And they are off...
(to school).

He was the first to go and was off to college the second week of August.
His school is a 20 minute bike ride away across a field, along a bike path
 and then through a neighborhood. 

A week later, the big girl returned two days a week to the charter high school as a junior.

This is the first year she has not had the overseeing eyes of her brothers

watching her every move.  Who knows what she might do with all of that freedom.



 

Probably the most excited of all was the happy 3rd grader who declared that she

felt so grown up.  That happy feeling lasted until the first difficult math page and then

completely evaporated.

 

The last to return was our other college student who drives 30 minutes to school.

It is also his first year of college and he is finding it shocking and exhausting to go somewhere five days a week (pampered homeschooler by any chance?).

  

 

I have resumed my part-time job as teacher.

When you home school, depending on the number of students and the type of curriculum,

it is equivalent to a part-time to full-time job on top of the duties of being a home maker

and a mom.  That in itself is an adjustment for the mother of the family.

 

To make life even more exciting this year, I also helped the boys buy

their college books and I had almost as much to learn about the process as they did.

When I was in college we had one option and that was to go to

 the college bookstore and buy the required books. 

 Now there are so many options and ways to find books

but it takes time and energy to find the best deals.

Then it is further complicated by books that have internet codes and need to be bought new.

Many $$$ later and with lots of packages delivered to our house,

everyone was finally outfitted with their books for the semester.

Then I had to inform them that they are going to have to repeat this whole

process for the next semester in just a few months.

 

A few weeks in and we are starting to get a handle on who is coming

and going at what times and who will or will not be home at any given time.

We will probably get it all figured out in time for a new semester to roll around!

 

Happy Back-to-School

 for all of you going through the process.

 

********************

Nathan informed me that the first lesson he learned in college was that

you can wear whatever you want and use whatever kind

 of language you want in college. 

(Let's just say that sagging pants, immodest women, and foul language

have come as a bit of a surprise).

 

 

 

 



 

Snapshots of Summer:

 Part 3

 

August

 

August is actually reduced to just two weeks of summer vacation.

What in the world happened to starting school after Labor Day?

Our biggest event the first full week of August was our annual
beginning of the week camping trip.
We went to church on Sunday, loaded down with our equipment,
and from there headed up into the mountains.

After many days of over 100* temperatures, that day dawned cool and overcast.
It was definitely abnormal for the central valley of California.
It was all of 80* when we headed up through the hills but the temperature
climbed as we gained altitude.  That was reassuring but once we got
to 3000 ft. elevation then it started cooling again.

As expected, we had our choice of campsites.
It was just our family this time and the only thing we really
planned to do was to be lazy...after setting up camp.

The Chief Cook...

 

who provided all our yummy meals.

 

 

Then the Chief Dish Washers take over.

(We are "equal opportunity" in the clean-up department.)

 

 

The camp ground was so quiet with just a few other scattered spaces being occupied.

Due to the lack of traffic, Tiana was allowed to ride on the road to her heart's content.

She did her best to provide the noise the campground was missing.

 

One fun thing we brought along was an instant camera.

It's amazing to think that this was the quality of photos of days gone by.

 

I definitely prefer the clarity of today's photos...

 

She must have been sent to sit in the chair for some reason and

she sure is not happy about it!

 

We certainly got in some R&R.

 

Our one excursion was a drive up the highway to Columns of the Giants

where we took a walk to this interesting geologic feature.

(See if you can spot our mountain goat children in the second picture.)

 

 

Rudy and I are down at the base where we kind

of enjoyed being alone for a little bit.

 

Climbing the columns.

 

These boys can not resist trying out some photography stunts.

 

 

This is what the sky looked like most of the time we were camping.

There was not a lot of change between the temperatures of the day and night.

It rained in the middle of the first night and then there was

a mist most of the evening on the second night.

We are not used to getting rained on while camping in the summer

but we were surprised to find that things really did not get too wet as

long as they were under a tree.

 

Hanging out at the river...

Rudy challenged Tiana to walk across this log, which she did with lots of drama.

Then he challenged her to run back across it.

She finally agreed when he offered her 200 pennies if she would do it.

Then he offered her 500 pennies if she would walk back and forth across it backwards.

And she did!!

Then we had the math lesson where she had to figure out how many pennies equaled

a dollar and how many dollars Daddy would pay her for her bravery.

 

Nothing is better than spending the day with our family.

The bonus was spending the time with our family and being nice and cool at the same time!

 

 

 

It was rather anticlimactic to have to lay the wet things out to dry when we got home.

That is something we are not used to doing after camping.

 

And so ended the summer fun as we began back to school preparations.

Our long and sometimes lazy days were over and reality was quickly taking over.

Our minds turned to schedules, book buying, and all the technical details of four

different school schedules.  Life was taking a turn down a different road and we know

that all change is not bad...it is just different and takes some getting used to.

 

********************

 

 One of our conversations while camping turned to skin color and how Black people

from Africa have really black skin while in the United States they have variety of skin tones. 

Tiana informed us that she did not have black skin but she had brown skin

and that is because she is "half Filipino and half American."

That might be why the week before she told me it was too bad I was the only

white person in the family while the rest of them where "half Filipino and half American."

I guess I am the one missing out in this family!  :-)

 

 

 

 

Snapshots of Summer:

 

Part 2

 

July:

Bethany's summary of the month:

The kiddos travel. Come back. And then lazy life begins.

My longer version:

The kids were all home for July 4th...an oddity.

 

Then it was back to San Francisco for a flight to Denver, CO.

 

The three older kids enjoyed another year at Youth Retreat

in the beautiful Colorado Rockies.

 

 

This group of boys sing together every year.

They call themselves The Sunshine Boys.

I think they got that name from the year they serenaded the unlucky staff at sunup.

 

 

This is what happens when your pranking friends get ahold of you and a roll

of shrink wrap. A complete lack of sleep adds to the general silliness.

 

 

 

In the meantime, Tiana was again reduced to the detested status of "only child."

 

She enjoyed another round of swim lessons and made great progress.

 

 

While everyone was gone I packed up the Richard Scarry collection.

It was kind of sad to see them put away.

 

Then I packed up the rest of her books because I decided

 that it was time for a new bookcase.

  A bookcase that leans sideways and has a back that is falling off

 really needs to be replaced.

                                                 So this is what our hallway looked like.

 

We headed back over the water skimming San Mateo Bridge

to pick our big kids up in San Francisco.

 

Then we stopped in at IKEA to buy a new bookcase.

That is when we found out that there were no bookcases to be found at any of the IKEA

stores due to changing suppliers and phasing out their current systems.

So, we returned home to live with boxed up books for awhile.

 

July was the month for new kitties.

 

 

 

I found that the local grocery store carries these gems.

Eating dates takes me back to the winters when Grandma and Grandpa Reed

would come stay with us.  They loved fruit, citrus, and dates so we usually took a

trip to Shield's Date Garden in Indio where we watched the titillating film,

"The Sex Life of the Date."

Or, we would drive 15 minutes to Hadley's to have a date shake and taste the multitude of

samples of dried fruit and nuts. 

 

The outdoor canning kitchen was busy one Saturday.

It takes no time at all to snap 30 lbs of beans when there are six workers.

 

The end of July is when the peaches are ripe.

These are cling peaches that are good for canning.

We also picked some freestones to eat.

 

The days had been 105* or more so we were at the orchard at 7 a.m.

in order to beat the heat.

 

We had our buckets full in no time.

 

Then we spent the rest of the day making a mess in the kitchen.

We had a good time reminiscing, singing along to music, and acting goofy.

 

Jars and jars of the finished product.

 

Fruit leather was made from the left over freestones.

 

So, despite Bethany's description, I think it was a busy enough month.

It was a good mix of busy and lazy and

everyone needs that once in awhile.

 

********************

 

Tiana was at speech therapy and the word that she was supposed to use in

a sentence was, "father." 

The sentence she constructed was, "A father belongs in a family."

Those of you who knew her at two years old know how far she has come

and know that is not really a simple sentence.

It is a statement of truth that has taken her a few years to realize.

Thank you God for the healing that has taken place.