1st Day of School!

How is it back to school time already? Alex had his first day of 5th grade yesterday and Daryl has his first day of 8th grade today! How is this our last year of grade school? Daryl is excited for football, and I'm excited to get them back next week and grill them on ALL THE THINGS! 

Kelly did send me the traditional first day of school pictures and I talked to them both when they picked up their school supplies from my house Monday. Summer went fast, but I'm ready to get back on a schedule. I will not be the first one going to bed anymore! LOL 

Alex finished the book Code Talker last week and Daryl is working furiously on his book The Night Gardener. They had a goal to read 12 books this year and right now they are both sitting at 6. When Daryl finishes his current book he will be at 7. I'm not stressed about it, they have been reading longer books and Alex is reading books without illustrations, so they take a little longer. 

I'm glad as much as they grumble about reading time, they do like the books we pick out together! 

1st day of 8th grade! 

1st day of 5th grade!

Be careful when your mom is 
following your Instagram! LOL 

Goal Update (It's not pretty)

 I won't bury the lead. Goals did not happen in July. I can give you many excuses; busy, injured, hot. But the truth is I went six days in a row of not tracking and decided the whole month was trashed. 

We will call July my goal vacation, I may trash a month but I'm not going to trash my year! If anything I need to work harder so if I decide to trash December I've still accomplished things this year. 

It's fine to have a great month and shout it from the roof top when you do everything you set out to do. It's also fine to be honest and let people know that you also ride the struggle bus from time to time. This was a struggle bus month. 

PS-The most visual result of trashing my goals for the month is my house looks trashed too! The 10 min. tidy up is making a come back! 

Read 21 Books: 11 /21

I finished zero books in July. I did start about four, so I should be able to finish some of those for August! 

Run 720 Miles: 420/720

My hip was uncooperative this month. I've been to one doctor, need to go to another. Not running can't be the option...I don't accept it. With faulty hip I mostly walked 20 miles this month. Some miles is better than no miles. 

Money Goals: Made an extra principle payment! 

Add 2K to Savings, Done Feb 2022 

Pay Mortg. principle down 5K

New Living Room Furniture (Home), Done Feb 2022

Replace Some Windows (Home) 

Replace Window Blinds (Home) 

Create Backyard Oasis (Home) 

Trips: 2/3

The deposit for trip number three has been paid! Passport (Check) Friends on board (Check) Hotel and Flights booked (Check). Now patiently wait for months..........

Days I hit all of my Daily Habits: 0,

I changed some of my Daily Habits goals. I need so new ones just to keep me motivated! My New Daily Habit goals are: Move AM and PM, Read 15 min, Tidy Up 10 min, Sew or Knit and Don't waste $. Good news is yesterday, I hit them all! 

July goal tracker was a waste of a
sheet of paper....

August will be better!

Saturday Alex had his first Ramen, this 
needs to be documented! 

2022 Fair Post #2

 On Sunday the 2022 Shawnee County Fair wrapped up! It was a good fair and even with the heat, everyone was having a good time! (It rained all day Monday and that would have been nice if it came a couple of days earlier!) 

   Friday, Daryl had his Archery meet and he earned a red ribbon in bare bow. He really enjoys archery so I'm so glad they have an event at the County Fair.  On Saturday, the Boys helped with the 4-H Pancake Feed, participated in their club tour and enjoyed hanging out with their 4-H friends. Daryl also competed in a pickle eating contest and made it to the final round! On Sunday, Daryl walked in the Fashion Revue. He got a blue in Fashion Revue, mostly because of his paperwork, he scored very highly for his modeling. :-) 

The boys didn't take a ton of projects this year, but I was proud of what they got done. The older they get the less I have to do with their fair prep. They are sure growing up! 

Mr. Cool in the Fashion Revue!

Alex's Harry Potter Diamond Painting

Alex's Grogu Diamond Painting

Pickle eating contest!

Club Tour!

Those participating in our club tour!

2022 Fair Post #1

 It is the hottest week of the year, so it must be county fair time! Daryl had clothing judging last week and Alex had his Arts and Crafts judging yesterday. Alex really pulled through, he was sure two weeks ago he wouldn't finish his big diamond painting and in the final week he "kinda*" finished it and completed another small diamond painting! Way to go man! 

*When it looked like there was no hope on Alex finishing his diamond painting, grandma had the bid idea to crop it down to the part he had finished. It looked great that way and his hours of work on that part got judged. Win-Win! 

Daryl has Archery and Public Fashion Revue left, so we are about half way done. :-) We are going to make it! 

His Smaller diamond painting 

Daryl got a champion ribbon on his buymanship! 

Having his Grogu and Harry Potter Diamond 
Paintings judged 

He got 2 Blue Ribbons! Way to go Al! 

A Birthday Weekend!

 With a free weekend on the calendar we celebrated Alex's 10th birthday on Saturday! His actual birthday is Wednesday but we didn't see how we could fit a party for him in the middle of 4-H Fair week. But this way he got two special days, so he was ok with that! 

Grandma and I planned a pool day with his friends and then cake and ice cream at the house. It was a lot of fun, and I think the boys enjoyed seeing each other during the summer. These three boys have been in the same class with Alex for a few years, and they always gravitate towards each other! 

Happy 10th Birthday Al, you are becoming a fine young man! I am constantly impressed with your brain power and how you figure things out on your own. You have a knack for problem solving, and if you keep that up it will serve you well! So happy to be your mom! 

A blurry, blowing out the candles, picture!

He got some pretty cool presents from his friends!

I got him a book with some cash book marks!
Made us both happy. LOL 

When I yelled "Boys let me take your picture!" 
Alex got lifted out of the water! Those darn kids!

So glad he got to reconnect with some 
school friends for his summer birthday!

Happy 4th of July

 You know it was a good day when you only have a few pictures. The boys worked really hard to earn fireworks money. Alex got $5 a hour to work on his diamond painting for 4-H. Before you judge, this was money I had set aside for his fireworks anyway....LOL 

Daryl mowed for me and his dad to get his money. I kind of like this trend of handing over money in exchange for something I want...hmmmm

Once fireworks were secured we were ready to start our 4th of July day. We kicked it off watching the Potwin Parade. One of my favorite parts is watching the T-High drumline perform in Potwin after the Parade. Then we had our traditional shrimp boil with our friends, some daytime fireworks were also enjoyed! 

New this year Daryl scored our family an invite to his friend's pool party! That was so much fun and a great way to cool off for Daryl and Alex after being outside all morning. 

We ended the day watching the whole neighborhood do fireworks at Auburndale park. Am I getting old or are fireworks getting louder?! The boys got their exercise doing their fireworks at the park with everyone else. At 11pm we all finally tucked in, and if fireworks were still going off, I didn't hear them! 

Thank you to all our friends and family that let us be a part of their day, 4th of July is only a favorite holiday because I get to see a lot of our favorite people!! 

Grandma thought it would be cool if 
we tie dyed our own shirts. She was right!