And the rain came tumbling down.

Setting: we are listening to the "introduction" to Ella's reading program for the year, which explores the 50 states.  A song starts.
Me: Oh!  This is our national anthem!
Ella: Yeah!  The Star-Strangled Banner!

Bahahaha!
Star-strangled banner. (wiping laugh-tears from my eyes)

We had a good week, it really felt like we were back in the groove, if that makes sense.   School is in full swing, options has started, sports are moving right along.  This week, unfortunately, Caleb was bummed because his practice AND game were both cancelled from weather.

We've had an enormous amount of rain these last few days, (since Wednesday maybe?).  We are lucky where we are, no flooding at our house, but even in the same neighborhood there were basements and cars that took on water.  (This is the other end of our neighborhood late yesterday afternoon...)

In Denver and especially north of Denver, the flooding has been much worse.  Kip's job site has been under some water, and today and tomorrow we are supposed to get more rain, so it should be interesting to see how everything fares.  Kip heard today that Boulder expects to take more than a year to repair all the crumbled infrastructure. :/ Yikes.  I'm pretty sure records for rainfall are being broken all over the state!

It did stop raining long enough to go pick up 5 boxes of peaches for us to can yesterday, which is great since we just ate our last bottle from last year.  I feel so Susie-homemaker with all my canning and preserving. :)

But anyway, back to school, Caleb is a great little student who is pretty good about doing all of his work, especially on Mondays, when he gets his technology tickets replenished.  His method is to binge play for 3 hours on Mondays, then wait until the next week to play again.  (Rather than, say, playing 30 minutes each day.)  But it has really helped stop the "Can I play video games" question 50 times a day, which I dislike very much, so win-win.

A few weeks ago, Caleb lost his retainer.  It was sad, because the last time I had to buy a new one, I told him that he would have to pay 10% of the next new one (assuming it was lost by him).  That amounts to about $21 (roughly 20-30 chores that pay .50 - 1.00 each).  He really didn't care about his lost retainer until I reminded him of that deal - which he had agreed to -...then he was very unhappy with ME.  We checked the pool, checked with his Cub Scout leaders, searched every pants or jacket pocket, looked downstairs, outside, etc.  ONE DAY before his next orthodontist appt, when he would have to order a new retainer, we tried one last avenue - his piano teacher's house.  They are good friends of ours and this kids run and play while I take my lesson, but I thought it was a long shot. By this point it had been missing for over two weeks, and we had already been back to that house twice since then and not seen it.  Lo and behold, he runs down to the basement, and comes up again in less than ONE MINUTE with his retainer, which had been sitting on top of a video game undisturbed for 16 days.  YAY!  We were both so happy to have found it.

Ella is also doing well with her school work, although she is much more prone to wandering and distraction. :)  She is very excited to be back in art class at her options program, as well as a new offering, musical theater. :)  A child after my own heart.  She started gymnastics at a new place closer to us, and she was not a fan the first time because they made her run for five minutes at the beginning, which in her words gave her a "heart attack!  Really!"   heehee.  She was also put-out because she got in trouble for stepping on the trampoline after the coach told her not too.  At her last gym, apparently she could get away with a lot more, because it was a bigger class.  I am quite happy with the closer gym and smaller class, so we will stick with it and see if she likes it better after another few weeks.

Rachel will be starting her dance class again this week, which she has been eager to do.  We are practicing letters and numbers and writing together, and Ella reads stories to her and plays all sorts of imaginative games with her.  She is getting to be a very meticulous drawer; by that I mean she can sit for 30 minutes with one sheet of paper and color in shapes and lines without taking a break.

McKinley can speak in complete sentences, which feels new, although I may have mentioned it before.  She's very good at parroting me, bossing the other kids, and making messes, like most 2-year-olds.  She LOVES butter and anytime we make the mistake to leave it where she can see it, she will climb or do anything to get her fingers in and start licking.  (Don't worry, if you come to eat at our house, I will open a new stick of butter for you!)  We made an attempt at potty training with brand new Dora panties, which held their charm for about 2 hours before she had 2 accidents and whimpered "I want my diaper."  Fine with me, I have learned not to stress too much about it.  Probably next summer will be a better time for me, unless she decides to do it on her own before then.  :)