Band

We attended our first official band concert as parents last weekend. The last time I was at a concert, I was in the band. It seems like years have flown when I experience something like this.

Jonah started studying trumpet this fall, he attends band practice once a week and practices most days. I think he loves it. We're excited for him and have encouraged him with our stories of band trips and fun. He's also started working on guitar and is still taking piano. I think he may have found a niche.

Even Aaron enjoyed the concert, tapping his foot and asking the names of the songs. It was only 40 minutes, perfect for his attention span. We enjoyed having Grandma and Grandpa with us too!

Isaiah went to the concert thinking he would like to play the flute (they had been listening to instrument sounds online and the flute appealed to him). He left the concert convinced that the clarinet would be a better choice. Too many girls in the flute section. :)

10th birthday sleepover

I had promised Isaiah a party with friends for his 10th birthday. October 29th was that day, so he sent invitations out to 4 friends for a 3PM to 10 AM extravaganza. They played capture the flag, ate, played pool, ate, played Legos, ate, SIM city on the computer, you get the idea. They set up sleeping bags in our basement rec-room and put Isaiah's Lego gifts together until Ron told them lights out. They were asleep by midnight and up at 5:30 the next morning... hungry. I sent down crackers and juice and turned on the oven to bake up some Monkey Bread.. our staple Birthday breakfast (two packages of refrigerator biscuits broken and rolled into balls, then rolled in butter and cinnamon/sugar. Place in bundt pan and bake at 350 degrees until they smell done. (sorry I don't use a timer for these, maybe 45 minutes?) We also had bacon, orange slices and apple cider.

I have to say, it was a great time because it was a great bunch of kids. I've made a note to myself in the future... Birthday sleepovers are no problem as long as the kids know a few basic things...
1) How to be respectful to adults and other kids
2) How to be laid back about taking turns and helping others
3) How to use their manners.
I heard lots of pleases and thank yous from this group and was very pleased at how well they all got along even though some had never met. I would do it again in a minute... well, I can say that now that I've had a some time to catch up on sleep.

One cat is not enough...

for four children. Our cat, Butterscotch, has proven herself to be a "one-kid cat" and that kid is Jonah. She sleeps on his bed, if he sits on the couch, she sits on his lap. The rest of us are just here for her amusement and to bring her food and water, I guess. Well, this has led to Isaiah and Ella asking for more pets. Isaiah thinks a dog would be swell and Ella has begun longing for a kitten. For the last month she has been asking every day, heartbroken when I tell her we don't intend to have any more indoor animals. And then an add came across the homeschool wire for two free rabbits, hutches included. We met the rabbits and the kids loved them.

This is Ella with "Cookies and Cream". She carries it around singing to it like a little mother. She's in rabbit heaven.

The hutches came to us in a bit of disrepair. The shingles were not attached and they needed a painting. Thankfully, I have three kids who were perfect for this job. They handled it all themselves, with a little advice from Ron about shingles. Here's the before picture:

One coat of primer and two coats of paint later (with almost as much paint on Ella as there was on the hutch). We had our "new" hutches. Here's the crew. Isaiah is holding his rabbit, "Thumper".


By the way, they are both male rabbits. So, no baby rabbits in our future...for now. I had thought it would be a neat experience to have a female and see her have a litter. (Is that my husband groaning I hear?)

Frogapalooza

We have had an amazing number of frogs in our window wells. From the basement windows, it looks like a terrarium out there. The kids have collected a few times (they'll die down there if we don't pull them out). This particular morning we had at least 25 frogs in all shapes and color patterns. Today they came in with a tree frog that clung to Isaiah's finger. It's just been the year of "frogapalooza".

Aaron's first day of preschool

After lots of searching around and prayerful thought, Aaron headed off to preschool the beginning of Sept. It gives me more time to do some special projects with the older kids and gives him something of his own to experience. He was excited the first morning, but then evidently got some jitters and needed a little blanky time...

After some consoling from big sister, he looked much more ready to face the day. Way to go Aaron!

What we've been up to.

Baseball. The Washington County Fair. Jonah and Butterscotch in the 4-H Cat Show. Keeping up with my little garden. Visiting MN and having my parents and brother (from Japan) visit us. Making plans for building a bedroom in the basement for the older boys... they have out grown their little room upstairs. Swimming lessons. Birthday parties. Six flags. Noah's Ark Water park in WI Dells. The Laura Ingalls Homestead in De Smet, SD with my sister and her three children.

I love summer and am always sad when it draws to a close. I've been madly searching out curriculum and making my lists for what we need before we start school (hopefully mid-August). I'll let pictures say the rest...

Chicken love

Just to prove that our chickens have it pretty good... no more sitting incidents since I wrote about that a few months ago, I have to post this pic. It's one of my favorites.

We've started letting the chickens out into our back yard from time to time. They have an outdoor fenced area, but that has been pretty thoroughly scratched and picked, so now they get bored and wait for us at the fence gate. We can only have them out while we are watching them, to avoid them meandering over into either neighbors yard. They happily cluck, scratch and peck in the woods, dry leaves flying out behind them. Getting them back into the chicken yard has proved easier than I thought, all it takes is a white bucket. They'll follow us all over the yard just to see whats in the white bucket. Today's treat? strawberry tops, homemade pizza crusts and the corn cobs from lunch today.