What I remember most about August 2013 is that it was the end of camp, summer number nine, and school was about to kick in for real. This was the first time I would have four students, kindergarten, first grade, third grade, and fifth grade.
Before school started we had a little time between the end of camp and the school year's start.
Amelia learned to ride the four wheeler.
We acquired an electric drum set from the Dollar family, and Brice came over to give Shannon a few starter lessons.
We took a trip to McDonough to catch up with family we hadn't seen since before camp started.
And Anna!
Mom has a slip n slide.
We had some family over for an August birthday and anniversary party, but also because I requested it so I could see everybody!
Gary and Deannea
Bailey
Reda with Nanny, who wandered over from next door (bearing chicken and dumplings, her specialty!)
I love catching people eating and looking like they're not having very much fun.
Happy birthday and anniversary to everybody! We were heavy on the February birthdays until a bunch of August people married in.
The kids had fun playing with each other in the basement.
Typical Avery!
Isn't it amazing how mesmerizing a screen of any shape or size is to kids? Mine are like moths to a flame anytime somebody turns on a device.
We had a rare and wonderful visit from Grandma and Grandpa Lee, James' mom's parents, who live in San Antonio. It was short and fun, and it's always great to see them.
Guess the older generation doesn't do silly!
Here's our school year in a box! We do use other material for math and a few other subjects, but the most fun stuff comes in these boxes.
Lots of books! The best part!
I finally got the school room looking mostly like I wanted it to at the start of the school year in 2013. Here are a few pictures.
This is the former nursery and the room is too small for a table and chairs or desks, so we school in bean bags with lap desks.
It works great and is laid back and comfortable. My only complaint is that it suddenly becomes too much work for seated children to get up for pencils or books they need. Also, it seems the beanbags are most comfortable in a mostly laying down position, which doesn't bode well for neat handwriting! I am ready to put the phrase, "Sit UPPP!!!" on some kind of button I can hit and constantly replay.
We're getting a nice collection of books by using Sonlight for school.
I wanted to start the school year off with a fun little field trip to the planetarium at Young Harris College, up and over the mountain from camp. Only I forgot how long it took to get there and we were on track to be pretty late. They don't open the doors for you if you're late. Instead we found this crazy little shop near Blairsville and had some fun there instead.
The woods outside the store were filled with these cute, strange little play houses.
There was a gnome land on the hill across from the play houses. I'm still not sure how it counted as education, but I called it a field trip and the next week we were officially beginning school year 2013-2014.
But first Avery lost one of his top teeth.
On August 12 we started the year in our one-room school house. Here are beginning of the school year pictures.
Kindergarten, 5 years 2 months
First grade, 6 years, 11 months
Fifth grade, 10 years, 1 month
Third grade, 8 years, 10 months
There was a little time for some rainy day sillies too. I like to call it "P.E."
Macy D. doing her favorite thing- carrying around little people.
Shannon and blobbing hijinks, kicking off the start of Family Camp weekend at Strong Rock.
I believe this is Avery's inaugural blob!
Following are several Family Camp photos. It was a fun weekend as usual!
My friend Betsy, whose son comes to camp. She and I were Camp WinShape and Berry College friends.
Our buddies, the Lawson and Jennings families.
Mama Norma and Papa Norma (as we jokingly call my dad). The counselors and staff all know her well because she spends all summer at camp. They don't see him nearly as much and are never sure what to call him!
Humiliating the dads with a game that involves panty hose.
Here's another creative use for panty hose. Yikes!!
They let me play too sometimes.
Haven't we already seen this face once?
We had some fun just up the road at Dick's Creek with some friends, including the D's and Marjorie, Rebecca, and Thomas. This happened much earlier in the month, the weekend before we started school. I am too lazy to make this many pictures move.
We made our first forray into organized sports this season. Amelia, Shannon, and Avery played soccer. The oldest two were on a U10 team together and Avery played on a U8 team. That put us at the soccer field Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday evenings, and the older kids had games on Saturdays.
Here's Elizabeth, hard at work over her letters.
And finally, a shot of her learning to ride all by herself! No, that's not grass in the pony's mouth because she knows her rider is little...
Okay, that took a lot of time. I think to catch the next 14 months of this blog up I'm going to have to mostly post photos and say very little about them! My mom set a good example for me by taking pictures when we were kids and making sure they got put into albums. This is the way I do it. I'm glad I have them!
More to come, I hope, before this Thanksgiving holiday break is over!
No comments:
Post a Comment