You Can Be Productive While Having Fun

Our friend, Stephanie Goodman, is working on another children's book. Nichole and I went over to her house while her daughter was there and the four of us went through a draft of the book together to check how the pictures looked and how the story flowed. It was a very productive gathering but it was also so much fun. I'm excited to see how the finished product turns out. It's a cute story with even cuter illustrations.

Here's a picture Stephanie got of us. 

 

Eat Trail Mix Outside

August 31 was National Trail Mix Day and Eat Outside Day.

Some of us had trail mix and some of us ate outside... in the rain. 

In fact there were several rainy days the end of August. They were quite enjoyable.

 

Mixture of Holidays and Celebrating

We celebrated Jr.'s birthday in August. We spent a few days doing celebrations. It wasn't all on the same day. So here's how we celebrated his birthday and some other holidays around the same time.

August 28 was Race Your Mouse Around the Icons Day. I did that in the morning.

It was also National Bow Tie Day so we had Jr.'s birthday dinner of bow tie pasta with homemade alfredo sauce and other yummy stuff and garlic bread and orange soda, of course.

August 28 was also National Thoughtful Day. I added bacon in with Jr.'s birthday dinner even though it wasn't on his list of dinner items. He appreciated it. 

Jr. got earbuds and fabric Thud board for easier traveling. 

He also got banana runts. He likes runts candies.

 

Jet insisted the candles on the birthday cake be in the shape of a "love heart." 

August 29 was More Herbs, Less Salt Day. Lucky got up in the morning and cleaned the table so he could display this for me to see. 

August 20 was Toasted Marshmallow Day. The kids had s'mores. 

Banana Days

There were a couple of banana themed holidays in August. We celebrated around those holidays. See if you can spot how we celebrated "observed."  

Hint: The first day we did not celebrate with bananas. 

 

August 23 was Gene Kelly's Birthday. I wore my bow earrings and had a discussion with other choir members about Gene Kelly movies.

August 24 was National Waffle Day. I made waffles.

 

August 25 was National Banana Split Day. It was also Kiss and Make Up Day. Jeremy joined the kids in "Mom is old" jokes so he had to kiss me to make up for it. Tee Hee.

 

August 26 was Toilet Paper Day. We used toilet paper. It was also National Dog Day. 

We had hot dogs. Jr. Jr. and Lucky went to a Back to School party and brought home hot dogs and buns. 

Jet brought home some water colors from school and decided to draw a treasure map with them, including "X marks the spot". Then he asked me to follow the map with him around the house to find the X, which was made with some PVC. He started putting items around and adding them to the map. He made a banana cannon and we had to "dodge the bananas" and sneak past a tiger and later there was a cow.

Jet: Watch out for the cow. If you open the pen, then the cow will come out.

I love the creativity in my family.

 

August 27 was Banana Lovers Day. It was also Just Because Day. The kids did get to play video games and we did other things just because. 

I participated in an online book club for Hearts of Locke Hill by Krista Jensen just because... I finished the book about an hour before the book club. The audiobook came in on Libby the day before and the ebook came in the day of. When they announced the book for this book club earlier in the month, I was just listening to the book that takes place before this one, Hearts of Briarwall.

Because of that book club, I won another book! 

When You Rescued Me by Sian Ann Bessey

Mom Is Old

I have to admire how my children manage to say certain things. They are pretty clever instead of outright saying, "You're old." Sometimes they do say it, though. I'm not, by the way. 

 

 

Jet was done with his junky pizza and both Jr. and I wanted to finish it off.

Jr.: I guess you can have the pizza because you have seniority. Extreme seniority. 

He told me later, he wouldn't say it if I was actually old. 

 

 

 

 

 

At a paleontology museum-

Me: That turtle died many many many many many years before I was even born.

Jr.: An impressive feat. 

 

 

 

 

Mom (explaining about the cartoon "Jem"): It's total 80's, with the hair and the makeup. Total 80's.

Jr. Jr.: It's like you, Mom. You're in your eighties. 

 

 

 

 

 

Jr. (when noticing a bruise on my arm): Is it an old bruise?

Mom: It's not that old.

Jr.: No. Is it a bruise because you're old?

I have no idea where the bruise came from. Maybe I'm extra clumsy in my "old age." 

 

  

 

 

 

 

 

School Begins

School begins. Reading during pick up and drop off times begins.

It's that time of year. You better believe I was quoting Nemo. "First day of school! First day of school!"

I remembered to get first day of school pictures (oldest to youngest because they started on different days). 

Jeremy got in on the action. 

 

Before that, I got some going to the schools to pick up things or talk to teachers (and eat hot dogs) pictures. 

We have another string player this year. We joked for years about how the oldest played violin, the next oldest the cello, and the next oldest the viola in orchestra, so the next should play bass. 

He took it to heart. Ha Ha Ha Ha. This is NOT a full sized bass (it might be 1/4 size) and it's taller than him. Ha Ha Ha Ha. I love this family.

 

Date and Second Date

One day, Jeremy and I took some time to ourselves. We got up early, had a quick breakfast, and headed up Nebo Loop to go birding for a date. We saw mostly cows. 

There was one spot we stopped right on the trail because there were birds all around us, including in the branches right above us.

The cows decided not to continue on the trail we were on and went their own way. That was nice. We didn't have to move. It was good we stopped when we did or we would have run into them. 

He had a little walk at Devil's Kitchen before heading home. 

When we got home we had second breakfast, took a nap, then had second date.

We went to see the new Spider-man movie. Spider-man: Brand New Day.

It was a lovely day with my sweetheart.