The Games

Dakota did not have school Friday because of parent teacher conferences.  I took a personal day and gave Kayla a vacation day and we went the the opening of Hunger Games.  It seems a lot of students had hookie days.  We got their 20 minutes early with advance purchased tickets.  It was awesome.

It stayed pretty true to the book.  It was worth spending time with these two great kids!  We had a great day.

Kayla is having all the YW over tonight for a sleepover.  So I had to get in gear and actually get my spring decorations up!  I'm glad Kayla can help now.

 We even found the bottom of our table.  It's more than a place to collect things!

 I'm finding less is more the longer I decorate.  I really like the clean look and it is a lot less to dust around.

 Happy spring!

Most Improved

Kayla earned most improved cheerleader tonight at the winter sports awards assembly at school!  She worked really hard and was proud of herself.  Not enough to try out again next school year...

She also found out she was accepted into the college program as a junior in high school next year.  She will graduate high school with an associates degree.  She will be taking a bio science degree and will be able to be the veterinary technician right out of high school.  If all goes well, she will have an opportunity at a $35,000 scholarship at AU.  That should pay for her entire tuition if she chooses to go there.  She may want to continue on to be a vet later, but is unsure at this point.  Who has their life figured out at 15 any how?  I told her regardless if she wants to be a vet later she would need a bachelor's degree if she chooses to go that route and might as well go for the scholarship and degree with little to no debt, than skip the opportunity and then decide to go and have to pay for bachelors, masters and doctorate degrees.  I hope she'll see the wisdom in that.  Instilling wisdom in teens is a hard job, any ideas?  I am feeling like she is earning a lot of blessings right now!

March Madness

 Early spring in Ohio, is leaving me wonder...what happened to winter?  We only had very little snow.  Is it going to snow again or is it really gone.  Either way I'm enjoying the 60 degree weather.  My hyicnths are beginning to come up.

 Kayla's specialized plates came in.  She chose her soccer number to go with it.

 We enjoyed such a great day where we were able to work in the yard some and enjoy the warmth and sunshine on our skin.

 I strolled around the house and took shots of whatever caught my eye.  I love this oak tree in our back yard.  It has an interesting texture to the bark.

The daffodils are blooming and showing off their brilliant yellow.

 Kyle cleaned up some of the leaf and bean pod debris and maintained a burn pile.

 He finally hung the bird feeder he got me for Christmas.  I laughed and said the birds won't stop by now, they have plenty of worms to eat.

 DQ is having their March Madness sale of by one blizzard and get one for 99 cents.  MMMM, midnight truffle is one of my favorites.

 Kota decided that he would like to adopt a fox kit.  So we checked them out.  He is on the list to get one later this spring.  I'm kind of excited about this, but nervous too.  He has done a lot of research on this, which is a miracle in itself.  He was looking this up when he was off school for a week with his mono.  He has a good plan on how he's going to make this work.  IF he follows through I think he will do fine.

Kayla is still practicing her driving.  She a bit jerky on her turns, but is already doing better than Kota.  (Shh. don't tell him I said so!)

 We stopped by Grandma B's today while out driving.  Her pond has really come to life.  The turtle was out sunning himself.  I tried to get a closer shot, but I scared him away.

 There were 1000s of tadpoles.  If I were the science teacher I'd have been fishing them out.

The cattails were seeding themselves out.  They looked nice and fluffy.  Over all life is good right at the moment.  Things are going fairly well, no real complaints, just the normal happenings in our life.  I think the hope of spring is touching us.

Change

The school district I work for is making a major change for next school year.  We are going from 5 elementary schools to 4.  We are changing from 5 grade K-6 buildings to two primary grade K-3 and two intermediate grade 4-6.

Change can be rocky and scary, but I'm excited.  I am a grade level facilator for 6th grade.  For the past four years we get to meet as a grade level twice a year to make decisions and work on improvements, etc.  Now instead of having 2 of us in a building we will have half of us.  We will be more uniform and be able to do things we've wanted to do, but logistically we weren't able to do.

As everything that changes there will be growing pains.  I look forward to the change and learning new things.  I think we will do great.

Finito, Finished, Over, Done

 It ended last Tuesday.  I'm glad basketball is over, but if there is one game I wished the boys could have pulled off ...it was this one!  They fought hard.  The other team was so mean and unsportsmanlike.  I wanted our boys to walk away winners, the better of the two.  Instead they walked away with the loss.

 Kayla decided she is done with cheerleading.  She is not going to try out for the squads next year.  I don't know how I feel about that, she made so many improvements and could have made varsity next year, but she does not want to anymore.

 So we watched the end of her cheer days.  She is growing up.  She is starting to see the world for what it is now.  It was interesting watching her learn lessons about herself.  Sometimes she stood alone in helping others.  She was often last out because she was helping clean up things she didn't get out.  She often would roll her eyes over "girl drama."  She loves people for who they are and tries really hard to be a peacemaker or to stay out of drama.  She said, she is done with the drama of cheering.  She wants to focus on soccer.  I laugh because I too, dislike drama, but it seems to pop up even in my job from time to time.  So Miss Kayla is on to the next fold in her life.

 I attended breakfast at Yaya's house Saturday with Kayla.  Yummo!  She is the hostess with the mostest!

 I feel a bit energized by the motivational speaker.  She was real, she talked about real life struggles.  She has a busy life and 6 kids and figured out how to take control of her health.  What I like about her is that she was so sincere and honest about her trials with food.  I seem to always be around these cute little women who have the challenge of a few pounds to lose and wear a size 6 or smaller.  Then to top it off they ALWAYS talk about how fat they are when I wish beyond measure I could even be close to their size.  (I realize everyone has their own weight trial, but why are the skinniest the loudest about being fat?)  I hope to be like the motivational speaker and just start and see where I go!  I need to, it is just such an overwhelming task I usually deny and avoid the problem!

 We finished the weekend out at Kim's house, fulfilling a promise to take out Kayla's pistol and letting the nephews and niece give it a try.  Kaden and Kamyrn did pretty well, Kolton didn't even want to try.  (I don't blame the kid, I don't like to try either.)

It was a wonderful, sunshine-filled, 68 degree day.  Definitely in like a lamb.

I Will Do My Best

At church we get what are called callings.  They are assignments, if you will, to help out in different areas of the branch.  I accepted the assignment to be an Assistant Den Leader and Advancement Chair in the Cub Scouts Pack of the primary.  It is a bittersweet calling.  I love Scouts.  I love the idea, the mission, the activities, and values.  That is the sweet.  Tonight was my first official night helping.  Whew! 9 year olds...I forgot how engergetic they are...guess I'm getting old...er. 

Tonight was fun.  The boys were working on a mosiac.  I was trying to get their records all caught up.  See what is left.  That's the bitter part the dual role.  As Assistant Den Leader I follow, as Advancement Chair I lead...hmmm balance.  I hope my type A personality doesn't drive my Sister-in-law nuts!!!!  I brought the teacher voice out a few times tonight...can't help it. 

I haven't done cub scouts in 7 years, there are a lot of differences from Cubs to Boy Scouting.  I'm still working with the Boy Scouts; Kota has a few more months to go.  I love these boys, we've seen some of them from Bobcat (lowest rank in Cub Scouts) to Eagle Scout (highest rank in Boy Scouts).  Even the one's I did not raise...are mine...my boys.  I hope it might be that way with this next bunch...

Cupcake War

Today is Dr. Suess' birthday. We decided to have a birthday party today at school and celebrate. The kids had to earn the party by being good (somedays this is a big battle), and perform a Dr. Suess reader's theater for the Kindergarten and 1st graders. They earned it. So the 3 of us that teacher reading in 6th grade decided to up the anty and have a contest. We talked a little smack all week to each other and this is what we came up with. The challenge was the most creative: (Dr. Suess theme was not a criteria). We took the above tray to Linda our principal to judge.

My contribution was milkshake cupcakes.  Alas, I did not win...

 Kayla jumped into the competion last night.  Her idea was the Thing 1 and 2 cupcakes.

 Nicole did the Cat in the Hat cupcakes.  I love these, they are so cute.  She is super competitive too, and really wanted to win.  Too bad she didn't win either.

 Kristie "took the cake" with these Green Eggs and Ham cupcakes.  Although I didn't win I had a lot of fun.  It was a great day at school today.  Have a great weekend.