Animal Kingdom

I think I am running out of steam! Grace was up at camp this past week....

 

 

 

 and without all the help she gives me with the toddler especially I just plain felt too worn out to do much.  Plus with her big sister gone Sophie insisted on multiple play dates to keep her from dying of a broken heart or boredom so even she was gone a lot.  When here she had to sleep with her little sister

 

 

...and she practiced being the biggest sister in charge!

 

 

And when she wasn't here I focused my attention on these two wild animals, having a whale of a time in the tub...

 

So knowing for months this would be animal week what a blessing when kind and generous Miss Heidi asked if anyone wanted to go horseback riding this week, I knew Sophie had to get in on that! Softened the blow from dropping Grace off at camp to have this to look forward to on Monday.  

 

 

Just when we got our horse all saddled up we noticed...

 

 

...a little stow-away trying to steal a ride!

 

 

 

My little cowgirl and I had a great time! It was nice to be able to do something just the two of us too! Thanks Miss Heidi!

 

There are million of adorable animal food ideas, I had about 30 of them on my potential snack list.  However, this is what I am talking about being out of steam.  I didn't do any of them.  These were three of my favorites!

 

 

 

 

On Tuesday we watched:

 

And the girls played barn and noahs ark with little people.

 

 

And then we made our own farm animals out of paperplates...

 

Wed morning we made rainbow loom caterpillars from this link here.

Then Sophie was gone from Wed afternoon to Thursday afternoon.  Meanwhile having a flare up of asthma Grace had to come home from camp just for one night.  On Thursday she was eager to get back up to camp so she occupied herself waiting for dad to get home to take her by making her own paper plate animals. 

 

Friday we did a whole lot of nothing...in fact I can't remember what we did at all, I think the baby had a rough day and Sophie was tired and cranky, I think she may have watched a bit too much tv that day! Saturday we went to pick up Grace from camp and then headed right to the Boulder Ridge Wild Animal Park.

 

 

Some of the animals we saw...

 

The girls liked how close up all the animals are at this place, a change from the regular zoo...

 

And you get to take a safari ride too to see the bigger animals...

 

Afterwards we cooled down with another pool day at my parents, the days of enjoying the pool are numbered so we cherish them all!

 

 

 

For our continued study of the fruit of the spirit: There is a saying frequently used in church: "God is good, all the time. And all the time, God is good". We talked about the fruit of goodness and how we can be good as God is good and that he is our perfect example.  We talked about the way God shows his goodness to us, how he blesses us.  We pointed out the ways he is good to us as they came up over the week. I only have 2 more weeks with "a plan", one of which Grace will be gone a lot again.  Then we have some free time in August where we can squeeze in some of the activities we missed earlier in the summer.  Going to keep chugging along for now.  This next week is sports week, should be interesting as my family is very...not sporty!