Friday, June 28, 2013

Getting Our Feet Back Under Us...

This past week since we got home it's been so great to see all the neighbors we've been missing, get the house re-stocked with food, finish blog posts about our trip, catch up on emails and bills and mail, get the house somewhat clean, and even have a little time to just plain relax a bit here and there. I think I'm finally mostly caught up on sleep after so many short nights on our road trip.

We've got this year's Loosli Learning Adventures Camp well underway. (details here - this post went viral - hundreds of thousands of reads - nice to see that some things that have worked for us are resonating with lots of other families.) The kids are going full-force on their daily "must-do's" and their summer goals. I have to say it's pretty wonderful to have the kids busily reading, writing, doing little jobs around the house, etc while I do my Power of Moms work for a little while each day.

Here are the kids' goals for what they'll be working on at home at at Bear Lake the rest of this summer (part of the Learning Adventures Camp). They'll get $45 each if they complete all their goals and they're super excited about that. Every year we do this, they get quicker and better at setting measurable, tangible, time-bound goals. They've been really good about working towards these goals every day (and it helps that they need to check off their "practice" point on their "must-do" chart every day). I love seeing the kids moving towards things that are important to them (and to me).






Jared's Father's Day present was season passes for the whole family to a water park. We went with some cousins and had a wonderful day:

Our dear friends and neighbors got back from South Africa and the kids had a great time dressing up as the stars in some Disney Teen Beach movie that's coming out soon and then they put on a few crazy shows for their moms. I sure get to watch a lot of shows around here.

Ashton got to buy this new Nook he's been saving up for forever. He was SO excited when the package came. But then we unearthed his report card that had come in the mail while we were travelling and found some pretty scary grades that didn't go along with what he'd told us we could expect from his grades. So that lovely new Nook has to be put away for a bit while Ashton does takes care of a check list of things he's agreed to do to make up for those grades (write some history reports, meet the presidential fitness requirements for situps, mile-run, etc that he didn't try hard for in PE, etc.). We're all pretty sad about it but he's working hard and hopefully he'll be able to enjoy his Nook soon!

We had a bunch of the kids' favorite little people over for an afternoon of playing/babysitting so their mom could have a break:

Oh, how I love summer!

5 comments:

Tara said...

I love the summer goal sheets! I attended one of the retreats about two years ago and I'm really feeling the need to implement more while my kiddos are still young! Thanks for all the inspiration. Love reading your blog!

kms said...

I feel bad for him. A great experience in delayed gratification and then a big let down.

chercard said...

I think the lesson you taught Ashton is a great one by the way. It's okay for kids to be disappointed, it's a real life experience!

kms said...

It's awesome how they made him "own" this large purchase. It's is the trend. I believe he also did this for a Lego robotics thing? So then they took away the ownership?

I think it's great he is working on some of the subjects he had trouble with.

It's obvious the kid is bright and talented. There also are some frustrations over homework and organization. Could add or a learning difference be going on? Didnt an uncle also deal with a learning difference? This is not a question to answer, much too private.

My son has some special needs. One of the many is ADHD. I sometimes lament that I was frustrated with him about a behavior that is related to his ADHD and other labels he has before we knew. I thought he was being purposefully goofy or disresptectiful. After the doctors identified I realized he couldn't help it "many of those times" since we hadn't been adopting the strategies and redirects necessary. It's still a challenge.

chercard said...

Aren't you glad this is Saren's responsibility to deal with and not yours? She knows her son better than anyone and knows what is best. I know she is extremely capable and is a fantastic Mother!

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