Around Here Week 17: 04/21-04/27

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

Intentional Outdoor Hours:  71+ hours (of 1000)
Up 12 hours this week because spring has finally sprung - truly! We earn quite a bit of hours at spring sporting events alone - but we were able to snag some more hours with Easter egg hunts too. I have a goal to spend at least 1 hour a day outside currently and I'm getting at least that 5 out of 7 days a week between our activities and the weather.

Reading and finishing The Feeding and Care of Ravenously Hungry Girls by Anissa Grey. I wasn't a huge fan of the writing style in this book but it was still an interesting and worthwhile read. The Easter Bunny brought me the next Books & Brews book club choice which is Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal and he also gifted me with Ikigai: The Japenese Secret to a Long and Happy Life by Hector Garcia and Francesc Miralles which I became intrigued by after seeing the image below on Instagram. (I think I am currently in the "satisfaction but feeling of uselessness" category between What I love, What I'm good at, and What I can be paid for - which is maybe how all public school teachers feel when there are so many things we need to be for our students; it can feel like any good I'm doing is such a drop in the bucket for some of the issues and obstacles that my students face in their own lives and in the world today. I try to remain focused and steadfast on the tiny, shining moments that are so bright and beautiful and keeps all teachers going again for another day, but it can be overwhelming some days too. Good thing I love my job all the way down in my bones, man. it ain't for the faint of heart).

Celebrating Easter! The Easter bunny found us and brought the kids candy, books, and those odd surprise balls that are cool these days. We went to church (Grey served) and then spend the afternoon with our Studer cousins at Mimi's house for brunch. We got to spend some time with Gigi and Pappy afterwards at their house before heading back home with full bellies of too much chocolate easter bunnies. hah!

Moving the baby chicks out to the coop. We are officially free of live chickens in our dining room again! The weather has been nice enough consistently and the girls have started to grow in their real feathers - so we kicked 'em to the coop! The big chickens are keeping them in line and we have the lamp secured for some of the cooler nights, but they seem to be adjusting just fine so far. They are definitely loving the free range life pecking around all day in the grass!

Getting the most incredible news on Thursday in the form of a CLEAR SCAN for our Gigi. After almost 10 months of battling Pancreatic Cancer, our Gigi gave us the best news after her appointment. Omigosh, we were all in tears and shouting with joy. What an incredible gift and how proud we are of here for fighting so hard. Thank you all for your prayers, kindness, and support through this. We are so deeply blessed and grateful.

SCF happy hour'ing with my sisters at our house for this month. Kitty brought sushi (yummiest!) and Brandon kept the kids corralled so that we could laugh and talk and catch up with a few kiddo kitchen dance parties and tickle fests sprinkled throughout.

Spring Sporting with the last week of soccer practices before games begin next week. We also had soccerfest at the elementary school on Saturday complete with team photos, a bouncy house, concessions, and face painting. Grey and B had two baseball games this week - one at home and one at CV

Teaching the mini unit before Brandon Brown Quiere un Perro which includes learning how to merengue! The kids really impressed me with how well they did after they got over their initial fear of boy/girl partnering up (hah). Spanish 1 Honors is in the final stage of their (longest ever) food unit and started working on their menu projects. Spanish 2 learned about El Cucuy and impressed me (and themselves). Spanish 2 Honors watched two films this week to prepare for their last novel Esperanza. They watched Living on $1 a day and Which Way Home - I realized last minute that next week is Screen Free Week and had to squeeze them both in - thank goodness for movie guides! Spanish 3 Honors began the fable El Que Se Enoja, Pierde from Martina Bex. Whew, the end of the school year is in sight now (I even updated the hallway bulletin board calendar to show our last month's activities!) and my desk is proof of the last sprint madness.

Making cheesy potatoes and contributing 4 dozen eggs for our Easter brunch at Mimi's house (thanks chickies!) We made ham pot pie with leftover Easter  ham, and had a leftover/fridge clean out dinner. We were surprised with two meals from our family this week - tacos from Gigi and Pap and taco pasta and apple dump bake from Heather. Kitty brought sushi to SCF happy hour (yummiest!) and We received a Misfit Market fruit/veggie delivery (thank you AGAIN Heather!) and was shocked to see how much delicious produce we got in it. I made the most soul healing/rejuvenating potato and leek soup from our delivery with a side of three ingredient cheddar beer bread.

Around Here Week 16: 04/14-04/20

A peek into what it is like to live in our home just this minute:

Intentional Outdoor Hours:  59+ hours (of 1000)
Up about 11 hours this week thanks to spring weather and the our time at the fields for spring sports. We were so lucky to have a gorgeous evening on Thursday night and we stayed out way past our bedtimes around the fire.

Reading The Feeding and Care of Ravenously Hungry Girls by Anissa Gray and There's No Such Thing as Bad Weather by Linda Akeson McGurk....still.

Marveling at our bean seeds growing! The kids each planted a few bean seeds in a bag at Reading Night the other week and basically to humor them, we put in a few tablespoons of water and left them on the counter. To our shock and awe - these bean plants are growing, and incredibly fast. Brandon transplanted them to a tupperware dish and we swear they are growing an inch a day! We don't even know what kind of beans they are (I fear they might be beanstalks to giants in the sky plants! LOL) but whatever they are; we are about to have plenty of them!

Receiving my 2017-18 family yearbook from Shutterfly! Eeeeeeee, it makes me so happy. It takes me almost a whole year to finish it but each time I receive the final product of my labor of love, it gives me enough energy to do it again for the next year - hahhaa. it's therapeutic, I swear.

Hosting two sleepovers at our house! First Sophia and Gemma talked their mommas into an impromptu sleepover when the Fiores were visiting for the afternoon on early dismissal day and then cousin Caleb slept over our house on Friday night! It is always somehow easier when we have extra kids in the house because there are less sibling fights. I don't know how it works but #bigfamprobs

Having a college friends dinner and playdate at our house with Brandon's W&J roommates plus all.the.kiddos. We had pizza and desserts and spent most of the night chasing kids around and trying to squeeze in life updates between kids asking us for another snack.

Feeling grateful to all the good men in our life who showed up bright and early on youth turkey day to mentor our Greyson Rudy. They didn't have success but to see him surrounded by so many dudes who were excited for him and ready to teach him made me so grateful and proud.

Enjoying our Adams family at Easter dinner on Saturday. We had a delicious meal, and egg hunt, and finished the night off with some Just Dance on Youtube. We lucked out with a beautifully sunny day so we spent most of the time after dinner sitting on the deck and catching up with family that came in from all over (Montana, Chicago, Pittsburgh). The kids are always so happy to have so many people willing to play with them endlessly on holidays (hah).

Spring Sporting with baseball games and soccer practices. Grey has been doing well pitching and/or playing short stop in his games. I was able to finish my concession stand duty at his game this week and put that check in the box (good thing because we have a lot of overlap coming up between soccer and baseball games!) My little U5 soccer team makes me laugh every practice with their hugging and cheering each other on. Gem is really starting to understand the rules now between defense and offense. Soccer games won't start until the last week of April/first week of May - but we are just about ready!

Teaching about los castells de Tarragona in Spanish 1 and building cup towers. Spanish 1 Honors learned about the Mexican street food favorite: el elote and the Mexican Easter tradition of cascarones. Spanish 2 took a quiz on Spanish animal vocab and we played the Taco vocab game from The Engaged Spanish Classroom (tpt). Spanish 2 Honors learned about Las Madres de la Plaza de Mayo and did some research about the desaparecidos of la Guerra Sucia. And Spanish 3 Honors worked on their rough and final drafts of their Robo en la Noche final papers and I was so proud! On Thursday for our early dismissal day, the gym teachers hosted a Nitro ball and pickle ball tournament. It was a fun day and a great way to boost school morale heading into these last few weeks of school - we have only 26 more days!

Making strombolis (thank you student fundraiser!), frozen pizzas, hot dogs and cheddar brats over the fire, egg sausage casserole, and chocolate chip cookies & ordering in pizza for our college friend get together.

Around Here Week 15: 04/07-13

A look into what it is like to live in our home just this minute.

The Mighty Muffins!

Intentional Outdoor Hours: 48+ hours (of 1000)
Up 14 hours this week with some beautiful spring weather. Sports practices and games are leading up the hours for outdoor time after school, but we had a absolutely perfect Saturday morning that the little kids and I spent on the porch reading, coloring, and riding scooters. The boys were at fishing camp for the first day of trout before they had to come home and we all headed to the baseball game.

Reading the same books still (good grief!) and ordering our next book club book Erotic Stories for Punjabi Widows by Balli Kaur Jaswal and signing up to participate in the Summer Book Club with Book Love Foundation for teachers. My friend Renee (also our school's eleventh grade English teacher) introduced me to the opportunity and my books and swag have already arrived. I have to hide them from myself though so I can read along with the schedule and fully participate in the book discussions this summer. SO EXCITED!

Introducing the chickies to our big chickens with little success - hah. they mostly ignored each other and the chickies were just so excited to have more space to explore. We still have about two weeks before they can officially move to the coop, but they are loving the occasional outdoor adventures.

Celebrating our nine year old! Our booboo is nine years old and it came and went with just a little bit celebration because baseball season/fishing season is so crazy (hah). We sang at fishing camp the weekend right before and had cupcakes, then he played up in a baseball game on his actual birthday and had a big crowd of extended family cheering for him. We got baseball iced donuts to share with his team at their game on Wednesday and B had lunch with him and his friends at school. He got a shotgun from Gigi and Pappy (for turkey and pheasant hunting) and a kayak for fishing on the Quemahoming from Abba and Chum! #outdoorkid  We will have an actual birthday in a few weeks when it warms up (and slows down). He wants to have a sleepover at fishing camp (shocking! lol). He's nine and, truthfully, making me nuts. Every few years I have to pull out my It's a Boy parenting book and my 25 rules for moms with sons post to remind myself I'm not insane. Raising young men is not for the faint of heart. I love this wild kid, but good grief we are like bulls fighting horn to horn these days. I know we'll get through this, but it's hard to know what's a battle to have and what's a battle to let go (for both of us) right now.

Registering the two big kids for fall sports (already!) Grey will be playing minors tackle football again and B is the head coach and Gem will be cheering flag footbal and I'm the coach again. Did I mention that B is also the VP of the football board. #heliumhands

Visiting the big kids' school on Reading night. Our PTA does an incredible job of decorating the whole school (this year's theme was Enchanted Forest and the kids were on the hunt for hidden gnomes!). Each classroom had a theme - our favorite was planting beans! - there is a book fair in the gym and our local animal man put on a show including his alligator that had all the kids in awe.

Opting out of standardized testing for my third grader after a lot of research, impassioned conversations, and reflection. I love our school and our teachers and our kids so intensely. And even if I'm just a drop in the bucket; I just could not.

So thankful and proud of our Gigi who got to ring the bell this past week! I spent most of Friday in grateful tears that she got to celebrate this incredible milestone. She is truly a warrior. Thank you all for your continued prayers and good wishes. We have a big scan coming up later this month - please keep her in your hearts.

Volunteering at our church's fish fry for the last time this Lenten season. The kids helped clear tables and even got to do some serving of drinks and rolls/coleslaw this time!

Looking at the calendar and realizing I need to remind the Easter bunny that his big day is coming fast. Ahem, as is always the case, thank you Amazon prime.

Spring sporting with more soccer practice for Violet and Gemma. My little U5 time has a bakery for the sponsor so we call ourselves the Mighty Muffins (#cutest thing on the planet) and there is so much hugging! I've started calling our huddles = huggles because the girls get in so tight and squeezed up. Oh gosh, I'm having a blast with those kiddos. Grey started games this week. He pitched on Tuesday and played short stop on Saturday. They are 1-1 so far and had such an awesome game on Saturday even if it was a loss by one point. Our pitcher had a moment on a mound that he was really getting down, and our whole in field huddled around him and got his spirits back up. It was awesome to see. #sportsaremorethansports Also, our baseball coach is so handsome and makes me proud every game, but that's a longer post for another day ;)

Teaching and practicing horizontal conjugations with Spanish 1 and finishing out Somos Unit 6. Spanish 1 Honors got a new group of food verbs and did some free writing about breakfast and lunch choices. They had a fiesta food day on Friday! Spanish 2 worked on animal vocab and started Somos Unit 9. They did an awesome job of completing a Mad Lib version of a story with target structures with a partner and then translating it all into English. I was so proud of their hard work and collaboration (especially as they have been my most trying class period all year). Spanish 2 Honors worked all week on their final novel projects of retelling the novel through their choice of format. Many of the groups chose to make a movie trailer and through our mini conferences this week, I can hardly wait to see them. Spanish 3 Honors celebrated their finishing of Robo en la Noche with watching the movie Rio.  The final few weeks of the year are all mapped out and we are jammed in tight up through the end! All classes have one more book to read before the end of the year (!!) and lots of fun end-of-year activities! yeesh, I'm starting to sweat a bit with only 30 more days to go!

Making chicken and gravy over mashed potatoes for Grey's choice of birthday dinner, banana cinnamon and sugar muffins, grilled kielbasa and pasta salad, and a fridge clean out night. Tis the season of concession stand for dinner (ugh oh).