Chalk Ridge Falls

A hike with several water features? We are not in Lubbock anymore!

Down a ways we found this beautiful swimming hole; good thing we wore swimming suits for the falls! It was so pristine and surreal. I felt like Katniss in the wild. (Except of course, I wasn't concerned about starvation and being hunted.)

Then even further down, a swinging rope!

This hike is definitely going back on our "to-return" list. 

A less Fancy Birthday

 But no less fun! We celebrated with a very Austin birthday: mini-golf at Peter Pan, dinner at the original Chuys, play time at Zilker park, and watching the bats at dusk on the Congress Street bridge.

We about had Ollie convinced that River was apart of my name.

This is either hole 2 or 3. We are already so hot and sweaty.

Ideas of food trucks were abandoned once we realized we could sit in AC! As always, food was delicious at Chuys. 

Just hanging with my favorite crew.

I love this picture! Great on the fly capturing of everyone's personality. 

When you come to visit us, this whole bat-bridge thing is really pretty cool. About 10 to 15 minutes after google tells you the sun goes down, 1.5 million bats come out for the night. 1,500,000!! It really is such a cool sight. They all go in a long group, you can see the lanes/clouds/paths of the bats coming out and crossing the sky. I had never seen it before and was pretty impressed.

And Oooooh! A cricut! Yay!! Thanks!

The next day blowing out my candle on my actual bday. None of the kids were impressed by my choice of fruit and fruit dip as a celebration dessert. ha. 

A very Fancy Ten Year Old

Just look at this kid. 

Doesn't he ooze charm, warmth, and kindness? He is just the best. This past summer he has started to love to read, continues to love sports and still is friendly and friends with everyone. He has also been fashion conscience since he was first able to express himself. I can remember shaking my head at him when he was two because he had such strong preferences of what he thought looked good and wanted to wear. That has not changed. He has become borderline obsessed with suits and loves to see people wearing them. Recently he made our flight attendant chuckle by complimenting his sharp suit. I found him a suit jacket at goodwill and he was in heaven. He and Jon spent an hour or two pouring over restaurants, pictures, and reviews to find a fancy place to go out for his birthday dinner. Maggiano's was selected and it was perfect. 

                                                 

Just look at that giant meatball. 

It was declared second to grandma's though. Hers are still the absolute best. 

Our kids' first Shirley Temples. 

For sure a great evening out celebrating this 10 year old young man.

A picture of the lucky ones. We are blessed and honored to get to be Ollie's second parents.

Of course we had to celebrate at home as well with cake and presents.

Loot this year included tons of Chiefs paraphernalia for his room and an aquarium! He was pretty happy to have a tank for his room to put all his fishies he catches at the creek. 

Pat and Ollie. Bffs forever. 

Ollie, you are tremendously loved! We are so proud of the young man that is taking shape before our very eyes!

Mid-August

 Flowers for the teacher! (And hard seltzer.)

We have home-schooled for 10 days. Truly I am not sure if it is going well or is a train-wreck. (If I don't know, does that automatically mean its a train-wreck?) 

                                      

I have actually enjoyed some components of the job. It's nice to be really intentional with the boys. It's awesome to see them learn and understand a concept better. It's fun to know what they are learning about and be able to talk about it casually throughout the day if the topic comes up organically. 

I do not like that one of my kids totally loses their cool and screams at me at least once a day. That is something I could for sure do without. Also, the pay is terrible. 

We have been learning about the four regions of Texas in social studies and learned about llanite, a pinkish granite found in the Great Plains region. The capital building in Austin is made out of the stuff and thus an afternoon field trip was born. (The following pictures don't really do the pink-ness justice.)

It was actually a super lame trip. The fences were all locked up and gates barred and we couldn't even walk on the grass. Sometimes covid regulations make no sense to me.

But we did stop by HomeSlice Pizza, further down on Congress Street, so that was definitely a redeeming factor of the trip. As I'm typing this, I'm realizing it was exactly like a real field trip where lunch with your friends is the best part. Really, who cares about dumb 'ol pink granite??

I kept Nolan enrolled at the elementary school that we can see from our backyard. I wanted to keep tabs on the school and wanted him to have a place once school re-opened as pre-k spots fill very quickly and are not guaranteed like other grades. He is on his fourth day of virtual and it is somewhat of a nightmare. Him and all his four-year old little buddies are expected to log-on to the "classroom" at FIVE different times during the day for live instruction from his teacher. The good news? You actually only have to log on once in order to be counted present for attendance purposes which is mightily more manageable. It does make me really glad the big boys aren't doing virtual though. It seems so unrealistic. 

Nolan has also called his teacher Mr. Underpants, turd, and sucker in a joking and jovial way on these video chats. I played off the turd comment by interrupting and quickly saying, "she doesn't want to be called a turtle!". We are working on only using the name Mrs. Tiemann or ma'am. Oye. 

Other happenings: 

We have started decorating a bit of the house. Ollie is getting some Chiefs striping in anticipation of setting his room up for his birthday. 

Jolly Mask Co. had a good run, but is already winding down. For these last few orders, its only been the J. Mask Co. 

I mashed up the back of HotShot as I backed out of the garage with the tail gate open. It makes me infuriated. 

Lots of outside time and trips to the park, track, or bike rides despite every day being right around 100 degrees. 

Now it's time to gear up for some birthdays! 

First Day of School 2020

 Here's the crew for Mot Academy!

***Ollie: Grade 4: Teacher- Mrs. Mot***

***Seth: Grade maybe 5th or 6th (TBD-Ha!): Teacher- Mrs. Mots***

***Nolan: Grade Pre-K: Teacher- Mrs. Mama***

Haven't I always heard how people love homeschooling because of the flexible schedule? With that in mind, I'm going to need people to come visit us and invite us to their houses. Currently, we are open for August, September, October, November, and December. Book now! (Fingers crossed that we will be tied back to a schedule starting in January!)

First full time job in a while! No pay, but Mrs. Mot, Mrs. Mots, and Mrs. Mama to three students.

HP Forevah!

Happy birthday, Harry!