October 14, 2011

Abe is gone on an overnight camp-out with his 11-year old scouts.  I just spoke with him and he and all the boys are doing great.  After a very long, hard week, the kids and I took today pretty easy.  It was not declared an official no-school day, but very little school work got accomplished anyway.  It was a very emotional week, topped off with the funeral this morning of the young man in our neighborhood.  I played the organ, which I had never done before for a funeral.  I don't get nervous at all to play for Sacrament Meeting, but I was plenty nervous this morning.  And I'm sure no body was looking at me or cared, but funerals are very embarrassing for me.  I cry.  A LOT.  It doesn't matter if I know the person well or not.  I openly weep.  I'm afraid I am a bit distracting and I was embarrassed. 

Besides the emotions of the week, we had sickness as well.  I wasn't positive that we have had sickness until today.  I thought perhaps I was feeling so run-down because of all the emotions, but then several more kids started complaining of the same things and worse.  Unfortunately, I don't think the yuckies have run their course quite yet, so it could be a long weekend as well.

There have been some fun things as of late as well.

Do you know what causes a facial expression like this on a 3-year old?

 

THE CIRCUS!!!!!

Our wonderful Auntie Allison got us free tickets to go to the circus.  She was planning to take the kids, but then she got sick, so Abe got to go instead.  He bravely took 7 children to the circus all by himself-- WHAT A MAN!

 

There were extra tickets as well, so a couple of friends came along.  This was the Picadilly Circus, which was a one ring circus as opposed to a much larger three ring circus (Barnum and Bailey).  

And they did have a boxing kangaroo!  What more can you ask for?  

I was very happy they got to go to the circus, and I'm especially happy that it was at such a little cost to us! 

Look where we are again!!!!

This isn't a good picture, but that is Elinor running at the Tae Kwon Do center that Clark earned his black belt from.  She has been begging for months and months to do Tae Kwon Do and she finally got to start this week.  I don't think I have ever seen her happier in her whole life.  She was absolutely beaming.  

I must admit that I was all smiles during her first class as well.  Partly because she was so delighted to be there, but also because I have such fond memories of Clark doing TKD.  He gained so much and had a very positive experience learning from Master Kim.  

We are so happy to be back, and happy that we have a carpool with a friend which will simplify our schedule.

And speaking of simplifying schedules-- soccer is over!  Hallelujah!  I know I said I could do anything for a month, but that was too much.  I don't really enjoy soccer that much.  Perhaps if my children were soccer stars I would feel differently, but alas.  I am happy to report that Faith did not really like soccer, so we will just stick with gymnastics.  Elinor has chosen to do Tae Kwon Do, so I don't have to do soccer next year for her either.  And Cannon is 3, so it was ridiculous to begin with to put him in soccer and he didn't really get it (duh!) so we don't have to go there for a while either.  

But here's what we DO want to do next year.

 Football has been a marvelous experience for Clark this year.  And while he is definitely NOT the fastest kid on the team, his coaches have told Abe and I on numerous occasions how much they love having Clark on the team because he works so hard and has such a good attitude.  This makes me one happy mama!  As the season goes on he is getting more and more playing time.  I think we're all going to be sad when football season ends.  

I am in the pink hat holding the banner that the team will run through after half-time. 

This is serious business, you know.