Fall arrives and we do house projects

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Lisa writes: Thursday, we caught the last dregs of hurricane Michael. It was only rain and thunder. It has rained and rained and rained this whole summer.

Friday, autumn finally arrived. Boom. Where did we put all the jackets? Joseph had a genetics appointment. They took a long health history, a cheek swab, and a hand x-ray (to look at bone growth). The reason we met with a geneticist was because our PCP wondered if Joseph's combination of physical problems could be related to some sort of a syndrome. The heart, the kidney, the tinyness. We'll hear what they think in a couple of weeks. But the doctor did definitely recommend speech therapy, so I made that phone call and here we are, off on another adventure.

Saturday, the fence repair guys arrived while the boys and I were still in our jammies and very efficiently reset all the leaning poles in our backyard chain link fence, put the long pole across the top again (after I'd excavated it from under a few years' growth of ivy), and straightened up the back gate. And just like that, we have an enclosed backyard again. Shortly before they finished, the concrete guys arrived to dig out the foundation and set a mold for our new little patio. Because we're so clever, we asked them to put the dirt into the big chipmunk cave-in area. Maybe the rodents will get the message?

The extra dirt was used to fill the sunken spots in the front yard where trees were taken out long before we bought the house. James and his next door buddy, William, immediately claimed the dirt piles. The gathered up fallen branches and staked then upright in the dirt to make a "forest" then gathered up all of their plastic dinosaurs and declared it "Jurassic World."

James FINALLY had a soccer practice (see "endless rain" above) and then we went to the firehouse open house where James got to sound the siren in a police car and shoot a firehose.

After scheduling speech therapy for Joseph's apparent lack of vocabulary (he only says about 10 words) he decided to surprise us with two new phrases. He heard me say "Oh man!" and repeated that all the way home from the firehouse. In the evening, James said, "Not me!" And Joseph thought it was hilarious to say that over and over again, too.

Sunday at church was awful. Sunday at church is always awful. Sunday afternoon was nice.  Joseph and I got a nap. Friends came to visit. James and William kept working on Jurassic World. When William had to go in for dinner, we went fishing at Burke lake. Just brought bread for bait. The fish got two small balls of bread; the geese got the rest. They were two very polite geese.

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