School's out for Summer

Another school year in the books. Jongr was promoted to 6th grade, Jontu promoted to 3rd grade and Jonev get to go to 1st grade next year.

Jongr is leaving the elementary level and moves to the middle school. New friends, new teachers, new classes all on the other side of the street (the schools are all close to each other and close enough to walk from our house). There was a special 5th grade awards ceremony we attended.

 Mama got a little carried away with the celebration (really Jongr was being a stinker before and so it was my turn). This one went on Instagram (@paulscrazylife).

Now there is a proud father and a happy young Jedi.

Before school let out, Mama and Jonli went to the Blue Bell Factory and got some ice cream. It always tastes better when you are there.

We had to alter our normal celebration because of the no school "ice day" extension. We stopped for snow cones on the way home from swim practice. Another Instagram classic.

While getting snow cones we realized that most of use had on our Crocs or Crocs branded flip flops. One lone Jedi dared to where his cowboy boots. He has some Crocs but he decided to be himself. Stay unique little man!

 

The next day Mama and Dad went on a date (yes, even the most talented Jedi trainers need time off). They enjoyed a bowl of Orangeleaf frozen yogurt. The flavor of the month is Blackberry Greek yogurt. It was quite tasty and comes highly recommended. This picture was tweeted with a mention of @myorangeleaf and they retweeted. Sweet! (another food picture, aww I love this man - Jonsu aka Mama)

Fun Run

Each month at Jongr's school they have a "Fun Run", each grade runs for about 20-30 min. (don't really know how long the time is). They each get paper to have their laps recorded on, then they start running and the PE teachers and other volunteers mark their laps on the paper for them as they go around. This is the first one that we have made it to this year and I talked Jontu into running with Jongr. They got 18 laps each around the hardtop at the school. It is the most laps that Jongr has gotten this year and it was lots of fun for the two of them together. Sadly I forgot to take a picture while we were there of the two of them.

I decided that I would document for you how our day begins each and every day, we say good bye to daddy. I don't know exactly how the tradition got started, but we have been standing in on the front porch waving to dad as long as I can remember. Here is a picture that Jonpa took of us in all of our morning glory. Even Jonli loves to wave and say "bye, bye". Jonev usually has a two handed wave going.

They keep on waving from the doorstep until they can't see the car anymore. It is super cute! Who knows how long this phase of life will last.

Jonli has learned to hold on while her brothers take turns pushing her on this ride on toy. She laughs as they go faster and faster. (I have to keep telling them to slow down a little, she doesn't hold on too tight yet.) It is so nice that they can all play together.

In other news this week, I went to the cannery again, it brings me such peace to buy more food for our year supply. We are far from having a whole year, but every little bit puts us a little closer and makes me happy. If only we had more room to store it in.

We are looking forward to enjoying our Spring Break this week; check back next week to see what we were up to.

First Day of School

The boys on the first day of school, Jonev just wouldn't hold still.

Jongr all ready for 2nd grade, I can't believe that he is going to be 8 this year.

Bring on Summer!

Here are a few pictures from the last day of school, we kept with our tradition of having a water party and playing with water balloons, this year we let the kids play with shaving cream on the slip in slide, it was lots of fun! Brings back memories of my childhood end of school days, it seems like there was always a shaving cream fight and a few water balloons for good measure. Although the young Jedi's and their friends don't go about their fun the same way that we used to when I was in school. It is still fun!

Jotu didn't want to take a picture at first, then he decided to show off his muscles! Jonev had lots of fun picking up the balloons and throwing them in the grass as fast as he could get to them. His older brothers didn't like that so much, but there were plenty of balloons to keep everyone busy for a good 10 minutes or so. I love this day!
Here is a recent picture of Jonli (I love her Jedi name!) she is about 5 weeks old in this picture. It is hard to believe that she is growing so fast. I know some of you would like more pictures, I'm working on it. Happy Summer!

Go Texan Day and a Visit to the Stables

Jontu's primary teacher invited us to her stables where she has about 30 chickens. This is one of the roosters that has 2 combs, it was one of the roosters that was born there. The boys had so much fun helping to feed the chickens, gathers the eggs, and feed the horses. I am so thankful for places like this that are close by so that our boys can get a taste of the rural life a little more than our visits to family.

Here are the boys with the eggs that they collected, we got to take some home too. They loved that the eggs were all different colors, especially Jongr. It made for a really great evening.
Go Texan Day is celebrated at Jongr's school and most others in the Houston area to kick off the Houston Rodeo. The kids learn western dances and then on Go Texan Day they dress up in their cowboy clothes and perform for all of the parents. It is a lot of fun. Sorry for the blurry pictures.
Jongr with some of his classmates. Jonev, Jontu and I enjoyed watching and even dancing a little bit. Jonev especially loved watching everyone dance all together. He loves to dance too!

Cross the Street 5 times One way

Today on our walk to school to pick up Jongr, Jontu asked me how many times we have to cross the street before we get to Jongr's school. So we counted, it is no less than 5 times. That adds up to 10 times for a round trip and since Jontu, Jonev, and I walk that route roundtrip 2 times a day, it equals 20. That would make a good math story problem. LOL!

Today we also went and read a story in Jongr's classroom. We took Pirates Don't Change Diapers to read today, since it is National Talk Like a Pirate Day this Saturday. We didn't walk this time though, we drove or else the math problem could have read; If Jonsu and Jontu have to cross the street 5 times to get to the school, how many times did they cross the street today if they walked to the school and back 3 times? Anyone that is looking for a good story problem for their kids? Maybe we could come up with a few more.

Our walk to school

This is Jontu and Jonev in front of our house getting ready to get Jongr from the last day of school for this school year. It is a pretty typical day, Jontu has his stick (one that he has had in his collection since sometime around January I think) and Jonev is ready to see the world from the seat of the strolley.

Along the way we generally encounter at least 2 obstacles of some sort or another blocking the sidewalk. I really don't like this aspect of our neighborhood. Most people use their garage as a basement since we can't have basements here. For our northern friends and family try to imagine where you would put all of the stuff that is in your basements if you didn't have it anymore. However it is really annoying to try to maneuver about 80 lbs of boys and stroller around said obstacles and not roll into the street.
This is one of the many reasons why we do walk though. We get to enjoy so many beautiful plants and flowers as the seasons change. This is a lovely Crape Myrtle tree, it is almost as pretty as the lilac bushes, but doesn't have a fragrance at all. They can be purple like this beautiful one, pink, or white and so many people have them. I don't remember them blooming last year, probably because we weren't out of the house much since Jonev was just a new little baby. They sure made me smile this year though.
This is a view of the bayou that we walk along for a little while, we often see turtles, frogs, snakes, fish, egrets of all varieties, cranes, and even the occasional bird of prey (hawks or falcons) swoop in and pick up a fish out of the water. To me it is a small reminder of the country life I enjoyed growing up in so much. I am thankful for our own little preserve. You will notice the big white objects in the picture, it is the water treatment plant for our neighborhood. It is right by Grant's school and it doesn't always smell the best, sometimes we hurry through this little park a little faster than other times.
This is MonNa (her Jedi name this is not the best picture of her, we were trying to hurry), she lives near us and we walk home with her part of the way. We have enjoyed planting seed pods, racing across the park, watching the animals in the bayou and talking on the way home this past year. You can see the front entrance of Jongr's school behind them. A pretty normal looking elementary school building.

FIRE, FROSTY, FORWARD

WOW! What a busy week this has been on top of Christmas preparations. We started the week off with an early morning FIRE at Jongr's school on Monday. It burned through 6 second grade classrooms and their is smoke damage throughout the building. They lost all of their computers and other technology. It is so sad! Our awesome principal though had every grade assigned to a new school for Tuesday, so the kids only missed one day of school. It has been a hard week on the teachers and administration and interesting for the kids. Thankfully the fire didn't harm anyone and it only 2 weeks before Christmas break and we are going to be able to come back to the school in January.
The weather has been very FROSTY here in Houston for us. We actually had snow on Wednesday evening that stuck to the ground and the cars. It was weird to see snow at our own house. It has been more than 7 years since we have seen it fall where we live. We are especially grateful for our cold weather clothing and a special thanks to Aunt Jen for sending Tucker a coat. We sure have needed it this week! We had FROST on the windows of the car on Friday morning too, I had to dig out the old ice scraper that we keep in the trunk for our trips to ID.
Jonev has mastered the FORWARD motion of crawling. He was chasing me around the kitchen yesterday as I was baking away. I would walk one way and he would follow me and then grab my leg. He wanted to be up and seeing what I was doing. He loves the mixers and is fascinated by them, just like the other boys. They all enjoy helping me to cook whatever I am making and are already pretty handy in the kitchen for their ages.

We are busily making the final preparations this week for our trip to IN for Christmas. It is like Christmas is a week early for us because I have to be done by next Wednesday so that we can pack and be ready to go. LOL!