Summer!

Summer is here in NYC.  It's so hot.  The kids are keeping busy throughout the days and I just prefer to stay indoors with my air conditioner on, lol.  K went to a water park called Splish Splash with her friends yesterday, the beach a few times, and will probably go to the movies tonight.  Her last day of school was Monday.  She chose all her classes for senior year.  It looks like this:  Trigonometry, AP Literature, Government & Economics, Astronomy & Forensics, Latin, and Yearbook.  She did very well this year and is already planning for college.

J has been spending lots of time with friends.  They usually hang out at the park, running through the sprinklers, and watching the boys play basketball.  They all had a great game of dodge ball going the other day, too.  Sometimes they grab a bite to eat at a nearby diner or catch a movie.  Today she's taking advantage of the heat and spending the day in her friend's pool.  Summer dance classes are in full-swing.  Tuesdays she takes ballet, tap, and lyrical, Thursdays she takes contemporary and hip-hop, and now on Mondays she's part of a class based on the show "Glee".  Her dance team (her immediate team of 6 members) was just notified that based on their platinum first place performance at one of their competitions this year, they won a full scholarship to 8 hours of master classes and free competition fees to an "Ultimate Overall Challenge" in NJ in July.  It's like a mini-Nationals and is spread out over 3 days.  Needless to say, the studio owner is thrilled and we are all so proud of them.

W is spending his summer so far doing what he loves best - going to the playground and playing Nerf Gun Tag with his friends on the block.  Auditions for a summer musical are coming up and he is looking forward to that.  It will be 2 weeks of rehearsals - 2 hours each day, 5 days a week - with 2 Saturday shows.  He was in this program last year and loved it.  J may join again, too, with her friend Amanda, but she's right at the age cutoff and besides, she'll be dancing at a fundraiser for St. Jude's Childrens Hospital that same day as the performance.

W will also be finishing up AO Year 2 all summer.  We took a lot of time away from our schedule, so it's time to catch up.  We have a lot of fun with it and W enjoys it all.  We really only spend about 2 hours each morning on academics.  The rest of the day is his.  I want to try and get to Year 3 by autumn.  I ordered a few books already, like Writing Strands 2, Simply Grammar, The Story of Inventions, and Science Lab in a Supermarket.  Those cost about $68 total.  I only need to buy 2 more books on the schedule - American Tall Tales and The Princess and the Goblin.  Then I still need to buy about 8 of the "free reading" books (all the others I either have already or downloaded free on my Nook).  I can get those for a few dollars each, though.  So I probably won't spend more than $150 on his total 4th grade curriculum.

Loving life here in NYC.