Fleur de Lis Homeschool Blog: Jul 6, 2018

Friday, July 6, 2018

June 24-30, 2018 Orthodontics,Lake Michigan, Movies, and Return Cello

June 24-30, 2018

Orthodontics, Rosy Mound Park, Movies, and Return Cello

Hello, Friends!

We are looking forward to Giz and Grampy coming up from Indiana to visit us next week so I tried to get some lessons done with Dd as I know we won't open a book while they are here. We are really looking forward to our summer visit from them!! It is our version of a vacation, such good times with them.

Orthodontics:

Dd teeth have started to buckle a little bit and we thought we'd get an evaluation. Wednesday's appt. went really well; except learning that Dd does indeed need braces and our insurance, of course, doesn't cover any of it!!! The orthodontist, Heather, was extremely likable. By the end of our visit, Dd has decided she wants to be an orthodontist like Heather! That shows just how above average and impressive she is. Dd will have to get her wisdom teeth removed before the next steps can happen. We've got hoops to go through for that--our dentist needs x-rays and Heather sent hard copies and our dentist wants them in an email. Hopefully, our dentist can send a referral soon as they were taking the whole week of July 4th off and we have to wait until they get back to find out who our oral surgeon will be. Dd is very excited to have straight teeth and she has lead this whole process so I don't worry about her taking care of her teeth while they are in the braces for 2 1/2 years.

Kales are doing awesome this year.

Movies:

We went to the movie theater twice in seven days! First, we went to see Hans Solo because we couldn't let a Star Wars movie leave the theaters without seeing it. I don't know why so many people didn't like it--I thought it was pretty good. We all have such super high expectations for a SW movie, which makes it hard to please most. By the end of the week, on Saturday, it was just so sticky hot and we were all so tired we decided to splurge and go to the movies and see the other two movies we wanted to see this summer, back to back!
First, we saw
Jurassic Park - Fallen Kingdom
and then when that was over we walked to the next room to see The Incredibles 2.
We loved Incredibles 2 and especially the scene where Jack, Jack (the baby) fights it out with a neighborhood raccoon! So very funny!!!! We usually only go to the theater once per year, but we decided to make an exception and have a little fun this week!

Lake Michigan:

I've heard about a great park on Lake Michigan called Rosy Mound Park and we finally had a chance to drive out there and see it this week. We took along Lexi for our big adventure. We packed lots of food in our cooler, got our sun umbrella, sunblock...and headed out. It was a beautiful day, but the water was absolutely freezing!!! The girls dunked all the way and swam a bit, but I was content to walk through the water, chest high, as I thought it was just a bit too cold. I also wanted to keep my sunhat on to avoid the full blast of the afternoon sun.

We saw lots of natural highlights as this park, Rosy Mound, goes through a Back Dune which had a whole forest and lots of fun things to see. We hiked the 30 minutes from the parking lot to the beach after deciding to have our picnic later. We quickly wished we had brought our food along as we all got so hungry! We had to walk all the way back, many, many steps and stairs later to have our lunch in the parking lot. We found a bench beside the woods, shaded, and ate there. Afterward, we drove to our normal Lake Michigan park--Kirk Park--but the crowds there were horrendous so we drove back to the quieter Rosy Mound and re-hiked our way to the beach again. Both Dd and I had sore muscles the next day; it was a really steep hike up and down so many dunes.

We returned the rented cello this week...bummer.

Cello:

Dd had her last cello lesson with Lucy and we returned the cello back to the music store. It was regrettable that we had planned to treat Dd with four lessons during her month of having a cello, but her teacher had a family emergency last week so we only had three lessons. Dd did really well with the cello but doesn't feel like she will have the time to practice the piano, violin, AND cello. Apparently, she is staying with the violin---unspoken but understood. I'm sure the instructor has a little to do with the decision as well. Our violin teacher, Christie, is really a perfect fit for our personalities.

The Swiss Chard is doing really well!!! So are all the onions that I can't eat that Dh wanted me to plant for him.

Chickens:

Zeus is still having seizures and I am carrying him up and out of the inner coop each morning and down each night. He doesn't seem to be in any pain and the seizures, though frequent, don't last long. I'm doing a great job bringing in all sorts of weeds, especially duckweed and dandelions, for them each day, often throughout the day. I have to admit it is a nice treat for me to "have" to go for a walk in the woods to gather greens for them!

The spinach bed is dwindling down, I'm hoping it will "bolt" and it will form seeds soon for me to harvest for a later planting and for next years spring planting. I've never tried to harvest spinach seeds before, so I am figuring this out.

Sharona, the brooding Amber Link, is still being a crazy hen. I keep pulling her out and forcing her to eat and drink. It is odd because when I push her out with the other hens she acts totally aggressive and dominates the other hens. She clucks and clucks and puts on quite the show when out of the nest box.

The tomato plants to left of the compost are doing well.

Hot Chickens:

It was SO hot I refilled the chicken's water twice a day a few days this week. The chickens don't seem to be appreciating this hot humid weather. I've been having three big water cans in the top coop and one in the bottom inner coop, so they have lots of access to water. I've also been spraying water in the coop from our hose.

The tomato plants I planted out by the compost are all growing well. I always think plants need lots of care, but these guys are showing me just how well they do on their own.

One of the four gutters I cleaned this week.

Gutter Day:

Two of our gutters were un-attaching themselves from our house and outbuilding, so I had the joy of repairing and cleaning gutters this week. I was SO pleased to not find bee's nests in any of the gutters this time around. Normally, I've found at least one nest in a gutter, if not two. Luckily, I only needed to hammer in the long nails to re-secure the gutters, but, I did put in two screws in one spot that I wanted to be sure was very secure. Another gutter was completely jammed up with pine needles, our nemesis here, and the whole gutter was full to the brim with water. I'm sure we were breeding mosquitoes without our knowledge. I'm glad that chore is done, although I know they will be full again in two months since we are surrounded with Spruce trees. I never knew why it was so important to clean out the gutters, but I found out this week. When the gutters are full the weight pulls them away from the building---go figure! I had no clue.

Grapes doing fine

Garden:

We have hit our greens high spot for the year and now I need to start blanching and freezing as many greens as I can before the bugs come in and start bringing my harvest down. Hopefully, I can start that next week. I've seen some damage this week and took up my arsenal to a higher level. This year, instead of just picking off all the worms and buggies I'm trying a homemade 'insecticidal soap' by adding some dish soap to a spray bottle of water. I'm not sure how much it has helped, but I have been able to avoid chemicals this far in life. The earwigs and slugs have been very busy in our early garden, now the green worms have been showing up, eating our kales. We have some green tomatoes starting up! I'm still planting-- this week I planted some Rosemary seed and Spinach seeds.

Dd's sunflowers are coming up nicely

Growth/Transplant:

The herbs we had planted in one of the potato beds had been buried by the potato plants, so I dug them out and found space in the designated 'Herb Bed.' I thought I had a ton of oregano, but come to find out, that plant was not oregano, but a weed!!! With all the weeds removed we had room for 4 Purple Basil plants and 1 Thyme.

Truck:

We finally picked up the truck after being at the repair shop for the past 3-4 weeks. It needed a new transmission and fuel lines. It had been at the shop back in May getting the wheel barring fixed. It drove for about a week before it broke down again. What a surprise for us to get these monstrous truck bills--we just paid almost as much as we paid for the truck on this summers repairs. Since we bought this truck 2-3 years ago we have had to fix everything but the motor; everything--literally. The bonus is that we practically have a new truck at this point. Maybe it will run for a few months before breaking down again. We really found a dud on this auto choice. The Camry is still in our garage, no hope on it's repair any time soon.