This week Matthew and Buddy were involved in a rally obedience trial. Matthew came home with three ribbons: two first place ribbons, and one highest scoring dog ribbon. Photo by Mom.

Our vegetable business is booming! This is unusual for this time of year, when things are usually slow. Our newly-purchased store and cash register are making things a lot nicer as far as serving customers goes. I have finally learned how to use the cash register, and rarely make mistakes on it now, after a slightly stressful first few weeks. I am serving more than my share of customers this year as Mom has been VERY busy with numerous things lately. I don't mind it, really, but find I am not exactly a sales-lady.

A Word About The Weather

It has continued cool and moist this week, with a few sunshiny days towards the end. Wonderful growing weather for our vegetables!

Somehow, that whole day had been strange from the very beginning. Not only did everybody wake up around four a.m. and decide to stay up, but when Jodi made peanut-butter cookies, it actually made seventeen dozen, just like the recipe predicted. Nobody knew quite what to do with all those cookies.
"I predict," Victoria said as she bagged cookies and piled the bags into the freezer. "That we will all be entirely sick of peanut-butter cookies by the time this supply runs out."
But even that wasn't the strangest thing that happened that day. One of the cats that had always been regarded as a boy had twelve kittens, much to the shock and dismay of the entire family. Victoria's favorite dog had strange prolonged sneezing fits all day, and the cows went on a food strike.
"The next thing that's going to happen is a visit from Abraham Lincoln." Jacob said darkly, hanging up the phone after a conversation with the local vet. "I can't find a single reasonable explanation for why those cows won't eat. They have to be the healthiest cows for miles."
But the next strange thing that happened wasn't a visit from Abraham Lincoln. The next strange thing came in the form of an innocent letter.
"Anything good in the mail?" Vic asked Jodi. Jodi closed the kitchen door and tossed the stack of mail onto the table.
"No," she said. "Only a few magazines and stuff from the bank and other things."
"Mom's upstairs doing laundry; bring it to her." Victoria said, going to the kitchen counter and beginning supper preparations. Jodi scooped up the mail and left the kitchen. A few minutes later, though, she was back.
"Mom is acting really strange!" Jodi whispered to Victoria in excitement. "I handed Mom the mail and she started opening up the letters. When she got to one letter, she said, "Oh, goodness.", and went down to the basement to talk to Dad. Take my word for it, something's up."
"You girls are all so silly," Jacob scoffed from the sink where he was washing up for supper. "It was probably a bill or something."
"A bill that made Mom say "Oh, goodness," and go find Dad?" Jodi replied.
"Maybe it was a really high bill," Jacob suggested, shrugging and wondering what on earth he was going to do with his cows.
"When we get a really high bill Mom says "Good grief! How will we ever pay this?" not "Oh, goodness," Victoria told him. "I agree with Jodi. Something is going on."
"Well great," Jacob said. "But I really don't have time to sit around talking about a letter. Vic, come out with me after supper and let's try to get those cows to eat just one more time."
"They probably have some kind of deadly disease," Peter said cheerfully, skipping into the kitchen and casting admiring glances at the sandwiches Victoria was fixing. "I expect they will all die."
"Most likely," Robert agreed, following him in. "Do you think they got struck by lightning in the storm last night and their brains got so fried they can't think enough to eat?"

"I told you something was going on!" Jodi crowed triumphantly, scrambling into Jacob's room as he and Vic sat talking after yet another unsuccessful attempt to get the cows to eat. "I told you!"
"What's happened? Did Mom tell you something?" Victoria asked while Jacob looked hardly convinced.
"Nobody told me anything," Jodi answered. "But I went down to the basement to put away my winter clothes in the laundry, and there were Mom and Dad all holed up in Dad's little office, talking away as seriously as could be. And when they saw me, what did they do but close the door! Now, isn't that something?"
"That really is something." Victoria began to get as excited as Jodi was. "Last time Mom and Dad did that was before they told us the twins were on the way!"
"You don't think..." Jacob and Jodi began together, but they both abandoned the idea as entirely ridiculous without finishing their sentences.

"This is crazy!" Victoria paced the porch, pausing only to help Jewel down the steps. "Jodi, this is the third night Mom and Dad have spent in the office!"
"I told you something was going on." Jodi answered.
"Please, don't start that again." Jacob said, shifting positions on the porch swing. "And by the way, my cows finally started eating."
"That is hardly a matter of importance," Victoria told him. "Jacob, aren't you worried yet?" As Jacob rarely, if ever, got worried, he could not give the answer his sisters wanted to hear.
"Look, girls, I just say that if Mom and Dad want us to know what is going on, they'll tell us, all right? Why do we have to get ourselves all worked up over this?"
"How can you not get worked up?" Jodi demanded. "Victoria, you try to talk some sense into him." Jodi departed, leaving Jacob laughing and Victoria looking frustrated.
"Something's going on," Jodi whispered into the fur of one of the new kittens. "I wonder. I wonder..."

A Word Of Wisdom

All that is gold does not glitter; not all those that wander are lost. ~J. R. R. Tolkien