A last first

Micah started his senior year today! It's his last first day of high school...the start of a number of lasts for us as my baby finishes up his secondary education journey. He headed off early this morning to Front Range Community College, where he takes three classes. (His remaining class is online. See my curriculum link on the left for a list of his classes.) 

Before leaving to drive to his 8am class, he cooperated for my traditional first day picture...

...which is crazy because it feels like this is how he looked just yesterday...

This was his very first, first day picture when he started kindergarten back in 2010. He was so excited to finally get to go to Options (the one day a week homeschool enrichment program we participated in) with his big brothers. :) 

It feels odd that Micah's my only son starting school today. This is a first. With Noah having graduated college in May and Asher taking the year off from UNO to earn his private pilot's license, it's just Micah today. (More on what the other two are up to later this week...)

In any case, Micah's feeling pretty good about being a senior. He's just finishing up a few random requirements for his Associates degree. (Really, he could have finished last year easily, but we all agreed that finishing high school in three years wasn't necessarily the best thing for him so we spread things out a bit.) Also, he has a good start on his college applications process already and somehow managed to arrange his classes so that he only has classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays this semester...yay!

So...we're off! Happy back to school, everyone!

Happy birthday and Happy Father's Day to Nathan!

(Woohoo! I *think* I have the blog file storage issues in hand now. Yay!)

So, remember how I declared that this year we'd celebrate Mother's and Father's Days on my and Nathan's birthdays? Well, last weekend was Nathan's birthday and we celebrated both that and Father's Day. 

For his birthday, we got Nathan a membership to Wings Over the Rockies. Also, they were having a special event called Dream Machines at one of their locations in Denver. They had cool cars and planes...some simulators...and a gyro chair. We wandered and enjoyed...

After that, we grabbed lunch at the airport restaurant and were entertained by the "ladies who lunch" at the table behind us. :) Then we went home and tackled some weekend errands before playing the new game Asher got for Nathan. 

On Sunday, we celebrated a belated Father's Day by playing some miniature golf...

Let's just say that we kept score during the first round but got creative during the second. There was simultaneous putting (Noah and Asher were amazingly good at this)...using the tiny golf club we found at one of the holes..."batting" the golf ball...teeing off with eyes closed...golfing on one leg...and climbing *all* the rocks (just like when they were little). Also, public service announcement: that water feature under the waterfall is deeper than one might think.

(Micah got a bit frustrated...threw Noah's ball into the water...and then retrieved it. Unfortunately, not realizing how deep the water was, he didn't take his phone out of his pocket. Fortunately, the phone now appears to be mostly okay.)

In any case, it was a really fun morning and a nice return to tradition. With only a few exceptions, we've managed to play miniature golf most years for or very near Father's Day...

This spans 2004 to the present. Along the way, there were years with alternate activities like hiking in Zion, going to Europe, and indoor rock climbing...and I'm going ahead and counting croquet as miniature golf-like...but still mostly miniature golf. Happy.

After that we enjoyed a delicious lunch at The Farmhouse (at Jessup Farm) followed by ice cream at Josh & John's. It was a good weekend. :) 

Thankful Thursday

Sorry. I've been having technical issues with my blog...still sorting them out so can't add pictures right now. In the meantime, let's catch up a bit, eh? Things I've been thankful for over the past couple weeks...

1. Eye appointments. The boys and I had our annual vision checkups a bit ago. Micah and Noah's prescriptions increased slightly, Asher and I stayed the same, and we're otherwise all good. Thankful for our optometrist (who also happens to be a neighbor and friend)...he's been awesome at monitoring Micah's eye health in particular. Who knew that juvenile arthritis can affect eye health? (So far, it's been pretty uneventful other than extra dry eyes because connective tissues are affected by arthritis.) Thankful for a doctor who knows what to watch for and keeps us informed along the way!

2. Boot camp. People, I'm continuously so thankful for boot camp. I'm thankful for the exercise...for the consistency...for the people and friendships. Recently, too, our fearless leader had a party at his house for all his clients. Nathan and I went and enjoyed the social time...and learned that apparently you can buy bags of pre-made jello shots. Did not know that. They don't taste great but nice to know, right?? ;)

3. Micah didn't throw up. Micah went with friends to the Larimer County Fair earlier this month. This was his second year going and riding rides. Last year, he may have thrown up on himself and others. (He's not a fan of the spinning, lol.) This year he managed to stop before he got to the point of throwing up. Progress! :) 

4. Toaster revelations. I recently saw something online about toasters...and how the numbers on the toaster are actually minutes and not just different levels of toastyness. Whoa! Seriously. Is that true?! Needless to say, I've since timed the toaster and it seems at least possible. (Honestly, we don't use the toaster that often so our test numbers aren't great.) If you all happen to time your toaster, let me know, okay? Thankful for random things like this to think about. ;) 

5. Coach Asher. Last Friday, there was another monthly promotion at Karate West. We went to watch and were delighted to see a little boy (a brother of one of the kids promoting) walk in and just light up when he saw Asher. "Coach Asher!" he exclaimed. Apparently he was one of Asher's ninja class students at Mountain Kids this summer. It was awesome to see both the boy and Asher's smiles and hear the boy tell his dad all about Coach Asher. 

So, that's some of my catching up. :) Will continue working on these technical issues so that I can hopefully include pictures with my next post. Happy Thursday to you all!

Thankful Thursday

Happy first Thursday of August to you all! Things I'm thankful for today...

1. Sons who value minimalism. So, last Friday, we moved Noah home from his apartment while he continues his job search after having graduated in May. Gotta say that I'm thankful my guys don't have much "stuff" and mostly value minimalism. Noah and Micah have even, of their own accord, gone through their stuff to purge at least once just this summer. :)

Micah and I had moved a few larger items earlier in the week (a large monitor, a 3D printer, a bag of board games) and then hauled most everything else in one big load on Friday morning. (We'd debated waiting until the afternoon when Nathan and Asher would be available to help but decided the cooler morning temperatures and less competition for the curb parking spots outweighed the extra hands. While Noah finished actually packing things up, Micah and I made multiple trips--Noah's apartment is on the third floor--and I'd done boot camp that morning and Micah still went to the gym that afternoon. We rock. Also, we think we made the right decision.) Aside from the first load earlier in the week (which wasn't much, just oddly shaped), here's the total of what we moved...

That's not much more than when we originally moved Noah to the dorms four years ago. Okay, I just looked. I think it might actually be less than the first dorm move in and definitely less than the second dorm move in...despite the fact that he added kitchen stuff when he switched to the apartment two years ago, lol. (In the apartment, though, he didn't have to move a mini fridge...and since his bike got stolen just before finals week, we didn't have that to move either.)

Grateful, too, for Micah's help. He enjoyed the few times he got to literally toss things into the giant dumpster out front. Here he is taking a load down...using the mattress protector/envelope as a bag. (Noah reasoned that it makes more sense to buy a new mattress cover when he gets a new place and figured that it's not likely he'll need a full XL sized mattress cover anyhow.)

Whew. And now all that stuff is in Noah's room, and all three boys are living here again. It's a bit of an adjustment after just having Micah here (and him being gone much of the time anyhow, lol), but we're figuring it out. :)

2. A new tree. The City of Fort Collins has a Community Canopy Project that offers discounted trees to residents. I took advantage and ordered a skyline honeylocust for our front yard. I get to pick it up in mid-September and am silly happy about it. Our existing trees out front are older and probably won't last too much longer. (Everyone else in our neighborhood has already removed their trees planted around the same time.) I know this new tree will be small, but the hope is that it'll get established and grow at least a bit before we have to remove the others. (And, at this price, I'm willing to take the risk on investing in a tree.) Fingers crossed!

3. Neighborhood BBQ. Our neighborhood had its somewhat annual BBQ on Tuesday...with hot dogs, brats, chips, watermelon and margaritas. It wasn't as well attended as a few years ago but it was still nice to catch up with folks and be reminded that we love our neighborhood and neighbors. 

4. Good health. Micah had his annual well check yesterday. Thanks to the wonders of medication, his arthritis has been under control for more than a year now, and he's quite healthy. Very thankful for that and not taking it for granted at all. 

5. No back to school shopping this year. I'm starting to see people sharing first day of school pictures already and know that all of my teacher friends are already working again (either officially or on their own to prep). Strangely, I only have one going back to school this month (not for another couple weeks) and no back to school shopping to do. It feels weird. But. I'm thankful...and am savoring this and tucking it away to remember next fall when we probably spend plenty to move Micah to California for college. :)

So. Seems like August is off to a good start. What are you thankful for today?