Around Here Week 2: 01/5-11

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

Intentional Outdoor Hours: 3+ hours (of 1000)
We went from snow on the ground in the beginning of the week to a heat wave- in the high 50s in January! Gemmi and I got the dogs out for a really long walk at the Quemahoming and Bullet tried to take a swim but realized within about a minute that the water was freeeeezing. Our girls (chickens) were so glad to be out and roaming around the yard, poor things don't realize it's just a fake spring day. Rusty didn't either and joyfully declared, "Mum, winter is over!" I had to break the news to him that it most certainly is not over....not even close.

Reading With the Fire on High by Elizabeth Acevedo for our Project Lit book club at school and loving it so much. What a heartwarming sweet YA book. I love the character and the truthfulness behind the way that Acevedo writes her main character, Emoni's thoughts as a teenager. I can't wait to discuss with the book club students!

Asking Aunt Kitty to sage our house to get rid of all the germs (and demons?) because that's where we are in desperation with this darn sick season! She came over to watch the three little kids so they didn't have to go to one of Grey's games but both parents could. She hung out with the kids, helped with homework (thank you!) and saged the whole house. Fingers crossed! We love you Aunt Kitty!

Celebrating our extended families by honoring Orthodox Christmas. We don't celebrate too big, but we have Orthodox on both sides of our family (Serbian on my side and Russian on Brandon's) so January 7th is a day that gets a little something special. It's our tradition for a few years now to let the kids sleep under the Christmas tree (before we finally get to take it down on January 8th!) and they get one present each from "Orthodox Santa." It's the official closing of the holiday season for us, and it is simple but important.

Stressing over my junior class students who had prom raffle fundraising tickets due this week. We still had quite a lot of students who missed the due date and I had to have a heart-to-heart with them on Friday to let them know how serious it was for them to get in their sold and unsold tickets. I also went on a teacher/momma tangent about how all these small low risk/low stakes things they do in high school is for practice. Not so far in the future, they might need to confront their wifi provider about a bill and selling a raffle ticket to a stranger is an opportunity to talk to someone who might agree or decline their proposal. Later in life, when you care about it, it doesn't get any easier - it gets harder because something is actually on the line! Get in all the practice you can now so you have lots of experience for later in life. Sheesh - this raising kids (our own and my students) is not for the faint of heart!

Cheering on my students at their basketball game at our kids' school. The whole crew headed out to our home gym to cheer on the visiting (but my students') team and it was a really great and close game. It's hard to want both teams to win - luckily I don't have any children playing for our home team (yet), so for now I'm a cougar fan until the kids get big enough and then I'll be in a really sticky situation.

Girls Nighting' it with Gem and Violet on Saturday night. We went to see Frozen II (cute!) and then out to Eat 'N Park just us girls. It was a special night and I am so grateful for these two - so different - but so complimentary daughters of mine. With the realization of the house very soon to be over run with so many boys, having my two daughters feels even more special.

Having a (mostly) boy free night at home as Grey and Rust got a sleepover with Chum & Abba. It is always so much quieter (and cleaner!) when the boys are out. So it was a pretty peaceful evening and the boys loved spending time with Chum. Rust got a long walk in the woods with Chum and Grey got to be sister free for an evening (which he's always grateful for). B got to hang out watching college basketball for most of the evening when I took the girls to the movies and the only boy who tagged along is the one kicking around on the inside (26 weeks and as long as a bowling ball - hah!) Thank you Chum & Abba for keeping our boys!

Winter Sporting with six basketball games (!) and one practice. Oh, this boy of ours. I keep asking him if it's too much and he repeats over and over that he loves playing for all four teams and he's not giving any of them up! He had three games in a row on Saturday and didn't miss a beat. It's been fun to watch how much he's learning and how all the positions that each team needs him to play has been helping him learn so much about the game.

Prepping for Spring sports (!) by updating the sponsorship letter for the upcoming baseball season to be sent out to local businesses. Since I've been doing it for the past few years, its actually pretty simple to just update with new information. Once it's approved by the board, then all I have to do is get them mailed out. With so many kiddos, it's nearly impossible to get to meetings, clean up days, or other events that need me to physically be somewhere to be helpful- but I can do this small task at home so it feels good to help in a way that works for me right now in this stage of life.

Teaching a full week back to school after a long break and - whew! We were all so tired by the time Friday rolled around. It is hard getting back into the swing of things. In Spanish 1 we worked on our Señor Legalos male 'models' including written descriptions using our clothing vocab words and adjectives while also introducing them to Billy La Bufanda on Señor Wooly. Spanish 2 continued practicing verb conjugations - all three endings in the present tense. Sp2Honors watched two (!) documentaries to prep for our upcoming novel, both of which held their attention and had them thinking broader: Living on $1 and Which Way Home. Sp3/4Honors started dipping their toes in the Preterite (eek!) and just practiced with AR regular verbs to start. They had a Past Tense Identifier vocab test too (hace mucho tiempo, pasado, etc)

Making sirloin tip roast in the crockpot, pierogies & baked beans, Hawaiian meatballs in the crockpot over rice, Italian baked chicken with potatoes and green beans, and sloppy joes. The kids helped me make Muddy Buddies/Puppy Chow (with chocolate, chex mix, and powdered sugar) - and we gobbled the whole batch up in 2 days!