“Insta” replay-a thankful heart is a happy heart

Happy Thanksgiving!

This year we started what I hope will be a new tradition, and did a 5k walk first thing Thanksgiving morning!  Merry joined her Aunt and I in the “fun”.

Also fun was discovering Merry’s picture is the local Holiday’s event guide.  Her class was shown practicing for their Christmas program.

Animal Crossing for my phone makes me ridiculously happy.  Mostly because my sisters are also playing so it’s a fun family thing!

Another thing that made me ridiculously happy was Jon reading “Grumpy Cat” out loud to his family.  He really connected with the main character!

So that’s how we are wrapping up November, with thanksgiving and laughter! (And way too much time spent playing games on my phone, sigh.)

Insta-replay, focusing on family fun!

Between moving and school, life is pretty crazy right now.  So I’ve been making an extra effort to slow down and make some happy family memories. So while most of our time is spent digging through boxes and typing out math assignments, here are the highlight.

We went to my old highschool’s student play, the Wizard of Oz.  The girls had friends guest staring as munchkins.  It was fun seeing faces we knew on stage.

It was dress rehearsal week for our dance studio.  Charry is at that fun, easy to embarrass age, but I gave her some space and didn’t go in to watch the rehearsal as long as she took a picture with her sister while in their costumes.

We’ve started a weekly game night.  The agreement is at least one game as a family.  Last week we opened up Angry Birds Star Wars Jenga, which had been bought on sale years ago but never played.  

Sunday we tried something new.  Instead of going over to my inlaws, we all stopped at a food truck rally down the street from us, then they brought the food to our place. A highlight for Merry was playing potato head with her aunt. 

Now we are getting ready for the holidays! The plan is to continue to make memories, so this year Christmas Barbie is making her comeback. So much to look forward to!

We moved! (In real life not to another website)

So I have been crazy busy and not at all focused for the last few months! But now things are settling down just in time for the holidays when life gets crazy again, sigh.

After spending a month living in a camper in my inlaws backyard, we moved to our very own house! Now we get to experience the joys of home ownership!

Through it all we have been trying to keep up on school which has been a struggle.  Even now getting into a routine is tough.

But girls are working hard, even in the evenings and on the weekends. 

And I had a moment free to update my blog (although I should get back to my school).

Instagram-replay: more summer fun

This last month has been crazy! But next month will be even crazier! We are moving in a few weeks, but not sure where to and then into a house we are buying after a month more of paperwork. In the meantime here is a look back at what our summer has been like.

Barbie fashion shows have been all the rage at Grandma Jackie's house. Aunt Katie and Aunt Abbie dug out their dolls and 90s clothes. Big hair and bright colors!

It was warm outside so we found things to do inside, like going to air conditioned movie theaters. Both girls enjoyed the new Spider-Man movie. 

We finally got end of the year dance photos done, only a few months late, oops.  The piggyback photo was their request and it turned out so cute!

The library continues to be one of our favorite places.  In fact one of my biggest concerns about the upcoming move is "will we like the new library?" And it's going to be a library, what could we possibly not like!

15 years! Not sure what else needs to be said.  We went camping with the family for our actual anniversary but have a movie night planned, so it's all good.

While camping we went to the Sea Lion Cave. It was fun looking at the wild Sea Lion and exploring the dark area of the cave set up for visitors.  

Biggest event of the summer was the eclipse! We had so much fun making pinhole projectors and glimpsing the sun through our protective eyewear. Totally Amazing!

Living just outside of one of the major viewing areas, after the eclipse we had an equally unusual event, traffic backed up in front of our house.  Since I had leftover water bottles from camping, I put some out for the weary travelers. I heard it was taking over 2 hours to get 30 miles! 

So that was summer, even though it's not quite over yet between my classes starting again and the moves coming up my mind is moving on to Fall.

Sixth grade lesson plans

It is almost August, we are a month from the the next school year, yet I felt like I was trying to beat the clock finishing up my lesson plans!

The house we are living in is being sold so we thought it might be a good time to look at moving.  We'd been talking about buying a house for the past year and now it is time. So between shopping and cleaning, packing and touring next month promises to be a busy one. I didn't want to wake up on the first day of school and not be prepared so I preemptively got it all (mostly) ready now!

With the exception of a few workbooks I still need to purchase, all of the sixth grade curriculum is in this file box.

And I've made a checklist and lessons plans for each week!  While my plans are not yet final, at least one subject will be reevaluated after the first week, it's nice to have them done.

That's one less thing to worry about during our big move.  Now I just need to make sure I don't lose the crate!

Insta-replay: family time!

What another update? But it's only been a week? I can hear you all wondering at my new found reliability.  Truth be told, I sat doe to work on homework and my computer decided to update, so instead of homework I thought I would blog!

We have had some delightful time with family! Our small family made it to 7/11 on 7/11 for the free slurpee!

Our Walters family had a camping trip together.  It involved relaxing round the fire and the girls played paper-dolls. I'm so glad those dolls are getting some use!


The trip also involved icecream! They were some of the biggest cones.

Next we had Ward family time at the Enchanted Forest, our local theme park. It was so much fun, and is a great place to spend with little kids and big families!

Merry had some one-on-one time with a cousin, they are definitely kindred spirits!  Yet both so unique.

And then we were back to our little family, Charry and I clogged at our local art fair. And we as a family wandered for a bit before going home to nap.

So that's what we've been up to.

"Insta"-replay, keeping track of time

Dear Diary,

I should be cleaning and getting ready for camp but... oh wait this isn't my diary, it's a public blog. Whoops.

So what have I been up to? Spoiler alert, it's not cleaning!

We celebrated with Grandma Jackie!  She finished treatments for breast cancer.  And we went all pink to show our support and love 💕.

Celebrated Fourth of July with small town style! Dressing up and watching the parade.  We skipped the late night fireworks but saw quite a few on our car ride home.

Biggest excitement came in the form of a branch landing on our car.  Now we are dealing with insurance, which is no fun.  

Spending time with my family is always important!  Right now I just have the one little sister living close by, so we were excited when she had a day free to spend with us.

And we had our first clogging demonstration at the county fair.  Speaking of fair, I don't think it is fair my daughter is as tall as I am!

So that was my busy week, full of celebrations and family! And I'm excited for more family and celebrating with camping and visitors planned in the next weeks!