quiet

It's been a little quiet over here of late. Wish a had a wonderful great excuse, but I don't. Other than we've been dealing with some not-so-fun stuff. Our summer hasn't quite turned out the way I had planned due to a lack of vehicles and funds. Oh well, right? There have been some very good parts but also a bit of sadness as well. Reading through some bloggy friends wonderful summer posts (like her's, her's, her's, and her's) I realized a. I haven't taken many pictures in the last 4 months and b. our summer days of late have looked mostly like this =




















Not exactly post worthy or inspiring, huh?
Maybe I should follow Andi's example and make a family end-of-summer to-do list for these next few weeks. Maybe I should muster up some spare energy from somewhere and make a few more memories with the family. We'll see. I'll keep you posted.


PS. Please excuse my blue funk and self-pity party. Chock it up to mid-pregnancy hormones. Tomorrow will be a better day!

1st day of school

School has officially started for us. 3rd grade, here we are! Our books arrived last Thursday around 4pm and Olivia was ready to start right then. Thankfully I was able to put her off until Monday.
We had a family conference Saturday morning regarding our attitudes and how everyone has a part to play in the function of our family and for everything to work smoothly (or as smoothly as possible) that we all need to try our hardest and best at all times. I think it has helped, though I don't kid myself in thinking that it will be the only one we'll have to have this school year.


Our days are going well. There is a comfort and peacefulness in knowing how your day will progress. And as we are still with only one air conditioned car (as Mike likes to drive to work in relative coolness in our heat index of 115F) we enjoy quiet afternoons at home reading, folding laundry, and listening to books on CD.

Sadie-Rose spends a lot of time playing blocks or in her kitchen with a baby and fixing up copious amounts of pretend tea with milk. She also has her own "school book" and loves to sit on my lap sorting the pencils and having me help her write numbers over and over.

My favorite day was definitely Monday. All the excitement of starting something new, the new books, new pencils, all make for good spirits. The funniest moment was by far during our math lesson. We were working on learning some new subtraction sums. Here's how the conversation went, being worked out with manipulatives :
Me: "These squares are cookies. If I had 5 cookies and then I eat those 5 cookies, how many do I have left?"
Olivia: "I want some cookies! Give me some cookies!"
Me: "That's not the point, remember. They're just plastic squares. Now if I had 5 cookies and then I eat those 5 cookies, how many do I have left?"
Olivia: "0"
Me: "Right! Now if I had 9 cookies and I ate 9 cookies, how many do I have left?"
Olivia: "0"
Me: "Good! Ok, now if I had 7 cookies and I ate just 1 cookie, how many would I have left?"
Olivia: "6. I still want some cookies."
Me: "Not right now dear. So, if I had 5 cookies and I ate 0 of them, what would I have?
Olivia: "A bellyache! Because you ate all those other cookies! ha ha ha ha ha!"

Much hilarity ensued but we did finally finish our lesson and Olivia finally got her cookie. :)

I hope your first days of school go as well and are filled with as much merriment. I can't wait to hear all about them!