A New Year Begins

A new school year, that is.  :)  And it actually started a week and a half ago, on Monday, the 13th, but I'm just now getting around to finishing this post.  Life got in the way of me posting this on the first day of school. Life has a way of doing that.  ;)

Why did we start so early?  Well, a few reasons.  First, we have a vacation coming up in September (when the beach is much less crowded and much, MUCH less expensive!), so we'll take time off from school for that.  Second, I love having the flexibility throughout the year to take off a day here or there unexpectedly.  Sometimes I need that.  Sometimes the boys need that.  :)  Third, we've gotten into the habit of finishing school in April, which leaves us free to enjoy beautiful springtime to the fullest as we frolic outdoors.  Fourth, all of our extra summer activities/extracurriculars were over, so why not start?  Fifth, Josiah, in particular, was expressing a desire for a more structured routine; he was so happy to be starting school again.  Sixth, I like school.  I like teaching my boys.  I like spending that time with them.   So for all of these reasons, I was eager to get started, even though we were still in the first half of August.  :)

That day was a great first day.  It began with love and family togetherness, this time in the form of a big brother who crawled into his little sister's crib...

 ...and then imitated her finger-sucking.  :)

 Such love between David and Moriah!

Then the day progressed to breakfast; and, as is our custom on the first day of school, we made funnel cakes.  (To be honest, I was going to break tradition and not make funnel cakes this year; instead I was thinking of doing a french toast casserole that I could make ahead of time.  But then on Sunday, the day before we started school, Josiah mentioned the fact that he was looking forward to having funnel cakes for the first day, so how could I abandon the tradition after that??)  ;-)

As always, the powdered sugar I let the boys sprinkle on top was an even bigger hit than the funnel cakes themselves.  :)

I tried to make an initial for each of them.  David's "D" turned out dismally...

...but Shav's "S" was actually recognizable!  I felt very accomplished.  :)

I hardly took pictures of any official school stuff we did that morning, but I did want to capture a picture of Tobin doing some pages in a workbook.  Although we are not starting him in kindergarten yet, I am planning to do some preschool material with him; and he has been SO excited about that.  I'm really looking forward to focusing on him and spending a larger amount of (educational) time with him this year than I did last year.

Josiah has gotten interested in counted cross-stitch recently, so he spent part of the morning working on that.  My brother used to do counted cross-stitch--in fact, I think he might have won a ribbon at the fair once upon a time for a cross-stitch that he did--so maybe Josiah is taking after his Uncle David.  ;)

Like everybody else in America does, we always have to take first day of school pictures.  :)  We do ours by the front door, and I love doing this and then comparing the pictures with ones from previous years.

Josiah, our fifth-grader (age 10):

(I always let them do some silly poses after the "normal" ones, and they love to ham it up for the camera.)  :)

David, our second-grader (age 7):

Tobin, our pre-K student (age 4):

Shav, our three-year-old:

(When I asked, "How old are you, Shav?", this is what I got...)  ;)

And sweet Moriah, our baby (4 months):

All my students together:  (Isn't it great how they all pay attention to me so well?  Errr...well...I guess they're hardly paying attention to me at all.  That *rarely* happens, let me assure you.  Yeah, right...)  ;)

When I'm taking a group picture of them, I like to say things like, "Everybody look at Josiah!"...

...and "Everybody look at Shav!"...

...and "Everybody look at Moriah!"  :)

Apparently Tobin didn't get the memo that this was supposed to be a "serious" picture, because he's in full-blown superhero mode here.

Well, I don't mind.  He can be my hero any day.  :)

Later in the afternoon, I happened to spot Tobin hanging out with Moriah in the living room...

...and I couldn't help but pause to watch their interaction.

Close family relationships...

...is one of the top three reasons we chose to homeschool.

What a pleasure to watch our vision of siblings who are best friends coming true!

(Which is not to say that they don't still squabble from time to time, because of course they do!)

Playing frisbee in the late afternoon...

...was a nice way to relax after a tough day of school.  (OK, I'm kidding.  It was not tough.  Not tough at all.  We eased our way into the new school year and didn't even cover all our subjects.  We've learned that the gradual approach works well for us as we transition into our school schedule again.  But playing frisbee was still pretty fun.)  ;)

It really was a great day.

I think it's going to be a GREAT year!  :)