A glimpse into what it is like to live in your home just this moment.
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| photo cred: Mrs. Miller (thank you!) |
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| photo timehop from Katie! |
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| selfie cred: Grey |
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| found on my poetry magnets - lol, we are all feeling this in the last few weeks of school. |
Intentional Outdoor Hours: 128+ hours (of 1000)
Some sunshine and warm this week but also a couple chilly and windy days too. I'm definitely ready for some consistent sunshine! The plants don't seem to mind the weather changes though - my lilac bush out front is blooming more than she ever has! It smells so good and I pulled each kid individually out of the house to come get a big sniff one afternoon.
Reading The Neurodiverse Classroom by Victoria Honeybourne for my professional development book club and Crying in H Mart by Michelle Zauner for my friend book club.
Listening to I Who Have Never Known Men by Jacqueline Harpman for my teacher book club!
Mother's Day at the soccer fields and honestly no other place I'd rather be than watching the kids doing what they love. I actually dislike the pressure for Mother's day to be a big thing because it just stresses me out getting out of my routine. Like, I can lay in this bed and wait for everyone to make me breakfast (which is a mess and I hate laying in bed that long) or I can get up and have my coffee quietly in the house while everyone I love is sleeping soundly under my roof - which is my literal favorite moment of every day! So, getting up and moving is my preferred holiday - HAH. We had a pizza picnic in a parking lot, I spent time in the sunshine, and everyone let me listen to my music on the car rides (hah)!
Thankful Grey and Pappy spent the day on the creek together with Bryce and Reed on Mother's day as it was a tough without Gigi here this year. (thank you Becky & Dan for letting the boys go with them!)
Whew! We are feeling that home stretch exhaustion of mid-May. It's giving wheels-falling-off-the-wagon-but-still-full-speed-ahead vibes. We are in the stage of trying to remember all the things every morning. Violet participated with the MS band to provide music at breakfast! Olive had snack day this week, Grey and Gem had participation forms for SHOFCO soccer tourney due this week, permission slips for upcoming field trips, and early dismiss forms for Finals week. I just keep shoving things into my planner and crossing my fingers that I don't forget anything!?
So impressed by Grey's embroidery project he did for his art class. Most of his pieces of work this year for Art has been some sort of fish (hah, two paintings and one sketch all of trout!) and his embroidery project was a fish too and he did actually amazing on it. It took him almost four weeks to finish it in class. His teacher, Mrs. Spangler was so encouraging and even let him keep the embroidery hoop and stitched a back to it so we can hang it up in the house (thank you Mrs. Spangler for supporting him!) #notjustajock !
Happy for field trips: Rusty's 2nd grade went to visit the Compass Inn Museum. They had a day full of crazy rain so they didn't get to see the blacksmith area, but he made a cool tin-punched craft and had a great time. (thank you for organizing PTA!) Reddy and the preschool 4 room went up to the elementary school to make a visit - they even got to eat lunch there! (thank you for all you do St David's Learning Place!) And Grey and the baseball team went to the PITT vs. Penn State baseball game at PNC Park in Pittsburgh! (thank you for organizing Baseball Boosters!)
Haircuts for the fellas with Lamont! And thank goodness because they all needed it too! (we love you Mont!)
State Algebra test for Grey this week. The Keystone tests for high school students are a Pass&Never Again standardized test. Grey took the 2-day test this week and despite feeling like he had applesauce brain afterwards, he thinks he did well enough to pass (fingers crossed!)
Turkey hunting for Grey, B, and Pappy on Saturday morning. No luck but then Grey set up some turkey hunting for Red and Olive at our house later that afternoon with our turkey decoy and the Orbeez gun. We were all cracking up and Reddy and Livy ate it up with some over the top acting.
Cooking out with Pappy on Saturday at our house. He loaded up all the dirtbike / 4 wheelers he could fit in his truck and the kids were so happy to run them all over the yard all day long. He, B, and Grey worked on making smash burgers on the Blackstone and just spending the day together as we were about to cross the one year mark of missing Gigi. (May is rough - Mother's Day, the anniversary of her passing, and her birthday all in the same month. Grateful to all our friends and family who squeezed in tighter around us to make sure we were all doing okay. xxo)
The genocide in Gaza is heartbreaking and most days I am overwhelmed with heartache and hopelessness. I feel insignificant to make any impact; I refuse to look away though, so I continue to engage with social media in a way that I think brings awareness. I contact my representatives and I try to love my family in a way that will make for a generation of people who care and empathize and live with compassion.
Teaching family member vocab in the elementary and using the Madrigal family from the movie Encanto as the example of the family so that we can finish the year out with watching the movie! 8th grade expo classes did week 2 learning about corre, camina, and doing some writing. Spanish 1 read chapters 1-8 of Tumba in pd 7 and only chapters 1-4 in pd 8 because of statie testing. Same for teaching only 2 days for Spanish 2 because of Keystone state testing; they read chapters 4 & 5 of Robo en la Noche. I met with Riley this week too for our third in-person meeting. She is so close to the end of the school year and I am so thankful that my former students have her! We had a great chat about school and life (she got engaged!!) Our next meeting will be in the summer to do some curricular mapping for the next school year.
Sporting with some changes since the rain washed away a day of games! But we had two U5 AYSO games for Red & Olive and Coach Mom. Rusty and Asst Coach Mom had two U10 AYSO games. Violet had one Sparks practice, one Sparks game, and two U12 AYSO soccer games. Gemma played twice with her Gators team and two 14U AYSO soccer games. Grey had one Varsity baseball practice, two Varsity baseball games, and went to PNC Park with his team to see the PITT vs Penn State baseball game in Pittsburgh. I had to reschedule some U5 soccer games and I got Rusty and Violet registered for football and cheer for the fall!
Making classic hot dogs and shells & cheese, sheet pan kielbasa and veggie bake with parm pasta, chicken, veggies, and biscuit casserole, pork tenderloin and gravy over noodles, sheet pan chicken fajitas, smash burgers on the Blackstone and corn on the cob for a cookout with Pappy at our house in honor of 1 year of missing Gigi. Before I put Celebrina (the sourdough starter) back into the fridge, I made sourdough chocolate chip scones and a sourdough loaf. On Saturday, I made brownies with peanut butter icing for our cookout on Saturday (these always remind me of Gigi).
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