A Last Visit to the Castle

Before the local skating rink closed down for good, we had a last horrah party with some of the kids' friends.  The kids got a kick out of getting to dress up in their winter clothes in August and it was nice for them to get to spend time with friends since we were gone from home so much this summer.  It's a shame that the rink is closing down now.  There's a lot of good memories there.  This was definitely one of them.

Being Boys

Here's my little ninja, digging in the sand with some friends and soaking up the last week of sunshine before school started.  We had a great summer of fun with friends and family and are looking forward to seeing some of them all in the classroom this fall.

Impromptu Dance Party

There we were, sitting idly by the lake, enjoying our barbeque with friends when all of the sudden a certain song came on the radio and OH MAN!  It was like the pied piper came and started blowing his whistle!  I don't remember which tune it was, but these kiddos went BANANAS!  They were dancing and jigging and moving like Jagger.  I have come to realize that we have to appreciate these moments when they happen so I have a picture of the aftermath but not the brief insanity.  I think there were about four more kiddos that missed the picture because they were still somewhere rocking out.  This age is awesome.  It just keeps getting better and better.

A New Day

We had our first day of school this week. My little darlings were up bright and early, waiting for me to take them to the school almost half an hour early.  I am guessing that this is not going to be a trend. If their summer schedule was any indication of how things will go, I figure I will be dragging them half dressed and half asleep into the car by next week. It was nice for the day though to have them so energetic about new beginnings.

My little princess started her day in second grade, ready to conquer rocket science (or simple machines...whatever). To the left  is a picture of her with her new teacher.  My youngest baby is finally starting kindergarten. We were lucky to get the same kinder teacher that his sister enjoyed (also pictured).  I will be helping out in his class once a week and it will be nice to see how he interacts with the other kids (and keep me ease into my empty nest syndrome). I am looking forward to those other few days though where I can have a couple hours to hit the gym or get some work done. My guess is that the errands will often overrule the gym.  Stay posted...

Something to be Proud of

This is my dad, in his sailor suit when he first joined the navy.  He is standing with his grandfather, my great-grandfather.  My great-grandfather came across the Atlantic ocean to America from Denmark when he was very young and stayed when his family went back.  There is something to be said for having vision like that.  This picture was taken before my dad ever met my mom.  He is a veteran for helping to build submarines when the Vietnam war was being waged.  It's a good feeling to know that there are people out there will to give of themselves to be more than they are individually.  I am proud to be in a family that realizes the value of sacrifice and vision.

Catching Up (Where I've Been)

I have been an avid scrapbooker for many years now.  It started before we ever had kids in an attempt to do something with the many pictures we took with our friends.  Once a week, some girlfriends and I would rent an old movie and the husbands/boyfriends would play poker while we watched our movie and scrapbooked.  We used scizzors, glue and paper.  No fancy schmancy gadgets.  It was a very fun time in our lives so there was a lot to scrapbook and I looked forward to our weekly gatherings.

As all of our lives progressed, and people moved here and there, the weekly gathering stopped and we began to do scrapbooking whenever we had spare time on our own.  I still enjoyed it very much on my own and relished the time spent reminiscing about previous activities.

Then we moved and had our little princess.  It was the perfect excuse to scrapbook all of her new moments and our adventure with her.  She wasn't really doing much yet so I could scrapbook while she napped or taught herself Mandarin.  I was scrapbooking things the month after they happened.  That was 2006.  I think her baby book is longer than War and Peace.  Before we knew it, we were expecting our second little bundle of joy.  Now having a mobile 1 year old and a nursing newborn, there was less time for scrapbooking but not wanting to be unfair to our little boy, I put together his baby book and it is also fairly long, although somehow it didn't get completed until 2009.  Don't judge me.

So there I was, in 2009 and having to decide how to proceed with this hobby.  I now had TWO mobile toddlers who loved to take pens off of counters and take (read: hide) anything that mommy showed interest in.  So scrapbooking hit the back burner for a while.  Then all of the sudden some other girlfriends and I had the brilliant epiphany that our children liked to play together so we should let them!  Enter stage left: our new excuse to scrapbook together!

In an effort to expedite my scrapbooking, I attempted to digitally create my 2008 book but soon abandoned it because I didn't want to be staring at a computer screen while my girlfriends were happily cutting and pasting around me.  We had all sorts of new gadgets and gizmos that I wanted to create with so I decided to move on with my photos for 2009 in the hands-on approach.  I wasn't nearly as efficient at scrapping my photos but with a few strategically planned "mom's weekend"s, I was able to keep up fairly well for a couple years.

And then came school.  My ballerina started kindergarten and with it came a whole new set of hours that we had to be home and in the car and here and there and everywhere.  So there was no more time for our mommy playdates to scrapbook.  Fast forward a year of kindergarten (2011) and a year of homeschool (2012) and I found myself looking at scrapbooks yesterday, thinking "Where did 2008 go?".  Resolved to not let the photos go to waste, I locked myself in the office and cranked out a digital scrapbook for 2008 - WHEW!  Five years later, but it is done!  I feel so accomplished!

Now, having 2009-1010 already done from previous mommy playdates, I am only behind by 2 years, and that seems manageable.  I mean, I can actually REMEMBER those events :)  In scrapbookers' terms, it's "recent".  Which leaves me looking forward.  For all of you mommies out there who have boxes of photos piling up on your desk: Anybody up for a mommy's scrapbooking weekend over Labor day?  Let's DO this!

Three Pieces of Advice on Gossip

Insomuch as it depends on me, I shall be at peace with all men. This is a hard mantra to live by. Living in a small community, virtually everyone you meet knows someone who knows you.  It is healthy and worthwhile to keep updated with friends and current events.  There is a fine line that borders hearsay and meddling however.  When people ask me about a struggle with such issues, and I have a hard time walking that line while being human and fallible, I can only summarize my advice as three things; don't listen, don't relay, forgive.

• Whoever gossips to you will gossip about you. --Spanish Proverb
• What you don't see with your eyes, don't witness with your mouth. --Jewish Proverb
• A mind conscious of innocence laughs at the lies of rumor --Latin Proverb

#1 My thoughts on this: When you hear a rumor disguised as news, try to recognize it for what it is and consider the motive and character of the person relaying the news before considering the content. When that news is about you, you can only remember the same thing and hope that others do as well.

• I resolve to speak ill of no man whatever, not even in a matter of truth; but rather by some means excuse the faults I hear charged upon others, and upon proper occasions speak all the good I know of everybody. ~Benjamin Franklin
• Because they are mean is no reason why I should be. I hate such things, and though I think I've a right to be hurt, I don't intend to show it. ―Louisa May Alcott, Little Women

#2 My thoughts on this: It is better to be known as the bearer of good news. Conveying rumor is as bad as creating it. Rumor in any form is ugly and it make the bearer ugly as well.

• I forgot that every little action of the common day makes or unmakes character, and that therefore what one has done in the secret chamber one has some day to cry aloud on the house-tops. ~Oscar Wilde 
• Before I can live with other folks I've got to live with myself. The one thing that doesn't abide by majority rule is a person's conscience. ~Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird 
• Gossip is called gossip because it's not always the truth. ~Justin Timberlake

#3 My thoughts on this: Whether they say it to each others' faces or not, people usually know the truth. There is only one person that we ultimately shall be judged by and it is not those spreading rumors as news. A rumor seldom is completely true and even if it is, it is seldom the news-bearer's business. Sometimes rumors hurt you and it is best to address them directly rather than respond to the messenger. Forgive 70 times 7 times and if it still hurts perhaps you didn't really forgive at all.

Farmer

My little farmer is proud of himself for the sweet and delicious carrots and tomatoes he has grown this year.  We are also growing beans (from 15 bean soup) and basil and mint and watermelons and cilantro and apples and raspberries and strawberries and pears.  In any greater quantities, we might be considered a farm!  It makes up for those pesky ground squirrels eating all of the cabbage, beans and sunflowers.  Stupid ground squirrels.

geocaching

While we were in Oregon this June, we took a little time to go geocaching.  If you've never done it then you should.  It's like treasure hunting for cool places.  Along the way, we got a couple choice photos.  One of the kids contributing to the local "gas" and one of hubby and I.  Good times.

Candy Monster

My little ninja fisherman turned six while we were in Alaska recently.  This is the cake I made for his birthday.  He requested a "Candy Monster" cake.  I think I nailed it, don't you?

Girls of Summer

My little ballerina has been begging me to allow her to have a sleepover with her girlfriends for months now.  Actually, it's been pretty much non-stop begging since her birthday sleepover in March.  We have been so busy with school and track and tax season that I haven't gotten a day to do it for her.  Well, once school got out I had no more excuses.  We met the girls around noon, spent some time at the beach on the lake and then came back here for a night of giggles and girlishness.

My personal favorite time of the night though, was when it was about 8:30 and the girls had gone up to their room for "bedtime".  They were up there no more than 10 minutes and came down and peeked around the corner, looking like this picture.  They proclaimed, "We can't sleep!  We tried and it's been like THIRTY HOURS.  It's almost MIDNIGHT!"

The Mighty Hunter

Daddy taught our little hunter how to use the live-trap to catch those pesky ground squirrels that are eating all of my vegetables.  My son can strategically place the trap, bait it, set the spring trigger, and make sure to rig it so they cannot escape once caught.  So far I think he has caught seven of them all on his very own.  You GO boy!

Ninja Trophies

Congratulations to my little ninja who won TWO TROPHIES at his first karate tournament last month.  He earned them for his kata and a weapons exercises.  He was SO proud of himself!  It's like validation of his ninja-ness.  I mean, really, how many trophies for being a ninja do YOU have?  I thought not.

Pictures of Alaska

 Hiking at Skilak lake

  Catching Dolly Varden at the Russian River

Catching Salmon on the Kenai River

Hiking at Hidden Trail

Catching Halibut and other oddeties in Homer

Waiting on a Parade

One of the better decisions we made this year was to get annual passes to Disneyland.  At first we were worried that we wouldn't get our money's worth out of it.  As the months rolled by, however, we realized that we were going regularly.  The bigger benefit of the passes though was the ability to enjoy ourselves more when we were at the park.  We spent one day just playing in Toontown.  We spent another day with just the girls, doing any/everything princess.  We got to ride the big rides on days when no one else was there and then just enjoy the parades and big events if we were there on a day with a big crowd.  The lack of pressure to fit the entire park into one or two days made every day that we visited much more enjoyable.  Here we are, last June, with some friends, waiting on the Pixar parade in California Adventure.  Just enjoying our time together.

Always the Bridesmaid...

You may recall a similar story from last year.  Can that really happen twice?  Those were both such HUGE marlins but as it turns out, this year, they were short by 53 pounds (last year it was 54 pounds).  They were so close to winning!  Keep trying guys.  Next year is bound to be your turn.  You obviously know how to catch them.

But Can You Do BOTH?

I often tell people that in track and field, there are three just things to do.  First, you can run.  2 year olds can run.  Second, you can jump.  Two year olds can also jump.  And then you can throw, which, let's face it, those athletes' arm muscles are in a league all their own and I'll leave that out of this equation.  So what we are left with (excluding shot put and discus) is perfecting a motion that you are taught to do from all of the time after you turned one.  Sounds easy right?  Well, for the most part, it is.

Except hurdling.  Hurdling takes a special kind of crazy.  You have to be able to not only run, but also jump.  You have to be able to run and jump and then keep running and jumping 8 to 10 times for up to a quarter mile.  That's some crazy zombie eluding skills, folks.  To make matters even more complicated, in the shorter distance hurdles, you have to be able to convince your brain that your muscles are strong enough to carry your body where your eyes do not believe that it can go.  You only get one landing step and then three strides (called three-stepping) if you are going to be at all competitive.  So those feet have to land in the exact same spot for 100 or 110 meters repeatedly.  I have often professed that in their prime, hurdlers are better with their eyes shut.  They can run straight and know where the hurdles are without looking at them.  To see them and allow one's brain to judge distance is a detriment to their race.

That's why I think I enjoy coaching hurdlers so much.  It's not just that they are the special kind of crazy that jumps into snow-runoff waters in the lake in March, but also that they are smart.  Good hurdlers are usually naturally fast or naturally smart.  Great hurdlers are both.  They can convince their brains that their muscles will do what their eyes profess to be impossible.  I have had several good and great hurdlers run for me as their coach.  This year was no exception.  Hurdling attracts some great kids.

San Elijo

We played in the sand.  We caught fish (BIG fish). We entered the chili cookoff.  We drew on the ground in chalk.  We visited with friends.  We enjoyed fellowship with our fellow church members.  This was our first visit to the annual church campout at San Elijo and it did not disappoint.

How Can You Sleep?

With these three thirds of my whole all lying peacefully beside me, after reading at bedtime, how could I possibly fall asleep?  All I wanted to do is watch them and soak in the blessings that they are for me.  I could lay there for hours if I knew they wouldn't eventually wake me up at the crack of dawn.  It refreshes my soul to see them so peaceful.

My Awesome Nephew

My new nephew is just an awesome miracle.  We were delighted to get to meet him and see him get baptized recently.  The pastor did a great job of speaking and when he finished with the water and blessing, the little guy (my nephew, not the pastor) raised his fist in the air as if to shout "Halleluiah!"  It was just precious.  We all retired from the church, back to the house for some catching up with friends and family in the beautiful sunny weather God planned for my nephew's big day.  The older my children get, the more I realize how very fleeting those precious moments are and try to appreciate them whenever I can take a snapshot in my brain.  My nephew's fist in the air after being baptized is definitely one of my snapshots.