Sun, 15 Aug 2010
End of SummerSince school starts this week(!) I think I'd better finish up writing about the things we did this summer. Soon after we got back from our trip to California, Melody and I went to Girls' Camp the same week that Bryan went to Boy Scout Camp. Both camps were, coincidentally, at different parts of the same Boy Scout facility. We went to S-F Camp in south central Missouri, about two hours from here. Bryan was at Famous Eagle and Melody and I were at Swift. Bryan has gone to Swift before. It is supposed to be the best of the camps around. We were very lucky to go there. The Boy Scouts own the whole lake that the camps are on and have developed some really nice facilities.
Anyway, the girls had a great week. I was a little nervous about dealing with all the "wildlife" that Missouri has to offer, namely: ticks, chiggers, snakes, spiders…Mostly these things don't bother me much, but the quantities that I'd heard about along with the no air conditioning just didn't sound that fun. Last year when Bryan came home from camp he went in the shower and came out and said something icky like, "Well I removed twenty-six ticks from just one leg…" Do you see why I was a little reluctant about the "opportunity" to go to camp?
So we went and had a great time. All the girls were troopers. The put up with bugs and heat and had fun doing it. It was very hot, but we were lucky to not get rained on (much). We were grateful for the waterfront so we could cool down, but we managed to do other activities away from the water, including a six mile enforced march through the forest. Here are some activities we did:
swimming,
games,
archery,
horseback riding,
worshiping the electric fans,
gearing up for the ropes course (which had to be stopped in the middle because of lightning) ,
and rappelling.
I don't have pictures of many of the coolest things we did. Mainly, because they were in the water and I didn't want to get my camera wet or I was having too much fun to go and get the camera. Melody and I went sailing together. We went tubing and also went to Huck's Cove, which is the scout "waterpark" where there were slides and zip lines and other water toys. It was a blast. The whole experience was so much fun and the ticks and chigger bites were minimal. Meanwhile…
During the same week, Bryan was on the other side of the lake. He left a day earlier, so he was there for the storm that hit before we arrived. Additionally, he participated in the Ranger program so he was roughing it for the whole week, eating dry food, sleeping in self-built shelters, and hiking from place to place to learn mountain man skills. I don't know if it was "fun", but I'm sure he finished with a great sense of accomplishment.If he'd write in his own blog, you'd know more about it.
Putting up with pain served Bryan well the next week when he got his wisdom teeth out. He was fine for the first few days, then developed a complication called "dry socket." He was quite miserable for another week. And so were the rest of us.
Let's see, I guess before that ordeal, we all enjoyed seeing Wicked at the Fabulous Fox theater.
And we've had "fun" school shopping and sitting around. We're watching Buffy on Netflix…
I've been working on a quilt and Bryan has made himself a bag for his new laptop. (How many 17-year-olds that you know could design and sew their own padded laptop bag? It's pretty fancy.
So, it's been an exciting summer and a boring one. I guess we're ready for school to start again.
Tue, 03 Aug 2010
SummerThis summer has gone so fast! I haven't written about anything that we've done, and now it is almost time for school to start. I don't know where all the time went.
Right after school was out, the kids and I left to drive to California. I wanted to spend some time being a tourist on the way, but the kids were anxious to visit with grandparents and cousins. We did stop for a little while at Arches NP, but only stayed a short time. It was so hot!
When we finally got to Fresno we got to see my niece, Lara's HS graduation. We visited with my mom. Here we are making strawberry jam at her house.
We went with Mom to San Francisco and Marin, so enjoyed Golden Gate Park and Rodeo beach. The weather was beautiful in Fresno and the Bay Area. We had a great time.
Then we got to spend some time in Coloma with the Bennetts. We enjoyed seeing them and had fun visiting our old neighborhoods. We miss that area. The weather was too cold and the water too high, though, to do the kayaking on the American River that we had planned. We enjoyed Placerville instead.
Then on to Sacramento to visit with Marc's family. Again, we had a great time seeing everyone. Marc flew in and we were glad to see him also.
Then we drove to Lake Tahoe to spend a few more days visiting at Kith and Kin. The weather was unusually cold for Tahoe this time of year and so we spent more time than usual inside visiting and playing games.
We did venture forth once to kayak on the lake. It was beautiful, but no one wanted to get wet.
After seeing Marc off at the Reno airport, we stayed a couple of days in Gardnerville, then headed across the desert to arrive in Idaho for another reunion. First, the kids and I went to Yellowstone for a day.
Then we had a reunion in Rigby with the extended Hall clan. We saw people we hadn't seen in a long time. It was also lots of fun to visit and play games.After the reunion, we "gave" Thomas to his grandparents to keep for a couple of weeks. I think he's written about part of that trip in his blog.
And we arrived home in time to celebrate Marc's birthday. We ate lasagna, opened presents, and ate ice cream.
We've done a few more things this summer, but I'll write about them in another entry.
Fri, 09 Jul 2010
Bryan’s Eagle ProjectThe day after Thomas' birthday, was the day Bryan had planned to work on his Eagle Scout Project. Once again, since my camera broke the day before, I had to take pictures with my video camera. This is the camera that I used most of the vacation also, but Panasonic sent me a replacement camera so I was able to use the new one for the last of vacation. Now that we're home, I've finally got all of the pictures on to the computer.
So, Bryan worked with the city to plan some horseshoe pits for the park near our house. The plans went through many revisions, but finally were ready to be implemented. The wooden boxes were built in our garage on a Saturday, and then dug into their spots the next Wednesday. A fence was also built on Wednesday. It all went mostly smoothly. I provided pizza on Saturday and BBQ hot dogs on Wednesday night. That kept me from having to do much digging.
We left a few days after this for our month long vacation. I checked on the pits this morning and they still look good. The grass has recovered. Now Bryan just needs to do his write-up and I need to straighten out his paperwork. We hope to have this all done before school starts.
Thomas turns Eleven
My camera broke the day before Thomas' birthday, so my blog entries are a little (OK, lots) late. Thomas has his birthday at the end of the school year so it is often a hectic time, but on the positive side, he often gets to have fun times at school on his birthday. This year was the fifth grade Spring Fling. They got to leave school and walk to the Rec-Plex for ice skating, swimming, and other fun. Here is Thomas with his class on that day. I didn't take these pictures, other moms did that for me.
In the evening we celebrated his birthday as a family. We ate his special birthday dinner of stuffed shells and then he opened a pile of presents. We gave him a camera and he was pretty happy with it. Then we sang and ate the ship ice cream cake that he'd wanted. Wow. Thomas is eleven. Happy Birthday to our youngest-but-not-so-young-anymore.
Thu, 13 May 2010
Another busy week
Last week was cinco de Mayo and Bryan's Spanish teacher celebrated by assigning a cooking project so that the class could have a party. Last year Bryan made mole, which was rather difficult and not real popular, so this year he decided to go for a dessert. He made alfajores, a cookie from Argentina. They were filled with dulce de leche. They were fun to make, but I think they were a little dry.
Thomas' school project for the week was an extension of a unit in JET on inventing. Each student had to actually invent something. They couldn't make anything that already existed. So Thomas made a prototype of an"air bed." This is a bed with a fan underneath and nozzles of air that you can aim at yourself when you are sleeping. He had to design it, do research, apply for a patent, build a prototype, and present the idea to the class.
Melody had another choir concert,
and then on Friday she had Medieval Day at school. She wore a costume that we borrowed from a friend of mine, and had a fun day. Tomorrow I get to go with the seventh grade to the local Renaissance Fair.
Bryan had his last track meet of the season. He ran the 800 meter. He hasn't run the hurdles since he hurt his arm. He's talking about staying in shape this summer and then running cross-country in the fall, so that would be something new for him.
We had pretty nice weather for the week and Marc took a day off and we went to the zoo together. We had a fun time even though there were a lot of school kids having end of the year activities at the zoo.
I love the zoo! Let's see…last weekend was also Mother's Day. I had to work, but came home to cards and presents, and flowers. Nice huh? Melody and Thomas also cooked dinner and I didn't have to. I always enjoy food that I didn't have to cook!
This week, we've had two big events so far. Wednesday was Bryan's seventeenth birthday! How did he get to be so old? His requested birthday dinner this year was BBQ chicken kabobs and couscous. His ice cream cake was lemon and vanilla. That was a first. I'm calling the cake "The Blob" because I rushed when putting it together and the whole think slumped into a big yellow blob. It sure tasted good though. I made lemon pie filling for the top.
Bryan's presents look pretty tiny, but we did manage to get a guitar into one of those little boxes…
And the other big event this week was Thomas' Fifth Grade Review, a singing and dancing extravaganza that celebrates the end of elementary school. Thomas had a dancing part and the whole fifth grade has been practicing a lot for this. They did a great job. Thomas will remember being in this show for a long time.
Wow, next year, I'll have two kids in middle school!
Tue, 04 May 2010
sunshine and musicSince it is the last month of school, there are a lot of end of the year concerts, shows, parties, projects, field trips, etc. This week was no exception. Thomas had an orchestra concert. It was fun to listen to his fifth grade group, but also fun to see the progression of improvement through sixth, seventh, and eighth grade. I hope Thomas will stick with this. He sounds pretty good already. The orchestra teacher does a great job. Thomas will have him next year also at the middle school.
Thomas' musical skills are very good. I must question his reading skills though. On the night of the piano recital,he wanted to have a friend over. I asked him to go and double check the flyer for the exact time of the recital. "Is it at 6 or 7?" I trustingly ask. Now, in retrospect I should have known better, but I am a trusting soul, and I guess too lazy to walk to the other room to see the flyer for myself. Thomas got to have a friend over and as we sat down to dinner at 6:00 (in plenty of time to arrive early for the recital at 7:00) Marc's Palm beeped, indicating that he was supposed to be somewhere. Yes, it was the recital, which started at 6! So, a beautiful dinner wasted, we got to the recital at 6:20, in time for Melody and Thomas to do their parts, but the evening was not as fun as we'd planned! Here are Melody and Thomas with their teacher, who is smiling even though we came late.
Thomas' orchestra teacher (who also teaches orchestra at the middle school) and the choir teacher were in charge of the musical that Melody was in at the middle school. She was a choir member for "School House Rock Live" It had all kinds of good music in it, things I remember form the old television show, and many I don't remember. Remember "Conjunction, junction, what's your function?" It was very well done. All did an excellent job with some very difficult music. It was fun to watch. Melody is on the risers, upper left. It must have been a fun play to be in, and besides, they've had TWO cast parties now. Go figure.
I titled this sunshine and music, because I was thinking of the beautiful sunshine we've had the last couple of days, but last week was actually rainy. Bryan got to go to Six Flags for Physics Day on Friday and they probably had the nicest weather of the whole week. They had thunderstorms predicted, but I don't think it ever rained. They even had sunshine most of the day. I think he had a fun day there. Otherwise, he's been pretty busy also. We've all just been counting down until school is over, but haven't gotten too far at making summer plans.
Fri, 23 Apr 2010
We still like springOK, I haven't written again for two weeks. I kept meaning to write last weekend, but I never got around to it. So, I have two exciting weeks to tell about. There have been several track meets. I got a really good picture of Bryan in one, but well, I cut off the top of his head…He is blurry in this one, but is all there. This is while running the 4X800 relay.
I had to leave before he ran the 300 hurdles, but he called me afterward to have me pick him up because the team trainer thought that he'd broken his arm during a rather spectacular fall. I'm glad I wasn't watching. Turned out that his arm wasn't broken after all, but it made for a long evening and a painful few days.
Maybe Bryan just wanted an excuse to "delegate" his Eagle project. He's started marking the grass to start his project at the local park. We all went to the park to help him last weekend. I took pictures. Marc and Bryan measured and painted lines. Thomas went off and played. Melody quickly got bored and wanted to go home. OK, Melody only got bored at the end, but I liked this picture because it is so typical of sibling supporting one another…I will probably get in trouble for posting it, but since no one ever looks at this…
Melody has been busy most nights with practice for her school play. They are doing School House Rock and she is in the chorus. That will be next week. In the meanwhile, she was inducted into the National Junior Honor Society. That is her reward for all those long hours spent doing her homework so carefully. She didn't pause so I could take a good picture of her receiving her certificate.
She and Thomas did agree to pose with the snake that they found in our back yard. When we first moved in, we used to see a black rat snake like this one (only much bigger)but we haven't seen one in years. So we were excited to see this one. I want him to eat all the moles and gophers. Does he look big enough?
In other wildlife news, we've been watching this mother robin on a nest in the front yard, but I haven't seen her for a couple of days. I hope something hasn't happened to her.
Thomas has been borrowing my camera a lot. He likes to take pictures. He took this one of a double rainbow.
And I took this one when he got home from school one day because I still think it is funny to see him wearing his cello on his back.
Today was Colonial Day for the fifth grade at Thomas' school. Here he is dressed up. He had to go to school early this morning because he has a dancing part in the fifth grade review. That will be performed next week. I'm looking forward to seeing that. I hope all the colonial children will have fun today.
Sun, 11 Apr 2010
Hunting for eggsI posted pictures last week before we had our egg hunt. Even though Bryan is nearly seventeen (!) I felt that we ought to have an egg hunt. It was so beautiful outside and everyone needed an opportunity to enjoy the backyard and earn some chocolate. Although I suspect that they just wanted the candy, everyone humored me and participated. I had to laugh, though, at Bryan. Melody was the first to find her allotted number of eggs. And then I realized why Bryan was behind. He was checking inside the eggs first to see if they contained chocolate, or some less desirable candy before "finding" them! So maybe he is too old for an egg hunt after all.
Marc was in Tennessee this week, and with two track meets and a choir festival, the week went quickly. I still have been unable to take a decent picture of Bryan running. Even though I've put the camera on "burst" I still get him just before or just after a hurdle. I'll try again next meet.
Melody's choir did an excellent job at their festival. They are a small group, but sound great. I had trouble with my photography here also, because I didn't want to stand up, but this guy's head was really in the way. Their performance was short (only three songs) so this was all I got. Melody is in the front row, third from the left.
Thomas stayed home sick on Monday, but felt better Tuesday. Good thing, 'cause this week was standardized testing.Thomas does not enjoy being dragged along to track meets. He says that watching them is boring. He sat and read a book at this one on Saturday, but refused to let me take his picture. Just as predicted, we went from freezing in the bleachers one week to roasting the next. Ah, the joys of track.
Thomas did let me take his picture halfway though his new haircut.
Melody was glad for the opportunity to watch our neighbor's dog this weekend. She also babysat on Friday and is grateful for both opportunities to earn money for girls' camp this summer.
A last note. With the changing weather, Melody and I made homemade Popsicles. We made pudding pops and regular ones of Kool-aid. Yum. Have a great week, we plan to. This spring weather is wonderful.
Sun, 04 Apr 2010
springWe've had a beautiful warm week. The flowers are blooming. On Wednesday I went outside to take pictures of the daffodils in the backyard and while there I took a picture to show that the pear tree was about to bloom. By Saturday it was in full bloom! The redbud in the front is my favorite, but it hasn't bloomed all the way so we still have that to look forward to. The birds have returned. I watched a robin build a nest yesterday in the birch tree by my bedroom window. Maybe we will get to see eggs and babies soon.
On Wednesday…
On Sunday…
We started off the week with my birthday. It wasn't my best birthday ever because I worked the night before and the night after. Marc and the kids gave me cards and presents and we ate lots of ice cream to celebrate. Then I went off to work. I slept when I got home and then was sick for two days. bummer. Yesterday, Thomas came down with whatever it was. Hopefully everyone else will stay healthy.
Especially Marc who is taking off to drive to Tennessee tomorrow. I haven't mentioned before, but Marc and St. Anthony's have parted ways. Marc was very unhappy there. He is hoping to do some contract work while we evaluate options. Tomorrow he will start a very short term job (one week) in Tennessee. We will miss him.
Meanwhile, we have all enjoyed the nice weather and the days off that the kids got for Easter. Melody sewed herself some new pajama bottoms yesterday. Here she is modeling them.
Everyone enjoyed some tome to relax and spend time with friends. Thomas and friends had fun throwing stuffies down the stairs, (a game that used to be popular when they were younger… ). The stuffie friend collection has grown big enough to hide people in it. Maybe it's time to get rid of some toys…
Melody made Easter pancakes for us this morning. We will eat cinnamon rolls later during conference. Then have an Easter egg hunt, and later a ham and mashed potato dinner. It will be a nice day. I really like spring, and eating I guess.
Sat, 27 Mar 2010
Back to realityAnother busy week, but I can't think what's been going on. I guess it's just the shock of getting back to school and work after a week of relaxing. My work was particularly difficult because there was some kind of virus going around at work. Both staff and patients were getting sick. I used my hand sanitizer faithfully and no one here seems to have caught it.
Thomas had an orchestra concert on Tuesday. This was all the string students from all thirteen elementary schools in the district. It was impressive how well they played together (with only an hour practice together) and what a nice big sound they got with this many students. I was expecting cacophony and they really sounded good! Thomas sounds good by himself, but all those screechy violins…they did great.
Bryan had his first track meet this morning and it was freezing. We huddled in the bleachers and were really glad that we didn't have to run in shorts. Once again, I didn't get pictures of Bryan going over the hurdles. My photography skills are pretty weak in the area of action shots. I will work on that this track season.
Final picture, since I didn't get any others of Melody. She got to go to a sleepover this weekend and had an end of quarter party for getting 100% of her assignments in, but I didn't get any pictures of those events. This is from last weekend, when Melody and Thomas were playing Monopoly together.
Jan Dill Hall St. Peters, Missouri
Page created: 09 November 2008
Page modified: 31 December 2009
