What a Day

On Monday I scheduled a trip to see a dermatologist on Tuesday because Thomas' poison ivy rash came back again.  The office is a good hour and 15 minutes away.  Then Julia came home from school with a stomachache.  Tuesday morning Julia still felt sick but Thomas really needed to make it to his appointment so Jeremy came home to be with Julia and I took Thomas and the little boys to town.  All went well there.  My mom watched the little boys and Thomas got loaded up with new meds that will hopefully get the rash gone for good.  Julia was feeling better so Jeremy took her to school for the afternoon and went back to work.  We got home from the doctor and discovered a rat in one of our window wells.  I also noticed I hadn't seen Jack the cat since breakfast.  Jeremy came home and took care of the rat (you probably don't want to know how) and went back to work.  On the way to Sam's football practice I saw a black cat on the side of the road.  :(  Jeremy came home from work and took care of the dead cat.  Telling the kids wasn't as bad as I thought it might be but still wasn't fun.  And this morning there's a mouse in the mouse trap.  Yuck.  I'm done with crisises for awhile now!!!!

State Fair Fun

We didn't have any projects go to the state fair this year but we went out to enjoy it anyway.
We really liked the new Game and Parks area.  The kids loved the new playground too.  They even got to enjoy a couple rides thanks to the summer reading program.

It was a good adventure!

Pivot fun

When the kids got home from school the other day the pivot was hitting the yard so they put on their swimsuits and played in the mud!

One other hot day I got out the sprinklers to greet them after their toasty ride home on the bus.

This week God has had his sprinklers turned on!!

Gardening

We have managed to grow more than one thing in our garden this year!  (Most years Jeremy forgets that I'm not a good gardener, we plant too much and then everything but one really hearty plant dies.)
So far we've harvested:
Two ice cream buckets of basil (now blended up with EVOO and frozen in 24 two tablespoon packets)

 Lots of cherry tomatoes.  The regular tomatoes we planted aren't liking the cool weather though.

 Sweet corn (no field corn around us this year so no cross-pollination issues, yay!)

 Lots of zucchini which has also been blended up into lots of 2 cup packages for future bread and muffins.

 Parsley which is next in line for the food processor.

And one weird mutant ear of corn.  Not sure what's up with this one.

We also have onions to be dug eventually.
Good garden year!

It Was the First Day

Of the 1st grade

It was the 1st day of the PreK

It was the 1st day of the 4th grade

It was the 1st day of the 5th grade

and I don't remember any more of this song!  (Guess we haven't watched Veggie Tales in awhile!)

  Happy first day!

All Their Bags are Packed

They're ready to go

 I'm standing here wondering where did the summer go?

Don't worry, I don't have a kindergartner, so I don't think I'm gonna cry...

(with apologies to Peter, Paul and Mary)

It's the last day of summer.  And when you read this later, Samuel, Thomas, Julia and Philip, I want you to know, no matter how loud it is around here, or messy the house is, or how many fights I have to break up, or how frustrated with behavior that I get, I really do enjoy having you with me all summer and I will miss you tomorrow when you're gone.  And I'll be watching every day for the bus to bring you home to me.

Love you,

Mom

Last Blast

It's time for the quick-it's-the-end-of-summer fun!
We hadn't made it to the Children's Museum yet this summer so after our two day school and grocery shopping extravaganza we headed there.  Jeremy was even able to join us!  Samuel requested going there and I couldn't turn him down knowing he may outgrow the fun there soon.  Julia did her own face paint and was very proud.  Can you guess what Philip is?  A Lego guy.  Way to pick something easy!  :)

We had a little water balloon fight in an attempt not to have to save the package AGAIN.

And we've been enjoying the lovely weather (mostly by playing American Ninja Warrior on the playset.  Did I mention we maybe shouldn't have let Samuel and Philip watch that show?  Too many ideas brewing in their heads now.....)

 Ninjas stand on this and roll it to the next obstacle, not sure why Ninja Thomas is sitting.

 Had a cat fall out of the tree near my head (not this cat, it is obviously still in the tree) guess Jack is not a ninja yet.

 Ninja Sam

 Ninja Philip taking a break.  I told him to give me his mad face but he couldn't, I'm too funny.

 Ninja Nicholas climbs into the train window to ring the bell all by himself.

Headed to the pool for one last chilly dip this afternoon.

What Nicholas Has Been Up to

Deciding he is BIG!
He prefers to sit in Philip's booster at the dining room table (as opposed to his highchair).

He is attempting to refuse drinking out of a sippy cup (too bad for him, he'll have to be thirsty until he gives up on this one).

And he decided he was big enough for rides at the county fair (shown by doing everything he could to get past the fence onto the boats).  He loved the boats, motorcycles and tractors!

I guess he is the kid who walked at 8 months old...

Baseball!

Uncle Deere treated all his employees to a minor league baseball game last Sunday!

We rode a bus from Jeremy's store to the stadium, had seats behind home plate, wristbands to get the kids into the fun zone and way more than enough money in vendor vouchers to feed all of us (Nicholas had to stay home with a sitter, we didn't want to play chase the whole game!).  It was a fun employee-bonding outing!  :)

Fancy Julia Tea Party

Julia has been asking and asking to host a fancy tea party so we finally invited over some friends for tea.  She chose to make scones out of a princess cookbook from the library and was pretty excited about that.  They also had tea, lemonade, cookies and blueberries.  She picked the decorations and set the table (and chose the ginormous flower in her hair).

They watched the songs from Frozen and played Barbies after they ate.  The girls seemed to enjoy themselves and Julia basked in the girly-girl time!

County Fair Time!

We enjoyed the fair as usual this year.  Samuel and Julia decided to brave the Ferris Wheel (we missed you Greta!), Thomas tried his hand at some archery, Philip loved all his choices and Nicholas decided he was big enough to ride the boats, motorcycles and tractors and loved them all.  He hated the carousel though; it could have been that by then it was getting late and he was tired, he wouldn't let me put him on the horse I just held him as we went around.

 Everyone loved trying out the old farm equipment and playing in the corn.

We entered tons of open class stuff and did pretty well.  Everyone had pictures, Lego creations and a couple other things too.  (Sorry, no pictures, too many last names to blot out.)  The boys each entered a robot in 4H and a video of a robot in action.  The judging was tougher this year.  Samuel got a blue and a red (with a project better than last year's and last year's went to the state fair....) and Thomas got two reds.  Julia entered a Lego airplane for Clover Kids too.
Raleen won best of lot in the cookie category in open class (congrats!) and all I have to say is watch out for next year!  She always says she makes hockey puck cookies while I make pretty good ones but I will admit I deserved the second place ribbon I got on the cookies I entered. I had an off day  and she had a great day of baking I guess! :)
And now for the last week of summer.  :(

Rodeo

We enjoyed the County Fair Rodeo again this year.  The big kids enjoyed passing out John Deere balloons and suckers.  Then Julia and Philip got to ride ponies.  Samuel and Thomas are too big, not that either of them really wanted to ride anyway.

Nicholas had to just watch.  He's not big enough to stay on a pony by himself.

The littles, Thomas and I headed home early.  Thomas was still dealing with poison ivy and the heat made it even more itchy.  The following Monday we headed to the doctor and got him some steroids which very quickly got the rash calmed down.  They make him very energetic though!

Wax Paper Resists

These wax paper resists were easy and fun.  All the boys entered them in the fair. (Julia was at G & G's when we did them.)

Water Play

I thought Nicholas and Philip might enjoy playing with some colored water.

 They did.

 Then Samuel and Thomas joined in (Thomas didn't make it into any pictures though).

 And then the cat joined in.

Guess it was a hit.  (Julia was at G&G's or she probably would have played too!)