Darby Creeking with the 6th Graders

Last week I took a day off to go on a field trip with Ella's sixth grade class. We went to Darby Creek and lucked out with a gorgeous day!! Earlier in the week it'd been 20° cooler and rainy. 

The kids has different assignments to complete to evaluate the water conditions. 

Ella was excited to jump on in and see what she could find. 

I can't remember what she called this thing -a sand penny or a water penny... something like that. 

Then she found a little crawl dad. Some of the kids found a bunch of them and big ones!

I discovered that my right boot has a hole in it as I was standing in the creek...That was chilly!

And of course I took a lot of pictures while I was there.

Goober Girl!

Fun day. I'm happy I get to tag along on these field trips!!

Busy Times!

We are ending our third week back to school and it's been pretty crazy. 

Soccer has also hit at full speed and we tend to have soccer at least five days a week... Which is a bit crazy as well!

One thing that's really helped with soccer this year is Ella got contacts. She still takes a lot of balls to the face but she's not breaking more glasses!

She's done really well with the contact so far - she can wear them all day and she can take them out by yourself.  Getting them in herself is still a bit of an issue. 

I can't remember if I mentioned that we are tearing out the ducky bathroom and redoing it because it started leaking...

This was a few weeks ago actually before school started and it's finally starting to come together. 

Justin ripped down pretty much to the nubs and started from scratch. 

This has taken us down to one bathroom or at least one shower, which is a royal pain in the butt for five people, especially with school starting :(

But it's going to be beautiful when it's done! 

Other than getting back into the swing of soccer and school, I've been working a ton, Justin's been working a ton and I've been trying to get out running, biking and walking as much as possible. Especially since we have the trail at Frank's park now that runs about 4 miles round trip. It's been great for getting a runner, bike or walk in every day. I take lots of pictures when I'm out!

I also got out for a 20 mile bike ride this past weekend, the farthest I think I have ridden my bike at least since college!

I love our Rails to Trails! 

This past weekend we also gathered to honor and remember Elijah. I can't believe it's been a year since the accident :(

We lit lanterns and sent balloons up from the cemetery. 

Still all so very hard to believe sometimes. 

I took Ella to a school night concert last night. Probably not a very good idea, but we had fun and we were both extremely exhausted today!

We saw Grouplove and Portugal the Man. 

I've been doing most of my blog updating via my iPhone for the last month or so. Otherwise I don't think I'd be getting any updating done. My computer is so old and so full from music and pictures and it barely runs anymore. 

It's hard to believe that today is the 13th anniversary of 9/11.  Still so vivid in my mind even 13 years later...
Never Forget. 

So, that's it in a nutshell for now! Ta-ta! 

Back to School 2014

And they are off and running. Yesterday was back to school!

Ella was less than thrilled to be woken up at 6 AM. Her first words uttered were "Know what I can't imagine?"

"What's that?" I asked. 

"Doing this every morning!" 

Yep, it's going to be a rough year I think as she transitions to getting up at the crack of dawn!!

Silas got up with her the first morning to walk her to the bus stop. I don't think that'll be happening very often...

You can see he wasn't quite awake. 

The bus stop is about a block away so we walked her to the bus stop yesterday and today. 

I suspect that too will end soon and she'll be on her own. 

Silas was much more chipper when it was time to walk him to school at 8:30am. 

They both had fantastic first days of school!!

And felt a lot like this at the end of the day:

Besides the fact that I'm getting up at 5:50 in the morning, it's nice to have some morning time with Ella alone and then time with Silas alone before school. And there's a lot less fighting going on!!

Last weekend of summer...

We had another busy but really nice weekend. It was our last before school starts tomorrow. We went to another Scioto Miles concert, which we love!!

They are free and the kids get to run around in the fountains when they don't want to listen to the music. It's really nice for families. 

Tomorrow, or soon, there will be back to school pictures, but for now I'm going to pretend that we still have a lot of summer left!

I don't know why it's so hard to get these two to smile at the same time...

I think the morning will be rather traumatic again, as I see another one off to middle school...
It's 10:55pm and I can hear Silas upstairs singing or talking to himself.  Ugh...

The Office

I have to say, I'm very lucky with my job. I get to work from anywhere that I have Internet access typically. The Friday that we left for the beach, I got to work from the van while on the drive to North Carolina. (hectic, but a nice option).

This week (the last week of summer break before school starts back), I took the kids to lunch and then we went to the park with their friends. I was able to tap into my Wi-Fi hotspot and work in the park while they played and had fun. It was quite ideal. 

I feel grateful that I do get to spend time with my kids, work a full-time job, be home for them when they get home from school or need something during the day...

I'm sad that Ella is leaving our elementary school, which is right in our neighborhood. She's moving on to the sixth-grade building. I think Silas will definitely find it weird the first week or two of school.

Today we went to Ella's new school, got her schedule, made sure that we could open her locker... And got her first school ID!

It'll be six more years before she and Silas will be in the same building again. That won't be when Silas is a freshman and Ella is a senior! 

OBX 2014

Another year, another summer vacation in the Outer Banks!  We ended up back in Nags Head again this year after the traffic getting north of the bridge (and into the Duck/Corella area) was such a nightmare!
Glad we did - it's so  much less crowded and easier to get to the store, etc.

The OHYoungers split up our drive this year by leaving on Friday afternoon and staying the night with Don and Maria in Greensboro, NC.  It is always fabulous to spent some time with them and catch up (and drink some wine) with them!

We were able to make the less than 5 hour drive on Saturday and got to enjoy some great beach time that afternoon!  We had some fantastic skies while there.  A few storms, beautiful blue skies, some overcast days - the variety was nice and made for some great picture taking.

Ella and Silas are both at the age now that they can get out and around in the waves very well on their own.  They spent a tremendous amount of time in the water!

Tyler, Mason, Ella, Silas and Justin wave jumping. 

We managed to make it over the our favorite ice cream shop (Scrammels) most days.  Better Batter Brownie was amazing!!

No pool at the house this year :(  but we were right on the beach, which was quite wonderful.
My view was this most days...

And this...

And with Mom working out at the Y all the time now, she is feeling like a champ and could get up and down the steps and out walking on the beach!

One of of the days after too much sun, we ended up at the aquarium - an annual visit.

 Ella even learned how to give a turtle enema - what a fun vacation!

 

I managed to catch a sunset over the sound.

And a couple sunrises when it wasn't too overcast.

(PS...I LOVE the iPhone panoramic setting!)

And with much of the usual grousing, I was able to get a very nice family photo (and it only took TWO takes!).

Sad that I most likely won't see a beach for another year... :(