One long day

Twas the day before Easter, and a track meet was scheduled. Say what?!   Andy wanted to keep Wyatt home from his first meet due to the timing. Um, we forced encouraged him to join the team and have heard no complaints about the practices, I argued.  I won that one, but we knew it would mean a very busy and tight day.  Wyatt had to be there at 8:45, and my mother-in-law needed a ride home from the airport at 4:10, and one/both of us needed to be in the nursery at church to serve back to back services at 4:00.  You get the picture.

We journeyed to the meet where we faced spring weather in all its glory.  What looked like a beautiful sunny day was actually breezy and very cold to start.  My feet were numb, and my gloves were barely keeping my hands warm as we waited at the discus pit for a long line of boys to each take four throws.  Wyatt scratched his first shot because he stepped out of the front of the circle - huge no-no, but commonly done. We saw many of the boys make the same mistake.  

Immediately after discus, Wyatt lined up to run the 100m. 

I love that he grinned as he ran.

We then had lunch, waited and waited some more before realizing that it was going to be really tight if we were going to see his 200.  We called for reinforcements, and Savannah and Julia arrived to cheer him through his last race, record it for us and get him home.

By the time we arrived home that night, we were too tired to care about putting together an Easter basket treasure hunt, so Julia did it.  I pulled out the baskets for the Easter bunny, and one of them was missing.  What?!  We used a different basket and are still scratching our heads over how they did not all get put up together and how one could be gone.

Curls

I enjoyed snapping a few pictures of Savannah before she went out with friends.  Does anyone know the secret to keeping curls in fine-textured, thick, heavy hair?  She curls her hair and hopes for an hour with curls before they drop.

Sister Love

The girls were just goofing off in the kitchen, hugging on each other.  I saw an opportunity and grabbed my phone hoping for a good picture of them.  Unfortunately, Julia really got goofy then because she was determined to stand on her toes and appear taller than Savannah.  Julia is actually about an inch shorter, and I think she has more growing to do, so her day may be coming.  If she hadn't been so goofy, I might have gotten a stellar shot of both of them, but I am satisfied with the pictures I did get.

This one was my favorite.  

I filtered this through Instagram.  It's crazy how blue Savvy's eyes look in it.  They are actually green.

Continuing on the road to college

We spent an exhausting weekend with Savannah at her future school. Merit weekend allowed the opportunity to learn more about the campus and community.  She had her ID made and completed her fall schedule.  Savannah got into all of the classes she wanted.  She likes to be challenged, and she will be.  With honors and pre-pharmacy combined with economics, she will be a busy girl.  We will send her with many prayers as she has to maintain a 3.3 G.P.A. to keep her scholarship.

College is so different now.  I call the roommate search the equivalent of match.com.  When Savannah was struggling to find a good match on there, we learned of a Facebook page where her classmates are connecting, so she's working the roommate angle on that page.

She will be attending my alma mater.  I loved my years there, some of the best of my life, and the friendships formed are priceless.  If we were able, we would get together annually with my college friends.  I think she's gonna love it.

Ending the cheer season

We ended the cheer season with a casual banquet hosted by a very gracious cheer family.  It's been a great year getting to know wonderful families and sweet, hard-working girls under the direction of a great coach.  Rumors are flying that several are not returning next year, and that makes me sad.

The girls stayed the night and one exhausted Julia came home on this morning.

Just another conversation around our dinner table

We are trying to eat healthier.  Andy and I both like Mediterranean food in particular, and it tends to be healthy, so Andy bought the Daniel cookbook and has been trying various recipes from that.  He also likes Fabio's style quite a bit, so he works on choosing healthy recipes from Fabio or altering them with a healthier twist.  I have to say we are having some yummy meals around here.

On Thursday night, Andy made chicken saltimbocco, and it was really good.

Julia, however, has picked up some bad habits.  She was our best eater throughout preschool, usually willing to try new things.  However, her closest friends in elementary school were picky eaters, and Julia found that they got away with it, so she started doing it too. Now we fight her to try anything.

As a result we have returned to an old strategy of ours.  If she's willing to try everything at dinner, the family gets a pizza night on the weekend.

Julia put one bite of chicken saltimbocco on her plate.  She proceeded to shred it and take tiny bites of it.  It was so ridiculous to see her reaction.  At one point the conversation went like this:

Julia: This was cooked in wine?
Wyatt: Haven't you ever seen anyone cook with wine or beer? I once saw a chicken cooked with a beer can up it's butt!  Mmm, it was good.

We cracked up.  I stated that that was a FB post and repeated the conversation.  At that point Wyatt told me to get it right.  He said "mmm, it was good", not just "it was good." That boy cracks me up!

On the same night, he got a much overdue and needed haircut.  As I complimented him and told him to watch out for the girls in all of his cuteness, he just shrugged and stated, "I know."

As the evening proceeded, we witnessed Julia gagging on eggplant.  Really?!  Oh, the drama!

Teased

This picture was taken on Sunday, one day before February left and March walked in.  Julia was on her way to a pre-season swim clinic that will meet weekly almost up until the season actually starts.  She did not have a sweatshirt or a jacket with her.  She simply pulled sweats on over her suit, threw on flip flops and went on her way.  She left practice wrapped in a towel - in February.  It was a nice day.

It snowed today.  Nothing stuck, but we witnessed those big, pretty flakes coming down throughout the day.  This came four weeks after that insightful groundhog said we'd only have two more weeks of winter - yeah right.  It's funny to work in a high school when it snows a few days after a big warm tease.   One student commented that this must be a joke.  No joke, we've had snow in March before, but yes, that spring tease left us hungry for spring weather, flip flops, sandals, painted toenails and such :)

I can't complain.  This winter has been mild. I just got the energy bill for this month, and it is only $10 over budget.  It was $60 over last month, and that was rough, but last year, it was $150 over, and that was with the thermostat set on 65.  I'll take a mild winter.

This photo is just a random photo texted to me from Julia one afternoon when she was on her way home from school.  I'd say she's the family comedian, but she has some pretty funny competition among her siblings - especially the boys.