happy birthday and goodbye

so a few weeks ago sam and i came up with the fun idea to throw his parents a surprise 60th birthday party!

so i quick called up his sister, anna, to see what she thought

she thought it was great so the planning began

then, anna and her husband accepted a job in kansas

and will be moving in like 2 weeks 

so then came the idea to include a going-away party

with the birthday party 

we were only inviting family along with a few close friends

so it was the perfect opportunity for anna and her family

to see everyone before they left 

from that point on anna thought she was helping plan a birthday party for her parents

when really she was helping plan a party for herself too

i didn't tell my girls about the party til the morning of

it was quite a secret to keep and with anna's family living in

town with sam's parents and us seeing them daily i wasn't sure they could 

keep the secret 

they were super excited and quickly went into decorating mode

sofie was in charge of the happy birthday sign

and lia was in charge of the good luck sign 

the signs along with black streamers for the birthday party 

and red, blue and yellow (kansas colors) streamers and balloons for the going away party were excitedly packed 

was a fun night visiting with aunts, uncles, cousins and friends

that we hadn't seen in a while 

the weather was calling for storms that afternoon, but it turned out to 

be a beautiful night with not a cloud in sight

 we are sure going to miss anna and noah along with their 4 kids--

ava(10), john(8), esther(7), charlie(2) and their unborn baby due in december

 our hearts are sad for lia whose best friend is cousin esther

 thanks to everyone that came to help celebrate

 the rest are photos taken during the party

happy birthday chuck and susan

and

good luck noah, anna, ava, john, esther and charlie!!

 

fun in wisconsin

we took a little trip to wisconsin to visit my sister and her family last week.

 we pulled the camper thinking cousin sleepovers in it sounded fun

the drive up was quick and scenic as usual

my sister and i both have 2 girls and 1 boy

 there was some reading...

 a lot of dress-up and playing house

 we drove to the nearby state park and did some hiking

it had this beautiful waterfall in it

my sis and her husband

it had this monster hill that you could climb up.

everyone but me climbed it.

i lost my sense of thrill when i had kids. 

these 2 are 3 1/2 weeks apart in age.

i just love taking photos of them together. 

 a silly group shot

notice all the bunny ears

the adults

a group shot

turned out pretty good 

after the hike we headed over to the beach

even though it was like a fall day and the water was a tad cold--

the kids still had a ball 

 thanks for the smile sam

6 completely exhausted kids after a full day

sam was able to play on our brother-in-law's slow pitch team while we were there

 these guys were pretty fun to play with

 cousins are special!

 thanks to sara, todd, clara, simon and ruthie for a relaxing, fight-free vacation!!!

looking forward to seeing them all again in 2 weeks when they come to iowa for old thrashers!!!

 

summer highlights...

so far--

*  frequent trips to nearby pools and aquatic center's

*  relaxing while kye jumps off diving board for hours with his arm floaties on

*  sofie loves the high-dive

*  lia has gained so much confidence in the water

*  all of our curriculum has arrived and been put away.  we are all so anxious to get started in 3 weeks

*  had a really fun 6-day visit from my sister and her 3 kids.  we are excited to make the trip to wisconsin in 2 weeks to visit them

*  as of today, the kids and i have picked 54 cups of blackberries.  so far we have given them all away

*  kye and i made the most delicious zucchini bread with zucchini from our garden

*  eating fresh salsa everyday

*  as of today, i have canned 23 pints of dill pickles and 18 pints of bread and butter pickles.  and i don't even like them...

*  we bought a pop-up camper

*  lia is still loving riding lessons once a week

*  the kids finished 2 summer reading programs.  at one point we had 50 books checked out at once--that's just nuts.  they definitely don't get their love for reading from their mom

*  sofie and i had our annual shopping trip for her birthday--it's always one of my favorite days.  it's a good thing i like claire's

i wonder what august will bring?

ready for school

the girls and i are so excited for school to start!

i started researching curriculum back in early spring. 

and i finally finished in mid-june.

i am confident that i have found curriculum that will fit our family perfectly!

if i didn't feel strongly that summer break is so important--we would have 

started already.

that's how excited i am!!

so, this year sofie will be using the following:

math-- math-u-see

i used it last year and we loved it!  this year she will be finishing up the second half of gamma and probably start their next book around christmas

reading-- drawn into the heart of reading

i am super excited about this!  this was an easy pick for me--the curriculum will allow her to read from several genre's and really break down the books in different ways.  i am confident this will be a really good fit for her.

english--  learning language through literature-the yellow book

we used this last year as well--just a different grade level.

art--  rod and staff's artpac

last year i didn't use a formal art curriculum.  i just kinda made up my own seasonal art's and craft's projects.  this will be a fun change!

and, lia will be using:

math--  math-u-see

again, we used this last year and it was a wonderful hands-on curriculum.  lia will be starting the beta book.

reading--  rod and staff's we learn more about God

this was probably my hardest decision to make.  reading is very challenging to lia so i really wanted to find a curriculum that would fit her learning style as well as be interesting for her.  

english--  rod and staff's building christian english

last year i used learning language through literature but i didn't feel it was a good "fit" for lia.  i hope this will be.

art--  rod and staff's artpac

just like with sofie, this will be our first year doing a formal curriculum

and we will be doing the rest together:

science--  apologia's exploring creation with zoology 1--flying creatures of the fifth day

i am super, super excited about this!  we didn't do a formal curriculum last year--just a few experiments here and there. 

history--  the story of the world

this is our first year doing history as well.  since we travel twice a week to kye's speech therapy , the cd's that came with this was very attractive to me.  i have been wanting to incorporate some kind of school into our drive-time and now i can!

geography--  our father's world

we did some general map work last year but a formal curriculum will be new to us this year.  

bible--  character building for families

we worked through devotionals last year and it was really fun.  however, this will be something our whole family will do together.

i really wanted to keep our first year simple.  and it was!  it was perfect!  i wouldn't change a thing about it.

so adding in science, history and geography will be a change for us.  will probably add a good hour to our school-time if not more.  but, the beauty of homeschooling is that we can go at our own pace.

we will still spend our mornings schooling, being done by lunch.  and our afternoon's will be spent baking, doing simple chores, playing outside and getting together with friends or really whatever we feel like that day.

school starts in 3 weeks!!!