Chill-axin July

We started off July 1st with a bang - a Canada Day run.....so much for chill-axing!! ;) Both Keziah and Lincoln ran a 1 km (I ran with Lincoln), and Nathan ran the 5 km. It was a good way to start the celebrations of our nation's birthday.

 

 

 

 

 

 

A hard run always deserves a treat of ice cream!

 

School must be done and Keziah must be home........she leaves a creative trail wherever she goes...

 

Painting rocks at 8 in the morning, the first morning of summer break. Yawn.

So fun to have friends over and make memories!

 

We've received a LOT of rain this summer, and so one day we decided to hit the mall. The kids get so excited to do this. Although the mall is only 15ish minutes away, we rarely go and so it felt like quite the treat! Even Lincoln doesn't mind - as long as he can play at some point and if we hit every.single.escalator and elevator ;)

 

Keziah's birthday once again fell in the weeks that we were gone camping and so we had a shared birthday party before we left. This was the sign she made and taped it to our door ;)

 

The birthday girls!! What's kind of neat is that to the girl to the left is a daughter of Nathan's cousin (on the Helder side), and the girl to the right is a daughter of Nathan's cousin (on the Witten side). So both are related to Keziah....I believe that makes them second cousins?!

Fishing in our pond.

So peaceful.....

"I got one!!!" Oh wait...it's a snag. A really big snag. So big the line snapped. Oops!!

And that was our July! We've enjoyed sharing a pool with others most afternoons but I realize I don't have a single picture of any of it! It was a good month - a month where I didn't want to think a single thought about school. But now, we are in August. School (for me as a teacher) will begin this Monday. 'Member all those boxes and moving? Yeah, they need to be unpacked now and a classroom needs to be set up. Thankfully the first two weeks of August were very restful as we camped so now I am getting more ready to pick up my task as teacher again.

Camping pictures next time! I hope you are enjoying your summer so far! Or winter....depending where you are from ;)

Jumpin' June

I seem to do my monthly reviews when the next month is more than halfway over!! Oh well, better late than never :)

June. Jumpin' June. Was it ever a month of jumping - between report card writing, organizing a Play Day for the school, wrapping up curriculum with my students, saying good-bye to them, then packing, packing, packing everything in our school as our school is moving into a new building. Jumpin' June?! I'd say so!! And that was just SCHOOL stuff!! Never mind HOME stuff! But we got through it and I managed to take a few pictures as well.

Play Day - a day where the student body is divided up into teams and they play different team building games as well as track and field challenges. Here are some of the games:

Kids had to pour water from cup to cup till the end of the line, where the last person then filled a pop bottle. The more pop bottles they fill, the more points they get.

 Not too sure how successful these two were, considering they weren't watching what they were doing :)

Spider Web - where each team member needs to go through an opening (that has not been used yet) of the web without touching the sides.

High jump! Keziah did quite well in this event.

 

Water balloon Volleyball - using two bed sheets, they need to pass a water balloon back and forth. The more complete passes, the more points the team gets.

Skis (that Nathan made!!): the team needs to work together to move the skis past 6 pylons. The more pylons you pass, the more points. Very tricky!!

It was a fun day. I was one of the Play Day Committee members, and I managed to put 23, 000 steps on my Fitbit that day! The kids weren't the only ones exhausted that night!

Nathan was gone for a few days and we discovered skype!! That was pretty exciting for the kids. And me :)

We had some marvelous sunsets!

 

 

My dad comes to visit often (when he is not off motorcycling, atving, snowmobiling, traveling etc.), and the kids LOVE it when he reads to them.

Goofball

 

This girl has discovered chapter books!! It's slow going but she is getting there!

The cozier the spot, the better to read!

Keziah found a couple beautiful butterflies on the way home from the bus stop. Aren't they gorgeous?!

 

 

My old classroom, almost done packing!

Lincoln's self portrait :) Not sure about the orange teeth....but everything else is pretty accurate :D

And that was June. It was a busy but fruitful month. Oh, and our basement renos also finished. But that's another post for another time. We are enjoying our summer holidays thus far - enjoying God's creation and all that summer has to offer. I hope you are as well!!

Magnificent May

Well, I am in the last week of school. Report cards have been written up, class trip to Marineland is booked for tomorrow, and Wednesday is our last day of school. Then our school is moving, so packing, packing, packing is in store for the rest of the week. Then unpacking, unpacking, unpacking is what is on the agenda for next week. So while the feet are ready to be put up, it'll be a bit yet.

But let's take a moment to go through the month of May. May had a bit of an added busyness to it as I coached the Gr. 7 and 8 boys baseball for about a month, to get them ready for a tournament where many of "our" schools meet to play for the day. It was fun but oh so busy! I loved it but I was thankful for the after school practices to be done.

It wasn't all baseball though May. Here is what else kept us busy:

This not so brilliant bird thought that to mate with his reflection would be a great idea!! And so, for a good 5 weeks, this bird attacked my windows, making an absolute mess of them. We printed off some birds of prey and taped them to the windows to block his reflection AND to scare the feathers off of him. It took a week and finally he either gave up or found a prettier bird to go after.

 

 These two continue to love life together.

There was one popsicle left. They were quite content to share it - one lick for him, one lick for her and so on.

One of my Mother's Day's gift from Keziah - a homemade water bottle. Lucky me!! :)

Enjoying the outdoors together.

We went on our first camping trip of the year!! We went on the May long weekend. It was a buffet of weather: cool, warm, sunny, and rainy. But no snow so that is good :) Before we left, Nathan and Keziah bought some wood - she was quite the hard worker!

 

 

 Friends came to visit on the sunny day. We spent some time at the beach but not too much swimming was happening - Lake Huron was freeeeeeezzzzzziiiiiinnnnnggggg!!!

 

The ice water didn't stop these boys....

 

 

 First s'more of the season!! Apparently one is at risk for a head injury when eating a s'more....:)

Such a typical fire picture - Keziah is in the second row. She still does not like the fire and heat.

Back home, we kept up our tradition of the kids (note, the KIDS, not adults....) jumping into our pool on the May long weekend:

 

When school is not on the agenda for the day, these two are never ever far apart from each other.

She's reading!! She's READING!!!! Keziah has discovered chapter books. She has discovered she can do it! She has discovered confidence. What a beautiful thing to witness. It has taken a long time to get to this stage and she has worked very hard.

Ever the crafty girl. She made this desk and chair out of cardboard and tape. She is just so unbelievably creative.

McDonalds was on the menu for that desk....:)

This is what our Thursdays look like, the day Lincoln and I are home together: a very occupied boy playing with his cars, lining them all up.

He is getting so big. I can't believe he is going to Gr. 1 in September!!

And this girl. Growing up in so many different ways. Here she is wearing a dress and hat sewn by my mom for her.

 

And that was May!! Now June is almost over. I think I have all of 4 pictures for June. Oops!! I have about a week to add a few more.....

It'll Happen!!!

Breathe. It's June. Like 11 days already. May hasn't been documented yet. Breathe. I am a teacher. Did I say it's June? Breathe. I can do this. May update will come soon.....maybe in a few days?  Stay tuned. Breathe.

(just reminding myself to breathe is this very busy month!!)