2016 Memories

As I’m updating my blog and getting it a bit more streamlined, I’m combining all of my memories posts for the year into a post for the year, so here is my 2016 Memories for the year.

Yep, it’s that specific.

And, as I copy posts over there are probably affiliate links in here.

January

Or that’s what it’s felt like.  The first week Jeff was off of work, so we were continuing our games marathon.  The two we’ve played so far, Shadows of Brimstone*, and Favor of The Pharaoh* both got played a couple of more times.

But, before Superman fell sick with his epic sickness of pneumonia, we got the kids a little more moved in to their new room, and it’s looking a quite a bit neater, if cluttered.  We’re still working on the getting rid of stuff and organizing, but that has been thrown off by the pneumonia.

And for everyone who’s asked, Superman is feeling better-ish, but everyone I talked to says pneumonia is a slow recovery process with lots of setbacks, and that’s what we saw this week.  He was listless on Sunday, had energy enough on Monday to go to Trail Life, but was wiped out on Tuesday so he just listened to lessons…  It’s been a very up and down week.

In between cuddling a sick boy, I sewed a ball gown for the “Old South” ball I’m going to tomorrow.  I made a swiss waist (which is what a visible corset is called), a chemise, and a skirt for the ball.  I also learned how to make a Civil War era hair pieces.  As of when I’m typing this, I haven’t quite finished the skirt.  I’m figuring out how to make a chevron panel for the last panel because I was a bit short on fabric and don’t want to skimp on the fullness with the hoop skirt.  If you’re following me on instagram, then you’ve seen a few shots of it in progress from time to time.

But did we accomplish much with school?

Not really.  We spent a lot of time at doctor’s offices this month.  Superman had 3 appointments in 2 weeks.  Batman had 3 specialists appointments (physical therapy and dermatologist to remove a planter’s wart), Princess had a tooth removed (her grown up tooth was growing in where her baby tooth still was), and I suddenly broke out in hives and had to get that taken care of.  For our family that usually only goes to the doctor for well check visits, it’s been difficult.  I have a whole new level of respect for those of you homeschooling with sick kiddos or chronic illness.

February

I almost forgot to give an update of our general life.  February was a month of busy weekends, we had one weekend free, and ended up using that weekend to help a friend move (that’s two of the pictures up there).  Another weekend was the father/daughter dance and Princess quite happily posed with Jeff for pictures.  We also spent one morning helping the camp the kids have gone to several times, they were caught in the Bastrop fires last fall, and so we helped repair cabins that hadn’t been caught in the fire.  They’re going to have to find completely new land for the camp until the land grows back.

And for a bit of fun, here’s the games we played this month:

• Kings of Israel– and here’s my Kings of Israel review if you’re curious
• Shadows of Brimstone– my boys are ridiculously obsessed with this
• Geopuzzle– the kids have been randomly putting them together when bored
• Favor of Pharaoh– I love the combination of Dominion game and Yahtzee
• Smash Up– my boys play this a lot with their friends, Smash Up review

March

Let’s see…..  This month, the boys turned 11, and I was in a bit of shock they are now this old.  We went on a couple of field trips this month, but an especially memorable field trip was to a rescue horse farm and the kids were all allowed to ride as much as they wanted and pet the various animals in their petting zoo.  Princess was in heaven.

Speaking of Princess, she was supposed to have a campout with AHG, but the weather rebelled, and so we went for the day (the picture of her on the bridge) and had a Mommy/daughter campout in the backyard a day or so later when it had dried out.  That was considered sufficient for now.

And since bluebonnets are out in force and all the rain from this fall has ensured a great crop of them, I’ve been grabbing random bluebonnet pictures as I’ve been able to.  Once I’ve got them editted I’m sure I’ll be putting up my 2016 bluebonnet pictures to go with all of the past years.

I don’t know why I thought I was going to be able to get this out on Wednesday with guests here, but for some reason I thought that was going to happen.  Boy was I insane.

April

Part of why life got so busy and distracted, is we had the boys’ birthday party a week or so ago, and I insisted the house be clean.

That same day we had a big huge field trip to Lysts on the Lake and got to see real jousting, which the kids all enjoyed, and they found lots of wild onions, which we just cooked into a meal last night.  These were rather small wild onions, so a lot of them did not give much food, but they sure had a strong pleasant smell.

Oh and my dog found an opossum during the boys party and was quite upset I didn’t let him get into an all out brawl with the furiously hissing creature.

And then the Monday right after was our homeschool group’s demonstration day, and the kids each had a report they wrote for that, so we took an entire week to work on their writing, and how to research online, and put together a presentation.  It was a stressful if rewarding week.