Our homeschool journal: 4th of July

Life this week...

I feel like my blog is just becoming a place for reviews. I'm sorry for that. It is not my intention. Lately it seems like it's all I have time to get on here. I have so many things I want to share, but I just can't seem to get my time management figured out. I also just get plain old tired a lot lately. And we all know how well tired Mama's do! Not good. I've had a short fuse, and I've been grumpy a lot too (among other things). So, blogging comes last of course. I just wish it didn't have to.

Homeschool this week...

Yes, we are still schooling as much as we can this summer. This week it wasn't as consistent as I'd wanted it to be. I did some planning and prep and we worked on a lot of reviews. We didn't do any formal math, but Alex decided play the Times Table Tutor when I was writing the Dyslexia Gold review.

Reviews we are working on...

We have some awesome bird activities that we are doing from the Crafty Classroom. We just received a box of books today from Library Educational Services, so we've got some new books to read. We have several others too! A lot of fun things going on right now!

Places we're going and people we're seeing...

We had a pretty low key 4th of July, but it was still good. We usually go camping, but didn't plan or reserve anything for this year. It's kinda fun to be home for a change, and see what people do close to home. We hit up 2 parades. One a little farther out (Lake Oswego) because April thought it looked fun. The other was a lot closer (the next town over in Gervais). It was our first time to both of those parades.

First, the Lake Oswego parade:

This parade was big. It was long with a big crowd. We barely made it in time so we had to squeeze in somewhere. I was thankful we had shade.

It was a fun parade, but I have to admit I was surprised at the lack of creativity. There were only a few really cute or patriotic displays, but it was mostly groups of people walking for different organizations.

The Gervais Parade:

I was impressed by this small yet lively parade. There were actual cars/floats and a few fun things to look at. It even had cows! It was short though. I think it lasted a total of 25ish minutes. We also parked and sat right next to our car with no one else around us, so the kids got a lot of candy thrown to them.

I didn't take many pictures of any of the parades because the only camera I had was my phone, and its storage is full. I really need to go through and get rid of a ton of my 2,000 pictures on it.

Later in the day we headed over to a homeschool friend's house for BBQ and fireworks. All the kids had fun. We got to know our homeschool friends a little better, and just enjoy a lovely low key evening outside. It was just what we all needed. Maybe next year we'll make it to the big show at the park, but this is what we needed this year. So thankful to our friends for inviting us!

April made a gluten free 4th of July cake. It turned out delicious!

The boys also decorated their bikes earlier in the day. We didn't have any special reason, just for fun.

My favorite thing this week was...

Spending some time outside in nature with my family. I could just spend all day listening to that river.



My kids' favorite thing this week was...

Getting candy from the parades.

Things I'm working on...

Getting my front room reorganized. I have a lot of games to go through and purge.

Random things the kids worked on...

Aric decided to pull out this old K'nex roller coaster and build it. We've had this for many years. I think before we even had the boys. Dad built it first with April when she was little (or maybe just built it for her, I can't remember). Then Aaron built it a few years ago, and now Aric has built it. It only stayed up for a day because it just takes up too much space in our small living room, but they had fun playing with it while it was up.

Something I accomplished...

I can't say that I've accomplished anything worth noting this week. I did the dishes, and barely kept up on the laundry and that's about it.

What we're reading...

Our library basket is very full. We are reading aloud Fablehaven. We have a lot of books about Canada to read through. Just a lot of random books that the kids picked up from the library!

I'm cooking...

I made Apple coleslaw for the picnic. I don't make that very often except when we have pulled pork or we're taking it to a picnic. My friend said she really liked it, so I'll take that as a win! I didn't take a picture of it, and I can't seem to find the exact recipe online, but here is an example of what it might look like (click on the link). Good stuff!

I'm grateful for...

Opportunities to get out and play with my family. We had a lovely time out on the boat today. Alex really rocks the knee board.

 That wraps up this week!