Monday 25 April 2016

A Week in Review (April 17-23)

A Week in Review (April 17-23)

Watched: Nick and Jack have a good time playing football in the parking garage elevator area at DIA. Nick needs to get to the airport early to build up his courage to get on the plane.  Jack wanted to stay and play. Of course, we didn't bring a football so we had to make due with the small water bottle that Jack had brought along. It was pretty funny to watch them play. I caught one photo that I thought summed it up nicely. I was also able to sneak a rare photo of the hubby. 


Read: I finished up Three Wishes.  It was another winner by Liane Moriarty. While all of her books have a similar feel, I never feel as if I am reading the same story. Having a friend who has triplets made this one even more entertaining for me. A good story about siblings and family, even without the triplet aspect.  Next, I started Reached, the third book in the Matched series.  I'm not very far in, but it's not looking a lot better than its predecessors. 

Listened: To my boy snore slightly as he fell asleep against me at 9:30 on Saturday night. He was so exhausted from his busy day. We started at 9:30am at the baseball field. When the games wrapped up around 12:00, he came home and played outside with the neighbors until lunch. When we finished lunch, his friend came over and they played again until they left for a birthday party. They were at the party for 3.5 hours. He went back to his friends house and played basketball for at least an hour too. He finally came home about 8:30pm and it didn't take him long at all to unwind and fall asleep.
Made: The a huge order for carnations for the Teacher Appreciation order. I think that it is going to be a special treat for the teachers. The next couple of weeks will be full of things preparing for and executing a great week for the teachers. Hopefully they enjoy it!

Felt: Glad for Ryan. Nick flew in from Charlotte on Wednesday night. Ryan had worked up in Denver so he was willing to swing over to the airport and get Nick.  It was probably a good thing because he had way more patience for Nick's post flying attitude than I would have.

Planned: On having the bed to myself the night Jack had friend sleep over. It didn't turn out that way. Instead, I got two extra bodies and a whole lot less sleep than anticipated. Oh well. They had a great time when they were awake. It just made the next day require a little more Dr Pepper.

Loved: Having a handy husband.  The bulb cover for my blinker finally fell off. Nick says that they have been burnt out at the top for several years.  We decided to just go with new ones. The change is way more dramatic than the picture actually shows. It makes the car looks years younger.

Here are the pics for the week:








Wednesday 20 April 2016

A Week in Review (April 10-16)

A Week in Review (April 10-16)

Watched: Weird Science with Jack. It was so much more risqué than I remembered. I wonder how much of it went over his head. I am hoping a lot of it. He really liked it for whatever reason. I am looking forward to sharing more 80s movies with him, but I think I will watch them in advance next time.

Read: I finished up Crossed.  After completing this book in the series, I feel like it should have been written as one long book rather than broken up into a trilogy. There wasn't any real action in this book and I am hoping that the third book is almost all climax and conclusion. I will stick it out because I have to know how it ends.  I also finished up Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore.  I really enjoyed the majority of this story. I like the references to current pop culture.  I like the mystery. The description of spaces totally transported me there. The ending was just okay for me.  I know it really couldn't have worked out many other ways though. I did love the epilogue though. No wondering about what happens to characters for me! Next, I made a small start on  Three Wishes.  My reading partner found it.  It is by the same author who wrote What Alice Forgot.  It has triplets for the main characters, which is why it caught her eye.  It will be interesting to see what happens.

Listened: To a most peculiar phone call. On Friday, Jack had a fellow student tell him that he was going to kill him. This isn't the first time and I told Jack if he felt umcomfortable that he should tell a teacher. Apparently he did so, which lead to the school calling security and Jack having to file a report. The child apologized to Jack and had other consequences. Hopefully everyone learned the power of words and how careful we must be them. 

Made: The official date for Academy Little League Chipotle fundraiser.  I am pretty excited because they are allowing us to use three locations for our families. I really hope that the community and league comes out well in support of this event.

Felt: Excited about Jack's spring picture. He looks so absolutely handsome in it.  He hasn't lost anymore teeth in a while so he had a nice even smile. He picked the background and the pose himself. The only drawback was that they didn't send me enough 8X10s and so I have to wait 3 weeks for the grandparents pictures to arrive.

Planned: On a weekend full of sports but Mother Nature had other plans.  My mom was even slated to come down, but when we looked at the forecast we decided it would be better to push it off to another weekend.  Good thing we did because we got the snow that they were calling for. It didn't really stick to the roads, but did make it unpleasant to be out in and totally unable to play sports.  Luckily the organizers of spring sports around here know what they are doing and we already have make up dates in the calendar.

Loved: Celebrating my birthday.  I love birthdays and therefore I really can't hate aging. I find it odd when I comb hair and find large chunks of gray at my temples. I don't feel old enough to be gray, but it is without doubt that they are there.  Since my birthday fell on Monday, it was full of checking off my to-do list. We also had a special Monday night baseball practice.

Here are the pics for the week:




Monday 11 April 2016

A Week in Review (April 3-9)

A Week in Review (April 3-9)

Watched: Jack receive an award for Outstanding Novice for his wrestling club.   I was so excited for him.  He really worked hard all season and dedicated himself to the sport.  I thought his coach gave a nice little speech about him.  You can see it HERE.  It's recorded from my phone so the sound isn't ideal, but you can definitely hear him.  He was also one of a select number of children who were recognized for being a Champion of Character, which I am super proud of as well.  There were a lot of stories of wrestlers who received other award that I hope motivate him to keep up the good work.

Read: This week wasn't too busy, so I was able to get quite a bit of reading done.  I began and finished Matched, which was recommend to me many years ago since I like the Hunger Game trilogy. It was okay. I can see why they would make the recommendation because both stores are dystopian love triangle novels. For me, they just didn't have the same punch. I felt that this one had more angst to it and I felt like I spent a lot of time listening to a teenager whine. Even with that being said, I will finish the trilogy.  I immediately started the next book in trilogy, Crossed. I haven't gotten very far into it though.  I am glad that it seems to pick up where the first book left off.  I also starts a new book with my reading partner, Mr. Penumbra's 24 hour Bookstore.  I am really enjoying it.  It has a lot of modern day references that I think will be funny for people to look back in ten years.

Listened: To the doctor's advice on how to proceed with Jack's head bonk. He was playing football with some boys after school and he took an inadvertent elbow to the head.  He didn't cry when it happened, but he did freak out when he saw himself.  He may have sustained a mild concussion. He passed the pupil test and the cognitive test, but his balance was a bit off. He took it pretty easy for the rest of the day.  When he woke up, he didn't have a headache. He did have to call me to bring him some Tylenol. He managed to get through the rest of the day which included PE, after school sports camp, and baseball practice.  We are lucky in that he really showed no adverse effects and was able to continue with life normally.

Made: An official claim to get the ball rolling to replace the contents of my purse.  It is hard to actually think about everything that you have inside there and attempt to value it.  The highest value item I lost was my prescription sunglasses.  It's kind of crushing because I know that the thieves will have gotten nothing out of them and probably just tossed them in the trash.  We will see what the insurance company says.  I must say that I don't feel that they are really living up to their good neighbor slogan.  I have much better neighbors.  :)

Felt: Joyous about the nice Spring weather that we have been having. It's so nice to be able to be out and about without bundling up.  I really do think we might have to look at getting some sort of room air conditioning though. Our bedroom is already 78 at night. 

Planned: On Opening Day ceremony for little league being kind of silly and it was.  However, Jack enjoyed it way more than I thought he would have.  They got to walk down onto the field and have their team recognized along with every other team in the league.  He was selected to read the Little League pledge as representative of his team.  The board gave some nice speeches and honored their all star teams from the last year.  It was much toastier than I had envisioned though.  Jack wasn't happy that I had put him in a long sleeve black t-shirt.

Loved: Spending good chunks of Friday talking to my mom.  While the subject matter wasn't ideal, I was reminded of how fiercely I love her and would do anything to protect her.  I was also really reminded of the power of words and how you need to be aware of how you feed into others.  I've got a great mom and I don't like anyone messing with her.

Here are the pics for the week:

The head bonk 

Nora attempted to kiss and hug it better

Walking onto the field during his Opening Day ceremony

A baseball memory popped up in my Facebook memories. I couldn't believe how lucky that was. These pictures were taken exactly six years apart. 

Jack with one of his wrestling coaches and his award. 

Sunday 3 April 2016

A Week in Review (March 27-April 2)

A Week in Review (March 27-April 2)

Watched: I got all caught up on my shows.  I am just so in love with The People vs OJ Simpson.  I tell anyone who was somewhat interested in the trial to watch it.  I look forward to every episode and will be quite sad when its over.  I am not loving any story line on Days of Our Lives write now and that makes me so bummed.  It just doesn't do anything for me at the moment.  Sure hope the story line changes quick!  Nick and I also watched several Better Call Saul episodes this week.  I also watched Jack excitedly come home and build an egg transporter.  We made a video to show his teacher.  We took a couple, but I only uploaded one to YouTube.  You can watch it HERE.

Read: I read Mirror, Mirror this week.  This book was unique. It's definitely nowhere close to Disney's version, not that I expected it to be, but it was just so different. Along with other reviewers, I agree that character development is totally lacking. Also, plot points seem very disjointed to me. If you like variations on fairy tales, you may enjoy this one.  Next I decided to start Skylight Confessions.  It is pretty short, so I don't foresee it taking me too long to get through.

Listened: To several rounds of April Fool's from everyone in our house.  Jack started out the morning by trying to pretend he puked.  He chewed up some gold fish and spit them out on the floor and tried to tell me it was puke.  His teacher told them that it was tradition in France to place a paper fish on someone's back for the holiday.  They made one to bring home to their parents, but I got him with it instead.  Sadly, it pulled off when he put on his jacket and he didn't make it school with it.  I got Jack by changing his iPad screen saver to a cracked screen and yelling at him for breaking it.  He was quite perplexed and scared.  I also wrapped up all his food in his lunch in crepe paper.  I put a brick behind Nick's tire so that he would have hard time making it out of the house.  He returned the favor, but I wise to that so it didn't delay us.  Jack tried all sorts of sayings like he got in trouble at school, etc.  He was quite bummed that I didn't fall for any of them.

Made: A very simple Easter dinner.  Jack had requested french dips since he had one that he just loved on our trip.  I needed the traditional ham, so I got myself a small ham steak.  We also had just a few deviled eggs, a fruit salad, and some veggies to go with it.  The boys had some movie popcorn when they went to see Batman vs Superman, so it was good that it wasn't too heavy.

Felt: Very grateful for the good help that we have developed for our Popcorn Fridays at Jack's school.  We were able to get a ton popped and bagged before the kids even got out of school.  It is good to see mom's talking with each other and just enjoying the experience.  I had two helpers who helped me count and deliver bags the next morning too.

Planned: On just being crowd control for Jack's team in the dugout during their first game. Coach informed me that he needed me to keep the book too.  Man that really changes things up.  It definitely made the game more exciting and intense.  Although no official score was released, our team won impressively 12-4.  Jack and I took a picture of ourselves before the game.  I don't love the picture, but both my boys say I look okay.  It's funny how differently we perceive ourselves from how others do.

Loved: Having an Easter Egg hunt with Jack.  I was up several hours before him so I gave him a head start since I had a chance to spy several of the places the Easter Bunny had hidden them ;)  He loved racing after them and beating me to them.  He ended up finding most of them but I think Nick and I got 5 or 6 for sport.  The eggs had gummies, junior mints, bubble gum (which I pretended I thought were Robin Eggs), and money in them.

Here are the pics for the week:


Jack dressed up for the movie 

Jack's fish. He didn't know it was there. I snuck it on with a hug. I had a ton on me after I stopped in their room on Popcorn Friday. 




A Week in Review (March 20-26)

A Week in Review (March 20-26)

Watched: A fun game between the Jayhawks and Maryland.  It was good to get a dose of revenge for our loss so many years ago.  Jayhawks hold grudges to the teams that take us out of the tournament.  Speaking of grudges, we will have to hold one against Villinova now.  It was a painful loss, especially in a year where so many people predicted we would win it all.  I may have taken it worse than normal since we had driven home for the game going 55mph on a 450 mile trip.  That really makes quite tedious and awful trip.

Read:  I finished up What Alice Forgot.  I thought the author did a great job about putting everything back together. I'd recommend this to anyone who is looking for a book.  It would make a great "beach" read.  Of course, I didn't take two books on our trip.  I am going to start Mirror, Mirror next.

Listened: To the nephews having a great time playing together.  Sadly Q was out sick with both the flu and strep, so we only got the see Declan and Keegan.  It was definitely a different dynamic without the oldest  one around.  They had a lot of fun swimming, building a tent, messing around in the empty trailer, and just talking to each other.  I really wish that we saw them more often then we do.

Made: A million phone calls and trips places because of my most colossal mistake.  After our trip to Pueblo, I took my purse out of Nick's truck to check the mail.  I set it down, most likely on the top of my car, and walked inside.  We forgot to close the garage door that night.  The next day the boys decided to take Nora for a walk while I was going to run to the store to get the stuff from the Easter Bunny and for Easter dinner.  At that point, I realized I couldn't find my purse.  I was sure that I had just put it somewhere silly.  I spent an hour searching and kept getting more frantic.  I checked the two main credit cards that were in my wallet, they did not show any unauthorized activity.  After Nick got home, and still couldn't find it, I checked one of the lesser used cards that wasn't in the main part of the wallet and there was activity.  I was so upset.  I lost my purse, my keys, my wallet, and Jack's wallet.  It is going to be a very expensive mistake to repair.  I really want to kick my own ass repeatedly.  Luckily, both my husband and kid are pretty understanding and are pushing for me to move on.

Felt: Such a roller coaster of emotions.  Monday was an awesome day in Pueblo, Tuesday was awful discovering the loss of the purse and the start of that entire process, Wednesday was lucky because escaped a crazy snow storm on our way out, Thursday and Friday were nice seeing family and getting away, and Saturday was quite disappointing.  I am hoping next week is a bit more even keeled.

Planned: On avoiding the winter weather by leaving early enough on Wednesday morning.  There were some very crazy parts.  Luckily Nick was driving and he just took it nice and slow through the dicey parts.  On saw on Facebook that a lot of my friends were talking about I80 being closed, so I decided to google I70 being closed.  Sure enough, roads that we very recently gotten off were shut down!  Guess we didn't get out early enough to avoid the weather, but we did get out early enough to avoid our route being shut down!  The storm dumped a ton of snow in the Denver area.  I stole a picture off my cousin's Facebook page to show you!

Loved: That Nick was able to take off the whole week of Spring Break.  I am very glad he wasn't at work when I found out about my purse.  I really benefited from his calming presence and the way he helped me make calls to cancel credit cards, change the locks, and just reassure me that I was more than my mistake.  We also got to take a fun trip down to Pueblo on Monday.  We did the river walk and enjoyed a doggie diner.  We went out the lake and had fun messing around out there too. If we lived closer to Lake Pueblo, I am sure we would already have a boat.  Being near the water really made us miss being able to be out on it.

Here are the pics for the week:





Nice, huh?

Look at all that snow. They had predicted 5"

Nora thought she needed Jack's seat

Cousin time




A Week in Review (March 13-19)

A Week in Review (March 13-19)

Watched: A lot of March Madness.  It is always a great time to just enjoy the thrill of the tournament.  Jack cracked me up because he said it was called March Madness because the kids were mad that all the parents wanted to do was watch basketball.  Haha!  He has gotten into a little bit this year with his bracket picks.  He is doing pretty well in the Wilson and Company bracket.  He was hurt, like so many others, by the loss of Michigan State.  However, we all still have our national champions--The Kansas Jayhawks.  Luckily they haven't faced a huge challenge yet, but I think the next couple of weeks will be a challenge.


Read: I kept reading What Alice Forgot.  My reading partner has had illness and her kiddos Spring Break so we haven't read this one as quickly as we might have otherwise.  I am really enjoying the story line.  There are lots of questions raised and it makes you examine your own life with the eyes of your former self.  Quite the original tale.

Listened: To the boys have a ton of excitement as they went and built a rocket to launch.  It all went pretty well, until the launched and the wind caught it and we couldn't find it.  We asked a couple people if we could look in their backyards, but didn't have any luck.  We came back home and were grilling dinner when we looked over and saw it on the roof of the house directly behind ours.  We launched from the bottom of the sledding hill, so this was really quite impressive!
Made: Food for our staff conferences.  We decided on doing a taco bar for lunch and then having a potato bar for the smaller group in the evening.  It was nice because dinner didn't require a whole new setup as they were able to just use the leftovers from the taco bar on top of the potatoes.  Everyone seemed to really like them.  The fellow parents really stepped it up from the fall and I didn't have near the work.  Thank goodness as it was on the first day of March Madness!

Felt: Proud of Jack.  He had a good conference.  His teacher says that he is an all around great kid.  I like knowing that he is making a positive impact in his classroom.  I was a bit worried because I know he said he had been having trouble with the students he had been sitting by.

Planned: On a trip to Wichita for our Spring Break trip.  Since work has slowed down a bit, Nick is ready to bring his motorcycle home.  I am not sure that it will fit very well in our current garage/outside situation, but we will find a way to make it work.  It will be nice for him to be able to enjoy his commute for work.  We are looking forward to seeing everyone in Wichita.  It is their Spring Break this week, so we won't get to see them as much if they had been off school, but we will make the most of it.

Loved: The hanging of our dart board. Because Jack is moving onto multiplication in math, we decided that we needed to get the dart board out for some good practice that is a lot of fun.  He has even beat us in one of our first games.  I am really going to step up my game.

Here are the pics for the week:


The clean up from the teacher dinner