School During the #CoronaVirusPandemicQuarantine2020

 Let’s remember today that there is no universal correct answer that works for every family’s dynamics in regards to schooling for the upcoming school year. They ALL feel like this...

So, whatever you choose for your family, hooray for making that decision, I know it was challenging. Whatever anyone else chooses for their family, offer them the same kindness you would appreciate hearing about your choice.

#Kindness
#ToughDecisions
#HowToSchoolYourChildIn2020
#ALittleSchoolHumor

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. 

It's the Little Things: Day 39

  I want to focus on the good things this year.
All the things people get right.
All the times that everything works out just perfectly after we assumed disaster had already struck.
All the times that the right word was spoken at the right moment.
So, let's celebrate those little moments together, shall we?

•  COMMUNITY GROUP! How I've missed meeting together with these amazing people. These are 'our people' and I've missed them like crazy over the last 10 weeks that we've not been meeting regularly. It was GOOD to be together again. 
• LEGO Club was a large affair again, and I'm endlessly amazed at how we can have 30 people in the large room of the office, and while it's loud, there is no fighting, no fussing, no drama. It's such fun! 
• DT and Mr. T had a great day of school today. I think we are finally getting back into a good groove after the holidays. 
• I think I'm getting the hang of this free time thing. I'm reading, blogging, and relaxing more than I have in the past several years. I may get good at it before too much longer. :) 
• I'm embracing my word of the year (Progress) and learning to grant myself grace in areas where I struggle, encourage myself where I'm lazy and to be grateful for small changes instead of hoping/praying for overnight sweeping massive changes that never end up lasting. 
• I've already blogged more this year than I have during 2 other years during the last 10. I'm going to call that progress and delight in it. (Hopefully, I'm not talking your years off, LOL)
• It's stumbling across a perfect field trip for the boys that 'magically' ties in with what we are currently studying. Ain't God good?
• 
  

What's on YOUR grateful list today?

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.

#100HappyDays: Day 81

 

Day 81 of #100HappyDays
Challah bread. Beautiful and delicious...and educational.

#100DaysOfSummer
#Homeschooling... See More

— feeling happy at The Man Crew House.

 

HOMESCHOOL 2017-2018 School Year

Yes, we're *those* people. The crazy ones that homeschool. On purpose. Because we like it.
If you are interested in what we are using this year, you are in the right place. Here is an overview of what we are doing for the 2017-2018 school year.
With a job change firmly in place for this school year, we are doing this a little differently this year. Jodi and I are sharing the teaching time with my Derek and her Titus. It's good for them to have a class mate, and to have a variety of teachers and styles. So, without further ado...

DEREK (and Titus):

• We are once again returning to My Father's World for our curriculum. It covers Bible/character training, geography, history, science, art, music and our read-aloud books. We are in year 2 of the 5 year cycle called Creation to the Greeks. It can be found here. I teach in the afternoons while Jodi is with clients. We are following the public school schedule since James is in public school and it also keeps our schedule simple in terms of when Jodi will have clients in the office and I will be at work.
• Jodi teaches in the mornings and is writing curriculum specifically for Derek and Titus to cover Language Arts and Arithmetic, with a special focus on writing. She is using the "What Your ___Grader Needs to Know" series as a starting point and adding from there. So while some of the work is too easy for them since we are going back to square one to make sure we've covered all the basics, they are picking things up at an exciting rate that have been missed here or there along the way, and when she teaches something they already know, they feel ahead and super smart. I call that win-win. We are also using Teaching Textbooks Grade 4 as a way to cover some of the basics and reinforce the math concepts that Jodi is teaching during the mornings.
• Derek and Titus are learning some Spanish this year and we are using the DuoLingo phone app to allow them some independent learning time. They are both soaking it up like little sponges and are teaching us new things weekly.
• Extra Curriculars include: Lego Club, Synergy Group, Game Nights, Craft Day/Board Game Day/camps at Learn For a Lifetime, play dates with friends (and each other) and for Derek, joining the church youth group. Grma is snow-birding in Cruces this year is always on the lookout for activities they will enjoy that are both entertaining and educational.
• The boys are trying JAM's Build Your Own Machines online course for some engineering fun. They are building all sorts of amazing machines from normal household goods. Check it out here.
  
  
  That pretty well sums up what we are doing this school year. If we add or change anything, I'll update the page.

#100HappyDays: Day 74

 

Day 74 of #100HappyDays
Making new school year plans!

#100DaysOfSummer
#Homeschool
#PlannerNerd — feeling happy at The Man Crew House.

#100HappyDays: Day 65

Day 65 of #100HappyDays
BOX DAY!! This is like Christmas for homeschoolers. 😍 And I only needed to order these few things this year, because I already have this year of curriculum from when P did it a few years back PLUS I used my gift certificate from when I worked the homeschool convention in June so this was free! Woot!

#100DaysOfSummer
#BoxDay
#FreeBooks — feeling happy at The Man Crew House.

#100HappyDays: Day 4

Day 4: My first Homeschooling Conference, and I'm representing my favorite curriculum company, My Father's World. I had a blast meeting with all the parents and kids, from the we-haven't-started-yet parents, to the We-are-on-our-20th-year parents. Great curriculum, great parents, great experience!

I want to BUY IT ALL

If you like this challenge, head over to www.100happydays.com to sign up. You can choose a start date, your favorite photo posting platform and even a custom hashtag if you want to be more original. Do it, you might just decide you love it.

Planners, Planners, Planners!

When you get the kiddies all tucked into bed, hubby is out of town and the teenagers are saving the world from the zombie apocalypse via video games, and you have a few minutes to yourself, what do you do? Sometimes I read, I often fold clothes or tidy the house (just being honest) and occasionally I just drop into bed. But what I like to do is use the quiet, uninterrupted time to plan meals for the week, look ahead for upcoming anomalies in the schedule so I can set an alarm so we don't miss it, make sure I've got time to get all the people to the right places, on time...or at least know in advance that I can't be in two places at once so I can make alternate arrangements. At any rate, tonight I thought to myself, "It's been a few days (OK, more like a week) since I spent any time updating and working in my planner. I'll work for 20 minutes and then head off to bed with less mental clutter." That was nearly 1.5 hours ago. Oops.
I just LOVE my planner! Just call me a planner nerd. I won't mind. 😍

I've used nearly a kajillion different planners between my years as a student, as a young wife, as a new homeschooling mama, and as a seasoned veteran of wifely duties, homeschooling organization and lively motherhood. I've used everything from simple pencil and paper (any little scrap will do), a homemaking binder with tabs, color coding, highlighters, schedules and every piece of info anyone walking into my shoes would EVER need, to a desk calendar, daily dockets, fitness tracker apps, daily email reminders, FlyLady website, the much loved "Chandlers" school assignment notebook of yesteryear, and even an app that sent me notifications of when to clean things. I currently have 11 daily alarms to help keep me showing up at the right time and place each day. I lead a B-U-S-Y life and until the last year or so, had never found the perfect balance between usability, portability, affordability, longevity and efficiency. But this one is just right for me. It's called the Print and Go planner by Life As Mom.
A planner that you can print as you go and pop it into a 3 ring binder, or all at once and have it spiral bound somewhere like Staples or Kinkos. It's got a monthly overview page for each month, plus a week's worth of daily time schedule/meal plans/to do lists on each 2 page spread. Also featuring a few pages of lined pages for notes, plus a goals page, which I'm really enjoying this year. Now then, I DO color code my people's activities so I can see at a glace who is where at any given time, but the rest is cake. A few post-it notes, some colored pens, a good black pen, and some white-out tape and I'm ready to plan ALL.THE.THINGS.
From this planner nerd to you, check it out. You won't be sorry.
What do you use to keep your ducks in a row?

Homeschooling 2016-2017

Yes, we're *those* people. The crazy ones that homeschool. On purpose. Because we want to. ;)
If you are interested in what we are using this year, you are in the right place. Here is an overview of what we are doing for the 2016-2017 school year.

David~ DONE for right now

• David is finished with his schooling at this time. He worked his way through High School using Blessed is the Man Curriculum, Progeny Press Literature Guides, Cordura Driving School and his library card.
• He is waiting for me to write him an English curriculum that focuses on composition so that he can get his diploma.

Patrick~ 12th Grade

• Patrick will be using Easy Peasy All in One High School for his last year of formal schooling, found here. We decided the go with it again, since he liked it so much and it offered him freedom from sitting with me all day. He is working their 12th grade recommendations and reading devotional materials provided by the youth pastor. He will need to do the composition class I write for David as well. We are going to work through an American Government online class together. He is also working at the church in the children's department a few times a week, and at the gym 2-3 days a week with David. He recently got his license and is spending many hours working on his 95 Honda Civic. (I can count that as shop class, right?)

Derek~ 5th Grade

• Derek is using My Father's World Exploring Countries and Cultures. You can find it here. It covers Bible, Art, History, Science, Geography and Music. Since it does not cover Language Arts and Math skills specifically, I am using the MFW suggested materials to cover Language Arts. They can be found here. We've added Reading Eggs after a free month long trial brought surprising results. For math, he is using Life of Fred.  He is taking online piano lessons at Hoffman Academy. We also have an educational video a few times a week. We've purchased all the episodes of Liberty Kids, all the Magic School Bus episodes, and have many  from Drive Thru History and Learn Our History DVDs. We enjoy the Video (and Quiz) of the Week from the BrainPop app on my Kindle. I also have a few DVDs from Izzit. That way, we can redeem some of the hours we spend in the car that day, and he can have a some extra education disguised as fun. We also enjoy a board/card/dice game each day to have some fun, work on sportsmanship, strategy, situational awareness and to take a break from book work. Current favorites include Ticket to Ride, King of Tokyo, Exploding Kittens, 7 Wonders, and One Night Ultimate Werewolf. We work hard 4 days a week and then have a light day to catch up on anything we missed, some life skills and perhaps even be social for a while.

ALL OF US

• We're all enjoying field trips, park days and other fun activities this school year. We head to the park once in a while on a Friday after a week of hitting the books to relax and enjoy some food and fellowship with other homeschoolers. On the other Fridays, we rotate between field trips, life lesson days and catch up days.
• We re-assumed a normal school schedule this year with A in 1st at the local Christian school, and G's online homeschooling schedule not being as flexible as we'd hoped. Hooray for US having the flexibility to adapt to their needed routines. (Please keep in mind that NORMAL is just a setting on your dryer and we don't do normal very well at the Man Crew House. LOL)
• We are working hard to not be controlled by the school calendar, the curriculum or other people's expectations of us. It's nice to put down the weight of other people's expectations of us and just do what works for us. It's been a much different school year. When Mama K isn't worrying about what other people think of her (*ahem*), it's been very freeing. 

I wish I'd thought to do this every year when I updated for the coming school year, but better late than never, right? 

The Most Perfect Sentence Ever Written

As a homeschooling mama, I try to keep things interesting for DT. This boy HATES to write, and so recently, we've been learning to type/keyboard. And to keep from typing A, A, A, B, B, B, etc, we've been using the same wonderful sentence that we use to practice handwriting, because it has every letter of the alphabet in it.
What is this magical, marvelous, mystical sentence, you ask?

The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog's back.


I typed it once for him and then he typed it twice. The first time took him quite a while, but already by the second time, he was moving faster. Go DEREK!

The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog's back. 
The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog's back.
 
The red letters are Derek's work. I"m so proud of him! 

Pumpkin Patch 2015 (pic heavy)

 Ahh, the pumpkin patch.
Our favorite field trip of the year.
Our annual FIRST field trip.
Where Mama K takes the picture for our annual (or sometimes annual) Christmas cards/letters.
The boys always have so much fun, even the BIGS.
Mama K always has so much fun.
Good stuff.
Very Good Stuff.

Our local pumpkin patch, Lyle's Family Farm/Mesilla Valley Corn Maze is a family owned and operated charming place to spend a day. Hay rides, huge slides, panning for gold, rubber ducky races, enormous hamster wheels, cotton candy, and oh yes...pumpkins. And once you pay admission, nearly everything else besides the food is free. You can play all day and never get bored. At least my boys certainly can. :)
This year was no exception. David took some time off of work to join us which I thought was fantastic since he missed it last year. We met up with our local homeschooling group and enjoyed spending the day together. Miss Kathi was there with her kids and Little Carissa, and that was an added bonus. We had a ball.
I know you are all here for the pictures, so I'll stop waxing nostalgic and get on with the good stuff. LOL!

 

Socializing Our Poor Unsocialized Homeschoolers

 

My oh My, those poor unsocialized homeschoolers. LOL! I've never intentionally addressed this question that plagues homeschoolers in all seasons of the journey. However, as I've gotten closer to the end of my journey, I think I can share a few things that have helped us to make sure our boys didn't become social pariahs. 
Once upon a time, the 'socialization' question made my blood boil. The only question worse was, "What about prom?" to which I would reply in my head "Could you BE any more shallow? Who gives a fig about prom...seriously." Ahem. Anyway, back to socializing. I'm not going to be all preachy or bossy, or even bore you with factoids and statistics...I'm just going to share some of how we make sure our boys don't end up in the *poor unsocialized homeschooler* category. 

~We are involved in our church. Always have been. Always will be. Sunday school, AWANAs, pot lucks, service/mission projects and the like, along with our BIGS being involved in youth ministry. Friends of all ages/races/backgrounds, AND friends of the same ages/races/backgrounds. No one is perfect, but Jesus loves us all, and that's an important lesson to learn.

~We are rarely home unless it's time to eat, shower or sleep. Handsome Hercules works his 40, and then spends the evenings with the family; playing games, riding dune buggies, working on the cars, or creating something out of his never ending this-could-come-in-handy-someday pile. When he works a side job, he takes at least one along to hang out, learn something and meet new people. I work 30-50 hours a week as a nanny, so the boy(s) come along with me nearly every day. D (17) works *more on that later* and DT (9) must come with me, but as long as P (15) is caught up in school, he may stay home, but Grma is home 1/2 the day with him. On the weekends, we are at church, Hercules is working side jobs, and I am working at the gym, so again, they go along and meet MANY people along the way. We expect them to be pleasant and helpful every where they go, and so they've grown up learning about serving others.

~As an aside about my job, it probably goes without saying that since I'm a nanny, there are other children to spend time with each day. Right now I'm working for a family with 3 kiddos. Z is 18 and only home on weekends as he's in college, G is 13 and homeschooling along with us, and A is 4 and spends the mornings at preschool and the afternoons with us. Until he went off to college, Z spent his time after school hanging out with my BIGS, but they still get together every weekend for games, laughter and small shenanagins. DT splits his time between G and A, depending on his mood and if A is napping. My boys have learned a lot about girls from this family. And that's never a bad thing, right?

~My family is largely here in town, so besides the 5 of us, there is my mother who joined the family mayhem in August, my younger sister with my 2 nephews, my older 1/2 sister, an adult nephew and my great niece. Another young adult nephew is moving in with us in just a few days. So we aren't hurting for family interactions, that's for sure. :) Between differing generations, different parenting styles, religious/political/financial differences, we've learned the art of letting love cover our differences.

~We are active in our local homeschooling group. Between simple pleasures like hanging out at the park together, fun and educational field trips, and the co-op that helps fill in the gaps of things that Mama can't or forgot to teach, life is rich with homeschooling friends.

~D, our 17 year old works full time at the local gym where he also trains for his gymnastics competitions. He teaches classes of toddlers/preschoolers, kids wanting to join the competitive team, and runs birthday parties. When people ask him where he attends school, he replies that he is homeschooled and the reaction he gets the most is "Wow, I would have never guessed." I'm not entirely sure what that means, except that everyone seems to have met "that homeschooling family" that never let their children out of the basement, so they enter the world pasty white, completely naive, and wearing a plaid shirt, horn rimmed glasses and a bow tie.  (Sorry if this is you. I am not criticizing, I am just amazed that every person on the planet has already met you, but they still think us homeschoolers don't socialize. LOL) I take that to mean that we've done our job well of raising a completely well rounded, well socialized homeschooler. *winks*

~We host a game night every Friday for our family and friends. This is homeschooling socializing at it's finest. We have all ages, from my Mother (66) all the way down to my great niece (1). These people bring great variety to our lives, and especially to our children's lives. To make sure we all get along, we must learn to extend grace to one another. We play board/card/dice games, we shoot pool, play air hockey, throw darts, and laugh out loud all evening. Handsome Hercules and I have made it a priority to make the boys' friends welcome in our home, and to create our home to be the 'hangout house" so that the boys always have somewhere safe and fun to be with their friends.

~We host out of town guests as often as our schedule allows, so that the boys learn the art of hosting other people, of being gracious hosts, and to learn about other people's customs, habits and hobbies. The boys enjoy taking them to all their favorite hangouts, sight seeing spots and to meet their friends. It keeps us from only ever spending time with like minded people, which often leads to us being narrow-minded.

~All the boys have public school friends, which we encourage. Things like football games, late night movies, and talking about cute girls shouldn't only be for public school kiddos. So we encourage them to venture outside of our homeschooling group for friends. The youth ministry at our church has been great for this. The BIGS have many friends that attend public school who take them along on all those 'but what about the prom?' moments. DT has public school friends as well, and he enjoys spending time with them when he can. He spends much time lamenting that they have to spend so much time in school each day. ;)

~The BIGS have each traveled with my parents or spent summers at their house since we've moved to NM. They've met family members across the country, spent extended time with all the grandparents, their IL based brother and sister in love, and their IL cousins that we don't see very often anymore. They've learned how to navigate the world's 6th busiest airport, survive an extended family reunion without immediate family's intervention (HA!) and speak up for themselves when the need arises.

These are just some of the things that we've done with our boys along the way to make sure they are ready to take part in the big wide world in which we live. I'm sure you have some fresh ideas, or things I've forgotten to mention. How do you socialize YOUR children?

Catching UP with Us Meyer's~ January through June 2013 edition: Part 4

I am having fun with this little series while I'm trying valiantly to catch back up so we can move on with a fresh slate. Hope you are, too! This is going to be the random post where I try to squeeze in all the random pics that don't make a post by themselves :) Hang on, here we go!

After Christmas was over, and all the excitement was over...

We started off the New Year with lots of rest since we'd all be sick for so long.

 In early January, it actually SNOWED in Cruces (and yes, my child is wearing shorts *sigh*) DT was quite excited about this and enjoyed the snow for the 47 minutes is was on the ground.

 Gymnastic season started. David and his pal, Derek seem to have mixed emotions about that,

 but David has learned how to soar right over his competition!

 Fun days were spent making puzzles, enjoying movies and popcorn and slowly getting back into the swing of things at the Man Crew House.

 Tyler's late arriving Christmas gift from PaPa and Grma was a hit!

 DT learned the Greek Alphabet. Hurray for homeschooling!

 We enjoyed a trip to the local fire department. DT was thrilled with all the buttons and knobs, but saddened that fire stations no longer have dalmatians OR fire poles.

 However, all was not lost as the knowledgeable firemen took them for a tour and let them climb all over the truck.

 I allowed the BIGS to massacre the sad, squishy pumpkins from the fall with a 4 foot sword. Oh yes, I AM that mom :)

 We enjoyed some beautiful weather, with outstanding sunrises and sunsets.

 Jodi, James and T spent many hours at the Man Crew House visiting with us and Dad and Mom. T likes Uncle Dan's tickle fights, even though he always loses.

 Gymnastics season continued.

 David did well and earned the admiration of his teammates and coaches for his hard work.

 He even learned some new BIG tricks, like this one that I magically caught him mid-air.

 We hosted a Magic the Gathering card game tournament and had LOTS of fun!

 Here are the final standings. The out of town wringer won it all, but the surprising 2nd place went to Dan. I was pleased for him since he had worked and worked and WORKED on his decks all week under the guidance of said out of town wringer.

 The Black Ninja came to visit his country cousin the White Ninja and even stopped long enough to mop the floor for me. As if he made any marks ;)

And someone played in the tub too long.
Phew!