Week in Review - June 26 - July 2, 2011

I have decided to up my workout a bit.  I now have a fairly decent set up in the garage to do a workout without leaving the house.  The only thing we could still use (at my hubby's request) is a weight lifting set.  I am working on not just walking, but jogging.  In my mind I want to last longer, but not necessarily be faster.  You guys all read about our kids....the pics always look good and make them look angelic, but we all know that the real pics are edited and staged.  I should post all the screaming and crying pics for one week.....how funny that would be!  Or even the ones where you actually see a massive mess that always seems to exist no matter what I do.  But anyway....I need to work harder at keeping up with them!!  So I am working at beginning running.  I ran twice this week, on top of other physical activities, and really sore from it.  Next week will keep two days most likely also.  Working in 1.5 mile stretches.  I figure though speed happens as I build up the endurance, so really it all goes hand in hand.  Who knows, by next spring I may be able to actually run the Autism Society Marathon!  Here's our garage workout room....still working on it though:)  But hey...it's a garage and there's no monthly membership fee.

There's an elliptical trainer, Gazelle machine, ball for sit ups and the treadmill.  I added a cheap punching type bag for frustration for me and Joey.  Eventually we are hoping by fall to have the carpeted area inside of its own room.  As you can see a ways to go!

We are also eating healthier...or attempting.  Buying local meat and veggies from a co-op about 10 minutes from the house.  We get our first batch from them on Tuesday, but this week still had to go to the grocery store.  Made gluten free veggie wraps and the hubby actually liked them and said he would eat them again.  Same with the gazpacho topped with seared bay scallops.  He liked both.  YEAH!!!!  Very happy that he is working on his snacking also.

We had a light week this week.  Lydia had Horse Riding Camp all week and had so much fun.  It is the only camp we gave in and paid for this year.  Budget has been tight and sending the kids to all the camps they went to last year (and some they didn't even enjoy) was just not in the picture. 


We are making up for them though because instead of theater camp for two, we are doing Reader's Theater plays with Grandpa and Grandma as our audience and it includes the whole family.  Our first play will be this week and it's The Three Little Pigs.  The kids are getting very excited. 

Instead of Magic School Bus Science Camp, we are going to have our own Science Camp.  The last couple weeks of July and the first week of August we will be doing fun Magic School Bus Activities and that will be it for the day.  Not every day of course, but every other day or so.  I can order all the kits from Amazon and still spend less than two of the kids would cost to go to camp.  I am planning now.

Anyway, lots of games for Caty this week.  She went with me on all the errands and did really well.  We read books.  We worked on Right and left.  We also went Blueberry picking, just Caty and Mom today.  It was really nice.

The boys worked on Coin Math Addition from Math Mammoth.  The continued practicing Grammar from our Summer Bridge workbooks.  They also started daily journals this week.  Each day either they can write or draw about a writing prompt I give them on Fridays it's free choice day.  They can choose what to draw/write about. 

Lydia did not do much with school.  We did reading and some coin/number recognition.  She painted with fizzy paint.  But basically she was exhausted from 3 hours of horse camp each morning.  Which was fine, we were expecting that when I worked on lesson plans.

As a group we continued reading about Jesus life on Earth.  And we finished our Butterfly lapbook.  We also read a new to some of us book and did a review on it.  Chester and the Big Bad Raccoon was an awesome book and I highly recommend it.  It's a great elementary level book on bullies and how a child can handle the issue by seeing an adult.  We did a activity with it that not only allowed us to work with adjectives, but also allowed us to say Positive things about each other.

The girls and Joe spent a lot of time playing in the pool this week.  I had the camera handy this afternoon.  Caty is a little fish and loves to swim when the other kids are not in the pool.  She swims on her back really well.

They both love playing in the Hot tub.  They have Barbies they leave outside just to play in the pool/hot tub with.

Next week, we will be taking Monday and Tuesday off.  Then the rest of week finish up coins with the boys.  We are going to learn how to take better care of the Bearded Dragon...Lollipop (I am making up a study unit tonight about him).  We are going to present our play to Grandpa and Grandma.  Daddy will get his splint off his arm and we are going to go Blueberry picking with some friends.  I may be missing something, but not sure.  Guess we will find out in next week's post!

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND!!!!