William visit Day 14

 Oh oh, I have to catch up with 2 days now. 

Saturday

William could not sleep last night. He just could not make his brain stop working. Early in the morning he came into our bedroom and said he doesn't think he had slept at all. But of course he had since he didn't remember that I had checked on him. And then he fell asleep in our bed. 

So, we let him sleep and I went to the church for the St. Martin's project by myself. James and I volunteered several years ago to help make sandwiches/bags when it is our group's turn. William actually looked forward to it. He had said he likes to help to do something for God. Turns out that he woke up not too long after I had left. But waking up naturally is always a good thing. He and James did some errands.

I had to do one too but can't remember what else we did before lunch. Except one of us suddenly noticed that we had butterfly # 3. It seems that the hatching doesn't take that long because we had checked just shortly before. 

After lunch we decided we had to let it go. We were leaving for a while and thought it wasn't fair just to leave it when it would soon be ready to fly. 

This one was a lively one. I couldn't catch it easily in the house so we carried the whole thing out. William was the photographer with my phone.

Butterfly # 3 out-smarted us, slipped out, fluttered away and landed on top of our neighbors' sun-umbrella.

This weekend was a bit complicated. Sarah and Wade were celebrating their 10th wedding anniversary and had gone away for a long weekend. The cousins 'other grandparents' were staying at their house during this time. They are leaving again on Sunday and taking Caleb with them for the week because he will attend a horse camp there. This means that William and Caleb will not see each other for who knows how long.

So we arranged to pick Caleb up for a sleep-over. Both were so excited. Here just a few things they did to occupy themselves. 

The dominos had to be experimented with since they just had experienced the cereal box domino run.

William 'borrowed' my phone (camera) und did all sorts of slow-mo videos. It was rather cute.

We ended up playing several real games though. Much fun.

Of course there were other games to play too.

Around 5 pm we checked and it was not so very hot outside any longer. We decided to all take a walk in the neighborhood together. 

And what did Caleb discover this time? A broken birds' egg followed by a cicada around the corner!

We did not get very far though. The sky started to get darker and darker. And then ... can you see the first very large drops of rain?

Oh well, back to the house. William wanted Caleb to learn his new game. Caleb liked it as much. He has the same problem holding the many cards towards the last rounds.

The boys were very good going to bed. Yes, another great day. 

William visit Day 13

Friday

Last day of VBS. Of course everybody was looking forward to the "Cereal Box Domino Run". I went a little early to pick him up to see whether I could take a photo. You never know how the event is going to go. As you can see, they left some boxes out to make a gap every so many boxes in case something falls prematurely. 

 

Some of the children's art work to admire. 

Ha, I didn't know it was from William's group. And his painting on slate is in the above photo on the left in the first row. I like it. Not many with a religious theme.

At the end of each day everybody met in the sanctuary. Today too. At the end instructions where to go. It was really a great idea and a lot of fun. And oh yes ...

VIDEO    (0:34 minutes)   

We said good-buy to his cousins for today and made arrangements for Caleb's sleepover tomorrow. In the car William declared that he did enjoy VBS today. 

When we arrived home James informed us right away that butterfly # 2 has also arrived. We decided to let it go soon so it had still some time at daylight to find food etc.

VIDEO   (0:17 minutes)

In the afternoon William and I decided to make the Key Lime Tartlets which he had helped make at Sarah's house. I had bought the ingredients even before that and we didn't want them to get bad. William did the graham cracker crumbs to perfection.

He decided he also needed to take more pictures because I should put them into a blog.

My turn to take a photo. He is very intense when he works. No smile on his face doesn't mean that he is not enjoying himself. He is 'into the job'.

After baking and 2 hours of cooling ... tasting! These are leftovers.

A very good day.

William visit Day 12

Thursday

Time is going fast and we realized that today might be our last chance to do the tunnel walk. 

William's cousins did the Blue Ridge Tunnel Trail and had a great time. This was on his list to do when in Virginia. So he skipped VBS today and also did not need to be woken up since we had better control of the time. After breakfast we headed out. The drive took 1 hr 15 min and was easy. 

And off we went.

The stretch from the parking lot to the West Portal is a wide trail made of crushed stone and has several short, steep ups and downs (so it says on the internet) but one is quite a long down and I was not looking forward so much to the return.

We had prepared by buying headlights from Harbour Freight to the tune of $2.98 each, including batteries ha-ha. They were really brilliant. We put them on when we were in front of the tunnel entry. My arm is just not long enough for a proper selfie. 

A friendly young man took this photo for us. James had printed out something from the link which I had shared above. It is all very interesting. I find the history of it (completed in 1858) very impressive. Interesting titbits are also posted on mailmarkers along the way.

Towards the end I kept hearing rushing water ... and there was a waterfall.

The East Portal. 

And then the whole way back again. But it is not boring. Somehow it feels different. The photos look 'empty' but there were surprisingly many people walking since it was quite hot but cool inside the tunnel.

No more photos inside the tunnel. After that the way back UP to the parking lot.

Sarah had recommended to us the Blue Mountain Brewery. Great suggestion. We loved it. The food was outstanding. The server was so friendly. Would go back any time. 

William surprised us when we were leaving. He knew what this was and what you do with it.

Whow, how would he know hops?

Well, not the first time the kid surprises us.

Another 1 hr 15 minutes drive to go home. After a short rest Papa took William to the library. He found two books he liked and burried himself in one of them. But he also wanted to play a game of Five Crowns. Dang, he won against me.

William visit Day 11

Wednesday ... already? Another 'full' day. 

I am always very sorry when I have to wake William especially when I know he had trouble falling asleep. But I must say that he is very good about it. We have to leave before 9 am to be at the VBS in time. James came with us to retrieve his car which Sarah and Wade had needed to borrow one more time because of their car trouble. I had an errand to do too and then spent the time at their house until I could pick William up at 12:30 pm. 

At 4 pm we were back to meet Sarah and the children.  We went to Kroger to spend the $58 collected at the Lemonade Stand Fundraiser (see previous blogs). Kroger had a sale and that money bought 24 boxes of cereal. I  happened to have a little cash in my jeans pocket and that made it a total of 30 boxes to bring to the church.

In the car Sarah had worked out with the boys that each of them could spend about $11 for the cereal for homeless people. They were excited and eager.

At the cash register they had even more fun piling up all the boxes.

And here is a VIDEO   (0:32 minutes)

I have to give credit to a lot of these photos and videos to Sarah.

Unloading at the church. 

Sarah tried to take a group photo. OMG, good luck. We had 4 of the boys straight when the 5th one lost his boxes. 

But finally everything was taken care off.

When William and I were driving back home James informed us that he just saw that one of the butterflies had hatched. It had trouble climbing up the slick container walls. I helped him and put him (or her?) on the food. No interest. 

The butterfly didn't seem to be interested in the food I had provided. We decided to let it free. After all that it had been the whole effort to save the caterpillars/butterflies. Such a gorgeous creature. It made be happy!

VIDEO    (0:34 minutes)

Oh, yes. After dinner William asked to play the game. The white tray is his card holder. Especially in the last round with 13 cards it is difficult to hold them all orderly and efficiently. 

Some more interesting historic/science TV and William declared it a good day. Night night.