebration here where we live is very nice, but we are always melting by the time we are ready to go back home.

• A local county newspaper interviewed both of our children for a column about our parade. As my children are both very opinionated, they were very happy to share their feelings about our local celebration! I look forward to seeing the results, with their photos, next week.
• We are bird sitting for nine days. Self Reliant man's boss' boss (or is it bosses' boss?) is the doting parent of these birds. The birds are Tweeters (parakeet), Sunny (cockatiel), and Mystic (lovebird). Prior to this, I had no experience with birds, and I am amazed at how BUSY they are, all day long (and Sunny is 21 years old!). The children have been giving these birds constant attention, and I have had to impress upon them the seriousness of this responsibility we have taken on. In other words, don't let the birds out of the cage (er.. house!), don't stick anything inside the cage without permission, don't spray any aerosol cans in the house, etc. Anyhow, the photos are not great of the birds. I'll have to work on that.
  

• We will be traveling sometime in the month of July to visit my mother in law, who lives in assisted living. It has been way too many months since we have seen her. Since we will be van camping while we visit her (in Florida.... in July) Self-Reliant Man has been working on making window shades to reduce the incredible heat gain through the windows of our van, so that the portable air conditioner can work, possibly, during the daytime, while the sun is shining (instead of just after sunset, or in the shade, or while it is raining, or at night, like it does now). Don't know whether it will actually work, but Self-Reliant Man gets an A+ for trying. They are simply blackout window shades held on by magnets, in our truest classy style of doing things **wink wink** Pretty fancy, eh? The camping neighbors in their Class A 40' motorhomes will be so envious.

See how dark they make the van interior, even with full sun shining upon the windows?

• We have made our camping reservations for our annual family vacation in late September. It will involve camping in three different locations in Tennessee. I will post more details about this later. It is so nice to have a cool mountain vacation to look forward to at this time of the year, and it is only two months away!
• Some of you know that our family is between churches. We have been attending a church since around Christmas, but have not joined, as we want to make sure that this is the right place for our family. Shortly after beginning to attend this church, we learned of the construction of their new sanctuary and fellowship hall. It was being built adjacent to property that is owned by a well known international Christian ministry (founded by the same pastor as the church). Well, as it is mostly finished now, today was the first morning that the congregation attended services at the new property. For about a month, services will be held in the fellowship hall, as the church awaits the final completion of the sanctuary. Well, right now, my first impression of this new location is that it is simply...... stunning. Yes, stunning would be the word. We haven't even seen the best part, yet, and the rest that we did see is just amazing. Amazing, as in..... over the top amazing. That is all I can say about it so far. A lot of money was spent on this facility. It is even going to be featured in a PBS program soon, due to the artwork and windows. Going to church there was a strange feeling, and I am wondering what effect the new environment will have on the church culture and congregation. Even the property and grounds are gorgeous. Many people were there today who we have never seen before, and they were taking a lot of pictures. It wouldn't surprise me if the photos were in cyberspace already. Anyhow, our family is taking all of this in, and figuring out what it all means. I don't know what else to say. It is hard to believe that this church still only has 600 members. These are photos of the church that I found through Google. They must have been taken within the past month or so. It only captures about half of the facility, that which is most visible from the road. The rest of the property contains two older mansions that are going to be modified to become a seminary. All structures are located around a small lake. The setting is really lovely.
  

• Our tractor has been working marvelously well. All Self-Reliant Man has to do is press the button for the starter motor and off he goes. This is such a beautiful thing! We can have the whole yard completed in between 2 and 3 hours, and the rest of the weekend available for other things. Hooray! Now here is poetry in motion...

• Finally, I am saddened by the news of a tragedy at my former workplace, W*lt Disn*y W*rld, early this morning when one monorail train collided with another. The 21 year old driver of one of the trains was killed, probably instantly. It was during one of the final runs of the night, at 2 a.m., after clearing away a large crowd from the Independence Day festivities. Having worked myself for years as an engineer, almost literally in the shadow of the monorail (my office window looked out at the monorail service facility), it is difficult to imagine the possibility of such an accident on this impressive form of transportation. It is the first fatal accident on this system in the history of WDW. My prayers and heart go out to the family of this young man, who never made it home from work this morning.