Anna's Kitchen Concoction

Anna made ice cream today via the milk and cereal in the bottom of Noah's Honey Nut Cheerios bowl and some whipped cream.  She apparently poured it all in one of her play kitchen pots, mixed it up, and popped it in the freezer all before I ever got out of bed.  Somewhere in the middle of the day, she transferred it to the fridge so it could thaw a bit.  And then just before Josh got home, she asked if she could try the ice cream she made.  "Yes?" I said, not quite sure what the heck she was talking about.  This was the first I heard of it.

It took some chipping away, but try it and love it she did.  As it melted, she even went so far as to pour it into another of her little bowls and beat it with her toy mixer.  I had to physically bite my tongue in order to not fuss about the drippy, melty, sticky mess she was making.

But how could I argue with this face and ALL that initiative?  I am so in love with this girl.

Taa Daa: Tree House

Josh got creative again this past weekend fashioning a tree house from stuff he had in his workshop.  The kids like to pretend it's a pirate ship they are climbing aboard. :)  

Enjoying this week of temps in the 80s.  Some other ways we played outside...

Not pictured is the swimming we did with buds earlier this week and the zoo trip we have on the calendar for Friday.  Never a dull moment!

11 Years Today

Today makes 11 years for Josh and me.  

We'll be celebrating really casual today with a sitter for the kids and a leisurely dinner and a movie for us, just like we used to spend our newlywed days of carefreeness.  Minus the sitter of course. :}

End-of-Summer Swim

We joined up with some new homeschool friends at an end-of-summer party at a local pool one evening this week.  This particular pool has a hill with a giant slide cut into it.  As you can see, all three of my kids thoroughly enjoyed it. :)

So long, summer!  You were ever so gentle on us this year in terms of heat.  Thanks for that!  Tell your pal winter to bring us some serious snow, so we can slip and slide around with him, too!

Summer Reads & Back-to-School!

I meant to do some math review over the summer, but that just never took shape in our schedule.  But, we did manage a good bit of reading, so we get points for that!  Yesterday, Noah finished his 12th chapter book of the summer.  His summer reading included all of the following that we read together:

In the process of our reading, we started noticing lots of good sound words.  So for the fun of it (yes, listing is fun; do you know me at all?!), we kept a running list of any that we came across. Noah really got into it, finding words all on his own while he read pages independently and asking me to add them. 

One day somewhere down the road, I'll slap the word "onomatopoeia" on it and Noah will be impressed with how he's already well-versed in that literary device. :}

The only other schoolwork type stuff we got done this summer was some phonics/spelling stuff in prep for fall.  Noah got through almost the whole book.

And then today, he became an official second grader! 

Our first day of homeschooling went really smoothly, really successfully, and really sweetly.  We will tweak a few things as we find our groove, our timing, and a few adjustments to the room's layout, but I am so glad to report that we give it a thumbs up after Day 1 at home. :)

Evolution of a Room

Taa Daa:  Our homeschool classroom is ready for action.
It's Go Time, y'all!

 

Looking at this space now amazes me to recall how much this bonus room has evolved in the almost 5 years we have been here.  It started out as Noah's bedroom (toddler bed and all) when we moved here. 

 Then when we swapped Noah's room with the guest bedroom a couple years ago, this rec space became a multipurpose room housing storage, a guest bed, craft space, and video game space.

Then it morphed into a more orderly version of guest bedroom/game room/exercise space.

Last fall is when the biggest transition started.  We started clearing out EVERYTHING to build it again from the ground up for homeschooling space.  It got messy! It also got occupied by Legos. :S

Little by little, we sold stuff, cleared stuff, moved stuff out and my old school stuff started finding a home once again.

Until finally last night we got the finishing touches in place - pocket charts hung, plugs found for various needs, and all extra clutter moved out once and for all.

A close up of the wall of shelves.  All my manuals, guides, resources are on the left,

followed by chapter books in bins, a comfy chair, an easel and my favorite thing from my classroom days, the dartboard, on the right.

The banquette/table we'll use for getting work done. Also, all my picture books have been pared down to JUST what you see on the cubicle shelf.  That is just amazing to me!  Now that I mention it, my chapter book library took a pretty good trim down this year as well.  It only took me 7 years and about 4 clean outs to finally be able to let so much of my classroom stuff go. :}

What you can't see is the closet with shelving and supplies.  But trust me, it's also there and quite organized. :)  We are getting started tomorrow with Noah's first day of second grade.  He is GIDDY, I tell you. Impatient to start and just plan giddy. Myself? I just don't know what to expect.  Which makes me wonder what he's expecting!  Yikes! We'll find out soon enough.  We are gonna ease our way into this new routine and report back after a few weeks when we have had a chance to collect our thoughts and let any crazy emotions settle.  Wish us luck!

35

Someone had a birthday this weekend!  He has a new movie/old fave (Oh Brother Where Art Thou), two guitar books, and two new water bottles to show for it now, too.  Happy 35th, Josh!

All he wanted was cheese fries from Outback, so Outback we did.  And then Gigi's for cake.

Anna was concerned about Daddy not having balloons and candles for his birthday until he told her birthdays don't need all that when you are older.  Older, btw, when we asked the kids how old they thought Daddy was turning, was 100 (Noah) and 85 (Anna). 

Wrapping Up Summer

Since we will officially start Noah's second grade year next week, that means this week was our last week of completely free summer days.  Here's how we spent them...

At our beloved Cornerstone play area. 

 We go often,

 but this time I actually remembered to pack a decent camera and snap some pics. 

Another day it was rainy out, so we did the pirate thing indoors instead.  These two fashioned an entire pirate ship out of the couch, complete with a plank, sail, flag, anchor, and spyglasses. Then we watched Swiss Family Robinson since there are pirates and ships in that movie. :}

We spent much time swimming and I suddenly realize I stopped taking pics of that activity awhile ago.  That's a shame.  That is where we have spent most of the summer!  Must grab some more swimmy moments for the blog.  My two are FISH I tell you and becoming quite fearless.  They now do flips under water!

In other summer news, we finally set up our badminton net and grabbed a few racquets and birdies off clearance and got busy playing.  This game makes Josh and me smile because we played it a lot back when we lived in GA and had no kids and LOTS of free time. :}

Anna tends to stare off into the sky and loses track of play, but Noah is ga-ga for this new game.

And he's pretty good, too.  He's now asking for tennis lessons (again) and I bet he gets them at some point or another.

Noah has begged to play every day and just waits and waits for the sun to go down some so Josh and I will actually come out.  In the meantime, he and Anna have spent a number of hours out in the sun riding their power wheels in our cul-de-sac and playing with the neighbor kiddos.  I don't know how they stand the heat.  Guess we can just chalk that up to the bliss that is childhood. 

Intensely Anna

Y'all.

I don't know how to say this.

It's just that ...

Well, if Anna starts singing you songs that say that trouble is headed your way or...

if she tells you she worries about you falling into the lake of fire...

... just try not to be rattled or offended and just send any and all complaints to her daddy who began teaching her things from the book of Revelation recently.

And know that I have since issued a "cease and desist" order to him after a little incident at the fountains yesterday.  Those poor, poor little unsuspecting boys who were just trying to play with buckets and water. :S {Shaking my head}

Bless her intense little heart.

(from the comments... explanation-I am afraid I don't know exactly what she said to them. And mercifully, they didn't know well enough to go rat her out to their moms. All I know is she ran up to me (and the mom friends I was with) all wet and wide-eyed in the sun and tattles, "Mommy! Those boys don't believe in God!!" It's ok, baby, I say. Some people don't and they are allowed not to. "But they are gonna fall in the lake of fire!!" Cue my stunned and mortified face in front of my friends and my stammering to my girl to NOT go say that to the boys because it will hurt their feelings ... or terrorize them.

My word, that girl. :S Apparently it all started when they would not share their buckets with her. I suspect she stepped up to the lectern and let them know what God had to say about not sharing and let them know what they needed to do to please God. And things escalated from there ... straight to the fires of hell.

We are so that weird homeschool family already, aren't we?)

Just a Typical Morning

I love him so.

I love this age.

 

I love that he asked me to take these pictures for possible submissions to Lego Magazine.

 

Day Trip to Burgess Falls

Since our original hiking trip got rained out over the Fourth last week, we were over the moon to take in another of several 80 degree days this past week, including today.  So first thing in the morning, we piled in the car and headed east to Burgess Falls State Park.  

The first of four falls that you see along Falling Water River.

There were plenty of scenic spots along the walk.

We didn't get far before our wussy rears needed a break. :}

And we discovered that Anna had packed a stowaway for the hike.

The second, and smallest, set of falls.

 

The third set of falls.

Since we've had such heavy rains these past two weeks, there was much noise at the falls and all along the trail.  Loved that!

Big Falls.  We would have loved to take on the hike to the bottom where you see others down there fishing and hanging out, but Anna was already in whine mode at this point and claiming to be starving to death.  We hoofed it back along the road to feed the poor thing and her brother who joined in the fussing. :}  One of these days though, we are gonna get these kids to the bottom of some falls.  Somewhere, somehow.  I want them to feel the wind and mist and weight of all the water rushing down toward them.  I was sorry we didn't get to do that when we went to Fall Creek Falls last October as well.

After a perfectly packed picnic lunch (thank you, Josh!), we headed back to a calmer spot along the river to do a little exploring. Noah was a bit skittish about being barefoot here and ended up putting his shoes and socks back on after this.  He is much like Josh about his feet. :S

Anna was ALL about getting her feet wet ...

and making tracks all over the area ...

and really checking things out.

Noah, bless him, couldn't stand missing out and gave it another go ... with much handholding from Mommy.  We took this shot for Memaw while we were at it.

After collecting handfuls of stones and seashells, it was back to dry land for him again though.

Thanks for a lovely day, Burgess Falls State Park!  :)