Miscellaneous fun

Since that last Friday of school, we have been having a few adventures.
Anika spent that Friday night at a friends.  The next Saturday was our turn to clean church as well as the church rummage sale.  So, Brandon, Jessica, Maria, Matt and I headed off to church (after a Jessica and Maria's final soccer games) and rummaged through a few tables.  We walked away with a bag of clothes for random times.  I went in to clean, the kids played with other children and Matt helped with the rummage sale.  There are four different families that each take a turn cleaning, so we take one weekend a month and the if there is a fifth weekend, a team of cleaners does the job.
The next Monday we headed off to Grand Haven's library parking lot and learned the game of pickleball.  The kids are pretty hooked and I've been looking for paddles on ebay or craigslist.  I may just go buy some paddles so we can set up a court in our driveway.  Its pretty fun:  a combination of tennis and ping pong I guess is the best description.
We have been to both the Grand Haven library and our Norton Shores library for a variety of shows and crafts.  We have been to a science show where we watched the color of a penny change, dry ice do some crazy things, and played with gloop.  We've seen a ventriloquist, a juggler, and made star fans and zipper pulls.  At the Norton Shores library there is a jar of candy every week.  You can make one entry guess for how many pieces of candy are in the jar.  Jessica won the first week - 26 pieces!
Matt's oldest niece, Emily, graduated from high school this year and had her open house on a Saturday afternoon.  We left on Friday evening and drove to Matt's parents, then spent most of Saturday afternoon hanging with cousins and eating lots of good food. It was fun to see some family and the kids had fun playing with cousins.  Matt got to chat with a few of his high school classmates that lived in the area and attended the open house.
My family has also discovered that they like homemade strawberry jam way more than store bought.  We ran out of homemade several months ago, so they have been waiting.  We are members of a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) with a local farm here.  They had a special strawberry picking day at their farm, so off we went.  We picked plenty of strawberries.  enough for 3 batches of jam, one pie, and a bag full of frozen strawberries.
The special day was fun. It was hot and windy, so we picked strawberries first.  Everyone helped, but Anika really dug in and kept working.  She insisted we keep picking more.  It was near the end of the season, so the berries were very small, although from what we understand,  MI berries are generally small.  After picking, the kids got strawberries painted on their faces and planted a bean seed in a dixie cup to take home.  Then we went on a horse drawn carriage ride.  Jessica couldn't wait to get done and go pet the horses.  Next was some serious climbing on the hay bales and then hotdogs, chips and lemonade.  All for the price of picking some strawberries!

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Last day of school

The last day of school was rather anti -climatic.  They have the chapel first thing in the morning here, then the kids go back to their classrooms for the last few hours.  I drove up to the carpool spot as usual, my kids were waiting for me, they hopped in, and away we went.  I had taken teacher pictures the day before, so we just drove away.  It was strange!
BUT, an hour before that, a friend called saying a few people were headed to the beach for lunch and fun and did we want to come?  I almost cried, well, I actually did on the way to school.  It was so nice to be thought of, to be included, and to have the bonus of the beach was extra special.  While at the beach that afternoon, I explained Beach Days from MN and they decided it was a good plan!  SO, the past Tuesdays, we have packed up and gone to Beach Day MI style.  Oh so much fun. The kids love having 3- 4 hours with people from school to play with at the beach.  I am meeting a few more moms.

Since then, we have finished up baseball and soccer.  Brandon pitched a few times, played catcher once, and played in the field just about everywhere.  He walked several times - something quite common when you first have kids pitching - but also had some really nice hits.  I think he would say his favorite was being able to steal bases.
Soccer was a whole adventure in an of itself.  We have met several of the people that run the program here. It is a private program - not through the city- but it has both a rec program and a traveling program.  Anika and Maria thoroughly enjoyed their rec teams and coaches and played very well.  Brandon and Jessica struggled.  Both of them had several players on their teams that had never played soccer before so the level of play just wasn't there.  We decided to let both Brandon and Jessica try out for the traveling team, just to see what would happen.  Brandon made the U 11 B team (a year up) and Jessica made the U9 A team (also a year up).  We had only two days to make the decision.  We finally landed on everything is still so new here that we just want to keep it basic for one more year.  So, rec it is again, and who knows, maybe we'll try out again next year.  I'm fairly sure Jessica isn't ready to play soccer year round!
These past weeks Anika has attended both a basketball camp and a softball camp and Jessica and Brandon attended a basketball camp.  Jessica was awarded the hustle award.  I don't want to take anything away from her hustling ability, but I'm wondering if she batted those eyes at the high school boys and they just gave her the award.  Maybe she needed that little boost.  The three of them are all signed up for a few more sports camps yet this summer.

Here we go

Its been over a month since I have posted.  A crazy month.  Sometimes I don't post because I am so busy.  Sometimes I don't post because I'm not sure what to say.  Sometimes I don't post because the things I want to say aren't very positive!
BUT, I hope to post each night this week to catch up on the life of June and start with the life of July.  Maybe no one will read it, but at least I will have a little history of our lives saved in print and picture!
First, Anika had a band concert in May and she has a flute solo.  It actually was a duet with a clarinet, but even with the volume turned up loud, I can only hear her!  She did a great job.  She hasn't played her flute since, but we are hoping to start lessons again in the near future! I'm trying figure out how to post the video, but as of yet, the computer has me beat.
The trip to MN was great.  We had good travels and so much fun with friends. I actually dropped Anika and Brandon off at school on Friday morning and did not see them again until Sunday morning.  Thanks to all of you who helped make this such a special weekend for all of us.  For taking in our kiddos as one of your own.

to the park

yes, we traveled this way

Matt and the boys

the happy couple

dress up time

movie time

On the way to school Friday morning, Brandon could hardly sit.  We were a few blocks away and he said, "We're almost there".  Then we turned the corner and Anika said, "I remember this playground."  as though she had been gone for YEARS!  A friend came running out the door to give her a big hug, followed by another friend and then her teacher.  I was in tears in pretty short order.

Relationships are important to me.  I grew up with family ALL OVER and I love my aunts, uncles, cousins and got to know them well in the short time we spent together.  We are still ALL OVER and it is so much fun to have people to connect to in so many places.  I hope my kids can keep up these relationships and have friends that they remember for life. I know I will.

The Countdown

The final few loops of the paper chain count down are holding on for dear life.  In the past, we have made a paper chain count down to Christmas, but again, we missed out on that this year.  So, Anika proudly made a count down to MN paper chain and has bee ripping off sheets of paper for about 3 weeks.  As you can see, there are only two left.

There are many excited little bodies in this house, but there is also some wonder.  They've talked about how excited they are to see everyone, but wonder what it will be like.  They've asked to go back home - which I explained to them we can't do. Its not our house anymore.  They are eager to attend school and see classmates and teachers, but someone here asked me if I was certain I wanted to reopen those wounds.  So, this weekend is an experiment of sorts, and I am sure the ride back to MI on Sunday will be yet another adventure. I liken it to being a freshman in college and going back to the high school football  game.  You need to experience to realize it isn't the same anymore.  We'll see!

We had another rocket launch this weekend. This time launch and retrieval were both successful.  Anika only shot hers off once, but the other three shot their's off twice.  The kids had a great time retrieving all the rockets our friend set off as well.

We are also planning a trip in August.  We plan on being in NW Iowa from August 5 -8, Hollandale from August 8 - 10, the cabin from August 10 - 12, and Minneapolis from August 12 - 15.

Happy Trails!

Love notes

I found a book I had purchase YEARS ago when I was unpacking last month and I picked it up and started reading it.  I LOVE reading this book. I only read a few pages at a time, but it gets me so excited.  I'm even taking notes..... I'll wait while those of you who fell off your chair can get back on and start reading again.

Its called 'Love notes in lunchboxes'.  The saddest part is, I found this book as my children start a school with a hot lunch program and rarely take a lunch box.  It has such great ideas and now I get really bummed if I send my kids out the door with their lunch box and I realize about two hours later that I never put in the note!  Jessica posts them on her door and Maria asks for one on her chair even if she doesn't take a lunch box.

I've also been working on taking a monthly chart I have for praying for specific character traits for our kids and putting it on a calendar that I can print and frame.  So many projects.....

So, what have we been up to?  I can't believe its been almost a month since I posted.
We've had a few people over to our house for supper.
We've played lots of soccer.  All four have a game every Saturday!

Brandon has played some baseball and I am even talking to some of the moms at practices and games.
I unpacked about 10 more boxes and rearranged two closets.  Someone made fun of me that I wasn't done unpacking yet so I decided I better get to it.  Although, I'm still not done.  My goal is the end of June - we'll see.
I've decided there are some similarities between living here and where I grew up.  There are many towns in the area.  Each town has its own elementary, middle and high school.  When you play sports for one town, you travel to the other towns to play them.  Sometimes this can take you 30 - 40 minutes.  When you describe to someone where the field is you don't use road names or directions.  Such as, turn right at Kramer's corner, or turn left at THE blinking light in town.  However, when you are new to an area, you mapquest things and get names of roads.  The blinking light may or may not have a road sign, and Mapquest doesn't know that, so you have a hard time finding the field.  The directions to Brandon's last baseball game literally read in one part 'turn left at Lee's chicken'.  No address of where the field was, no school name, no park name.  I have a few people that look out for me and ask if I know where stuff is, so that's good, and Brandon got to his game early!
We went to Meijer Gardens with Aunt Kathy and saw all the beautiful butterflies.  It was Matt's first trip there. The kids love that place so we became members for the year.  They showed Matt the HUGE horse and we fed the fish.

The school sponsored a truck from Feeding America.  It provides food for low income families. Anika, Maria, and I helped distribute some of the food.
We planted flowers in pots with the neighbor.

Jessica 'traveled' to Washington DC.  I was airport security and hotel check in.  When I asked her where she was from, she answered MN.  After questioning her a bit more she remembered she was born in MN and lives in MI now. Phew!  Although I can't blame her. I was talking with a mom about how far her sister had moved from home living all the way in Virginia. Then she reminded me we only live 12 hours from Virginia now.  Yep, we've moved.

on the airplane

There have been some cool storms coming in off the lake, the cloud formations are fun to watch and change quickly.

We found our first MI letterbox in Grand Haven.  We walked all the way to the end of the pier to the lighthouse and then walked back to find the letterbox.

Mother's Day was amazing.  We went to our friends that live on the beach and just enjoyed life. The kids have dubbed it the best mother's day ever. We even shot rockets off from their deck.  The shoot went great, the retrieval, not so much.  We promised them new rockets and a better place to shoot in the near future.

Anika is going to Michigan Adventure with her class. Brandon is going to the planetarium and Hoffmaster state park.  Jessica is going to the zoo.  Maria went to Meijer Garden to look at the butterflies a few weeks ago.  They are keeping busy!
We missed Holland Tulip time due to soccer, maybe next year - although around here it was called the Stem Festival this year due to the early spring.
That's still hard for me to say - maybe next year.  We used to play the game 'Where do you see yourself in 5 years, or 10 years?'  Now, I don't look much past one week.  Its weird for me to think what we will be doing 'next year'.  We have been enjoying the times when we get to take adventures as a family.  Good memories.
But we did take in the Grand Haven Kite Festival.  Aunt Kathy met us after soccer and wow what a day to be on the beach!

The dangers of home exercise

This is what happens when you run through the room while mom is performing a home version of BodyPump.  Perhaps renewing the YMCA membership is becoming more of a NEED than a want.

Another Adventure

Yesterday I went with Brandon's class to the West Michigan Symphony in the Frauenthal theater.  We are really starting to like that place!  I would guess its about the size of Calvary church's main auditorium.
Anyway, when you hear that there will be over 1000 recorder wielding third and fourth graders in a large theater, most people would run in the opposite direction. I however, braved the elements and walked IN. I even PAID for my ticket. And I was greatly rewarded.

Imagine the whole bottom level and the sides of the upper level filled with a third of fourth grade students holding a recorder.  They were instructed to keep their recorders in their cases until told otherwise - they even unzipped the cases all together at the count of three.
The classes have been working for MONTHS on this. The orchestra played nine songs (or parts of them).  One song had Can-Can dancers on stage, one song had a ballet dancer on stage, one song the kids had practiced a sitting dance routine, two of the songs the kids had been taught the words to sing along, and two of the songs they played their recorders, all from their seats. It was so cool and it sounded great - no ear plugs necessary and no ringing of the ears when you left!
This trip was progress in many ways.
-I knew by face all of the other chaperones - and I knew 2 of their names; one I even shared an 'inside joke sort of look' with that made me laugh inside (and yes I know she is reading this)
-I knew two of three teachers - my kids are still helping me with that one, I can't keep straight who is who and who is music and art and pe and who is married and who is not.....
-the music was amazing - especially the french horn player, but I'm probably a bit biased; one of my sadnesses of leaving MN was my fear of loss of good music to expose my kids to at a cheap price; there are so many free concerts to get a hold of there;  These tickets were $5, Maria got in free;  My aunt assures me that they have these in Grand Rapids as well, so I am hopeful we will experience more concerts in the future!

Today Maria is off to Meijer gardens with her class - we hope to go back with all the kids on Saturday.  I have been printing a few resumes and sending them off.  We'll see what happens!