Around Here Week 8: 02/22-28

 A glimpse into what it feels like to live in our home just this moment. 

photo cred: Uch

photo cred: CT Media class

photo cred: Kelly D (thank you!)

photo cred: Abba

photo cred: Daily American 

photo cred: Michael O'Ship

photo cred: Michael O'Ship

photo cred: Michael O'Ship

Intentional Outdoor Hours: 12+ hours (of 1000)
The weather is so flippy floppy - we had snow and ice (enough to get a FID this week!?) and then by Saturday, it was absolutely gorgeous and the kids were outside riding dirt bikes and in barefeet. These little hits of sunshine and warm are starting to not cut it...I need real spring to arrive. I am just so over the cold! 

Reading The Johnstown Flood by David McCullough and rereading Remarkably Bright Creatures by Shelby Van Pelt. We had our Lit Ladies book club meeting (thank you for hosting Jacinda!) and we got to chat about our last two books. It is always so nice to catch up and talk books with friends! I updated the POTF Reading club group page on facebook. 

Scheduling the cats for a vet appt. The gasp I gasped when I saw a neighborhood facebook post that featured a Ring camera photo of our cat Blaze. The neighbors were asking if anyone knew who owned this chatty but sweet cat. Good grief?! How do we have 14 acres and surrounded by woods and our cats are down exploring the neighborhood!? The neighbors have been so sweet about him (I messaged everyone) and they said they actually enjoy his visits- honestly, how lucky we are to be surrounded by sweet people! Regardless, I got them scheduled for a visit and future neuter appointment to try to keep them closer to home. They are most likely out there looking for girlfriends, and nobody needs that! 

Re-stocking the freezer with an order from Fisher's Country store! We stocked up on ground beef and bacon. Brandon always likes to sneak in a completely random item too and this time it was 25lbs (?!) of mini hershey kisses. I mean, what the actual heck? They just come loose and unwrapped in a giant box. I will use them in place of chocolate chips (also we are just literally eating them by the handful too). 

Smiling about the girls working together (although it is turning out to be an enormous mess). Gemma cut up a bunch of shirts and sweatshirts that she has to patchwork a spirit crewneck but enlisted Violet and her sewing machine to help. The two of them are working side by side sewing piece by piece but it looks like an explosion in the dining room. Rule 5 of raising kids: let the messes happen - someday your house will be clean, today is not that day though. 

Time with family and friends: Olive got a day home from school and spent it with Abba and Chum (thank you!), Rusty had some play time with his friend Abe who got off the bus with us to go to baseball practice, Violet had sewing class with Kuma, and I stopped to visit my nephew fellas after book club to get in some tickling and huggies. I took all the kids to visit at Abba and Chum's house on Saturday where we hung out and the kids played badminton in the front yard (their favorite!) 

Teaching only four days because we got another FID this week and multiple 2hr delay starts!? (Please winter, go away). The elementary school is still watching Pachamama this week and I got a new batch of eighth graders for my Spanish Expo class. Spanish 1 started the Super 7 irregular verbs conjugation week including Personal Interviews with questions and videos with a partner. Spanish 2 did a quick review on verb conjugation (present, regular AR, ER, IR and super 7) then we took a dive into Stem-changing verbs! I took in five cereal boxes (and some kids brought their own) to start their Verb-o's cereal box projects! 

Sporting Reddy had one coach pitch baseball practice, Rusty had two minors baseball practices. Violet had one Sparks soccer practice and Gemma had one semifinals Gators indoor soccer game. Grey had four basketball practices, two team dinners, and a District championship game vs. McConnellsburg at UPJ. Brandon and Violet supported four of our football players at the weight lifting competition at Ligonier on Saturday (good job football players!) We participated in the bus send off for the district playoff game (lining the parking lot, honking and flashing lights as the basketball team bus left for the game). Brandon had a football coaches meeting too. I had a lot of paperwork to finish up for sports - we RSVPed to the basketball banquet, made a basketball hype video for the championship game, I submitted our donation for the coaches' gifts, we turned in our youth baseball fundraiser money, finalized the big kids' paperwork for spring sports, and I got my 6u AYSO soccer team roster this week. 

Making instagram chicken  with parm & pea pasta, slow cooker shredded beef and cheddar sammies, beef vegetable soup (with the leftovers from the sandwiches), copycat Olive Garden chicken pasta, meatball sub sammies, crispy shrimp alfredo pasta. For breakfasts we had pancakes and bacon on the 2hr delay day and on the snow day, I made mini zucchini bread loaves. For desserts I made rice krispie treats for book club

Around Here Week 7: 02/15-21

 A glimpse into what it is like to live in our home just this moment. 

photo cred: CTES

photo cred: Tribune Democrat

photo cred: Michael O'Ship

photo cred: Michael O'Ship

photo cred: Michael O'Ship (the student section after Eric's dunk!)

photo cred: Becky C

Intentional Outdoor Hours: 9+ hours (of 1000)
I played lots of catch for baseball this week with Reddy and Rusty and Olive and I did a little fake ice skating routines on the blacktop when the snow all melted away  - yay! We could see grass and our solar panels are fully generating energy again! 

Reading and finishing This Tender Land by William Ken Krueger. I really enjoyed it and was another confirmation that Historical Fiction is my favorite genre. I tried to continue reading The Wind Up Bird Chronicle, but my heart is just not in it. I might DNF because it's so huge (600+ pages!) and there are just so many other books that I want to read! 

Slowly putting the house back together after the multiple reno projects last week (new carpet upstairs, new wall and bedroom installed in the living room). We moved a dresser into the boys room and I got it all cleaned out and reorganizing for Reddy. I returned most of the things that we had stored in the bathroom back to where they go (but still will slowly be returning things or donating!)

Finishing the new wall in the living room. We made it an accent wall and it looks so cozy - we love it! Everyone helped a little bit between painting it dark brown first (in case any of the wall was visible behind the woods), the installing the wood pieces, to hanging up the shelves and adding the plants back into the room. On the girls' side, Pappy and Brandon got everything mudded on the drywall and now we wait for it to dry. 

Double special day for Lunar New Year and Mardi Gras which landed on the same day this year! I made Asian-style dinner (chicken over teriyaki noodles with roasted broccoli) and for dessert we had Kings cake (made quick from tube cinnamon rolls!) with six babies in it so that each kid got a baby in their piece! 

Cheering for Violet when she found out that she made the Math24 team to compete later this spring. She was the only girl to make the team and she was proud of her hard work at practice. This chick - she is determined to do all the things and win all the things. (she also had reading competition practice this week too!) Lord help me! 

Celebrating our fourteen year old: Gemma Rose! She is going to wait until the summer to have her party - but my girl is still happy because fourteen also means social media in our family (if you've deemed yourself trustworthy of it and was able to handle a phone without social media for a year). She did great - so she was allowed to get Snapchat and instagram (after a lot of conversations about appropriate posting & commenting, and friend requests, DMs, etc. I have no filter which always makes Brandon laugh - but I just tell the kids how it is in the most blunt way possible. It is common knowledge around here with our teens (and their friends even who have recited this back to me before!) "if someone sends you a picture of some part of their naked body - delete it immediately. If you really deserved to see it, you'd be seeing it in person!" 

Wishing a very happy SIX SEVEN !!!! to Pappy on his 67th birthday! Pappy spent most of the day at our house helping finish up the living room wall (LOL, such a pappy kind of birthday!) We sang over cinnamon rolls and gave him lots of hugs! 

Time with friends and family. Reddy got an afternoon with Pappy since he was home sick (thank you Pap!) Violet was so happy and proud to have Cohen (a Senior football player) help Coach Daddy at her last basketball game (thank you for coming Cohen - you made her day!) Gemma went to her friend Elle's birthday party and she got a facial at Swanky Aesthetics too! Grey got to celebrate his besties' birthday (the Conn twins turned 16!) at their sleepover party

Teaching only four days this week because we were off for Presidents' Day! My elementary school students continued watching Pachamama and my Spanish Expo students worked on their final week of expo learning the classroom supplies vocab list. Spanish 1 finished their Verb conjugation unit and took the big test (they did so well!) Spanish 2 learned about stem-changing verbs and practiced using Direct Object Pronouns. We are really in the thick of the school year where everyone is starting to have a little cabin fever - the end is still too far away to see and we are all absolutely tired of the winter. We just have to dig our heels in and push through! We got this! 

Sporting with a little more of a taste of spring sports. Reddy had a coach pitch baseball practice, Rusty had a minor baseball practice. Violet had a Sparks soccer practice and her last basketball game. Gemma had an indoor soccer game with her Gators team and a softball open gym. Grey had one baseball pitching practice, a baseball open gym, four basketball practices, and the district playoff basketball game! He also had a sports massage with Miss Emma too! 

Making meatloaf with roasted potatoes and carrots, teriyaki noodles with roasted broccoli and shredded chicken (a family favorite and so insanely simple), crockpot chicken taquitos, hot sausage sammies with sweet peppers, texas toast mini pizzas. To celebrate Mardi Gras, I made Kings Cake (with canned cinnamon rolls and sugar sprinkles!) and hid tiny babies inside for all the kids to find. For Gemma's birthday, she picked strawberry crinkle cake mix cookies and for Pappy's birthday I made homemade cinnamon rolls and cream cheese icing.