The second half of October, I've been gone a lot. We were in Miami, and then I was home for a little and then I was off for a trip to DC. Besides that, Calib and Peyton have been gone a lot. This last semester there was a change to duel enrollment, and because of the lag between the Pasco County School Board and PHSC, there was a bit of a hiccup where they were not able to go as soon as the Fall Semester started- but they could do the abbreviated 7 1/2 week courses for Fall Term B. But, all they could take here was *gasp* ON CAMPUS!
This is significant because Peyton hasn't been IN a traditional classroom in 7 1/2 years. Traditional classrooms did not suit him, so while I am confident he could handle it, I was a little nervous about his adjustment to this one. Luckily, the class is American History, and he knows more about history than me, so he is killing it. And his professor is the awesome 'we don't need to know dates and read this all out of a book- instead it's a cause and effect story' type of history teacher instead of the 'Bueller? Bueller?' type of monotone boring professor.
Calib meanwhile is taking Psychology, which is basically a gimme class. I wasn't with them the first day of class (we were on our way back from Miami) so the next time I was with them I made them stand for 'first day of school' pictures before they went off. Let me tell you, they were just thrilled about it. (They could have sidestepped this by taking a picture on Tuesday like I asked- but I think they've learned their lesson).
Their classes are back to back but not at the same time, but since it takes about half an hour to 45 minutes to get out to the Porter Campus they just go together and wait for each other. Peyton does peer math tutoring at the library while he waits for Calib, and Calib goes to the mall and buys shoes while he waits for Peyton.
Anyway, I'm burying some other awesome news down here. I haven't even Facebook posted about it yet. BUT..... Asa Waterstraut has gone and acquired himself a new job! And this new job is like his dream scenario. It's still work from home, and it's out of IT Support. After 12 years of answering calls from desperate people who can't get into their email he's making a bit of a 'swerve'. He was hired as a Program Mentor for Western Governor's University! We're all super excited about it. He did enjoy his old team he was on, and is going to stay around in a consulting role for now and see how that works out.
The night he was offered the job we celebrated with take out. His new job starts next Monday. He's looking forward to the work. I'm looking forward to having benefits, and retirement and set vacation time back.
I made a trip to Costco and noticed a lot of the seasonal items for Christmas we looked for when my mom was here was back in stock. This includes the hot chocolate Hayden was looking for, and the cookie dough tub Calib was looking for. Since the boys did such an awesome job when we were gone, I bought them the tub as a thanks. I also went on over to Earth Fare to get some stuff from the olive bar and made them the pasta they like so much.
While we were gone Peyton beat Asa's high score on Piano Man on Rock Band and rubbed it in. Asa has no hope of recovering such a score anymore, he says. So, Peyton is safe there. We've sort of moved on from Rock Band to Monster Hunter these days. Apparently they bought some expansion and can play it in three different rooms at the same time. I can't get away from it. But, they're entertained. Calib, Peyton and Hayden just went in on Luigi's Mansion which will be here on Thursday.
Staying in the realm of video games, because I live in this house, Asa and I pooled our Amazon gift cards from my mom for Christmas, plus some other rewards we'd been saving and got ourselves RingFit Adventure for free the day it came out! This is like a game and a workout in one, and it's super fun. Lots of squatting is involved though. I have only gotten to play once, because I was gone (and now I have a bit of a cold), but I'm excited to play it again hopefully later this week.
In other news, years ago Asa and I set all these random google reminders. We were on skype with my grandma and telling her all the things the Google Home could do, and we wondered how long we could set out reminders. I don't have any idea when they are coming, or what they are for, but they make me smile when they show up because I remember all my skype calls with her. The one that came up about two weeks ago now was Hayden being 5,000 days old! We celebrated with donuts.
Going out to check on the plants, things are going well. My watermelon plant is spreading, and my swamp hibiscus is really starting to take over my pond, though it could be at the detriment of my lily pads, so I need to be keeping an eye on that.
Asa's tomato plant is doing really well, but today there were caterpillars all over it. I said we should relocate them. The world needs pollinators! But he blasted them off with a hose and they ended up eating my marigolds at the bottom of the tomato plant.
And then in VERY big plant news, we got to pick our VERY FIRST LEMON OFF OUR TREE! This is exciting stuff right here, people. This is why we NEED POLLINATORS!
Speaking of which, a week ago Saturday was Garden Fest at the library and they had a bee house workshop in the Foundry so Asa and I both signed up. You could make one of two different bee houses, and I said we should make different ones, you know, to give the bees options. Asa told me I could do whichever he I wanted- but he wanted to do the cool one with all the little bamboo pieces. I did get to drill the holes in the log for his house though, because mine didn't take near as much time.
After class we planted some seedling and checked out the garden fest displays.
Then we went over the the rec center and I finally got a picture of a gator by one of those 'watch out for alligators' signs!
I think he was out and about because of the wet weather. We've actually been pretty dry this summer, but we were on the east side of some tropical system that came through and just got dumped on.
Good thing I had my rain jacket though, because that weekend we were watching Huck and Murphy (the neighbors boxers who we LOVE to hang out with!)
Hayden went over with me to check on them quite a few times, and we like to play and snuggle with them for a while when we are there. It makes for a nice quiet place to do school work too, if you're trying to spend some extra time with them.
Ellie and Etta, meanwhile, have become buddies. They're spending more and more time together and especially enjoy playing with ropes together. And Ellie really likes it since we moved the couch, she can look out ALL the windows in the living room now.
I wasn't here last week, so Hayden had a lot of boring workbook sheets and stuff to work on. A little reading comp, a little spelling stuff, and a lot of math review. I pinned packets up for him on our corkboard where he usually has his stuff pinned up, and it worked out pretty well while I was gone.
He also had a few library classes to get to. He sewed an awesome Halloween Pumpkin at Junior Seamstress Class.
Last Sunday we of course did our usual taco bar, and our usual bike ride.
And Peyton has been dealing with a real crappy boss at work, and needed a little pick me up so we took him out for some Earth Fare shopping and a trip to Siptopia to cheer him up. For real, he got the short end of a stick with a new (terrible) manager coming in like a week and a half after he was hired.
That's it from here. I know it's not a big update, but stop me if you've heard this before: I've been gone a lot recently. So, I don't have a ton of home stuff to update you on.
But, I do have some cute Waterstraut doggie pictures to share with you.
Next Up: I have done three blogs today, and I am up to my trip to DC (you can skip those incoming ones too if you're not so interested in a Corinne-centric blog!)
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