5th Grade Social Studies Project

I feel like we just came charging into 5th Grade. There was no gradual review process this year, ya know, where you catch up on every thing you forgot all summer?  Poor Chase has had hours of homework every night, he has to read for 30 minutes and practice his instrument for 30 minutes. Add dinnertime into that, and it's bedtime before we even know it.  So when he brought home a paper about this huge Geography project I nearly cried!! We worked on it together every night for a week, but when we finished, it looked really awesome!!  He really did most of it, and the ideas were mostly his as well. I was just there to help, cause this would have taken him a month on his own!

I tried to show a picture that showed the 3-D effects that we did. We used Salt Dough for the mountain ranges/canyons. Then we used flags and pins to label everything. I was really proud of him! Scott helped him take it to school and said it was by far the best one!

We had to label each state and capital. Two: peninsulas, straits, bays, canyons, lakes, tributaries, mountain ranges, capes, & gulfs. Thank goodness for Google!  How did I ever survive school with out it??

I sure hope we don't have huge projects on a regular basis. This one was exhausting:)

Rain-gutter Regatta

Our Scout troop did their very first Rain-gutter Regatta.  It was pretty fun!  Chase wanted to go with a pirate theme (cause how many ways can you decorate a boat?)  I had to go to two different stores to find pirate stickers that would work, then we glued on a lego man and a treasure box. Come to find out, all the added things made the boat unsteady, and before I could even take a picture, he had ripped all of it off. The best part of the night?? He took 2nd place (out of probably about 15 boys?)

I hope they call me on a mission...

Our stake issued a challenge this year to set the date that we will serve a full time mission for our church. We finally got around to doing that, and it was kind of fun to see the places that the kids hope to go!

Elder Chase will leave in June of 2021. His top pick- Alaska (brrrrr!!!!!!)

Elder Tanner will leave in March of 2024. His top pick- Russia (even more brrr!!!!!!!!!)

Sister Sienna will leave in February of 2029. She hopes to go to the Zoo (that one gave us all quite a laugh)

Hubby & I- can go on a mission in 2043, and it was unanimous, we both want to go to Italy.

Back to school!

It's back to school time again! And it came just in the nick of time. I was dangerously close to dis-owning the two little boys that live here!!  Here are some 1st day of school pictures:  The boys wanted to match, isn't that cute??!!?

We've survived 3 whole weeks, and it already feels like we've been at this forever!

Chase came home day one and says "I need a trombone"  Oh crap, I had completely spaced that one. So I say "When do you need it by?" "Tomorrow" is his reply, and then "Can we go get one now?"  He's clearly not understanding that I can't just go pick one up at Walmart like I can most everything else.   So I put out a plea on facebook:  "Anyone have one lying around??"  And the good new is: I found one! Bad news: it's in Idaho.  So I work that all out with my aunt Ruthann, then my Dad calls and says that my brother Brady's trumpet is just in storage at my uncle's house and could we use that?  Well, sure why the heck not!!? So they shipped that to me too.  Now I've got more instruments than players.  But here is the best part:  He comes home from school last week (before he officially had an instrument in his possession, both in the mail) and says, all sheepishly, "Mom, you're going to be so mad. They said that I can't be in band anymore and they sent me to choir" Apparently, they had too many kids sign up for band, and so they just picked kids to send to choir. Little did they know, all the finagling I had been doing to get this boy an instrument.  I had Scott call the office because he can keep his emotions in check a little better than me when I'm fuming mad.  We got it all straightened out and we're back in band now. Unfortunately, I'm sure that means some other poor kid is being kicked out, but I'm not going to let that bother my conscious too bad!! He's been using the trumpet for about a week, but the trombone just got here today, so he wants to switch to that. It has been a loud week,  let.me.tell.you!! In 5th grade you start rotating classes and so he feels all big and important doing that and really loves it.

Tanner is that kid that just goes to school, listens to his teacher, does what he's told, never acts out, finishes his work, is quiet as a mouse, helps others, is friends with everyone (and then comes home and lets loose all that energy he's been holding in, sometimes a good thing, sometimes a bad thing). He really loves 2nd grade. He has the same teacher Chase had for 2nd, but I assured her that he is the calm one, a complete 180 to Chase (who was a total nut job at the age of 7!!)  His favorite subject is Art, he loves to be creative!

I've been working on having Sienna tested for preschool. If they find that she needs preschool for speech reasons, then it's free. Which is a whole lot better than the $150/ week they charge for the regular kids.   So far we've had a pre-screening.  It was about a 20 minute interview, where they played with her and asked her questions. Sienna sat there with her hands over her eyes (I'm sure thinking, "If I can't see you, then you can't see me") and wouldn't talk to the teacher, until she asked Sienna if she had a dog. Sienna put her hands down, looked at the lady and said "I have 2 dogs" and she was good from then on out. They did find that they couldn't understand a word she was saying except when I translated, so they are going to have her come back in a couple of weeks to have a screening with a speech therapist. They will decide at that time if she qualifies for preschool or not. Sienna was so excited to be going to school, she got her little back pack out, and Tanner just kept talking about preschool and all the fun things she'd be doing, even though I kept telling him to keep his mouth shut in case she didn't get in. It was funny, because after that first pre-screening, she told Tanner that she didn't need to go to school anymore because she had already gone. Apparently, 20 minutes was good for her. 

My brain just keeps saying now that school has started, that summer is over. Now if we can just get this terrible heat to go away, so that it really feels like fall, then all will be right with the world!