Lazy Days of Summer

Summer is officially here. I had such a wonderful day with the children home yesterday. It was the first day with my school aged children home. We enjoyed a leisurely wake up and breakfast. Of course, our first vacation breakfast was celebrated with chocolate chip pancakes. We spent a lot of the day trying to prepare the house for summer visitors but also had time to enjoy our very warm day. Our BBQ hot dogs were served outside on the little picnic table. We also enjoyed a walk to the neighborhood park. I took the four youngest ones to the park after supper. We played and got all hot and dirty. We came home and rewarded ourselves with homemade frozen juice pops on the front porch and then one by one they found their little bodies in a nice bath. That evening as I put the last one to bed, I laid there wondering what had made such a wonderful day. I believe that I just needed a day without too much outside interference and to just enjoy my children. My children at there own level, not expecting anything from them. We just hung out like friends. Ahh... I wish every day could have been like yesterday, but then today happened but that is another story.

School Trips

I have been thinking about "School Trips" a lot lately as many of my children are now taking part in these. A couple things have come to mind. The first one is how many of the students as young as 7 & 8 years old are allow to have free run of our small local amusement parks. Usually the grade ones have chaperons with them but after that, some have meeting spots and times and others are on their own for the whole day. I think that this is kind of funny because as Mothers, not many of us, would allow our young children to go there with a friend and no parents any other time of the year. Why do we okay it now. I was lucky to have had my husband there with my younger boys. I wonder why we feel some sort of safety in doing this. Any ideas?

My second thought is the amount of end of the year trips for grade sixes. Where I live grade six is the last grade in elementary school and therefore the student's last year in that school. Since the students will be moving on, the school and some parents believe that the end of the year school trip should be big. My son, who is in grade six this year is going on his trips over two days as it won't all fit into one. The first day takes him to park in the morning with all sorts of different things about Anne of Green Gables and than to Subway for lunch and than to an amusement park for the afternoon. He gets back two and a half hours after school is out. The second trip day takes him to a movie theater to watch "Up" and than to a pizza party and than for an afternoon of swimming. The cost to parents $60.00. ( I think) Now we did have an opportunity to fundraise by selling raffle tickets but since our family doesn't believe in gambling we could not take part in the fundraising.
M questions is, is this a little over board. When I take my children somewhere in the summer for a fun day, will it pale in comparision to what they have already experienced. Don't get me wrong, I like all of the places they are going, I just wonder if it is really necessary to go to all of them in one week. Ahhh... parenting, it is always full of questions and thoughts.

Relay for Life

I am always so amazed at how fast time flies. Last weekend I participated in the Relay for life with my son and his grade 8 class. It is a fundraiser for the cancer society. The class worked hard and raised $6,200.00. Wow, that is a wonderful group of 21 grade 8 students. The whole night was great other than the terrible weather we had. It poured for hours and we were all covered in mud but still no one complained. It was such a good eye opener for our community to see how some teenagers are amazing contributing citizens. Way to go guys!!!

Pandemic

Well, I just finished watching an United Nations' web cast by the World Health Organization. I was really happy to see, how the whole situation was handled. I believe they did well to express concern about people thinking that if their country had already reached the peak, that they didn't have to take notice. All countries were strongly encouraged to prepare for the first hit or a second wave of infections. Yes, that is right a second wave. This flu is expected to go around the world for the next year or two and therefore in all likelihood would find its way back to a lot of the countries that has already been visited. They also mentioned that the degree of the symtoms, of the flu could change at any point. In most cases the flu symptoms have been mild and not even needing medical attention. So, with that being said. They also did not feel the need for any trade or travel bans to be put in place. They also mentioned that there is no need to panic or think any doom and gloom. That the places that we should be most concerned about are in the developing countries where the health systems are not very advanced. Not to mention the health of the people is already compremised from poor nutrition and higene habits.

Hilary Weeks is one of my Favorite People

Okay, so my very large family has been hit with the flu hammer. It has taken five of us down in six days and now dear Hubby thinks that he is not feeling great. So you might ask what gets the mommy of this house through such an event. Well, her name is Hilary Weeks. She is not a nurse nor doctor but she sure has a way of making me feel better. Today I watched two little you tube videos of her and laughed so hard. She is so talented and truly has a sense of humor that tickles my funny bone, while she tickles the ivory. Please, if you want a treat today go and look it up on you tube. The first one is

Hilary Weeks the to do list

and the second one:

Hilary Weeks My Favorite things

Now Liz, my sweet sister in law, over at "home life"has been encouraging me to get blogging again so here is your thank you. Go watch these and let me know what you think.

Lost but I have been Found

Hi, I am sorry for anyone who has been waiting for an update on here. No, I have not fallen off the earth or even encountered something terrible. It has just been life and more life. I try to remember not to be a slave to the computer though some family members may disagree on that. With school and some activities winding down I am very hopeful that my blogging days are back. I look forward to writing again. Hope everyone has had a very pleasant spring and will have a very fun and relaxing summer.