Soccer star

It is 4:47pm and I'm sitting in my living room, about to take the boys to pick Olivia up from school.  She began a YMCA after school soccer program this week.  That means Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday afternoons she will stay after school for an hour and a half with other kids from her class.  They will play soccer, receive healthy snacks and (hopefully) have a lot of fun.

What is weird is that three days a week I won't see her until 5:15.  She wanted to do the program.  In fact she wanted to do it last semester but I wanted to see how the adjustment to first grade went before I shipped her off three out of five afternoons.  Since first grade has gone so well and she really wanted to try this, I figured what the heck?

It just seems so grown up to have her gone so much.  She came home delighted on Tuesday.  They didn't have school yesterday because of a freak March snow storm.  And we will see how it went today.  Her good buddy, Lila, is doing it with her.  That should be great fun. 

 

It's also nice that I have three afternoons a week that the brothers and I can get errands done, come home and relax or just have a bit of freedom to do whatever rather than turning around an hour and a half after I pick them up to go and pick Olivia up. 



My kids are growing up.  I like who they are becoming.  Even I am growing as a mom.  I have much to be thankful for and I feel it today!

Giant pencils on key chains and puffy stickers, Oh my

We had a big celebration around here the other week.  I couldn't let my sweet girl turn 7 without posting pictures of her big day.  She had thought long and hard on how she wanted to celebrate and what she came up with was:

 

Getting her ears pierced and fancy dining.  We talked about a party, but she is a girl who knows what she wants and she insisted she didn't want a big party.

 For years now, Steve and I told her she could get her ears pierced (if she wanted) when she was 7.  I figured by that point she could decide if she indeed wanted to go through the pain and responsibility. This is what my mom had done with me and I like to think I turned out ok.

We invited her good buddy, Lila to be moral support.  Lila and Olivia are true partners in crime.  Lila is in second grade and O is in first.  They were in the same pre-k/kindergarten classroom.  Then Lila moved up.  This year, O got moved into the same classroom.  The girls have become fast friends.  I truly love their friendship. They are a great match, two peas in a pod.

 

O was brave.  And all smiles.  She declared that day to be the *happiest day of her life, so far.*

 

The girls then shopped around Claire's Boutique for awhile.  (Is there really anywhere else for an American girl to get her ears pierced?)

 

I stood back and tried to get out of the way.  I felt like I was in some kind of weird dream where my daughter and her friend giggled over the sparkly hello kitty press-on nails... and then I realized, nope, it's just the beginning of the rest of my life.  Somebody get me a refill on my Xanex, please.

 

We ended with fancy dining at the Cheesecake Factory.  The girls were so excited and chatted and checked out the bathroom and the cheesecake case.  They talked about earrings and diaries that had locks on them at the store.  I basically re-lived my 1st grade year all over again. 

 I know there is a distinct possibility (dare I say certainty) I will take these words back but, I love watching my daughter grow up.  I love her choice in friends.  I like the friend she is to others.  I am not taking for granted the fact that she wants me around right now.  I know there will be a day she will ask me to want me to drop her off a block away from wherever she is going.  She will purchase a diary with a lock on it to keep ME out. 

I know I will do things that she will roll her eyes at.  I will embarrass her (and sometimes it will not be on purpose.)  Now I need to go work on figuring out how to pick locks... it might be a good skill to have one of these days.

High Hopes

I was in the classroom the other day helping some kids to read.  Most of the kindergartners in the class are on track for reading.  Several are not.  I've gotten to know the kids in the class pretty well.  I'm there just about every week for two hours.  I'm not sure how much I contribute by my measly two hours, but I like to think its something.

This week I spent time with two kids in particular who are struggling to read simple words.  It seems like rather than being unable to read, they are distracted.  Uninterested.  Unmotivated.  It's no fault of the teacher, she is amazing.  It just is what it is right now. It makes me sad.

De'Sean has made a lot of progress since I first met him.  Some weeks he is more focused than others.  This week was a not so focused week.  At first he rose to the challenge of not letting me "stump" him.  Then he got bored.  After about 7 minutes he was rocking in his chair.  Looking around.  Telling me "I don't want to read any more."

I had noticed earlier that De'Sean was good at and interested in drawing.  I asked him about art.  He said he liked drawing.  I told him I noticed he was really good at it and encouraged him that some day he might be a famous artist.  He said, "Yeah, but ain't nobody gonna take me for lessons."  I let him know there are schools where you can learn to be an artist but you have to know how to read to go there.  I tried to cast some vision for him to learn to read so that he can one day draw cartoons for other kids to watch on tv.  I don't know if those words sunk in.

Next up was Aleyah.  She is a smiley round girl who loves to give me a hug when I come in the classroom.  She lights up when she is called into the hall to work on reading.  She breezed through the letters and their sounds.  She grew discouraged and bored when we started reading the words.  Her brightness and smile faded after a few minutes of struggle.

I decided to ask her some similar questions.  She loves to sing and wants to become the most famous singer in the world some day.  I told  her I couldn't wait to hear her sing.  I also explained to her that singers need to know how to read so they know what words to sing.  I let her know that she is on her way to being a famous singer, but that it's so important she focuses on reading. 

When I think about the kids I get to spend time with, I have high hopes for them.  I pray that various negative cycles will end with them.  I pray that they will know Jesus.  I pray that they will have hope and dreams that don't get squashed along the way.

There is a reason we keep our kids in Dayton Public Schools.  Actually, there are a lot of reasons we keep our kids in Dayton Public Schools.  De'sean and Aleyah are two of those reasons.  I believe God wants to use our family to breathe hope and life there.  I also believe God wants to breathe hope and life into our family as we rub shoulders with these kids too.  I'm the one being schooled.

A chill in the air

Two days ago I was sitting next to a pool with tranquil music being piped in while I enjoyed 80 degree weather.  Hours later I touched down to gloomy, snowy 21 degree Dayton.  I had to literally chisel my windshield wipers from the windshield and open my door to pay the parking lot toll because my window was frozen shut.  Mmmm.. February in Ohio, I curse you.

That leads me to share a few more vacay pics so that you can hate me and I can resent being back in the mid-west just a little more!  I'm good like that.

My 25 year old self would totally judge my 40 year old self over this next fact:  Our kids have seen all 6 of the Star War movies.  25 year old me would have wondered what in the WORLD are you thinking?  Clearly the themes are too adult too scary and too violent. 

 

My 40 year old self says, "Just you wait young Jedi!"

 One of the highlights of our entire trip was our day at Hollywood Studios.  It was also a low light.  Steve and I *might* have spent the day fighting because he was obsessed (not an exaggeration) with getting our kids in Jedi training.  I definitely wanted them to do it, but not at the expense of our whole day.  (Please shield your eyes from the glare from my halo.)

I had read enough to know that when you arrive at the park you have to go first thing to sign your kid up so they will be assigned a time to be in the Jedi training.  Spots fill up fast so you have to high tail it over there.  There were some extenuating circumstances that prevented us from getting over there right away.  We were able to get our kids on the "alternate" list.  This meant if any kid didn't show up for their assigned time, kids from the alternate list would be called on to fill the slots.  Small problem, you have to be present to fill the spot.  You had to check back 20 minutes before every show.  And PS the shows were every hour.  Which meant we had to check back every hour because our kids *might* be called.

Steve (bless his heart) wanted our kids to be in the show SO BAD.  So bad, in fact, this became his quest.  A kind of get-outta-my-way-my-kid-NEEDS-to-be-a-Jedi-it's-a-matter-of-life-or-death- kind of quest.

 

He is a good dad. As you can see... they got in.

 

They did not make it into the same show mind you.  The boys got into one show, Olivia into another(Please read between the lines... an extra 2 hours spent on Star Wars obsession.  But I'm not bitter.)

 

My battery died so the pictures of O fighting Darth Vader are somewhere else, but suffice it to say, she was brilliant.  I was internally really glad that they all got in to the show.  They were thrilled.

And we did have time to do a few other things (other than running back and forth to the Star Wars ride/stage.)

 

But the looks on the boys' faces say it all in this one.  Steve and I were totally that couple on our way out of the park literally yelling at each other and doing the "FINE" and the "Oh, so it's MY fault?" kind of thing as we spilled the stuff from the stroller getting on to the tram car.  It's true that the chill in the air during that scene may have frozen a few windows shut that night as well.

We do, however, have 3 fully trained Jedi on our hands.  Which makes it totally worth it. Right?

Humor me while I bore you

I'm on a roll... now that I've figured out how to post pics again I suppose I'll bore you to death.  But hey, it's Disney, you have to show off how much fun you had, right?  Some how it cancels out the pure exhaustion and frustration you experienced while actually AT the parks.

Here we are, about to head off to the longest, I mean HAPPIEST day on Earth.  Weather was perfection.

 

The monorail was shut down for the morning so we took the ferry across.  How did I not know that it took half a day just to get to the Magic Kingdom?  I was pooped before we even entered the gate.

Seeing Cinderella's Castle for the first time:

 

My kids were traumatized by most of the rides.  We took them on Space Mountain.  Tears and screams.  We went on the Lilo and Stitch experience.  Tears and screams.  Needless to say, we are not exactly *ride people*.  Oops.  They did, however, really enjoy meeting the characters and seeing the shows.  Here are some highlights:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

There are also high lights from our Star Wars experience and the BibbityBobbityBotique.  I will post those separately.  But now, I need to jump on a plane and head back to Orlando.  Steve and I have some meetings the next few days.  Our gracious and brave friend will stay with the kids and hold the fort down.  It's strange to head back there so soon after all of this family fun with out the kids.  It makes me a tad bit sad.  And yet strangely relieved.

 

 

 

Dreams do come true!

It's a miracle, but I finally figured it out.  I will resist the urge to post 50 pics all at once... instead I'll try and tell the story bit by bit.  The smiles in these pics are my favorite.  Pure delight. 

 Here they just found out where they are going.  I think they are excited!

Grandma and Papa went all out to make their room so special.  Looks like it worked.

 

But there was no time to lose.  We dropped our bags and were off to Epcot.  The first stop was Talking with Crush.  It was really cool.  Crush from Finding Nemo had a nice long conversation with Quinn (and then Quinn's mom, that would be me.)  I have to say, I'm not the best at stuff like that.   We also found our favorite ride... Test Track.  It was super fun and worth the long wait.  We loved it so much we went back at the end of the week to ride it some more.  Just today, my kids were asking if we could go back and ride it again. 

 

Good luck with that one, kids!

 

Stay tuned, high lights from Magic Kingdom to follow.

 

Here's one just to peak your interest :

 

Princess Olivia

Seriously, I'm at a loss.  This is the only picture from my phone that I could access- I'm about to lose heart.  At least this is a good one.

I can hardly believe this little princess is going to be 7 on Tuesday.  I can remember when I was 7.  That is big time, real memories kind of stuff.  She doesn't want a party.  She wants to go and get her ears pierced.  So she and I and her good friend, Lila, from school will go get her ears pierced and then we will go for some "fancy dining."  (For real, that is what she requested.)  Cheesecake Factory.  That is about as fancy as we are getting for two seven year olds.

Honestly, I can't think of a better way to celebrate. 

While we were at Disney World, we treated her to a major birthday treat.  She had her hair and nails done at the BibbityBobbityBoutique.  She soaked it in.  She felt like a princess.  For an hour, she was a princess (and if I had half a brain you could see pictures of it.)

What makes my heart swell over my little girl is that her heart is the heart of a princess.  She is well-mannered, kind, thoughtful, not bratty .  She loves Jesus.  She is not bossy (well... maybe a touch with her brothers) but can stand up for herself.  She is creative and loves to read.  I am so proud of Olivia and I am excited to celebrate her this week.