Grasshopper Days

Grasshopper Days

For today,  November 7, 2011

Outside my window...  our beautiful fall leaves are nearly gone, glad I got some pictures I'll share later.  Beautiful frost in the mornings, lately, and... snow on the hill at the end of the lake.  Brrr!

I am thinking...  48 days until Christmas, but no pressure ;D

I am thankful for...  the boys like hand-me-downs, especially from Uncle Dave.

I am praying for...  work, peace, and wisdom.

I am wearing...  jeans, blue sweater, brand new Keens I scored at Value Village for twenty bucks.

I am creating...  I've been discouraged every week when I see this prompt because I have nothing to share.  But now?  Music :D

I am going...  to Messiah rehearsal tonight.

I am reading...  I've had very little time to read for me, but am enjoying reading to the boys.  Since vacation we've read Pedro's Journal, by Pam Conrad; Walk the World's Rim, by Betty Baker, a biography of Martin Luther; The Broken Blade, by William Durbin; and we're about to begin Wintering (the sequel).  We've read The Broken Blade a few years ago and the boys loved it, so I'm taking advantage of our study of explorers to read it again, and tie it in (loosely) with Jacques Cartier.  Though the story takes place in 1800, and Montreal is well settled, most of the land is still wild and uninhabited except by Indians and fur traders.  Pierre, a thirteen year-old boy, becomes a voyageur, traveling up the Ottawa River, through Lake Huron and Lake Superior, and back home again.

I am hoping...  to tie up a mess of loose ends this week.  Arrrrgh.

I am hearing...  the dryer tumbling.  Laundry.  Seems like the soundtrack of my life some days.

I am remembering...  lists, lists, and more lists.  Or else I am forgetting!

From the learning rooms...  graphing equations, barometric pressure, Sir Francis Drake, pinnipeds, the relationships between self-supported statements and supported statements, colons and semi-colons, reading the Constitution, and winding up with fossils.

From the kitchen...  I'm off the hook tonight!  We had a wonderful, double birthday lunch at my brother and sister-in-law's, and she sent the leftovers home with us!  I'd call it lasagna, but she made it with ziti.  Delicious.  We celebrated my mom - Grandma Grasshopper's - birthday, and... be still my beating heart... my Tater-bug will be THIRTEEN on Wednesday!

And you know what that means?  (Besides the fact that I'm beginning to see the shadow of a mustache...)

In four days, he'll be  leaving for Disneyland! 

My sister and brother hatched a plan back when Wyatt was twelve, to take each boy to Disneyland when he turns thirteen.  Wyatt had a fabulous trip, and Tate has been patiently biding his time.  Soon!

Around the house...  I think fall is my favorite season.  I'll share some pics of the house and yard later in the week.

Something I want to remember later...  Gunnar, giddy and excited about his math, saying,

I feel like Einstein!

On my mind...  that the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, are three different things.

Noticing that...  time flies.  Oh boy.

Pondering these words...   Time flies like an arrow.  Fruit flies like a banana.

One of my favorite things...  a clean kitchen.

A few plans for the rest of the week...  schooling - of course, rehearsal tonight, CAP tomorrow night, Tate's actual birthday on Wednesday (probably pizza lunch, thanks to Pizza Hut's Book-It program :D ), and getting Tate ready to leave on his big trip Friday morning!

Here is a picture I am sharing...  

It's been awhile...

... May 2007.