Up 16 hours this week. The kids and I took the dogs to the Que for a quick swim on a gloomy day much to Bullet's extreme happiness. Trixie could care less about swimming, but Bullet would swim until he drown (which I was worried a few times when he swam really far from shore). We swam at Pappy&Gigi's house on Friday afternoon and scored some more hours at fall sports practices. At 529 hours and 55 minutes to date, I have officially surpassed all previous years' outdoor hours! Last year, I called my full year count at 529 hours and 23 minutes! So yay me...and thanks camping!
Reading and finishing Yaqui Delgado Wants to Kick your Ass by Meg Medina, I really enjoyed it! I also read and finished a new language learning novel that I will use this year in Spanish 2; El Silbón de Venezuela by Craig Klein Dexemple about the Venezuelan/Colombian spooky legend of the Whistling Man.
Half Marathon Training this week: 5 miles
Ugh, I did pretty poorly at my half training schedule this week, but I think my body did need a little bit of a break. I took rest days Monday-Wednesday and then ran 3 miles from our house to cheerleading practice! It was so efficient to run there and then drive home after practices with the fam, so that helped beat my running boredom which has become a real thing for me. I did some modified training (hah) on Friday night with a 2mile dog walk.
Swinging by the library with the kids to return and pick up one last book haul before the end of the summer. Grey read and finished The Man Who Wore All his Clothes by Allan Ahlberg in preparation for AR tests this school year (haha/yay!)
Videochatting with my college this week to make sure I am all set to go for the upcoming school year. I have a teaching practicum in the fall (multiple observations by my principal and mentor teacher) and another semester of the teaching practicum and a 15 page research paper due in the spring, then I'll be all done with my PA certification by May 2020!
Singing happy birthday to our Uncle Kevmoo for his 30th with a late evening cheesecake after football and cheer practice. We love you Kevin Duck!
Letting out a deep sigh of relief when Gigi received the news of another clear scan this time 3 months post-chemo! Thank you for all the continued support, prayers, and good thoughts.
Back to school prepping with a shopping trip with the girls on Saturday. We picked up some clothes for all four kids, bought updated hygiene supplies, and grabbed some pencils and folders. The babies got new lunchboxes and the backpacks have been cleaned out and washed (we reuse our LL Bean backpacks each year - they're lifetime warranty!) B and Greyson got their hair cuts on Friday and Grey had his dentist appointment. The big kids just need new shoes and then we will be all ready to go!
Ordering delivery Aldi through Instacart. So instacart is kind of like Uber or Grubhub but for groceries. A person gets your grocery list and then goes and picks up your food and delivers it to your home. We had ours delivered to Gigi & Pappy's house while we were swimming because our zipcode isn't included yet. It was a good experience but we get such a huge order that it makes more sense for me to just do it myself I think in the future. We are all set for the school year though, so that's a relief!
Resolving our rooster problem. We had four roosters (!!) and they were really getting mean and bossy. One of them tried to flog Rusty, it was constant trauma to our hens all day long, they were fighting each other, their crowing was constant - and we figured that all that noise was probably calling in the predator that's been picking our hens off one by one all summer. So I had enough and told Brandon, it just needs done. We did keep their breasts to cook and some hackle for Grey's fly fishing supplies. It certainly wasn't fun, but it needed done - especially before the winter - and our coop is peaceful and happy again. Rest in Rooster Heaven Peace.
Being an outdoorsman's wife. The whole year is outdoorsman season, but we are really creeping into the most intense season and the boys are itching to get out in the woods. Brandon and Grey spent Friday morning setting up tree stands and checking trail cams with our Gilmore cousins. On Saturday morning they went out with cousin Jesse and his bird dog Gunner for a pheasant/chukar shoot. Grey harvested three chukars! And even Rustman got in on the action while B helped him shoot his BB gun at the target in our yard while the girls and I were shopping.
Teacher-prepping by finalizing all first week lesson plans and syllabi for all levels. I hauled all four kids to school with me on Thursday so that I could decorate some more, hang my word wall, and organize a bit. I got to have a chat with my teacher bestie, Renee too and the kids watched The Book of Life on the projector. I received the best surprises from our classroom fairy godmother (Ashley) this week too! I asked her to help build our reader's theater prop collection and she found and sent the most hilarious and perfect props, including - top hats, nerd glasses, animal masks, and a super hero cape! The kids are going to be so much more theatrical as we read our novels this year with so many costume options! Thank you Ashley!!
Fall Sporting with two cheer practices and one picture night. We painted three of our six run-through banners on Thursday nights and they are awfully colorful and creative (lol). Grey and Brandon had three football practices and their picture night too. Grey was nursing a stoved thumb back to better this week after jamming it in a basketball game with his cousins last Sunday. We were worried for about 5 minutes that maybe it was broken, but with repeated thumb-ice baths and tylenol, it was almost back to normal by the weekend.
Frugal Living digging all through the football/cheer shed to find last year's run through paper so that I didn't have to buy another roll. Harvesting our first (teeny) tomato from the garden! Saving the breasts from our four roosters and the three chukars Grey harvested during the bird dog hunt. We saved some neck hackle from the roosters for Grey's fly fishing collection too. The girls and I used a Starbucks giftcard for our back-to-school shopping snack that covered our whole order and I did at at-home dye for my fall hair using Nutrisse's light brown instead of going to the salon.
Making ground turkey with green beans over rice, chicken, veggies & stuffing casserole, sloppy joes and mac&cheese, buffalo chicken dip, and keto chili which the kids woofed down and loved.
Keto'ing right along. I am continuing with Keto, still tracking my macros while B has taken a more lax approach since he doesn't want to lose any more weight. We had really delicious chicken, broccoli, alfredo casserole this week and I made another batch of chocolate cream cheese fat bombs. Grey made me a delicious Keto friendly breakfast (eggs, cheese, & strawberries) and B whipped up some chicken fajitas (sans tortillas) with pepperjack cheese on the grill.
I had SO much fun finding those props, hah! Can't wait to hear how the kids like them. XOXO
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