Little Princess Went to FSY and We Celebrated Independence Day

 First thing Monday morning, Little Princess was off to FSY.  

The rest of us settled into our normal Monday routine of chores, school, and free time . . . at least we did after we celebrated The Munchkin's successful completion of "Kindergarten Boot Camp" and return to our house.

We cheered for him and for kindergarten.

His mom texted me later to tell me that even though kindergarten promises to be awesome, he missed us very much.  I assured her that the feeling was mutual.

Nature Angel spent all day on this beautiful crocheted square.  


She says the pattern is quite complicated and that she pulled it apart to redo it more times than she could count.

Her determination and patience constantly leave me in awe.

Much to my dismay, I just discovered that I took no pictures of the kids' main activity all week--Pokemon play stores.  They made pretend money and pretend debit cards.  They set up our living room to look like an entire mall of Pokemon stores with their cards set up in elaborate displays.  They established prices and shopped each other's stores.  

I can't even describe the sheer quantity of math practice that happened all week long!

Then there was regular math, too.

Lola didn't do her math all day long.  She got started on it at 7:00 pm.  We were all waiting for her to be finished so that we could do bedtime reading.  She was frustrated, but Brother was a patient teacher.

Once she finished, we read the last chapter of The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh.  

Such a satisfying read!

With no advance warning, The Munchkin and Sugar Bear were not in attendance on Wednesday.  The weather dropped to 80 (though with 93% humidity), and we had a coupon for a free day at the zoo.

We went!























The aquarium was new to the zoo, and it was amazing.  I'm grateful for how the zoo is making more interactive exhibits.  We got up close and personal with a lot of animals.

We made another recipe from our Summer Baking Bingo card--fruit salsa.



When all of the fruit was chopped and mixed, we ended up with a gallon of fruit salsa!  

We ate it with grain-free chips, and it was a really fun treat.

Then we ate the leftovers on our oatmeal the next morning.

Suddenly it was the 4th of July!

We headed up to celebrate with Mamaw and Grandpa Chad.


Among other things, we were in charge of corn on the cob.


We arrived just in time for the town parade.  It consisted of emergency vehicles, campaigning local officials, the PTSA, a band, the high school cheer squad, and lots of farm equipment.

It makes my heart happy.


At the very end, there was a small equestrian group.

This is where the absolute joy of a small town parade comes in because they stopped walking so that the kids could pet the horses! 🩷


Then the kids spent the afternoon in the pool.


And we had a marvelous cook out.


Mamaw led a family gratitude circle.  We each expressed our thanks for various blessings we have as a result of living in the USA.

Our entire area had been experiencing torrential rain for several days.  Even though the afternoon and evening of the 4th turned out clear and warm, many towns in the area postponed their fireworks shows because of flooding and/or dicey forecasts.

The town we were in was one of those. 🥹

But . . .

The view on our drive home was filled with fireworks shows out on the horizon almost the whole way.

So we got a pretty good show nonetheless.

In the evening, we received a few messages from Belle in Aruba.  Apparently, a some Americans were in town because she and her companion got a bit of a fireworks show from their patio.  They danced to country music and sang patriotic songs to celebrate the founding of the USA even from 2,300 miles from home (or 1,100 miles from the southern tip of Florida).

All week long, Nature Angel was busy with paperwork and her pre-employment physical.  On Friday, she had her TB test (which is so obviously negative, it's laughable), and she'll report back to the doctor's office for the check on Monday morning.

Saturday morning, Nature Angel drove 4 hours round trip to pick up Little Princess from FSY.

Oh. My. Gosh.  How beautiful is my girl!?!?!

Some favorite friends

Her counselors for the week

Little Princess came home filled with joy and stories.  Most impressive were the stories she told of the classes she took.  It seems to me that this FSY had superior teachers who really knew how to reach the youth, validate their questions, and teach them to look for answers.

I am very, very grateful she attended FSY this year, and she says she feels the same.

Lastly, the tomato harvest has begun.

It was delicious!

Sir Walter Scott and the 3 oldest boys are headed off to Boys' Camp at 6:20 Monday morning.

I think our at-home food consumption will drop by more than half this coming week!

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Anne's Day in the Life: 17, 16, 12, 10, 9, 8, 8, 7, 5, & 5

Image
This is my crew last summer--the day we said goodbye to Pixie as she headed off to college. I actually have all 12 of my children home right now. Rose Red is nearly 20, graduated from our homeschool a year and a half ago, lives at home, and is working as a server at Applebee's as she tries to understand what it means to be an adult. Pixie is newly 18, graduated from our homeschool almost a year ago, is a dance major at BYUI, and is spending her off-track semester working full-time in the 1-year-old room at a daycare. These two still are part of our family days, and their schedules directly impact the rest of us, but I am no longer responsible for their day-to-day educational needs. The remaining 10 are still under my educational supervision.  Among these 10 children we are schooling while we cope with anxiety, depression, FASD, ADHD, DMDD, ODD, ASD, PTSD, and Intellectual Disability. Here is a February Wednesday in our lives. 5:04 am :  Sir Walter Scott's al
Read more

A Week, Briefly (Summer is not over)

Image
Last August I was not ready for school to start, but I did it anyway because I thought I should. And in September I had mental health crisis of the most serious kind. This August I am not ready for school to start. And I'm honoring that. However, I am ready to document brief moments of the beautiful learning that my kids engage in when I'm not running school. This week Rose Red is in Florida at a surfing camp.  She's with a sweet friend.  I could not be happier for her to have this experience away from home, at the beach, out-of-doors, physically active, and just plain cool. As far as I'm concerned, this is a quarter of a credit of P.E. The rest of us are at home.  My teens are reveling in their last days of bizarre teen sleeping schedules before early morning seminary begins next week. Pixie has been working on memorizing the dances she's choreographed for our dance team.  She'll be teaching the 10-12 year olds and dancing with the 12-17 year o
Read more

Different Seasons Require Different Days

Image
 I'm sitting in my nightgown on the couch looking at two needy kids.   Beowulf, lying in the oversized armchair, doesn't feel well.  He's got no appetite; he's lethargic; he says his head hurts and that he's dizzy. The last two are actually less concerning than the first two for this endlessly hungry, endlessly energetic boy of mine. He's got no fever, but he says he's cold. And he just looks . . . ill. Mister Man lies stretched out on the couch with his foot propped up.   It might be broken. He certainly can't walk on it. It's just about 24 hours since he fell off the fallen tree in our backyard.  We thought it was just scrapes and bruises and treated his injuries accordingly.  Since then, he's been achy, throbby, sore, and swollen.  We've used ibuprofen, ice, and elevation, but he hasn't improved. We found an orthopedic urgent care that opens in an hour and a half or so.  Sir Walter Scott will take him there. I will stay home with Beowu
Read more