Currently...
Celebrating...The end of the school year, and to mark it our crazy mountain weather dumped 1.5 feet of snow on us, with several other smaller snowstorms in the last two weeks as well. It put a damper on our summertime feelings, but I am very grateful for the moisture. The grass greened up significantly since that big snowstorm, and before that it was scarily dry. Here's to hoping for no fires this year!
Trying...to recover from our Memorial Day weekend trip, which was so fun but also took all my energy. We took a road trip to New Mexico, to see a couple of the National Parks down there - Carlsbad Caverns and White Sands (with a brief stop at Guadeloupe Mountains National Park in Texas, and Petroglyph National Monument and the Manhattan Project National Historical Park on the way home).
My kids especially loved Carlsbad Caverns National Park. We saw Mammoth Cave with them last fall, and I think Mammoth Cave was a good starter cave - Carlsbad was the ultimate goal though, and they were ready for it. We walked over two miles of trails inside the caverns, and the kids were fascinated with all the formations. Clarice frequently reminded us "Don't touch the formations!", and Georgie quietly walked through the trails and occasionally declared that she was "kind of freaking out". But no one was too afraid, and we all enjoyed the adventure! We also enjoyed watching the bats fly out in the evening, while marveling at the inability of some people to understand what "silent" means. Any little noise can spook the bats and prevent them from flying out of the cavern, and yet still people were fiddling with bags, opening food wrappers, knocking around water bottles and allowing their children to cry without taking them away from the amphitheater. I'm proud to say our kids were silent and still though, and we did get to see a little flurry of bats anyway.
White Sands National Park was also impressive and a little mind-blowing - the sand stretched for miles, and if you didn't know better, you would think it was snow. We tried going in the middle of the day, but if you are going to visit this park, this time you want to be there is 7-9 PM. The light turned pretty, the wind died down, and the park was relatively quiet! Here are a few photos, but these are just the ones I took with my phone - when I get my big camera photos edited, perhaps I'll share more.)
We came home to 3 inches of snow on June 1st, which thankfully melted off immediately. I can't be too bummed about the incongruent weather when I see sparkling water trickling along the road and quenching the dry grass. We even had some flowers springing up despite the cold!
Giving...some thought to sharing the homeschool posts I promised a while back. I intended to write a few homeschool-related posts in March, but for some reason March and April became extremely busy. Maybe it just comes with getting older, but I find myself drained alot more easily in recent months by too many days out of the house or excessive socializing. I have thought of myself for years as an "ambivert", leaning toward an extrovert, but the pendulum has seemed to swing back to the introverted side for right now.
May was a little frantic because my dear friend moved away to another state (yes, I cried a few times), we were trying to wrap up school, and then I immediately had to start switching out the kids' clothes from winter to summer and prepare for our trip.
All that to say, my homeschool posts never got written, but I hope to rectify that soon. I still have some ideas swirling around in my mind, and I may even make a rare foray back to Instagram to share a few thoughts or curriculum videos in the next couple months! A couple people have specifically asked me what we've been using for language arts, so that's the first topic on my list.
Wearing...I really can't decide what to write here. I'm still wearing long pants (the snow, you know), but with sandals, wearing my hair curly (which I like better now that my hair is longer), wearing this eyeshadow palette (so light and pretty). Wearing this body spray (smells like summer laundry), this lip oil. Wearing out my earbuds from listening to a bunch of chic-lit audiobooks (thanks Katherine Center and Chanel Cleeson).
Taking...charge of the budget. I have been a little lazy about my budget over the last year, but in 2022, with this ridiculous inflation, there is no more wiggle room for that. My method is to plot out every event I have going on each month on one of those little $1 monthly planners, estimate how much each event is going to cost me in gas, eating out, etc, and then work around that. I've also gone back to our repertoire of cheaper meals so I can stock our pantry a bit each month, as so many people seem to be doing. We already have quite a good amount of noodles, grains (for flour), oatmeal, rice, and dry beans - this month I want to stock up on sugar and coffee. You can make all kinds of things with those essentials!
Reading...alot of fiction, especially on audio, and it's been great for getting out of my reading rut. I think I was just getting bogged down in too much nonfiction - my brain gets tired, and then I don't want to read at all. Re-finding my fiction/nonfiction balance has been good. I just got The Lost Man by Jane Harper from the library, so hoping to start that this week, and I finished a bunch of books in the last couple weeks, so a book roundup is coming!
Watching...this amazing video about fractals. Apparently the solutions to certain mathematical equations can be graphed, and when they are, they create amazingly complex shapes that repeat themselves for infinity. You have to watch the video to fully appreciate how complex and crazy this is. It's amazing to me that God hid these incredible shapes in math, for goodness sake! It reminds me of this verse:
"For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,” says the LORD. "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts." Isaiah 55:8-9
Indeed.
How has the start to your summer been, friends?
Great pictures! It's hard to imagine better pictures than what you've posted but I do know from personal experience that ones taken from a nicer camera are always better than cell phone pictures. Speaking of pictures, when you referenced getting snow and I saw the picture of two of your girls, I thought at first they were playing in the snow. That seemed a little odd since they were wearing summer type clothes and even appeared to be barefoot. Upon reading more, it was obvious that they were surrounded by sand, not snow! Your trip sounds really amazing- please consider sharing more photos when you get them edited ;).
You make me want to go see the sand!!!! I miss sand!!
Can't believe it's been a month already since the beginning of summer! We actually just had our last day of school, but have a few skills to keep practicing. I also had to look closely at your photos because you did mention the snow! I see that someone else commented the same thing. The dunes are really pretty. I have several homeschool posts drafted and now the thoughts are already old. I think that's part of the problem-easier to write little updates more frequently. Also, putting thoughts out there just uses a type of energy that we don't have sometimes. I've been using Instagram for the everyday homeschool stuff, but I get intimidated by the "homeschool bloggers." I just don't really like to type that much on my phone, for social media purposes. As far as summer, we have 5 out of 6 birthdays, many of them milestones (10, 40, 75...). Some not-fun stuff like doctor's appointments. And hopefully a few adventures!
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