Working out

I have forgotten how good I feel after working out! I have been lazy and not worked out for a few months and it is starting to show on various parts of my body, so I decided that I would get back to it. 25 minutes a day is not too much of a commitment and it is do able! I of course have to figure out when is the best time of day for me to workout but I think that will be night time after the kids have gone to bed and I have time to myself. I have forgotten how the stress just rolls off of me and I can then take a shower and I fall asleep better. Why do I never remember these things when I am procrastinating a work out? Oh that is right, because it is so much easier to sit and watch tv instead. The iPad is helping me though because it is so much easier to read, watch a favorite show or movie, or play a game while on the treadmill with this amazing piece of technology! Yes, I am addicted to the iPad. Well, wish me luck that I stick to my new routine, it will help me not kill my kids while their Dad is gone for a little while! ;)

Let the craziness begin!

This part of the year is always crazy busy for us, and every year we chose to do this to ourselves so I am not complaining! I love it! The kids love it! We are starting two nights a week roller hockey for each boy (different days of course), one night a week and one game a week of basketball for Jonathan, two nights of practice and one game a week of basketball for Patrick, two days a week practice for baseball for both boys (thankfully together), once a week tumbling for Sami, once a week of guitar lessons for Sami, two nights a week TKD for Sami and Patrick, Sunday School for all three, and every school day basketball for Sami! We will be busy but the time while Pat is gone will fly by and the accomplishments will be great in this house! I love watching them participate in these activities and accomplish goals they set for themselves! Cheer for all the kiddos from where ever you are!

Photos from Summer

I got a new phone this fall and I have used that for my pictures lately, that means I have not used my regular camera for a few months! I was looking at the photos on the storage card and found some cute ones from this summer. We were in Michigan and we took a trip to the zoo with my brother and his family and of course my Mom!

The First Basketball Games of the Season

Both boys had their first games of the season this weekend, I love it! Jonathan is still in the younger group and they can't do as much as he would like but he is surviving. He did great, no baskets but plenty of rebounds. He is definitely one of the brutes on the team and has no problem climbing over or shoving people out of the way. Patrick on the other hand is my sweet child who doesn't want to hurt a fly so he has a harder time fighting over the ball. He is up in the leagues when they are playing ball completely. The other problem for his team is they are joining a league late because of a goof up at the youth center and the contract they had with another league so they are playing with kids that started playing games last month. Needless to say Patrick's team lost but they were starting find their grove by the middle of the second half. They were doing good on defense they just need to get the confidence to take more shots. We will be spending the next few months playing basketball and I have to say I am very excited to be able to go watch Sami play some bball also! She made the intramurals for her school, looking forward to having some more info after Tuesday.

TaeKwonDo

Most of you know most of the family are active in this sport, Pat, Sami, and Patrick. Pat loves it even though his body does not most of the time. Sami tolerates it but would rather be enjoying other things in her life, the other sports she participates in mainly. Patrick only goes at this point to see his friends. I like the confidence it gives them but I also understand how they feel, Patrick over the course of the year plays select baseball, football, basketball, just started roller hockey, and also has to practice his trombone everyday. Sami has a guitar and clarinet to practice, basketball, tumbling, and hopefully cheerleading soon. I am on the verge of letting them quit TKD because they are finding other enjoyments in life and lately I am feeling like I should get a part time job just to cover the cost of TKD. In the course of a year we spend $3000 for TKD, but I spend about 2/3 of that for ALL the other activities for all three kids! That total for TKD doesn't not include all of the little trips to include all the referee, self defense, instructor courses, or the testings that get throw in there that they strongly encourage everyone to attend. I enjoy the people in this class but I know that because I chose not to send my kids all over the Midwest to attend these courses that I am then labeled as not willing to put TKD first. For the past two years we have chosen to visit family or take an actual family vacation instead of attending TKD camp and I have been made to feel like a horrible person for choosing other things over TKD. Most of it is in a joking manner but man after three years of saying no to some of the trips they have definitely made me actually consider if I am making the right choice, sometimes I say yes just so I don't have to hear it. This is very heavy on my heart right now, I am not sure what the right decision for my kids and for my family is. I think what it will come down to is after the kids take the instructors course here in two months, that is mandatory and very expensive, my kids will be able to make a choice and we will stick to it. Pat will be able to continue to attend the class but the kids will be able to enjoy their other activities and not made to feel bad about it. Hopefully, this will be the right choice but this is the wonderful job of parenting, trying not to screw up your child while they are growing up.

Ipad

I got an iPad today and so far I am loving it. Of course I have only used it for a little while today and it will take some getting used to. Wish me luck during my exploring, that is if the rest of my family does not take it from me.

First Reconciliation & Basketball Tryouts

Jonathan is in second grade and in the Catholic religion that means First Communion and First Reconciliation. He had to have his first confession of sins today and he was incredibly nervous. He has worried about this for months and in the last week has broken down in tears over it a few times. We have tried many times to explain that it is not a bad thing and it takes about two minutes. He still was nervous when we showed up at the church today but he was going to soldier through! He was second in his class to go, they gave him a cheat sheet to help with prayers in case they mess up (which he needed, too nervous to remember that prayer he knew before we left the house), he went in, knocked it out, did his penance, watched Patrick do his confession, and then left the church! I was so proud of him for putting his game face on and powering through!

Sami has not participated in any school sports activity ever! So I told her at the beginning of this year she needed to participate in one, I didn't care which one as long as she did one. She chose basketball, the sport she hasn't played in 8 years, but she is tall, maybe that will help. I waited patiently for tryouts to come up and finally they came this week. She gladly told me about them, which is a switch because every other sport she told me about them a week after, so I saw this as a good sign, she is kind of interested. We went shopping for the appropriate accessories, of course, then she tried out today. She had a great time, played in 5 of the 6 games they played and just had fun. She is excited and we are looking forward to finding out what team she will be on, tomorrow sometime, and it will be Varsity, JV, or Intramural. She doesn't really care which team or level because she had a great time and is looking forward to just playing basketball! YEAH! I am so excited, I have a child who is playing school sports and I get to attend the games and cheer her on! Yeah, I am one of THOSE moms!

To celebrate every one's accomplishments today we switched things up and had ice cream from Culver's for dinner and the beef stew that was in the crock pot ended being dessert!

Sami

I can not believe that she will soon be 14!! Where has the time gone?

Bedtime

It is always a little crazy around here. We have a child that goes right to sleep, a teenager(that is enough description), and one that fights it completely. We spend many nights having to go up stairs numerous times every night to put him back to bed, argue about anything and everything, and explain why he doesn't need another _____(fill in the blank). Pat and I have come up with a solution, maybe??? We are going to spend the first ten-twenty minutes after we have turned off the lights, upstairs doing whatever so that there is no temptation to get out of bed. So we tried it for the past two nights, it was successful kind of. The first night was amusing but frustrating, we shut his door because he came out and then he spent the next 20 minutes talking, whining, yelling, crying and screaming to us. We heard how he was sorry, then he wasn't sorry, that it was the worst night ever, he loved us, he just wanted to talk to us, he missed us, and many more. We have learned that if you don't talk to him then he stops sooner rather then later so it was amusing to sit in the hall and just listen to the things he thinks about while trying to get our attention. Last night went much smoother and he went right to sleep but I think that might be because it was just him and I at home so he wasn't missing much, never the less, I take that as a victory! Tonight will be the next challenge and I will stay positive and say we have started a new trend!

SUMMER FUN!

Baseball, Mt. Rushmore, baseball, Grandma's house, more baseball, and hanging out with friends, oh and more baseball! Here is a few photos from our wonderful summer!

Summer Vacation...

I can't not believe that a month of our summer vacation has flown by already. We have been crazy busy but are loving every minute of it! The boys took summer school classes this year at school and Patrick had a blast but Jonathan was not really excited about having to get up in the morning! He had a great time during the day but we had some rough mornings, not any different from the school year. Patrick's class was a PE class all day and he LOVED it. Sami stayed home from summer school, even though her school had many really good options she chose to take this time to catch up on her sleep from the school year. We also had a lot of time to hang out and have girl time which is very rare in this house of three testosterone filled guys!!

This summer has given us a visit from friends who moved two years ago but occasionally come back for surprise visits and we love to see them even if it is for just a day! Their boys are all around the same ages as our boys so the only odd one out is Sami but they fit her in pretty good. We have also had a visit from my Mom, brother, and his wife during one of Patrick's baseball tournaments and the team took 2nd place in that! YEAH! The visit was a blast and we found out who was really good at Just Dance on the Wii!! We have also made time to go down to KC for a day to go to Worlds of Fun and finally use those summer passes we have. We are knee deep in baseball this season and the end of the season is fast approaching and we are very excited, we will be off on all our adventures after baseball. Mount Rushmore, Grandmas, Worlds of Fun, Oceans of Fun, KC Royals Baseball Games, Omaha Royals baseball games, visit MN, and of course the pool!!!

I hope that everyone is having a wonderful summer because I know that we are. The next few weeks we are taking it easy, sleeping in, playing baseball in the evenings (LOVE THIS), and hanging by the pool during the day! If you are in town and want to get kids together gives us a call because we would loved to see everyone before we hit the road and don't come back until school starts!! :)

FRUSTRATED...

Does anyone out there in the military get their child a same day appt ever? Instead of these appts at the end of the school day and you have to take all of your kids out of school early!! Yuck!

Visitor

We had a visitor last weekend while Pat was gone for two weeks. GRANDMA!! It was wonderful to have her come and visit and keep us from going crazy! We had a roller hockey game, a football game, four baseball games, and TaeKwonDo class. So we might have tired her out but we all enjoyed having her here to see all the games and spend time with the kids. I loved having her here to help me out and the kids really liked her being able to see their activties. She apparently had so much fun that she is coming out again Memorial Day, with my brother and sister-in-law.

Police Department Tour

Jonathan's Den Leader from Cub Scouts arranged a tour of a police department for the boys and they had a great time. They walked around and saw all the offices, the jail, the interview rooms, the garage, the cars, the evidence room, and many more places. It was very informative and the boys were very grateful for the police officer that offered up his time for this activities. We did find out that handcuffs will fit on Jonathan's wrists, his hand is too big to pull it through the cuffs! Enjoy the photos!

Hockey and Basketball

Jonathan is as always busy playing sports and tries to run his Mom ragged getting him to all the activities. He finished up a great season with basketball and then rolled, literally, right into roller hockey. He was very excited to start this new sport and he has done really well. He is skating much better and learning all the hockey terms. He has also started flag football and will begin the next session of hockey in a few weeks. He is a busy beaver and it is a lot of fun to go and watch him try very hard to learn something new, especially when he is doing pretty good. Every sport he goes into I have small expectations, no pressure in our house, so for hockey it was that he would be able to score one goal and he has accomplished that goal. The new expectation is to be able to cross his feet while he is turning, it makes the turn much faster and sharper. These kids amaze me and I love going and getting into the sport with them!

Easter

We had a great Easter this year. We spent the day together and got some things done around the house. It was a beautiful day so the kids talked us into finally setting up the trampoline. They then spent the rest of the day on the tramp and it took a little prodding to get them to come in for dinner.

Omaha Beef Game

We received tickets to the Indoor Football League, Omaha Beef, and we skipped out on our Pack meeting and decided to go and see how these games are. We have been to the college hockey games, college basketball games, and USHL hockey games. It has been a lot of fun and now we can add an IFL game. We only stayed for the first half and half time because it was a school night but we had a good time, except for Sami! She was ready to go home before the beginning of the second quarter but she stuck it out and we got a good photo. I am not sure we will make it back to another game this year but maybe we will try and go to a game next year but we will definitely make sure it is on the weekend.

Durham

This past month we went to a museum in town with some friends. The Durham is an old train station and we have never been there in the seven years we have lived here. It was a lot of fun to visit history of the this area, the history of the boy scouts, and to visit the exhibit of all the wonderful places to visit in the United States. We spent time in the traveling exhibit to ask the kids what they would like to visit in this beautiful country of ours. Of course we had many different answers but it was fun and is still fun to talk about and figure out what are family vacations will be as a family!

Conferences...

Last week we had our Parent/Teacher/Student conferences. It is a crazy week with the book fair for the PTA and two kids conferences at one school and then one conference at another school but that student has 8 teachers. We always look forward to these days and finding out how the kids are doing in their classes, good or bad. We always have good communication with all their teachers regularly anyway but it is nice to sit down face to face and discuss anything that needs to be taken care of. Of course I wish my children were perfect but I am under no illusion that they actually are perfect so it is nice to know if there is anything going on that we need to know to rectify any situation.

So with all that said, we had Sami's conference first and Pat was here for that one. Last time we spent an hour and half at the school talking to everyone, so this time we were a little shorter on time so we tried to spend the majority with her core teachers. She has great teachers that expect the best from her, some times they push, which is great because she can deliver! She has gone up or stayed the same in every class except for one and we got to discuss what the problem was and she set goals for her self to correct the situation! I was so proud listening to her explain what went wrong and how to fix it all by herself. She took the blame and worked out the solution with out help from Pat or I. Now with all that said her grades were good, ALL A's except for the one that is a B+ that she has a goal for herself to get that back up because she had an A in it for the first half of the year, so she is capable of an A in that class. Sami also was excepted into the National Junior Honor Society because of her academic abilities and her outside class activities. This has been a great year and we have many things to be proud of Sami for, she is amazing me all the time.

The boys conferences last about 15 minutes because the teachers have a lot of students to get through in two short days and Pat was not here for those because he was off to DC for a few days. Patrick was first up and we have had some problems in the past that we thought were improving but it would nice to hear what the teacher thought about it. We sat down and during the conference we heard many YEAH's from the teacher! She was excited to let Patrick explain his grades and show us which ones are up from the previous quarter! He has improved quite a bit and he has also improved his behavior in class, YEAH! Not as much talking, more listening, more time management, no homework missing!!!!! He does have to work on asking for help when he is not understanding something but that is going to happen soon because he is doing extra work at home until he learns to ask the teacher or his parents for extra help before the test. Again, he has all A's except for one that was an A and it will be an A again before the year is over because he has set goals for himself also!

Jonathan was the last one on the list and he is a very interesting guy. He has been on a chart system for behavior because he has a tendency to get off task easily, so we have been working with the teacher and Jonathan to improve that. We found out at conference that he is doing so much better that he is now off the chart system because he is doing so much better. YEAH! He has also improved on reading a little bit, but that is not a huge concern for me because my other two had problems reading until fourth or fifth grade and then BAM, they took off and love it! So we will continue to read and he will get there eventually. He is doing better with his spelling and his math is wonderful. The problem with this grade is that so much is tied into reading that since he is slowing working into reading everything else is slow going but again not too worried. The other two had the same problems and it all came together in the end. He is having to read a little more then the other kids in class at home, do a few worksheets a week at home, and we make him read more when we are out and about so he can hopefully have it all click soon but you never know when that will happen.

All in all we had great conferences and these kids amaze me everyday with the good and the bad. It is wonderful to be in a school system that keeps in contact with the parents so much that I am not surprised by anything at conferences. The teachers are amazing and they are wonderful at getting the best out of my kids. I am not going to be ready to leave here when and if Pat gets orders because it will be hard to leave a place that has had such a wonderful impact on our family!

Luck of the Irish!