June 23

Dad was in Iowa for another week, leaving shortly after cake on Sunday afternoon.
And it was a week of Vacation Bible School for Frances and Linnea. Linnea was in her final year. Frances and Creole were assisting with games for all grade-levels.
After running errands that morning, Mom, Collette, Carrie-Bri, and the Puck returned just in time for lunch. Wally had spent the night with Joe, and Rose had spent the night with Lolli. Once the girls had returned and Curly joined the party, the girls took off shopping with Carrie and the boys went to check out the Bugatti dealership. And while Collette worked with Frances on his math, Mom oversaw Linnea’s and Puck’s pool party in the backyard. Summer days generally seemed to follow this pattern.
Suddenly, Frances said loudly out of the blue:
“Carrie! Suck in that gut!”
Carrie’s jaw dropped in astonishment.
“Frances!” Collette exclaimed.
Then Frances understood.
“Oh no! I mean… you were just standing there, and it was sticking out a little…”
“I’m never going to eat again!” Carrie cried.
A little while later, Frances tried to rectify his error.
“I’m sorry, Carrie,” he said seriously. “It’s just that it was hanging out a little…”
“Frances!”
That evening, Sunrise brought over her collection of desert pictures from her two weeks in Arizona. Being an observant person, she was able to share information about the various plants and cacti, (i.e. saguaro cacti are about 100 years old before they begin to grow arms, only Native Americans are allowed to pick the fruit from the saguaro cacti…).
Awhile after she had left, some of the Joe Gang came over, including Curly and Rose, who were already arguing about something when they arrived.