I'm Not Sure What Happened....

But I must have blinked,

Because my little ground hog isn't so little any more!

Ardon is growing into quite the young man that's for sure! We went out for late evening coffees (decaf of course) to help ring in the birthday celebrations and look forward to a fun day of celebrating!

Happy 9th Birthday!

We love you!

It's Official

The first day of school that is!

The kids were so excited to get started!

Ok, maybe excited isn't the correct word but they were at least willing and I think it came as kind of a surprise that real book work was being done today so they were too shocked to complain! Yep, that's how I roll!

 

The day started off well and we just did lighter introductory work so it wouldn't be stressful. 

To say I've been anxious about this school year would be accurate. I've felt like kindergarten, for us anyway, is such a crucial time educationally. That is when we get so many basic concepts down and the curriculum I use has them reading quite a bit by the end of the year. It was a lot of work with Ardon but I've know it would be a lot of work in many different ways with Elee. She's my dreamer and usually the child that would rather live in a pretend world by herself than play in reality with her brothers. She is VERY sensory in everything and gets overwhelmed easily. That being said, we will take the year in stride, adapting what we can and working our way through the rest. Educating at home is definitely an adventure and with 2 full time students (plus my 2 extra's) I'm sure it will be much busier from here on out. That being said, today was a good day and I look forward to many more of them down the road!

To top off our first day back to the books,

Bronze was home.

His work schedule has been very different lately, to say the least! So he got to be around for our kick off to the new year. He and Eliad sat together and did some bible stories while I worked with the bigger kids at the table and Weston napped.

I had originally planned our school starting schedule to be a little different than how it actually ended up. The youngest 2 kids are having some major dental work done next week so instead of putting everything off an extra couple of weeks I am just splitting our first full week over this week and next. That's what homeschooling is all about right? And as hard as it is for me in this respect, I'm trying to just relax and go with the flow!

A Week Back Home

It's hard to believe we have been back in town for a week all ready! Our trip flew by and the week back home has gone by so quickly as well. 

Here are some of the random things that have gone on and sped us through the week! 

We got some fun shopping in and used our birthday money.

Just what we needed too, another noise toy! You know, you can never have too many of those!

We also did a little birthday celebrating for someone else.

Weston turned one last week so we made cupcakes and helped him celebrate while he was at our house.

It's hard to believe but in no time at all he'll have been with us for a year!

I spent a lot of time tearing apart our school cabinet to try and organize/get ready to start the new school year.

We have 2 full time students this year you know!

We also spent time breaking in our new playdough.

There were lots of sweet treats to decorate.

And last (at the moment) but certainly not least,

We spent some time in the dark! Yes, I just had to open my mouth and told my husband that we'd already spent our due time without power for the year when we had storms go through in April. This morning when the small thunderstorm went through, we are assuming lightning hit our transformer and it blew out power before we could get ready for church! Thankfully the power came back on before it warmed up too much so the house didn't get hot!

A Good Dog

You know how you can tell you have a good dog?

You can make jerky on a dehydrator in 'her' room and she won't bother it!

Quarters From Uncle Tom

One evening before dinner Uncle Tom had the kids line up because he had something for each of them. To their surprise, he pulled out a roll of quarters for each of them!

Now some of you may realize how valued quarters are in this household but for those of you who don't, he may as well have given them each a gold bar! We went to the mall today and they each got to spend some of their quarters on splat balls, too much fun!

Thanks Uncle Tom!

The Great Outdoors

We spent most of our days either outdoors or with the house all opened up enjoying the fresh air. The weather in Santa fe is amazing, if you're warm all you have to do is step in to the shade and if you're chilly you just step in to the sunshine! I absolutely love the climate there and it made me sad to even think about coming back to our humid, heatwave! 

The kiddos loved running back and forth between the front and back yard and being able to go through the house without hearing, 'hurry, shut the door!' and I loved it to! It's also monsoon season right now so occasional light afternoon showers are typical. One afternoon grandma got out rain gear for the kids to play outside with. She is always thinking of them and makes everything so much fun!

The afternoon before we left we spent time out on the front lawn enjoying the fountain and conversation together. The kids found a stash of silly hats and brought them out to model for everyone. As you can see, grandpa was king of the lawn, ha!

We followed our visiting with the traditional send off dinner at Dion's for pizza. We went back to the house for a short bit after eating and said our emotional fair wells. It was a wonderful visit and we packed so much into a short amount of time. We will be missing everyone greatly and already look forward to our next visit!

Hanging out with Grandma and Grandpa

We love to spend time just hanging out with everyone when we travel down to Santa fe. This trip was a bit last minute,  grandpa's health has not been good and we especially wanted to spend some time with him while he is up for it.

His body may be failing him but his mind is sharp and he still gives us a lot to laugh at. He still enjoys piddling around in the kitchen and watching me while I cook and I really enjoy the time we spend together! 

Grandma is just as busy (actually busier) as usual but we got to enjoy time with her as well. Aunt Netta surprised her and I with spa pedicures so we could get away and relax a bit together, it was wonderful and we may have over extended our welcome just a little so that we could enjoy the massage chairs a little longer!