End of August

We are getting closer and closer to fall...and cooler temperatures. It's so great.

Info day- it was raining so hard that day. 

Dominic started kindergarten in public school. And the transition...was neither easy nor good. He struggled....and still is. I have been taking him into the actual school and staying for morning announcements (the whole school gathers the first 15min for announcements and songs). He also has been dealing with a kid in his class that gets too rough. We are working on saying "no" and "stop"....but it's not working as fast as I thought it would. For now, the teacher and I have agreed to separate them at all times. The third day of school, he actually came out crying...which broke my heart. So, there's a lot of praying and fasting going on. This is a trial semester. If he can't sit down and enjoy his class, we may move him to private school.

First day

Makes me sad, because I transferred him from his district school, because this one had higher ratings (and hoping to avoid THESE situations). And also makes me mad, that maybe he should have been in the charter school, but it never worked out for us.

Spencer was able to come

Ethan will start school after Labor Day, and he says he's excited, but who knows? He deals with situations way better than Dom. Dom has genuine anxiety issues, while Ethan kinda just flows with whatever is going on. He's excited to have a backpack and lunch. He'll love it there. He will only go two days a week....perfect for both of us. He'll get spanish, music, recess, snack time, and the basics.

In the classroom

Spencer has been working super hard and finally finished his hospital job. He's off the hook for nights. He found a job an hour away willing to pay him the same for working days,....that's a no brainer. He took it and he actually loves it. It's in a small town, where people are homey and work as a group. He likes being part of the group haha. In the city hospital where he was, he felt like a number and there was no communication between nurses, midlevels, and physicians. So, this is a nice change for him. He loves taking care of his new patients....and has actually brought a lot of knowledge to the team. It's a good fit. They really needed someone with more acute care experience. We are so happy, he is home for dinner and  night time prayers.

We got crazy with the board this month

I am doing the same thing I always do- mom stuff. The garden was a pain this august, espeically all the vines. Since we lost the watermelon, I focused on my pumpkins. Then it rained...for three days...and for whatever reason, our clay soil did not dry fast enough rotting most of the roots and whatever else was there. We went from 8 vines....to 2. And the two are barely hanging....I'm just hoping to keep them alive at this point. I"m not even working to get fruit out of it. But we do have more veggies coming our way...the jalapeno plant is in full mode...holy cow...maybe about 25 jalapenos every couple of weeks. It's insane. And they were spicy. I mean...I like spicy stuff, but I can't eat these as fast as the plant spits them out. So, I have been giving most of them away. I"m always hoping for a salsa garden, but the darn onions NEVER sprout. BUT, my tomatoes, are doing really well. The grape tomato plant is still in full motion- probably because the tiny tomatoes are easy to grow and mature so much faster. The heirloom tomato plant, has only given me like 8 tomatoes. I was hoping for so many more, but I figured since the summer was so HOT and you need a lot of water to make tomatoes (I mean most of them are water)....I will take what I can get. We were lucky to not have a lot of pests this year. For now, I can see tiny little bell peppers coming out of my bell pepper plant. The cucumber vine is alive, but we think it is done. It's just relaxing- its hard work spitting 11 cucumbers over the summer. She deserves a break. 

tiny bell peppers

Found 5 more on both plants!

I'm already thinking about what I will plant next year, and where it will go. Clearly, the pumpkins should not stay where they are....and they cannot handle full OK sun.

Beginning of the month

Today....pitiful. Not even Epsom salt is helping

We also had someone paint the gray trim and garage door. We were so fed up with all the gray on the outside of the house, and we were hoping to do it ourselves. But Spencer is always so busy, and we just didn't have the right tools for the job (including a very tall ladder, and spray gun). So, we decided to just save and opted for someone to come do it...and it looks great. We have to change our front door now, because that color is ugly next to the new colors on the house. We thought about painting it, but it's so dinged and battered, that a new one would just look better.

Trip to the home improvement store

We will probably have to make a trip to the habitat restore and find a door there. They'll be cheaper, and probably way nicer than what we have...which was probably original to the house.

We got a quote this month to maybe get a nice covered patio...but it was way too much. So, we decided to leave it alone, and that will probably because a wish list item for our new home (whenever the time comes). That money could easily be spent fixing up the rest of the house, including landscape.

The trim and garage door was gray when we bought the house.

Middle of the project

Did the garage door too

You can see the white trim on the left....and gray trim in the middle and right. The white really brightens  things up.

Final project

We are also in the process of getting a mantle...we finally found someone to custom make one for us...(that was hard to find! who knew?)....so THAT and a few touch ups around the house (including new closet doors and cute little home decor projects) will be our projects for September. It's the little touch ups that go a long way.....