Year 3, May 31st and June 1st, 2018: The Last Day of School!

Editor's note: Apparently, I was too busy and took no pictures worth a blog post except maybe ones of an empty and full fridge since it was grocery shopping day!  Pretty typical day.  Now onto the good stuff below.

We made it to 180 days BEFORE Benaiah's birthday this year!  Wahoo!  And we ended very strong, even completing books and projects.  They will continue to do some new subjects that I want to continue in the fall, like tracing maps and cursive for Keturah, but there will be no exact planning of it.  Actually, we didn't do much today as far as book work goes because there were other fun things to attend.  Again, I'm trying to make it a point to get to know my fellow homeschoolers that have consistent playground and gym days on Fridays, so we went to one at a park I was familiar with and was closer by us.  Then we zipped down the highway to Dunkin Donuts for free doughnut day, which is held nationwide.  But in the process of looking up a place to get free doughnuts I discovered that our brand new Tim Horton's on the westside closed two weeks ago!  They didn't perform as well as they had hoped, but it was most likely due to some lawsuits within the parent companies because about 20 other stores closed around the nation.  So sad! But Dunkin was my family's go to doughnut and coffee place and is almost as good.  Plus, it's only 15-20 minutes away, not 50.  Oh well, moving on.  We came home and got out of the heat, had some quiet time, and had a nice dinner.  Then Benaiah stayed home nursing some vertigo from sinus drainage while the rest of us went to Meijer and Chick-Fil-A for dessert because we had a coupon that expired the next day.

Benaiah woke up with a wicked sinus headache and almost didn't make it to his job interview at that very same Chick-Fil-A at 10:45am.  That's right, the boy applied to work fast food because nothing else has panned out yet.  But that's ok.  The manager goes to our church (insert eye roll because everyone in our township is somehow connected to the Creek even if it's through a family member that attends, or least that's how it seems).  And Justin gets to hang out that manager's house for a few Sunday nights for their pool parties for middle school youth group.  AND so many kids have worked at that restaurant, so, yup, it's our favorite and we are totally ok with it.  AND they are closed on Sundays! That makes it super easy for us!  I'm sure Benaiah will handle it well.  Then, Jared took him to TCU to his own checking and savings account!  Ah! And next week he gets his driver's permit and then the end of the tunnel will be here before we know it.  Time seems to speed up towards the end doesn't it?  At least with this stuff.  So Benaiah did a lot of "adulting" today including doing it with a throbbing head.  That's how it goes, bud!  He will hear on Monday if he was hired or not.  His favorite story from the interview that he was telling his friend tonight was that the HR person went to shake hands with him.  He declined and said he was actually sick, and she said, thanks for letting her know.  Then, he smiled and said, "My pleasure!" which is THE signature line that ALL Chick-Fil-A employees have to use!  I'm not sure if the interviewer recognized it or not, but Benaiah sure did get a kick out of being so clever! And you know we are proud of him!  I mean, he wasn't nervous and we didn't give him that many pointers about it.  I think he's just had to present himself in many different positions, from having honest conversations with his principal about different social situations, to working with the tech guys and having to be humble and listen, but also share his thoughts openly with respect.  He's definitely learned these skills on the go.  He's made this part of his journey pretty painless.  I think it's going to be a totally different story with Justin, who is just like me, and needs a ton of pushing to do anything and then crumbles when it goes wrong.  Yeah, he and I have some things to work on still.  But he'll get there.  And for now, one kid down, and 3 to go on their first job interviews.  Phew!  Parenting is tough!

We went to Garfield Park which is the same park as the little train exhibit we went to around Christmas time, although that building is on the opposite end of the park.  This part has two playgrounds, a nice walkway, this pagoda and another picnic shelter.  We've been here a few times over the years, so I sort of knew what was here.  I had forgotten how lovely the pagoda was though!

This spiral staircase was so tall!  And Abishai wanted to go up and down it several times.  I went up with him the first time, but even I was nervous for myself so I sent Justin up with him the next couple of times.  Finally, he started ignoring it and  I didn't have to worry so much.  The top is blocked off, but the lookout would have been nice.  I bet you could see downtown from there!  I was going to take a picture of downtown because we could see a couple of buildings from the ground, but forgot to.

Hello.

The bars were too far apart for my taste.  Abishai scrambled up and down the staircase with careful but easy crawling.

Those blue things are picnic tables down there.

Crazy!  It would make for some great wedding or graduation photos though!

Look, Mom, I climbed up on top again!  Just when I think he's maturing, well, he's not quite there yet.  Bringing the middles to playgrounds keeps them younger at heart than some of their peers.

This is a first!  Riding on a bouncy teeter totter type animal.  He liked it for about a minute.

Justin rocked so hard the back of his head nearly touched the ground.

This climbing thing is a favorite and I have a picture of the oldest three on it when Keturah was about Abishai's age.  He climbed up to this point, and then I had to turn off the camera and help him get the top.  He did want to try and go down the other way, but I couldn't figure out a way to help him turn around and do it.  He didn't panic, but I managed to get him back down.  Maybe an another year.

This one he figured out of course.  He does stand up at the top and basically walks onto the playform.

Woah! This is an OLD pagoda! That's 115 years!  But it looks like it's foundation and basic structures stayed intact fairly well.

And that's how you build something that lasts, with quality materials.  Four round towers in the corners.

Hanging out with a friend.

The scrollwork and handrails were beautiful.  Maybe I'll have to look up the history of this area and find out what is what.

Keturah attempted to rock climb across but jumped down quickly because the ledge was too narrow.

Then I spotted movement along the handrails.

Abishai was copying what the big boys were doing and walked along this ledge!  Thankfully it was pretty wide and yes, there is a 2 ft drop, but I figured it was safer than most things, especially that staircase!

Ah, it probably had been abandoned for a long time and then restored in 1995.  Since Garfield Park is somewhat in the middle of the city, I wouldn't be surprised if the area was let to go wild when everyone moved to the suburbs like the City Market sort of was.  And since it's been 30 plus years since the last major restoration, there are parts of the pagoda that need some help.  But there's only so much money city parks have to use, and more people want the pools open than a pagoda fixed up.

Isn't it a beautiful pagoda!  Oh wait, it's perfect for some tag!  And yes, I see you, friend with your peace sign.  And this is why Abishai was climbing over the railings.

Abishai played tag with the big guys and they even slowed down for him to catch up to them. And they didn't always tag him back.  In fact, I think only Justin did!

These two love this apparatus!  Take our picture mom!

Then she got stuck and had to jump down.

Tada!  It's a recreated image similar to the one with the oldest 3.  I'll have to dig it up sometime and actually fully recreated it with Benaiah and all of them being in their original positions.  Same with a 3 slide thing at the Beech Grove park.  Wow, I think I've taken my kids to many different parks 100's times more than I ever went to our local park.  Sometimes I feel like I don't have the time to do it or I'm not doing it often enough, but really, I am!

Very determined big 3 yr old.

We're done!

Yeah!

I don't think I got pictures at the beginning of the year, but that's ok.  I take pictures every day.  We know how they've grown.

Especially this one.  He's a junior now!

Yup, our crazy big kids!

Abishai wanted to do it, too, so I let him.  There's really no sign that says, "I finished pre pre pre K" lol.

Selfie time, by Jusstin.  Not too bad, but not exactly how I want to look.  Taking pictures of myself is important though!

Before we left for the day, in fact, within the first hour, the boy who wakes up consistently at 7 am every day, left signs of his activities everywhere....his lunchbox he wanted to take to the park because he equates park with food.

He was in the pantry and saw the mop.  And he was in the garage I think and found the penny board, helmet, and box, never mind the chair being pulled over in front of the counter, again.

What preschooler needs 4 utensils for one bowl of cereal?

He happily played with these "hero clicks" for 15 minutes telling stories of bad guys and good guys, and cries of "I'm going to shoot you! Pow!" and Supergirl's name was dropped a few times.

He didn't want to let Daddy go to work this morning and he quite literally jumped into the back of the truck and went through the window and was putting his seatbelt on before Jared got even turn on the truck.  Too cute!

Selfie at the pagoda with the staircase.

We had to buy drinks in order to get the free doughnuts, but I didn't mind because it wasn't going to be a full meal and I knew we would be hungry from the park.  The staff was pretty friendly and served us well.  Keturah got a frozen strawberry lemonade and a sprinkle doughnut with blue icing called birthday surprise or something.  She would get something very similar at Tim's.

Boston creme, his favorite, and a coolatta? or some sort of fruity drink that tasted like cotton candy.  He didn't care for the drink.

This one got a frozen lemonade, and we started out with a plain doughnut but then when we saw Keturah's doughnut, he indeed wanted sprinkled.  I hadn't ordered Benaiah's doughnut and drink yet because I wanted them to be as fresh as possible, so I just ordered a sprinkle doughnut and swapped out Abishai's for Benaiah's.  Then Abishai still only ate two bites of it.  He's not a big sweets eater.  I couldn't get him to eat ice cream at Mrs. Curl's.  I couldn't get him to eat his cookie at the catacombs.  He only ate the frosting off the cupcake at a party last weekend.  But he will scarf down meat and veggies!  Justin was kind of similar when he was younger.  Keturah is all sweets all the time.

I had a mocha coffee with almond milk and raspberry syrup.  It was ok.  The raspberry syrup was unsweetened so the whole thing was less sweet than I had anticipated.  At least I wasn't sick to my stomach though because they had almond milk!

We stopped at Daddy's office before we went home and they played this game with this cupboard under the display for 15 minutes, trying to shot themselves in.

Eating lunch with Daddy on his now favorite stool.

Yes, Mr. Long Arms and Legs can contort himself into this cupboard.  They were playing a game of opening the cupboard and throwing peppermints at the person inside.  Then the person inside would throw them back out and they would all laugh hysterically.  If only Grandpa knew the antics they get up to in the office that will eventually become his.....

One almost 16 year old who was done "adulting" for the day.  Isn't this us all at times?  And his large iced coffee with cream and sugar is icing on the cake.  Welcome to adulthood kid!

Benaiah's final grades.  I will note that because his Bible class with Jared was an indepedent study and not required by state law, it wasn't included in his final GPA.  That's why he was still on the A/B Honor Roll and could still technically have a D first semester and a C second semester in Bible.  But, whatever.  I'm not worried.  Show up, do the work, and you get good grades in high school and in college.  That's what I learned.  It's not necessarily about lack of intelligence, it's about lack of motivation and pure laziness that some kids get poor grades.

The kids helped me ( a little bit) put this pop up book together as a final project.  I knew that they hadn't had much experience with models, so I did make them do some of the cutting and gluing or at least had them watch me.  It can be a very precise process, and I don't have a ton of patience and I LOVE this stuff.  So, hey, now it's done and we can use it in future years!  It's all about the Roman Empire so this is a Roman house.

Roman ships! There's 6 pages in all.  Pretty simple and fun if you have made models before.  I used a paintbrush this time to spread the glue more evenly and to use less glue and it helped.  You aren't supposed to use water based school glue because it's paper, but I always have.  Therefore, the paper did curl a little bit.

Then after supper and a run to Meijer for a few things, we took our coupons and got a treat at Chick-Fil-A.  Because of Abishai's lack of a sweet tooth, Jared got him a large order of fries.  He nearly ate the whole thing!  He didn't eat a lot at supper, and I didn't push it because I knew he would eat fries here.  However, I failed to give him any fruits and veggies today save some fruit snacks and fruit juice.  Whoops!

Cookies and cream shake!

Abishai climbed up into the play structure and would not come down.  He was exhausted and being very disobedient, almost embarrassingly so.  Justin climbed in and got him, but it was a struggle.  He's cute, but after a long day of playing hard, with no nap, he gets so ornery!

Wait, what is this?

It's our first born's first checking account!  Sweet!  Jared of course co signed it, but Benaiah's got a few checks to use and his debit card will be in the mail in the next couple of weeks.  I forgot to ask if it's an atm card or a debit card though.  There is a difference.  An atm card is just for the atm and does not have the 16 digits that a debit or credit card does.  I know that Leah, for example, couldn't go to Aldi's like we did because she didn't have or use a debit card for a long time.  Aldi's only took cash and a debit card, not credit cards, until just a few years ago.  Hm,...I guess we'll find out.  He was hoping for a debit card so he could buy stuff online without using our cards and giving us cash for it.  Anyway, big milestones for the oldest!  Exciting times!  And then the other two are not far behind.  Then we get to breathe for a moment before the 4th is ready.  Crazy!  I remember when I was 16 and got my bank account and had my first regular babysitting job, and was preparing to take college entrance tests and shadowing vets, and going to driver's ed.  Wow! Time really does go by fast sometimes!