Five on Friday

Things that make me smile:

1. I'd been looking for a particular liquid soap, scented with the almond cherry smell. I wasn't finding any locally so kept ending up with our boring milk & honey. I even tried ordering some online, but it turned out not to be the scent I was looking for (too florally). But. The other day I found some!! At the Dollar Store! Sweet. You may laugh at me and my ten extra containers that I nabbed (I hate running out of stuff, lol), but the scent makes me happy.

2. Watching Noah make his lunches entertains me. In true Noah fashion, he's decided on a specific lunch and has yet to vary from it (now more than 30 lunches in). One would think that might get boring, but this is the boy who wore almost exactly the same outfit for years...who insists on simply buying the exact same jeans and shoes in the next size up. :) Anyhow. Watching him meticulously fold the lunch meat and strategically place the slice of cheese onto his sandwich cracks me up. ;)

3. I didn't draw a heap of attention to it, but I didn't end up running that Equinox Half Marathon on my list. And that makes me happy. ;) I still really enjoy boot camp (though I might not be able to walk later today, lol) and was finding it just too difficult to get motivated to also get up and run in the mornings. 

4. I love that my younger two got together with a friend recently and one of the first things they all talked about was what books they were reading and what their all time favorites were. Happy sigh.

5. This week, I have a greater than normal number of women on my prayer list...women I love who could use a boost with one thing or another. I was thinking about how many hopes I have for all of them...for safe recoveries and graceful aging and family wishes...and it was making me a little sad that there wasn't more I could do for each of them. But, rather than be sad (or at least rather than only being sad), I'm choosing to be thankful...I'm simply so blessed to have these women in my life. 

Happy Friday, y'all!!

SparkFun

Last Friday and Saturday I was privileged to attend the SparkFun & Intel Professional Development workshop here in Fort Collins. I can't even remember the last time I took a class like this...where I was learning stuff completely new to me. It was kind of wonderful. ;)

I learned some about how to write code, how to wire circuits...

...and even how to solder! (Look! Doesn't my soldering look pretty?!)

Look! I did that! I wired and coded those pieces to read and display the temperature...

SparkFun, btw, is freakin' awesome. They really make this stuff accessible. I feel like I can actually lead my boys in the tutorials SparkFun has on their website (which you should totally check out!) and now can follow along better when the boys talk about this sort of material. ;) 

Don't get me wrong. I'm still highly unlikely to really figure this all out like my coding husband (who was totally jealous of the class and geeks out about all this stuff), lol. But. I'm not scared of it any more, and that's huge.

Gymnastics

So. A couple weeks ago we started taking gymnastics. By "we" I mean Asher and Micah, obviously. ;) They LOVE it. LOVE. 

Here's Asher earlier today on the rings:

And Micah on the trampoline (learning, incrementally, about front handsprings):

And here's what I love about gymnastics:

• The class is a homeschool class...during the school day and for ages 5-15. This is fabulous for us. I'd been looking into a class for Asher (at his request) but the existing classes didn't seem like a good fit. After school classes were all by age, meaning Asher would be with 12 and ups...and none of those were beginner classes. This way, also, both boys can take the class together (they'd otherwise be split by age). Whew.
• (There are currently about 9 kids in the class (5 boys/4 girls). It meets once a week.)
• The boys sleep well on Tuesdays. ;) After gymnastics (which is an hour and 15 minutes), we go home to tackle afternoon schoolwork then back out to karate (45 minutes on Tuesdays). 
• (Both boys are realizing, though, that they need to remember to switch gears for rolls...in karate, they roll over their shoulders...in gymnastics, they have to remember to roll straight over, which helps eventually lead into handsprings.)
• It fits well with Asher's current career path/goal of being a stunt double, lol. (Micah, for what it's worth, isn't as committed. He just enjoys doing whatever everyone else is doing.) Seriously, though, if that's the trajectory Asher thinks he's on, I'm glad we're able to provide this.
• Already it's been worth every penny...I've decidedly heard the boys receive specific instruction on how to fall so as not to injure themselves. ;) 

Ta da! :) Here's to happy, happy boys!

Ten on Tuesday

Sorry. Went missing. Nothing wrong...just enjoying life. ;) Here's some of what I've been up to the last couple weeks:

1. Went to the dentist. Fun times, lol. (No troubles or anything, just a check-up and cleaning...all good and nice to have done.)

2. We got another patio bid. We're still working this all out (sorting between bids for poured concrete and pavers and wooden stairs and such). We're getting closer but have lost steam on all the house stuff. ;) Part of us is stoked about improving the backyard and part of us just wants to be done, lol. 

3. On the 11th, when most of northern Colorado was bracing for a possible first snow of the season, I let Noah skip swim team practice. They were practicing in the outdoor pool; and, even though it didn't end up snowing here, temperatures did fall to near freezing...so swimming when it was about 40 degrees and drizzly outside seemed unfun. ;)

4. Incidentally, as is typical for Colorado, lol, just three days later, it was almost 90 degrees when Nathan and I got to go to our first Broncos game...which was awesome! Many thanks to Nathan's folks for the tickets (for Nathan's birthday last month). We had a lovely date afternoon/evening and enjoyed the people watching. ;) (Methinks, though, that the heat encouraged some to drink even more than normal, lol, which was loud but somewhat entertaining.)

5. The next day, I got to go clothes shopping with my pal, Deanna, while our kiddos were at school and Options. It was fabulous! We hit a local consignment type store and nabbed lots of fun new-to-us goodies for not too much. Woohoo!

6. Last week, too, I watched My Fair Lady with the younger two boys after reading an Excavating English lesson about phonetics. It was entertaining to see their reactions, lol. Micah wanted to know why, if Eliza was so poor, did she have such good teeth (being from Britain and all). Asher wondered why and how women would wear such big hats. Both found the song "Why Can't a Woman Be More Like a Man?" particularly enjoyable, and both decided that they preferred "The Sound of Music." (Noah, meanwhile, decided being at school that day (and missing this particular lesson) was A-okay, lol.)

7. Got my new iPhone 6! As usual, Apple done good. It's going to take a little getting used to, though...particularly the relocation of the power button and the larger size. To be honest, even the 5s was a little large to me. I have small hands, folks. ;)

8. Nathan was delighted to learn that it's now, once again, pumpkin pie season at Whole Foods. (Apparently they don't stock them most of the year...just in the fall.) Don't judge us if we buy a pie each week from now until Christmas. ;)

9. Over the weekend, Nathan was showing Asher how to actually use the deodorant we got him months ago. In the course of this conversation, (with Nathan and Asher in the bathroom) the rest of us distinctly overheard the words "no, do not lick the deodorant." I.kid.you.not. ;) I debated whether to share this but ultimately decided that perhaps it will help some other parent out there, lol. (In all fairness, Asher was obviously just joking around, but this definitely goes under the heading of things you never thought you'd have to say.) 

10. Yesterday, I had lunch with scrappy friends, and it was lovely. I'd been missing them...as we used to get together to scrapbook, years ago when I was actually scrapbooking and not piling my desk with homeschooling books, lol. We decided that even if we weren't going to scrapbook, we still could and should get together. Yay! (Also, yay for social media that has allowed me to stay at least somewhat up to date with friends like this...who I don't see regularly but have known for years now.) ;)

And that's some of what's been going on here. (Yes, some is repeat from things I've posted already on Facebook, but I know for a fact that some of you here aren't also over on Facebook. ;) Wouldn't want you to miss out.) More to come...

Monday musings

- Coconut oil is awesome. Last week I had hives on my legs for days. No idea why, but they were uber annoying. ;) I tried four different antihistamines and an anti-itch cream. Nothing helped, though one of the antihistamines did put me to sleep so at least I wasn't itching then, lol. On Friday, I tried coconut oil. Within minutes the itching stopped. Within 24 hours the hives were almost completely gone!  Plus, I smelled like a macaroon and my legs are super soft. ;) Yay, coconut oil!

- For what it's worth, we're going to need to rethink our outdoor Christmas lighting this year. For years, we've used the little hooks that Nathan installed all around/under the eaves...hundreds of little hooks less than a foot apart under the eaves of the roof over the garage and around to the front door. Like this (scroll down). For reasons unknown, though, the house painting crew unscrewed and removed each and every one of them when they repainted the house. We didn't discover this until after all the painting was completed, and Nathan's unenthusiastic about replacing them. ;) Hmmm. The pre-lit wreaths we usually hang around the outdoor lights probably won't work either, since the new outdoor lights are larger. Going to have to think more on this... 

- If you come to my house and ring the doorbell, please don't be surprised if it takes awhile for me to open the door. We replaced the weather stripping and door hardware, and the combination apparently makes the door SUPER sealed. Which is good. But I can't always open the door without some significant tugging. We're working on it. ;)