Summer is winding down and heating up

This summer has been a summer of getting things done, and the one I've worked on most is trying to rearrange and declutter the house.

Here's our new "office" - which used to be the storeroom (2nd pantry). It's tiny, but the computer is no longer cluttering up the den corner.

Seth has been working on his art skills. He's been doing a drawing class we got online from udemy. He'll do more drawing and painting classes this year. He wanted animation, but that wasn't available through any school option. (We have one of those from udemy also  that he can do on his own.)

 These 2 just want to play.

Finished library levels for coupons. Gideon was easy - I read about 15 minutes before nap and another 15 minutes at bedtime daily. (Alee had a little more trouble getting her minutes in since I left most of her reading to her to complete - audiobooks count - but she is not a big reader. She finally finished last week.)

 Seth got braces. Because he's at the end of his growth years, he'll probably have them about 2 years. (boo!) We had to wait until all those baby teeth fell out. (If I had known what the current orthodontist told us, I would have had them pull all those baby teeth and start this earlier when it would have been more effective and efficient!)

Swimming time at Pine Island Pool. I have some videos we took underwater (using my phone pouch for water protection). I'll try to post and link those later.

More decluttering and then reorganization (with labels!)

And one more zoo trip before it expires. (I'm sure we'll renew, but I usually just wait until we want to go again to renew. With the recent temperatures, I think we'll wait to renew.)

This is a screenshot of a video - the kids love the goats. I did too until this one tried to eat my pants!

Gideon tripped in the little kid area at the splash part of the zoo (Waterfall Junction), and after I got the bleeding busted lip to stop, we got him an icee to calm him and sooth the pain. (He still continued to say "ice pack".)

We are almost ready for the school year...I shopped around until I found a microscope that was both affordable and good enough for high school biology. (We also got prepared slides and microscope things to make our own slides.)

We have not had as many game times as I had hoped this summer, but we've had a few. (No one can agree on the games.) Seth won Scrabble.

Haircuts. Most wanted a trim, but Alee wanted to go short, like Kaitlyn.

 Rob's parents have been working on moving all summer (packing, purging, etc), and we were able to go up and help them get settled in at the end of July. (They still have a lot of boxes to deal with, but we felt pretty accomplished that the basics got unpacked and set up in 1 day.)

Gideon and his cars

Girls Camp 2019!

Water time got cut short with a storm. (I'm not sure why she needed the poncho on top of her swimsuit?) We saved the tent by holding up the poles during the very windy storm. And then it collapsed in the middle so that Kaitlyn could no longer see me; she begged, "Now can we evacuate??"
My tent lifted its stakes right out of the ground and rolled - with my camp chair set up and my plastic lidded box full of stuff inside. (I had left my tent to help the 12/13 year olds with theirs.)

We did get kayak time later. Yea! I was nervous about there being bugs inside (unlike a canoe where you sit "on top"), but we found bug-free kayaks and liked them better. I felt more stable and less likely to flip it.

The girls planted succulents at camp (it was related to a lesson on faith). I'm not worried about my girls' faith, but we'll see if they can keep the cousin of the cactus alive longer than I have in the past!

 Kaitlyn named hers Prickles.

 Carolyn named hers Drake.

 Natalie refused to name her plant.

Hand clapping games

Water colors class - They each got 1/12 of a picture and painted their portion. They will frame and combine the 12 pieces to make the full picture to hang in their classroom at church.

Carolyn's is 3rd on top row. Kaitlyn's is 4th on top row. Natalie's is 3rd on the bottom row.

We had some trials to help us grow closer together and strengthen us. 

One was a daily storm (2 tents were broken and the other 2 were packed up after they were flipped or collapsed during the first storm). By night 3, we were all sleeping on the screened in porch around the 1 building.

Another was bugs. Kaitlyn saw a roach get into her box from the woodpile on the porch. I had to deal with that. (So in case you're counting, I saved her life twice now.) :)

The collapsed tent was reconstructed, but ended up with ants in it. Natalie opened and shook out her sleeping bag and found these old boxers at the bottom beyond where her feet reach. (Seth does not claim these; we don't know whose they are. They have been disposed of.) She refused to even touch them.

The girls had a lot of fun. Carolyn was chosen as one of the 2 youth camp leaders to help with planning and set up. The twins were in their first year. It wasn't quite what they had hoped for (cabins), but they had a lot of fun, and even the hard stuff created great stories later, which they laugh about.

Kaitlyn and her friend wrote a song for camp, which she and her best friend performed the last night. The girls also performed a skit, which was based on the crazy adventures from the week. I won't post it online since only 3 of the 10 girls are mine, but if you want to see it when we're together next, just let me know. :)

And while we were gone, Rob had Seth, Alee, and Gideon. Seth was totally fine. He's been refinishing our dining room table and made more progress on that while we were gone to camp. Rob missed me.

Alee reported she cried 5 times while I was gone, and almost cried a 6th time, and she never wants me to go to camp again until she's old enough, and then I should go every year with her. haha

Gideon was sad about missing me (but he loves Daddy, so he wasn't really as distraught as Alee was). However, he did climb out of the crib twice while I was gone! I'll convert his crib to toddler bed this week so he doesn't fall trying to get out on his own. (I had planned to keep him in the crib until he was 3, and then convert it to double bed. I guess he changed those plans for me!)

Seth was totally fine with me gone. He did tons of yard work, they visited Rob's parents, and did other non-Mom things together. :)

And that sums up our summer. We have a few more weeks until public school (and seminary for Seth and Carolyn) start, but Carolyn will start homeschool officially this week. (We started PE while at camp.)

We're grateful for any rain so that it cools down around here!