Sunday Funday as they say on Instagram. Since we are still technically on vacation, Gary and Leah visited other churches today, while we kept a somewhat normal Sunday routine. Benaiah had no responsiblities since we were planning not to be home, but he decided to have the Strunks pick him up and spent the day with them, mostly at church anyways. The rest of us didn't go until the 11, so Justin just helped out in 1st grade, although he was technically off for the day. I guess I thought we would be back in time for Jared to do nursery, so he and Abishai did that at the 4:30. Keturah went to class as normal and I went with Jared to service at the 11. Abishai pat-patted Mr. Jeff's big blue truck on our way in. Then, he was wearing underwear under his shorts instead of a pull up for both the 11 and the 4:30 service! And he stayed dry! He stayed in the same pair of underwear all day in fact, even after several trips to the big potty for stinkies!!! Yeah! I'm very impressed! We are going to make that September promotion Sunday date after all! It's on September 2nd, which is when we'll be gone to Michigan for Labor Day, but we'll move him up the next week. Yeah! I'm sure he'll miss Mr. Jeff though.
The afternoon for me was blogging, but I made the kids have a screen free day after the last two days of seemingly endless hours of it after having been gone for a few days, mostly without it. And they still kept asking about it all day! But, they played more with their toys, read more, and played a board game together, so I call that winning. I shared the Lilla Rose business opportunity on a live video on my Facebook page while the boys were at church this evening. We had nice supper and a nice walk afterwards, where they kids played with Grandpa. Grandma was out visiting a neighbor. Now it's time to add videos to all the blog posts and publish them so you can see them! And plan our Chicago adventures for Tuesday through Thursday. Yeah!
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| I leave my step app on at all times and boy did I see some high numbers this past week! No wonder my legs feel tired but toned. Sunday was driving to St. Louis. |
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| Monday was City Museum and the Gateway Arch. Tuesday was the St. Louis Zoo. |
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| Wednesday was at home. Thursday was Holiday World, and the count would have been higher but I didn't take my phone into the water of course or walking to some of the water elements from our "base camp." |
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| Friday and Saturday were at home rest days. Those are pretty low numbers even for my at home days. I aim for 4500 steps a day. |
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| A lot lower step counts, but I took a walk on Sunday to try to boost my numbers. |
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| Storm clouds. One reason for lower steps is that it was a very rainy weekend and no one got outside much. I did have to declare a screen free day because they went to the other extreme and had too much screen time. |
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| We were all finally at home for a meal so we finally, after 4 months, at our freeze dried strawberries. They tasted dry of course, but still sweet. |
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| Kiddos all waiting for us lined up in a row. It was either come on a bike ride. Benaiah choose the dishes. |
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| Ready to get more steps in. |
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| Abisahi left his bike at home because he couldn't pedal as fast as the others. So, he ran instead. He stayed with them for a little bit, then stopped and sat in the middle of the road waiting for us to catch up to him. |
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| "I can't do it!" Yes you can! |
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| The Sloth, as he calls himself. |
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| Playing with water guns with Grandpa. Yeah for impromtu time at Grandpa's house when he wanted to finish writing next week's sermon! |
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| Getting soaked! |
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| Justin pretended to be the ugliest sounding squirrel there is. I don't even know how to describe the sounds he was making, but they did not sound like a squirrel. |
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| I'm going to get the bad squirrel! |
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| Go! |
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| Meanwhile, I swung on the swing and tried to get a grasp of where things are in Chicago. The places I want to go are much further away from each other than I thought. So, we'll need to come up with a plan to use transit as much as possible. Not sure if this is the city bus or the L actually. I hope it's the L. I want to ride the L with Abishai. But this is the general area for most of the things we want to see. |
Monday, I had to switch my chiropractor appointment from Thursday to today because we had to shift our Chicago trip a day because Benaiah had to work today. Then it was time to get everybody and everything cleaned up and up to date and repacked. I asked my friends about Chicago and then put together an itinerary. We went over it with Gary and Leah and I think we have a firm grasp of expectations. Abishai had a good day with potty training again, yeah! And he wore his pj's all day, including going to pick up Benaiah from CFA. You know you are a homeschooler when.....your pj's wear out and your day clothes never do! I do try to make the kids change into their day clothes 90% of the time though. But, they also have fewer pj's than day clothes so each pair gets worn more and washed more. I know this is probably opposite of most people's wardrobe, that their day clothes wear out before their pj's. Oh well, it's life. Benaiah was pleased with his shift at CFA because he got to be on "boards" which means he had to make the sandwhiches, especially the special orders. That means they trust him a lot. Yeah! Good for him!
I'll just insert here since this blog is shorter, what I've learned from this past week(s) of vacation. My expectations of what constitutes vacation is being refined each other. There's vacationing with children, so we focus on what the kids like, and there's my high expectations of a weekend getaway where I would love to just linger in one museum all day and read everything. Then, I would walk down the streets of any given city and ponder how people live there, what mom and pop shops they frequent, what shows they might go to on their weekends, how they do laundry when living in a big apartment building, how it all compares to the movies, etc. I would also like to take in more musicals and baseball games and ballets. I would sit through more demonstrations and take my time wandering. But, alas, this is not how Johnsons vacation. Sure they hit the highlights of famous tourist traps, spend 2 hrs in a museum that should take all day, and then call it "good enough, now I can say we've been here" and move on. I'm coming to realize that's not what the museums are meant for. The people that put together exhibits and do the research and preserve things etc deserve more time than that. If you don't linger and soak it all in, you're probably going to forget the facts before you get home, so why even go? I think you should just stand in front of a fish tank for a good 15 minutes to observe what they are actually doing and talk about it. Or to see a covered wagon and bring up how it relates to what you've already studied in history. So, now that I've discovered that this is what I really expect and don't often get, I can have a better attitude this time around and then plan for future trips where I take the kids with or without Jared and go at a much slower, lingering, wandering, contemplating pace and do 1 museum per day instead of 2 or more museums/stops, take a picture and move on. And I have to give up the expectation that you won't read every sign of every museum in your lifetime. And I do get tired and I should swallow my pride and ask for a wheelchair on premises when it's available. I just don't want people pushing me around. And I know I need the exercise. And we still push the stroller. So with all that mind, I'll try to be a good girl and lay out my expectations clearly and loudly so all can hear it and then be happy with whatever results we get. Wish us luck this week!
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| The kid with the permit practicing his driving. There's too many backseat drivers though. I just think we are all excited because this new to all of us and they just want to help and giggle about it. Fun stuff! |
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