Fall happenings

 

So Fall and fifth grade is in full swing....and one of the changes that started this year is Taylor taking the bus home every afternoon.  He chose to drop karate and rides the bus home instead then walks home and texts to let me know he is there. Usually he is there less than 30 minutes before Dan or I get home and so far, it is working well. 

 

For their first fifth grade project, they had to make a memory box to store items in throughout the coming school year...so we had some of his neighbor buddies over to do theirs together. 

 

 Projects are way more fun - and easier on mom - when done in a group!  So based on his memory box, you think my kid likes sports or what!?! :)

 

This was a nice surprise...we finally found out T's FSA score from last year and he actually got a perfect score on the Math FSA!  Shocking that two history geeks like me and Dan ended up with a kid who excels at math!  

 

 He and the other three kids who got perfect scores in the school were on the news that morning with the principal and vice-principal.

 

 Ahhhhh - the big eclipse of 2017!

 

 Cris and I took off work and had bellinis in the hammock at a local park so we could watch the eclipse in style.  No burnt retinas here!

 

 T went home with friends and they all watched together.  It really was pretty cool!

Another excitement with fifth grade...city wide 5th grade dances!!!! Check out these boys about to head into their first one....so dressed up right?  :)  You should have seen the GIRLS - rhinestones, big hair, eyeliner, oh my.  These boys are in for it.  And have no idea.  :)

 

 There was a photo booth so they took some fun pics.  They all were hesitant to go but came home saying it was a blast.  Do you think my kid actually danced at all?  Heck no.  But fun was had anyway. next one is the halloween dance on October 13th.

 

 And we fit in a fun saturday of parkour at the local ninja gym with our friends - always fun and a good workout.

 

After more than 15 years together, we had to say goodbye to our Fidel on August 27th.  It was so hard and his absence is still so obvious every day.  But it was time and we were all there with him, loving him, as he slipped this mortal coil.

 

 F-man will never be forgotten...for all his crazy and challenges, he was ours. And we loved him.

 

 And then came IRMA. The big nasty hurricane targeting our state...Cristina and Caleb and their new puppy came to ride the storm out with us...so of course we had to have a bit of fun...we staged a few scavenger hunts indoors to keep the boys entertained.

 

 And I got lots of puppy snuggles!

 

 Many tornado warnings that evening meant lots of closet time....closet selfie!  :)

 

I laid awake from 1 to 5 AM that night as Irma stormed through and it was LOUD and scary.  This was the radar during the worst - we are the blue dot.

 

 In the morning, we had some fence gone and some shingles damaged and a big old tree across our driveway...and no power for 4 days.  Still I know it could have been much worse so we consider ourselves lucky.

 

  During one of our no-power days, Cristina and Caleb invited us to Aquatica for the day...

 

 Floating in a cool lazy river in a water park....exactly what we needed to forget our HOT house for a few hours!

 

And just because....check me out in my snow boots using a chain saw for the first time.  :)

Other news - T is also on three teams this fall and the games all start this weekend so stay tuned for lots of flag football and baseball posts soon!  His teams are the Cubs, Seahawks and Venom.