Labor Day, Labor Week

 School always starts here the day after Labor Day, which seems like months ago now. We have been so busy since then, it's unbelievable! While we do have to wear masks to school again, I'm happy to do it since we were able to start the school year completely normal. 

On Labor Day weekend, Jason and I (mostly Jason as I was his assistant) worked really hard to finish the deck, which had to be completed by the next morning. I did, however, convince him to go to a family BBQ that evening at our friend's house with a bunch of other families and the missionaries. We needed the break from the deck, and we didn't have to make dinner. We just brought some fruit and veggies. Even though we stayed later than we should have, it was nice to visit with friends. Luckily, with Jason working at home, he was able to finish up the steps the next morning before his work meeting and before the inspector came and passed our deck and sunroom! We still have to put the drywall up on the back of the sunroom and do the floor, though.

Happy kids in the sunroom!

The siding has been completed too.

I love the darker blue!

Jason, hard at work!

So many details that I didn't realize!

The steps were a real pain! 

And I didn't realize how long it takes to set in pavers. So much patience and so many layers required!

Finished! (Except for the skirting on the other side and the rest of the pavers, but this is all the inspector needed to see.)

So, while Jason spends the day on calls for work in the basement and working on the financials with the Mustang for Ford and then spending his evenings working on the skirting of the deck while it's light and the sunroom as it gets dark, the kids and I have been doing all things back-to-school.

I am back with 22 students in my preschool class, only 6 are boys! Having many more students after so few last year, and they are a younger group, makes it more challenging right now, but I'm loving it!

 Victoria started 11 grade and is taking a few honors classes. She'll be doing track in the spring and is enjoying training with them after school on most days until dance starts this Thursday, in which case she still plans to train with the track team, but also dance. She's loving the comraderie of the team at the high school. She drives the car to the high school and still works twice a week. BUSY!

11th grade!

Karissa, who goes by Kai now, is in the Arts Academy at the high school now. Basically, for her ELA and World History classes she has more choices of how to show her knowledge. Instead of just writing a paper or taking a test, for example, she could write a play or a song, do a comic strip, or other creative outlets. She goes to seminary with Victoria, which now starts 20 minutes later because school starts a little later now, thank goodness! She also has orchestra with Victoria, so they have two classes together! Most days she has color guard practice for a few hours after school and all day on Saturday. Friday nights they play at the football games. It's been really fun for her!

Freshman!

First game as a color guard member! I'll post performance videos/pics later. They had a short performance this first time.

Filing out to the field. I was a chaperone and got to walk with the band to the stands and then sit near them with all the fun music during the game. It was a blast!

Austin is finally in the middle school groove, now that we're starting a "normal" year. Even when they were in person last year, he just wasn't focused. So many things were online and it was hard for him to focus. He's been on top of it all at the start of 7th grade and is comforatble and confident with school again. He's doing cross country every day after school, orchestra before school, taking piano lessons, and playing soccer again. His cross country is helping with his soccer stamina and his new coach was very impressed with his game on Saturday.  For his first cross country meet today he ran 12:10 for 2 miles and got 7th place out of the 7th and 8th grade boys. He was very proud!

7th grader!

Erik rides his bike to and from school, mostly on his own. Since all the public schools start 15-20 minutes later, I leave for work before he leaves. He's very responsible and reliable, so he gets there no problem. Jason is home working, but doesn't need to remind Erik at all. He loves his 4th grade class. His teacher is a tech-geek man, so Erik thinks that's pretty cool! He's doing really well on his soccer team and might try Stride at his school two days a week, soon. 

4th grader!

Since they all have after school activities, one would think I would have more quiet time, but no. I feel like I need to contribute, and I want to contribute. Right now, we are short on bus drivers, cafeteria workers, janitors, parapros, and a few other posisitions in the schools. Not to mentions garbage collectors, soccer referees, hospital staff and even workers at Wendy's (and many other places I am sure). I love my job and don't plan on getting another, but I am volunteering to help Austin's cross country coach on Mondays. I will be helping Erik's Stride coach on Thursdays, most likely, and thus far I have voluneered 3 different times for color guard/marching band activities in the past week. All those things are seasonal, so they'll end at the begninning of November and we'll see what I decide to do next, if I'm not dead by then! J/K, I actually have been blessed with tons of extra energy and have been able to just keep going, lately. Most evenings I'm even able to help Jason a little, who just keeps working hard on our projects to get them done. He's amazing! He seriously is so good at building the deck, I'm very impressed!

 He got some cool tools out of it too!

Erik and I got some donuts from the cider mill for the first day of school breakfast. 

The marching band/color guard packed over 1,000 meals for the Plymouth Fall Fest. It's one of their annual fundraisers. Kai and I helped for 3 hours. It was tiring and hot. Here's all the chicken being grilled.

Only some of the corn.

We were in an assembly line. Her job was to foil the boxes, mine was to put the corn in. 

Finished product. The chicken and corn are in the foil. There's a cookie, roll, chips, and utensils in there too. $12 a meal and people were lined up left and right! It's a tradition that's been going on for 65 years!