Blog Slacker!

Wow! Sorry about the lack of posts. I am hardly a slacker in all other areas of my life right now. We are super busy with school, sports and lots of other fun stuff.

Weekend before last we enjoyed an extended time off of school with an early release on Friday and no school on Monday. Friday when it was time for the bus to drop off the kids I walked down to the stop sign to meet them. As I waited I received a phone call from Pete; Soren had called his cell phone saying they would not let her on the bus because she was bringing home the school bunny. Hmmm. So I got in the car and went to pick her up with our new-temporary pet, Flopsie. That thing was HUGE! He was easy to take care of and kept the kids entertained, so it was no big deal to have him for a visit.

The NJE school pet, Flopsie

Soren and some school friends taking a "fall" picture as part of a school project

Everything is still about the same. We have not added any new activities in the last two weeks (not like we could, even if we wanted too!). Reese is reading like crazy. It is so neat how they just suddenly pick it up and then they are reading everything they can see. She loves to write, too. She spells everything phonetically, so it is sometimes hard to decipher, but it is really neat. They have to memorize short poems and nursery rhymes at school and she will write them down, in her own spelling. I love it.


She also learned a new skill on the trampoline! She has mastered the flip.

Grandma Charlotte is finally home from her summer long trip to Alaska so we are excited to go up and spend Halloween with her and do lots of fun crafts and eat good food! But first, this weekend the girls, along with all of their cousins (except for little Alissa), will do the Kids Monster Tri! This is the triathlon that Reese and Avery did last year. It will be neat to see them all compete in the same race.

the cousins

some of the fam

Back in the Water

After all of the drama at the Y over Soren's swim coach being fired, 60 out of 62 families decided to stay with the coach rather than the Y and so we have been out of the water for almost three weeks. This week we are back in the water, renting lanes at a local college and swimming under the name of a local swim team while our coach applies to be a head coach under USA Swimming rules. Crazy. At least we are all back together and swimming. The kids handled the changes well and are excited to move forward with our pool project so that we can officially be Sigma Performance Swimming.

Because we are no longer part of the Y, we had our annual awards banquet as Sigma on Saturday. Each swimmer was given a certificate from the coach with a very heart felt comment about their character and achievements over the past year. He did such a great job encouraging each swimmer right where they are in their training. Special awards were given for achievement. Five distinguished swimmer awards were given and Soren received one of those! She went from a BB swimmer to a AAA swimmer at one meet and was recognized for that. It was a special night and Soren was very excited to get her awards.

In other news, Soren is now a part of so many extracurricular activities that we had to get her a daily planner, but it is all good and seems to be balanced (for now, anyway). The girls are thoroughly enjoying their new drama class that started last week. It is fun to do something new and different.

Last weekend we finally celebrated the Parker fall birthdays. We got together at Pops and Nanas house, ate, ate, ate, passed around cards and money, laughed until we nearly peed our pants, and then played games. Such a great time!

this is what we do. pass around funny cards and money. such a great tradition. Mat always ends up with at least one weiner dog card in honor of Roscoe

Nana got a little bit more than a card from Pops this year. Kinda shiney, round, you wear it on your finger...

Pops and I always have to take pictures of each other taking pictures

just thought we would draw funny eyes and take a picture...do we have to have a reason for everything we do? Afterall, we are Kitz's kids!

I am loved

Today is my birthday! This morning Soren woke up at 5:45 am (because she did not know what time I would be getting up) and made my breakfast. When I came to breakfast I had presents waiting and an amazing card that the girls have been working on for the last few days while I have been at work. It was a singing card; they sang happy birthday and I love you with the love of the Lord. It was so sweet; I feel very loved today! Thank you, Pete for helping me raise great kids...and thanks for my presents, too!

Quick update

Lots going on and the blog got put on the back burner.

More kindergarten fun! To learn about different textures, the kids got to do a "texture walk". I thought it was pretty cool. There were 16 stations. At each station you stepped into a bucket with a different substance and had to describe the texture. Parents brought things like jello, marshmallows, cooked pasta, bananas, ice, dish soap. It was a lot of fun and the kids enjoyed taking off their shoes and sloshing around.

Last weekend there was a bike rally that offered the Lance Armstrong Junior Race TXBRA Criteriums. Lots of words for a kids bike race. It was a 40 minute race and Soren has not had much time on her bike with all of her swimming but she is always willing to try a new challenge, so she let Pete sign her up. A few days before the race Pete put Soren in clips on her racing bike (which made me nervous!) and they had a few practice rides to get her used to taking tight turns at a high speed. She showed up at the race and was, of course, the only girl her age. The turnout was low, so they grouped her in with all of the big kids. She had a pretty bad spill early in the race coming around a corner too fast and got scraped up. She said that she really thought about quitting but decided to get up, put her chain back on her bike and keep going. I am so proud of her. She got lapped many times by the big kids but gave it her all and finished well. Being the only one in her age category, she came home with a gold medal, which I think she earned.

soren is the cute little one in the back with the yellow jersey and blue helmet

The rally offered a kids race for Reese's age as well, so she and Avery decided to take on that challenge. There was a lot of confusion downtown as to where all of the different races were to start and in the confusion, they missed their race, so Pete took them to a parking lot and set up a criterium just for them. I think everyone had a good time.

So do any of you have a granddad, 80+ years old, who will come over and install a pool heater to save you from paying a $400+ electrician bill? Well, I do! And he did! So nice! Yep, now our little pool is heated and ready for winter, thanks Granddad!

Birthday season is upon us. We have 8 birthdays that we will celebrate with one big shindig this weekend at Pop's and Nana's house. Good times!