It's False Fall #1

 The kids were so used to hiding from the heat that they missed an awful lot of good outdoor weather!

So did I, for that matter.

I spent my days cutting music and choreographing dances for American Rhythm.

Nature Angel spent her days cutting music and choreographing dances for American Rhythm.

She did a lot more choreography than I did because I stopped constantly to prepare, serve, and clean up meals.

The kids read books and built stuff with magnetic tiles.

(I wish I could accurately represent the excitement and clamor of Sir Walter Scott coming home with our weekly library haul!)

As I realized how beautiful the weather actually was, I started kicking kids out of the house; "You all have to spend at least 30 minutes outside."

They would complain and moan and accuse me of being the meanest mom ever. 

But they would find out it was beautiful, and they would last an hour outside.  Then they would come in, feel the lure of the outdoors, and out they would go again.

Sir Walter Scott took the kids to the park one day for a little family baseball, soccer, and playing around.

We're picking tomatoes pretty steadily (not a lot because I didn't prune my plants well, but a good tomato a day is a treat).  We also picked some of our yard-long beans (ours were 12-18 inches) that I cut and threw into a batch of bucket pickles.  Mister Man and Brother watched over a neighbor's garden while she was out of town, and their pay was whatever produce was ripe over the week.  We ate lots of fresh cucumbers, and now we have quite a few jalapeños alongside another pepper that I need to ask her to identify for me.

We finished Super and started The Witch of Blackbird Pond.  The kids don't know this, but that's a schoolbook for our first month of school. (Hee, hee, hee)  They're loving it, and my only hope is that our days and evenings settle down enough for our reading to actually be a regular routine!

We have managed to settle back into getting a daily math lesson done (some have settled better than others).  I'm waiting until the last possible moment to order our new math subscriptions, so that I can cram as many as possible into the family membership deal.

We had our first American Rhythm meeting.  It wasn't a rehearsal, rather a mom's meeting and a special session to organize the kids into classes.

I called my little Stars over (ages 3-6) and did a few activities with them for fun.  I told them that our class is called The Stars, and, in order to cement that, I asked them if they were The Clouds or The Elbows and other silly things like that.  They were so cute nodding solemnly yes to whatever name I asked them about and then switching to shaking their heads no when I giggled (on purpose) and corrected them. 

One sweet boy who has already been one of my students at church is 6-turning-7.  I told him to stay with the main group so that he could dance with the big kids.  However, he's a perfectionist, and the rhythm activity the rest of the kids were doing was too much of a challenge for him. (It was too much of a challenge for some of the teens, but they were able to laugh it off and try again.)  He cried and got angry, and his mom sat him in a chair to calm down.  

I went over to him and let him vent while his mom headed to the mom's meeting (I've sat through 12 of these over the years, and I didn't really need to be there).  I listened, agreed with him, told him what our classes are really like, explained that he never had to come back again but that I'd really love to have him in my class, and gave him options:

1.  Go home and never come back.

2.  Join The Stars class and be the biggest kid there, but he'd be with his brothers, and the dances would be very easy.

3.  Join The Stripes class (his actual age group) and try some harder things, but nothing like that rhythm activity we were doing at the moment.  I also demonstrated some of the choreography so he could make an informed decision.

I told him he could think about it for as long as he needed, and that whatever he chose would be okay with me and his mom (I knew this because we'd already talked).

I headed over to join the mom's meeting.

After about half an hour, he walked into the meeting, passed his mom to come directly to me, and said, "I would like to be in the Star class.  I would like to be with my little brothers."  

I expressed happiness and told him, "You'll be the biggest kid there, but that will be very nice for all of the little kids to have a big kid to set a good example for them."

He solemnly agreed with me and told me he was very good at being a good example for younger kids.  Then he turned to go play again.

Oh. My. Gosh!

My heart!!! 

While I was still talking dance particulars over with the director after the main meeting, Sugar Bear got in the van and pretended to drive.  

She was very intense and very happy!

Church activities included swimming (Lola and Baymax) and a variety of team games for the teens/tweens who are working hard at getting used to one another as a newly formed group.

Little Princess attended CAP, which now conflicts with church activities due to the boundary changes.  It's quite disappointing because it will be harder for her to make new friends when she's missing the weekly activities.  Hopefully, she'll choose to miss a CAP meeting once every 5 or 6 weeks in order to attend a church activity instead.

Half a dozen supplies arrived in the mail this week, so that we can do the hands-on projects included in our first month's school plan.  I've got to order a few more, and then we'll be as ready as we'll ever be for our first official day of homeschool for the '24-'25 school year.

Holy cow!  It's getting close!!!!