No Greater Joy: Schools Out For the Summer!!

So....we meet again blogging world. Oh how I have missed you! I am committed to catching up, just like I have numerous times before. But for now we have more important things to focus on, like Summer FUN! Can't you hear that song ringing in your ears "Schools out for the summer!" While, 2 out of 3 of my children do not attend school, there is still something magical about Summer vacation. It's magic that has become a part of us and will never totally leave us after attending school for 13+ years. This year, I can honestly say, I am more excited than I've ever been. You see, having a third child has totally rocked my world. Some of you are out there saying, "I could have told you that." And after much prayer, deliberation, (and almost pulling my hair out on several occasions) I made the decision to take a step back from my photography business. I love capturing special moments for people, but I love my family even more, and I need to devote time to raising my children. Before I know it, they will be grown, or so I am told. Without the stress and time of doing shoots, editing pictures, returning tons of email, etc, etc, etc, I am beaming at the idea of TIME. Wonderful, Glorious, Quality time with my family. It's something we don't get back, you know!

Ok, since we have all this time now, I wanted to make sure that we didn't waste it. It's still easy to get distracted with all the stinkin' social media and housework that is never done, and for my kids...TV. So we started our summer vacation with Summer FUN cards. Now I know I just ragged on social media, but pinterest is my saving grace when it comes to ideas of things to do with my little people. While I do like to come up with original ideas, it's nice to have a whole page devoted to activities I can do with them when the creative juices just aren't flowing so well. I am such an idea thief! Going back to my original point, the Summer FUN cards were an idea I found on pinterest from this blog. And here are our summer fun cards:

You can see that I actually made most of them. Seems I have a little more life experience in the fun department ;) Lan kind of missed the idea to begin with. She was making "I love you" cards for the whole family. Sweet girl :) She got the hang of it though, and made cards for "going to the swap""camping out in the living room" and "living in Theweesianu (Louisiana)." Yeah, I don't get that last one either, but it's cute!

In addition, I made a tentative schedule. If I've learned anything from this first week, it is that I have to remain flexible. Things come up, kids get grumpy, and the baby is mobile. Recipe for disaster, LOL. The same brilliant woman who blogged about the summer fun cards, also came up with a calendar of learning exercises for her children. Each week, there is a different theme, and the children do a hands-on activity each day to go along with that theme. See her calendar here. I used her calendar as a skeleton, chose some more age-appropriate activities and thought up a few themes of my own. Here is my chicken scratch calendar.

Now, like I said, I do sometimes like to come up with original ideas. And so I did. Every week, we have "Make it Monday", "We care Wednesday", and "Fun Food and Family Friday". On Mondays we make breakfast together. The whole family comes to the table and we try a recipe we haven't tried before. Everyone gets involved. This not only begins teaching the kids to cook, it also gives us the opportunity to try lots of those wonderful recipes I have pinned! We care Wednesday is about service. On wednesdays we might make a card for someone, pick up trash, bring someone food, etc. I hope to instill an attitude of service in my children. This is a just a small way we can begin doing that. Fridays are family night. We'll bring up that trusty pinterest page, yet again, and pick a "fun food" to go with our movie or games, or whatever else we choose to do for family night.

Ok, so here is the run down of how our first week of summer went:

Day 1 - Make it Monday. We made poptarts for breakfast and worked on summer fun cards
I used this recipe. But if you have refrigerated pie crust, you don't even have to make your own dough. These were fun to make and YUMMO!

Oh, look at that cute little baby back there :)

Day 2 - Made a Prayer Pail (This has been wonderful!)

Yesterday we prayed for the president, alligators, Uncle Josh and his family, and we thanked God that he was our Lord. It's such a blessing listening to my children pray!

That night we camped out in the living room and made s'mores popcorn. Typically this would have been a Friday night activity, but they just couldn't wait!

Day 3 - We care Wednesday. We made "we miss you" cards for their cousin who visited from Seattle. Daddy took them to the summer movie program, and Landry made these adorable rings while her brother's were sleeping.

Day 4 - Today we had to get a new ac unit put in our house. That meant it was going to be HOT. We threw the schedule out the window, called some friends to meet us at chick-fil-a, and killed some time goofing off at some stores. Like I mentioned before, Flexibility is key!

Day 5 - Spent morning at the Lake Front and searched for rocks and seashells to make pet rocks. We also found Spanish Moss, which was perfect for hair. Now since it is "Fun Food Family Friday", we would typically make a fun food, but everyone opted for Taco Bell instead. Guess I can't win everytime, right? Look how darling their pet rocks turned out! I love how they show off their personalities. Eli's are monsters and aliens, with crazy hair and eyes. Landry's are pretty princesses, with girly colors and long hair.

Saturdays are fly by the seat of our pants. We can lay around in our PJs or we can take a quick trip somewhere. This Saturday we happened to have some special friends come to play!