Green Team Racing

Since Austin had to quit playing hockey due to multiple concussions, he has taken up cycling and is loving it.  For a 14 year old, I’m amazed at how far he rides and how fast he goes.  He does 32 and 45 mile rides during the week….. just for fun.  (what?)  Today he had a time trial race in Wickenburg, Arizona, about 35 miles northwest of our home.  It is about 1,000 feet higher than where we live and it was extremely cold and windy.  Not fun for the bikers or the fans.  Yes, that is snow in the mountains….. in Arizona, land of the sun.

Aus raced in the juniors class and he ended up in second place!  His buddy from his team came in third.  So the Green Team did well today!

In timed trials, they start individually.  (I learned this today.)  The ride was hilly, and chilly, and COLD!  Usually time trials are on flat land, but not today.

This is Vulture Mine Road….. where it all happened.  Great job, Austin!  Makes a mama proud!

The Circus Came to Town

We just wrapped up a one week unit on Fun.  Yes, you read that right.  FUN.  This is why we homeschool.  Because we can spend a week studying FUN!  Last night was the biggest FUN of all…. the kids put on a circus, complete with a Ring Master, clowns, jugglers, a tumbler, dog tricks, a princess on a bike, a snake charmer, a kickboxing dog and more!  We ate popcorn, peanuts, cotton candy and hot dogs!  YES!   F  U  N!  Here are some blurry nighttime pictures to prove that we do school. 

The only joke book the clowns found was a Canadian joke book, so the humor had a Northern slant.  But my favorite, hands down, was the knock knock joke that was told backwards.  The “orange you glad I didn’t say banana” started with the orange instead of the banana.  Too funny.  Great job, kids!

Locks of Love! <3

My daughter has not had a haircut in many years.  But today was THE day!  She has measured and waited and measured and waited for her hair to pass the needed 10 inches so she could donate to Locks of Love.  For those who don’t know about this thoughtful organization, they collect ponytails from generous donors so they can make wigs for kids who have lost their hair due to cancer. 

I was not too sure about the whole thing (as you can tell)…… but of course I supported her unselfish wish to help others.

It was so cute in the hair salon when our friend Donna got out the measuring tape, hair cutting, dyeing and manicures halted.  All the ladies, stylists and patrons alike, silently watched as her hair was brushed and put into the required ponytail before the CHOP!  After the chop happened, all the ladies in the salon cheered and clapped their hands!  So sweet!

And the deed was done.  Larisa’s hair is darling at its new length.  I’m so proud of her for thinking of others!

Witty-less Times

There are times when I feel witty.  There are other times when I feel witty-less.  Usually the witty-less times are somehow related to misbehaving/strong-willed children or not enough sleep on my part.  This week it has been my beloved children.  Monday, Valentine’s Day, which is supposed to be all filled with love and mushy sentiments, I called my husband at work at noon and mentioned strangulation in association with one of my four children.  (Of course I would never do it.) But the fact that it came to my mind gives a glimpse of the antics that were transpiring under my care.  He spurred me on in our parenting journey by chanting his supporting cheers, “You will win!”  “You are stronger!”  and “You can do it!” (NOT strangulation.)  It pumped me up enough to come out of my locked bedroom.

That evening I had a massage scheduled.  Ahhhhhhh.  Perfect timing!  After reporting that my back muscles have never been tighter, the massage therapist asked what we were doing later that night for Valentine’s Day.  I told her that I was thinking of going out to dinner by myself and leaving my husband at home with four little Valentines.  :o) 

The shift from one strong-willed child to the next in line was rapid this week.  I’ve been through all four kids and it’s Thursday.  I guess that’s fair on their part that they got one day each to push all of mommy’s buttons and steer her toward psychosis. 

I do not feel like homeschooling tomorrow.  At all.  The Lord knew I needed a break and planned for friends of ours to be moving tomorrow.  Perfect!  Manual labor is good for children!  Tomorrow, for school, we will work on friendship, giving, physical exercise, being a servant and loving others.  Hopefully a bit of the love will trickle home with us tomorrow night.

Perhaps I will feel witty by the weekend.

Filterless People

Some people are born with a filter and some are not.  This filter I’m referring to is the one that stops you from saying things in public before you realize that you shouldn’t say them.  Please hang with me, people, while I share a few nightmarish stories that are unfortunately factual.

Four years ago, right after I had reached the  B I G   FOUR-O Plateau of Life, I found myself sitting at a scrapbooking event with a table full of women that I was not acquainted with.  Across from me sat a beautiful younger woman who was ready to deliver a child in the next twenty minutes, if my calculations were correct.  She made me feel old.  Making friendly conversation and assuming that she was 20 years my junior, I asked if it was her first child.  Her answer shocked me.  With a terribly ungrateful tone she blurted out, “It’s my fourth and my youngest is 12!”  Knowing exactly how she was feeling with three older kids of my own at home, but taken aback by her response, my filter malfunctioned and I spat back in all honesty and truth, “THAT is my nightmare!”  Oh boy.  The good news is, I’ve never seen her again, and thankfully that was one of the only times I remember a filter malfunction.

My husband does have a filter, but it has much larger holes than mine does, allowing more humiliating information to pass through.  Yes, only humiliating for me.  For some strange reason I can think of SEVERAL instances to share with you.  From three days ago, as a matter of fact, comes my first example.  We were at a wedding, seated around a table with 6 members of my family, one acquaintance and two strangers.  My dear husband blurts out, “Did you see the wedding cake?!?  It looks like the Wailing Wall!”  Now that would be all funny and amusing, but my mother went pale, made a horrible face and slightly shook her head four times.  Both my husband and I saw her response and glanced around the table to see what the big deal was.  No sign of anything that I could detect, but we later discovered that stranger #1 was the son of the cake maker.  Great.

Another recent occurence is only nine days old.  Rick and I were asked to attend a leadership conference to see if we are interested in serving on a state-wide committee.  It was slightly an interview-type meeting.  We lunched with current committee members whom we knew by name, but not by face.  They didn’t know us from Adam and Eve.  There were three other couples and the two of us sitting in a corner of a banquet room conducting pleasant conversation when it happened.  BAM!  Just like that!  I had an out-of-body experience hearing my husband tell a story that is not “new-committee-member-appropriate” about a cycling trip, unexpectedly running into old friends and then finding out later that he had holes in the back of his biking shorts.  GREAT!  We haven’t been contacted by anyone on the committee since the fateful holy-stretchy-shorts story.  Maybe this was God’s way of keeping our responsibilities to a minimum.

Another time, when we were up in front of a married couples group…. with microphone in hand, my dear husband actually told everyone to wait a minute while I wiped his bum.  For that story of awesomeness, please go here:  http://mysistersjar.wordpress.com/2009/03/24/a-little-dessert-please/  (Someday my sister-in-law, Jennie, will show me how to use links for your viewing pleasure.)

Okay, I just thought of the other time my filter leaked out a response that was less than cordial.  It is a 25 year-old story.  My husband-to-be and I were in a shoe section of a major department store looking for steel-toed boots for Rick.  The salesman brought out two specimens for him to try on, one with a smooth leather curve from the laces to the sole, and the other with a sewn ridge around the top of the toe.  Curiously I asked, “Which one is more durable?”  The salesman, somewhat cockily answered, ‘Obviously THIS one.”  And my filter did not stop me from firing right back, “OBVIOUSLY, that’s why I asked!”  Oops.  :o)

Seriously, I could think of twenty-seven more cool stories about my husband and the missing filter topic, but I’ll spare you for now. (Blog topic dedicated to Mary Ann, a filterless friend.)

Just Dance 2 for the wii

This is what my husband received for his 44th birthday…. a dance video game.  There could not have been a more perfectly suited gift for my dance-loving husband.  He might even learn some new moves to add to the only two that he’s been doing for at least the 25 years I’ve known him.  He is mildly addicted already.  He’s even got the top score on several songs!  And with our eyesight starting to make tiny script undecipherable, the front of this game actually looks like it’s for AGES 40+.  Perfect.

Not only is it teaching dance moves to my husband, but it’s teaching English to our little girl, who is trying desperately to learn English.  We have been home from Colombia for seven weeks now, and she is saying more and more sentences in English every day!  Her words could definitely be labeled Spanglish!  Half and half to the core, mi dulce niña!  The only problem with learning English from a dancing video game is that if you don’t know the words… you make them up.  And when you are making them up from a VERY limited supply of English words that you have learned in 11 weeks, it’s quite entertaining!  Here is my favorite:

Hot Stuff by Donna Summer now sounds like a dinner order at Macaroni Grill:  “Lookin’ for some pasta baby this evenin’. I need some pasta baby tonight …. pa pa pa pa pa-sta-a.”

So cute!

Another Sitcom Day

Late last night we got a phone call from a friend visiting from out-of-town, so we invited him for dinner.  I found a roast in the freezer and put it on the counter to thaw.  I would figure the rest out tomorrow (today).  I went to bed early, woke up early, and planned on an ordinary day.  Nope. 

We’re studying nutrition right now… grains and beans, to be exact… so for co-op the kids cooked up some beans and rice, much to my little Colombiana’s delight.  That didn’t go as planned.  The beans weren’t done until two hours after co-op.  The rice was not the kind listed in the directions and needed WAY more water.  Nothing worse than crunchy rice… okay, I can think of several things much worse than crunchy rice, but still.

Outside we went to have games with the bean bags my sons had sewn on the sewing machine all by themselves. (Does a mother’s heart good!)  BUT…. the child in charge of clearing the grass of the dog’s deposits had not done her job… in a LOOOOOOONG while, I discovered.  That doesn’t do my mother’s heart good at all.  After my dog doodoo duty, the games began.  One bean bag on the two-story roof out of 9 is not bad odds either.

Off to the ortho to get Keeve’s braces taken off!  What an exciting day!  I took pictures at home and in the office….. but it wasn’t the removal day after all.  WHAT?  Seems two teeth are “flaring”… honestly, I couldn’t see it, but I’m just a mom.  So two brackets were repositioned and two more months of braces are at hand.  Here are the pictures of the day Keeve was supposed to get his braces off:

And even in the office…. the assistant later told me she wondered why I was taking pictures.  Great.

I arrived home an hour earlier than planned to troubled news.  Friend #1 is in the hospital with breathing problems…  friend #2 went to be with her because her husband is out-of-town.  Friends #3 and #4 picked up her two children at their schools.  Friend #5 picked up Friend #2′s younger children from school.  Friend #6 was supposed to be picking up the eldest child of Friend #2…. buuuuuut, while she waited in line for her children, a fire truck pulls into the school parking lot and blocks her in.  Somehow the eldest child of Friend #2 found out and called my daughter to come and pick her up.  I wasn’t home yet, so she told her that she didn’t have a car.  THEN I arrived and saved the day.  My daughter took off in a flash to save her friend stranded at school.  Forty minutes later I get a panicked call from Friend #6 who didn’t know if the eldest child of Friend #2 was still stranded at the school.  While reassuring her that all was well, the phone dropped from my shoulder into the bowl of flour/sugar that I was mixing to make a cake.  Nice.  Never done that before!

Then my sweet hubby calls and reports that our out-of-town guest is bringing a friend with him….. perfect.  I’m serving a new type of cake “Pumpkin Phone Dip Cake.”  It should be good.

If I make it to bed tonight, one thing will have gone as planned!  :o)

SCORE! (No, not the Superbowl!)

Just now, I discovered www.BooksShouldBeFree.com.  What a plethora of great literature all recorded for our listening pleasure. So many of my favorites: Anne of Green Gables, Swiss Family Robinson, Emma, Pride and Prejudice, Black Beauty and North and South.  YES!  I feel like I just won the lottery!

Just today I finished reading The Girl in the Gatehouse by Julie Klassen.  Loved loved loved it!  I never suspected a few of the twists and turns, which keeps my interest and my pages turning rapidly.  Julie Klassen has written several of my favorite novels: The Silent Governess, The Lady of Milkweed Manor, and The Apothecary’s Daughter.  I’m usually not drawn to European stories set in the 1900s, but I must say, Klassen has a talent for intrigue and suspense, along with tales that wind their way surprisingly along an unworn path.

Happy Reading!

Routine…. finally.

Nora, our little Colombian princess, is fitting in so well to our family, crazy as we are.  One of her English sentences is “_________ is funny!”  Fill in a family member’s name when appropriate!  We do laugh a lot and that’s a good thing.  Laughter is healing.  Everyone could use some healing.

We are somewhat into a routine these days, being our sixth week home from Colombia.  Nora is still sad on days when she discovers Daddy is gone to work, but thrilled to talk to him on the phone.  THAT is one funny conversation to listen to… Spanish on one end and English on the other.  I listen and laugh. 

One of our routines is morning bath time.  I shower first and as soon as I’m dressed I get the bathtub ready for Nora.  Depending on how hurried our morning is, she may or may not get bubble bath.  Her bath toys consist of “the pirates who don’t do anything” from VeggieTales and their ship.  She plays while I do my hair and make-up.  Today she was scrubbing the soap up and down her arms when she paused and told me that her brown arms were no good and my white arms are good.  I explained in lame Spanish that I love her brown arms and legs!  I told her they are beautiful and they are mommy’s favorite color.  If she only knew how much I’ve spent on fake tanning beds and rub-on tans!  It made me sad because I didn’t know if it is part of a phase that she is going through…. saying the opposite of what is true…. or the truth.  She isn’t a whole lot darker than her daddy…. I wonder what she would say about his arms?

I didn’t plan on starting Nora with schooling until her English improves (or shows up!)  But she is so eager to “do school” with the boys!  Under duress, I purchased a curriculum for her in the coloring book section at Walmart… on clearance for $3.97.  Imagine how thorough it is!  Now she sits at the kitchen table with us fills in her pages with numbers and letters.  I pray she is always this interested in learning!  It will serve her well!

Anyway, lately we have more days full of smiles than days stained with tears.

Update on Such a Time as This!

For those faithful readers who have been around here at MSJ for at least a year, you may recall my moment of excitement about a project that was presented to us (me).  If not, go here for a refresher: http://mysistersjar.wordpress.com/2010/02/01/for-such-a-time-as-this/

I felt the need to update you on the project.  A homeschool curriculum that I have used, since I pulled my daughter out of public school in 2001, was looking at heading toward retirement.  This news was not met by me with gladness or joy.  I was half-way between mad and utter shock!  This is the best curriculum out there, in my humble homeschooling opinion.  Taking matters into my own hands, I called a fellow homeschool mom in California and found that she was even more scared than I was that this useful tool might fall by the way-side.  With much prayer and supplication (and pizza dinners while we worked) we contacted the owners of the curriculum and asked if they were open to a buy-out-revamp business proposal.  They said they would look at it.

So for about two weeks, our two families talked to people in the business world and came up with a scheme to keep it alive.  We found willing volunteers to do work that we did not have the expertise to complete on our own…. web designers, tax people, Bible-knowing women, typists and proofreaders.  I was genuinely excited about the possibility of being “The Next Generation” to stand in the gap for other homeschoolers!  The work required was monumental.  The commitment was all-encompassing. The peace from God was in our hearts… simultaneously.  We presented the plan.

Upon further discussion with the owners, a buy-out would not be feasible because of the way the business was structured.  It was over. Just like that.  Shot down in a blaze of glory. 

So why did we have to go through this (and eat pizza for two weeks?)  The author of the curriculum had just been through the most difficult time in her life.  We were aware of this, hence the plan to keep her magnum opus alive and well.  My phone conversation with her lasted just over an hour… for which I took very sloppily written notes on 12 pieces of printer paper.  The last line I wrote down were her words, choked out among tears, “Thank you for doing this.  I needed to know that someone else believes in my life’s work.”

There you have it.  God planned it to bless her with our efforts.  Her life’s work was confirmed in her heart as worthy and valuable.  And it was ALL worth it.  It didn’t go as I planned, but God’s plans don’t always go with my plans.  Thankfully I’m proficient at a change-of-direction-in-the-middle-of-my-plan.  So there.  You are updated.