Spring 2013

Has it really been so long since I've blogged? Ah, I have fond memories of the days when this blog was a fun journal of our lives, detailing everything from family camping adventures to the mysteries of a Ladmo bag. I had fun following blogs too and miss hearing how all my friends are doing. But, time is a limited resource and regular blogging just isn't on the table anymore. Even when we're done homeschooling, my time will go to writing stories instead of blogging. ... Ah, doesn't THAT sound nice? :)

Well, for the sake of those of you who like to check in with the boys, here's another update.

They are doing just fantastic. They're still in counseling and we still go to grief group, but it's all really positive and they are doing so well. The holidays were really nice this year. They're enjoying all their activities. They're more settled and happy. I'm really proud of them.

Even though homeschooling has been completely exhausting and I literally felt like I was going to lose my mind a few times, it was worth it. It did what I needed it to do. Everyone's doing great. It was really fun to teach the boys this year. We did some fun projects and they're such smart little whips that they're easy to teach. What made it hard was the fact that it's just so time consuming. I cut back on the freelancing to make room for homeschooling, but I've had two book launches this year and the odd freelance deadline here and there. Not to mention the normal time it takes to run a household. It's been crazy at times.

But we're in the home stretch - four weeks and three days (who's counting?) - and they're all done with their standardized testing. Those are administered by the charter school for homeschoolers that we used this year, so I didn't have to worry about that. Anyway, all three boys did fantastic on their tests. That's a relief, cuz otherwise I would've worried that I screwed them up this year. :) 

John measuring his shadow. This was part of an Algebra lesson to determine the height of one of the trees in our backyard.

We traced a large outline map of Europe (this is about 3 feet tall) and colored in the countries as we studied them.

We read "Little Men" together this year. I was surprised how much they enjoyed such a simple, slow-paced, old-fashioned book. We made a "Plumfield House" box where we made notes about theme, setting, plot, vocabulary, etc. Then we made puppets for several of the characters with notes about each one. It was fun.

We stapled together several manila file folders to make a timeline of European history. We later added folders to show ancient Egyptian history so we could see how the two were related. Ben is in front of the section showing the Golden Age of Greece (blue line at the top) and part of the Roman Republic. From his knee to the edge of the picture on the right, this section goes from about 650 BC to about 70 BC.

This is how long the entire timeline is. It starts at 2880 BC and Egypt's Old Kingdom and goes to the present day. The Golden Age of Greece is not quite in the middle. It was fascinating to see how long the Egyptian Kingdoms and Roman Republic/Empires were around compared to Greece.

This goes from about 1170 AD to the present day and includes the last part of the middle ages (King John, Robin Hood, the Black Death), the Hundred Years War, the Renaissance, the Age of Discovery (Christopher Columbus, Magellan), the Protestant Reformation, the Scientific Revolution (Newton, Galileo), etc. ......   My lifetime takes up the last two inches of this timeline. Take the length of the top of the sunny spot at the end of the timeline, double it, and that's my life. Crazy!

Let's see, Chris has had not one but TWO procedures to try to correct that extra electrical pathway in his heart. Usually one procedure is enough, but the pathway grows back and reconnects in about 10% of the cases. Chris was one of the lucky 10%. Woot! Ugh. They don't do this kind of procedure in Boise (or anywhere in Idaho) so Kevin and I took Chris down to the children's hospital in Salt Lake City while my mom stayed with the other two here at home.

Getting ready for the first surgery.

Chris rode this little trike all the way from pre-op to the operating room. He barely fit on this thing! He cracked up the doctor and the nurses. That's my silly Christopher!

The plus to driving all the way to SLC was getting to see Uncle Travis (and the second time, Aunt Chelsea as well). That was a treat for Chris (me too!) and I'm just now realizing I didn't get any pictures of them together. :/ I've been so lax about pictures lately. I need to repent of that! :)

Anyway, the second time Travis came he brought a Lego set for Christopher. Travis claimed some guy on the street was just giving these away and Travis took one because he thought maybe Chris would like it. LOL. That's Travis. Anyway, Chris LOVED it. He wanted to take it to the hospital with him so he could work on it in the recovery room. Well, the recovery after the first procedure was NOT fun. Poor kid was so sick. Kevin and I didn't think Chris would be up for Legos. We let him bring them in the car but drew the line at carrying them into the hospital. We had enough to carry around while waiting for him to come out of surgery. I told him if he felt like working on them we'd go down to the car and get them. He insisted he would ask for his Legos right when he got up.

Guess what?

Yep. Recovery the second time was so much better. They used a different anesthetic so he didn't get so sick. Yay! :)

Here's a couple of cute pics of Chris before the second surgery.

You know, going into the first surgery, we were all a little ignorant about the whole thing. Before the second one, we knew just what he was getting into. That little guy was so brave though. He went into it with such a good attitude. He tried to look at the positive. He only got really nervous right before he put them under, but that's understandable. He did great. Kevin and I were both so proud of him.

So we get to see the girls every week, and they stay the weekend with us every two weeks. They live about 25 minutes away and we drive through farm country to get to them. Here are some pics of the kind of views we get to enjoy.

Isn't that lovely?

My oldest step daughter, Kira, was in the back of the van taking pictures of the scenery and snapped this pic of Kevin and I on the sly. I love it. :)

Kira's pretty fond of taking pictures of us on the sly. Here's another one I really like:

Ben's big thing lately is the Rubik's Cube. He watched some YouTube videos to learn how to solve it and has been playing with it every day since then. It's been several weeks. He's had to oil it many times and the red stickers are all faded with so much use. I think his fastest time solving it is 1 minute 9 seconds.

John is on the waiting list for the technological high school I mentioned in my last post. He's in a very good position though and we're hopeful he'll get in before the school year begins. :) This year John has really gotten into cycling. He's lost a lot of weight and is really starting to look like a teenager now. He earned his cycling MB, which involves several long rides including a 50 mile ride. A few weeks ago he and a friend went on a four hour, 30-mile jaunt around town. They went to the greenbelt, downtown, all over. It's so nice to live in a place where my teenage son can have that kind of freedom. :)

Okay, I'm going to skim through my photos to see what I've missed and just post things at random.

At one of our favorite parks in town.

Chris getting his Wolf.

Grandma and Grandpa Cook coming to visit.

Chef Bear

Day of the Dead

Trunk or Treat

Ben getting his Arrow of Light (and Indian Brave face paint!)

The cousins at Travis' wedding

Love this pic of Kevin and John

So cute. Ben and Chris on the grounds of the SLC temple.

Oh, for those of you wondering how the publishing/writing is going, you can follow my blog here: http://donnacookauthor.com/

It's been a lot of work trying to write and do the marketing at the same time. I've had some signings recently that went really well, and one of my short stories won Honorable Mention in IDAHO Magazine's Fiction Contest. The short story was inspired by some shoes I saw at the chocolate shop downtown:

Yum!!

Okay, there's a loooong update for you. Until next time....

Our First Snow

The winters here are very mild, similar to Prescott I'm told. I was worried the cold might be a bit much for me, but it really wasn't at all. Plus, I can't help but be partial to weather which encourages cute boots and fuzzy neck wraps. :)

These are pictures from our first snow, which the boys and I found absolutely mesmerizing. The boys played in it that morning, and on the way to school John kept saying, "It's just so beautiful!"

Amen!

Rather than go work in our office/studio in the basement, I camped out by the family room windows and watched the snow. It was so quiet and peaceful. And inspiring. I wrote a poem, my first in many years.

I'm glad I took the time to enjoy it because by mid-afternoon it was starting to melt and by the next day it was nearly all gone. Apparently, that's normal for Boise. I'm glad we don't get a ton of snow here, but we only experienced a few snows this winter; I would've been happy with a bit more. As John says, it's just so beautiful.

View from our front porch.

Chris playing in the backyard. It wasn't long before he came in, hopping and saying, "It's cold! It's cold! It's cold!" LOL.

View from the dining room. Otherwise known as the warm view.

I loved how the snow accumulated on even the tiniest of branches.

Ben decided he had to fling that snow right off the branch.

View from the kitchen window.

View from the family room.

John playing in it after school. You can see how much it's already melted.

Before we moved, Ben and Chris got to participate in one last Winter Sing at their school. One of the songs Chris sang went like this:

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, SIX-ty million snowflakes!"

Here's a video of Chris giving an impromptu performance of that song in the snow, but my memory card was almost full so it cut him off halfway through. I was so bummed! But it's still cute, so I'm posting it anyway:

Idaho Fun

I have one other Picassa album I've created since we've moved here, and since it's soooo easy to create a post from the album I'm going to cheat and do it again.

We love Boise. Even though it's the capital city, it's a pretty small town compared to the sprawling, concrete Valley of the Sun. The Boise River runs right through the center of town, and it's lined with all these different parks and biking paths. The Greenbelt is just beautiful, and in many areas you can be on the river bank and not see or hear the city around you. It's like being in the middle of nowhere. And it's a 10 minute drive from our house. Course, I could drive to the other side of Boise and back and not really feel like I've exerted myself much.

The city is ringed on one side by the Boise mountains, on the top of which is Bogus Basin, the popular, local ski retreat. I haven't been skiing. I probably won't go skiing. But I still enjoy the drive to the top of the mountain. Just 30 minutes from downtown Boise and you're on the top of the mountain, surrounded by pines and gorgeous views. It's a fun place to walk around and explore all year long.

We love to explore and take the kids out and about. The air is fresh, the sights are rejuvenating, and the family time is priceless.

Picasa loaded these a little mixed up, but I'm not going to take the time to fix it. .... More updates later...