Starting to Wind Down...For a Short Bit

Last week was busy but it was nice to think we were winding down a bit on some activities. We had our last practice for the 3on3 tournament. We had both the boys and the girls so Andrew took the boys while I took the girls. At one point, Lincoln told me that one of the twins had gone to the bathroom and needed wiped, but they were in the boys’ bathroom. There was also a Cub Scout meeting going on while we were practicing so I knew I couldn’t go in there so Andrew had to J. I think Andrew’s practice went well and things were okay with the girls until we starting working on trying to learn just one simple play-one girl down low ran across and set a screen for the other girl who would run in front of the basket to try to get the ball. When we scrimmaged the boys, they had no clue what to do. So in the end we decided our focus for the tournament was to play hard but still have fun.

When we got home from practice, Lissy and Molly were waiting at the house for us. Lissy was in town for a quick shoot so she picked up some shakes for the kids and gave Jackson his birthday present. He gets to come to St. Louis for a night and she is going to take him ziplining and to the movies. He really liked it. Ellie and didn’t get to stick around for long as she had her tumbling lesson. Since she doesn’t get to do an actual rehearsal for her routine, she wore her costume to practice to see how it would work out with her routine and it went well. She hasn’t had as much practice with this routine since she didn’t do competition so I think she is a little nervous about the recital. Since we were running late, I had to drop her off and then go park so I did catch a picture of her getting the mats out for practice.

Tuesday Ellie had her last gymnastics class in Macon. It was an open house so Andrew came along too. I knew it would be pretty crowded so my parents were kind of enough to keep the rest of the kids. We stopped by Sonic when we got into town and it took longer for the guy to take our order than it did for us to get it. Andrew was about ready to just give up and leave. The open house was pretty much like a regular practice. I think Andrew did enjoy seeing Ellie do all of the different apparatus though. And at the end, they got the results of the testing they did the previous two weeks and Ellie and her friend, Payton, were invited to try out for the competition team in August. Ellie was very excited but they practice two days a week for 2 hours each which would mean 3 ½ hours including drive time each time. I told her we would have to talk about it later. We are hoping that a gym can be opened in Kirksville so we can eliminate that drive to Macon because I would love for Ellie to be able to continue it.

We have decided we are going to do a kitchen remodel to take out some walls and open everything up so that hopefully we can fit more people in our house comfortably. We are not going to do it until the end of the summer though but I had a chance to get a great deal on appliances. So Wednesday I worked on ordering appliances. I ordered them from a place online that is actually a large store in Chicago and they deliver them for free, the price-matched lower prices, I didn’t have to pay sales tax and I got a rebate from GE, a free extended year warranty and a free upgrade to the slate finish. And then I spent Friday morning working on finalizing my ideas for the cabinets to send them to our contractor so he can get bids on them.

Bennett woke up from his nap with a fever Wednesday afternoon. So I set him up in my room and worked on finishing getting stuff ready for small group. I figured it was maybe too late to call it off at that point. But Miles quickly realized that Bennett would probably be sleeping in our room since he was sick, so he went ahead and brought his stuff down so he could sleep in our room too. I ended up letting him and he ended up in the bed by the next morning.

Bennett still wasn’t feeling well Thursday morning and then started having some GI issues. Andrew was able to stay with them while I ran to Aldi while he was home for lunch. I promised him it would be quick because he was busy and I made it there, did my shopping and back home in less than 30 minutes. And he left as soon as I was in the garage. He offered to pick up the kids from school too since I wasn’t sure what to do with Bennett-being stuck in the pick-up line with diarrhea wouldn’t be fun. He was finally feeling better by the evening.  But I did have to deal with Buddy for the day and he was in lots of trouble. The day before he had knocked over the LaBeth's trash and was digging around in it so I had to clean that up. Then Thursday he threw up on the carpet so I sent him outside. Soon after that Tiffany sent me a text that said I wasn't going to be happy with Buddy. I looked outside to find him destroying one of my cushions from our patio set out back. He ended up in his cage the rest of the afternoon.

That evening Ellie had her last dance class of the year and Jackson had his science expo he wanted to go to. Lincoln wanted to join us, so we dropped off Ellie and ran to Wal-Mart to pick up a couple things for Jackson’s birthday. While we were there he mentioned that he wanted to bring donuts to his class the next day for his birthday. So we were lucky we went to Wal-Mart. Then we went to his science expo and got to see the presentation his group did for their experiment on which brand of batteries tested the best. He wasn’t interested in the other presentations and just wanted to see some of the presentations by the Truman students, including the reptiles.

Since our Saturday was going to be busy, I went ahead and decorated for Jackson’s birthday on Friday. We were keeping it simple this year, so that just meant a banner and a centerpiece for the table. That evening we went to my parents for dinner. Saturday morning we were up and going for the K-Life 3on3. We were supposed to help with the concession stand starting at 8:30 so I took the older two and went early for that. They both had games at 9 though. Thankfully the concession stand was well staffed so they didn’t really need us. Each of our teams played four games throughout the day and they had to combine the boys and girls since their numbers were down a bit. So the girls’ first three games were against boys teams and their final game was the “championship game” against the only other girls team, the Kaos. They are a traveling team that has played a lot and they win a lot. Our poor girls were so intimidated. I think they were more intimidated by them than by the boys. We definitely didn’t win but they did have fun most of the time. Briley was our secret weapon and our high scorer. And I wasn’t much of a coach as I didn’t have any idea what to do with them J. The boys’ team fared better. They had to play a couple girls teams and couple boys teams. They won one game but they had some close ones. Jackson played with much more confidence just in those four games than he did during his actual season. It was neat to see him gain that confidence and play more aggressively.

Molly offered to spit on Lauren's shoes so she wouldn't slip around.

Andrew took the boys home before Ellie’s last game and Ellie went to my parents with Andy and Autumn after their game. I gathered our stuff from the concession stand and ended up visiting for a bit before heading home. Andrew had put the twins down for a nap and wanted to go to the ranch so I was kind of stuck there. I did have things to do though so I went to work getting stuff ready for Jackson’s party that evening. It was mainly cleaning stuff up and setting stuff out for dinner. We just ordered pizza and I had made his cookie cake the day before. Then that evening we got to celebrate our first born. The boy who stole my heart in those first moments and who protects my heart now. He can read when I’m maybe having a bad day and offers to help out. He is growing up and likes to be involved in our conversations, likes to try out his humor and likes to explore out at the ranch. He may not be the most outgoing, social person but I feel like he is striving to do the right thing and be a good person.

We didn’t do a friend party this year and just celebrated with our family. Owen was excited to be a part of the party and gave the birthday boy a big hug.

Jackson’s big present was the Millennium Falcon that was from us and my parents and he was very excited about that. He also got a Lego set from Andrew’s parents that he loved. We celebrated with cookie cake after that and then he was anxious to start building. So he had a pretty low-key party except for his crazy cousins running around. I guess Lola and Finley got into some nail polish up in Ellie’s room but their moms cleaned it up. And I didn’t realize until I was cleaning later that they also found some Playdoh downstairs and it was everywhere J.

Andrew cleaned up a bit that night while I printed off their turkey tags for youth hunting the next morning. And then I finished cleaning some that night and into the next day. The twins both slept in our room and started coughing during the night so it was kind of a long night. Andrew and Jackson were up early to go hunting and they sent me this “selfie”.

The twins weren’t feeling the best so they just laid around most of the day and actually fell asleep at one point. Since they weren’t feeling well, we didn’t go to church but Ellie and I did watch the sermon online and Chromecasted it to the TV.

Andrew and Jackson were back earlier than I expected though so I quickly finished up my grocery list and went grocery shopping. On the way home, I picked up Lincoln who had spent the night at my parents. The rest of the day was just a kind of dreary day which made it hard to motivate anyone to do anything. Ellie watched a Harry Potter movie and then played with her friends. Jackson and Lincoln both played with their friends for a bit and then Jackson had a basketball practice. A former Truman player who has played over in Europe had offered to work with a small group of boys on their skills so they could get a little more one on one time. Jackson enjoyed it and I hope he learns a lot from it. He also spent a lot of time working on his new Legos. At one point, Andrew even had Lincoln and his friends interested in the Paris Roubaix bike race he was watching.