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!

And We Are Home!

After 7 days, we made it home!

Our laundry was so thankful.

It really turned out to be a wonderful trip. Yes, there was a bit of whining (not all of it by the kids), and it was tough to sleep in a new hotel every night, but it was really nice to get away with just our little family and have a vacation with just us.

Considering what we were asking of them, the kids did great. They were sad to come home and wanted to stay sleeping in hotels forever.

I really liked this type of a trip- starting at a certain point and traveling just a little bit each day to go to various locations. I want to do lots more of these- I already have lots of ideas!

Onto planning our next road trip...

Carlsbad

And, for our final day: Carlsbad Caverns!

Ben went a few times while on his mission, and we went 11 years ago when we were first married. Admittedly, I was a little nervous to do the cave with the kids. For 11 years I have had nightmares of one of my kids falling off a ledge into a deep, dark abyss to never be seen again. I wish I was kidding about that.

Thankfully, the cave was WAY safer than my worst nightmares! It would have been quite impossible for our little lemmings to wander aimlessly off a cliff. Yay!

The cave was even more impressive than my memories. Seriously, this is a place every person should go to- it is truly a natural wonder. One of the rangers told us that 500,000 people go through the cave each year. That actually made me a little sad- it should be so many more than that! The problem is that Carlsbad is so far out- hundreds of miles away from civilization. I mean, you have to go through an alien village to get there. It's a huge shame- if you ever get a chance to go, take it!

It is 79 stories to get down to the bottom of the cave when you walk in the Natural Entrance- which we highly recommend. There is an elevator that can take you down and out of the cave, but it was broken for 6 months. Somehow, because the weather Gods had been so cruel, the elevator Gods took pity on us and the elevator started going today!!!! Literally a tender mercy! Even though thousands had been forced to climb back up out of the Natural Entrance, we were thrilled to not be counted among them!

 Pictures can not ever do this cave justice.

Camille looks happy here, but this is toward the end of the hike, and the girls were pretty tuckered out:

I asked the lovely little one to join me for a "special" picture. She was not amused:

 I loved being in an area where, aside from the trails, the area was completely untouched by humans. How many places in the world can you go to where that happens? It felt really sacred- the glory of God and His wonders.

Then we, thankfully, took the elevator up and enjoyed a wonderful lunch.

And went to the visitor's center to finish the Junior Ranger Program for the kiddos.

 As part of the requirements, we went on a nature hike just on top of the caverns. It was pretty cool to be walking on top!

And, they earned their badge!

At night, we went and saw the bats fly out of the cave. It was awesome! 300,000 bats coming out at night to feed. Another marvel which I highly recommend everybody go and see.