Create-Play-Homeschool

Scenes from the weekend

Lots of relaxing, outside play, and weeding.

  Reconstructing birds nests out of wire, doll rings, and coloring.

Today we are off on an adventure! I will share the details soon. Enjoy your Monday!

Morning chores

 I have a little helper on my morning chores walk. She only goes to see the kitties and is most likely running around in her underwear.

Calling the mamas as she walks to the barn.

She will pick every one of them up and insist that you see them.

I walk a little further in the barn and open up the door to the 15 rhode island reds that will soon make there way into the coop with the big chickens. We eat a ton of eggs around here. And my 9 year old has an egg business. She's saving for a horse.

Next up is the big chickens and ducks. I love keeping ducks. So fun to watch.

We've been spending a lot of time at that barn lately. With paint brushes.

You see, I decided we should paint the barn. It's the only one we have and it needs to stay in great shape. Plus when four kids love to paint, and you can watch barn kitties wrestling in the grass all day, it goes pretty fast.

Bunk beds redone

I was so excited to score a $30 set of bunks from my sister from another mother.  I wasn't liking the colors of the sale price bunks at the store so I'm so happy I could customize these to the girls' room. 

The first thing I did was take a belt sander to them and then an orbital sander to get in all the hard to reach spots. 

In progress- it took 2 coats of "totally teal" paint. 

 

 

And here they are in Alli and Kate's room-

I absolutely love them! 

Life on the mini blog

Summer is in full swing and the busyness of activities have subsided. All the meat birds are butchered, our chores slower. We are moving into a season of bonfires, fireflies, dirty feet, and putting our garden bounty away. The critters are also out in full force.

Lauren rescued this baby bunny from being our cat's lunch. She mothered her, put her in a rabbit cage, and gave her food and water. She found her dead the next morning untouched in the cage.  She dug a hole and buried it before I knew anything about it that morning. She's gotten so tough lately.
Austin received his own styrofoam worm box. It's full and ready to go fishing. Again. I think worms keep any boy happy.

I bought the girls a snap circuit jr. from Amazon last week. They have put together everything from a flying saucer to an alarm beeping. Seriously cool stuff! Alli likes it and plays with it more than anyone else. Here's a link if you're interested.  I see more of these in my future. 

I'm hoping to start our summer homeschooling today. Wish me luck!

town taxi

{Alli front and center}

{Lauren and her friend Lana.}

{Lauren's hip hop class.}

{Right before the recital}

{Costume change! Lauren and Lana again}

After a long but wonderful week, dance is over.  The girls had a blast with friends, shined on stage, and are still happy they wore makeup.

The next day Austin started t-ball.

He did awesome.

Monday morning we packed the car and drove an hour away to drop Lauren off at horse camp. I think I officially lost my mind at this point.

My parents have been helping me out by taking her to and from camp every day. (It's closer for them.)

She's feeling pretty awesome since she's the most experienced rider at camp this year. Which means she gets to move up on bigger horses. And give me a heart attack.

This is the horse she normally rides. Snickers. This is the horse she rode today-

(This was her two years ago on the same horse).  It's her instructors horse and one of the biggest ones there. Falling off Snickers last year has made her more confident than ever.

By the end of this week the craziness will subside  and we should hopefully be able to settle into a much slower routine.