Halloween 2014

What is really spooky is that we are almost two weeks past Halloween and I still haven't had a chance to post anything yet. 

This is the second year in a row that we haven't made it to the pumpkin patch.  I think there are three reasons for that.  The first is time.  As the kids get older and more involved in things, we just run out of weekends.  The second reason also has to do with the fact that they are older.  They just don't seem to care that much whether they go or not.  They were just as happy to pick out pumpkins from the back of a truck at the farmer's market.  And third, since they don't really care whether they go or not, we would rather not spend a king's ransom to go to the pumpkin patch where you have to buy tickets to the corn maze and the jumpy pillow..etc.  The "farm" where we always went has gotten so commercial and so expensive.  

So that being said, a few nights before Halloween, we carved our farmer's market pumpkins.  I only have a couple of phone pictures from the festivities.  I wasn't really in the mood to haul out the big guns. 

My favorite part about Halloween is the kids' costumes.  I absolutely LOVE putting their costumes together.  I love coming up with ideas.  I love the hunt for pieces.  I love stitching and sewing pieces together. It is one of my favorite times of the year.

Hailey decided over the summer that she wanted to be Maleficient.  I was thrilled - for one, not Elsa- and second, there is not much better than a good villain costume.

One of my favorite parts of the costume was her staff with Diaval attached to it.  I almost jumped for joy when I saw that bird at the dollar store.

We purchase the dress on ebay - it was a standard Maleficient kit costume.  I didn't like that the dress was all black so I added a purple underskirt from a thrift store prom dress.  She wore a purple top she had underneath.  The costume came with tiny horns on a headband, but when she trick or treated at the campground nobody knew who she was.  They all thought she was some kind of devil.  So I knew I needed to make her some substantial horns.  They turned out pretty amazing.

Evan wanted to be an Indian brave.  We were able to throw together his costume pretty easily.   We found his pants and that amazing shirt at the thrift store.   The shirt had beading and fringe and even some real animal fur.  We purchased it for one dollar!  Talk about being in the right place at the right time.

We found that faux fur vest at the thrift store too.  I don't know if he really needed it for the costume, but he liked it and it was a good addition to the dress up box.

Spencer was not sure he wanted to dress up this year.  Insert super sad mom face.  Then, typical Spencer, decided the night before he wanted to be a zombie.  Never fear - there is an app for that.  It is called "text your dad and tell him to bring home makeup and a blow torch to zombiefy your old clothes".  Thank goodness the boy has a dad in the theatre business or I would have had to wring his little neck!

These are the best photos I managed to get of the three of them.  They were freezing.  We were rushing around like lunatics.  Evan was still chewing on dinner.

I can't wait until next year!

The times they are a changin'

Evan spent part of the evening working in Google docs on a science poster about Isaac Newton. He is in fifth grade and he has a school issued Google account - so does Spencer.  It is amazing to watch them log on and see everything that is there.  The assignments they work on in class and save to their Google drive.  Study guides posted by their teachers.  Funny notes from their friends.  Their Google drives have in essence taken the place of Trapper Keepers and loose leaf notebook paper.

Anyway, he was working on gathering information about Newton and I was doing dinner dishes and cleaning up the kitchen when he yelled to me that he couldn't get the pictures he wanted to his Google doc.  They wouldn't send.  He said he needed them over there so he could print them out.  I told him that I didn't know much about Google docs but couldn't he just right click on the picture and print it like that?  He told me that is what he was going to try next.

It hit me after he said that how amazing it is that he even knew what I meant.  "Right click and print from there" sounds like something that makes no sense, but he knew exactly what I meant.   When I was in fifth grade we had two computers in the library that we could use if we finished early with our class work.  Mainly I remember using them to play Lemonade Stand.   My kids now go to the same school and there are multiple computers in every room.  Laptops, ipads, mac books - it is mind boggling.  Spencer was carrying around a more advanced computer than those old library ones in his pocket today when he texted me after play auditions to ask if I was in the parking lot!

It is just amazing (and a little scary) how much kids these days have access to.

Cabin days...

The boys spent the weekend up at the cabin for the youth hunt.  Sadly, they never really saw any deer so once again our freezer is bare.  Which is not necessarily a bad thing since the only freezer we own that really freezes stuff is the one in the garage.  Funny how when you build a house and buy all your appliances at the same time they all age together - we haven't had one die yet, but they are all on their geriatric last legs.

 

 

Since I was already mentioning up north, I found these pictures from the last weekend of summer to post - seems only fitting since today is officially the first day of fall.

 

My fire bug hanging by the fire. I love how you can see Evan fishing in the background.

It got a little drizzly after the sun went down so we headed inside for a game of Michigan rummy.  The boys LOVE this game.

The next morning as the boys were lounging around in their beds, Hailey decided to start fishing. 

She told me "I hope I don't get a salmon!"  I told her that was an odd thing for a fisherperson to say.  Usually they want to get fish.  She told me she did want to get a fish but she could barely reel in the catfish at Aunt Peggy's house.  She was sure if she hooked a salmon it would pull her into the water.

Meanwhile the bookworm was engrossed in his book.  He started and finished that book in a day.

Daddy went out to help out his fishergirl.

Trent took the kids on a kayak adventure.  They had to portage three times. 

Evan had the best time shooting his bow.  He kept asking me to make up creatures and tell him where and how many times he had to hit the target before the creature would die.  I love how creative he is and that he can entertain himself with cool made up games.

The traditional in front of the rive shots.  See you next summer cabin!

2nd grade values

I found these in Hailey's Friday folder over the weekend.  The pictures and words in this assignment always make me smile.  

 

The kids have had a pretty good start to the school year.  Evan aced through his trial spelling test last week on Monday so didn't have to take it again on Friday.  No spelling quizzes for him during the week takes some of the pressure off.  This week he missed two - not bad - he may only need to review.   Hailey has spelling tests this year for the first time - these may be the end of me.  Spelling tests and assigned math homework every night.  God bless the parents that home school - I could never, EVER do it.   Spencer doesn't bring much work home - which terrifies me.  I log into the parent portal every day and it seems he is doing well.   He had a "about me" project due on Friday that I was on him all week about.  He worked on it Monday and Tuesday so it could be done because he had hunter safety classes on Wednesday and Thursday along with a cross country meet.   He got it done - it was in his back pack on Friday all ready to go and HE DIDN'T TURN IT IN!  His excuse was that he thought he forgot it at home.  Hmmm.....maybe LOOK in your back pack before you settle on that idea.  The boy frustrates me to my last nerve.  I don't know if it is teenage boys in general or just him.   Fortunately I have many more years of homework to test that hypothesis.

Our day at M.A!

 

Today totally feels like a fall day, but I found some pictures from the summer that I wanted to post so we are going to travel back in time a bit....

 

One thing that was on all of the kids' summer to do list this year was a trip to Michigan's Adventure.  Since we took the boys last year they have been dying to go back.  Hailey won't let us forget that she never even got to go, so she was even more adamant about going.  The summer got away from us like summers always do and we had a great trip to the Wisconsin Dells where they got to ride every water slide as much as they wanted so Michigan's Adventure was kind of forgotten about.  Until one day Trent got a text from one of his former students that had worked there over the summer who had four free tickets he wouldn't be able to use before heading to college and did we want them?  You bet we did! 

 

I went to Meijer and purchased the one additional ticket we required and the kids counted down the days until we got to go.  Of course the day arrived and with it thunderstorms and not very desirable weather.  We weighed our options and checked the radar and decided to risk it.

 

It turned out to be a good day at the park.  Since the weather was iffy - it was not too crowded.  The kids had a blast and that is all that really matters.  I didn't bring my camera, just my phone so my pictures are not great, but they capture the high points.

 

Hailey's first ride at MA - the ferris wheel!

Evan and Hailey were two peas in a pod while we were there.

 

Evan and Hailey waited the longest to ride in these old timey cars.  Spencer and Dad took off for another ride while I waited for them.  I guess it was worth the wait - they loved it.

None of my kids are really into the roller coasters and after last year I will never be again - but they all love this Mad Mouse ride.

It was a fun day with just the right amount of time at the park.  The best part of the whole day and the thing I will remember most is that on the way home out of the blue Evan said to Hailey "I really had a lot of fun with you today."  And Hailey replied "Me too" to Evan with a shy smile on her face.  Oh My Heart!  I would have paid full price for all five tickets to relive that moment. 

First week down...

One week down, how many more to go?  I am sure that my teacher husband or my mathmatical whiz of a son could tell me in an instant, but neither one is here so your guess is as good as mine.

 

We made it through the first week with all of us at school.  Back to school this year for me means back to work since I was hired as a noon/recess monitor at the kids school.  I work a whopping two and a half hours a day for not enough pay, but plenty of hugs and smiles from sweet little children.  I enjoyed subbing last year and the extra money helps out.  The best part is getting to see two of my kids during the day.

 

Spencer started seventh grade this year.  The first day of school shots are a little funky in color, but it was pretty early in the morning.

 

Evan started fifth grade.  I can't believe it is his last year of elementary school.

Miss Hailey begins her year as a second grader.   Hailey was very nervous about school this year.  It was a little worrisome for me because I have never really experienced that with the boys or with her in years past.  One day we were driving past a church near the school and she told me to tell her when we passed the church.  I didn't really think much of it until she told me on a different trip down the same road to tell her when we passed the church.  I looked in the rear view mirror and saw her with her eyes closed.  I asked her why seeing the church bothered her and she told me because the road near the church was where the bus turned to head to school and she didn't want to think about school.  It just broke my heart that starting school weighed so heavy on her. 

When I asked her why she was so worried she told me that she thought second grade was going to be really hard and she didn't know if she could do it.  She is a smart girl, but school is a struggle for her sometimes.  I know she will be fine because I saw it happen with Evan - you just have to wait for it all to click.  And it will - it just makes me sad that she is so nervous about her abilities as she waits for the click to happen.

On this first day of second grade though...she rallied.  She was ready to take it on.

She even added in a little bit of sassafras!

It was a good first week.   Spencer decided to join the cross country team (that is a whole 'nother post).  Evan was star student of the week in his fifth grade class.   The best part was when Hailey told me that she loved second grade.  She loved her teacher and she thought second grade was going to be the best grade!  I couldn't agree more!