Sunday, August 2nd
We woke up and Grandma Num was here! The kids enjoyed having brunch with her and getting in a few more chats and snuggles before she went back to Missouri.
I woke up with a terribly sore neck and upper back that plagued me far into the week.
Sunday afternoon, Mike and I rolled up our sleeves (and ignored the neck pain) and went out to our van and used the 2 new brushes I'd bought to give it a great, thorough cleaning. The previous owners had pets and it just wasn't "new to me" clean (or really clean at all), but the furminator and rubber brush really worked well and we were pleased with our efforts.
The big kids were so good with Evie after she got up from nap while we were still cleaning. Eventually, though, I took her over and she became our little cleaning mascot. She loves the new big van - such a play place!
Such blue eyes in the sunshine.
Our friends, the Donatos, were in town and we met them at the park to play. The kids were overjoyed to see each other and they played SO hard for 3 hours. I should have taken pictures, but was having a nice visit instead. This is the only one I took - of my very dirty little boy.
Such a fun time they had, that the two littlest fell asleep in the 5 minute drive home. We showered them, gave them some supper, and tucked them in bed early!
(*had already unbuckled his chest strap to get him out before I took pic - we were home and parked)
Monday, August 3rd
Happy birthday, Grammy Sara!
When Evie went down for morning nap, we got out our bird study. She didn't sleep for her whole nap, which put a fun spin on things, but we did enjoy it still.
This week we focused on migration.
Mia and Zayden are matching initial consonants to birds.
Our art lesson was making doodle birds with swirly lines from one of our Usborne art books.
To add to this art lesson, I had the children choose to color their birds either hot or cool colors and then use the opposite for their lines.
Zayden wasn't quite able to understand the hot and cold colors but he did draw 5 birds like mommy asked!
I'm trying to keep my commitment to sitting down and doing all the art projects with the kids for this unit.
Here's our little mascot that woke up from nap early.
As we were finishing our study for the day, the mail arrived, and in it was a gift from my cousin who lives in south Missouri. The Crossley bird guide is gorgeous and we are so excited to put the bird feeder in our front window and see what we can see! Thank you, Naomi!
They've loved looking at the bird book.
I worked in my flowers a bit during Ev's afternoon nap.
Mike worked late again. As we were getting ready to go to the playground after supper, he showed up and was able to go with us.
Hey y'all, let's choose a state and pretend we're going on vacation. Ha. Might be the closest thing we get this year.
I don't know if I'd really choose California, but I was laying there resting my neck on the concrete so that's where my picture got taken.
photo cred: Xavier
The kids were so excited to bring our big dice and play Chutes and Ladders...and then discovered the board is painted wrong. Natalee got really stressed out, so they ended up stopping and going to play on the other stuff.
We stayed until dusk and then went home for showers and bedtime.
Tuesday, August 4th
Tuesday Mike took off work and Grandma Num came up again to watch some of the kids so that we could go into the city to meet a new doctor for Natalee. We're working on getting her care team set up nearer to us. She wanted to eat Mexican and we found a place with outdoor seating before her appointment.
A birdie joined us...
We had a great appointment and very much appreciated the doctor. He was kind, understanding, and agreed to become a part of Natalee's team.
Mom had my supper started when we got back - we're so thankful for her! She was working on frying up the 3 1/2 pounds of bacon I'd laid out. Evie learned to say grandma since she's seen her these last couple of times! When Mom put her socks on to leave, Evie brought Grandma her socks and was ready to go out, too!
Grandma also taught Evie the phone game.
Wednesday, August 5th
Wednesday we didn't get our bird study done, but Natalee did have her OT eval and we loved meeting a couple members of the OT team.
I've been trying to intentionally give Evie my attention in the afternoons still. It sure is a joy to watch her grow.
These kiddos made a safari with their old plastic animals, sidewalk chalk, and some dried grass! I truly do love their imaginations.
Evie has started to develop a real interest in books. If you're reading, she wants in.
Thursday, August 6th
Thursday we dove right into the bird study and had such a good time. We took turns using a video tutorial to draw cardinals with chalk pastels. While we rotated, some of the kids played bird/egg memory, while others worked on drawing a robin. We also tried our hand at acrostic poems. Natalee and Xavier wrote their own, while I helped gather ideas from Mia and Zayden to complete theirs.
[smiling like a Ninja Turtle]
We wrote haikus last week and I think I forgot to post them!
While Natalee was wearing her braces and Evie was sleeping, Xavier, Mia, and Zayden played quite a game of firefighters.
I should have made a video - their commentary was priceless.
Mike's schedule was just really crummy this week and some moments were lovely and some were survival. After a couple of days that were better with my neck, Thursday I was in tears it hurt so bad. I made a chiro appt for Saturday morning, because I didn't want to take all my little people into the office, which meant I just had to endure Friday with the pain.
Friday, August 7th
Ahhh, we made it to Friday.
Evalynn so enjoys being a part of their play.
Have you noticed how much we're loving learning about birds? So much.
The big kids worked up a life span bar graph for our backyard birds, and the younger ones worked more on their bar graph for our family "wingspans."
The wingspan bar graph they made a couple weeks ago.
Instead of a drawing art project, I had the kids construct birds' nests from play-doh.
She made eggs, too.
Evie found this stocking hat and wore it for a good part of the day. Funny girl.
The kids watched the documentary Winged Migration. It was okay - not much narration so a little hard to follow, but they loved seeing all the birds.
Evie thought having all the kids on the floor was wonderful - her personal play gym!
My dad and sister came up and visited and then I rode with them to visit my aunt Annette. We had a good visit - Aunt Beth and Aunt Marcia were there, too, and it was nice to get to sit and chat with no agenda.
I got home in time for supper and clean up, and bedtime.
Saturday, August 8th
Chiropractor day. Thank goodness. The chiro did a set of x-rays before he worked my neck, upper back, and hip over. Lots of ice, muscle rub, and rest. So hard to rest when you have 5 kids and it's back to school time at campus. Mike worked some on Saturday, but I did get a bit of downtime in. I set the sprinkler mat up for Evie Saturday evening, and she wanted to play, but got mad every time she went in it.
Zayden, Mia, and Xavier played instead.
I finally worked up a bit of gumption and Natalee and I made a peach crisp before bed.
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