THE BEST DAY!

     The public schoolers started school yesterday, and we celebrated a NOT back to school day! 

     We had the best day yesterday! After a whole summer of not using it, I finally took the boys out on our kayak (I can't take all three kids myself, but it was Daddy's day off so he watched little sister. It was also supposed to be a 1-on-1 trip, but Mr. 4 showed up in the middle of Mr. 7's ride)! I thought our pond wasn't too interesting, that there wasn't much to explore, but HELLO- the island is fantastic! I honestly thought it was mud and reeds, that it wouldn't even be stable enough to stand on, but it's the perfect field to explore, and in the middle of a pond, what could be better? Does anyone else have boats or kayaks and want to join us for a nature day? It might take too long to take kids across 1 by 1...        

After our explorations, we met up with other homeschoolers at the new splash pad (and I gave the wrong- warm weather info from looking at a completely different city on weather.com!!!) for a NOT back to school party! We haven't officially started since we're waiting on Shawn's charter school stuff, but we'll have a great first day celebration too :D This homeschool thing has taught me one thing, that learning/education is about SOOO much more than academics. We work on that of course, but we also add things like studying icky pond stuff, learning how to row, exploring sunflowers, or searching for feathers to our days. I've also learned that socialization is much more fun for this momma since we started homeschooling. I get to hang out with other like-minded moms a whole lot more than I used to! It probably also helps that we're past the baby stage so I don't feel so shut in.  

#imlovinit #wildschooling #weresosocial     

In these pics we felt a few raindrops as we went outside, so they had to get all of their rain gear on! lol. It's been a very dry summer, so any amount of rain needs  rain gear I guess.

A crab apple tree on the way to the pond.

Row row row your boat, through the pond scum?

Yay! We're outside, kayaking, & exploring, in cool weather that we've been waiting for! Or is it only me who has been waiting for that?

Sunflower fields forever

Feathers, he says that the big ones are to keep birds warm and the little ones are to help them fly.

"This is comfy Mom!" He and I have different definitions of comfortable...

Happy NOT back to school day! There were a lot more kids there, but these are the ones I convinced to stand for a picture.