Summer Garden, first installment!

Gearing up, for hopefully another good season of tomatoes.  Last year's was awesome, we were eating homemade tomato sauce until March!

This year we have two Early Girl, one cherry tomato, and I bought a basil plant already started!  We have blossoms too!

One of the Early Girl's have blossoms

Cherry Tomato plant blossoms!

Basil planets are looking good!

Year End

We've finished testing today!  Woo Hoo!  Let the summer fun begin.  Lunch was nothing special; here's what it looked like.

 A certain rising 7th grader wanted Cherios!

 A certain almost 4th grader didn't want a full yogurt and

shared with a very willing dog!

Quick photo, with packaged up tests, before heading to

post office.  Boys were happy to see those leave the house!

Happy Summer!

A Home School Mom's look at the summer

We will officially be on summer vacation by noon tomorrow!  I know one 12 yo that will be up by 6:30 ready to finish the last two sections of his test.  Not so sure when our 9yo will be up, but he won't be sleeping in, that much I know!

My brain is already racing with the things I would LOVE to get done!  Already telling friends I am cleaning out in case they want to stop by (hi Amanda!!!).  Already looking at new furniture for crafting area.  So here is my crazy list so far:

• go through the boys dresser drawers and purge clothing
• pull together a van load of stuff for donation (30 minutes worth of work and it will be a descent load)
• work down in the basement to find the floor around: the craft table, washer & dryer, play area, storage shelves, and many other parts
• straighten, purge, trash, organize boys playroom
• have the boys help create a list of things to do over the summer
• plan out some light school days to keep their brains strong
• plan out some fun exercise stuff to keep our bodies strong

Day 3 of 5

We are partially through day 3 of year end testing.  Oldest has five more sections and youngest has seven sections.  Yes, that seems strange that a third grader would have more than a 6th grader, however Iowa Tests of Basic Skills (ITBS) has two extra sections at that level.  Thing One has already gone through it, now it is Thing Two's turn.

What I like about the tests this year, is that they are "corrected" and scores provided more quickly.  I believe I'll receive an email in two weeks instead of the 6 - 8 weeks in prior years.  Had I realized this last summer, I'm not sure I would have planned to end this early in May.  Will keep this info in mind as I schedule out next year!  80)

Anyhoot, I'm scrambling to pull together a fun thing for the boys before Friday!  If you've read prior posts, this one may ring a bell.  It is an activity list of a hundred fun things to do over the summer.  I've already printed this out, as well as a lined sheet of paper to write out what they did over the summer (this will be the last sheet of their book!)  I plan to create a few sheets for a quick and easy book report type thing, have some pages that they can water color on, pages to scrapbook if they want, pages to draw and sketch (nature study or short story).  I'll probably pull together a reading list of books I've found I'd like to go through.  Maybe a list of movies!  Really, options are limitless for this.

Will be interesting to see what the final product will be like!

More on Summer Reading

Thanks to a homeschooling friend, I've had my eye out for lists of good reads for our boys!  Found another today on Pinterest and thought I'd link it here.

Without further adu ~ the list.
 


P.S. This list goes through High School and has some duplicate to what I've already post, but a broader range!

Random Saturday Pictures

Saturdays! Craziness at it's best around here.

Today we had two sports, two kids, two locations, same time. Now I know there are folks who have more than two kids, multiple sports, and have done many things as a single parent.

Kevin has been on baseball duty this spring with Thing Two in kid pitch. They were off and running about 8 AM this morning. Thing One and I headed toward church for TKD.  Dropped him off and headed toward Wally World for a few things.

Decided to swing by a yard sale prior to hitting the store. Found these glass things:

Brown Clorox Bottle

Another pretty brown bottle

What would a Saturday be without a bit of cleaning!  Asked the boys to bring me a cleaner from my bathroom, with the caveat of not spraying it.  It is a bleach bottle.  Once down, I asked Thing Two to get me a piece of colored construction paper and squirted it with the liquid to show the boys what bleach does.  Here's what the sheet looked like after sitting for a bit:

Hopefully this shows why you don't play with bleach or as kids pointed out "wear white while using bleach!"

Happy Saturday folks!

 

Long Hikes

Our oldest is in Boy Scouts.  One requirement for Second Class was to take a 5 mile hike or a 10 mile bike ride.  He choose the hike.  Here are just a couple shots from that:

 That would be Kevin and our oldest way up ahead.  Wonder what they were talking about.
Some things, though, are better left between a father and his son.  It's a guy thing

that I'll never understand!  Just thankful that Thing One (& Thing Two) have a

Dad that is crazy about them.

Our handsome second son.  We seemed to be going at

the right pace for each other.  Charlotte had no choice but

to hang out with me.