The Saturday 7

1. School's out!! Let the fun begin! We had a half day yesterday, and now I have a 10th grader, 7th grader, and 4th grader. When I took Lucy's "last day of school" picture, I realized I'm only going to do that 3 more times! 😳😭 As for me, next year I'll be working two days in the library and two days in Development. My co-librarian officially retired so I'm technically the head librarian now. Although my new co-librarian will be working the three days I'm not there, so she'll have more time in the library than I do. Haha. Development still scares me, but I'm going to set my mind to it and do what needs to be done.

First/Last Day pics: I don't think any of them changed that drastically this year . . .

2. We don't have any big plans for the summer. We have our traditional cousin fun days planned of course, but mostly we're going to stay home and not spend money. I need to come up with a solid plan of summer expectations before Monday - rules about screen time, ways for them to earn screen time, and any intentional learning I want to happen. I'm panicking a little about Lucy growing up and moving away and not being ready for the real world - practically, but also spiritually. I'm thinking about doing a book study or something with her, but I don't even know where to begin. 

3. As for me, I'm having a Summer of Self-Control. It's going to be a blast. Basically that boils down to: no phone games, no Dr Pepper (unless we're at a restaurant), being productive at home, and forcing myself to exercise a little. I lost 20 pounds last spring thanks to my stomach problems, but now that my stomach is behaving itself, I've gained all 20 and then some back. My knees are starting to hurt, my pants don't fit, and I always look 6 months pregnant. I'm going to be 40 in 4 months. I have to start being a little more responsible with my health. #lame 

4. We started a new book club at church this week, reading the book The Abolition of Man by C.S. Lewis. Whew. It's a doozy! The man was brilliant, but not particularly succinct. We read the first 20 pages, and I took 5 pages of handwritten notes - mostly so I could work it out for myself. When I first read the section, I was completely flummoxed, but working through each section and researching the parts I didn't understand (Coleridge's Waterfall? What?) helped so much! When I thought I had a good grasp on it, I asked ChatGPT to summarize the first 20 pages for me. . . . and my understanding matched his! Of course, he articulated himself much more eloquently than I did, but I was proud of myself for figuring it out, and not cheating by using ChatGPT from the get-go. C.S. Lewis would very much frown upon that!

5. I finished the book I was reading to my 5th graders last week, so I scrambled a bit to find a way to entertain them for 45 minutes this week. After a little Pinteresting, I settled on blackout poetry. I purposely picked up some random old books last time I went to Embrace, with the intent of using them for crafts or something, and they were perfect for this project. (#hoardingforthewin) Lena and I made a couple samples, and while I'm not nearly as artistic as the Pinterest crowd, it was way more fun than I expected!

I painstakingly went through each book and ripped out pages that had the fewest possible words for 5th grade boys to use inappropriately. (Of course the main character in one of the books was Dick, and Black Michael was frequently mentioned in another book.) I was pleasantly surprised by how much the fifth graders enjoyed it! Some of their poetry made no sense - I'm pretty sure they just chose random words without any forethought. But some of them did great with it! Of course, 5th grade boys will be 5th grade boys, and an innocent page from Alice in Wonderland became this: 

Alice murdering
Off with [his] head
Savage Alice

I was actually pretty impressed. At least he didn't illustrate it!🤷 😂

6. One of my goals for this summer is to enroll myself in Beauty 101. Now that I have a big girl job, I really feel the need to be able to wear makeup and curl my hair. If you've been around for long, you know that I've tried countless times. But I'm going to spend two full months trying this time. It's got to work, right?? So if you have any excellent YouTube tutorials or people I should be following, send them my way. Also, any good recommendations on grocery store make-up? I've tried so many of the expensive MLM brands, and none of it is ever worth the money for me. I'm not going to "contour" and I have no need for a "day to night" look. I just want to look like I'm making an effort. Haha.

7. Pics and memes:

The flowers in my yard are starting to bloom! I couldn't resist a pic with the raindrops.

My couch buddy