August

CONGRATULATIONS on another baby girl all you Portland Nielsen’s!!! I know when the twins were born, when I was six, they were my whole world after being surrounded by boys for so long and then I got the best gifts mom has ever given me, the rest of my 5 beautiful, wonderful sisters. And now Aaron, Matthew, and Michael have married the best women/sisters I could ever hope for. I wonder if Arwen would enjoy sharing a birthday. Madelyn probably wouldn't but we would sure have one heck of a friends party.

James and I have been feeling pretty good, physically, lately so we had a good weekend. Saturday we went to the too and all the animals were especially active. I watched a vulture start and finish an entire rat that looked the same as the black and white one that I had as a kid. James kept telling me to hurry on but I was stuck, I just couldn’t stop staring at this enormous bird perfectly devour the rat and then I got really stuck.
We moved on to the huge tortoises (Turtles/Tortoises are my favorite reptile and one of my top 5 favorite creatures). There were 3 that day and two were in a mud hole very close to the gate. I had an asian apple in hand from one of the trees at the zoo and couldn’t help but coax this beautiful prehistoric looking tortoise towards me. She SMACK, sloped out of her mud whole and reached as far as she could toward the apple. I called James and Madelyn back to watch her eat. Sooooooo fun. It’s so rare to see tortoises of this size ever move let alone eat. I couldn’t be more excited if she were an Apatosaurus (my favorite dinosaur). I was then naughty and coaxed her out with some green thing we picked off a tree just to pet her beautiful head. I made sure Madelyn didn’t see me get inside the fence (bad example and all). I didn’t let her eat the unknown (nut I think) but she let me pet her head until James got me to come running because the zoo had closed 10 min. earlier and then she, BUBBLE BUBBLE SQUIRT, slopped back into her mud whole.

Tuesday, James had the day off because I had a sleep study that night at 7:30. Lights out at 10, at 11 the nurse brought me a sleeping pill and what seemed like 5 minutes later, she brought me a second one (actually 45 min. later). She said everyone else was sound asleep. I think I fell asleep at 1am (no clocks), and at the 6am wakeup the nurse/tech asked me how I thought I slept. I felt like it was the middle of the night but felt like I did when I usually wake up and she said that my brain was awake all night long. Hmmm, maybe there’s a simple reason for all my health problems? YA THINK! I won’t get the results for who knows how long but she said that I’ll have two more sleep studies scheduled because of the results of this sleep study. I wonder if I did any arm tickling (like Emily and Aaron do also) in the middle of the night. I wake myself up talking all the time, the other morning I woke myself up by sculpting a face out of clay, I opened my eyes, and I was sitting up actually going thru the sculpting motions with my hands.

I don’t remember what day it was but James, Madelyn, and I spent some wonderful hot stormless time at the pool early in the morning and I actually got some color for the first time, even my face w/my SPF 30 on. Then in the afternoon, about 3:00 we got one of our hurricane-like storms, cannon fire thunder and pounding rain with winds that were blowing shingles off. So nice to be in such a nice apartment and not have to worry about a thing.

HAPPY EARLY AUGUST BIRTHDAYS TO:
(Your birthstone is a Peridot and your birthflowers are gladiolus)
8/6 My nephew Steven, Happy 21st!
8/14 Our cat Dresden, she’s actually 31 (in cat years), same grumpy age as me.
8/22 Meghan, Happy 22nd on the 22nd!
8/30 Sequoia, ha ha, you’re finally as old as me!
HAPPY ANNNIVERSARIES TO:
8/9 Michael & Heidi, Happy 4th!
8/20 Mom & Dad, Happy 38th! Yes mom, I have scrapbooking pages in the works.

Love, Wendy