Insta Friday

Happy Friday.

Joining with Jeannett from Life.Rearranged with our Instas lately.

I am @kellysmedley on IG.

I haven't linked up all summer...so warning...long post.

 

Bumpa brought his "Bumpa Truck" over.  

My kids were super excited!

The next day Ella saw a semi truck and yelled "BUMPA!"

 

The Mackinac Bridge.

My favorite.

My kids have each been there every year.

If I have it my way, it will stay that way.

The view from our campground in the U.P. a few weeks ago.

I miss it there...

A little family "selfie" on the beach.

Coffee.

Beach.

The U.P.

Babies playing.

My girl at The Bridge on our way home.

Books in the trailer.

We rub Ella's back at nap until she falls asleep.

DJ put her to sleep this day.

She rubbed her belly herself until she was asleep.

I am pretty sure fish are supposed to be neon?

I could be wrong...or not.  Regardless, my kiddos love the 'pretty fish.'

I have absolutely no idea what they were doing, but they did!

They share my love for the beach.

Hanging out in a tractor at the Hudsonville Fair.

An extremely dirty camp ground resulted in a toy washing party when we got home.

His B's straight from the dryer.

His favorite!

 

Nothing good comes from an evening nap.

Except late nights means lots of coffee the next day, and I like coffee.

Looking on the bright side...

 

Sleepy Babies.

Her first ever pony.

Pretty Piggies.

Getting the crash 'em up car ready for the derby.

Over tired baby + sugar = lots of silly giggling.

We let them paint the back of the derby car.

So excited, he was!

There is a stack of books at the end of his bed.

Always.

Every night.

The end of a full day at the beach.

Watching the sun "go night night in the water" as Karson says.

Determined to get the duck.

Which is actually a seagul.

After trying to convince her the entire summer that a seagul is not a duck...I give.

Its a duck.

The derby.

 

"Its ok Mommy.  I shut the gate.  That will keep Baby Ella safe."

The boots.

She insisted on the boots.

Currently, kid free time is pretty much non existant for us.

So the other day, when the kids were asleep in the car, and we HAD to stay outside, because the kids were asleep in the car...it was nice.

We had an hour to just sit.  

He had a beer.  

I had a coffee.  

We ate peanuts and talked.

It as nice, and an extremely rare occurrence for us!

 

Post Pumpkin Donuts.

Yum.

They came out this week.

They weren't on our way the other morning.

They were actually out of our way.

But no so much out of our way that it didn't justify a stop.

So good!

 

Ella & Tractor: 1

Mommy's flowers: 0 

To do: Teach Ellary to steer the tractor.

Ella's sleeping habits is a whole other post.

Or a whole blog in its self.

Basically...

She isn't big on sleeping.

She doesn't need a lot of sleep.

She is an EXTREMELY light sleeper.

She needs Mama to fall asleep.

She gets so exhausted sometimes, that she sleeps in odd places at odd times.

Like the cart at Target.

Whatever works.

I'll take it.

Happy Weekend.

Happy {almost} Fall.

Homeschool

We have decided to start out Homeschooling our kids.  We have talked about it occasionally since Karson was teeny tiny.  Last year, Michigan passed a law that schools would loose funding if they didn't provide all day, everyday, kindergarten.  Decision made.  While all day, every day, may be right for some families, we do not believe that it is right for ours.  As of right now, or plan is to Homeschool for Preschool and Kindergarten.  Beyond that, I don't know.  We will reevaluate every year, and decide then. 

While we never had plans of sending Karson to preschool, I decided I needed a "practice" year.  Basically, I wanted to makes sure I knew what I was doing before we hit Kindergarten.  I wanted to make sure that homeschooling was going to work for us.  Karson is eager to learn, he loves doing activities at the table.  He is constantly asking how things work.  Constantly.  All.day.long.  Thankfully Daddy is an engineer.  "Honey, please come over here and explain to Karson how {insert any random object} is made." is yelled often in our house.  Did you know how they make a Pyrex lid?  I do now. :)

I did purchase a 3's preschool curriculum.  Karson loves it!  He asks to do "preschool at home", all day long.  The first day, he did every worksheet for that week.  We are also using Zoo Phonics.  I have been doing Zoo Phonics with Karson for a few years, but never consistently.  A few weeks ago, I started going through the Zoo Phonics with the kids every morning at breakfast.  I was amazed at how quickly they were both picking it up. 

This week, I printed off the capital "A" and little "a" from Zoo Phonics and taped them to the wall.  Ellary walks over to Ally Alligater all day and says the sound and motions.  Yesterday at dinner, Karson looked at Nana's shirt and pointed out an "A" "Look Nanny!  You have a big 'A' on your shirt.  That is where Ally Alligater lives!!"

While I knew Ellary would pick up on some of the things Karson was doing, I didn't realize how much.  Last night, we were reading books before bed, and Karson was picking out every "a" he could find.   When DJ gets home from work, Karson runs to him and tells him everything he learned. 

Today, I threw all our Zoo Phonics cards on my bed, and started folding laundry on the floor.  The kids played with the cards for a half hour.  They would each bring me the cards, and show me the signs and sounds the animal made.  In that half hour, watching them play together, watching big brother teaching little sister, validated our decision.  Right now, this is what is right for our family. 

Demo Derby

Before Karson & Ellary came along, before we were even married (which was really only 6 months before we found out Karson was on his way), DJ used to run race in Off Road Derbies, and Demolition Derbies.  He stopped doing them because, well, they cost money, and require a lot of time.  Two things we don't have an excess of. :)  That and I wouldn't say that purposely crashing into other cars is a particularly safe hobby.

Last weekend, we went to the Hudsonville Fair's Demo Derby.  DJ got the itch.  He mentioned in passing to a friend of his after the fair that he was itching to get back out and race/crash.  Well, he had a derby car that he was going to scrap out, but it still ran if DJ wanted to use it for the Derby.

A few days later, we were doing this...

 

...and this...

 (baby + red paint = covered)

We agreed that we would turn it into a family event.  If DJ was going to go work on the car, the kids and I were going to join, too.  We gave them each a paint brush, and set them  free to paint the back of the car, while DJ and I painted his sponsor's name all over it. 

Karson was so very excited to see Daddy in his "crash 'em up" car!

For anyone who doesn't know what a demolition derby is...

12 cars in that wooded rectangle & crash into each other until there is only 1 car left running.

Telling Daddy Good Luck...

 

Watching for Daddy...

 

Going for a walk with Nana...

Then it was Daddy's Turn.

DJ was the 6th car out.

His car stalled, and he couldn't get it restarted.

Bummer.

But still, he had so much fun.

 

It took them five minutes.  

Five minutes in the pits and they were playing in the dirt.

We are very proud of our Daddy.

You watch...he will be back out again next year. :)

Feeding the Ducks {Holland State Park Camping}

We just got back from 3 back-to-back camping trips.  We have basically been gone since the middle of July.  The first trip, we just went 30 minutes west, to Holland State Park.  I wanted three days on the beach...get up,  go to the beach, go back to the trailer, go to sleep, get up and go back to the beach.  Yea...that didn't happen.  Thank you Michigan weather...it was freezing.  And raining.  Like it was in the low 60s.  The water temperature was in the 40s.  We didn't get to play on the beach, we we had a lot of great family time in the trailer while it rained. :)

We had a break from the rain one day, so we headed out with some duck food to feed the ducks.  My kids LOVE to feed ducks, and I carry around a container of duck food in my car always.    

 

Of course, it started raining again when we started walking back to the campground...

InstaFriday

Happy Friday!

 Linking up the last few weeks of Insta pictures with Jeannette from Life.Rearranged.

I like the beach.

A lot, a lot, a lot.

So do they!

They needed a rainy, low key day.

We Rainy days means we move the table to the corner of the dining room, and it becomes a play room.

Anything, and everything can come out.

They really loved their PlayMobile 123 farm and zoo this day!

Again, the beach.

A different day.

Have I mentioned I love the beach?

I also love stripes on the beach.

And my kiddos love their Aunt TT.

After nap curls.

Playdough & coloring.

Ellary is a little high maintenance.

She doesn't like bread, so she won't eat sand witches, unless they are grilled. 

High maintenance.

She does like peanut butter.

When lunch includes a PB sandwich, I just give her a bowl of peanut butter and a spoon.

He insisted on sleeping by his door.

We kept moving him to his bed, he kept moving back to the door.

He stayed there all night long.

Ellary usually nurses for 2 hours, every night.

'Usually' means...sometimes more than 2 hours.

Last Friday when she started nursing at 8:00, and was done, and out cold at 8:20, I knew I was in trouble.

It wasn't going to last.

I was right.

I tried to lay her down and she woke up, so I tried to nurse her back to sleep.

She wasn't having it.

Then she saw Karson on the video monitor.

That was the end of that.

I finally just got up with her, and let her play.

Karson wasn't asleep yet either, so we let him get up too.

He was thrilled.

We were leaving for camping the next day, and still had a few things we needed to pick up at Family Fare.

Family Fare has free popcorn.

The kids LOVE the pop-pop store.

So....we loaded them up in their jammies, and took them for free popcorn at 10:00 at night.

We didn't even bother putting shoes on them.

Fishing with a 1 and 3 year old...interesting!

Rainy camping morning crafts.

Even when it is only 60 degrees in July, I still love the beach!

YUM!  Camp Breakfast.  Enough said.

Before we left the campground, DJ dumped out the left over worms from fishing.

The kids thought it was the coolest thing ever, and kept bringing them to me.

Nice.

 They are so completely opposite.

In every way.

Except that they both carry around an armload of comfort items, at all times.

Including their waters.

Karson has B's & Doggie.

Ellary has Baby, Blankie, and Doggie.

B's are plural...2 of them...because when he was a baby I was never good at only giving him one.  

So he attached to both of them.  

Oops.