This Week at Our House #30 and #31

We finished off our final two weeks of summer vacation with some big bangs! We had two very fun trips to the beach,  Joseph had birthday, I published my creative writing curriculum, and Arwen had a birthday! It's been very, very hot. We cannot go outside during the daytime for the most part. It's hard to do anything outside. The chickens don't lay many eggs and the ducks and chickens sit in the shade all day. We start school tomorrow. We had a long vacation. The little ones are ready to get to work. It's a good time for it too, because it's hard to be outside.

Joseph turned 11. He played games with John and group family games all day. He got a small lego set that he happily built right away. He's getting ready for the 7th grade. I bumped him up with Anya when he was supposed to be heading into the 2nd grade and he has continually stayed one to 6 years ahead of grade level. I am excited for him to do my language arts curriculum. There's a lot of writing in it and he will come up with some very imaginative things.

Arwen had a spectacular eighth birthday. She played minecraft with John and herself. She got a light yellow parakeet, yes, that's right, a living bird. We had a steak lunch, then went to the beach and got ice cream cones on the way home. Then we had crepes with homemade chocolate pudding, strawberries, blueberries, and spray whipped cream. Then she hung out with John and I and then John watched a movie with her until like 3 am. She was tired the next day, but her birthday was special. Arwen will be in the 3rd grade.

 Susan has all of her stuff and has been practicing reading. She's asked each day when school starts. 

Sam has all of his stuff and he has been working on it for a while. He has animal flashcards to learn his animals. He called the toucan, canned tuna. I would have never put those two together, but I see where he did. It's so funny. Sam now swims at the beach. his terror of the ocean has ceased. He loves the big tubes and the waves lifting him slightly up. 

Anya's now much taller than Joseph and a little taller than Rachel. She's long and lanky and very thin like I was. She has the longest hair that goes down past her bottom now. She looks quite grown up. Anya starts the 7th grade.

I made sure that Rachel has paper workbooks to work from this year, and books that she can write in. We will see how she does. I have not let her complain about school because it's not good for her or the little kids who look up to their cool sister. She's made a few complainy remarks. I hope she finds herself this year. Rachel will be in the 9th grade. 

Adam will be in the 10th grade. He's big and fairly mature. He'll do his work and learn his stuff. He can finally read fast and spends a lot of time reading on his own, though he tends to read things other than novels. 

Ruth has finished pictures for my next children's book, but I was so busy with the curriculum that I

have not gotten to that yet. 

Kate and Johnny would still like to go on a mission in the future. I wonder if it will ever happen for them. Kate will help a bit with school this year. Those two are our next two birthdays. I hope this next 12 months brings some good things for them. 

Gideon will be shocked when school starts. I'm not sure what to do with him. He'll probably sneak out to get into things or try and sit on me. He's now 18 months. He is big and needed a bigger car seat. He says "no," "yes," and "uh-oh," most frequently. He'll also say mom and dad and cat and don't.

Three Birthdays

Susan had a birthday  June 19th, She's 6 years old and delighted to be so big!

Joseph had a birthday July 20th. He's 11 and has an argument for every situation, and will probably write a novel soon.

 

 

Arwen had a birthday July 27th. She had a list as long as Christmas, but got a parakeet and some capri suns and rootbeers. Arwen's very smart and very mature.

This Week at Our House # 29

 The refrigerator broke in transit and never made it to our house. I called and waited and called until I found out that another would not arrive until Aug 22nd or later. So we opted for a different one that will hopefully get to our house safe and sound and working great by August 4th.

I worked and worked and worked on my homeschool curriculum. It is up on kindle, but I need to get it ready for a paper version, and that will begin on Tuesday.

We went to the beach on Tuesday. It was hot, hot, hot, and the water was like a warm bathtub, as is common here in July. I got tubes on clearance for $1 a piece. They were awesomely fun, but made Kate sea sick. Sam played in the water for the first time, ever, because he really liked using the tube and riding in the waves on the most shallow end of the shore.

Ruth's working and working hard illustrating. Kate is figuring out what she is going to do next. Johnny broke a window and now has another house project to help me with. Adam reads a lot of scriptures now and I think that is great. Anya and Rachel did a lot of laundry and babysitting because I worked so much. Kate is reading a big fantasy novel to Anya and Joseph. Joseph loves it and Anya does not. Joseph and Josh complained a lot because all they want to do is play computer games. It's probably good school starts in two weeks. Arwen got scriptures from her grandmother and carried them around with her since then. Suzy prays to "help us bless the food," and Sam prays, "I want food." Gideon keeps us all on our toes and cleaning up. We've eaten too many ramen noodles and cans of chili. We look forward to more fresh and frozen food in three more weeks.

We need to clean pictures off of the hard drive before I can get them off from the camera and on the blog. I'm waiting on John to fix that.

This Week at House #27 and # 28

I have been so busy writing homeschool curriculum. I have finished the writing. I'll need to edit, format and rearrange some before getting it up on amazon for sale.

We went to the beach not this week, but the week before. It was so beautiful, I wrote a poem about it:

We'll remember today and talk about the water
how it shone like emeralds beneath an indigo sky

Thunder emptied the beach, except for us
we drove through the storm
I can't say that we bravely went in the rain
swimming, fell out of our heads and off our lips
anyway, ice cream cones called

We parked and the last of the rain
dripped down from the tired clouds
waves rolled and we swam
out into the billows--
warmed from days of hot summer sun

The fury of the sky calmed, the sea moved quietly
we stroked, and kicked, and floated
til our lips quivered and our toes looked purple
and ice cream cones called out loud

Ruth finished the pictures in my next children's book. We need to get the formatting of that done now.

We're getting a refrigerator in 4 more days. That will be a relief. We miss regular healthy meals.

Kate got a pigeon. It came in the mail. The post office forgot to ship it out. It was supposed to be sent overnight. They had it for three days. It miraculously lived. The pigeon loves Ruth.

Ruth sent this to me:
Susan was having her doll make my doll food and asked what my doll
wanted her to make. I told her to make dessert.
She handed me the food and happily said "Here's disease!"

Joseph wrote this really cute story:
It started one year ago. The apocalypse. It started with an entire country mysteriously being destroyed. No one knew what happened. Then a few weeks later, we found out. Giant chickens. We tried shooting them the bullets all deflected off, we tried bombing them it did nothing, we even tried nuking them it still did nothing they seemed to be immortal. They destroyed town cities and even countries. No one knew what to do. The chickens roamed through everywhere some people tried moving to very cold places like Alaska. But the chickens were even there. They roamed every island. Not even small ones were safe. They even lived in the sea no one knew what caused them. But there was a legend of a man called “The Chicken Lord” who knew everything about chickens maybe, he knew there, weakness or maybe he was the reason they came.

Anya and Rachel have email homeschool penpals. That is going very well. They need outside the home communication.

Arwen has been counting down the days until her birthday and Joseph's birthday.

Joshua wakes up first and tells me his dreams most mornings. He is obsessed with computer games, but is embarrassed if he dreams about them.

Adam made cookies for the neighbors; Johnny bakes treats for the family several times a week.

Sam lost most of his pacifiers so he talks now, and he says mature-ish things that surprise us. I bought him a preschool book and he likes to do school work. He asks to do school work. So he gets to start preschool this year.

Gideon is tall and strong and rough and adorable and time consuming. He loves to be outside. He loves to hold kittens and ducks. He loves to play in water and mud.