Sort of like a daybook

As anyone who knows me knows, I'm all about the ipod. I can do quick checks and even quick responses to anything that needs immediate attention. I can check blogs, facebook, email, and listen to the daily Mass readings, without leaving the comfort of my bed, or while standing at the kitchen counter making waffles. I can't so much post on my blog though. Well I can, but it's generally more work than I want to deal with. This afternoon I'm here on the regular computer because a bunch of needs have piled up... printing information about our vacation next month, finding the exact times of an event at theatre tomorrow (where they will be getting a potentially sizable grant delievered to the theatre kids by Mickey Mouse himself), and when a friend's flight lands on Friday night, and attempting to renew books from the town library (as opposed to the county ones){you can't if they're overdue...and they are}, and looking at the professional photos of First Communion {not surprisingly they're the kind of pics that you can't just save onto the computer} Anyway, I had things to do on the computer and here I am!

I was going to do a daybook kind of post, but don't feel like copying and pasting the prompts, so I'll do my own.

Outside my window...we are getting more and more birds all the time. I'm loving it. The first five years that we lived in Florida, we were right behind two strip malls and yet we had tons and tons of birds and even an ocassional duck ot turtle. Plus we cannot ever forget the snake that showed up for Madi's 4th birthday party! For the last six years we've lived a little more "out of town" with a bigger yard, but since our neighborhood was new (including the trees) we had almost no birds. Now they are finally coming! The best part is the window is still wide open, even as we approach the end of May! We have had three different cool fronts over the past few weeks and each time I open the windows I am well aware that it could be the last cool air we have until October, but then we get another gift of cool perfection. Apparently this is it though and in two days we should be back in the
90s, very likely that will last until I am the mom of a 16 year old.

From the school room... there is no true school room around here. We learn and read and grow and play all over the place. But metaphorically speaking, from the school room, we are winding down. This year is definitely different from others in that the kids are finishing up different subjects at different rates. At this point I would say that everyone is done with about half of their subjects. This is supposed to make the rest go faster, but with days like yesterday where we left the house at 9 and returned at 7, it's hard to tell if that's working. To be honest I returned home at 4, but was babysitting a one year old, which can hardly count as being home, and the kids didn't return home until 7.

All three kids took standardized tests this year. They all did well, but one of them really excelled. To the tune of 97th percentile excelled. Yes, this is the first you've heard about it because I'm trying not to brag (I know that in itself is bragging, I get the irony). The real irony is that I'm not talking about it because this is the kid who really keeps me humble. The one who I just learned is teaching his friends bad words. Yeah, that's the kid who I've been saying I was glad he didn't know bad words because he'd definitely use them. Remember last year when one of my kids earned a really major award at an end of the year banquet and then the other kid got an award and the whole time he was up on stage in front of all the people, he was balancing plastic cups on his head...that's the one! The one who doesn't say hi to people, and has a real hard time with please and thank you. The kid who still has two suitcases in the front room because he was going to run away when he was displeased with last week's American Idol results. I think you get the picture. Well anyway, the tests showed us the things we need to work on. It showed where two of the kids might be deficient and where I am deficient for not expecting much more from the third one!

Well open windows and school progress, what else is there?

Camp Rock opens tomorrow night. I think this is going to be a really fun show. I have not seen a minute of the acting, but I got to hear some of the songs when the kids performed at chick fil a the other night.

The kids and I just finished listening the another really good Andrew Clements audiobook, Things Hoped For. He is really a great author. Even though everyone had other perhaps more pressing work to do, we just kept listening this morning until we were done. It was that good! Somehow we never seem to have the downtime we crave, but so far this summer looks a little less busy than usual (that might just be because I still haven't gotten the hang of filling out the calendar), and I'd really like to spend some lazy-ish days with the kids listening to books on CD and doing puzzles.

Well instead of talking about what is from the kitchen, I better get down there and make the enchiladas (thanks Tiffany for the cheese!).