So, now I have my travel plans made and can sit back and enjoy the next couple of months, or not since I can’t eat anything. For the past year I have been in and out of doctors offices. It has always been the same thing. In March, after multiple tests, it was discovered that I had gall stones. This meant surgery to remove the offending organ. That happened in April and I was assured that I would be perfectly normal in no time. That wasn’t the case! Although I still managed to keep up with everything, I still was not feeling good and had the same stomach pains. So the first part of June I was in the O.R. again for a colonoscopy and endoscopy. If one wasn’t fun enough we went for the double whammy. I was told that everything was fine with no reason to explain away the pain.
Fast forward through the summer where I spent a couple of months down south soaking up the Idaho sun, working on the farm, and in my families fast food restaurant. Aside from the continued problems I was having a great time. The kids got to spend time with grandma and grandpa and work with me on the farm. They mowed lawns, fed chickens, weeded the garden, (the big Idaho kind, not the Kodiak box kind) they all got tan, and even a little sun burned. It was great to see them with some color and spending so much time outside. We attended family reunions and saw people we have not seen for too many years. I got to work with my younger sisters and brother who were all very young when I left home. It was great to develop a relationship with them and recognize that they are young adults and not the annoying little kids I remembered. During all of this fun I was also seeing a natural doctor to try and find some answers.
I got back home the middle of August and we immediately started figuring out our school schedule for the year. Alyssa and Sam also picked up a couple of paper routes, and started some online classes. The school year has been great as I see the girls branch out and start to learn more on their own. Connor has started kindergarten which means that we play games, read books, and learn letters while the girls are in class on the computer. That is our time and we can’t get enough of it. The last couple of mornings Connor has been pulling down some of his favorite games along with his reading binder and his “school folder”. He gets everything set up and waits for me to come in. He gets a spelling test where I say a letter sound and he writes down the letter. It has been great to see him looking for the letters he knows and starting to put them together into small words. This is the first time I have had to teach reading. The girls started to learn in school so this is a little overwhelming, but I am so excited to see some progress. Our days are crazy busy, and we never have enough time.
Friday has become our fun day. We have a small homeschool group from church. So we get the kids together on Friday mornings for our activity. Last year we alternated doing cooking, science, and art projects. This year we have focused our activity on history. We are using The Story of the World, which has an accompanying activity book. It includes a color page and map for each lesson along with projects that tie in with the story for the week. We have started with ancient history and have had some great activities. We have had an archeological dig in my garden, cave painting, constructed a replica of the Nile River, made cuneiform tablets, mummified hot dogs, and tie dye Tshirts.
As you can see, our fun never ends. Neither do our days really, as we jump from one thing to another. But winter will be just around the corner and then maybe we will slow down. Or not! But hopefully I will find more time to write down a few thoughts and save some of these memories.
