Monday: first day & to dos

 It was the first day of school!

I spent a majority of the day working on Hope work.  I feel like I got a good portion done, but there's still a decent amount to go.  I got the "you really need to do this" and most of the "you really should do this" items done.

I got a few things checked off my home to-do list, but not many.  As expected.  Ben found yesterday's plot hilarious and endearing, so he showed it off at work. <3

I was rather tired after dinner but went to karate anyway.  It was a good choice - it was a small class but a good one.

Saturday: rock climbing, botanical gardens

This morning started out with a rock climbing competition!  Both kids participated, and I was so proud of both of them.

This was Joshua's first competition.  Technically, he did fine.  Out of seven routes he topped two and zoned two.  I was super impressed with two things though: 1) His perseverance.  He took a few breaks throughout the 2.5 hours, but he tried a lot of those routes a lot of times.  Over and over.  2) His ability to talk to people.  Several people gave him some pointers and he came away with a few new friends.

Isaac did a great job technically!  It was similar to the last competitions in that he flashed six of the routes and needed a few tries on the last route.  After getting those done he tried some of the other routes.  I enjoy watching him because he is methodical.  He also got a compliment after falling off the white #3 youth about smiling as he was getting up.  I think he was happy that he got farther than the previous time, but it was still nice to hear.

My favorite pictures are when they are both on the wall though.

We had chosen the first session of the day so that it wouldn't be so busy.  Probably still a good choice, but it meant we had seven hours before awards.  After a snack and a small lunch (because we just had a snack), we went to the botanical gardens.

This was a great choice!!  I had read there were tours at 11 and 12:45, but we just missed the 12:45 window.  We stopped in the visitor center for a map anyway, and the website was somewhat incorrect.  The tours are individual tours whenever you want with a docent.  In a golf cart.  For free.  Sign me up!  It was a warm day, so not having to walk the whole thing was nice.  The docent was very knowledgeable and was able to tell us all sorts of things we would have otherwise been ignorant of.  A kids' garden is going in and so she gave us some plants to taste and smell.  We got to go inside the cow barn.  It was amazing.

This got us to about 2:30, and we went back to the gym to read and rest.  We found a nice cubby and relaxed for a while.  We walked to dinner, which wasn't amazing, and then back to the gym.  Finally...award time.

Unsurprisingly but still excitingly, Isaac got first place in the beginner category!  The others had already left, so he had to stand there by himself.

He got a nice plaque.  He got some other swag too, but he was most excited about the plaque.

And then we went home.  We were exhausted.  (There was a band outside though.  Ben said there had been music since 10am.  The live band probably started around 5pm and didn't stop until 10:15pm.  I don't want to be a downer because it's fun to have fun things, but it was a overwhelming when we just wanted to crash.)

Sunday: last day

Today was the last day before school.  It was a pretty normal day; we worked with Lego, had rest time, went to church.

We also started a Lego D&D campaign.  So far we woke up not knowing who we were and killed a skeleton.  It was a nice, gentle way to get started.

While my to-do list stayed only slowly inched up in number over the summer (63 in June and 83 two days ago), it suddenly exploded with 103 items today.  Several are on the shorter side, several are on the longer side.  I also have quite a bit of 'real' work I'm hoping to do tomorrow, so I don't expect all that much will get done.  But everything is in order, like I do during the school year, and I'll slowly check them off the list.

Yes.  I keep track of how many items are on the to-do list.  It's rather weird, but it also helps show me how things are going.  There are a few items, now at the bottom, that have stayed on the list since I started tracking.  I sometimes think I should take them off but still think they would be good to do so I don't.

Friday: Traverse City

Since the boys have a rock climbing competition tomorrow, we decided to come up to Traverse City a day earlier and make the trip worthwhile.  We left around 9am, because I was anxious that we wouldn't be able to eat lunch and get to our 1pm appointment in time.  (Spoiler alert: we had a little extra time.  The boys ate faster than I expected and there was no traffic, but it was just right in the end.)

Our first stop was Wheels on Rails, where you can use special rail bikes to bike down a decommissioned railroad.  Overall, I'd say it was a great excursion!  Since we only had three people we also had one of the guides sit with us (they're bikes for four people), so we got some extra info about the area.  The weather was beautiful.  The way out was on a very slight downhill, but made pedaling very easy.  The way back was a little harder, but between the four of us we moved right along.  I'd say the "worst" part was that a 1hr45min trip was advertised and it was really about 1hr15min.  I'm glad we didn't do the shorter one.

After some melty ice cream, we stopped at a rock shop in downtown Traverse City.  It was a bit disappointing, and seemed a bit expensive for stuff.  We walked around just a little bit and then headed to another rock shop a mile away.  This second one was much better and the kids were excited to expand their collections.

I took a short nap at the hotel and we walked to dinner.  The boys are calling it the best pizza they've ever had!  It was stone fired and it was very good, but I was a little surprised by their enthusiasm.  We ended the day by going to a nearby beach.  There were a few rocks for Isaac to look through, and the kids played in the sand for a while.

Thursday: shoes

Today was a rather busy day.

We had treats with Pat.  We tried a new rock climbing game.  We went to Target to look for shoes.

Do NOT go to Target for shoes.  It was a mess!  There was no organization and there were random shoes everywhere.  That being said, I managed to find a pair of shoes that Isaac kind of liked.  But then he didn't love them and we decided he didn't actually need new shoes.  Sigh.

We also went to meet the teacher tonight.  Joshua's room took all of about five minutes.  We spent a bit longer with Isaac's teachers.  His homeroom/science teacher is a rock climber too.  We had to waste a bit more time because Joshua had a piano lesson so we visited all the special teachers.

Wednesday: would you rather?

This morning we biked to Joann's and the shoe store.  We didn't come home with any shoes; Isaac did like the fit and Joshua wanted non-tie shoes and most of them stopped at size 3 when he needs a 3.5.  Maybe tomorrow!  (Maybe not.)

We also went to Craig's Cruisers to finish up using some tokens from earlier in the summer.  We had a lovely time and got exactly 750 tickets, so we were able to get some medium interesting prizes.  On the way home Isaac came up with this horrible would you rather: would you rather run into yellow lights at every stop light or have extra long red lights?

Tonight I was trying to finish up a quilt.  Tornado had claimed it though and wouldn't move.  I started the sewing machine - no movement.  I started sewing - no movement.  I put some quilt on Tornado - he nestled deeper.  I finally had to stop and work on something else because I couldn't do anymore without blatantly moving him.

Tuesday: shoes

 We did our school shopping today.  We did a pretty good job of shopping the supplies that were left over from last year, so we only needed a few things.  We also took a look at the shoes, but Isaac didn't like any at Meijer and Joshua didn't like the bottoms of the one pair he was interested in.  The whole shopping trip, while long, was much better than last week's trip which was timed poorly and took forever due to a pillow snafu.

At rock climbing, we also looked at new shoes.  Both kids have mentioned that theirs might be getting a bit small.  Well, Joshua could move into Isaac's, but Isaac didn't like the size up in the shoe he is currently wearing.  So we didn't get any new shoes here either.  But there's a plan for when either of them decide they need new ones.

I also used some of my birthday tickets: Joshua made his own lunch and I got to sleep with all the lovies.  There were so many I had a hard time getting a good picture.  (Night-sight doesn't work on selfie mode.)