If you’ve never seen Aloha Friday then here is the run down from Island Life….

In Hawaii, Aloha Friday is the day that we take it easy and look forward to the weekend. So I thought on Fridays I would take it easy on posting too. Therefore, I’ll ask a simple question for you to answer. Nothing that requires a lengthy response.

If you would like to participate, just post your own question on your blog and leave the link below. Don’t forget to visit the other participates! It’s a great way to make new bloggy friends!

Now on to my question of the week:

What’s been your favorite thing you have done this summer so far?

For me it’s been having the kids in swim lessons!  Origionally we were only going to put them in one session, but ended up putting them in 2 sessions and am amazed at how well they are both doing!  The first day Kevin was doggie paddling.  Now he is learning to dive and is able to swim without a floation device.  Katie’s first class was more just getting used to the water, but now being in level two she is getting the hang of using her arms & legs (she needs to learn to use her legs more) and the other day ended up jumping off the diving board without a floation device!  She did need some help back, but she is getting there!

While looking for a Sunday Meme to do.. I ended up coming across Straight Out Of the Camera from Murrieta 365. It’s actually quite fun because it’s another picture meme where you can show off what pictures you have taken. The only thing is you can’t do any tweaking or altering, but that’s ok with me as I usually don’t do that anyways. 

I ended up getting a new camera this week and have had so much fun taking pictures with it, I hope you don’t mind that I have more than 2 picture.  

I hope you have a wonderful 4th of July!!

This time though I’m going to take a picture of Kevin sleeping in hopes of catching the tooth fairy.   Thanks to Steve from Catch a Character who wrote on my last post about Kevin loosing a tooth I found out there is a way I will be able to catch the tooth fairy!!  I am so looking forward to using his services to capture her and will let you know how it all turns out!

I then got Katie ready and took her to school, then my 2 1/2 hrs of free time arrived!!  I first went to the bank to not only get money out for garage saling, but also to get 2 golden $1 coins.  My sister gave my nephew one last month when he lost his first tooth, so Kevin was all excited to get one.   After stopping at the bank, I did a little grocery shopping, but before I did that I just had to stop at this garage sale that sounded oh so good on Craigslist, but with all the rain I wasn’t sure if it would be open or not.

I ended up finding the street it was suppose to be on and saw a different garage sale so I stopped.  If only I was into the stamping stuff.. I probably would of made a killing.  Instead I ended up getting some books for Katie and Kevin.  I was excited about the one book for Kevin as it was a level 3 book about a karate mystery!  It sounded just up Kevin’s alley.  I then left in hopes of finding the sale that sounded perfect for Katie. 

Thankfully I printed off the ad off  Craigslist otherwise I wouldn’t of known they were having one.  While they did have the outdoor furniture they had for sale outside they only had one of their garage doors open with no signs.   I was thinking it would be a bonus for me as then they weren’t going to be picked over.   Needless to say I was quite bummed that all I found was a couple shirts for Katie and that was it.   Here I did better at the sale that I got the books for the kids.

After dropping off the groceries back at home and then picking up Katie from school, her & I decided to do some more garage saling.  I’m glad we did as her & I had a fun time at a neighborhood sale!  I really didn’t get to much, but found some more clothes for her, a few for Kevin and the Harry Potter movie Kevin had been wanting.   Needless to say Kevin was excited when he got home… not just for the cool  clothes I got him or the spider-man coloring book, or the books, but he was really excited that he now has a Harry Potter movie.

Since then, the sun popped out and turned really nice.  To bad now it’s starting to look a little dreary out there.  I know they were talking another chance of rain and a possibility on severe storms with a chance of a tornado.   At least if one did come, my kids are home with me so I know they will be ok.

Now I just hope tomorrow stays nice like they say it will.  If so, I think the kids & I are going to go hit another neighborhood garage sale!  Hopefully we will find some more good treasures!

My goal for this summer is to not just have a fun/enjoyable summer with them, but also to do some homeschooling.   I’m hoping to get Katie reading more than just Zac the Rat from starfall.com and of course continue her learning how to write all her letters and numbers.  With Kevin our plan (him and I already talked about it) is to do writers workshop (write stories and draw pictures) along with his reading, math & spelling.

Why do I have a feeling this summer will go by just as fast as this school year did?

So what did we do last week?!? 

Monday ~ As far as I remember, Monday was just a normal day here and then at night Kevin had Karate. 

Tuesday ~ We ended up having some friends over for dinner.   We grilled up Paul’s famous Venison Wraps and fried up some of Paul’s turkey that he shot the week prior.   After dinner we sat around talking for awhile before heading out to the back yard and had our first fire for the year.  You couldn’t of asked for nicer weather… the heat from the fire warmed you up and there were NO MOSQUITOES!!  

Wednesday ~ We started hauling stuff over to my sister’s as we were going to be having a garage sale there this weekend.  Around 3:30 we just about had it all set up and started asking why not just open it up now to see how we would do and we were surprised at the number of people who showed.  Honestly, I think that was my best day selling and we were only open for 2 1/2 hours.

Thursday ~ Got the kids off to school and went to my sister’s and helped with the garage sale.    It was actually a slower day.. a lot of people coming in the morning, but just walking through and leaving without buying anything.   Then around 2 it started picking up and people were buying things, except it also started looking a little dark.  Carl went inside to find out that rain was indeed on the way and since most of our stuff was outside and we started feeling the sprinkles we decided to close up and hauled as much as we could into the barn and covered everything else while my Dad went to pull down the sale signs.   What was nice was since we closed early and it was a slower day I wasn’t to tired to take Kevin to Karate, so that’s what we did at night.

Friday ~ Another day spent over at my sister’s house.  Let me just way the kids had so much fun since they weren’t at school.  By the afternoon they were looking a little on the tired side so my sister threw in a Little House on the Prairie DVD and let them just veg for a little while.  Of course it wasn’t to long and the boys were back outside playing.  It was once again another slow selling day and we just figured it was due to there are so many sales on Thursdays & Fridays.   So we decided to skip having it Saturday and doing it Tuesday and Wednesday of this week instead.  Of course now they are talking rain on Wednesday.  Oh joy!

Saturday ~ Paul ended up taking the kids to our friends house (who was over on Tuesday) so they could feed their fish and while they were doing that, I finally was able to go grocery shopping!  Now I know why I like grocery shopping during the week instead of on the weekend!  Not only were there more people there, but things I wanted were sold out as well.  I got home and Paul and the kids were still gone so I had fun (seriously I did) picking up/cleaning and having it stay that way.  It’s amazing how much faster you can clean without the helpers in the house.   I couldn’t help but think is this what it’s going to be like in a couple years with both are in school full days?!?

Sunday ~ We did our normal going over to my parents house for lunch!  Even though I’ve seen them all week long, it was still enjoyable to go over there to have some more adult conversation.  But this is what I did learn yesterday when I was over there….

Yup… Kevin’s 2 new bottom teeth are coming in before his others ones fell out.    Here I couldn’t wait until he lost his first tooth, but how sad knowing he won’t have that empty feeling because his other ones are already coming in.  I guess this is common.. just that I never heard of it before.  I did call his dentist this morning and they said for us to wiggle it a lot in hopes that it comes out on it’s own.  If not, then I’m suppose to call back again next week and they more than likely will end up pulling it.   So time will tell I guess.

Anyways.. tha’ts what we have been up to.  This week will be just as crazy, but I’ll try to post more often.