End of summer

Well, the summer's pretty much over already! This Friday starts our first Classical Conversations (CC) day, and officially kicks off our year of homeschooling for Marissa!We just finished up a fun weekend with Granny and Poppop, only a week after an extended trip to NY to visit with Grandma, Grandpa, Great-Grandma, and Rara. My PA grandparents, aunt and uncle from NH, and my brother and his wife also all drove to NY to visit while we were there. It's been a fun month of relatives, and we haven't had much downtime at all!
In NY, we spent a lot of time at the pool in the neighborhood that I grew up in, where my Grandma still lives. It felt so weird to go back there after all these years, and spend the afternoon swimming again! This year, by the end of our visit, all 3 kids finally started loving the water! Marissa finally gave up her floaties (after much convincing, and some "accidental" deflating - she hasn't actually needed them for a while), Arianna finally gave up on hysterical screaming, and Roman couldn't keep his face out of the water (as long as there was a ball nearby). I drove the kids out by myself (Dan used so much vacation time for Disney & Nicaragua, that he didn't have any left), and it went much better than I expected. We only stopped for dinner and gas, and made it in great time! The kids did great, and I didn't even go crazy! We spent one day at Toughannock State Park and ate lunch by the water, played on the playground, and hiked up to the falls with the kids.
Roman learned a bunch of new words while we were in NY (mail, bear, deer, birdie, fish, rara, and "grandma, grandpa" which both sound like rara, but he knew the difference). Just this week he also started saying car and poppop. He's still completely obsessed with all types of balls and games with balls. He now sleeps with a soft ball, and practices kicking and throwing balls against the walls. He's crazy good for a 20 month old (?!) and since I know I'm going to have to watch him play sports the rest of his life, I'm just glad he's so cute :-) He also discovered running while we were in NY, and he holds one arm sideways across his chest and runs so crazy!
Arianna's still having digestion issues, which means she's back in pull-ups so I don't go crazy. Wish we could figure this girl out, but I have a feeling we never will. She does everything 100% and all her emotions are extreme. I'm hoping we can do some school stuff with her and figure out how she works. Haha!
Marissa is excited about homeschooling, and we've started making a list of everything she wants to learn this year! I hope I'm up for the challenge...
I guess that's all for now!