Can I just breathe?

Have you ever had a time in your life when it feels like there is so much going on you don't even have a chance to breathe?

That is how I am feeling right now!

Sad thing, the computer I usually work on my blog with, the one that holds all the pictures, is acting up and won't let me do anything on it. I fear losing all those wonderful pictures!
I realized that all of this electronic mumbo-jumbo isn't all it's cracked up to be. One little virus and you can lose years of pictures if you haven't planned ahead.

I haven't forgotten to blog, but I just haven't had the time to do it. I have taken pictures but they are still sitting in my camera! I am really hoping that soon things will even out, slow down or something to where I feel like I have a routine again. Then maybe I will post a little more often.

Sorry, no pictures today - just my sad, little rant. . . maybe it will be better next time!

LET SCHOOL BEGIN !

The day has finally arrived for school to begin. You won't see a happier more nervous bunch I think, then our family.
We finally got Hailey into the Medical Arts Charter High School and are so excited about it but for Hailey this is difficult. New school, new kids, new everything. There are the same amount of Sophomores in this whole school that she had in her guitar class last year at the High School she was in! She knows this curriculum is going to be intense too but I think she is going to do fine!


There is a positive thing . . . her "bestest" friend Alayna happens to go to this school so she will at least know SOMEONE! Actually another friend Elisha also goes to this school - they will take good care of her I am just sure of it!

And we are off!!!! Yes, the homeschooling has started too. That will be one reason you haven't seen a post on here in awhile. The curriculum through this Virtual School is also quite intense. Most of the assignments with Tyler need a hands-on teacher.

Hayden has been almost schooling himself. I am hoping to change that. I am still trying to figure out how to schedule them so they both get some one-on-one time.

This is going to be quite an interesting year! I am sure there will be more posts to come on things we have done through the homeschooling. Just keep your eyes open and your patience on the forefront . . . it might be awhile!

Series of Depressing Photos !

I knew this day would come but of course, I could have patiently waited a little while longer!

The property owners behind us are finally breaking ground on the acreage behind our house. We have been in this home for almost 5 years and have had the luxury of not having ANYONE living behind us . . . until now.

I can honestly say I am not too happy with the idea that we will now be hearing some kind of construction noise for a long time to come.
First it will be the roads which will take a few months and then will come the home building which, from experience, can last a long time!
This means waking up at 6 o'clock on Saturday morning (or any day of the week for that matter) to the "Beep - Beep - Beep" of the backwards driving vehicles and the cacophony of nail guns, saws, cement trucks, cranes, crew members yelling things to one another and the possibility of music you hoped never to hear!

Gentlemen - we're in for a bumpy ride!

(as said by the Cat Captain on a ship from the movie "Treasure Planet")

Ever have a dream come true?

I'm sorry but I had to post this. After being without a dishwasher in a household of five for almost a year, I have to admit it feels as though a dream has come true for me. . . .

Kurt fixed my dishwasher!!!

Somethings you just want to shout from the rooftops!

School Daze!

Well, the day we have been waiting for all summer long has finally arrived . . . the homeschooling supplies have made it to our door! Everyone was very excited!

All of these boxes contained just the things for Tyler!

These items are Tyler's favorites so far . . .

Some of Hayden's things - Hailey is showing no mercy, she is already grilling Hayden from his Algebra book!

Some of Hayden's art supplies.

Tyler will be learning cursive this year among some other great things as you can see!

Tyler is using his new "equipment" to take a moment and check out Willow's fur with the magnifying glass. Willow was very patient with him.

Tyler's chosen elective this year was music. I didn't think I was ready to try to approach a foreign language with him yet! Yeah, that is a tambourine. . .

Tyler's Science . . .

Did I mention the inflatable globe? I don't have the heart to tell Tyler he will not need the safety goggles for all of his subjects. He wore them for most of the rest of the day.

Believe it or not I have to fit all of that stuff into these two carts . . . not so sure about this!

Ta - Da! It fit!

Actually, we did pick up another cart with different sized drawers to keep all of the supplies the kids needed to go with their books and also to hold my teacher guides.

By the way, these are the teacher guides for me! Scary, isn't it! Whose going to school here really?

Needless to say we can't wait to get started. I am getting a little cold in the feet but I am sure once we get going this is going to work really well for us!

Awesome Helpers!

It's always fun to have help but this time I was very glad for it. We have a weedy patch on the side of our home that seems to multiply overnight! I usually do the weed pullin' myself but Kurt felt the kids should kick in and help!
I'm glad he thought of it!

What would have normally took me probably an hour or so by myself took about 1/2 an hour with everyone plus we had great conversation to-boot!

Thanks guys!

Ye Olde Renaissance Faire . . .

I have always thought going to a Renaissance Faire would be fun but I never knew of any local fairs until this year. While attending our local Dairy Days Parade there were little slips of paper handed out from people in medieval attire and they were invitations to a Second Annual Fair with FREE admission! I couldn't tell you how excited I was. I decided right then and there that our family was going to this no matter what!
The kids and I have read so many different books about knights and maidens and evil doers, about jousting and battles - good vs. evil. Swords and staves and high towers. We couldn't pass this up!
Sadly Kurt had others plans but my sister Chris and my sister Debra were both interested too. We have boys . . . you just had to go!

The day arrived, July 10, 2010.

We were all excited not knowing exactly what we would find but knowing we were going to see knights and archery, battles with the sword and who knew what. The only hard thing was, we arrived at 11 a.m. and it was already HOT!

This was a neat group. I think they are called "The Guess When" band and they were pretty good. Hailey said she has seen them play at other events.

This was pretty cool. It is a Trebuchet and it was really quite large. It was also for sale and the kids thought it would be fun to fling cats with but, I just couldn't see the CCR's allowing this in the back yard! Tempting, but we had to walk away!

There was also this wonderful company that came from the Puget Sound area that had a lot of knowledge on Pirates. They had a tent full of items you would find on a ship and were having shows outside on black powder weapons and using whips. It was entertaining.

The girls taking a rest . . . did I mention it was HOT?

Hmmmm, just a touch too short to captain a ship yet, Tyler.

Let me take just a minute to mention something here. Do you see those two little black boxes hanging on that pole??? That was part of this groups brand new "speaker system". Being married to a man who works with a sound company really makes things like this tough. I can't think of how many times I tried to picture this with a pair of nice Mackies! The sound system was TERRIBLE. There were so many weird noises coming out of those little speakers and the pirate speaker's voice kept cutting in and out and their wireless mics were picking up all kinds of stuff. I realize now I am "sound spoiled". Thinking of putting out the word to their sponsors next year . . . really.

We are getting ready for the show to start. I think at this point we had all lost about 3 lbs. in sweat alone. Thankfully every now and then a thin covering of clouds would pass by and we would have a small reprieve but mostly you felt like you were going to faint.

As you can imagine this guy had a huge, booming voice. He liked to joke throughout his presentation. You could tell he loved what he was doing.

This is his assistant.

He was explaining how the weaponry of the day was used. How they used rapiers and small pistols and these little spikes they would throw on the deck of the enemy ship.

He explained the challenges of using the rapier, how it would get stuck in rigging and such and how limited your space was to be able to fight. How crowded the ships were during a battle and how unsuccessful some weaponry really was.

He was sharing here about how they had pistols but after they shot once they were literally worthless because you didn't have time to clean it out and reload so they would turn the pistol and use the handle as a bludgeoning tool, that's why a lot of them had metal built into the handle.

He actually attempted to shoot it but it didn't fire properly, he also pointed out about how that happened a lot during battle and gave us an explanation of where the term "Don't go off half-cocked" came from!

Here he is loading a weapon similar to a modern shotgun. I can't remember the name of it but all I can say is . . . LOUD! But awesome!

He also taught us about the use of the cannon. He had some funny stories while introducing us to this. Did I mention that the shotgun was loud? THIS was LOUDER! oh, and awesome!

This is just some pictures of us that I took while we were waiting for the speakers to work right. Here is Hayden and Jonny trying not to die of heat stroke!

Deb's boys: Brodie, Dylan and Ryan.

Tyler and Kimmy. I think Kimmy was coming over to tell us she was hot.

Debra looking remarkably cool, Bryan next to her.

After the show was over, Tyler went and told Mr. Pirate how AWESOME the show was and we asked a few more questions. We decided to wander around more and see what else there was to see.

I was pretty thrilled to get to see some armour. I really wanted to see it on someone but there was a guy standing next to this armour with a wet towel over his head mentioning something to a friend about glad to take it off because he felt like he was going to die in it or something.

It was still cool to look at. The shield was much smaller than I expected them to be.

A lot of wonderful weapons on display. Tyler couldn't understand why he couldn't pick them up. He REALLY wanted to.

I have to admit that when I was looking at these I wondered where the two dents came from on the top ax. I made a comment to Hayden that I hope it wasn't on the neck of some poor soul!

This is the stage for the Queen's Court. We missed the Royal Wedding, The Coronation and Knighting that they held here. We weren't going to be able to hang out all day plus it was so hot a few of the kids were starting to not feel very well.

Of course we couldn't miss this wonderful opportunity to all become a knight just for a few seconds. We couldn't get everyone to participate but it was fun anyway!

Hayden the Mighty!

Tyler the Valiant!

Emma the Noble!

Laura the Honorable!

Chris the Maiden of Hope!

That was a little cheesy but anyway.

Here is a little game for the kids where they could throw darts and try to hit the dragon's heart.

This was a children's art center but when we were there not much was happening because there was a communication glitch and there was no paint supplies . . . we moved on.

There were some really neat wooden items at this table. Hayden really liked the dragon but the prices were a bit high for us. I told him I would try to see if we could find a similar kit and see if he could construct one himself. Tyler did pick up a pretty fancy foam sword for a few dollars here.

This was one of my favorite and a must see. The Stocks! Every home should have one of these! Perfect to get that degree of motivation from your children when you need help with housework!

Will have to look into a box for Tyler!

Hayden's turn.

The tall people would have suffered more I think, Poor Emma!

We gave Hailey a hard time - she wouldn't quit smiling. I don't think she understood this was supposed to be a bad thing. She was worried about her hair :)

I had to try it myself. I tried to imagine what it would be like to be stuck in that for hours or days or weeks. And also having people throwing rotten food and who knows what else at you. Definitely would break the spirit. It must have been awful.

Couldn't have the proper Faire without the Maypole dancing. There girls seemed to be having such a great time. It had to be close to 100 around there and they were all dressed up in their medeival garb. Hats off to their enthusiasm.

The band played a nice tune.

This part was fun too. If you went up to this guy and told them that a certain person had done a wrongdoing he called out that this individual was guilty and needing punishment. They were put in the stocks and then a relative could pull a string and it would fling wet sponges at their face.

Naturally a crowd pleaser!

We tried to get one of the kids to do it but they didn't want to, well, not until we were getting ready to head out and Tyler kind of wanted to but we were all so hot and tired by now we said maybe next time.

It was fun and I really hope that they do it again next year. I am sure it will get bigger and better over time. I want to see some horses in full armour, some jousting, real knights having a fight. We will just have to wait and see!