summer wednesday….

Little man checking out his bowling shoes while the older two talk about their scores…

It's been a great few days. I find that I often think that when everyone has been in a good mood and no one is sick, and it's just icing on the cake if we get to do fun things. 

Monday afternoon, we went to our local kid's free bowling, and then we picked up Chick Fil A on the way to a local park. They spent some time playing and then discovered a grassy hill to roll down. They called it  "parachuting" for some reason. 

Yesterday we went to Marbles, the local children's museum. They played happily, buzzing like bees from farm play to the pirate ship to the train table, etc. and around and around again. I drove us home to their excited chatter in the backseat about their favorite things to play with.

Today I took us off to the downtown science museum. Evan really wanted to see the dinosaurs, though he acted a little intimidated like always when we got up close to them. We went to the morning "Meet the Animals." I love that program. It's such fun hands on science. They got to pet a baby alligator, some sort of African lizard, and a rabbit, while they learned about how each animal is adapted to where they live and what they do. The lady who does it asks lots of questions and does a wonderful job with making it interactive.

I'd packed a picnic lunch, and we stopped at a little playground nearby. I sat under the big, shady trees and watched them dig in the sand. Seth told me that he was being respectful of Ben and including him, and that Ben wasn't destroying his sand boat like usual. :) 

Our summer days are winding down. I had so much energy for planning this coming school year right after the homeschool conference in May, but now I'm a little stalled out. Maybe it's that I don't want to dive in again. Or maybe it's that I mostly know what we're doing this year, and it feels mostly familiar and not crazy complicated to pull together. I'm not somebody who writes down detailed schedules for each day. I know what books we're using, and when we finish a lesson, we move on the next. ;) 

Tuesday or Thursday Tea is on the agenda as something new for this year. (I figure that a day that starts with a "T" will help me remember to do it. :) I'm hunting for a teapot or tea kettle that I can use for that. I'm planning to put out a special snack after rest time, let the boys pick their own tea bags to use, have a little bowl of sugar cubes out, etc. I'm going to light a candle and make it a special time. I plan to put things in this time that I haven't gotten to earlier in the week. We may do picture study and read poetry during this time. It's a very Charlotte Mason idea that I've seen tossed around on the CM Facebook feed, and I'm excited about it. 

Well, I'd better run. I'm cutting up some fresh green pepper and SC peaches for dinner with warmed up taco meat from the freezer. (I do a lot of cut up fresh veggies and fruit for sides in the summer.) And then it's off to the pool for an evening family swim. Ah, summer… I'm gonna miss you.