First Day of School!

On August 10, the kids and I went to Abby and Sarah's schools and met their teachers.  The girls were very excited.  Abby has Mrs. Belski and Mrs. Puller.  She was thrilled to have a couple kids she knows in the class- especially her friend Lauren, who has been in her 1st, 2nd, 3rd and now 5th grade class with her.  :-) .  Sarah has Mrs. Allen and was thrilled to have her.  She was Joshua's 3rd grade teacher also, and he LOVED her.
That evening, Josh and I went on our date and when we got back, we told the kids to get in the car and took them to Yogurt Lab as a surprise.  We had to end the summer with one more fun outing together!

The next day we were up bright and early and getting back into a busy routine.  Here Joshua, Abby and Sarah are, walking out the door for school.

         
I have a friend who takes Joshua to school every morning, so I am thankful that I only have two school carpool lines to sit in, in the mornings.  That saves me some time, so I can get myself back home and back out the door in time to head to my school.

Week before school started

Seems like life has suddenly gotten busy now that school has started!  Here is a short recap of the week before school started.  We had a couple of the kid's friends over to play.   Joshua's friend Keifer came over to swim for a few hours.  They had a lot of fun together!

                                                Joshua read a whole lot this summer.

The kid's enjoyed Lazy Days with Grandmama again this summer.  Mom plans something fun to do with the kids once a week during the summer and the kids love spending time with her.  As a fun ending to the summer, they planned a party to have with their other cousins- Charlie, Sam, Noah and Gray.  Lillie and Eli came too, but they hung out with their Mama's and took naps.   Mom came and picked up the kids on Monday and they went to a local bakery and picked out some fun cookies for the little boys to have at their party.  Tuesday morning, I took them down to Dad and Mom's house so they could have their party.   I love that the cousins all love each other so much and really enjoy being with each other.  Even with such a big age difference. :-)    They had a great time!

I dropped the kids off and then a little later went back down to visit with Mom, Bec and Angie for a little while and enjoy a yummy salad that mom had made!

Josh and I had a meeting at Joshua's school that afternoon, so the kids stayed there and she and dad took them to IHOP for dinner before bringing them home.  The kids loved it!  Thanks dad and mom for letting the kids have such fun memories with y'all!

Strike up the band!

His first try at the trombone

Learning how to hold the trombone

Joshua has been looking forward to joining the Pizitz school band ever since he realized there was one. I wasn't sure what instrument he planned on playing, but this last week Joshua made his choice.

Joshua scored 8 out of 10 on the flute

I like the way the school assists students in finding a reasonable match. In a room full of instruments and musicians, the students carried a list from station to station trying the trumpet, trombone, tuba, baritone, saxophone, clarinet, flute, drums, bassoon, and oboe. The musician at each station gave each student a quick introduction in how the instrument worked and they had a chance to try it out. The student then received a score from 1-10 on how well they picked up the basics of that particular instrument. Joshua scored strongest on the larger brass instruments, though he did pretty well on all the instruments. In fact Joshua confided to one of the instructors that he really wanted to learn to play all the instruments there that day. He had the hardest time with the flute on which he scored an 8. To my surprise he chose the trombone as his top choice and the tuba as his second. I think it scored so highly in his mind because it is an instrument that also is included in the school's jazz band.

The first trombone he tried at Art's Music Shop

Here is a link to the video I shot earlier of Joshua trying a trombone at Art's
So today was the day Joshua got his trombone from Art's music shop in Birmingham! He chose a used Getzen 747 that he couldn't wait to try out when he got home.

Getting ready for school

This morning I cleaned a neighbor's house and then the kid's and I went to Pizitz so that Joshua could set up his locker and practice his locker combination.  I cannot believe that I have child in middle school!!  And that he has a LOCKER! :-)

We set up his locker and then he practiced his combination lock for a little while.  Hopefully it will go smoothly when he starts school on Thursday.  Watching all the girls set up their lockers made me thankful I have a boy going this year.  You should have seen all the decorations, rugs, wallpaper etc... that they used.  The lockers looked VERY cute but it sure was easier to put in a shelf and a couple magnetic holders. :-)

When we were done, we went to one of the gyms and helped clean up the supply sale that had been going on for a few days.   It is the only fundraiser the school has, so we are encouraged to buy the supplies there.  The prices weren't that bad, and I have to admit I wasn't looking forward to driving all around looking for specific items, so yesterday, we bought Joshua's supplies there.  It sure made it simple!  I think all 4 of us enjoyed cleaning up and we had fun visiting with friends while we did it.

 Tonight our Sunday School Class had a party at someone's house and we had hamburgers and hotdogs.  We enjoyed visiting and catching up with friends while the girls had fun swimming in the pool!  Joshua didn't want to swim but had fun playing ball with some of the boys and watching the kids swim.  

I am so thankful for friends and for the schools that our children have the privilege of attending!

Blueberry Picking

On Friday, the kids and I went blueberry picking with mom and Bec and her boys.  It was fun being together!

I

Noah had a ladybug in his bucket and they were all three trying to see it.

Afterwards, Mom and the kids and I went to Whataburger for lunch.  It sure tasted good!
Thanks Mom!

highlights of this past week

I can't believe that summer is almost over and that school will be starting up again soon- for the kids and for myself.  We have had a fun and pretty relaxing summer.  I won't go back and document all the happenings, but here are a few of the highlights from this past week. 

On Tuesday morning, Noah and Gray came over to play for a little while. We had LOTS of fun with them! 

This was after we had walked around outside looking for bugs and really couldn't find any.  We decided they must all live at Noah and Gray's house. :-)

The boys loved looking at Joshua's snake. 

On Thursday, I took the kids to the Ketcham's house for a horseback riding lesson.  They LOVE going out there and have SO much fun!  I love watching them enjoy the horses!

After riding the horses and gving them baths, they let them eat some grass before they put them back in the pasture.

I thought this thistle in the pasture was beautiful. 

This dragonfly seemed to really like the plant also.  It kept flying away and coming back to this same spot.

We have a betta fish and our cat, Smeagol, thinks she has found a new water bowl.  I clean  it once a week and by the time I need to clean it, the bowl is half full. :-)

Here we go again

My wife's Xanga blog has been copied to Blogger where we can easily convert it to book form which is so much better than trying to do it with Xanga. As I type this 250 blog posts with over 2000 photos are being put together into a book by some brainless computer program, and I am breathing a sigh of relief. Looking over the blog entries from the last several years it occurred to Elizabeth and me that we need to record our life events now as much as we did then so here is where we will share the responsibility and pleasure of sharing our family news and events. For my crazy thoughts you can check me out at  http://me-as-me.blogspot.com/ Be forewarned, Elizabeth does not have editing input at that blog like this one :-)
This is where I say goodnight!