Monday 26 February 2018

A Week in Review (Feb 18-24)

A Week in Review (Feb 18-24)

Watched: Good Place and Atypical.  Both of them were great shows and I am thankful for the recommendations of my friends to give them to me.  I have quite a bit of reading that I need to do in the next couple of weeks so I doubt that I will get much TV watching in.  Plus my regular shows resume so that will take up a good chunk of time.  I am looking forward to seeing what the other recommendations are like.

Read: I finished up These Is My Words.  For some reason this book was a bit slow for me. While I enjoyed hearing of the struggles that Sarah and her family endured, I was just never drawn into the story. I mostly felt like it was a story that I had heard before. However, I was sad to see it end because I didn’t feel like I was at the end. If you are looking for a good pioneer story, I feel that you would enjoy this one.  Next, I started Still Me, which is the third in a series.  I only just got a few pages in, but I am hoping to finish it up next week.  It will be a bit of a challenge, but hopefully I can rise to it!

Listened: Jack cry when Nora clawed him accidentally.  He was messing around with her and she jumped up on his back.  She must have been losing her balance on two feet and so she moved her paw to regain and it went in a long movement down his face and across his eye area.  Luckily there doesn't seem to be any damage to his sight, but his face sure hurts.  I guess she just wanted to make him look tough for his basketball game.

Made:  On Monday, the head wrestling coach invited Jack out to see Black Panther.  I decided to use that time to make the bags up.  Wow!  It was a lot longer process than I had imagined.  Coach offered for me to bring them to practice so that people could help me, but I knew that I was too anal about the way they were looking to share them with anyone. I love the way that they turned out and I think the families will like them too.  There is a picture of one below.

Felt: A bit sad that Jack didn’t do state. So instead, we watched trackcast and were able to see some of his teammates matches.  We had to leave for his basketball in the middle of it.  When we got back it seemed like many of the matches didn't record because they didn't have the link to watch the videos beside them.  I was bummed because that was many of the kids that I wanted to watch as they are kids from my team that I take care of.  However, I did get to watch Jack have a good basketball game.   His team is really clicking and they get along so well.  After the practice, the coach asked me if they were a club team that played together.  The idea made me laugh as I am not sure why a club team would ever come play Y-Ball, but it was a nice a compliment.  Hard to believe that we only have two more weeks left.

Planned: To be utterly confused by the chess ladder concept that was explained to me, but once I saw it in action, I really liked it.  We have seventeen 5th graders in our chess club, so there isn't a good way for them to play each other.  Therefore, they have to use this ladder style to determine who they can play.  They can challenge anyone that is four spaces above them.  If they beat them, they take their place on the ladder and everyone else must move down one.  The kids seemed to understand it quickly too and I think they like the visual representation of their status.

Loved: Ladies offering to help with box tops.  I had an awkward exchange with our school's coordinator on Thursday which resulted in me counting the box tops for this challenge.  It wasn't exactly something I was prepared to do and I loved that when I told people about it that they offered to help me.  I gave a huge task to my girlfriend to count her son's class.  They ended up winning the contest most likely with a total of 799.  It took me long enough to count the other 2200 that I am so glad that I didn't have to count the 799 too!  I am hoping the coordinator steps down next year so that I can take it over and have fun contest for the school.

Here are the pics for the week:









Tuesday 20 February 2018

A Week in Review (Feb 11-17)

A Week in Review (Feb 11-17)

Watched: Despicable Me 3 and The Empire Strikes Back on Valentine’s.  I voted for 50 First Dates or The Wedding Singer, but I was vetoed by someone who cared more than I did.  Jack and I both really enjoyed Despicable Me 3 and thought it was much better than the 2nd one in the series.  He's pretty into Star Wars again for the moment so he really enjoyed it.  Nick wrote me a sweet love letter and looked forward to our trip together over the weekend.

Read: Finished A Wrinkle in Time. This was also a part of my banned books challenge for 2018.  This book is the classic battle of good vs evil and love conquering all. I’m not sure why you would ban it for too much or too little religion. I suppose if the teacher were trying to force their religion on you while discussing the book things could get messy.  Jack definitely enjoyed it more than I did.  Since we both really enjoyed our read aloud time, we decided that we would take turn picking what book we read.  Since I picked first, he picked this time.  He selected Slacker. The opening chapter was quite hilarious and I am looking forward to seeing how the rest of the book develops.  Made a bit of progress on These is My Words.  I am hoping to be able to have it finished up by next week.   

Listened: To Jack complain after his haircut on Monday.  He knew that football season was coming up and he needed to get it under control for his helmet.  He also was informed that he would have to be showering more often because thick, long hair can get smelly quicker.  With the combined forces, he went in for a cut.  He was none to thrilled with how short they left.  You can see the before and after below.  His face really sums up how he felt.  I am sure we will be seeing it fluffy again soon.

Made: Bag tag samples for our wrestling bags.  I thought it was best to give people a variety of styles to choose from.  Everyone came to an agreement pretty quickly and now I just need to get them made.  I have forty to do, so I know that I can't put it off very long!

Felt: Bummed that my Lifeproof case wasn't waterproof after all.  Shortly after I recorded THIS awesome video, my phone fell all the way in.  I wasn't too worried about it, but when I saw water in the case, I kind of freaked out. Turns out that was the right emotion to have.  While it still powers on and I didn't lose any of the picture or data on it, it kind of has a mind of its own.  We will have to get a new one on Sunday.

Planned: On being close to both the Sand Dunes and the pool with the hotel that the boys picked as my Christmas present.  It ended up being about a 35 minutes away from the pool and a little over an hour to the pool.  Because the pool didn't open up until one with their winter hours, we went to the Sand Dunes first.  What can I say?  It's sandy, very sandy.  It was also pretty chilly because there was a light breeze and nothing to block it.  Jack had a blast playing in the sand.  He rolled down the steep dunes several times and even convinced me to roll from about half way.  We had sand everywhere and will most likely be finding it for months to come!  We also planned on gas being close but we had to drive 40 minutes out of or way just to get gas.  The cool thing about our place was that we got to exploring some backroads and see a bunch of Buddhist rock sculptures and some cool views.  Jack enjoyed taking some scenic pictures with my phone.  I have put some of those below.

Loved: Sand Dunes Recreational Pool.  It is so amazingly warm at 98 degrees.  It is naturally heated which makes it even more mind blowing.  We were there when it was 40 to 50 degrees.  Jack and I both thought that 45 was amazing because it made the water feel like such a treat.  As it got warmer, it wasn't quite as neat because you didn't get the rush.  They had a couple diving boards that Jack did lots of tricks off of.  It is a very reasonably priced trip if you are in the area.  I'd recommend that everyone take a least a day trip down there to enjoy.  If you decide to stay overnight, I'd either book in the cabins there or Center, CO!

Here are the pics for the week:

























Wednesday 14 February 2018

A Week in Review (February 4-10)

A Week in Review (February 4-10)

Watched: The Super Bowl.  I came down with a cold and I wasn't feeling especially excited about it, but it was fun to just sit around around and root for the Patriots too lose.  If the Eagles would have made that first down and not had to kick the field goal, Nick would have won a square in his office pool.  But alas, it didn't happen.  I was glad to see the Patriots not get another win.  Because I wasn't feeling great, we didn't have any big spread, but Nick made himself Hotwings and me a bowl of tomato soup and grilled cheese.  Jack went with a Tositno's cheese pizza and several Sprites.

Read:  I finished up The Bean Trees in plenty of time for book club.  I’m really surprised at how much I liked this book. I read it for my face-to-face book club and I was kind of dreading it because it felt like having teeth pulled to finish The Poisonwood Bible. In The Bean Trees, I was introduced to characters I wanted to root for! There isn’t a lot of conflict, but I still found myself drawn to the story. I’m glad it wrapped up like it did. If you want a story where the characters are more important than the plot, I would recommend picking up this one.  I didn't have any books come off hold soI decided to look through my TBR list and found Sam's Letters to Jennifer.  I put it on the list almost 5 years ago and decided I would mark it off.  This is book was a quick and sweet story about the enduring power of love. Great for a quick Valentine’s read.  Next I started These Is My Words.  Again, this another book that I have had on my TBR list for a long time.  I marked this one almost 6 years ago. I really slowed down my reading and am just barely at the beginning of it.

Listened: To Jack tell me he was ready for wrestling to be over. The practices are long and hard and have been going for a little over 5 months. He knows he isn’t doing any more tournaments and so he is ready to wrap up. He knows that he has to complete his commitment even though he is tired.  It will sure make football practice be so much easier than most kids. 

Made: Champions of Character poster for our wrestling club.  I really liked how it turned out.  I saw they saying on a Facebook post and sent it to the head coach.  We both thought it sent the message that our club tries to convey to all its wrestlers.  They kids will be getting this as a poster rather than a cinch bag for the first level of Champions with Character.

Felt: Thankful for a handy husband who is able to do things around the house.  Before the Super Bowl on Sunday, he took apart Jack's treadmill and took it to the basement where he had to run some new electrical to give it an outlet to run on.  Then he installed a ceiling light in Jack's bedroom.  It is so nice to be able to have some decent light in his room.

Planned: On it snowing in the afternoon of tournament and only giving us an inch.  I know I shouldn't listen to the predictions or models.  It was flurrying by 6:00am and really snowing by 7:00am.  We ended up getting around 3 inches.  It made for some interesting events at the tournament with refs not showing up, people wanting hot coffee like it was the best thing on earth. and not as many people coming out to support their wrestlers.  However, we covered it all and came out looking awesome.  I did a rough tally on Saturday night and we earned about $2500 for the club.  I am pretty excited by that.  It's a lot of work, but that's a lot of profit to help support our Champions with Character program.  I ended up scoring the mat Jack was on.  He won all 5 of his matches. You can watch them HERE, HERE, HERE, HERE, and HERE.

Loved: Having Nick home the whole week.  We had a lot going on so we didn't get a ton of downtime together, but it is just so nice to have your partner around to support your everyday life.  Someone to help your clear the kitchen dishes after dinner and someone to scratch your back when it itches.  I always forget during the long stretches how nice it is to have him home.  We are looking at starting him being gone for two week stretches pretty consistently through the month of March.  No one is really looking forward to it, but it will be nice for him to not have to drive and to be able to focus on his work without worrying about getting in time with his family too.  We are looking forward to him coming home next weekend for our trip down to the Sand Dunes.

Here are the pics for the week:




Tuesday 6 February 2018

A Week in Review (January 28-February 3)

A Week in Review (January 28-February 3)

Watched: The first couple episodes of The Good Place.  Since I had wrapped up the series Hart of Dixie, I was looking for a show me to watch in my down time.  I especially like having something to watch while I eat lunch.  I went to Facebook and got lots of recommendations.  I wasn't sure which one to watch first so I put them all into a hat and drew out the The Good Place.  It is right up my alley.  The way that her cuss words get altered to be things the Ashhole and Fork really endeared me to the show.  It's only a couple of seasons into production so it won't be very long before I back at the hat again finding a new show, but I am looking forward to this one.

Read: I finished up My Lovely Wife in the Psych Ward.  If you love someone who struggles with mental illness, you may identify with the author. He doesn’t make himself out to be a wonderful human being. Most of the time, he paints himself to be quite the ass. If you are having feelings of guilt during your partners break from reality, this book would show you that you aren’t alone in feeling that way. I am also very curious about where their money came from that allowed them so much downtime during each of her episodes. I feel fortunate that love my life has never left me to experience the psych ward.  Next, I blew through Eliza and Her Monsters.  I found this book on the recommendation of a friend. It made her Top 5 books from 2017. I can see why she loved it so much. The characters (in all the worlds) draw you and make you anxious to know more. Excellent YA material.  I was also able to read the novella, Gwendy's Button Box.  It was entertaining and thought provoking. What would you do if you had a button box with the power to destroy whatever you wanted? I am sure that I would become addicted to the exquisite chocolates such a box would provide too.  Next I started The Bean Trees which was this month's selection for my face-to-face book club.  While I made good progress on it, I don't have it wrapped up for a review yet.  

Listened: Growling dogs as Nora and her friend Sadie had a blast playing with each other. Sadie’s family went skiing for the weekend and so we got to dogsit. They both had a great time running around chasing each other and looking like wild animals as they played with one another. 

Made: Everyone gather around for a picture with our PTA membership award. It is exciting that we have grown our membership enough to have qualified for the award. We had a pretty good group show up to our PTA meeting and the photo was well received on Facebook. I’m going to kind of miss running the page when I step off the board.

Felt: Amused by the outfits Jack and his friend came up with for basketball practice.  Jack went upstairs to get changed for practice and said he was coming down fancy.  He came down wearing shorts, a polo, his jersey, and a clip on tie.  I busted a gut.  Too make things all that much better, his friend requested a tie so that they could match.  They went to practice like that and wore it the entire time.  It was quite the hoot.

Planned: Tournament shopping list for our concession stand.  We kept a pretty good quantities list after last year, so it wasn't too hard to do.  I was glad to hear that Nick could keep driving up the company car and we wouldn't have to load and unload it a couple of times before the tournament!

Loved: Nick coming home.  He got home early Thursday evening in time for a quick kiss before I headed off to the PTA and he took Jack to wrestling practice.  He did get to enjoy both wrestling and basketball.  Jack had an amazing day of wrestling winning 3 out 4 matches and losing his only match by 1 point.  It must have been a pretty even bracket because it somehow worked out that even with that record, he got third place.  His whole team played amazingly well and won something like 34-6.  We enjoyed just being together and knowing that he didn't have to leave on Sunday night or Monday morning made it even more of a treat.  He gets to be a home an entire week thanks to the Board of Directors meeting that is being held in Denver that he is presenting at.  It will be a week full of tournament preparations, but I will just be so glad to him next meet even for only a few minutes a night.

Here are the pics for the week:
Jack and Rylan with their back to back picture. Jack may be sucking it up, but Rylan is raising his feet.  I am sure Rylan will catch back up soon.


The PTA crew


What hams!


Nora and her bud Sadie