Around Here Week 15: 04/07-13

 A glimpse into what it is like to be in our family just this moment.

photo cred: Abba

selfie cred: Miss Baylee

when you forget a fork for lunch, hah.

photo cred Vi 

Intentional Outdoor Hours: 33+ hours (of 1000)
Finding ways to get outside even while Spring tries to figure her life out. One day will be freezing rain, next day beautiful, gorgeous sunshine, next day high winds...we are just trying to roll with it but very hopeful for warmer weather and longer days in our near future because my friends, the blooms are beginning to be blooming! 

Reading High Achiever by Tiffany Jenkins and The Body by Bill Bryson

Listening on my commute: Wrong Place, Wrong Time by Gillian McAllistor and finished it this week. I really enjoyed it: good story (interesting twist on time loops and I liked the narrator's voice) Thank you Elena for the suggestion!

Fishmas Day2! Grey got to spend the day at fishing camp with his twin brothas from another motha - Bryce & Reed. It is literally the most-looked-forward-to day of the year for him. The boys slept over on Saturday night and then they (and B and Rusty) headed out early on Sunday to spend the whole day with wet lines. 

Eclipsin'. Rusty and Violet got dismissed early with Chum and Abba (thank you) while the big kids, B, and I all watched the eclipse from school. My 9th period and I went out together and the kids were pretty excited about it and seeing it through the glasses. We had about 95% coverage here in Western PA - so it was actually pretty cool; it got weirdly dark in the middle of the day (almost like maybe there was a really big storm coming, but you could tell the color of air was off somehow. Our good friends drove up to Erie, PA which was along the path of totality and they said it was incredible. Nature is the coolest!! 

Celebrating our 14 year old. Time is actually unreal. Not only has Grey really transformed in a visual way this past year (it's like a 1 year old to a 2 year old - such a huge visual transformation! That is what 13yrs to 14 yrs has been), but he is also so much more mature in thoughts and actions. Don't get me wrong, still a huge pain in the butt teenager (hah, he would agree with that statement), but the conversations we have, the compromises he is willing to make, the way he has stepped up in certain scenarios. I am just so proud of the man he is well on his way to becoming. You're doing good, Booboo. Better than good. thankyou, loveyou, forever and ever.

Laughing about how our kids can hardly ever all agree on what they want to watch on our one tv in the house at this stage (Grey: Impractical Jokers, Gemma: Glee, Violet: Youtube channel about a snake sanctuary, Rust: any Marvel movie, Red: Miniforce Super Dino Power, Olive: Blippi) but they ALL will agree to watch AlienTV on Netflix which is literally the most ridiculous show with NO WORDS just strange alien sounds and weird scenarios. But they all can agree on it. Unreal. 

Scrubbing baseball pants. It's Fels-Naptha scrubbing season my fellow baseball mommas! sending love to you as you also are hunched over a sink somewhere soaking and scrubbing multiple times a week. bless you all. 

Shopping for dress clothes with Grey. He and I went to the mall to pick out his semi-formal clothes and it was a dizzying experience when we walked past a mother and her five year old son holding hands...and there I was with my 14 year old towering over me trying to tell me that his date's dress is just lavender and I'm not making any sense asking questions like purple-lavender or silver-lavender? (for the record there is a difference, thank you very much). We picked out everything he needed and I felt relieved to have that done and checked off the list, but most of all for this boy who no matter how much bigger and stronger than me he gets will always be my baby boy! 

StuMoo cousin monthly dinner. Kev & Uch brought pizza and the kids ran around crazy and everyone hugged Uchie's belly in the last week of pregnancy and life was good. 

Switching up bedrooms and thank goodness for big kids because I had plum run out of steam by 8p on Saturday night when the kids decided to try out the boys' bunk bed in the playroom (aka Grey wants his own room). Rusty agreed, so Grey and Gem got to work and played furniture Tetris upstairs while I 'white hatted' the situation and by the end of the it all - every kid was pleased and not fighting. So even if not a permanent situation, everyone is happy for now - so okay, whatever.

PCT Update for Kitty and Bryan: 250 miles! Poor Kitty got some booboos this week (busted her knee and her finger up) and then she and Bryan both powered through a bout of food poisoning (?!) They are freaking champions! We are loving her weekly video posts on Instagram (you really should be following her! @kankla ). These memories she is making and these obstacles she is overcoming are so profound. I am just so proud of my baby sis. (excuse me, crying forever). 

Teaching the last bit of Castells de Tarragona with the cup building challenge. All the students have been massively engaged. I have two classes in the school that made it to 15 cups high! Then I got the next cycle of classes and we learned about fútbol (aka soccer). Spanish Expo learned about El Encierro de San Fermin (Somos Unit 2). Spanish 1 got new vocab for Unit 5A and started reading Brandon Brown Quiere un Perro (chapters 1-4). Spanish 2 got off to a late start because of our Eclipse viewing party, then I had students early dismissed for baseball, musical, FBLA, and track?! So I had like 4 kids in my class that day. hah. We did finally get back on track and got vocab for unit 5A and started The 33 movie. 

Sporting with soccer season in full swing this week! I coached Reddy and his fellow 4U AYSO soccer players (a hilarious, exhausting 35 minutes!) and Rusty & Violet had their first 10U AYSO soccer practice (we bumped Rust up to condense our team affiliations, hah! but he can hang with the 9 and 10 years olds at 7 years old - so it's good).  Gemma had 2 AYSO soccer practices and Vi had 1 Sparks practice and their first Sparks game in Scottsdale on Sunday. Grey had 2 baseball games this week, 2 baseball practices, and an AAU 14U basketball tournament with his Chaos team in Monroeville. Coach Daddy and the varsity football team got together on Tuesday evening to go as a team to the funeral home for a teammate who lost his Dad. (thankful for a husband who is a coach dedicated to raising good and decent men. love you, babe.)

Making egg roll in a bow, ordered in wings & burgers for Grey's birthday at his request, candied kielbasa and haluski, spaghetti, crockpot round roast, take out pizza,  For weekend breakfast, I made another loaf of banana bread. I'm still Keto'ing and it's going strong; I'm energized, full, and clear headed (yay!)