Here are a couple of cuties in front of our house. Kade with red hair and Konner with blond hair. Note the lava rock Keith is in the process of putting down in our flower beds.
The front of our house
The Wastelands, also known as the backyard. A lot of work in store for us as we plan to fence and sod it.
Mr. Perfect Neighbor's yard. Koi pond and waterfall, and not pictured, more gardens, trees and a bridge.
Our dead pool. The ground was not level enough to set it up properly, so there it sits . . . dead . . . right next to Mr. Perfect Neighbor's yard.
A corner view of our house.
A view down our road of the new houses being built.





July is coming to an end so very soon, and with July's escape comes August. August used to mean one more month of summer, but not in Georgia! It means school is starting! August 7! AHHHHH!

I've got to get the kids caught up on immunizations. There's a health clinic nearby that I need to take them to -- I think they ALL need some kind of immunization done, especially Kade and Konner. Our insurance quit covering immunizations a couple of years ago. That was a real bummer for us.

Konner will begin kindergarten this year. Can you believe it? My baby. Kindergarten. I'm going to teach both Kade and Konner the same material myself and skip the DVD program for them. Kade is just really not into sitting and listening to his DVD teacher. She's not live and in person, and he knows it!

Kade has been writing his name on all of his papers. At least he's not doing what Kylie was doing when she learned to write her name. She kept writing her name on walls and other non-paper items. I still have an old back-up bed sheet with her name written in permanent marker.

Speaking of scholastic items, I got Keri Lynn, Kristofer and Kathleen's standardized tests back right before we left on our trip to California. We were thrilled to get the results and see that they are indeed making good progress. The test shows three blocks: below average, average and above average. Keri Lynn scored at the top of the average block for most subjects. In reading comprehensive, she was at the top of the above average block. In spelling, she was below average! The reading comprehension and the spelling is a replica of Keith's strengths and weaknesses! Kristofer also scored high in reading comprehension and general logic skills. He scored at the top end of the average scale for all of his subjects. I was most interested in Kathleen's scores. I tested her at the third grade level, even though she's fourth grade age-wise, because that's the grade level she's been working at this year. She scored around third grade level in all of her subjects, but this was before her reading really took off. My bet is that she would have scored much better in just a few months because of her reading improvement. Even so, I was happy to see she was on par with what we've been doing. It will be interesting to see how she does next year. All in all, I think we were all encouraged by the kids' performance. We all felt a little more confidence in our homeschooling efforts and know what to work on for the new year.

The weather has been fairly mild. It's only 86 degrees right now with only 50% humidity. Mom says that the weather in So. Cal. has been really hot lately and with unusual humidity. Kaja reports weather over 110 at the top end of Northern California and they've been getting lots of humidity, too. The only problem with our weather has been lack of rain. We've had rain just in the last few days, but because it's so dry right now, our lawn watering restrictions have been cut back to ONCE a week. We can water from midnight until 10:00 AM Saturday morning. Isn't that generous!