Never Boring, Never Quiet

The kids are back in school and are grinding hard at the mill.  

Nicole has another new job. She is now a hostess at The Grove (a local restaurant). She says it's super boring but they pay $8 an hour so she is toughing it out. She has also been working out like a fiend, is back with her old boyfriend (Ken) and trying to work out a 12 week class schedule at our community college. 

Chelsea has been busy trying to get all her college applications done. This is a tricky thing for her as she likes to do everything at the last minute. And I mean the very last minute!! Unfortunately because of her propensity for procrastination she missed the A & M deadline by mere minutes. It wasn't in her top three but it was a backup school that she wouldn't have minded attending. Live and learn... 

Chelsea has also been busy with high school soccer this month. Every weekend she has had a soccer tournament. They leave school, usually, Thursday morning and get back Saturday night. This definitely makes school a challenge! But they have so much fun all staying in a hotel together that it is worth the makeup work she has to do for school.

Jordan hasn't played WOW in three weeks. This is a huge thing!! And because of all this extra free time he has now, he has been able to actually go do things with his friends ~ like in person and everything. They have been to movies, out to eat and to Bob Schneider concerts. It is hard for other non-kid-WOW-playing-parents to understand the joy this fills our hearts with! Of course it helps that all his friends now have their driver's license. 

Emma's club volleyball, her homework and a love of reading has been taking up all her time. She really enjoys her club team and her coach says that he can really rely on her lively happy personality to lighten the mood and make everyone feel welcome. Since she is the silliest girl I know, this works out perfectly for both of them! 

Somehow Emma has managed to read 6 books this last week and a half while still keeping up with her homework. I go to sleep before her and wake up after her. I have no idea how she functions all day!

Brandt's basketball has started up again. He is on a different team this year that doesn't seem nearly as intense. We only practice once a week with games every Saturday. Last year we practiced twice a week with an "optional" third practice. The difference in practicing time really shows in his games but it is nice for him to have more free time. Almost everyday Brandt and all his buddies are outside having air soft gun wars in the neighborhood or in our park (we have a park literally right behind our house). He comes wandering in at dark exhausted with everything he took with him either lost or broken, but as happy as a clam. If he's happy then we are too.

James has been working like a mad man trying to get our media room finished. The poor guy started two years ago but had to put it on hold for various reasons but now works like a man possessed on it. He has torn into walls and floors; taped, mudded, textured; installed double doors; prep the sub floor for carpet; chosen carpet and wood; and primed walls for painting. Next is the cabinetry. I'm a construction widow...

And last but not least, classes have started back up for me too. This semester I have an Art History class that starts at 7:45 in the morning ~ ugh! I also have 3 other photography classes that are all 4 hours each twice a week. Only one of those am I doing any shooting in though, so that's kind of a bummer. One of my pictures that made it into the print show (the flower) the school kept for their permanent collection. Kind of exciting!

Fandango still has giardia. So far none of us has caught it but the vet trips are never ending!!! And it is hard for him to gain weight with constant diarrhea. But he is so sweet and loves to give kisses, not the greatest idea with giardia!

So these are my two pictures that made it into the print show at school. The way the print show works is that everyone that is enrolled in a photography class, of any kind, has to enter pictures in the print show.The judges sit in a darkened room with only a lit easel. An assistant puts your picture up on the easel, reads the title and the judges give an immediate thumbs up or down. It is very quick because they have about a thousand pictures to go through in a matter of hours. Once they have made the initial cuts they have 3 guest judges come in and chose the winners for each category and the overall winners. There is a fundamentals category that is for all the first semester students and those pictures have to be mounted 8x10's. I had to enter 2 into that category, neither of which was chosen. I did enter 2 in the open lab category. These pictures had to be mounted 16x20's; you are competing against anyone in the whole department, not just first semester students or just students that are taking a particular class ~ so you can imagine my surprise that my two made it in! Unfortunately, James was out of town that week so I couldn't share it all with him and it since it was the last day of classes I had to get special permission to bring him back the next week (Chelsea and Jordan went too). The school keeps the pictures set up until spring so they can show off the program so it was really that big of a deal to let us in. Chelsea looked at every single picture and made comments on each one. Jordan whizzed through, looked at mine and then proceeded to harass us about how long Chelsea was taking. UGH!

The whole thing was a really fun experience though and so exciting to me to see everyone else's work. Know thy competition...

The Joker and some of his henchmen. Do you know which one is Brandt??

Emma wasn't really part of their crew but was kind enough to walk around with them. She had a long black dress on but it was hot so when she got home she changed out of it quickly.

I waited until the last minute to do all our decorating, of course, thinking that the kids that were home would happily help me. Nicole decided to carve her pumpkin instead and then needed hours to perfect her costume (don't ask). Brandt got out of school early and went to the park to play football with his buddies. The other three were still in school so that left poor James to be my helper. He helped me hang 7 scarecrows from the trees and light them so they were visible (their heads had lights in them also), then put up the giant spiders, the cobwebs and the headstones. Along with the candy we had a tub of drinks with dry ice boiling and brewing for all the trick-or-treaters. I was amazed at how fast the kids snatched the drinks up! The neighbors were amazed at how fast we transformed the house. They clearly don't know about our years of perfecting our procrastination skills.

Jordan decided to trick-or treat me. He had apparently decided that he was too old this year to dress up but didn't announce this to me until after his friends started showing up at our house. I kept calling upstairs for the boys to come down as it was getting later and later but they seemed to just want to eat and play video games. You would think I would have caught on earlier but one of the boys even brought a cotume with him as a decoy! Two days later they went home having eaten their fill of pizza and candy. Good thing Jordan's friends make me laugh so much...or maybe it's that they are all taller then me...

Yeah ~ Pee Wee football is over! We had a great season with only 1 loss (I think), Brandt had fun and being Spirit Mom allowed me to meet a few new people but I am so glad to have it over. Practices 3 times a week for 2 -2 1/2 hours each plus Saturday games was taking a toll on Brandt's homework, his body and his sleep; the laundry has been cut back considerably~ no more stinky pads, helmets, game pants, game jerseys, game socks, practice pants, practice jerseys, practice socks, cleats, ...ugh, the list goes on and on! Plus James and I have no more run-throughes to make late Friday night; me in a panic, James trying to help and stay out of the way simultaneously. They looked good and got lots of praise, but I hated them more then I have ever hated a sign before. I didn't even know it was possible to hate a sign!

Last Sunday we had our end of the season party. I had to plan it but because I have class on Sunday's I couldn't be there. James got to represent me which seemed only fair since he really did a lot of work helping me be Spirit Mom. Maybe he should get to use the gift certificate for the pedicure that the team gave me. Or maybe we should have a sign-off to see who gets it???

Brandt (#5) is bruised head to toe from playing Left Tackle and Left Guard on his Pop Warner team. This is harder on me than it is on him ~ James has to keep reminding me not to ask him if he wants to quit every time I see a new bruise! He looks so cute though in his pads and helmet that it is almost worth it to me. Guitar is much safer.