Play Doh

We've had a Play Doh revival around these parts, and the whole gang joins in!

Outdoor Fun

This heat! It's killing us!

Out we went to relax and cool down in the pool. 

Jack got out a short time after those photos were taken and went to go check out our little friend.

We are down to one caterpillar (boo to natural selection), but he's getting so big! He should be! He's doing a fine job eating up all of our milkweed all on his own.

Jack was smitten.

He was so smitten, in fact, that he managed to get a hold of the caterpillar and take him on a little field trip around the backyard. He apparently showed him all kinds of new places before we caught him. Ahem. Thankfully, we did notice and got caterpillar back to his plant, hopefully no less for the wear.

This kid. I tell you he keeps us on our toes!

Cooling Off

I bought a fan. All the boys, but particularly Jack, are big fans of the fan. :)

I mean, he's so much a fan that he even took off his shirt while he was there! Considering that the kid is rarely without a shirt (by his choice), that's huge!

Friday Five

Week two of school is over for the boys. This week brought intense heat, and I think that both of them got a tan that made them several shades darker from their recess time outside. The good news is that they go to an indoor, air conditioned school. That's definitely a plus when it is so hot out!

~~~

Our little garden continues to grow. We now have beans that have started, our pumpkin plants have flowered (everywhere--I may have overestimated how many to plant!), and out tomatoes continue to plump up and grow. The carrots are coming right along, too!

Our strawberries have become a favorite of Carl the squirrel. He likes to go over and take a bite out each and every one. I guess they aren't to his liking, though, because he leaves the rest.

~~~

Jack has become quite the daddy's boy and follows him everywhere. He has even gotten to the point of wailing uncontrollably when he notices that daddy is gone. It doesn't even matter how far he's gone or how long he's been gone. "Oh noooooooo! Daddy is going pppppoooootttyyyyy!" he wails before he dissolves into a puddle of tears. lol. It's pretty funny and annoying all rolled into one. ;)

~~~

Shawn totally rocked his first spelling test of second grade. He had 20 words and got them all right! Way to go, Shawn!!!

~~~

Jason called me in to the bedroom a little bit ago to have me look at what he was doing. "Watch this mom. I am an excellent fainter. Watch!"

He proceeded to collapse melodramatically to the bed. The act was complete with his hand to his head. "See? Did you see it? I am AWESOME at fainting!"

I laughed a little before I agreed. He is most excellent at fainting. :)

Butterfly Love

The one thing Jason wanted from raising butterflies was to be able to hold one. With the last batch of butterflies, he finally got his wish!

He was so, so excited!

Mostly Wordless Wednesday

We have monarch caterpillars!!!

The triplets were found in our outside milkweed plant this afternoon, and we are super excited!

Homework

Second grade homework may push me...um, them...over the edge.

And it's only day 2!

Each night they have a math worksheet, work to do with their 20 spelling words (alphabetizing the words and writing them 3xs each so far), timed reading, social studies (interviewing an ancestor--we're calling you tomorrow grandma), and work on memorizing a poem. Sheesh. 

Hopefully we'll get into the swing of things, so it won't seem so overwhelming sooner rather than later.

Challenged

I challenged him to touch his tongue to his nose. Comedy ensued...

Lol! He was quite frustrated that he couldn't do it, too. :)

Summer's Not Over Until We Say It Is!

School may have started, but we are going to squeeze out every last bit of summer as we can. That meant back to the pool for us!

Cute Big Boy Saturday

This is what the boy looked like after what seemed to have been a rough nap...

Friday Five

Week one of second grade is in the books! We had a fairly decent return (Shawn's sickness aside), and the boys were rewarded with a trip to Target. They love themselves a Target trip. They are smart boys, after all.

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Speaking of school, I am very pleased about what I am seeing come home. This teacher is trained in some of the same strategies I use in my own classroom, and it is very nice to see how she has adapted everything for the second grade. I have high hopes for an amazing year!

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Jack fell and scraped his knee today. Although he has hurt himself before, I think this is the first time he's had to have a band aid for something. He was fascinated and repulsed all at the same time, and waffled between wanting it and not wanting it for the rest of the night. lol

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The boys had homework to create a bag of three things that were important to them. The class would look at the objects and then try to guess who they belonged to.

Jason took a rock (to symbolize his collection), a few legos (because he loves to play with them), and a Matchbox car.

Shawn took some Cars stickers (because he loves the Cars movie), a family picture (because he loves his brothers), and a zebra figure (his favorite animal).

~~~

Jack has taken to watching videos on Kids YouTube that are in different languages. For the last several days he was watching Elmo in Mandarin. Tonight, he was watching Peppa Pig in French. He then likes to tell us all different phrases in the language of the day.

What is most amazing to me is that I am fairly certain he understands what he's watching! Crazy.

Second Day of Second Grade

Well, things didn't go exactly as planned today as Shawn stayed home sick this morning. He woke in the middle of the night saying he was going to throw up, and then spent the rest of the morning either sleeping or trying not to throw up. Poor guy. He did perk up some by the afternoon and was more himself by the time bedtime came around. That should mean he'll be able to go to school tomorrow.

Jason did go, however, and had another great day. I am excited by the things that are coming home from the class, too. I think we lucked out and got ourselves a great teacher! Yay for the boys!

First Day of Second Grade!

The boys had a great day! 

Two pictures are their before school pictures. The lower left corner picture is their after school picture!

Goodbye to Summer on the Eve of Second Grade

Can you believe it is already that time again? Summer is over.

The boys start the new adventure of second grade tomorrow. Clothes are picked out. Lunches are waiting in the fridge. Backpacks are filled with supplies. The sign is ready to capture their first day excitement and looks...

But we're not ready.

We are not ready to go back to school and schedules and early bedtimes and homework.

We are definitely NOT ready for our summer to end.

I'm not going to lie. There was a little bit (or a lot) of sad mixed in with the excitement as the boys headed off to bed.

We're not ready because we've thoroughly enjoyed this summer.

While we've done quite a few things this summer, in reality, our summer has been fairly unstructured and relaxing -- something I think we all really needed, something we're not ready to give up.

So yes, we are going to really miss the summer.

Is it too early to start looking forward to next summer? :)

~~~

For our reluctant summer farewell, we each said a few things we enjoyed about our summer...

Shawn:

"I like summer: the flowers, watering cans, and our garden, especially the tomatoes and carrots."

Jason:

"Everything...going to grandma's, planting our fruits and vegetables, and letting our butterflies free twice."

Jack:

Jack liked the swimming in the pool, visiting Clifford the Big Red Dog at the Discovery Cube, and playing outside. (all paraphrased because he wasn't exactly cooperating. lol)

Daddy:

"I liked family trips, (Jason piped in with, "I liked that, too!"), the swimming pool, (Jason - "Yeah, and that!), and going on rides at Knott's Berry Farm with my boys."

Me:

"I liked raising our caterpillars into butterflies, going on surprise trips as a family, and that we tried lots of new things."

Swimming Cuties!

More shots from our pool time!

Love our handsome boys!

Summer Bucket List - Going to the Fair!

On Friday we headed out to our local fair.

One of the first things we did was to head over to the to see the animals. We started with the small rabbits and hens. (The consensus was that the roosters are very loud.) Then we went to see the livestock. It was the day they were auctioning off the animals, so the area was pretty busy with 4H kids and such. We read about all of the animals and marveled at their ribbons. We also heard a pig protesting being moved back to his pen. (The consensus was that pigs that do not want to be moved are louder than the roosters.)

Jack was quite taken with the animals.

Shawn, who is always excited to eat out, was happy to find something to eat. We had a typical fair lunch of burritos, pizza, and sodas. (Jack was happy to have his typical lunch he has at home. He is not excited to eat out.)

A little love while eating lunch.

More lunch fun.

Next, we headed off to the carnival area.

We played lots of games!

They tried to throw rings on the coke bottles.

Both concentrated so hard!

Jack went on a few rides.

Flying on the bumble bee ride was a hit.

Jack nearly got his hand devoured by a dinosaur on this ride!

Although somewhat concerned that the kid would just jump in the water,
Jack got on the bumper boats. He loved it!

Meanwhile, the big boys were playing ping pong games.

If you look closely, you can see Shawn's white ping pong
in the middle of the lower sign. He actually got the ball into the colored cup
and won the large prize! He was kind enough to split the prize with Jay, though, and
instead got two smaller prizes rather than one large one.

Jack wanted a shot at the ping pong balls, too.

They won Minion toys!

At some point, daddy and Jay sneaked off to go have some ice cream.

He ate this whole thing by himself!

Shawn and I sneaked off to go play a few more ping pong games, too. :)

The weather was beautiful, and most importantly, it was nice and quiet. Hardly anyone was there the entire time we were there. It was lovely, and we all had a great time!