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The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge, but fools despise wisdom and discipline. -Proverbs 1:7

Wisdom is supreme; therefore get wisdom. Though it cost you all you have, get understanding.-Proverbs 4:7


Saturday, June 28, 2014

61 Days of Summer-Day #12

 
 
 
Nothing too exciting today...just little bits of stuff that I'm messing around with.  Classroom exemplar for next year, finally got around to sewing on merit badges (before they got lost) and still plugging away at that stats class.  The only good thing about the passage of time is sometimes there are things that must end and time determines that end.  By this time next week, that stats class will have ended.  Thank God.
 



61 Days of Summer-Days #5-#11

 
Photo Credit: Princess D
 

Here is what I should know, but forget every year:  There will not be a lot of physical productivity the second week of summer vacation.  For some reason, I thought there would be more this year, because I wasn't signed up to help with anything.  Didn't really matter.

Don't be fooled, though....it's all good.

All good, All the time.  I sometimes don't remember that.

Friday, June 20, 2014

61 Days of Summer: Day #4

Yes, I realize #4 is not over yet.  What you should know is that it was supposed to be unremarkable.  I have homework.  It was supposed to take all day.  I lost interest.  Which means I still need to do it.  Blah.


Here's how it goes at my house on summer days when both kids are home:  They make too much noise for homework to happen.  If they aren't fighting, they are wrestling and howling and teasing each other.  Or, "There is nothing to do."  over and over....  I suggested the mandatory, summer reading homework.  "But, there's nothing to read!"  Liars.  The dog insisted on being let out and back in and back out and back in....  I took the hint.

 
 
 
Map reading skills...if you don't teach them, your kid won't have them.  I think they've given up teaching it in school.  If they do teach it, their methods are ineffective.  I complained once when they were in elementary.  The response I got was "Who uses maps?"  Followed by "Don't you have a GPS?"  Yeah...as I mentally added map reading skills to that list of stuff I try to remediate for in the summer.
 
We came to see the ants.  It's weird we hadn't seen them considering they are so close.  I didn't know they were there until I read about them in my "100 Easy Hikes" book.  BTW, this is hike #53.  1 down, 99 more to go, lol.
 

 
 Got spellcheck?  ;-)
 
And there they are.  P.S.  There is no "maybe" about it.  They bite if you stop walking.
 


 The bigger draw was the creek.  Now, if you would have asked me this morning, I would have told you one of my kids was too old for this.  That she would not at all be interested.  Ahem.  They spent an hour trying to catch salamanders and, even then, had to be dragged away.  Because I had lost interest.

 
 

This boy is all arms and legs these days.

  
 Not a salamander.

 Look!  No fighting.


Turns out, we did have something he could have been reading.

Thursday, June 19, 2014

61 Days of Summer: Day #3

Persistence


This is the side of my junky, front step.  (Someday, maybe I'll do something about it.)  Who has the heart to pull such persistent things?  The seeds must have fallen last summer.

The bulk of this week has been spent jumping around from one task to the next.  Persistence for one thing at a time is not what I am known for.

My room was blue.  I chose the color, because someone else had a blue room and I liked it.  Turns out, blue is only ok for me in other people's spaces.  I lived with it for two years.  Because I am busy.  It's no longer blue.  Happiness is up for debate.  Ryan, who doesn't like flowers or bright colors (for the most part), was happy with the blue.

I have plans to ditch the fox mask and butterfly wings when I grow up.







 
 


Wednesday, June 18, 2014

61 Days of Summer-Day #2

In the Garden....

 
Baby Tomatoes
 
 
Don't be fooled.  Every year this tree tells me I will have peaches.  Right before it drops all of them on the ground before they can get ripe.  I have so few things growing in my garden right now though.  Gotta get excited about something.
 
This past winter was COLD and all of my herbs except this one lavender died.  I lost my big and beautiful, 10 year old rosemary bush.  So sad.

 At the pool...


This is still going on for 2.5 more weeks.  After that, I'll not be enrolled in a single class for 8 weeks.  I need that.  You have no idea how much I need that.

 

In my room...


The need to clean and repaint every surface in my house happened 6 summers ago.  If you know me, you know that story.  I'm intrigued it's happening again.  I have a good husband who allows all this to go on.

In the kitchen...


Portobello "steaks" with caramelized onions, mashed potatoes and salad.

Tuesday, June 17, 2014

61 Days of Summer-Day #1

 
Grilled chicken and pineapple with Brussels sprouts and artisan salad with poppy seed dressing
 

The first day is always "nothing major".  Mostly, a day of decompression.  With real dinner at the end.

O.K...one major thing:  I got a new job.  It needed to happen.  I was giving up hope it was going to happen. 

I'm trying to remain cognizant of what happens every summer, before it happens this summer.  At the beginning, it's like looking into a huge wasteland of time.  And then, by August, I'm in some depression all the stuff I wanted to do didn't get done.

Going to try and be a little more organized on the front end.  I did that once and it was kind of awesome.

61 Days of Summer

61 is such a random number, but that is what it is...61...from my first day out of school until the last day before I go back.  I hope I make them good.

Sunday, June 15, 2014

Cousins

 
The most important part of the weekend first:  I finally met my nephew!  I only have one and he's almost 7.  
 

  Jac and Liam got on well with each other right away.




 The Cloyd family legacy.  In hindsight, Ryan and I should have had a rack of kids. This is it for his parents and my parents only have my two.  Doesn't make for a very "branchy" family tree.
__________________________________________________
 
 
In other news, Granddad gave Alicia a gift.  I think he really meant it for Ryan, but it's Al that has been in charge of cutting the grass for the last couple of years.  It isn't that we didn't already have a riding mower, we do.  But something is wrong with it (in a major kind of way that is beyond my fixing) and it hasn't seen the outside of the shed in a long while.  We have push mowers and they do just fine.  Needless to say, (despite her annoyance I was taking pictures), she's thrilled.
 

 
 
Haha...I think she wasn't expecting it to move so suddenly.
 
 
I'd like to say getting it from point A to point B was not a stress causer for me.  It all worked out, but lemme tell you...there are some things that are fairly dangerous when not done conventionally.  We encroached on those borders.
 



Sunday, June 8, 2014

Real Stuff, Right Here

 
Weekend Randomness:

I thought last weekend was the last week of lacrosse.  It wasn't.  I think we are done, now.  Thank God.

The big take-away is "you can't win Lax Max every year". (AKA:  We didn't win.)


Further evidence this child of mine has grown.  Ryan just took him for his camp physical and he's at the top of the chart for both height and weight.  Maybe there will be one of us who makes it to normal height?


He also needs a haircut.  It's an ongoing battle.  I really only like one style-the military haircut.  He's not going for that.

Nevermind the wrestling shirt.  I was just happy he chose something that matched the rest.  It was covered by a pinnie anyway.


Who knew we had a badminton set in the basement? 

 
"Beef"  (Portobello mushrooms) and Brocolli
The real stuff:

Life gets crazy amidst the pretty pictures.  For example, just today...ha...just today.

Yoga at 7 a.m.  That will likely be some other post when I feel like getting real again.

Napping and avoiding reality and crazy dreams.  That ended with something meaningful I need to write down before I forget.

3 quizzes.  80%, 60% and 55%.  My child wandering around on eggshells saying things like "It happens."  Uh...not to me it doesn't.  Not normally, anyway.

Shivery and trembly and wondering "What the heck is going on?"  Until I remembered it was night and the whole day was doughnuts, a pot of coffee and Diet Mt. Dew.  And yesterday was kind of the same and the day before that I was downtown and it was kind of the same and the day before that was...pizza, I think.  Ahem...when did we last eat real food?

Tonight.  Ryan and I, anyway.  The kids, not so much.

I need for school to be out so I can get back to creating the illusion of what isn't real.  :-)