Time flies

I hadn't realized so much time had passed.  Lots to catch up on...

The boys are back in school.  Bear does love school.  Thank goodness.  He is doing well.  There are always the bad days too but overall he is well behaved.  We are coming up on parent teacher conferences already.  Man, time really does fly!  It will be interesting to see what his teacher has to say.  He says he really likes science, math, and reading.  Sounds about right.  He is very interested in the natural and real world.  For example if he sees a house fly it isn't just a fly but a "blue-bottle house fly."  How he remembers it all I don't know.  He loves to watch Wild Kratts and from that he learns all sorts of names of the critters.  Another good example of his desire to know more about the natural world was when we were picking raspberries at the u-pick farm and he wanted to know what the little white thing was that gets left behind when you pick a raspberry.  He asked the gal who ran the farm and she told him, calyx (maybe?  I don't remember for sure).  He asks lots of questions about the world.

Tom is super busy with school as well.  He has his class and he is helping to run the recruitment program for international students.

I am trying to catch up on a few things now that I am not running a farmers' market for the moment. My garden did not get attended to so it needs cleaned up.  The chickens will need their coop cleaned again before the weather turns.  Goats (yes, we got goats) will need more straw for their bedding, and I need to get their hay tarped better.  My current tarp is old and worn out and not big enough.

We got our firewood in and hay in.  Those costs are making this month a bit more difficult money-wise but should help in the long-run.  We also bought half of a hog so our grocery bill is down.  That is nice.

Mia is growing like a weed and learning at a rapid pace.  Big brother is a great teacher and she seems determined to keep up with him.  They love challenging each other with math problems and she is working on reading.  She has three-letter words down pretty well and she sounds the longer words out well.  The hardest part is remembering to read left to right not right to left.  In watching her I think we may have to come up with some extra school stuff for her.  She will be very happy to go to preschool next year.

As it is a young lady's quiet time I think I'll see if I can actually get her to nap.  She has decided that most days she'd rather not.  Mom would so love it if she kept naps for a while yet.