Elk Meadows

One of my goals for this summer is to get the girls out into nature as much as possible. In order to accomplish this, I came up with a weekly hiking schedule and distributed it among my homeschool and church groups (if anybody wants to join us, let me know and I will get you a copy!). I figured if I had passed out the list, it would actually force me to do it.

Today was our first hike: Elk Meadows. We had never been to this hike, so I was excited to give it a try- and I am so glad we did! It was absolutely beautiful. We are surrounded by so much beauty- we truly are blessed here in Colorado.

One of our homeschooling families joined us, which was great. The kids are all about the same age, and even though we went at a very slow pace, the kids all did great with minimal whining for a 2.5 mile hike- it was a great start to our summer hiking adventures!

Can you see the kids? Their favorite part of the hike was climbing these rocks!

 Here they are looking at a beetle- that's the goal of these hikes, that they notice and enjoy nature!

And the reward: Picnic lunch at the end! Phew!

Horses!

A former colleague of mine owns horses and posted on FB to see if anybody wanted to come ride her horses. Sign us up!

Like all children, my kiddos love horses! Karen was so great- and so sweet to let my girls come ride. I think this might become a consistent thing, too- she offered to give Audra riding lessons.

I put Audra and Claire in charge of the camera and this is what we got- I think they turned out nice:

The girls had such a great time- how could they not?

Cousin Love

Mackenzie loves riding around in the wagon Grandpa got- and of course, my girls were more than happy to join in the fun!

Roxborough State Park

Today was a great day! We took the girls up for a hike at Roxborough State Park. Our first family hike of the season!

The park had a puppet show for the kids and then we went out on the trails. This park is about 10 minutes from our house, and it is incredible!!!! How have we never been here before? Talk about a well kept secret- we will definitely be going back again and again!

Field Day!

The girls had field day on Monday. It wasn't the greatest field day ever, but the girls had fun.

They spend the first 45 minutes playing tag- which is pretty much all they did all year in PE. Then they finally did some relays, and there was even a bouncy house, so how could it go wrong?

Surprise, surprise- the weather went wrong. Of course. It started out nice, but then a storm came in, which was a bummer because the girls were having a lot of fun with their friends, and I wanted them to enjoy that.

Camille and I went and hung out at the park while field day happened:

Lemonade Stand

For weeks the girls have been begging to do a lemonade stand. Back in March they made a sign, and then they colored a million pictures to give a free picture to each to each person. But, the horrible weather meant they really couldn't do a stand- until now.

I wasn't thrilled about this, and honestly I have tried to push it off even further. A lot of kids in the neighborhood do stands, and I feel the market might be saturated. Even though I want to encourage entrepreneurship, this isn't my favorite kids activity.

But, they were adamant. And, people were generous and kind. In about an hour the kids made $7.75. Audra and Claire were thrilled. Next stop: Toys R Us.

Ding Dong, The Super's Gone!

In a very strange twist, our Superintendent resigned last night. Apparently she has taken another Super job in Humble, Texas.

Thousands of comments have now been posted on the Humble FB page warning them.

It is now coming out that one of the reformer board members said in a public speech that in order for the reformers to maintain control of the board in the 2017 election, they need Dr. F to go. Apparently their new strategy is to remove themselves from Dr. F, blame her for everything that has happened here, and try to get voters back on their side.

While I am glad that Dr. F is gone, I have mixed feelings. I mean, who are they going to hire now? This is obviously a political move.

But, it does mean that the work that we, as parents, have done for the past 6 years is working. We won the last election, and now we got rid of Dr. F. Now, there's only 4 more board members to be rid of and this nightmare will all be over. Well, not really. It will take years to undue their damage. But, it almost makes the fight worth it.

Where does that leave us with homeschooling? The same- nothing changes. I'll do a post on our school in a little bit, but for now we are going to keep on keeping on.

For now, it's time to celebrate!