10•15•2017

This week was filled with illness. Amelia was sick. James was sick. Paul was sick. I think they caught what I had last week. It wasn't fun. But there was a silver lining! I finally got to take a week off from my extremely busy life. We cancelled all appointments, classes, play dates, etc. and got to rest and relax and focus on getting better. As an introvert, the hectic schedule of life is extremely draining. For months I have had something going on every single day. It was nice to take a week off and just bake and clean and let Amelia watch Octonauts all day long.

For family night we Booed some neighbors (secretly leaving treats on doorsteps). We decided to just walk around the neighborhood and find homes that didn't already have "We've been Booed" signs on the doors. We got a lot of steps in that night. Apparently there was an earthquake while we were out walking around, but we didn't notice.

Amelia packing lunches in her underwear. 

James' school picture came home. That was...interesting. We are doing retakes this year, I think.

Amelia continues to thrive with preschool at home this year. She is breezing through learning all of her letters. She is so proud of the fact that she can write her name by herself. I'm pretty proud of her, too. 

The fires in Northern California really impacted our air quality this week. The school asked parents to drive kids to school and recess was indoors all week.

A campfire program had been planned for Thursday night pack meeting, but due to poor air quality we had to move it inside at the last minute. It went pretty well considering we had been scrambling to find a building with gym availability on Wednesday night. The boys had to race to put tents together and all the wolves received the Paws of Skill belt loop. We've officially split the dens and I'm in charge of Wolves now. Pray for me.

On Saturday we took a drive out to Watsonville's Gizdich Ranch where we got Apple-Ollalieberry Pie, Apple Cider Slushes (AMAZING) and let the kids play on farm equipment, climb hay bails and pick pumpkins from a pumpkin patch.

I also forced them into taking Fall pictures. I've been working on my photography skills lately. It's the one thing that I really want to be better at. I need to get a new tripod though so that we can get a good family picture with all of us (Amelia decided that the last one was a chair and it exploded). Then we rushed back to San Jose so that Paul could attend a memorial for a friend who passed away last week.

This Week's Conversation Highlights:

Amelia was upset with me coaxing her to nap and shower with the promise of feeling better. "you said naps would make me feel better and I'm not better. You said a shower would make me feel better and I'm not better! I'm still sick!"

While we were in Utah my dad told James that he has a very important job: annoying his mom. So James tries to annoy me near-constantly (I'm pretty sure this is also and 8 year old boy trait). Every now and then I shoot him the "mom glare" and he grins the biggest grin and says, "what? I'm just doing my job that Pee-Pa gave me."