fun in school

We have been having  a lot of fun in school lately. Here is Brendon Fishing with magnets. He is doing a magnet unit in science  right now.  I am so grateful for this time with my kids. They are a great bunch of guys.   Learning to just relax and enjoy our learnign time has made the world of differnce. As a homeshcooling mom you really are tied down a lot more but just like anything else the sooner you can accept that fact the better (=
Here is my new motto:
LOVE THEM, SUPPORT THEM, EXPECT THE MOST OF THEM, and EXPOSE THEM TO LOTS OF GOOD STORIES.

Handsome men

 Can you believe these two little kids are mine and Falesha's. I have known Falesha since I was 11. We have had a lot of fun adventures together. I am so glad that we have stayed best friends and are now enjoying raising kids together.

 This is  a rare rare shot of all my brothers and I. My youngest brother Gus on the computer is up at college in NIC. We have been having lots of fun skyping to keep in touch. My middle brother Ben has been in jail a few times but is out now so we thought we better take advantage of us "being together" even if Gus is on  a computer to get a group shot. It was so nice to all laugh and hang out. I look forward to really being together some day. Gosh the last time I can remember all of us together was going to lunch about 3 years ago.

Ben and I

 We went to Stevan's oldest brothers house last week for dinner. Here we are hanging out. We we're so close to a family photo but Wess was outside. We really have to get that done some day.

 The guys playing a serious game of football.

John and Brendon

Robert and Hayden making the plan

Wess after making a touch down

HUT HUT HIKE!

I'm open!!

They had a great time  Check out Brendon's face he cracks me up

Tables

The other day I was up at Eloise's my dear dear friend. We have a big gap in years between us but not between our hearts. She is one of my dearest friends. She is always full of energy and wisdom and is probably in better shape than I am. Anyway she is always thinking of us and she mentioned she had a table she wanted to know if I could use. It is beautiful and I was so excited to start re arranging the house and making things work better. Any one who knows me knows I love to rearrange and keep change in the house. I wanted to put a table in the school room for a while now. It just seems like we end up at the kitchen table a lot for projects. So I put our old Kitchen table in the school room and our new beautiful table in the kitchen and rearranged everything in there as well. I am loving it!! School seems to flow better. Last night I found all the boys reading and drawing at the school room table. I feel like I'm still working on getting a house that looks like an adult lives here, slowly but surely new pieces of furniture and getting rid of dumb clutter are helping the process along. Maybe by the time I'm like 80 or something I'll succeed . Here are some pics of the new arrangement.

the race track is back in action

Well with the weather changing the boys have been finding all there favorite fall things to do. We've had leaf piles, fires, snow balls once, and family football games along with countless hours on Mount Poopmoore, but there favorite activity is riding their dirt bikes. Wess is still struggling with the clothing change. As you can see in the pic below he's kinda missing parts of the cold weather wardrobe.


I loved this pic of Wesstin's outifit, this is such a fun stage with kids. Three is a trying time but they are coming into themselves so much as well. Here he is digging and playing with trucks I have pics of Brendon in this same spot at about the same age.


Wessitn is all about Capes right now But he calls it a Tape and tells us he is Batman and that he can fly really high. He also gets really bossy. It reminds me of Brendon's cowboy hat When he gets to powerful we have to threaten to take his Cape away.
I think Wess asked Stevan 1000000000 times to ride the BRmmm BRmmm( motorcyle) He had a blast

I don't think we're going to ever a get a good group shot again if someone's eyes aren't closed someone is making faces or bunny ears you know it's desperate when the best pick has someone with there tongue sticking out.

I can't believe how big Hayden is getting. His childish body is leaving quickly and I'm amazed at how great of a little man he is becoming. I couldn't ask for a better kid. I'm so proud to be his mom. He is helpful and loving and kind, Thoughtful and smart. I'm just love watching who is turning into.

My Brendon is such a character. He even rode Hayden's bike. His is getting tall and he's so funny. I love being around him. He wears his heart on his shirt sleeve, It's a great heart.

THE MIGHTY GOPHER HUNTERS!!

labor day weekend camping

Kerri and I went on an adventure this summer. We went up camping for a night with just the kids and then the husbands met us up there the next day. On the way up we had puicking in cups which worried us that it would turn into puick fest 2011 which it did but thankfully the last day. ooops....we also heard bumps in the night around the fire and ran like mad to the van. The kids all thought we were nuts as we told them we're going to sleep in the van, with no blankets, and no room. (= That lasted an hour and then we ran to the tent and got some sleep. We had such a great time. We went swimming in the river. Took lots of hikes and even saw a bear. Everyone was filthy dirty and tired just the way a camping trip should end. I love my friend Kerri so much we have so much fun together. She's always up for anything and always there for me.

Wess being cool on the 4-wheeler

my handsome husband and son

me and my dogs

Brendon's first lost tooth

Wess is three as you can tell by his outfit funny how they all go through this stage (= I love it

wesstin's world that kid caught so many frogs

our cooking tepee above and the kids playing tepee below

the gap between memorial day weekedn and labor day weekend.....I think it's called summer

Well it has been a action packed summer. Since I uploaded A LOT of pictures here and blogger is SO STINKING HARD TO ORGANIZE ON (What is with that I hate that you have to step ladder all your pictures up the page and it takes forever!!!!!!) so I am just going to go through them like they are and put little captions below them. From the beggining though my dad came out, cherry festival, Brendon turned 7, went camping, lots of fire pits, late spring late summer = late garden but it's in there, went to Kennwick for convention with Stevan's mom which was really fun, got to spend time with my brother Gus, did my first car show with my Uncle Dave really fun got rained out though, lots of BBQ's, lots of fire pits, mushroom hunting,more visits with my brother, swimming at the pool and water areobics, go to the dam, a few playdates, Brendon lost his first tooth, and I think that's it. It's about to hit crazy preserving time I've dehydrated a bit and made one batch of jam, oh yea we did Cruise night, hung out with my brother Ben. And now we're back in school we will have one more big camping trip with the Vaughn's and then summer is wrapping up. I can't believe it as run on sentence as this post is and hodge podged pictures are that is how this summer has felt. I can't believe it's winding down already. I thought it just started. My brother is off to college now. it's been great getting to know him all over again. He is such a good guy.

Betty came out and got all the kids on the bungee jump. Wess flew clear up into the trees and loved every minute of it.

frogs up camping with the Myklebust, Vaughns, Spaldings, and my dad

ahhh fire pits

first sparkler it was very serious

sara and wessy camping

the biggest morel we've ever seen and of course sara finds it she's like that

Troy the logger see our new tent in the background

rob and sara cooking brats

family picture at the river

dan and mary (kerri's mom and dad) playing cards with the kids

Hayden winning the cherry pit spit champion THAT's my boy!

beautiful moon

our kitty that lasted a week and then i took him back cause he peed on our beds

kerri and her dad

the winners of the parade at the cherry festival isnt' that a cool pic

bren is seven

Everydbody was kung fu fighting (= my brother and I !! we're awesome

I want to hang this pic on my wall it is so cool

hayden and Austin with their catch of the day

up at the dam

uncle dave at the car show

and that's summer so far!