Basketball, Basketball and more Basketball

The kids didn’t have school this past Monday. We didn’t have much in the morning, but our afternoon/evening was full. We all had dentist appointments after lunch. I had my crown put on and the kids had check-ups. The older three were all good, but the twins had cavities again. I was so disappointed! Ellie was the first done, so she spent some time at my dad’s office and even got in on some filing. She was much appreciated J.

All the kids had to stop by and see my dad and Molly and then we took Ellie to basketball practice. As soon as Ellie got home from practice, it was time for her to get ready for her dance performance at the high school girls basketball game. She had to put her hair in a side bun and she did it all herself. She thinks she can do her hair better than me and she is probably right. I took all the kids and got there for the beginning of the game and Andrew got there around half-time along with Lissy and Caroline. My parents came too. We hadn’t been to any of the varsity basketball games, so it was good to watch them. Ellie did a wonderful job dancing with a big smile on her face.

Since the twins were not the most cooperative from the beginning, Andrew took them home after the performance and the rest of us stayed to watch the rest of the girls game and part of the boys game. The girls are struggling this year as it is a building year. I definitely know how that feels. And the boys are having a great year and they were fun to watch. We left at halftime and went home to get ready for bed. But first, Andrew had to play a variety of 90s music videos so the kids could appreciate the music for our glory days J. Then a little after putting the kids to bed, Miles ended up with a bloody nose. Thankfully, it didn’t last too long and he was back to bed.

Tuesday it was back to school. Lincoln brought home some papers from the 100^th Day of School and in it he had to fill in the blank of if he could have 100 of something, he would have 100 Lincolns so they could do all of his work for him J. Another cute Lincoln story, he came into my room early one morning and I was finishing up my devotion and then I told him I was going to pray silently. I asked him if he ever prayed silently in his head and he replied that instead of praying he would actually sing songs he made up in his head J.

Tuesday night we were back at Mary Immaculate.  My parents, Lissy, Molly, Caroline and Emmie all got to come watch. I had to run the gate for the girls game but I had a decent view for the game which was great because Ellie got a play a decent amount. The other team was struggling a bit, so Brett pulled out some of her better players and let the younger ones play for a while. Ellie loved it and I loved watching how aggressive she was. We had talked about jump balls before the game as she had some questions about the concept. After the game she told me she would keep an eye on the possession arrow and if the ball was going to go to them, she would go after it. But then she decided she would just go for it all the time.

Jackson was up next and it was another good game. I think it was the first time they had their whole team there and they did a great job. I love seeing Jackson’s confidence and level of play build. He has become a smart player who gets aggressive when he needs to, looks for the open player and makes some great passes.

Wednesday was even more basketball as the three oldest all had practice. Jackson had practice after school while Ellie and Lincoln had their first Y ball practice in the evening. I made sure to have dinner ready to go early so Ellie could eat a bit before I took her to her practice at 5:15. She was done at 6:15 and Lincoln started then. I took Jackson with me to drop off Lincoln and we stayed during his practice and were able to find an empty basket to work on some stuff. Ellie joined us for a bit too (I later learned that she was upset a bit that I didn’t work with her more, so I will need to make sure I do that). We worked on defensive positioning for down low and shooting form. I think he felt a little more confident in it by the end. I watched Lincoln’s practice for a little bit and it was entertaining as always. He is a little go-getter. We didn’t request to be on teams with anyone, but somehow he ended up on the same team as Alex, Benson and Josh, so he was excited about that.

Thursday morning I had our bible study. After I got done with that, I picked up the twins from school. I worked on cutting out and starting to assemble some of the ninja valentines and while I was doing that, the twins decided to make a bunch of pictures. Their latest thing is drawing treasure maps with different members of our family in them. Miles was explaining one to me and he said first you go through the desert, then the waterfall and then the “cheese” or, at least that is what I thought he was saying. After saying it a few times and him just smiling at me like I was crazy, I figured out it was trees J.

Ellie and Lincoln had K-Life after school and then I dropped Ellie off at dance. I took Jackson early to his game and Andrew brought the other boys later. The girls game was a close one and it ran later, so Ellie was able to make it to some of Jackson’s game. My dad actually offered to pick her up, which I’m sure she was excited about. She was upset she missed her game, but I told her she wouldn’t have played anyways because they didn’t play any fourth graders since it was such a close game. Jackson’s game was close too and he was getting in there boxing out, going for the rebounds, going for fast breaks, making great passes-so much fun to watch. They ended up losing by 1 point and the last 10 seconds of the game the ball changed possession probably five times.

We received sad news on Thursday as we learned that Lincoln’s teacher from last year, Mrs. Quigley, passed away after a long battle with cancer. She went under Hospice care several weeks ago, so we knew it would be happening soon and I tried to prepare Lincoln for it a little bit. But when I told him after I picked him up from Little K, it took a bit to register. He asked several times, “She died? Really, she died?” I wish I could have recorded the conversation afterwards because it was sweet, sad and a bit humorous. He said several times that he missed her and he wished he could see her again, that she was a good teacher and a nice person. He wondered what heaven would look like (her husband posted that she said last week that, “Heaven will be the best day ever.”) and proposed “fluffy clouds on top of fluffy clouds” as one idea. He mentioned that God and Jesus have all powers in heaven and wondered if we would get powers too. He asked me what I thought Mrs. Quigley’s power would be and I suggested maybe being able to look down on her family. He thought that was silly because she would already be able to do that either with a fluff of a cloud or a metal tv box that she could make. He was excited for her to meet Jesus and he really had no idea what he would look like and that she would get to meet all of her “aunt’s sisters” which ended up being ancestors. Then he talked about the burial in typical Lincoln fashion, “You know they put their body in a box and dig a hole in the ground and put the box down in the big hole and cover it with dirt. I wondered what happens then?”

We had a bit of a break on Friday. The only kid-related activity was Jackson’s small group after school. On my calendar was to make dinner for the Heerens since Matt just had hip replacement surgery on Wednesday. Bennett wanted to help me make the cookie bars I made to take with the dinner.

Andrew got home in time for me to run it out to them. I was amazed to see Matt was able to get up and walk around without crutches or a walker. When I got home, Andrew had fed the kids and had everything put away with a plate of food for me. We had a low-key evening, although Andrew did go to the office for a bit. We had a busy day the next day, so I spent some time making sure we had everything in order for that. Andrew and Jackson went out to the ranch Saturday morning. I found the movie Shag on YouTube, so I turned it on while I ran 6 miles on the treadmill and it definitely made the time go by quicker. Lincoln had his basketball game at 10. We actually played against Ashlyn’s team and they got to guard each other for a little bit. There was a lot of running around J. We were able to go home, eat lunch and get all of Ellie’s stuff packed up and then went back to the Y for her game at noon. She was intense again, going after the ball, driving in and going for the rebounds. I think her time with the MI team has helped.

We had to leave her game after the third quarter though, as it started late and she had to be at Pershing at 1 to practice for her first dance performance at the half-time of the girls’ game. She got dressed in the back of the car on our way there and then worked on her hair in the bathroom. There were two other girls at her game that were in her class too, so she wasn’t the only one who was late. I made sure she was ready and then we sat with my parents and Molly who were already in the gym. There was about 4 minutes left in the first half and it was a close game for the girls. Ellie’s class performed after the Showgirls and they did great job. Ellie always has a cute smile on her face.

Andrew took the younger three home after the Ellie’s first performance and I made Jackson stay with me so he could watch some of the men’s game. They are doing well this year and I thought it would be good for him to watch. I enjoy watching the games, but I think Jackson takes after his dad and doesn’t care too much for spectating. Andrew’s mom got there towards the end of the girls’ game and we still had to wait the 20 minutes between games and the first half to watch Ellie perform again. The kids did enjoy the concession stand though. Then after the second performance, we headed home. We didn’t do much the rest of the night. I heated up some frozen spaghetti sauce for a late dinner and then I went grocery shopping while the rest of them cleaned up. It was a long night Saturday night as our tub jets kept going off for some reason. I have known something was wrong with the motor for a while as it has a more high-pitched whine sound now, but I haven't done anything about it. So, starting around 1am, the jets would run for several minutes once or twice every hour. Finally, around 4am I remembered that the tub was on a separate breaker, so I went to the basement and flipped that switch. I did manage to rest of Number the Stars since I was up from 1 until close to 5. We gave it to Ellie for Christmas and she is reading it, so I wanted to be able to talk about it with her. 

Sunday we went to church and then the kids and I got busy cleaning up around the house while Andrew went to the office. Ellie and Lincoln finished up their Valentines. 

Then Ellie worked on a Valentine sugar cookie pack I picked up for her from Wal-Mart. I kept busy with other stuff and let her do almost all of it herself. The twins helped out a bit. She mixed it all up, rolled the dough out, cut the cookies out and baked them. She was so proud. The problem came with the icing. She mixed it all up, divided it up and added the coloring, but she had the way it tasted, so she scraped the icing. And she wasn't too pumped about the clean-up :-).

The sun was shining so the kids spent some time outside. Lincoln got to jump on the trampoline with Alex, the twins played on the swing set and we all played basketball for a bit. Andrew and Jackson played for quite a while and Ellie was anxious to join them but was still busy with her cookies. So she ditched that for a bit and went out to play. Zach came over, so they had a little game of 2-on-2 going on. That evening, Jackson went to the K-Life Super Bowl party with friends and the rest of us went to my parents for dinner. Ellie decided it would be fun to wear all of her bows for dinner.

We watched some of the game and Jackson decided he wanted to stay at the party until the game was over. And it happened to be the first ever overtime in Super Bowl history and he didn't get home until close to 10. He had fun and was glad he decided to go.