My Pumpkins

After Mass, we picked and bought us some pumpkins.  Bob sad he was going "to sleep" on his in this picture, so that's what he is doing.

First Two Homeschool Field Trips of the Year

I am the one in our homeschool group who chooses and arranges the field trips.  That means that I get to do what I want pretty much.  The first one was at a splash pad park in downtown.  We met in the morning and had a picnic lunch together before leaving.   Fun start to the year!

I think maybe this means he was having fun, but I'm not sure.  ???

The second one was volunteering at the Food Bank, working in the Urban Garden.  The boys and I had so much fun doing this before summer began that I knew it had to be on the list.  It was a great experience for the kids again.  We picked up trash and weeded a big field ready for planting.  Then we got a tour of the animal, hydroponics, and aquaponics section of the garden.  We ended with feeding the goats and sheep.  So much fun to work along side friends and to practice corporal works of mercy.  And it even cooled off for us just in time for this field trip, into the 80's.

In front of the hydroponics system in the greenhouse.

The Story of How we Acquired Luna

Meet Luna!  She's a miniature (only 8 lbs) wire-haired dachshound who is probably about 2 years old.  She's got a lot of pep in her step.  She's house-trained and crate-crate trained.  She sweet as can be with  kids and LOVES (a little too much) other animals.  She was found nameless, collarless, and micro-chipless in a neighborhood by a big dog lover friend of ours through the kids' charter school.  All neighborhood apps and Facebook pages have turned up no owner.

I rarely check Facebook, but I happen to be looking on the school page for something specific and saw this post about this sweet dog.  I showed the post to Brian, expecting to be shot down, and told him just to think about it because we obviously can't have a bird or any other prey for Trinity and if we wait until we have land and are settled, the girls will already be out of the house.  He gave me half a dozen reasons why we shouldn't get a dog, and I said, "Just think about it."  

The next day, I get a text while homeschooling that showed me another puppy for sale that had been neutered, house-trained, etc in the neighborhood.  I was shocked because I thought he'd never give in, and here he was bringing it up to me.  I immediately asked him if we could just go meet these dogs, and he agreed as long as we didn't tell the kids about it yet.  

Turned out the puppy was $300 to adopt and Brian nixed that one, so we only went to see this stray dog.  Brian picked her up and immediately fell in love with her...more so than I did.  He was all about doing it, and I was the one saying, oh no, what if this is a huge mistake and too much for me to take on.  

The kids met her for the first time before we brought her home.

She's a huge fan of riding in the car, so she usually goes with us for drop off and pick up.

Overall, she's a very good dog.  We definitely have some things to work on, but she is already sitting very well, and I taught her to ring a bell on the back door when she needs to go out in less than a day.  I am somewhat regretting this because she is a very curious and busy little lady, often asking to go in and out and in and out way more than is necessary.  Her biggest issue is barking at people or animals, and she has made marked improvement with that already in just two weeks.

This is from after Drew's camp out, he came home, showered and crashed with her on the couch.

Trinity came down once the first day when we got her and hissed at Luna who just wanted to be friends and has refused to come downstairs ever since.  We tried forcing the issue, leaving her litter and food in the pantry where they already were, but after one peed on bean bag, I quickly moved the litter box up to our bathroom.  I tried still to leave the food, but when she hadn't still ventured down to eat in three days, I caved and moved it all upstairs.  We currently have a gate at the bottom of the stairs.  Luna gets the run of the downstairs except when we are gone or at night when she goes in her crate.  Trinity can come down whenever she feels like it, but two weeks and she still hasn't.

Naming her was fun.  I wanted a literary name that had a religious tie in.  Hyacinth was from a book and also a saint name.  Trinity wasn't from a book, but has the religious theme while still making light of her three leg situation.  Mr. Bubbles was named after a character in a book. So we had the following list...

1. Merrylegs, nickname Merry (from Black Beauty and has tie in to Mother Mary)
2. Ladybug, nickname Lady (from Lady and the Tramp and has tie in to Our Lady, plus ladybug is our family's favorite word in German, Mariankefer, translating directly as "Mary Beetle")
3. Hildegard, nickname Hildie (no literary character, just a German saint name for a German dog for a family that has lived in Germany) *Brian really pushed for this one, but not many others really liked it.
4. Luna (from HP and has tie in to Mary because she is often referred to as being like the moon and reflecting the son's glory, plus it's a Spanish word and we got her in San Antonio)

We did many votes, even trying out some different weights to the adults votes and still it always came out against Hildie.  So Brian relented and her name is Luna, with nicknames Lulu, Lou, Luna Love, Loonie Bird, Loon.  She's learning it.

Dog beds are expensive, so I made her a quick one for the time being out of spare fabric and old socks.  It was such a quick project.  I am going to have to make her a nicer one with her name on it when I find the time.

Family Beach Trip

Every year my mom rents a beach condo for a month during off season.  Last year we went every weekend because we had a free place to stay for three of those weekends.  However, this year the other condo wasn't available so we rented a place at her location to split with my sister the first weekend and rented a cheaper place across the street for the last weekend.  The second weekend, no one else was going down there and Brian had three of the boys on a camping trip, and so the girls, Bob, and I went down and stayed in her place with her.  

Judah was playing with his newest cousin, Savanna.

This was after Judah hyper extended his knee when he stepped into a big hole in the sand, under water.  He was limping around a little bit after that.

Bob had a grand ole time playing with Turner.  They especially loved trying to surf the waves on boogie boards.  They would get all ready, standing on their own boards just outside of where the water was and wait for waves to comes and make them "surf."  It was quite amusing to watch them fall off every time a wave was big enough to lift the boards.

One night we all went to a restaurant and took some pictures, but most of the time we ate at the condo so everyone could swim and play on the beach as much as they wanted.  Hannah really doesn't hang out too long on the beach, she just doesn't like the dirtiness of it.  She will swim a little longer in the pool, but still she is happy to hang in the condo most of the time.

Isaac was stung by a small jellyfish and Dylan was stung by a bee.  Both Turner and Judah hurt their leg and were limping part of the trip.  It was an eventful trip, but the most eventful moments involved Drew.  Drew had had his retainer to move his upper jaw forward for a little over a month when we went to the beach.  I have been super attentive with teaching him to be responsible with it and never take it out unless he's putting it in it's case either on the dining room table or the one in my purse.  He's a pretty responsible kid actually for an 8 year old boy, but still this is worth thousands of dollars and I wasn't going to just trust him on this one.

However, all that said, I made a huge mistake and did't make him take it out when he went swimming in the ocean.  It had never fallen out, and I figured "What could happen?"  Well, one morning I took all the boys and Genevieve out to the beach ahead of everybody else.  Drew and Dylan had gone out in the ocean as far as I said they could go to jump the waves.  They come running in and Drew tells me his retainer fell out in the ocean.  Wait.  What.  Tears immediately filled my eyes as I jumped up and tried to find the spot I thought they'd been in.  They didn't even have the thought to stay where they were and call for me.  The waves were so rough that whole weekend.  I plunged my hand into the water and lamented.  This is Corpus Christi, not Hawaii.  You can't see anything in this water.  I said to Drew and Dylan, who are standing with their mouths open and their eyes wide watching the crazy mom/aunt cry and panic, "There is NO WAY we'll ever find it in this water, and we don't even know exactly where you were."  Then I turned to Drew and grabbed his shoulders, almost growling, "Pray to St. Anthony!"  

I turned away from him and said aloud, "St. Anthony and St. Jude, pray for us!" and in the next breath, I stepped on something hard.  No, it couldn't be.  I reached into the murky water and pulled out his retainer.  If that isn't proof of the saints being able to intercede for us, I don't know what is.  We celebrated all day!  It was amazing!

In case you don't know, St. Anthony is the patron saint of lost things, and I perpetually freak out and forget to ask for his prayers.  St Jude is the patron saint of lost causes, and I threw him in there because this seemed like pretty much a lost cause to me.  Plus, he is near and dear to my heart, probably because I tend to feel like lots of things are lost causes, pessimist that I am.  

Somebody got so worn out, that he was asking for naps in his hideout.

I made a pyramid in light of our ancient Egypt studies while Genna tried to make a deep volcano.

Bob helped me make this castle.

Combined Boy Birthday Party: No girls allowed!

The seven year old privilege is to have an all boy (or all girl,depending) birthday party, but last year Drew didn't have many friends yet since we had just moved here.  So, we postponed it until this year.  I couldn't avoid it any longer.  He opted for a bowling party and agreed, very lovingly, to allow a triple birthday celebration with two of his brothers, Isaac and Judah.  They each wanted a different cake/cupcake decoration which complicated things a bit, but how can I complain when the cakes and invitations where really my only jobs after setting this up at the bowling alley.

Judah's Flash mini cake

Drew's Spiderman Cupcakes

Isaac's guitar cupcakes

I made chocolate melt guitars on wax paper with a basic outline drawn underneath.  Hardest part was actually keeping them from breaking afterwards.

Brian ran the youngest lane of bowlers and Bobby enjoyed himself thoroughly!

Isaac and his friends got a lane to themselves.

Judah was in the middle lane with Drew and their friends.  He's not quite strong enough to bowl regularly.

The girls stayed at home and took in the quiet house while Brian and I took the boys to the bowling alley.  I was so proud of myself for making it there with candles and cakes on time.  When I walked up to the counter to ask where we go, they informed me there were no birthday parties scheduled that day at that location.  They suggested maybe I was at the wrong location.  I sorta panicked at this point.  Thankfully, it was only 7 minutes drive which is just crazy because in San Antonio everything's far.  We made it to the party only a couple minutes late. 

The boys had three lanes organized according to age.  My family was able to come, and my sister and brother bowled in their own lane.  The kids had pizza and lemonade.  The kids got cards for the arcade and we sang Happy Birthday before eating cake.  It was a fun time.