Weekly Happenings: This week kicked off our birthday month. Mine was on Tuesday and Joseph’s was on Thursday. I call it our birthday month because Paul’s will be in a couple of weeks. Poor Abigail has to wait until December…but we did what we could to help her not feel left out (it’s tough to be three and just starting to understand birthdays, but not understanding that you need to wait three more months for your birthday, when literally everyone else in your family is having one within days of each other). We ate out both nights (birthday person’s choice) and had cake and ice cream (and presents).
The Weekly Weather: It’s been disgustingly humid. We have had quite a bit of rain the past couple of days, though, which has been nice. Next week, we’re supposed to have a legitimate cold front come through that will drop the temperature into the 70s for a couple of days. I’m ridiculously excited!
What Paul’s Been Up To: He had work, and yard work, and all of that fun stuff. He also spent a good chunk of his day today hanging up all sorts of things for me upstairs. I’m so blessed with my hardworking husband!
What Sarah’s Been Up To: My birthday was pretty great. A friend dropped by and surprised me with a homemade cake. Then we ordered take-out (Olive Garden) and I opened presents (a book of Strange Planet comics, a blow-dryer brush, and a new doormat). I also had a couple of friends drop by with flowers and a cookie. Other than that, my week was full of helping Joseph with school, keeping Abigail happy, and trying to put a dent in the housework that I’ve been…trying to ignore, haha.
What Joseph’s Been Up To: For his birthday, I made him a cake (we made sure to share leftovers of my cake with friends and Paul’s coworkers so we wouldn’t be completely overwhelmed with an abundance of cake), got the kids Happy Meals for lunch, and then Joseph chose to go pick up Panda Express for dinner. We squeezed in present opening (some video game characters, a few new video games, and then a new computer that will make distance learning easier…then when that’s over, it’ll be a good addition to the “man cave”) and cake and ice cream.
What Abigail’s Been Up To: She’s been liking having a little more one-on-one time with me (in between me helping Joseph with school). She is also expanding her imaginative play. She likes to speak out loud for her toys. I can tell the difference between her talking to me (she’ll call me “Mom”) versus her toys talking to me (she’ll call me “Abigail’s mom”). It was really cute when my friend dropped by with the cake. Abigail ran up and said, “Hi! My name is Abigail!” (which was kind of funny because my friend totally knows who she is, but this is one of the first times Abigail has introduced herself to someone, so that made it cute). Oh, and today at Hobby Lobby, she was sitting in the cart and if we were walking towards someone, she would say, “Excuse, me, ma’am!” (regardless of gender, haha). So then we had a little talk about when to say “ma’am” and when to say “sir”. 😀
This Week in Pictures (warning: there’s a lot this week):
I had a dentist appointment this week. Paul sent me this picture that he took while I was gone.She wanted to be a queen dancer (complete with dancing shoes…thank goodness her church shoes kind of look like ballet shoes).She asked me for fancy hair and wanted me to use all of her butterfly clips. Then she took it all out an hour later. Good thing I only spent about ten minutes doing it in the first place!I couldn’t find a quote about September that I liked better than the one I used last year, so I just used the same one. 😀Abigail was excited about getting the fall decorations out. Now, if only the weather would cooperate!She loved getting to sing “Happy Birthday”. She also loved that I let her help me blow out my candles.School days mean early mornings….and sometimes not everybody is quite ready.This is what a 9-year-old looks like (and an almost-4-year-old). 😀Yup. That’s ranch in her hair. Also, she may have been fishing a french fry out of her ranch…or she might have been just dipping her finger in it…I wasn’t watching too closely. 😉Joseph’s cake. I love when he wants toys as cake toppers…it makes “decorating” a lot easier!No friend party this year, but we still put up his favorite birthday sign.Unwrapping presents.A game he’s wanted for a while (Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild).We got him a couple of games.These little figurines have something embedded in them that can be activated with his Switch, so that their character can appear in the game and do something (as you can tell, I’m clearly VERY knowledgeable about this…). 😉Paul’s brother also got Joseph a couple of games.I love how excited he was about everything.I mean……his face says it all.Our toad hopped into my planter to get away from all the rain (his burrow was probably flooded).Cake! Abigail’s face should tell you that we were singing “Happy Birthday”.Blowing out the candle. I had to put my hand in front of Abigail’s mouth, though, because I knew Joseph wouldn’t be as happy as I was about her wanting to help blow out the candle. 😀Enjoying ice cream……and cake.This sunset caught my breath. I love when it goes purple.She insisted I take her picture. I was more than happy to oblige.Paul had some business that took him past Bucc-ee’s, so he picked up this shirt for Abigail……this shirt for Joseph……and this magnet for me (he knows I like magnets).One thing that Paul hung up in the loft was this bulletin board that used to be in Joseph’s room (we had to take it down when his new bed went in). I put fresh paper (I had some left over from when I originally put paper on there, but it was that really good paper that doesn’t fade…that paper’s 8 years old, y’all) and a new border (which I got at Hobby Lobby) on it and turned it into a “gallery” for the kids’ artwork. Now I just need to get Abigail to make something for it.I found this cute metal pumpkin at Hobby Lobby and knew it would be perfect for this spot.Abigail already had this metal flower over her door, so I wanted to get things to put over our door and Joseph’s door……so I found this for our door……and this for Joseph’s door. Now all of our bedroom doors have identifiers over them.I also found these fun decor items for the loft.The wall’s done!Paul also got some things hung up in Abigail’s room: a picture of the Savior walking with a little girl and her name page that we got from one of Paul’s work picnics. Basically, since there are a lot of people at Paul’s work that speak different languages, they will take a paper and write your name in a bunch of different languages. Joseph also has one (his is a strip of paper with his name in different languages…which is still cool, but I kind of wish it had the names of the languages on them like this one does, just because I don’t recognize a lot of them).Paul also rehung the picture of Pikachu that I drew for Joseph. We had to take it down when we moved Joseph’s new bed in, but he told me he kind of missed it, so we found a new place for it.
Weekly Happenings: Monday was out 18th wedding anniversary. 🙂 It kind of got swallowed up in also being the first day of school for Joseph, but we did take time to have a special meal. Paul grilled steaks and I made sauteed mushrooms to go on top as well as some corn on the cob. I also made a strawberry pie with fresh whipped cream for dessert. Oh and we exchanged gifts as well. We’ve got one week of virtual schooling under our belt, too. It actually went really well. There was a small hiccup right at the beginning (the servers for the district were a little bogged down by all the increased usage and there were other issues with some of the programs as well. We were able to bypass all the issues simply because Joseph was still logged into everything from when we tested things over the weekend…so we were able to get onto everything just fine. I guess it pays to not wait until the last minute to try and see if everything works! School did encompass most of our week, though, since it was just like a normal school day, time-wise. I did take the kids to the park earlier today, though, just for a change of pace.
The Weekly Weather: I don’t think it rained at all this past week…we were warm and dry (and humid). I must admit I’m ready for fall and cooler temperatures!
What Paul’s Been Up To: He’s helped to make sure this first week of digital learning went well (thank goodness this happened to be his work-from-home week). He also painted Joseph’s old bed frame and got it set up in Abigail’s room. She was so excited!
What Sarah’s Been Up To: I met up with my book club, which was fun as always. Other than that, I was mainly helping Joseph with school and helping Abigail try to understand that while yes, he was home, he couldn’t play with her.
What Joseph’s Been Up To: He did great with school this week. His teacher is very organized and helpful, which has been great!
What Abigail’s Been Up To: She’s been getting used to not having her brother at her beck-and-call. She has also started saying, “Yippie-skippie!” (something that a character in Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood says) when she’s happy or excited about something. She loves the improvement to her bed (her mattress had been on the floor before).
This Week in Pictures:
His teacher had printed up these cute signs for everyone to use for the first day.Flowers, a cute card, some yummy chocolate, and some pretty earrings. I got Paul a new yard-work hat and something he can use to clean his AR-15.A close up of my earrings. Paul looked up what the traditional gift for eighteen years was and found that it was porcelain…so he got me porcelain earrings. 🙂Always keeping me on my toes, this one…We had put the gate up in front of Joseph’s door so that it would be easy to poke our heads in every once in a while to check on him (without Abigail barreling in). Abigail insisted on having a gate in front of her room, too. This was the quietest part of the week. 😉Giving virtual learning a thumbs-up.Completing a writing assignment.I don’t know where she was going……but wherever it was, she was prepared for anything.Snuggled up after a long day.Abigail’s new set-up. I love that Paul thought to take one of the old baby gates and use it as a headboard. It was already the perfect width, so he didn’t need to alter it at all.Because the kitchen is as good a place as any to play pirates.This is a fun bridge. The swinging platforms are chained to the ground and you have to step from platform to platform as they sway back and forth.Talking to each other through the pipes.Weeee!He took her back into the trees to show her the spot he and his friends like to hang out. I thought they were pretty cute walking back there.
Weekly Happenings: This was our last week of summer vacation before school starts (virtually) on Monday. We went to the zoo, hung around the house, did a drive-through Meet the Teacher, and just relaxed because we know that from here on out, it’s going to be back to business as usual.
The Weekly Weather: It’s really been a mixed bag. We’ve had random storms come through (and by random, I mean they weren’t showing up on my weather app until it was actually raining…and then the app would update and all of a sudden show rain, haha). The only time it was really irritating was when I walked out of the grocery store with a cart full of bagged groceries only to find it raining…that was a fun run. I am grateful for the rain, though…we always need it!
What Paul’s Been Up To: He’s finished and installed Joseph’s bed! It was a big job, but so worth it. Joseph has a really cool set-up in there now. Other than that, he’s been busy at work (as usual). This next week will be a work from home week, which I’m grateful for, since it’ll be Joseph’s first week of distance learning. It’ll be nice having my resident IT guy here to help with any technology hiccups.
What Sarah’s Been Up To: I took the kids to the zoo and then did a bit of organizing. I had a gigantic pile of stuff in our room that I’ve been meaning to donate but haven’t had a chance to. That pile was giving me major anxiety (I’m kind of anti-pile), so one morning, I loaded it all up into the back of the car and hauled it off to the donation station. It felt really good to get rid of it all! I’ve also washed all of Joseph and Abigail’s new clothes and gotten them into their drawers.
What Joseph’s Been Up To: He has been soaking up every last minute of this last official week of summer vacation. He enjoyed getting to meet his teacher and finding out more about how things are going to be for the first little bit of school.
What Abigail’s Been Up To: She has really gotten used to Joseph being home. It might be a little rough come Monday when Joseph needs to be doing school instead of being able to play with her. She didn’t really understand it last year when Joseph was home but not able to play (and she really didn’t like that she was closed out of his room). Hopefully Joseph will be able to go into his classroom after Labor Day…because that’s the type of schedule that Abigail is used to when I say that Joseph is doing school. 😉
This Week in Pictures:
Laundry Day in 2020 looks a little different than I imagined…I needed to wash my masks, one of Paul’s, and all of Joseph’s (since he’ll need to wear them when he does eventually get to go back to school).Checking out the spectacled bear at the zoo.Zoo train!Say “cheese” everybody!All snuggled up to her big brother.Do you see the satisfaction on her face? She had been asking me for a banana for two days before I had the chance to get some from the store. She was especially excited that I let her just hold the entire thing instead of cutting it up and putting it on a plate.Some days, breakfast and lunch kind of meld together for me. I’ve discovered a pretty yummy smoothie combination, though: frozen mixed fruit (peaches, strawberries, cantaloupe, grapes, and pineapple), frozen blueberries, milk, plain Greek yogurt, cashews, and a bit of honey. It’s so good and so filling! I love that I’ve been able to add a little more fruit and protein into my diet in such an easy way! I took a picture of this because right as I set it down, Abigail was next to me, asking to share my banana and my eggs. I wanted to document it before it got gobbled up by the resident food thief. 😉She wanted to wear her Vampirina costume AND her Texas boots. Why not?All painted……and installed.Paul added a bit more of a railing so Joseph would feel more secure up there. I like that his bookcase, desk, and nightstand all fit under there. His room feels a lot more open now.When trying to figure out a way to get more light under there, Paul came up with the idea of using some old LED lights that we were no longer using (they had been in Paul’s office until he got more lighting in there). Joseph seems pretty pleased with the result.
