Tuesday: better

 Today went better than yesterday, although yesterday didn't go poorly.  Joshua spent most of the day working on Lego projects.  Isaac also has a few projects that he's working on, and the two of us went rock climbing.  He belayed me this time!  I fell once, from not very high, and we both ended up off the ground.  The weight bags worked, but they weren't attached to him quite low enough and so we were both floating.  And laughing.  After a moment of confusion Isaac told me to get back on the wall and we easily figured it out, but it was pretty funny.

Joshua had some cute cat pictures.

We also went out for Mexican to celebrate Dad's 70th birthday!  I gave him a reading list.  He would always give me a reading list growing up, so it seemed appropriate.  However, I gave him a list of the books I have enjoyed the most in the last 12 years while he would give me books to become a more well-rounded reader.  While the paper list I gave him only has names and authors, I also emailed him a list with additional information: series, series (not finished), or stand-alone; how many books in the series; main genre; my suggested reading order; and other notes. 

Monday: summer vacation, day 1

Well, summer vacation is officially here.

We started the day with appointments: everyone had an eye appointment and Isaac had a dentist appointment.  Joshua's eye doctor was running so far behind.  Isaac and I were finished and waiting for him to come out as I saw her come out with a different patient.  Of course, I had forgotten to have the kids bring books as they're usually pretty fast.  We got out just in time for me to drop Joshua off and home and go to the dentist appointment.

In the afternoon Joshua was helping me make banana bread.  He was in charge of the dry ingredients, and I wasn't paying much attention to him.  Then he says, "oh, and I need three of these!"  I look over and he has a 1/4 cup salt ready to go in.  I was able to stop him in time, but in trying to save some of the salt made a mess.  (The bread turned out fine, even though there were a few other much more minor issues to deal with.)

Isaac has been acting crazy.

Sunday: clank

We played Clank as our family game today.  It's been a while since we've done one and it was nice.

It's a game where you go into a dungeon and try to find treasure, fight monsters, and try to not disturb the dragon.  I took some of Isaac and Joshua's cubes and was pretty happy with my cube monster that I made while waiting for my turn.

vacation Saturday1: castle

We visited Okayama Castle in the morning.  There was a giraffe in our taxi, so we obviously got a picture.

Travis and Scarlet got there a bit before us (due to Travis practically stealing a taxi and making us look foolish. :D).  But there was a strat cat and a heron so Scarlet was happy.

The castle walls looked amazing for climbing.  Seriously.  That's all I saw when I looked at them.  I think that even I could probably climb them.  However, Isaac and I stayed off the walls and just commented on what looked easy (or hard) about climbing them.

The castle!  Most of the castle was destroyed at some point or another, either by neighboring tribes or in WWII.  They took the opportunity to rebuild the castle with better earthquake protections and turned it into a museum; we were able to go through almost the whole space.

More rocks that looked fun to jump on.  These were the original castle foundations, so once again we held ourselves back.

The first area was very interactive, with guns and swords to try out,

a palanquin to ride in,  

and a horse to ride on.

This was the view from the top floor.

In the basement there was this photo oppertunity, which at first glance looks pretty boring.

But when you use the flash, you suddenly get a really cool scene behind you!  If you look closely at the black area you can see that the picture is there, but we weren't really sure how it worked.

After the castle we went to the gardens behind it.  There are large fields of grass...that we can't walk on.  I understand they're trying to keep it looking nice, but the cultural differences are apparent: in the US you would be encouraged to walk on the grass.

There were a bunch of cute koi.  They all had different colorations which made them pretty interesting to watch.

Rock bridges!  No one fell off.

A steep bridge!

The drinking fountain water stream shot straight up, vertically.  It was easier to drink from than I expected.

There were tons of koi in the large pond, along with several turtles, and you could feed them!  It was a lot more fun to feed them than I was expecting; there were so many of them that the sound of them trying to get the food and vying for position was surprisingly loud.

This day is also getting rather long, so it'll be continued!

Saturday: a lovely day

Today was a lovely day...and I only heard "I'm bored" once. :D

We put together Lego sets in the morning, got some chores done, played some games, and Ben went to e-Foil.  Cheryl came over for dinner.  The weather was lovely so the slider was open all day.

Friday: last day of school

We made it to the last day of school!  Ever since we got back from Japan we've been ready to be done.

Joshua came home with a packet about fourth grade.  Most of it was pretty normal, but I took pictures of the funny ones.

All the people were stick figures; drawn as quickly as possible.

His favorite part of the classroom was the floor.  (Without the floor there would be problems!)

His goal for next year is to not dye.

Isaac emptied out his math stuff.

We also got an ice cream cake.  It did not thaw quickly enough in the center and I got really frustrated with it.  However, once I got it cut it was delicious.

Thursday: O:CtH

Since today was the last full day of school, I gave myself permission to work on the storage room instead of some of the more important chores.  The important chores are just so much more boring.

Tonight after reading to Joshua I fake trapped him.  However, it's been a long standing rule that I don't do traps at bedtime: Ben does that.  Anyway, I clearly wasn't trapping Joshua, because I don't do traps, so I told him I was doing a part.  (Trap backwards, but no one realized that.)  However, then whenever Joshua asked if I was doing apart I would tickle him.  (I wasn't doing apart.  I was doing part.)  Isaac came over and sort of got in on the action, but oddly enough it didn't work for him.  He's been so silly lately.