It's better than nothing

I have major guilt about not keeping up with the blog more often. I need to get pictures on here, but in the meantime I'll update on what we're up to.

* School started Aug. 3. John is in kindergarten, Mary's in 4th grade, and Ellen's in 5th grade. John is pretty excited to not be taking naps anymore. I knew I'd need some leverage for him to not balk at doing school work, so I told him that kindergartners don't nap, they just rest. He loves it. They all have a rest time after lunch. The girls read and John listens to books on CD. He is working his way through all the Ramona books our library has on CD.

* Garrett took a part-time job at the QuikTrip distribution center near our house. He works there five nights a week and is helping my dad right now about 3 days a week. Substitute teaching positions seem to be picking up and he's in the process of certification to be a lay coach with Dacula High School's wrestling team. Whew! I know he feels like he's chasing his tail, we all miss him, but we know this situation is temporary. We know there is a bigger plan and we're just hanging on to see where it takes us.

* The girls started ballet lessons last week. It's an intermediate class, which is challenging for them right now, but they have a great instructor and they enjoy the class.

* The garden is gone. Mowing it down was a sad day for Garrett. Nothing to pick, dig, or water and it's too warm to cut or split fire wood right now. What will he do? Oh yeah - work three plus jobs. That'll keep him busy, I suppose.

* We've been on a few field trips: Zoo Atlanta, Gwinnett Braves game, and Camp York.

* We're reading a non-fiction series by Ralph Moody. I've suggested this series to everyone I see - being overall obnoxious about it, I guess. It's our family-time reading. We laugh, I cry, and we can't help but pick up on the language of the characters. "I and you'll show 'em what logs makes wide shingles!" Awesome.

*I'll get pictures up soon. Maybe.