Game on

Soccer season has been going well.  I am at the part where I am ready for it to be over.  Both boys have been blessed with great coaches and good teams.

Here's a picture of Crash's team on picture day.  The big boy standing to the right of Crash is G.  We love G. He is a good soccer player, which is even more amazing given his size.  But more than that, he has taken little Crash under his wing. 

Let's just say Crash is not the most attentive player out there on the field during a game.  He gets distracted by many things like spectators, clouds, telling super hero stories to another child, etc.  Enter G.  He literally will grab, pull, or point Crash to where he is supposed to be.  Crash loves him and probably appreciates the help.  It just warms this mama's heart to see a child helping out my boy.  

Here's the Test Pilot on Team Newcastle United.  They used professional league team's name for the kids' team names.

Here's our team.  We have great coaches.  They balance each other well.  One guy yells in Spanish and the other in English.  It's pretty funny to watch the kids faces as they try to interpret the yells.

Here's the Test Pilot in his goalie garb.  He loves being goalie and has learned a lot this year.

Wingman is excited, because we learned that he gets to play next spring.  Watch out!

Heritage Day

Our local college hosted a Heritage Day describing life on the pioneer in the 1800's in the this area.  I had planned on taking the Test Pilot as a field trip, but when we discovered that Crash's school was going too, we decided to tag along.  

Here is Mountain Man Moses.  He was very interesting.  He demonstrated setting traps, skinning animals, making clothing out of the hides, knife throwing and much more.  The kids loved it.

There were various goats and miniature horses around to pet, which peaked the interest of Wingman.

Crash's class just looked adorable in their matching outfits.  I am a sucker for that sort of thing.

Here they are making rope.

The whole class plus my kids got roped.  That guy was very talented.

We went in a teepee for story time.

The guy gave a very balanced perspective of the Indian vs. White Man pioneer life.  All these speakers really had the kids' attention.

It was a fun and educational day.  We look forward to going back next year.

Sorry for the absence

We will just have to blame this blog absence on him or her.  We are expecting another baby next April.  I have been feeling pretty nauseated and very tired for awhile.  However, the nausea is now gone and the fatigue is easing a bit.

So far everything is going well for both baby and mom.  I am going to try and do better to check up with some posting this weekend.

Corn Maize

Our local homeschool group took a field trip to the South Texas "Maize".  It's a 7 acre corn field with a maze built in throughout.  

They do split the maze into 2 halves.  The Test Pilot, of course, had to do the longer portion first thing.  That boy loves a challenge!

While in the maze, you have to look for numbered posts that give you directions so you can escape the maze. It took us 35 minutes for the longer portion.  And it was very muddy.  The Test Pilot had a great time.

Wingman loved the corn popper.  A big air bag that you could jump on.  They had fun doing that with their friends.

We took a hayride around the owner's farm property.  We learned about cotton picking, pumpkin picking, and hogs.

What's life without a barrel train driven by a tractor.  The boys did this twice.  Mommy gracefully bowed out of this ride.  I don't think I would have fit.

We finished off the day with some great kettle corn for the long drive back home.  They had fun and want to come back.  Mommy is going to need a few days to recuperate from that field trip.

PS-  I got sunburned in October.  Agh!

I love kindergarten!

So Crash is going to a little private Christian school that is literally 1 min and 45 sec drive from my house.  We had heard rave reviews about this teacher and it sounded like the perfect place for our Crash.  It's even better because we knew about 1/2 the children and families already on the first day of school.

Things seem to be going well for him.  He is excited to go each day and I have had no complaints.

Since the school is held at a church they do not have a cafeteria.  So on Wednesdays the moms take turns providing "hot lunch" for all the children and their families.  We signed up for the first week.

I let Crash help pick the menu of all his kid-friendly favorites.  We had corn dogs, fries, and carrots, with a side of chocolate cake.

Wingman and the Test Pilot were so excited to go to his school and help cook and serve lunch.  They were very helpful.

At the end, I walked around passing out the chocolate cake.  I hand Crash his plate and he says with the biggest grin on his face, "I LOVE KINDERGARTEN!"

Apparently, having corn dogs with chocolate cake with your family is the best day ever at Kindergarten.

Bad drought

We are studying Apologia's Zoology focusing on creatures created on Day 5 of creation.  Specifically looking at birds, insects, bats, and butterflies.  We have enjoyed it so far.

The authors recommended regardless of the order of the book, to cover the insect section when it is warm.  So we have begun the insect section because it has been plenty warm.  There are many activities that include observations and experiments with live insects.

So we need to temporarily capture an insect to perform our activities.

I live in a buggy place.  Most years I could sadly admit that if I needed to find an insect, just look somewhere in the bathroom or right out the front door.  Fire ants are everywhere much to my chagrin.

However, this year we can hardly find any bugs.  I am not exaggerating.  There are no fire ant mounds in the backyard.  Very few mosquitoes.  No sugar ants in my kitchen.  We could only find a few bees in the flowers but I am not attempting to catch them.

I guess the drought has affected them too.  So we had a good lesson about the affects of drought on insects as well.

We really need some rain.

First Day of Kindergarten

Our sweet boy, Crash, finally started Kindergarten.  I say finally, because he is been excited since last spring.

Here's a shot in his uniform.  He looks so grown up.  

Here's the new school backpack.

This is him sitting at his new desk.  He was sitting with one of his good buds for pre-K and church.  In fact, he knows about half the class from pre-K and church, which made the first day even better.

Since alphabetically, our family almost always comes first, he was up to present his "All About Me" poster soon.  We went ahead and turned it today.  He was so funny working on that thing.

Mom asks, "What's your favorite food?"
Crash responds, "Lettuce."
Mom responds, "Really? Lettuce?"
Crash states, "Why yes!"

I knew he liked lettuce and salad but who knew it was his favorite.

We are looking forward to a good year!