August 2013 – Andelin Adventures

Groceries anyone?

Kyle and I took the family grocery shopping today. I know that is something so exciting that everyone should blog about it….well not really. But we were in desperate need of groceries. We usually keep a supply of the stuff we use, in the storage room downstairs, but it was getting to the point that everything we ran out of upstairs, we would go downstairs to get more, and there was no more. And this was becoming WAY too common, so we needed to go restock. We filled two carts with all of our groceries, and we didn’t even get everything that was on our list, we just felt we had been there too long, this was going to cost a lot and we could do another trip in a few days or next week to get the rest. We checked out and the cashier hands us this LONG receipt!

Just seeing that receipt, and my large brood of kids made me think that I need to come home and watch “Yours, Mine and Ours” again. I am talking about the one with Lucille Ball and Henry Fonda, not the newer release that just looks like they butched the story. 😉

Park Day

We had a meeting with some other homeschooling families in our neighborhood at the park today. I think it was good for the kids to see who else out here is home schooling, and see that these kids like it. Ethan still complains about wanting to be at the “real school”, as he calls it, but I noticed that he did NOT complain about getting to spend the morning playing with Pokemon cards with a few friends at the park this morning. 🙂

The kids got to play with other kids that are also doing home school and I got to sit and chat with other moms who teach their kids at home. Everyone talked about the things that they are doing already, the different curriculums they are using, and we talked about other tips and ideas. We each brought a picnic lunch for our families and we brought something to share. So every kid there got to ice their own cupcake. I think Lydia really liked hers.

Adam’s First Birthday!

Adam turned 1 today! His special birthday dinner was pasta, because it’s something that he can eat easily, and he really likes that.

After we got him all cleaned up we went downstairs to let him open his presents. I decided to just get out some toys that he had never seen before and wrap them up for him. All the other kids recognized them when they were opened, but they are completely new to Adam, and he doesn’t care that they are toys that his siblings used before him.

Then we went back upstairs for cake. I made him a chocolate cake with penuche frosting.

When he was all done he tried to throw his plate overboard:

He got to crawl around a play a bit while he waited for the big kids to get ready for bed.

He had a really good day, and when we put him to bed he just wanted to keep partying (maybe it was just that he was on a sugar high….)

Eventually he did lay down. 😉

First Day of School- Home School Style

Today is officially the first day of school! A few weeks ago we decided it was time to tell the kids that we would be home schooling this year. It’s a terrifying thought for me, but it is something that I have been wanting to do, and putting off for several years. With all of the problems we were having with Tyra last year, being problems that had just built off of problems the year before, I decided that I didn’t want to have another year that was just worse than ever because it was building off of the problems of multiple years before it, and therefore it was time to just kick myself in the butt and do this home school thing!

The kids had various reactions. Ethan was VERY upset about the concept of home school, probably because Ethan is a creature of habit and when things suddenly change from what he is expecting he does not like it, no matter what the change is. Tyra was upset as well, but mainly because “I will miss my friends”. So she is upset about missing out on the social aspect of school. Jeremy, just shrugged his shoulders and said “ok”. He doesn’t seem to be upset about it at all, but he isn’t excited either. I kind of wonder if maybe he was being picked on at school. He used to ride his bike to school, but then one day he REFUSED because it had training wheels on it. So we took them off, and tried to help him practice learning to ride without but he hadn’t got it down and just refused to ride his bike to school ever again, which is what makes me wonder if someone picked on him for having training wheels or something. Dinah also wasn’t very excited about the home school idea, but she wasn’t sad either. I did preschool with her and a group of other kids and each parent took turns with the teaching, so sometimes the preschool was here, and so learning at home isn’t really a new concept for her.

So I was determined to make today special even if they weren’t going to the public school. I made special crepes for breakfast:

I decided we would kind of take it slow to begin with because I am still figuring out what I am doing and the kids need to adjust to the idea of this is home school, not extended summer vacation. I didn’t want to just jump in and try to do a million subjects every day and burn myself and them out, so today I just explained the concept of ‘copy work’ and had them do a bit and we called it good. Hopefully we can make that part of our morning routine and then add something else after a bit.

Here they are on the first day of school:

My big school kids:

I am glad that they aren’t so mad about home schooling that they at least smiled for the pictures. 🙂

Utah County Fair

Last year I found out that there is a Scout Expo at the Utah County Fair, and I really wanted to go, but our schedule was so crazy, and I was so close to having Adam that we decided to not go, but to plan on going this year. So I am SO excited that we got to go this year. I am a little disappointed that the website said it ended at 1 and it really ended at noon, so we had to rush to get to as many booths as possible before everyone packed up.

We didn’t get very far, before the boys just wanted to stay and stare at what was in front of them. The first booth we stopped at was a display of a scout camp made out of legos!

There was a booth with a big scout quilt on display, the front and back had all kinds of patches on it and the back had neckerchiefs put together to make up the background. The kids got to shoot off some paper rockets that were left at another booth. There wasn’t any more paper for the kids to make their own and that’s ok with me, because all they really wanted to do was launch them, and not making their own rockets meant more time to see the other booths. Next the kids got to make some sand and glitter art by drawing a picture on a paper with glue and then pouring colored sand or glitter on it so that you could see the design. At another booth some of the kids got to plant some seeds, and some learned to tie a couple of new knots. At the last booth we were able to get to before everything was packed up was a booth where the kids got to make necklaces with boondoggle and a leather fob. Lydia was excited to show me hers (I actually made it for her so I already saw it, but she was excited about it anyway 😉 ).

I’m sad that we didn’t get there until the expo was almost over but I am very glad we got to go. Someone gave Tyra, Ethan and Kyle patches for the scout expo which I think is so cool, but I’m kind of sad that Jeremy (who is almost a scout) and Dinah (who is already a scout) didn’t get patches. I guess I will have to see if I can hunt a couple of extras down. It was rather disappointing that this was supposed to represent scouting across all of Utah county and as I think about the lay out and count the booths that I saw there were about a dozen booths total. Granted I am coming up with that number as I think back on it, and I might be missing one, but it was really very small considering it was supposed to be for all of Utah county. I would LOVE to see our pack or boy scout troop or both, have a booth there next year.

Once the scout expo was all packed up we decided to walk across the bridge and check out the county fair. The first building we went to was another huge distraction for the boys:

All three of them are drooling over the lego display. 😛 We walked around and checked it all out, then we walked around the rest of the building and I took pictures of crafts that I thought would be fun for the kids to try to make.

Next we went to see what animals were being shown at the fair. There were FAR less animals here than there usually are at the state fair. The state fair usually has several buildings of animals of all different kinds, and there was only a small tent of animals to check out at the county fair today.

There were some animals that some girls were allowing kids to sit down and hold or pet. One of them was a baby pygmy goat. It was so cute.

There was also a rabbit.

Just before we left I took Lydia over to see the pony. She got SO excited and said “is horsey!” and I just happened to be trying to take a picture of her with one hand while I held her with the other and got her super excited face as she was exclaiming that it was a horsey: