Well, I guess that’s one word you could use. We call him Luke most of the time, but he often goes by “WHAT are you doing?” or “What were you THINKing?” Another common phrase that follows his given name is “If it’s not yours, DON’T TOUCH IT!” Yes, in BIG letters. He really tried my patience today, let me tell you. He’s awfully sweet, and terribly cute, but in the area of self-control, we have a lot of work to do. He definitely knows he's the baby!
Today was supposed to be our first day on a ‘new and improved’ school schedule, designed to streamline the day and make it easier for me to give each child the attention and instruction he needs while the others are occupied with work or play of their own. Let’s just say it didn’t happen. After sleeping an hour later than usual for a weekday, we finally got up, and I started into my Monday Madness cleaning routine. That means I try to evaluate and attack the mess from the hurricane that was our weekend… every weekend! I usually start in the bedroom, where I have to unpack and sort clothes, start laundry, etc, then move to the kitchen, where I put away dishes (clean ones, at least) and everything we pile on the table as we unload the truck on Sunday night. It takes a while. Then I move to the desk, where I attempt to organize and plan for the day. By then, it’s usually 9, or 10, so we’re already behind. This morning, however, Neco had to be to the groomer by 9, so I dragged the kids out of bed at 8:30 and we took him in. Only two of them had shoes, but, hey, whatever. The point of all that was to say, we’ll have to try again on the new schedule tomorrow.
We did get to have a little fun today, though. Dad came over and brought a fabulous brisket that he smoked, so we headed to the river for a picnic. We ate our sandwiches by the river bank and tossed around the softball (as if we needed more of that). When the kids started throwing sticks at the ducks and girls showed up in tiny swimsuits, we decided to head home. It was a nice outing for a Monday, though, to kind of break up the monotony of load after load of laundry and trying to catch up.
Last night, we had our first (of what we hope to be many) Glendora softball game. We had a full field of brothers and sisters, ranging from 7 to over 60 years of age, and we had some fun! We all joked about being sore today, but the day went pretty well for me. Craig came home with a slight limp from a ‘stiff knee’, and we settled in to watch a movie. However, for some odd reason, when I got out of bed after the movie, I had pain in several sections of my legs that wasn’t there before. I asked Craig in amazement what I could possible have done to make my calves hurt! He replied, as if I were a total white bread, in that sarcastic questioning voice, “Run?” Well, har-dee-har-har. As if I don’t run… every now and then… in an emergency.
No, actually, I jogged with him last week and I wasn’t sore. He’s been jogging 3 or 4 times a week, and I, having no desire to run and sweat, would follow him on the four-wheeler with the boys, so we could all be part of the family activity. One night, when I was busy with dinner, he decided to go jog, and the boys REALLY wanted to go with him. Well, they had tried running, and there was no way they could go that far, or fast enough to keep up with him, so Craig had them ride their bikes. Since Luke is still on training wheels, and pretty unsteady and slow, Craig tied a moving strap to his bike, then tied it around his own waist, and pulled him along. I’m still not really sure how they made it down the hill without taking all the skin off the back of Craig’s ankles, but it apparently worked out well. I surprised him one night by saying I would be jogging along instead of riding, so the kids took their bikes and we set off. I ran a couple blocks, then told him to run on and I’d walk some of it. Besides, someone had to pull Luke out of the ditch when he ran off the road every few minutes. Then I ran a couple more blocks and met Craig coming back. He didn’t want to leave me behind, so he actually ran circles around me while I walked and jogged intermittently. It was pretty funny. I DID run, though. I just need a little practice, that’s all. Not all of us can be as hearty and athletic as HIM!
Saturday was our last ball game of the season. Wait, do you hear those angels singing? HALLELUJAH! HALLELUJAH! We finished this one with a party, piñata, and cupcakes, of
course, and we are glad to be done! The boys had fun, and we can have our life back! Jake is
thinking he might want to play next year, so that ought to be fun… don’t know if we can manage three at once!
Backtracking a little bit, I noticed that my last post was from Jake’s testing days… He seemed to do fine on the test, as far as HE could tell, and thought it was easy. He checked back over his answers after each section and said he was still finished early every time. We won’t get his results for a few weeks. As for the rest of school, we won’t be having a Summer break anytime soon. We are trying to get everything finished before September, when we’ll start the new year. It’s so nice to be able to have our breaks throughout the year when we need them, instead of all clumped together in the summer, when everyone ELSE is out. It’s nice to let our life dictate our school schedule, instead of it being the other way around. It’s much busier this way, being always together, but it’s still great!
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