Here my boys are at an Order of the Arrow event. So cool that they get to do this. I actually don't really know what they are doing, but Mr. T assures me that it was fabulous and they both remembered their parts pretty well. This was just in October, up at Camp Kiesel. They had pretty good weather, and they have recruited several of their homeschool friends, so they have a pretty good time when they are there.
Don't they look awesome!?
The biggest event in Apples' life right now is this:
If you guessed that she's sitting on a little potty, then you're right! She is 20 months old and thinks that she should use a potty. She is pretty good about it too. I am rather surprised and unsure what to do with one that will train without any treats or incentives. Since I took this picture, just a few days ago, she has decided that she prefers using the big potty like everyone else. She just seems to young though, but I guess it's best to seize the moment when they want it! She requires so much more assistance though than an older baby. For example, she doesn't understand that she shouldn't shred the toilet paper, or play in the toilet. Typically I always keep the bathroom door shut to avoid some of those messes, but with her wanting to train, I kind of have to leave it open. Also, she always want to wash her hands, always. Drives me crazy! And then I thought, ugh, what about when she wakes up in the mornings? She's still in a crib, and there is no way I am putting her in a big bed yet. Just not doing it. I'm not fast enough in the mornings to get to her and help her so she just gets mad that she's going in her diaper. Sigh..oh well. I guess we have some messes in our future. :)
Rock has turned into quite the chef around here. He has really decided that cooking is kind of fun. Here he is making Lembas bread. It's pretty tasty. If only it actually kept you full as long as it does in The Lord of the Rings. Just think of what I could do with all that time I usually spend preparing meals. :)
Apple loves feeding her siblings, once she's full of course. It doesn't really matter what it is, as long as they open their mouths. Here she is helping Ginga eat popcorn during conference. She got to the point that she was grabbing fistfuls and shoving them in his mouth, and then grabbing another in the other hand and trying to shove it in before he'd even had a chance to begin chewing the first fistful!
On Constitution day, we went to the park where there were several booths about the beginnings of America. Ginga and a couple of his friends were in charge of the Jamestown booth, they dressed up and pretended to be from that time and told how it was to live there. Here's a picture of Nutmeg in the stocks that they had set up.
She also has developed a love for making very colorful veggie plates this summer. Here's one she was very proud of.
In preparation for her being old enough to join Vanguard next year, (really, she's going to be 12! When did that happen?) we have been practicing weekly mentor meetings and Student Accountability reports. She loves them. She's a list maker I guess. She loves to be able to see what she should work on each week and not wait for me to let her know. It's been fabulous. She's been very responsible to own her education. This week she wanted to do some kind of hands on project about the Solar System. So she painted in planets with the help of me and her dad, he then hung them from her ceiling, because that's way cooler than hooking them together with sticks. Thank you dad!
Squirrel came to find me last week to show me how she was a true "housholder". She can hold two houses at once. She was very giggly about it.
SUMMER HIGHLIGHTS
Squirrel and Nutmeg both had swimming lessons this summer, here's a video of Squirrel trying to be brave enough to go off the diving board. Hopefully it works. :)
Here's one of a great flop dive of Nutmeg-she said it hurt, yes I laughed.
Apple loves her corn on the cob!
We went to see Ginga at Camp Loll this summer, Apple didn't enjoy the ride, this is just one of the many last ditch attempts to keep her from screaming about being in the car. Rock was quite the sport.
The one and only picture I took at Camp Loll. :)
It was great to see him after so many weeks not seeing him! It is a beautiful camp! At least he took lots of pictures while he was up there all summer! I can't believe I haven't blogged about what happened while we were up there. It was pretty crazy. We pulled in around 5 on Friday to find out that one of the scoutmasters of a troop was missing. Search and Rescue and just gotten there, and things were really jumping. Turned out that he had gone off that morning, but his troop had waited to tell the camp staff until 3 in the afternoon. It was very impressive to see how the staff handled it, and to see the camp director working with his staff. Friday night it was important for most of the staff to continue with the program for the sake of all the troops that were up there, I don't think many of them even knew there was a problem yet, the staff was great at taking charge, even though the adult staffers were busy elsewhere. What a great group of youth! The next morning though, it was all business. They hadn't been able to find him before it got dark on Friday, so first thing in the morning the staff was organized into 15 groups and each group had some search and rescue people with them. They had a briefing, and they were assigned to different trails and off they went, planning to be gone the entire day if necessary. My younger kids were pretty disappointed that Ginga wasn't going to be around to spend time with him, especially Nutmeg, she was very mad at that man for getting himself lost. We ended up spending a fair amount in their trading post so that they could work on some projects to get their minds off of not seeing him. But, within the first hour that they were out they found him! The search and rescue people were so impressed by these youth who knew how to behave and knew these trails and knew all kinds of things for surviving out in the woods. The really cool thing for Ginga is that because of this, the entire staff who participated earned the brand new search and rescue merit badge-and they even each got letters from the council congratulating them on a job well done! They were the first to earn it! And what a way to do it too. We were happy that he was found, safe-and that we ended up having lots of fun times with Ginga after all. And for the record, I plunged into the polar bear that day. Unfortunately, no one thought to grab a picture of it!
I did slightly better at picture taking when we went to family camp. I took about 15 pictures there, and on the very first day. She had a blast getting filthy right off the bat! She wasn't clean again until we went home 5 days later.
Nutmeg ended up getting super sick on Thursday of family camp, and so the girls and I all came home. I decided that I'd had enough of the dirt, and the last thing I needed was to figure out how to deal with a dehydrated girl and a baby while living in a tent! Afterwards though, I heard that the weather turned yucky the next day, and so I'm really just fine admitting that I enjoyed a nice warm, dry house. :) And indoor plumbing, yeah!!
We have started our school year now, and we are having a great time in Vanguard. We went to a concert on Friday night on temple square. They played a cello concerto by Haydn and Symphony #2 by Rachmaninoff, it was so good! Words cannot possibly describe it. Fabulous. Here are a few shots of some activities we've done so far.
The one above is a team building activity that Ginga was in charge of.
This was our theme activity night that Rock was in charge of. They were split into different groups and they had to create a stop motion video using photos that they took. Each team had to decide on a scripture story and recreate it with play doh. It was so much fun.
It was pouring outside though, so we had to move into the garage to make it fit for us! Most of the kids were drenched though, because it was too much fun to play in the rain before we started our activity!
This day we went on a hike for the Imaginative Arts lens-it was a beautiful day, and we even saw two moose! I was sort of freaked out, but they just waded through that pond and headed up into the hills. Just really glad they didn't have babies!
Well, that brings us up to date. Maybe I'll actually remember to update this more regularly, just for you, Grandma and Grandpa! Oh, Grandpa, you'll find it fun to know that Apple says grandpa, just like Ginga used too-bok bok! So cute!
Wow! Great update! Glad I looked for this one :). Thanks for sharing! (Love the "house holding"!)
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