Labor Day Happenings

Okay, so Labor Day is typically not one of those holidays that people write down as their favorite. You don't give out Labor Day Gifts. I've never heard anyone sing a Labor Day Song. Basically, in our family, it is just a day where the kids stay home from school and mom and dad try to stay sane and accomplish something, at home.

I decided to change that this year. This year, our family was going to DO something for Labor Day. In the spirit of creativity I took the letters of the word LABOR and came up with a few activities.

1. L = letterboxing

If you've never heard of letterboxing, you may have heard of its technologically advanced cousin, geocaching. Letterboxing, however, is much older, tracing its origins back to England in 1854. I've been letterboxing since 2007, but hadn't really gotten the kids involved until Labor Day 2010. We went and looked for four boxes and found two. Not bad odds I'd say.

Samuel, Kiera and Aaron stamping the logbook of a letterbox.

2. A = Act of Service

One of our favorite things to do, is wait until dark and then take something to someone's house, leave it on their doorstep, ring the doorbell and run. Today was no exception. It's always thrilling, and you know the people should enjoy the treats!

The crew ready for an evening of sneaky doorbell ditching --- with treats!

3. B = Bake

For this activity, the kids split up into teams and picked cookie recipes to bake. Then each team made and baked their prize-winning cookies. Their were some good, some bad, and some ugly-but tasty cookies to be had in our kitchen! UMMM! Did my house smell good! Afterwards, we put them on a plate to use for the activity mentioned above.

Shenna and Enoch during the bake-off

4. O = Order

This simple thing just involved ordering pizza for supper from our favorite local pizza place! Can you say absolutely delicious?

yummy pizza...no, Enoch is not eating it. He has the peanut butter sandwich in his other hand.

5. R = Ride

Simple, but true. The day was filled with riding in the car. However, Aaron did also take Uncle David for a ride in the airplane, so an airplane ride also counts.

Kiera trying to be incognito in the car.

All in all, I think my warped mind came up with some fun things to keep us all entertained. I still don't think anyone in the family will claim Labor Day as their favorite holiday though.

School Begins

School started for the Whitaker kids on August 30. We had two who were really excited and two that were not as happy about it. At least we were evenly split. Of course I had to take the traditional "leaving for school" photos. Just look at the fingers to figure out what grades they are now in.

You can tell by the difference in the sky outside that the girls leave about 40 minutes before the boys this year. They still get home around the same time though. It is always a surprise which set walks in first. Some days it is the boys, and others, the girls saunter in.

Shenna on her way out the door....
Kiera all ready for the day..... Samuel with his perpetual hoodie on.....
and Enoch holding his favorite animal, Roland the rainbow armadillo. There is a story behind that one which may have to be told in another post.