Schnofelurpalumphagus...

...is the word of the day.  Do you ever make up words?  Or, try to invent your own language?  We do it all the time at our house.  The new words and language don't have to have real meaning attached.  Instead, just make them up and use the tone and volume of your voice, combined with your expression and body language to convey meaning.  This is a fun game when the kids are bored, or you feel a need to interact in a different way.  Give it a try.  Walk up to your child right now, and say a random made up word, but put real emotion and energy into it.  Then, see how they react!  Give it a try, and let me know what happens!  My son and I have had entire conversations just using made up words and noises, and by observing one anothers body language and facial expressions.  A fun, easy way to relax and connect...

Yesterday, I planned out our first six weeks of the homeschool year...we won't actually start lessons until September 6th, however.  That is the day my grad school classes begin, and the day my tutoring students go back to school...seemed like a natural start to the homeschool year as a result.  I'm very excited for all of us!

Although my classes don't start until next Tuesday, I volunteered today for new student orientation (this will be my second year in the program).  It was great fun to see old friends, and make new ones.  I took the boy with me this evening for a new student welcome dinner - basic green lettuce salad, grilled chicken, fruit salad, dinner rolls, lemonade, grilled veggies.  Then, I took the boy to CVS for junk food - he's been good, he deserves a treat.

To make up for the lack of pictures in yesterday's curriculum planning post, I have four pictures for you today...but no mail call...again...I'm considering getting a P.O. Box and posting my address on this blog just to entice you all to send me snail mail...no, just kidding.  It would be nice to get more mail, but I don't want to spend money on a P.O. Box.  It would defeat the purpose of the careful budgeting that I've been doing over the past two months.

Did I mention previously that we were without cold water for a couple of days last week?  It had nothing to do with Hurricane Irene.  Just dumb luck - the bathroom above ours had a leak AND the boiler in our building had a burst pipe.  That translated to no running cold water for about two and a half days.  Our hot water was so hot that it was probably illegal...as a result, I ended up with this:

and this:

But, I also ended up with this:

I had a few zucchini about to go bad in the fridge, and decided to make zucchini bread.  Don't you just adore those baking dishes?  I will do a separate post on them at another date, as I am trying to research them a bit and find out if they are worth anything.  I scored them for free from a friend who is moving out of state and getting rid of almost everything she owns!  They are definitely vintage...and so cute!

Will post the zucchini bread recipe another day...want to tweak it just a bit more first.