August 14-15

I got the lucky opportunity to take our not so little family over to the Novaks’ house first thing in the morning to help Darcy out so she could make an important appointment an hour away. Ken had class, his last before the test, so for him it was a drop and run. I got there AFTER Darcy had left (gotta love the older boys who can manage for shorter periods of time).

We had the computers running Minecraft, the oldest still sleeping away, cartoons on the tv and a lovely day to enjoy.

Lunch was simple – veggies, crackers, cheese and juice.

Apparently celery without peanut butter is NOT cool!

We stayed well into the evening as Ken not only had class but afterwards everyone went out for dinner.

SNOOPY~!

Andrew and Anthony took all but Echo out to the nearby park. I think we completely wore out all 5 of ours but it was a great day… not only did we have a massive playdate BUT we also had a lovely bit of downtime before Thursdays first annual assessment test for the kids officially registered in homeschooling (ages 7 and up).

birthday cookie!

With her Snuggly Worm

The test was a long awaited final requirement for the state of Minnesota for the year and a total weight off my mind. While I do not believe in sharing grades and really in grading completely at this age I can do the proud mama (and teacher) brag and state that ONE of the twins is 2 full grades ahead in math and the other almost 1 1/2! We do need to work on spelling (not a surprise) and general knowledge (well DUH, we are teaching them NOW what the kids here have grown up knowing) so no real surprises… except how well they are doing!!! Good job boys!!!!

We were hoping to start swimming lessons Thursday evening but the swim club ended up short of numbers so we are waiting for the second session. Instead I took the (apparently) courageous move to walk all 5 kids (with Echo in stroller) along the major road, over a bridge and hill to McDonald’s for a special dinner! What I thought was a decent length walk turned out to be a total 3.4 mile walk!! ACK (that is with return trip, 1.7 each way) We had a lovely dinner and even won a free smoothie!

Starting out all excited

Freebie!

Ready to head home

Emanuel figured once we got there we should have contacted Daddy and had him come get us but we were made of sterner stuff  than that and walked all the way home and directly into the shower!

We came home to undies for our no longer baby… not sure she understands what they are for yet!

A day of milestones to be sure!