We have pretty much taken the month of July off from formal "book learning" academics. It just seemed we had a lot going on in July since Daddy was off work most of the month. So we played a lot, visited a lot of places on little day trips like the zoo, Kings Island (a lot), a farm, bowling, and parks. We celebrated the fourth with fireworks and parade and family fun. We hosted some young girls from a children's choir for a few days and saw their concert. We celebrated Grandma's birthday, caught lightening bugs, picked berries, rode bikes, did a lot of swimming, and took care of a friend's chickens. This next week and half left of July we will send Alexis off to her first year of girls camp (sniff sniff) and we will be paying a visit to grandparents afterwards. So with all the activity I felt it was easier to take a little break from formal "book learning" type things. When August comes we plan to resume our normal lightened summer schedule (which will still, as always, be adjusted and interrupted by life and family fun, but we won't have quite as many trips in a row.) :)
On this particular day, it was a slower day, and I woke up, changed Adam's diaper and handed him off to Daddy to watch while I showered. Then I headed downstairs and found these two playing PacMan. We have an old XBox that has been in the basement a couple of years and yesterday Ashley suddenly remembered the Pacman game and begged to play it. So I relented and they have been having fun playing it. Everyone relaxed for a while and ate breakfast and then everyone got dressed and we headed to our favorite park for a while.
Afterwards we got the kids ice cream cones and headed back to the house. Adam was filthy so I changed him. We had lunch and I put Adam down for a nap.
Ashley became an Indian and played Strawberry Shortcake dolls with Emily.
Alexis worked on some Rainbow Loom projects for a gift exchange she's participating in.
I folded laundry and caught up on a couple of other chores.
After a while everyone headed outside. Alexis rode her bike and Ashley and Emily headed out to the back deck and played a game of dolls.
Alexis came inside and played piano for a while and Adam woke up and decided to help her do a duet.
I had to call Ashley inside for a minute because she left her crayons out and after Adam was finished playing piano he got into them and dumped them everywhere. So she and Adam worked together to clean them up. Then they both headed back outside.
They decided it was hot, so everyone went for a swim for a little while. (The sun is not in Alexis' eyes in this picture - she's in the middle of a wave.) :)
After swimming everyone headed inside, got into dry clothes, and ate dinner. Then we did evening chores and we read for a while out of our current family read a loud book, "Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of Nimh." Afterwards we popped some popcorn for a family movie night. We watched Pete's Dragon, one of our favorites. It was dark now and I had told the children earlier today we would watch the stars come out, except now the clouds were thick and there were no stars to see. So we decided to make stars inside. Ashley grabbed a straw hat and put a flashlight under it and we turned off all the lights and admired the beautiful stars. We made smores using our stove and some skewers to roast the marshmallows. Then we sat under our living room of stars and told funny ghost stories (not very scary at all.) We also made shadow puppets with the flashlight and sang a couple of songs.
By then it was 10:45 and way past bedtimes, so we read scriptures, sang a hymn, said our prayers and everyone headed off to bed. I'm so thankful for these sweet moments of simple family fun and hope my children always remember them.
