Busy Week

After a season of one tie and the rest losses, Kris's soccer team won their first playoff game on Tuesday night, even with crummy weather approaching and lightning far off to the north. Her next game is tomorrow night. Thursday night we went to a banquet for Peoria Christian School. Karen subbed at Katie's preschool on Thursday and Friday - it went fine. She subs tomorrow, too. Today Karen taught Sunday School and then hosted an ice cream social at St. Anthony's - that also went well. Kris won a few books this afternoon for participating in the annual Peoria Science Treasure Hunt.

Dragonflies

Kris's last regular season soccer game was last Monday. It was noteworthy for the vast numbers of dragonflies buzzing around. They did not bother people, but I would not have wanted to be a mosquito out there. Katie is signed up for a tumbling class...with antics like that in the picture you can see why. Today I stopped back to visit that coal train derailing that happened 2 weeks ago. I had thought there were only about 5 cars wrecked - it was more like 19. The quarter inch aluminum skin on these coal cars crumpled and peeled like aluminum foil.

Sister visit

My sister Tina visited us this weekend. She came to Kris's soccer game, then watched the kids while Karen and I had a date night. It was good to see her. Katie now does a pretty good job singing the ABC song.

Katie's First Day of Preschool...

...went well today. Neither Katie nor Karen cried - she went in and started playing, barely having time to say good bye. There were also no reports of naughtiness when Karen picked her up. She was pretty worn out tonight, though.

If the train jumps off the track...

...do you want your money back? An old rhyme from my childhood. This morning about five coal cars derailed down by Kickapoo Creek. Some of them got twisted up pretty badly, but it was back in the woods and I don't think any people got hurt. This afternoon Katie and I stopped by to watch the cleanup efforts from a distance - there were cars and cranes from Indiana and Missouri. Lots of fixup battles at home to this weekend. I tackled the leaky kitchen drain, made it much worse, then much better (thank God and Great Blue Pipe Joint Compound). Not a fan of plumbing projects! This mornings fix it was funny: I attempted to use my cheap, rusty spreader to put some weed-and-feed on the lawn. First one wheel came off on the way to my starting point - I said OK, I can still make this work. Then the powder flow control was rusted shut so I turned around to head to the garage for some engineering, and on the way back the other wheel came off! I think its a sign that I should save my fertilizer-spreading for the classroom. We have all been pretty busy with school stuff this week. Karen likes her class. Kris had lots of soccer practice but no games. Katie even stopped by her preschool for an hour or so on Friday (she starts this week more fully). She was eager and nervous to go, but she enjoyed it. Last week was the Peoria rock and fossil show. We saw someone selling a fossil from Katie's province - a Jurassic sea reptile called a Giuzhou dragon (behind her head in the pic).