Back to School

I can't believe that we are already into the new school year but here we are.

Terrible picture taken by mom at the last minute.

This year Gloria is in 4th grade, Sara is 6th grade and Dan is in 9th grade. They have all had a good first couple of days. Dan had a little bit of a crisis on day 1 when we couldn't find his ID but that all worked itself out. Everyone seems happy and I am happy to get back to a routine. Dan is going to try out for the golf team, if golf is not an option, cross country is his back up.

Here in Arizona, K thru 8th is in one building, I've never seen that before, and then the high school is separate. Even though I don't agree with some of the thinking that happens here in AZ, I have found that the way they approach education is very progressive and inclusive.

They work with homeschoolers to help them be successful. If you are unhappy with the schools you belong to (perhaps there isn't a strong band program) there is a window of opportunity each year for you to switch your kids to a school that will work better for your family. There are also many, many charter schools so that your kid who is a wiz at science will get a curriculum heavy on science. I think it's really innovative.

Most, if not all the places we've lived before, the rules and policies have been put in place for the benefit of teachers and administrators and they seem to be all about keeping both children and parents under control. Here, I feel like it is all about what is best for your kids and your family. I feel more freedom and in-turn I feel much more supportive and want to be more involved.

Housekeeping

All of the work and energy and money and thought and stress and worry and hope of the last 6 months finally culminated this week as Pauly checked into the MTC and we closed the sale of the house. It has been an extremely emotional week but as those two things finally came to pass and Paul arrived safely in Cambodia, an enormous amount of weight was taken off my shoulders. I really feel like a new woman. I feel great and am ready to get this move done. Geesh! Sometimes I feel like we've been pulling this band-aid off one hair at a time since November.

I have so much on my mind this morning. Everything I am thinking about could have it's own post but I'm not sure if or when I will be able to post over the next two weeks so I am just going to do a little purge.

The Chickens~ I miss the chickens. We gave them away about two weeks ago. Don't get me wrong, they were never pets but I liked the movement in the chicken yard when I look out the window. I liked that when dinner was prepared I could send them the ends of the carrots, the potato peels, the apple cores and nothing went to waste. I miss the eggs whenever we wanted them. I miss the work it made for our children. Outside of our children and Paul's careers, the chickens have been one of the most rewarding and enjoyable endeavors of our marriage. I will be glad when we can do that again.

The House~ The house is sold. The folks who bought it have a big family and are so excited to move in and have chickens and a grow a garden and cook in the huge kitchen. They think Paul's egg boxes are ingenious. They are right, of course. It feels good leaving the house to people who will appreciate it.

Dan~ Daniel had his farewell party last weekend and went to an end of the year dance on Friday. For his party they hooked three XBoxes together and killed zombies for hours and hours. Honestly, these are the easiest parties to give because I don't have to do anything besides make A LOT of food.

For the dance the theme was '80's characters'. He dressed as Luigi from Mario Bros. He had fun. I promised him $1 for every girl he asked to dance. He made $20.

Dan's band concert was this week too. This is just a Jr. high band, I am always suprised at how good they are. Here's a taste.

The Girls~ The girls have been making nonstop friendship bracelets since their cousin Maude posted this tutorial. Gloria sang When Will My Life Begin, from Tangled at her school talent show. She did a great job. This is one girl who is not afraid of the spotlight.

In other little girl news, Sara is wearing her first grownup 'heels' today to church and we ordered bedding for the girls' new room this week.

Paul~ Paul is in Cambodia. He sent me this picture of a woman weaving silk. I hope he brings me some. I love that he will be landing in Phoenix just two hours before we get there two weeks from today.

Thank you~ Thanks to everyone for the encouraging notes and kind words as we sent our boy off on his mission. It has meant a lot to us.

And Me~ I love my new iPhone. My favorite thing? Depositing a check into my checking account while I sat on a bench at the park; that and Tiny Wings. What a incredible time we live get to live in! Also, I got my haircut.

Isn't it cute? I haven't had it this short since we lived in SLC. The girls are getting their summer cuts this week. Well, I guess that is all for now. Have a great couple of weeks.

Eagle's Beak

If you go to this website and scroll down to the video you can see Daniel's class project. He did the filming and technical stuff and loved it.

Dan's Party

Dan just sent out these invitations. We had fun writing it.

All Hail Daniel!!

Dan is sort of on a roll these days.

1~ This week was Dan's science fair and although he didn't place, we thought his project was incredible. He built this contraption with his dad to measure how much weight an egg could hold. He and I worked and argued about a design to measure this for weeks and never did come up with anything. When Paul took over, he came up with a great design in minutes. Dan came in from the workshop and said, "Dad is so freakin' smart!" They built it and then came in the house to do the testing. (Man! He's beautiful!)

2~ He smoked his dad in a run a couple of weeks ago. Dan ran cross-country this fall but because of conflicts and his lack of interest in racing, he didn't run in any meets. Consequently, he couldn't appreciate how good he had become until he ran with his dad last week. This was the first time he had run the same route with his dad since the summer. Dan had barely been able to finish it then. This time he not only kept up with his dad, he stayed ahead of him much of the time. He walked in the house after the run, looking like he could conquer the world.

Those are the times that I love being a mother. Any of my children's triumphs, large or small, make all the sacrifices; (early mornings, grouchy rides to the track, teenagery complaining) worth it.

3~ Did you know that Dan plays the piano? Well, he does and he also plays the French horn. He started playing 2 years ago with the band at school and has been first chair most of that time. He found out last Friday that he made first chair again for this year. Woot! I recorded him playing when it was brand new to him, he has progressed so fast that it makes us laugh when we watch it and compare him, then and now.

4~ Our stake is part of an eleven stake jubilee that will be performed next June. Below is the audition we recorded for him to be a part of the jubilee orchestra. Now don't hate, the audition isn't perfect but he decided that it was better to play a hard song imperfectly than an easy song perfectly. We'll keep you posted on the audition results results.

Dan is pretty much the most awesome 8th grader we know.

P.S. I was so focused on Dan and his playing that I didn't notice the unswept floor and cluttered counter until I had already sent this off. *Sigh* Will I ever have it all together?

~Please don't answer that.

Pack Man

Over the summer a switch was flipped and Daniel stopped being my little boy. Here are a few of the rules that have been laid out for me since school started.

Things I am allowed to say to Daniel in the car when I am dropping him off:

Anything

Things I am allowed to say once the car door is opened:

Nothing, not "have a good day" or " love you" or "be nice to the nerds". I will be met with nothing but a quickly slammed door. If I am lucky I might get a dirty look, but usually no recognition of any kind is the result of any comment made.

Things I am allowed to call Daniel at home:

Dan, Danny, Daniel, Danny Pants, Pack Man, Bud, Buddy

Things I am allowed to call Daniel in public:

Dan, Daniel

I have learned to be on my best behavior when accompanying Dan anywhere in public. My mission is to be as inconspicuous as possible. This, as you can imagine, has proven to be harder than it sounds but I really am trying.

Daniel is having his first Halloween party tomorrow night. We are setting up a big movie screen in the backyard and are going to watch The Mummy. I am worried I might accidentally show affection to him. I am really going to have to watch myself.

Boy Scouts

Daniel is going to scout camp this week. We had just finished gathering and packing everything on the list he was given. Last thing left was the toiletry bag. I was collecting travel soaps, shampoos and toothpaste when I heard Pauly say, "Dan, rule number one at scout camp: Nobody uses their toiletry bag."

Wobbly surfing

We left the big kids home (they had to work) and went to the Galveston last week. We missed Rob and Paul but it was so good to get away. All 3 growing kids traded up, in wetsuits this year.

In Galveston things are much more back to normal along the seawall but there are still lots of scars. Where the seawall wasn't present is another story. There the devastation is still just breathtaking; the rebuilding and cleanup has still barley begun.

The surf was really rough and very crowded but Paul looked great! It was so fun to watch.

Gloria used her boogey board. Dan and Sara spent most of their time helping each other on the surf board. They are getting better and better.

Man! I love this face!

Black and Blue

These are pics of some of our fruit picking this year.

There is huge wild blackberry patch nearby. They are smaller than commercially grown berries but they are very sweet and fun to hunt for. The wild flowers were still out.

We picked blueberries on the 4th of July. The big kids and dad were at work so it was just me, Sara, Dan and Gloria. Blueberries have no natural enemies here in Texas so they grow 7 feet tall, they never have bugs and the birds don't touch them.

Enablers

So Monday night at exactly 9:05pm Dan said, "Oh mom! I forgot I have some homework." "Well get it out and get it done." I said, in a not so cheery voice. I knew we were in trouble when I heard the next question. "Do we have any pipe cleaners?"Dan was supposed to make a figurine of Harriet Tubman with pipe cleaners and it was due Tuesday. I told him, "Too bad, I'm not going to buy pipe cleaners at 9:00pm. It will have to be late."

I bought him some pipe cleaners the next day and when he came home from school he said that our conversation (above) had been repeated in homes throughout Lindale the night before so the teacher said they could all have one more day. Way to give them standards.

Consequently, Tuesday night found me making little clothes for a figurine that I am guessing really doesn't look all that much like Harriet Tubman. (I am just assuming her head wasn't yellow and could be easily reshaped)

The best part is that I have no idea what the actual assignment is because Dan didn't bring home anything with instructions. He just described what he could remember. I just guessed that this is what the teacher wanted.

SO LAME!! The teacher, the assignment, the student and the parent. I'm not happy with anyone right now.

Poetry and Pinewood

Dan's pinewood derby was Friday evening. He got 3rd in the best of show category (don't they look thrilled?). The first pic is what his car looked like when it was 1oz. The second is what the bottom looked like when it was 5oz, the top was covered with coins as well, they were out of weights. Dan was happy. I didn't realize this was our last pinewood derby until Gabby mentioned this was Ralph's, in her blog a week or so ago. I'm a little sad.

Robin made it to the district speech tournament and she won 2nd place for her poetry reading this weekend!! She is going on to regionals in two weeks, if she makes it into the top 3 there, she will go to state! It was a two day tournament and she came home so happy but exhausted Saturday night. (I took this yesterday after church when she finally got a chance to relax.)

Our songs

I'm feeling romantic this month, thought I'd share a few songs with you.

INXS Never Tear Us Apart

They came out with this song just after we were married. The video made us laugh last night when we were looking things up on You Tube, because we remember it being very, very cool.

We love this song.



We love that this was filmed in Prague; of course we didn't know that back then. We recognized it last night.

At one point we only lived 3 hours away from Prague and visited there several times. We were visiting the Jewish cemetery in the video when 3 year old Daniel wandered off. He was missing for about 30 minutes. I found him about 3 blocks away after we had looked all around that cemetery and called the police. Some very kind people had found him and were keeping him in their store. They heard me calling him and they came out and motioned that they had him. They had called the police too.

Not a very happy memory but one that makes up the last 20 years for us.

When I took Jordan and Jenny Bushman to Prague we had to smuggle tiny Dan out of the country. (A story for another time.) Dan has quite a history in the Czech Republic. Maybe he'll serve his mission there.

The Dan

Dan found this fortune in his fortune cookie last night.

He read it to us and then said very smoothly, "Oh yeah, the ladies love The Dan."

Dan is thankful for . . .

Awesome family!



Bonking boogie boards




Scrumptious fettuccine Alfredo

Super cool teachers

Very best friends

Sweet uncles and aunts

Gnarly house

1,2,3 O'clock 4 O'clock Rock!

Today was 50's day at Dan's school.

Rockin' C Ranch

Last week Daniel's school took the entire 5th grade to a ranch for a 3 day 2 night camp out. They stayed in cabins, and fished and rode horses and built a raft and paddled across the lake and collected bugs and fed baby cows and gathered eggs and did a zip line 50 feet up and ran and swam and it was great!



Our only complaint was that all the kids had to wear life jackets in the water even if, like Dan, they were great swimmers. I guess it is understandable, with 200 kids out there at different swimming levels.

I went out everyday to help chaperon. It was fun to watch Dan with his friends. We both loved it.

That's another check in the "so glad we moved

here" column.

In the last picture, Dan is branding a piece of wood with the Rockin' C brand.

Tooth Fairy

Sara lost her tooth yesterday and it has reminded me again that I am the worst tooth fairy on the planet. I always forget. On average the tooth fairy usually comes around breakfast time while my disappointed child sits crying into his Cheerios. "Go check again." I have said more than once, "Maybe she had a lot of houses to go to last night."

. . . childhood must seem so magical in my home.