Our LAST day of school!!

Both girls had a history project due today.

Jesse's diorama

Chloe's diorama

The dioramas were only part of the project; they also had to give an oral presentation. Chloe was able to choose anything she studied this year in Story of the World III; she had to create a diorama and give a report explaining what she chose. She chose The War of Jenkins' Ear. Jesse had to create a diorama and give an oral report on how life changed for people during the time she studied this semester. Her diorama depicted nomadic people and her oral report explained how people lived prior and after. She also explained how there are still people who are nomadic. They both did very well.

The rest of the day was spent in total bliss. lol  We ran a few errands this morning, including a celebratory trip to Tiffany's. I mean really when you only have a two week "summer" you need to enjoy every single moment. Right?

I am also happy to say last weekend I was able finish most of the homeschool association's paperwork. We just need to grade the history projects and one English test. :D  I've already switched out most of this year's books for next year's books.

I posted a picture of one of the new verbena with a few blooms the other day. Well, today I saw the other verbena now has quite a few blooms. Oh, yeah! (Remember I paid $1 each for them.) We also bought a couple of new plants today: a bee balm (which I planted by the garage, near the fence gate) and a parsley plant (in the kitchen). John said the parsley tasted awesome. :)

Unfortunately, I did not get the house organized this week. Boo! I think it is actually dirtier, except the kitchen. I even reorganized a kitchen cabinet the other day, so food would stop falling out onto my feet. lol I hope I can get everything I want done next week, so the following week I can relax. Because the week after that, we start school again. But that is in two weeks, so I choose not to think about it right now. ;)

Blooms everywhere!

I love this time of year when everything around the yard is blooming. Well, almost everything, the hydrangeas are taking their time this year, along with the butterfly bush. But still there are blooms almost everywhere you look.

Another iris bloomed.

The snap dragons on the deck table.

Begonias in the front and petunias in the back.

(This picture turned out a bit weird looking) The new verbena I bought for $1. It looks happy now.

In fact, the same verbena has more buds on the other side.

This is my prettiest lily every year! This year it will have eight blooms!

The end of school...almost

We are nearing the end of our school year. The girls would say, "Oh, yeah!" I'm saying, "Oh, geez!" Our "summer" break is going to be short this year. To be honest, I'm very glad neither of our girls are in high school this year, or a senior.

Our 3rd Option accountability group is now wanting high school grades by May 25th (this year they wanted senior grades by May 15th). We won't finish our year until May 30th. Again. I'm so thankful neither are in high school just yet. The grades are needed for class ranking and scholarship applications for seniors. I understand why; I'm just not prepared. So, this year our break is being cut short, so next year we can end early enough for grades to be in when HEA wants them. Should prove to be very interesting. lol

The nice thing is I only had to order English books this year. The bad thing is we did not finish our science books this year, which is why I didn't need to order new ones. Both girls were struggling in the beginning of the school year with math. I decided early to do their math books, from this year, over two years (they were both a year ahead in math anyway, so no loss there). They will both finish their science books by the end of the first semester, so I'll have to order books in the fall. Hopefully, late enough that everyone else will have placed their orders already. I don't like to wait long. Jesse's English books were ordered on Thursday and arrived yesterday (Monday), now that is quick! I like it.

I'll admit I already have the first two weeks of school scheduled for next year, but I have yet to put actual grades on tests for this year. I think I'm working in the wrong direction. My plan is to have everything ready to start the paperwork for HEA this weekend. Actually, I want all of it done except the final grades (a few tests will be taken next week). Then all I will have to do is put in the final grade, print, sign then mail. Easy. Right?

Honestly, what I really want to happen is the house to somehow become immaculate, so I can totally relax during our two week break. Yep. Two weeks is all the girls are getting. Now, before I start getting hate mail please remember they do not have school when John is off: every other Monday, every National holiday and too many vacations days to think about, per year. I don't give them any sympathy, mainly because I'm right here with them. But getting back to what I was saying, I'd really like some time to not worry about the house or school or anything. I just want two weeks to relax. I'm not sure that is going to happen. But right now, I can still dream.

Korean food and more Korean food

Yesterday, we went on an adventure. We've talked about going to Decker Boulevard since we moved to Columbia. Decker Boulevard is where many of the specialty grocery stores are: Mexican, Asian, and Korean.

The reason for our visit is for John's work. On Wednesday, they are having an Asian/Pacific Island Heritage program. John was asked to bring some food. Okay, originally he was asked if his mother could attend to speak and bring food. After he stopped laughing, he told them no. ;)  He has been trying to come up with food to take for a couple of weeks. The thing about Asian food is it is always prepared then eaten right away. It is best fresh, because it uses fresh ingredients. He finally decided on something, but wanted to take some snack items too. This was the reason we wanted to go to the Korean market.

However, the Korean market did not open until late on Sunday. So, what are you to do on Decker when the market isn't open. Find a Korean restaurant, of course! We found ourselves at the Korean Garden. To be honest, I've never been to a Korean restaurant and I wasn't sure what to order. John helped all of us. Then came the appetizers. Oh, my! I was shocked at how many of the twelve dishes the girls loved. Not liked, they loved them. And Chloe's eyes lit up when she found out several of her favorites are always in Grandma's refrigerator. All the food was fantastic. Some Oma makes better, but overall it was really good and we are planning on returning.

By the time we made our way through all the food, the market was open. We found Chloe's favorite honey snack. So guess who gets to go back tomorrow to get another bag, because one bag has already been mostly eaten. Yep, me. lol 

So many things!

I'll start with Saturday a week ago. It was the day before Mother's Day. We went to Edgefield to give Oma her present and take her out to lunch. We made her a book through Shutterfly; she liked it so much. I think at first she wondered why we bought her a book. We told her to open. When she turned to the first page she said, "Oh, my". It was a picture of her and Ernest. I'm glad we made her smile. Lunch was great too!

Mother's Day was good. I did very little, which makes for an awesome Mother's Day. The girls made me some awesome presents. They had been hiding behind their loom boxes for days.

African violets from Jesse

Hummingbird from Chloe

Carolina blue "Mom"

John ordered me a garden cart, which came later in the week. He and the girls put it together Friday afternoon and I LOVE it!

I have to tell you, especially Courtney, about my two awesome finds this week. I haven't mentioned it yet on the blog, but I bought myself a new bike a couple of months ago. I haven't ridden it yet, because I needed a new seat (the one it came with is horrible; Jesse said it was too, so it is not just me) and a new helmet because mine was about twenty-five years old. lol  Anyway, we went to Academy last week to get my seat and I found a beautiful helmet. When I went to look at the cost, I was elated to find it was on clearance. The original price was $22 and it was on sale for $10. Score!!  My second find was earlier in the week. I mentioned earlier on the blog my verbena died. :(  Well, I happen to find, not one, but TWO verbena on the clearance rack ($1 each) at Lowe's because Lowe's was trying to kill them. They are doing awesome now and seem very happy by the mailbox. :)

Friday we spent some time with our friends the Finnocharios. We met them at the zoo after Chloe volunteered at the library. It was the first time we had the chance to really hang out since Lauren had Samuel. And he is totally adorable! I took pictures but have not downloaded them yet. Sound familiar? lol

We did have a sad note this week. We have lost, yet another, beloved librarian. Amanda is leaving our branch for another branch, to make working while achieving her educational goals a bit easier on herself. While we are elated for her and her education, we are sad to be losing another librarian. She is hoping once our branch's new building is complete her education will be done and hopefully she can return as a full librarian. We hope so!

Amazing

I'm not sure why today I have an overwhelming sense of amazement regarding our girls, but I do. Today has not been out of the ordinary. We left early, very early, for the commissary. There they helped me get the items I passed, or were not on my list. They chatted with the ladies in the meat department (who adore the girls' senses of style). Each person they spoke with asked if Chloe was feeling better, and each person was met with a smile and sincere small talk.

They helped unload the car, then put away the groceries so I could water all the plants before it got too hot. They took the dogs outside to run them. They collected more school work (they did some on the way home from the commissary), and we were off again. They were pleasantly talkative at our favorite local toy store (Chloe need more loom bands).

They patiently waited for me to talk to our favorite "lunch lady" at the Arby's drive-thru. Somehow, I have no clue how, we got onto the subject of taekwondo. I was telling her we are starting new classes tonight, then gave her all the information. (My business cards were at home because I removed them to clean out all the coins. Of course!) Did they complain they were hungry? Did they complain their food was not hot? No. They ate. Then they took the dogs out again so they would be tired while we worked on school work.

Then they finished all their school work by 2:30, even with all the running around. I am simply amazed by them.

Sadly, it is official

My verbena, by the mailbox, is dead. I talked to Dad when we visited Sunday; he agreed that by now it should be showing some green. {pouting} Well, life can be short. We enjoyed it for about five years. Today, the girls and I bought some petunias to fill in the space...for now. I'll come up with a plan for it by next year, hopefully.

This morning, the girls and I ran errands. The first stop was Dr. J. Jesse has had a wire continuously come out all weekend. The clipped it. Her back tooth has moved much faster than the one in front of it, so once the second tooth catches up, they will put the wire to the back tooth again.

We also went to Lowe's. Yes, we live there. lol  We bought the final bags of dirt to fill the raised bed. We planted the marigolds we bought last week. A steal! Those marigolds were in the bigger pots and were marked down to $1! All they wanted was water. Of course, they wanted that today too. I watered them this morning, but by the time we planted them (3 hours later) they were dry as a bone again. I watered them again tonight, and fed them, and found them dry again. I need to put the soaker hose on the raised bed tomorrow to get it nice and wet.

What a weekend!

We had an in-house tournament at taekwondo yesterday (Saturday). I admit I was not looking forward to because this was our weekend to have school. We did finish all the school work before we had to leave. Yeah! The tournament actually turned out to be a lot of fun. Jesse won 2nd place, in her division, for forms; and she won 1st place in sparring. Chloe won 3rd place, in her division, for sparring; and she won 1st place in forms. I did not even take my camera because I was one of three judges for the entire tournament and John was working. So, no one would have been able to take pictures anyway. :)

Today, the girls and I went to Charlotte to help my Dad with some yard work. We cut down some kind of tree thing (not sure what it was, but it is cut back now). We trimmed a maple in the back, so more light can hit Dad's garden. We pulled a few weeds too. In return, we had some of Dad's lemon cake. Awesome!

Pictures, as promised

I know my Dad has been looking for Jesse's crochet projects. But like I said, in another post, he did see a couple of them on Monday. Let me tell you this was not easy! She would finish a project then immediately start on another. And even though I'm posting some now, both girls are working on a project together so there will be another post later.

Anyway. It started with a pot. Well, it started with the plant in the pot, which in the beginning looked quite strange. I'll be honest, though, I love it! I think this one is totally adorable, but I like plants. lol



Potted plant

Now, this is no ordinary potted plant. Oh, no! Of course not, that would be much too easy. Here it is...growing. :)

 

 

Adorable!!! My Mom cracked up laughing when she saw this Monday; my Dad loved it too, but he didn't laugh nearly has hard as my Mom. She had me laughing!

 

Jesse's next project was a little simpler. Well, not really. Look at all the feet!!

 

Adorable ladybug

So cute! She gave this one to Chloe, and Chloe loves it.

Then she started making one that really looked weird. I mean w.e.i.r.d.! John and I were not sure how it would turn out, honestly. Jesse knew it would be great; she was correct.

Giraffe

Back of giraffe

Personally, the tail is my favorite. It is just too much!

 

Then came the one that really spoke to me.

 

Cup of tea

There are more pictures coming. I'm not sure how long until they finish the current project, but when they are done I'll tell you all about.