I am 34 weeks pregnant with my 13th baby. Never have I counted weeks like I am with this pregnancy, but this one has been so hard, everyday counts to me. I am sure that this one is the last one too. I am old and my body will not do this again. But I think in time I will miss these days of pregnancy and baby life.
Yesterday, I mentioned to Ruth that she will be older than this baby than I am of her. Life can be funny that way.
We are on summer break now and have been since the last week of April, but that will end around the
second week of July. I have our schedule ready and my ideas for this next school year ready to go. For summer break we have been doing a lot of reading in the mornings to afternoons. Joseph and Adam have been working on paying attention to what they read and learning through reading. Josh is still working on fluency. He has been reading about dangerous animals, volcanoes, meteors, and now insects and he is enjoying learning all about that.
Rachel and Anya read Anne of Green Gables and now Rachel is reading Anne of Avonlea while Anya is learning to paint with acrylics. Arwen has read a variety of books and is now reading Fable Haven book 1 to me. I have been enjoying that book again. Susan is reading the Bob books everyday to me and I have been continuing to read the Little House Series to her. I am, at least, enjoying those books immensely.
Sam and Gideon pick out whatever books they want me to read to them each day and often more than once a day. I have read several Holocaust books and am learning a lot of history that I could not have learned any other way. Biographies are a great way to learn how the people experienced history and I really love that way of gaining knowledge.
The summer heat is upon us and we are spending the afternoons in doors. I usually let the kids watch tv and then send them outside to run out their energy around 6pm. They usually stay out until dark or afterwards and then come in for a late dinner between 8 and 9pm. Then we clean up. John usually sets us all down for family scripture study if we have not done it already and then its game time or more reading or whatever and a very late bedtime.
My feet tend to swell at night so I usually head to bed to rest my pregnant body.
In a couple more days, I will be driving Ruth, Kate, Rachel, and Gideon to Palmyra, NY and Kirtland, OH. We have been planning this since March or before. John has decided to stay home with the other kids. Not too long after we get back, I will take whatever kids desire to visit my parents for the 4th of July holiday. After that we have to get things cleaned up and organized, have two July birthdays, and get through two weeks of school before the baby comes the first of August. Once the baby arrives, we will take off two weeks of school and then resume on our normal 2 semester schedule. So life will be busy and fun over the next two months.
