Early April

Posted on April 18, 2018 by jlcleve

This has been a pretty fun month. I really enjoy spring in Colorado because you never know what the weather will bring and it means we’re closing in on the last bit of school so things start relaxing around here. It’s a lot of fun.

One weekend in early April when Mike was in Canada for work, the boys and I joined Aunt Ashley and her family at their new place for dinner. The boys especially enjoyed seeing their dog, Gracey, and getting to play Wii (I think that’s what it was…) games with Uncle Zach. This was Micah’s first video game ever and he was beaming with pride! Thanks, Zach, for patiently walking them through it and keeping it fun for them!

That Sunday evening we went to a birthday party for a kiddo in Micah’s CC class. The boys especially enjoyed trying rock climbing for the first time (milestone alert!). I think both would enjoy it more if they had longer to try it and get the hang of it. Ethan was especially nervous about the height, but he kept getting higher the more attempts he made. And Micah used his arms a lot more than his legs, so he’d benefit from a little more coaching. But, seriously, they loved it and did great!

A few nights later, I went out with my dear friend for some rock climbing at a rock climbing gym we enjoy. It had been a good year+ since we had gone, so it was fun to get back out there again…even if I was pretty rusty/weak. The boys asked for a picture of me reaching the top – so we made an awesome video of my whole climb up one of the easier runs. It’s a good 2 minutes long, so I trimmed it for your benefit. Now you can just laugh with me at my ridiculous attempts to impress the boys…by running into the wall:

While I was out rock-climbing, the guys were busy welcoming our new-to-us piano into our home. Ethan was especially excited about this and said it was “one of the best days of his life”. He snapped lots of pictures. Micah attempted to snap a bunch, too, but sadly his camera ran out of batteries. He was pretty devastated about it.

We had our final day of CC on April 5th and then had our end of year party/celebration on the 12th in the evening. Each class does a little presentation in front of everyone (about 80 people were in attendance this evening) about something we’ve been learning. Micah’s class sang the preamble to the US Constitution – thus the patriotic theme. Sweet Micah told me that evening when getting tucked in for bed that he accomplished one of his goals – he sang up in front of everyone without needing to have me next to him! The Lord has done so much healing on his sweet heart and mind! We are thankful!!! Ethan (and my) class sang the first 12 elements in the periodic table. Then all of the classes did an orchestra song in a round together. We have videos of all three, but they won’t upload because they are pretty long! We’ll be glad to share them in person or through email sometime as per your requests. =D

We also had a really lovely weekend with Daddio back in town. We played a lot of games and just relaxed together, which was so nice!! Milestone alert: Micah learned how to play chess!

Homeschool Edition

Posted on April 15, 2018 by jlcleve

We finished CC a couple weeks ago now, but that doesn’t mean we are done with school, yet. (Although, I did just calculate our hours and we technically only have about 35 school hours to go until we’ve reached the official Colorado mandated hours…but I can tell you that we will surpass that since I am estimating our last day of school to be Friday, May 18th.)

We’ve been having some fun taking schooling outside on the nice weather days:

And we’ve had some fun indoors, too. One day, for instance, we made a homemade game that outlined all of the main happenings in “The Hobbit” – including losing a turn when doing riddles with Gollum and other such things.

You’re seeing lots of books in my pictures because we are really loving read-aloud time. Some of our more recent books: The Sign of the Beaver (boys loved it!); My Father’s Dragon (again, boys loved it – especially Micah as it’s a much shorter chapter book with pictures often); The Green Ember books (Ethan and I – and sometimes Micah – are reading the third book in the series); and A Wrinkle in Time (E and I hope to go to the theater to see this when it comes to the cheap one near us).

Life in the Meantime

Posted on April 6, 2018 by jlcleve

Just wanted to post some pictures from some of the other things going on in our world over the last couple of weeks.

Mike and Micah have been doing some bonding…playing made-up games of “basketball” and doing some stretching.

A sneak peak at homeschooling life in community and at home:

Kiwi Crates (these come every month – our Christmas present to the boys – and while they are not super sturdy, the boys have lots and lots of fun with them). See above that the boys presented on their kiwi crate creations for CC that week. =)

Snapshots from around the house (the posed ones were taken for Grandpa Russ’ happy birthday wishes)…complete with all the mess that is life these days:

Also, we love living in Denver where you can have a snowstorm followed by 70 degree weather. These pictures were taken 10 hours apart:

And, in conclusion, this week marked our final day of CC. My class ended with lots of smiles and laughs and a whole lotta energy. =)

Butterfly Pavilion

Posted on April 5, 2018 by jlcleve

As promised, here are some pictures from our field trip to the Butterfly Pavilion. We stopped in there before heading to the fair trade conference to see Jen and J. Both boys held Rosie, the tarantula. Micah had done so once before, but this was Ethan’s first time. We learned a new fact – no one has ever died because of a tarantula, but there have been 3 known deaths from hamsters. =D

Micah took most of the pictures (or requested them) this day. He likes to find beautiful things to capture which makes me smile.

Micah had a beautiful butterfly land on his head! So fun!

And, lastly, we’re pointing to the fair trade conference from where we were at the Butterfly Pavilion:

The Js in town!

Posted on April 5, 2018 by jlcleve

We were thrilled with the timing and location of the Fair Trade Conference this year – the week before Easter and in Westminster, CO. This is a conference that Aunt Jennie often attends. Naturally, we were pretty vocal in our desires to have her out for the conference and for the weekend afterwards. The best part of this was when Jen and J became parents through the beautiful and arduous process of adoption just 5 weeks prior…which meant that all three of them could come out and we’d have to chance to meet Baby Girl and enjoy their company over Easter! It was wonderful and we were SO thankful that they were brave first-time parents flying across the country with our sweet niece/cousin!

We saw them briefly for dinner on Monday night at our home before they headed north for the conference. Then we drove up to see the fair trade expo, to help out a bit and to grab dinner with them on Wednesday evening. And by Thursday night, they were back by us for the long weekend!

I would simply LOVE to show you Baby Girl’s darling face, but that will have to wait for a few more months… Suffice it to say, she’s beautiful and loves to be snuggled!! Micah and I took turns snuggling her a whole bunch – I think I may have even finished a book during their visit. =)

Monday Night dinner and hang out:

Wednesday at the fair trade conference (we did the butterfly pavilion while we were up there, but I’ll save that for another post):

On Thursday night, we enjoyed merging our two sides of the family together. Grandma Cleve was in town helping Ashley and Zach to move so we were thrilled to get to have dinner all together (sadly, minus Zach)!

Other highlights from the weekend together included some workouts in the park, walks, bike rides, making paper airplanes, playing memory/matching, reading books, going to church and out for ice cream, enjoying Easter dinner at the Jonker home, and Jen, J and Mike floating (*milestone for Jen and J) while I got the chance to babysit Baby Girl! Oh, and I can’t forget laughing while the boys fed Aunt Jennie her Good Friday meal while holding Baby Girl! We sure had a lot of fun hosting these guys!

Thanks for honoring us by having your first flight with Baby Girl be out to Colorado to see us! We were so excited to have you all with us again! Both boys expressed their desire to have you live in town after you left. =)

My Retreat

Posted on March 28, 2018 by jlcleve

This past weekend my dear friend, Amy, and I went on our third retreat to the mountains. We laughed a lot, prayed a lot, and hiked even more! In total, we probably hiked a good 6+ hours throughout the weekend. We hiked for at least 4 hours on Saturday before it was even time to eat lunch! =) It’s refreshing to spend time with a dear friend in a beautiful place doing some of the things I most enjoy – hiking, reading, journaling and painting!

This year, we spent our retreat at Glen Eyrie. You’ve heard me mention this place before – Amy and I went to a tea there in January and I went to our church women’s retreat there before that! It’s a beautiful spot and you’re almost sure to see big horn sheep, deer and wild turkeys. From there, we even hiked into the Garden of the Gods park, but we found that being around people after hiking for hours without seeing anyone was really not for us. =)

Here are some pictures from our lovely retreat:

Meanwhile at home, Ethan gave piano lessons and the guys did a whole lotta wrestling. I also hear they played another game of Risk Legacy and now we have mutants with which to contend. E said, “I can’t wait to play this with Uncle Ger – he’s going to be so surprised at all of the changes in the game!”

HUGE thanks to Mikey for being so gracious. He was supportive and encouraging of this which helped me to have a guilt-free vacation away to refresh!!

Quick updates

Posted on March 27, 2018 by jlcleve

Before I get to weekend updates, I wanted to do a quick update on life from last week.

Ethan competed in his first pinewood derby race. His car didn’t do all that well, so he was a bit disappointed. We had some good chats about trying something new, learning from the past, asking people for their guidance in the future, etc. etc. Anyway, I think it was a great experience and it was lots of fun to see all of the cars!

We finished week 22 of CC (only 2 weeks left!!). Ethan gave a presentation on “The Hobbit” – our most recent read-aloud book. It’s not his most flattering picture, but I really like his outfit and can’t get over how old he looks!

Micah gave his presentation on some of his Legos. I received this email from his tutor afterwards: “His presentation made my day yesterday. It went on for at least ten minutes and his face was completely lit up the whole time. My favorite part was his explanation of the ninja warriors fighting the city people (one of whom was in a wheelchair). :)”

Micah sometimes wears these glasses for school because they make everything look prettier:

Last Friday, Aunt Ashley and Caleb came over for a little picnic and time at the park! Caleb went down the slide by himself and had Ethan to catch him. He was cracking us up with all of his, “uh oh!” remarks anytime the boys fell or pretended to fall.

Next up…my retreat!

The Cleve Crew

We do FAITH, FAMILY and FUN!