How Are you? A Truly Blessed Season

 A dear FB friend asked me how I was today. Often, people say, "How are you?" but they are just being polite, not actually inquiring as to your wellbeing. And to those people, the only correct answer is, "Fine, thank you. How are you?" However, this is a friend who really wants to hear a truthful, specific answer. Like, how I *really* am right now. And after a moment of reflection, here was my response.

How's life?

~Overall, pretty good. We've got our heads above water financially for the first time in years. Dan has largely settled down and when he isn't working, he's hanging out with the family. Derek is emerging from the sulky early teen years and is spending more time with us, has rediscovered his sense of humor, and has even left the house a few times in the last few weeks. In fact, Dan and Derek are currently sitting in the LR playing Minecraft together, and we already have an expansion of Dominion on the table for board-game playing later tonight. I'm loving my job at Acton, even on the days that drive me crazy. It is good to be needed and feel like what you are doing is making a difference. And frankly, making decent money doesn't really hurt my feelings either. 😉

I've been really enjoying this season of 'non-active parenting' with The BIGS and their ladies. We have breakfast together once a week, plus pizza and movie nights on Sundays, we all ride motorcycles together whenever the weather and schedules allow, and each of the boys pop in and out of the house in the evenings a few times a week. It just feels like everything is right with the world when your grown children want to hang out with you, while still being mature and independent adults. Sometimes, you just KNOW that a particular season of your life is fleeting, and you want to cherish every moment. And that's where we are currently. It's pretty great. 

Dungeon Mayhem: Monster Madness

 Gaming with this guy. First he whooped me three times at Dungeon Mayhem with the Monster Madness expansion, and then I snuck right past him to win a game of Unstable Unicorns with the Dragon expansion.

#GameNerds
#BoardGameNerds
#DTSlick
#ManCrewHouse

12 Years Ago...

12 Years ago...
     I arrived in NM after a 3 day drive with my mom, David (9), Derek (2), 2 hysterical dogs and a few tote boxes of belongings to a place I'd never been before to start a new chapter of our life away from everything and everyone we'd ever known.
      And while I miss my Illinois family like crazy even all these years later, I've never been sorry I said yes to the adventure of a lifetime, not one single time.
      Daniel Meyer, I'll follow wherever you're going for always, because I love you to the moon and back.




#TeamMeYeR
#NotOneBitSorry
#AdventuresWithHercules
#TheManCrew
#NewMexicoForLife


PS. I should add that Dan and Patrick (7.5) had left town before the rest of us and had arrived in Mid-July. By the time we arrived, Dan was gainfully employed by the company that would employ him for the next 7 years, and Patrick had Auntie Karen wrapped around his little finger. 

#100HappyDays2018: Day 81

 

#100HappyDays: Day 81
Old friends reunited. It’s my 3 favorite vidiots from behind the snack bar, together again for one day.

Andrea, it was so great to see you and the kids today! Derek was so delighted to be with Natie for the day. — feeling happy with Sandra Wilcox Moulton, Derek MeYeR and Andrea Searor at Andele Restaurant.

#100HappyDays2018: Day 67

#100HappyDays2018: Day 67

#100HappyDays: Day 67
Birthday celebration, round two for this guy. Minecraft with Dad all day today. His gift from Dad and Mama K was several packs of the much anticipated and often requested Pokémon cards. He was pretty excited. He mentioned that he needs some energy cards to make complete decks, so they are on the way, courtesy of eBay.
Happy birthday, Slick!

#100DaysOfSummer

#DTStrong
#Slick
#Pokemon
#100HappyDays2018

PS. anyone want to teach me how to play Pokémon?

— feeling happy with Derek MeYeR at The Man Crew House.

 

#100HappyDays2018: Day 65

 

#100HappyDays2018: Day 65

 A Happy Days photo mixed with a recent Throw Back Thursday post. Our current at-home family. Hercules, Mama K, PattyCakes and Slick at the races for Independence Day. Green flag racing, friends, glow sticks and fireworks. Not a bad way to spend an evening. It's one of our very favorite traditions. 

#100HappyDays2018: Day 64

#100HappyDays: Day 64
Happy 13th birthday, Derek! Gummy bears and Pokémon cards for the win. Thanks Grandma!
#100DaysOfSummer
#DTStrong
#Birthday
#NewTeenager
#100HappyDays2018

 

#100HappyDays2018: Day 15

#100HappyDays: Day 15
Minecraft buddies! Both Dan and DT were feeling poorly today so they spent the day together while I headed into work. When I came home, they were happily playing Minecraft together and excitedly told me about all the things they had built together. Made my heart real happy! 💗

#MakingMemories
#DanAndDT
#100DaysOfSummer
#100HappyDays2018 — at The Man Crew House.

And Just Like That...Another School Year Is In The Books!

Friends, we are done, we are done, we are DONE! Mr. T and Slick have completed their best school year ever as of yesterday and now it's time to let the good times roll. Our 180+ days have been completed, we've MORE than accomplished what we set out to do this school year and they both have grown by leaps and bounds over the past 9 months.

They finished their 3 Rs with "Aunt Jodi Mom" this week and all that's left to complete is a few lingering Teaching Textbooks lessons. They will continue to read and work through DuoLingo over the summer but their formal lessons for the 3 Rs are complete.

As for their MFW curriculum with me, we are switching to "Homeschool Lite" which will be a short lesson or two every other day until we wrap our curriculum, which should be well before Jodi and her boys take their vacation in July. In the afternoons while Jodi is teaching classes at the office, the boys and I will head to the newly created 'teacher's lounge' and do a little work. I'm pretty excited about it.

To the boys, I say, "Well done, sirs! You have worked hard and accomplished much. Enjoy your well earned rest."

As for me, I've already brought all our extra books home, just the MFW core is left at the LFAL office, and the homeschooling shelves in the lounge are looking light and airy.

Best. School. Year. Ever. 

School Year Review: December 2017

We are wrapping up school for the holiday break. Here at The Smith Sisters School for Boys (the silly name we made up for our combined homeschool years ago), we have accomplished 85 days of lessons, meaning the school year is already almost half over, can you believe that?! If you have a student in any of the local schools in Las Cruces, your child has accomplished approximately the same amount. Hooray for all the hard work we’ve put in already this year!

Mr. T and Slick have been hard at work this year learning the 3 Rs plus with “Aunt Jodi Mom” every morning and learning Bible, Science, History, Geography, Art, Music and various other topics with “Aunt Kristy Mama” in the afternoons. Both are thriving with working together, as they have generally been only students in their class at home previous to this. Jodi and I are so proud of their effort this year and can’t wait to see where the rest of this school year takes us. 

Happy Holidays, friends! Enjoy the tail end of 2017 and call a hearty welcome to 2018!

Adventures in Learning with Mr. T and Slick: Week 4

Can you believe we've already completed 4 full weeks of school? As a teacher/mama who generally isn't even starting until now, it's hard to wrap my mind around the fact that we've got a solid month of school under our belts already.

Anyone want to guess what we are studying this week?

You guessed it, we've arrived in Egypt for a few weeks of in depth study. We are learning about the Nile River, the Pharaohs, the pyramids, and which of Noah's descendants migrated to this area after the incident at Tower of Babel.

A reenactment of the battle for the unification of Upper and Lower Egypt. Over all, we (including me) are learning a bunch and having a good time doing it

Adventures in Learning with Mr. T and Slick: Week 3

During Week 3, Mr. T and Slick's main focus was learning about the Tower of Babel, the Fertile Crescent and starting to learn the books of the Old Testament. The learned how to draw a map of the Bible lands (where all our study of history this year will take place) and a silly sentence to remember the names of the places on the map. I was very proud of their diligence this week because learning to draw a map full of names that make no sense to you is difficult, and they were champs. Also, the books of the Old Testament are some serious tongue-twisters and both of the boys tried really hard to learn to say (and spell) them correctly. It is a work in progress, but that's ok. Our current read-aloud book is The Tanglewoods' Secret about a little boy and girl living with their aunt. It's delightful and the boys are enjoying read-aloud time quite a bit.

Mr. T is working hard on his Bible Lands drawing.

Say the silly sentence with me, "E.T. Purrs in the Red Nile Med."
Ask the boys what that means next time you see them.

Adventures with Mr. T and Slick: Week 2

Week two started off really well with Mr. T and Slick digging into Adam and Eve's original sin. How often we are quick to blame others and try to cover up our own sin. :( And how quickly the whole world went to shambles once sin entered the world.
We started read aloud time this week, music studies (Hello, Vivaldi!) and added a few things to our timelines. The boys love coloring their timeline pieces and them laminating them. We worked on adding a few pages to our history notebooks, and the boys' sentence structure is improving already.
We learned about the four types of energy this week and it was a delight for me to see the understanding dawn in their eyes as we tried different activities and had much dialouge about the differing types.
Circle time continues to be a hit, and the boys are doing so well with their speech ideas and Scripture memorization. Mr. T in particular always has something to share.
Areas of focus this week at circle time are days of the week and months of the year. And remembering to sit still at circle time. LOL!

Follow along with us this year as we learn about His Story from the Creation to the Greeks!

Four types on Energy! I don't know about them, but I'M learning so much :)

Heloooooo, Antonio Vivaldi! It's been lovely listening to the Four Seasons all week long.

Schooling with Mr. T and Slick: Week 1

     Mr. T and Slick have hit the ground running and are enjoying their first week of school. Jodi is doing some assessments with them this week to be sure of their reading and arithmetic levels before she starts assigning work. Together, the boys and I (Kristy) are slowly working our way up to a full afternoon, so we are starting off slowly with Circle Time, Bible and some history. We are going to be learning about public speaking this year, so it's something we are focusing on in Circle Time. Both of them are NOT shy and aren't afraid to ramble on and on, so making sure we don't overshoot our planned speech time may turn out to be more of a challenge than making sure we talk long enough.
     Week 1 of My Father's World has us studying the days of Creation, reciting 2 Timothy 3:16 and dabbling in art. Mr. T LOVES art, and Slick tolerates art, so it will be a bit of a trick this year to balance the projects out so that they are both pleased. These next few weeks, we will be covering some art basics, like drawing straight lines, working on ellipses and learning about not getting frustrated by not being a perfect artist from day one. First project was to draw with a pencil in their mouth, after learning about Joni Eareckson Tada, who is a very talented artist despite being a quadriplegic. They both loved this project and in fact, have recreated it several times on their own time. They've learned how to work together on something they can't do on their own, like take the cap off of a marker.
     We are also studying The Sabbath, which is a great reminder to the adults as well, since Jodi and I both work many hours, at work and at home. We baked Challah bread and made table coverings. Slick was especially interested in the resting part of Sabbath, although he seems convinced that resting means he can have unlimited time on his tablet for the 24 hours. LOL! I'm working on Slick's schedule to keep it reasonable as he currently practices gymnastics for 12 hours a week and attends youth group activities twice a week.
     We had our first synergy group meeting this week and while we were missing a student, we enjoyed ourselves quite a bit. We did a science experiment, we baked bread, and we had our first official speech opportunity.

     Follow along with us this year as we learn about His Story from the Creation to the Greeks!

SCIENCE!! Whenever I say we are going to do a science lesson, they both shout, "SCIENCE!!"

Slick hard at work coloring the days of creation.