September wrap up!

So September has been a busy month!  Nothing too major or unexpected, but as school and all the "school year" activities begin again, the pace of life just seems to go up to the next level!  Since that usually means fewer blog posts, here are a few of the highlights of a fun, enjoyable month!

We spent many afternoons at the beach!  Since moving to the area almost 10 years ago, Steve and I have found that fall brings some of the best beach weather of the year!  And it's generally not as crowded at the beach to make it even better!  All three kids love the water, and it is enjoyable to take advantage of living so close to great beaches!

One more from the beach!  This time it was later in the afternoon and we intended to just go for a walk by the water and let the kids play at the playground!  All three ended up in the water!

 

Shane is playing soccer!  His team name is the Vikings, and they are doing very well!  After last year's experience, we are grateful for a coach who shows up and plans practices so that the kids can actually learn a thing or two!  Shane is enjoying playing and enjoying the boys on his team!  Also this fall Faith is taking ballet, and she is also dancing in the Nutcracker!  She is loving dance, and we see little glimpses of her role as a snowflake in the Nutcracker as she dances around the house!

 

With school in full swing again, our homeschool co-op also started up!  This year in addition to the class days twice a month, there are field trips on the other two Fridays.  Our first field trip was to a farm (the same farm the kids go to for farm camp each summer!) to do some apple picking.  And of course see the animals too!  Olivia was a huge fan of the piglets!!

 

Here is Shane in the apple orchard.  He ate three apples before we even left the farm!

 

A few other cute pics that I couldn't resist posting!

 

Trip to the Big House!

Last Saturday we spent the day at the Big House!  What a thrill it was for me to share with Faith and Shane something that was part of my childhood and something that in general I just love!  Thankfully the forecasted rain held off, and it was a fun-filled day of football! 

 

Before heading to the stadium we had a tailgate picnic in the lumberyard parking lot!  Couldn't resist having our picture taken in front of this party bus painted to look like a Michigan helmet!

 

The next stop was the band practice facility.  We were able to see the band come out and line up and go through their final check by the drum major.  They then stepped (seemingly all at once!!) from the sidewalk and onto the street to march toward the stadium!  What an incredible sight!  The pageantry of it all is indescribable!

 

After marching behind the band to the stadium, we finally were inside the gates and ready to head inside the Big House!!

 

Shane and Grandpa at the game!  Sitting with 106,000 other loud, excited, cheering Michigan fans!

 

Go Blue!  What an incredibly fun day!  And it sure helped too that Michigan played well and won big!  Hail to the Victors!

Michigan Trip - Part 2

Here are some of the other highlights from the trip...almost every day the kids rode bikes around the yard and on the driveway.  Faith and Aunt Betsy even ventured out on the street for a ride around the 'hood!

 

When we first arrived in Michigan, the weather was hot and humid.  While this makes great weather for going to the pool, unfortunately it also is prime thunderstorm weather!  I love a good thunderstorm and always hope to have one while we are there!  The first day we went to the pool the sky started looking darker as we got closer to the pool, and sure enough it arrived just as we did!  We tried to wait it out by having lunch.  Sadly, we ended up having to go home without swimming as it was a long storm!  The next day we tried again!  This time the kids were in the pool for about an hour and 15 minutes before we were told that yet another thunderstorm was on the way and the pool was closing!  But the time was well spent as Shane discovered the joy of jumping off the diving board!

 

Olivia loved the kids area, but of course she too wanted to swim in the big pool with the older kids!  She kept saying "beach! beach!" as she thought that since she was swimming we must be at the beach!  It was pretty adorable!

 

Another adventure was visiting the John Ball Zoo!  While the kids had fun feeding the birds, petting goats, and visiting all the animals they have seen in the past, a highlight was viewing the new tiger exhibit!  Those cats were huge and very impressive (and scary!!).

 

Olivia and Grandma walking together at Grandma's zoo!

 

The Children's Museum is also another place on the "must visit" list!  Faith enjoyed performing for us and the other guests a rendition of "Row Row Row Your Boat".

 

Olivia had a ton of fun, especially pretending to withdraw money from the bank!!

 

 

Faith waited patiently to pay for her groceries.

Trip to Michigan - Part 1!

We are back home from another fun trip to Michigan.  Over the 9 days that we were there we went on many adventures - some the same as in years past and others brand new!  One of the places that we always like to visit is the Fredrick Meijer Gardens.  We even went twice on this trip to see different parts.  The first time all three kids went, and they played in the Great Lakes with the boats, walked through the children's garden, and went on a hunt in the sensory garden. 

 

The obligatory picture in front of the children's garden entrance.  This was the first picture with all three kids as last summer Olivia did not make the trek to the gardens!

 

Olivia loved the tree house in the children's garden as she ran through the entire tree house!  She did stop for about 30 seconds to have a quick tea party with Aunt Betsy!

 

The second trip to the gardens was just for the older two kids, and we visited a section of the gardens I have never seen before - the sculpture park.  I was amazed at the number of sculptures there as well as the variety of the art!  In the picture above the kids are sitting next to Fred and Lena Meijer for whom the gardens are named. 

 

The featured sculpture of the gardens is the DiVinci horse.  Originally designed and created in clay by DiVinci himself, the large sculpture that he intended to create never happened because a war depleted the money of the duke who was funding the project.  Also, the clay model was destroyed, and it wasn't until about 50 years ago that the drawings of the horse were discovered.  Fred Meijer paid an American artist to create the sculpture from DiVInci's plans; two horses were made.  One is here in the gardens, and the other is in Milan, the original place DiVinci and the duke planed for it to be.  It is a massive piece of art as you can see how the size compares to the two kids!!

 

We took a tram ride around the sculpture park to see many of the sculptures as well as hear the descriptions of them and any history surrounding them.  It was a very interesting ride!  Faith just loved it!  She definitely has an interest in the arts!

 

This was one of the kids' favorite sculptures!  It's called Mad Mom!!  So we were all trying to look mad as we posed by it!  When asked the kids did say that their mom does get mad at times!  We look forward to visiting in the winter to see the Christmas trees from around the world.

First Day of School

Today marked the first day of third grade for Faith and kindergarten for Shane!  While I think we could all use another month of summer vacation, we needed to get started per our charter school!  And everyone else in Ventura is starting too, so it made it more bearable!

 

Since it was the first day, there was quite a bit of eagerness and excitement and cooperation!  While I hope the excitement will last at least through the week, I do know that the entire year will not go as smoothly as today did!

 

Shane was thrilled to be given actual work to do after watching Faith over the years!  He did well and commented that kindergarten is pretty easy so far!

 

For each of the kids, I break the school work into three parts: On your own, with your sibling, and with mom.  The with your sibling assignments I think are going to be special as it puts Faith in charge of reading something (and of course commenting and asking questions, done totally on her own!) to Shane!  Today she read his Bible story to him.  It's also great to see Faith being able to do so much more of her work independently!  It's going to be a great year!!

Soaking Up Summer!

In an effort to soak up as much sun and beach time as possible in the last week before school started, we went to the beach four times!  Living so close makes it easy to just venture over for a couple hours or more!  The kids continue to savor their time there, and it's enjoyable to watch the older two kids start to learn how to navigate in the ocean waters!

 

Steve was able to join us Friday and Sunday afternoons since he was off of work!  It was way more fun having him there of course, and it was nice for him to swim with Faith as it allowed her to venture out a little bit deeper than I would allow her to on her own.  And he showed her how to dive into waves and other important ocean swimming skills!

 

Olivia was pretty excited that a wave created this personalized mini pool in which she could splash! 

Faith and Shane running back into the ocean!  Faith was pretty much in the water the entire two hours we were at the beach yesterday!  We are hopeful to squeeze a trip or two in this week too! 

A Saturday to Remember!

This past Saturday Shane had his final t-ball game for the season.  While the A's were not the most skilled team in the YMCA league, they definitely had fun!  Since soccer practice has already begun, it felt like it was time to wrap up the season!  Shane finished strong by having his two best hits of the season in the final game!  And the best part about the season coming to a close was the pizza party after the game! 

 

If that was not enough excitement for one day, Grandma Poelstra and her three sisters (two of whom are from out of state) drove up to visit us!  We made sure that they had the complete Ventura county experience as we ate dinner at Padaro Beach Grill!

 

Having just spent a few weeks with her own grandchildren, Aunt Sonja knew the best way to entice that kids to sit by her at dinner was to order a malt!  And of course it totally worked!

 

Seeing how successful Sonja was, Aunt Sylvia took Faith with her to order a malt too!  Again, the kids followed the ice cream and enjoyed sitting by Sylvia!  It was a treat to see all of the aunts again and hear all about their kids and grandkids!  What a great day!!