August 4-6

Sunday is always an up and down day… but we totally lucked out with Sunday afternoon COMPANY! Lily Bean and our girls are fast friends already and this time Bree brought Quinn!!! Talk about a great afternoon!

Our Monday moved right back into our daily patterns. While I love flexibility and all, the constant spelling, folder work, and together time has been doing wonders on our progress and our attitudes.

We had two rather important completions! Trinity finished another of her Pre K books and GAVIN moved onto his grade 3 math. A little ahead of schedule and with some things we will refocus on later, but what a confidence boost!!!

On Tuesday we started our true discussion on Lions and what we know already about them. I was quite impressed by the amount of facts the kids already have about them. We plan on learning a bit about Kenya and Tanzania as well, with some books, lapbooks, worksheets and random shows I think we will do just fine on our 3rd major animal unit!!

Of course we had to enjoy some sunshine. With the AC sometimes we forget how lovely it is outside as well. But wow is it nice on those super hot days!

 I am sure there will be another picture blog with the rest of our Lily and Quinn time, but I hope you enjoyed the pictures that I have posted! It is so nice to visit with our friends be it planned or surprise drop ins!

Ok maybe just adorable babes in the sunshine.

Oh… and me!

Flowers from the garden

And thus begins the Lily Bean Babysitting photo spread!

That dragon always returns to the photo shoots!

Both of my babies

With her Mommy

July 10-12

Welcome back Nana and Baba! They got home late on the 9th after everyone had gone to bed, WITH the cousins in tow! So the kids woke up to grandparents AND Gabriella and Zachary. Talk about pandemonium…. But even more importantly for yours truly – I had PLANS!!! Fun plans… that included babies, Korean food (a first for me!) and shopping! Bree is originally from Korea (born there) but adopted and raised here, so it was so exciting to go to a restaurant her parents took her to to better understand a portion of her previous culture. The food was AMAZING! And FILLING!

So filling, amazing food!

After eating it was time to go to Mall of America and shop around… which ended in myself buying some rather ADORABLE and decadent (for me) retro shoes… I could not resist and spent more on one pair than I have in ages (not hard to do as I usually limit myself to as far under 20.00 as I can!).

Walking the mall with Bree and Lily was great fun… we shopped and then headed over to their place to relax until we could avoid the rush hour traffic.

Walking in the sling

And now some cute pics… cuz I can!

Mommy has a nice selection of pretty cloth diapers

Definitely a day well spent… Thursday had us down to one cousin. Gabriella had a friend contact her the day before and had left to join them so we just had Zachary here. So the kids played the morning away.

In the afternoon we had time outside in the sun. That playset is a definite boon to our peace keeping.

We ended our week off with a lovely walk… just us 6 enjoying the sunshine and flowers. It was hot and we did not come across any garage sales (just one misleading sign) but I think we did good.

She looks so grown up at times

The twins worked with pastels to fill the time. I love when they try harder mediums! And together no less!

Using the Art for Kids site (link on right)

The littles had a blast watching Dora. It is fun to see Echo trying to answer the questions and follow along!

At the hottest point of the day I sat down to work on our advance stuff. Each of the 4 kids has a summer folder now with pages that they can mostly do on their own with a 5th folder of some games. I really need more cardstock and laminating sheets! Can you ever really have enough?

Ken took a shorter day of work so that the kids could have a full on water fight with him!

Getting ready for Daddy

And then he and Baba FINISHED the swingset! Two swings and a teeter totter type one that the twins are too heavy for. The kids are over the moon with the completion.

What else is there to do with a free Daddy but to end with a boardgame??

Oh and Emanuel graced us with some dinosaur themed sidewalk art.

I don’t think we had any complaints about our day really!!!