Sailing Through Summer

Well, summer is sailing along and we have settled into a more relaxed routine now that most of the scheduled activities are over. Grant's football practices will start in two weeks, but until then we have nothing on the calendar, which is kind of nice.

So, Grant and Katie have been playing outside with kids in the neighborhood quite a bit. They have a special spot by some trees that they have claimed as a "fort" and all kinds of pretending goes on with the upkeep and guarding of the fort. It is an ongoing game that is picked up every time they run outside to play. I'm glad they enjoy playing outside so much as opposed to wanting to watch T.V. all day!


We have also been taking some fun outings as a family, like to a park or a lake, and hope to do some more of that in the next couple of weeks. Before we know it, summer will be over and it will be time to start school again!

Winding Down

Grant and Katie recently played with their teams at the last event of the soccer season -- Super Soccer Saturday. All the teams played a few games and there were snacks, face painting and carnival-like games to keep busy with between soccer games. All the kids received trophies, too. Grant and Katie each had great coaches and teams, which made for a wonderful season. I think it was a great experience for them.

Now that soccer is over, our summer activities are winding down. It is kind of nice to have less of a schedule for the rest of the summer...that is until football starts up next month! :-)

American Girl Movie

There has been a lot of excitement around here recently in anticipation of the movie, "Kit Kittredge: An American Girl" finally coming to theaters. Last week Kate and some of her friends finally got to go see the Kit movie and they brought their dolls along. The girls had a great time munching popcorn and watching the show together. :-)

We have read some of the American Girl books and we have listened to some of the stories on tape. We studied the American Revolution in history this year and the Felicity books were fun to listen to then. When we listened to the Addy stories, it led to some deeper conversations about slavery. Grant read those books before we listened to the tapes and he said, "Mom, those books are hard--not hard to read, but hard on your heart." And they were hard. But it was also a good way to begin talking about some of those difficult things. We had not read any of the Kit stories, but we will discuss the Great Depression next year in our history studies, so maybe we will read them, or listen to the tapes, then.

Cool Spray on a Hot Day

Wow, today was HOT!!! And the humidity made it seem even hotter. Grant and Katie love to cool off on hot days like today by playing on the slip-n-slide that Dave made with a long piece of plastic from Home Depot. :-)

Happy Independence Day!