Intentional Outdoor Hours: 143+ hours (of 1000)
Only up 9 hours this week from spring sports, concession stand duty, mowing the grass, and general summertime outdoors has got me excited to boost these hours in the coming weeks of summer.
Reading Good on Paper by Rachel Cantor (fiction) and I also started our book club choice The Only Girl in the World by Maude Julien (memoir)
Celebrating our Violet at her preschool promotion program. She sang songs along with her class and won the "Miss Dependable Award" for being helpful and independent in her class. We also hugged and thanked our preschool teachers - all of whom are amazing and kind and sweet - since the babies will be staying home with us for summer vacation. After the program, we went to Kings & Queens with all four grandparents to celebrate Gigi's birthday!
Show and telling Spike (our hamster) at school. Grey earned a show&tell with his AR points, so after my last day of school, I stopped home to pick Spike up and felt like a celebrity walking through the hallways as every kid oohed and ahhed over Spike in his cage. Grey was proud to have him in class (took him around for all the kids to pet him and put him in his ball too) and he answered his classmates' questions. It was really sweet. I stopped by to thank Gemma's teacher for being so wonderful all year and Spike was invited to do another quick hello with the Kinder kids too. (It was a very excited day in Spike's life!)
Sending prayers to our community as we lost two beautiful, young souls this week.
Panicking and then laughing about Rusty's hair falling out. He came to sit on my lap and when he got up, there were tons of curls all over my shirt. I ran my fingers through his hair and a whole clump came out and Brandon and I looked at each other in sheer terror for 15 seconds trying to go through a catalog in our mind of all the possible medical reasons why his hair would be falling out in clumps. And then I ran my fingers through the other side of his head...and nothing. It took about four seconds of questioning for Violet to confess that she had cut his hair with scissors. Luckily because he got that #georgewashingtonhairdontcare - you can't even tell it's been cut at all. So technically, he still hasn't had his first real haircut.
Sweet summertiming which includes lots of mowing (everyone mows with two kids on their lap, right?), free play outside, kids who sleep on the couch, reading, and the wider schedule to start big projects and get chores done. I had about six hours kid free for my summer vacation (woohoo!) as my last day was the day before the big kids' last day. But officially - we are all done with school for the summer (except B, duh). Brandon and I put together a huge to do list that covers all the rooms in our house (and garage and patios) of little things that need done. Despite if being overwhelming, we're going to try to think compartmentally about it. We have chores (laundry, dishes, regular cleaning, etc), and then we these other projects (powerwashing siding, organize the tupperware cupboard, update the photos in the staircase, new screen doors, etc), and then we have our regular work. Our hope is that we'll get up between 5a-6a each morning which gives us at least a 3hour head start to our kids, giving us time for work and then tackling regular chores and a project or two when the day allows - as in managing between kids' activities, scheduled events & parties, everyone's energy and well being, etc. I am such a list nerd, so even though the sheer size of our list is staggering, I love knowing that it's all written down and I only need to cross those babies off one by one.
Losing no weight again this month (but, no gain either, right?) It gives me some happiness to know that maybe that means the previous 9lbs are gone for good - that this is my new 'normal,' but I still have a ways to go until I feel better in my own skin. Refocusing and adding regular exercise is on my summer to do list.
Taking Sheila to the 'car doctor' to get healed up after she was sounding like a tractor trailer on the highway. She's all better now, but she was out for two whole days which meant long walks to the bus stop to pick up the kids - including me sprinting down to the bus stop on the last day of school to get them off the bus - late - because I couldn't find the tractor keys and it started raining. I was sore for two days after my half mile sprint.
Starting off our no bummer summer with the Fiodercrew! We had a playdate at our house with water balloons and butterfly releasing. Kate and I started brainstorming our no bummer summer list while the kids ran around and laughed together. How lucky we are to have friends who understand us at our core.
Releasing our painted lady butterflies. We had one little butterfly that had their chrysalis fall while it was still forming. Poor thing came out a little wonky and I took it as my personal responsibility to care for that sweet thing and make sure it was eating and keeping it from getting stuck on it's back. Three of the butterflies flew right away but one of them sat on the kids' noses for a minute. My little runt couldn't fly at all due to his malformed wings, so it got a seat on each kids' nose and then we placed it in our hanging basket right out front.
Happy for Grey and Bud who spent the day with Chum and our cousins at Uncle Steve & Aunt Judy's house in Spruce Creek. Grey was so happy to be in the creek fly fishing all day. That kid and fishing, man. (with Gem away for the weekend too, I was at home with only two kids !? I got a lot done and had some special time just with the babies too - always a nice treat!)
Feeling proud of Gemma as she had her first weekend alone away (with not grandparents). She went all by herself with our Garretson cousins to go camping at Shawnee for two nights! She fished and played on the playground and hung out with Gracie and helped watch that babies. When she got home she told us that at night she was thinking of us and feeling sad, but "I didn't cry Mum, I just closed my eyes and kept sleeping." Gosh, that girl. Thank you Taush & Aaron for taking her along, she had such a great time!
Teaching is done for my first year back in the classroom! Our students had a two hour day on Tuesday and then we finished out our Teacher time on Wednesday morning. I have my next year curriculum calendar plotted out almost entirely and lots of new ideas and different thoughts about tweaking what we did this year to make it better for next year. Before I left on Wednesday, I finally got rid of all the old textbooks that were in my room and it was so liberating. For the next two months, I'm hoping to work a little each day on curriculum planning, some self development (spanish podcasts, Spanish novels, etc), and then in August slowly get into my room so that I can start this next year with a more grounded bang since last year I had only about a five day start up. #nerdforlife
Making ground turkey and green beans over rice, candied kielbasa, and another batch of cake mix chocolate chip cookies (?!). We also had concession stand, Fox's pizza, and Kings&Queens restaurant meals this week. I am determined to get back on track now that it is summer both with my own healthier eating and with meal planning.
You making a master list for summer makes me want to write a list SO BAD! (seriously though, #nerdforlife!) Haha!
ReplyDeleteI am hoping to wake up before the kids too this summer just to enjoy that sweet time before they wake up with all their demands (and fighting-- good lord, the fighting!) So here's to hoping we can make it happen and not hit snooze, even though we'll be tempted!