Any Similar Revival

This week, we started our first year of kindergarten at home. I had meant to start last week, but between illness and broken appliances, it just didn’t work out. No worries, though. That’s one of the reasons we’ve decided to home school.

We start our day with a walk. Sometimes we do the Block. Sometimes, we do the Big Block. Sometimes we go to a park. As soon as the trail down the street is finished, we are going to do that most of the time.

We gather things for our seasonal nature table. Aiden is really good at finding acorns, but not as good at taking them out of his pockets. I’ve been finding them in the washer and dryer all week long.

Here is our table so far:

I.love.the.nature.table! Aiden enjoys it too, but it’s really for me. I’ve even named it: Gnome Hollow.

Then we do our circle time, which I have no pictures of. Just think of us singing and dancing and clapping. I was worried that Aiden wouldn’t like it, but I should have known better. He is, after all, our song-and-dance man.

Then we do our main activity. Monday is baking day. Mmmm, pumpkin muffins!

And Aiden then gets to “wash the dishes,” aka, play in the sink for 45 minutes.

We do a story later on, but most of the rest of the day is Aiden playing. That’s his job, and he’s really good at it. Yesterday was not a school day, but a housekeeping day. Aiden announced that he was taking his animals outside for a picnic.

He did this for HOURS. Then the rain came, and he came in to don his rain suit and work in the dirt pile. Because that’s what rain means, right?

He still runs to the sidewalk when he hears the train whistle down the street. Train brain.

Note the muddy hands.

We also had an outing to the zoo with our best buds this week:

All in all, it was a great first week! He really enjoyed it, and so did I. The rhythm of the days really carried us through with very little drama.

On to next week!

I made a lot of pages this weekend. Here are some more. Click to see enlarged view.

Click on each image to view larger.

Enjoying our rainy, cool day! Fall!

I did a little bit of scrapbooking this morning.

Aiden’s fifth bday party:

May Day Flowers

And my mud-loving boy.

OH July! You are so busy and full of photo opportunities! Stop it! Share with January! Share with November! Stop being so fun and pretty!

I’ve taken almost 1000 photos this month. Scratch that: I’ve kept almost 1000 photos this month. I’ve probably taken 500+ more. Even when I try to pare down, it adds up. We had a visit with my dad, an epic vacation, a sweet little niece, a day at Camp Allyson, a beautiful wedding, AND the fair. Not to mention the normal stuff, like the garden and the dirt pile and what I made for dinner. I take a lot of pictures. And then I get tired. I call it “Photo Fatigue” and it hits several times a year. Most notably in December, May, July/August, and October. I get overwhelmed by the sheer volume of photos taken, to be taken, still to be edited, still to be scrapbooked. So I stop. And then later, when I’m going through things and ready to DO something about my bazillions of pictures, I wonder, “why didn’t I take any photos the entire first half of August?” Photo Fatigue.

Anyways, here are some, before the fatigue hits full-force.

A wedding (no, I wasn’t the photographer. I was a guest and it was so fun to NOT have the photographer hat on)

The rehearsal:

What I wore: BOOTS!

The Reception: PARTY BARN!

It was a good time. All the people were beautiful, the locations were splendid, and all the food was delicious.

I think we may have to break up this post. I don’t think the fair will fit.

I’ve been seeing this kind of face a LOT lately:

Not sure why he likes it so much, but there it is.

Yesterday was Camp Allyson, and we went on a field trip to Dan’s Dogs.

Root beer floats (“I’m drinking beer!” says Aiden, blithely. “No, you’re not,” corrects Olivia, “That is ROOT beer!”) + chocolate milk shakes (me) + a basket of fries to share = A really good summer time beat the heat treat!

Then later, a little bit of this:

Ahhh, summer.

Someone has been baking in his dirt pile, making cakes and such.

Trying to stay cool today and really hoping we get some storms and that they’re not as severe as the weathercasters are saying they might be.

. . .You should definitely take its picture.

Cherries, blueberries, muenster cheese, carrots, eggs, and bacon on a bed of lovely greens.

Yummmmmmmm. . . .

And I was worried that bacon + cherries would be a weird combination. It isn’t. It’s really actually quite fabulous.

Hello, beautiful!

Funny story about these peppers. Last year, I planted what I thought were jalapeno peppers. The tag said so, the plant looked right, the peppers looked right. But they didn’t taste right. They were completely NOT hot. Like at ALL. So this year, I bought my plant from a different nursery and waited. Before we went on vacation, I picked one and Chad tried it. Not hot! What?

Fast forward to last night. I had eight lovely little peppers from this plant, and I thought that even if they’re not hot, anything stuffed with cheese and wrapped with bacon had to tast good. And while I was slitting their sides to stuff them with cheese, I stuck my finger in my mouth, and it was HOT. Chad didn’t believe me. He had to try it. HOT. Isn’t that weird?

Anyways, it was a really good dinner. I was laughing with Chad that we had the grill going for our veg, but we did our burgers inside on the stove. We’re weird like that (and we like pan-fried burgers. so. very. much.)

I don’t know why he looks grumpy here, because he really was very happy.

The lovely house Kam and Kymberly shared with us during our stay. Just a short walk to the Inner Harbor and many of the other delights of this beautiful city.

Outside of Murchie’s, my favorite tea room in Victoria.

Inside of Murchie’s!

Braylyn’s crème brule, soon to be inside her!

Watching the boats in the Inner Harbor

At East Sooke, loving the beautiful rocky beaches! Cold water though!

Kymi and me at East Sooke.

We are completely unaware of the Sasquatch behind us.

Photographic evidence of said Sasquatch. We decided to call him “Kameron.”

Boat face.

Fisgard Lighthouse

They thought they were soooo funny.

I think that’s enough for now. I took a million pictures, of course, as usual. I’ll be posting scrapbook pages as I make them though. That will be a better representation.

OH MA GUSH, I love this baby! I am the luckiest auntie in the wearld.

All coy here.

And look at this smile.

AHHHHHH! Slain by the cuteness!

Let’s zoom in and look again!

Love this baby.

I’ve been doing a little scrappin’ since we got home.

This is from June, when the Cousins Aide(a)n were together:

And here are some pages from my Dad’s visit at the beginning of July:

I have a ton to catch up on, but I am sticking to my proven method of working on just the photos and stories that are inspiring me.

So, on the Fourth of July, we went to Canada. Yes, I know that sounds disturbingly unpatriotic, but it was SO much cheaper to travel that day, we could not resist. And how many times can one say that she spent the Fourth crossing the entire country? It was pretty epic, and we decided that if we ever go back to Victoria (and we hope to!), we will get there in two days instead of one, or just go direct. We flew from Cleveland to Seattle, then rented a vehicle and drove up interstate 5 to the Canadian border. Then we continued on to Tswassen (not sure of the spelling), and caught the ferry boat to Vancouver Island. THEN we drove from Swartz Bay to Victoria, and the lovely home that Kameron, Kymberly, and the girls have rented for the summer. Aiden did as well as any five-year-old could do, but we were really, REALLY glad to finally get there!

Aiden LOVED the ferry boat. Loved it. We had to make a very stern rule, however, about standing on the railings. Because this kid climbs like it’s his job, or something.

Phew! I’m tired again just reviewing this day! I’ll tell you more about the rest of the trip later, I’ve got to to lay down, or something.

So, July is half over already. Huh.

It began in a blur, two weeks ago, with a quick, two-day visit from my dad. Yep, just two days to see all of us, but we will take what we can get, at this point.

These two love each other:

And we went to visit my brother, sister-in-law, and their new sweet baby, Piper.

I think she looks like me here, like my baby picture. SUPER cute!

The next day, we were packing like crazy for our vacation to the northwest,but in the afternoon, we had some more family time, at Granny’s house.

Uncle Jon was helping A learn how to climb Granny’s apple tree, a time-honored rite of passage in the Hrubik family.

And then, ICE CREAM.

We packed a lot into those two days! Early the next morning, on the fourth of July, we left for Victoria, BC. But that is enough for another post.

I’m in the “ebb” part of my ebb-and-flow scrapbooking cycle. It doesn’t make me anxious the way it used to. I know it will come back around on the guitar soon and we can sing four-part harmony again. But these are still newish, at least from this spring.