Early July

It has been an amazing (and busy!) couple of days - June ended, my sister arrived for a 40-day visit, Matt turned 25, and I worked an 11 hour day to catch up from the long weekend mail.

SO I made it through June without using shampoo (although I was tempted once or twice) and am going to stick with no-poo for the time being. I have occasional greasy-hair days, but I have been tweaking my baking soda mix and experimenting with how long I let it sit in my hair (sometimes no time, sometimes a few minutes), so for now I think it is worth it for healthier hair and scalp plus its dirt-cheapness.

Esther arrived bright and early Friday morning. Matt and I picked her up at the airport, then we had a delicious breakfast of crepes! They were small so I could flip them with our flipper since my last crepe attempt ended in mangled, doughy mess.These crepes include kefir and home-ground flour! Very delicious.

After crepes, we spent the day alternately hanging out, napping, watching TV and generally relaxing. Then that night we went to a barbeque at the Keidanns' for some of the youth group to welcome Esther
and ALSO to surprise Matt with a cake! Three cakes actually...

but only candles on one :)

After bbq, Matt and Esther and youth played games in the woods, but I wasn't feeling well, so I watched comedy on netflix and listened to fireworks from home.

THEN Saturday was Matt's real birthday! He decided to go fishing in the morning, but that turned into a much longer adventure because the hospital visit and emergency surgery took up a big chunk of fishin' time.
So what happened was, Matt was helping detangle one end of a double-hooked lure from a net WHEN the not-dead catfish on the other hook suddenly thrashed and hooked Matt's thumb. Then it continued to thrash around and generally freak out, driving the hook all the way to the bone. So there was a hospital visit, emergency surgery, and a tetanus shot! I'll post pictures separately so that the squeamish can avoid them. Happy Birthday Matt!!!

It all had a happy ending though, and we had a fun night with Esther and a friend playing Settlers of Catan :)

That's all the new news! I officially have a summer cold, so that's no fun, but it's not worth posting any pictures of. Just picture me blowing my nose all day.