Encore and Back to the grind!

Last Sunday was Evelyn's final Encore concert of the season - I'm so glad I was back in time for one of them!!  The concert was amazing and Evelyn was amazing!!  I tried to get a group photo after the concert, but I was too slow - so instead I got this photo.  :)  

This week has mostly been getting back into the swing of life.  Getting back to routines and such.  One evening, I had scratched my leg and David noticed it bleeding - so he runs off to get me a bandaid.  He comes back yelling "Here comes David Doctor!!!"  And bringing a damp paper towel to clean it off and a bandaid to cover it up.  It was so sweet and reminded me of when Sandi and I used to go to "Daddy Doctor" to get our scratches and cuts cleaned up! 

Daivd wanted his picture taken on top of the sign on one of our walks home this week.  The weather has been beautiful all week, so we've enjoyed playing after school - chatting with friends and enjoying the sun!  

I'm now helping coach the younger age group kids water polo teams with THills - the kids are adorable and a ton of fun to work with.  The range of skill levels is wide - but its been fun to work with them!  David and Paxton got signed up for the 10 and under group this week - so on Friday and Saturday, David and Paxton came to water polo with me!  David much preferred Friday which was only the younger kids and in the shallow water only.  He didn't like Saturday at Connestoga with the 12 and under group too and scrimmaging in deeper water.  They are both doing great though!  It's been fun hanging out with them and doing something I love with them! 

Saturday was a bit nuts though - Between swimming, Parkrose, coaching water polo and open polo -  I was thoroughly clorinated by the time the day was over.... 

Today was Mother's Day.  I've been blessed with awesome examples of motherhood in my life - both in my family and my friends.   Dan really hit it out of the park today though.  While I was gone in Scotland, he learned how to make Eggs Benedict and surprised me with that for my Mother's Day breakfast before church.  I don't know how I got lucky enough to be married to the biggest green flag ever.  

 

Back at Last - and Oops

It's been an eventful couple of weeks.  The swim team was finally able to do their awards banquet.  Conner was awesome and kept it short and sweet - Evelyn lettered and got a most improved award.   

Anna got home from school and immediatly started cleaning and sewing.  It's been awesome to have her back.  She and Dan went to swim up at the 50 meter pool and she ran into Elizabeth who said she should pick up some shifts while she is back - so she has been picking up some lifeguarding shifts.  

David got to be one of the kids leading the school spirit song for the whole school during their assembly.  He did an amazing job!!!  

Evelyn had her Terra Nova plant sale and it went super well - also she has been planting a garden in our back yard!  

On Saturday, David wanted to go to the "bike dirt hills" so he had a great time riding around and enjoying the beautiful weather.  

Dad and I had a great couple of weeks - going up to Orkney, going to York, London, Dundee, Durham, Inverness and more - The weather was fabulous and we loved getting to be out walking and out learning and out exploring! 

We enjoyed talking and eating ice cream and just had an amazing trip over all.  However I'm too lazy to put all the details in here having already put it all into facebook and my journal.... :) 

Scotland and Easter

Monday morning, I got up early to swim, then headed home to finish packing and then Dad and I were on our way to the airport!  We flew to Texas for one night where I got to see the progress on their kitchen and the changes to their back yard.  Then Tuesday morning was travel day!  Dad and I headed to the airport for our flight to the UK.  Dad surprised me with first class seats on the overseas trip into London which included a super posh meal in the first class lounge and of course big reclining seats in our own little area for the flight - plus pjs and pillows and blankets and such. 

  

Wednesday morning, we got into London, then walked around the airport and ate in the lounge until our flight to Edinburgh.  We got to Edinburgh and got our luggage (yes - all of it - even Dad got his luggage for once!)  then we hopped the bus for the city.  We got checked in to our flat and then went out to walk around the city and see some stuff!  We ended the day late - with a tour of Mary King's Close.  It was a lot of fun and a great bit of History to see.  

Thursday, we got on a train to North Burwick.  Then we walked out to Dirleton Castle and enjoyed wandering around the ancient ruins for awhile, then grabbed some ice cream as we headed back to town for lunch.  

Then we took off again for Tantallen Castle - another beautiful ancient castle 

After, we headed back into town and got to go on a Sea Bird island boat tour.  It was awesome!  We saw puffins, and penquins and gannets and lots more - birds, plus seals!  It was awesome, but cold!  So after we warmed up with hot chocolate and chips and then cooled back down with more ice cream... :)  

Friday, we took the train down to Beamish - and since it was a holiday - it was rather packed!  We had a great time checking out all the exhibits and eating candy and riding a train!  

Saturday, we went down to Stirling.  We got to see the Castle and do a guided tour.

Then we went to the Old Jail and they had a fun little tour with an actor to talk about the Jail and it's history.  

We had a beautiful walk out to the Wallace Monument and climbed to the top.  We stopped at an old ruined Abby on the way back and got to enjoy a few minutes talking to the caretaker when he came to lock up.  Then we walked back to the train station just in time to make the train before it left!  Then we got to the crepe place for dinner just before it closed for the night! 

Sunday was church, followed by the Botanical Gardens.  And of course, ice cream on the way home! 

Dan and the kids kept busy too.  Some friends got together for a little Easter Egg Hunt on Saturday morning, he even found the "big egg" again and he told dad that it was an answer to his prayer.  :) 

Then after, they went to John and Melissa's for another Egg Hunt!  And then after fun eating and playing.  

Their Easter Meeting was late enough that Dad and I were back at the flat and could watch the kids sing in the musical numbers!  They all did awesome!  

Evelyn also had her first Encore concert this weekend - it went super well!  Thankfully there are more to come! 

Crazy....

It has been a crazy busy week.  We had our final choir rehearsals this week - and after the Saturday dress rehearsal, we were feeling pretty solid.  It's amazing how far the choir has come!  

Evelyn had another track meet on Wednesday.  So David went to his friend Anna's house.  Evelyn did ok on her pole vault, but not as well as she would have liked.  She also ran hurdles and took 2nd place.  

David has had a front tooth loose for awhile now - on Monday we had corn on the cob and it got LOTS looser - but he wouldn't pull it out - so it hung on for a couple more days.  It finally came out Wednesday afternoon at Anna's house.  

This week I started helping out coaching the THills 12 and under and and 10 and under groups.  They are such fun kids and it has been great getting to work with them! 

Friday evening, my friend Nicole came over for a puzzle night.  She and Eileen and I worked on the puzzle and got it down just in time for bed!  Plus we had fun chatting, watching movies and eating snacks!  

There was a Water Polo tournament this weekend that both Aaron and I played in.  Me with the masters group and him with Newberg.  We both had a great time.  Our teams lost, but we played well and had fun.  It was out at Mt Hood Community College which is a beautiful outdoor pool - and the weather was nice, we enjoyed a day out in the sun and hanging out with friends and playing water polo!  

While Aaron and I were enjoying the pool and the sun, Dan and James and David and Eileen were enjoying the sun while doing some work around the house.  They pressure washed the front stairs and put in some fresh mulch around the flower bed in the front yard and filled in our ditch in the back yard.  

Today church was wonderful - primary was a bit crazy, but good and after, I started doing some packing.  Dad's flight was delayed, so he was late getting in, but thankfully still in time for the concert in the evening.  Dan came with Eileen, James and David and Sandi and James came up too!  The concert went well and it was wonderful to be a part of it all!  The choir did such an amazing job!  Everyone seemed to love it and I got lots of comments about wanting this to happen again next year - both from choir members and from audience members! 

Where did the week go...

This week has been crazy busy.  David has had swim lessons and he's loving them - he is doing so well!  Evelyn had a track meet this week against Jesuit.  She jumped varsity, but between the bad weather and not having a great week in practice before this, she didn't jump as well as last time, but still had a few good jumps!  She also ran hurdles this week for the first time.  She did well and didn't knock over any of the hurdles!   

It was pouring during the meet, so Dan and I got soaked watching her jump - we didn't stay for the hurdles, which was probably for the best since it continued to rain and she didn't get done until 8 pm....  

On Friday, David had an assembly.  His grade was singing a song and he was holding up a poster for the song.  He was super nervous, but he did a great job!  

This weekend was crazy.  Dan had a race early Saturday morning.  Unfortunatly the race was not very well marked and he ended up a bit lost and didn't finish the actual race, but he had a nice run in a beautiful area.  

It was also General Conference weekend.  So we enjoyed watching as much of the sessions as we could.  Dan made up Monkey Bread on Saturday for the evening session, but we skipped the 7-layer dip this year.  It never really gets all eaten and it feels like a LOT of work when it's really just Dan and Aaron and I who eat it...  

I swam in my first swim meet in over 25 years this weekend.  I only did a couple events and for the most part they went well.  I lost my goggles on the dive on my last event, which sucked, but oh well...  It was fun getting to know some of the team better.  I was in a suit with a tie and one of the ladies on the team said it would get me DQ-ed, and loaned me her other suit- which was a tech suit.  So i shimmied my way into a tech suit for the first time.  It was nice to swim in, but a major pain in the neck to get on and not much better to get off.   Dan came and watched my last race on Saturday and filmed it - kinda eye opening to watch, I've never really seen myself swim before....  

Sunday we had the sister missionaries over for dinner and then Evie had Encore and I had the Messiah Choir practice.  It's coming along well!  Just one more week!!  

Spring Break

We had a fun and lazy spring break this year.  We didn't travel anywhere, but we did get to spend some time enjoying the PNW!  Weather was beautiful early in the week especially.  Dan took Evelyn out for a hike around Hoyt Arboretum.  Weather was great and they had a fun hike and a fun time together.  Evelyn has been struggling with her band section leader and it was good for her to be able to get out and vent some and enjoy nature.  

We also got to eat outside a bunch this week with the nice weather - and had some fun meals this week including hamburgers one night and sushi one night.  

David and Paxton wanted to have a sleepover and decided to try sleeping out in a tent that night.  It was a little drizzly and cool - but they slept there all night.  Paxton came in around the time I got back from swimming, and he was pretty cold, so he curled up with some blankets on a couch and fell back asleep.  David was happy as a clam outside and slept in! 

Friday afternoon, after I got off work, I took Eileen and David to the Gem Faire up in Hillsboro.  We had fun wandering around and looking at stuff and David found a new little stuffed friend.  

Saturday, Aaron and I went to Parkrose to play polo, then after, I met up with Dan at Hoyt Arboretum and Aaron took the extra car home while Dan and I wandered around looking at the Magnolia trees and the Vietnam Vetrans memorial and just enjoyed being outside on a beautiful day! 

On Saturday, Evelyn planned and prepared a meal for a bunch of her friends as part of a school project.  She made a bunch of her favorite food and all her friends said it was amazing!  We also had fun getting to eat the extras!  

Saturday evening, I went to Open Polo - but Aaron and Evelyn were too tired to go.  

Church was wonderful - it was Fast Sunday since next week is General Conference.  I also had a Messiah choir practice in the evening.  It's exciting to see and hear it all coming together!  

Jump! Jump!

Monday morning - my mom, Sandi and James and I went over to Grandpa's.  We worked on helping him organize some stuff and scanning the letters from my Grandmother.  We enjoyed a nice lunch with him and then in the evening got together with some of the family for pizza.  After - the siblings met with Grandpa to figure out some things to help him out going forward while the rest of us watched the documentary that Grandpa was in about the Batan Death March.  It was a great program and a great evening.  After we let Grandpa rest while we went home and packed up for departure.  

Tuesday morning, my parents left early - my mom to drive home, my dad to work and then Frank drove the rest of us to the airport.  I had a good, easy flight home.  Dan picked me up and it was wonderful to see the whole family again!  

Wednesday Evelyn had her band concert.  She did an amazing job!  The band sounded awesome!  We had fun watching her and sitting with a bunch of our friends who also had kids in the band!  Before the band concert, Evelyn also had her first track meet of the season.  She did so well!  She cleared her personal best from last year and is already making a good start to the season!  

This was the last week of swim lessons and water polo lessons, it has been fun.  James and Caleb did awesome.  David did awesome too - but he didn't move up a level and that is really frustrating him.  He really wants to move up to level 3.  So we are hopefully going to take him to the pool next week to work on his moves! 

Saturday, after his run, Dan took David and Paxton to David's favorite play ground.  The boys had a blast.  While there, David goes "wait, I'm going to do something really dumb" then he jumped down a big jump and hit the ground pretty hard - then he said "yeah, that was dumb."  The boys had a blast together, then went to Costco and got samples before heading home.  

Mom and Aaron went to Parkrose to play polo and had a lot of fun.  Aaron played well - and mom was on fire.  After, we grabbed some lunch with some of the other players, then headed home.  Mom had a work inservice in the evening, then at night, Mom, Aaron and Evelyn went to open polo.  There were a ton of people there - including a bunch of people that don't usually come - it was great to see friends - including some I haven't seen in awhile and play some great polo.  My body was really tired by the end of the night though....  

Church was wonderful - the choir sang and did an amazing job, and the talks and lessons were wonderful.  We had the Bristow's over for dinner and games and had a great time!  We love their family and their kids had a lot of fun playing with Evie!  She is so good with kids and they loved playing games with her. 

Family is Forever

We've had a busy week.  Mom and Dad have had work.  I'm still swimming in the mornings and Dan is still running regularly.  Evelyn is full on into track season now and loving pole vaulting.  Aaron is full into water polo again and we are glad he is able to drive himself to practices in the evening.  

I've had choir practices and I'm loving singing the music of Handle's Messiah and directing the choir.  It is slowly coming together.  

I've also enjoyed working with the kids at the Score program.  Hanging out with James has been wonderful and the other kids are great too!  Caleb has been coming and doing a great job and told me this week that he wants to learn to be a goalie and come play for the high school team!  

Friday after swimming, Dan drove me to the airport and I headed to Colorado.  My mom picked me up from DIA and we went to go see grandpa.  We spend the evening with him before heading back to the hotel for the night.  

Saturday was busy for the kids - they went to the temple in the morning and there way a big sports themed youth dance that evening.  

I spent the day with Mom and Grandpa.  We helped with cleaning out his old file cabinets and found some old letters of Grandma's from before they were married.  Reading them was so wonderful!  So wonderful to see that side of her and to see the love she had for Grandpa.  It was also fun to get a picture of her as a young woman and her fun spunky side.  :)  We got In N Out burger for dinner  (since Grandpa has developed a liking for it) and Frank and Frankie joined us and we had a nice evening eating and chatting together.  

Sunday morning I got up and walked to the nearby church building for church - then after we went to Grandpa's for lunch.  Sandi and James and Dad all flew in and got to Grandpa's in the afternoon, then we went out to dinner with the family in the evening.  We had a great time with everyone and then in the evening we headed back to the hotel.  

Dan and the kids had a usual day at church - then after had a fun time playing together and snuggling together and napping together.  David had fun playing with Popcorn since Dan and the kids are dog sitting while Sandi and James were in CO.  

Running and Swimming and More Running

Evelyn is officially fully into her track season - she has practices after school and has been working hard on her pole vaulting and loving hanging out with her friends.  

Aaron's club water polo season is starting and he's been enjoying that - it's alwasy a bit crazy the difference between club sports and high school sports in terms of difficulty....  He's been working hard and tiring himself out!  

My dad flew out for the weeked to do a half marathon with Dan.  So he and Dan got up early Saturday to go down to Salem for their race.  My dad placed second in his age group and Dan placed 7th in his.  They both came home tired and a bit stiff, but otherwise feeling good!  

The pool I work at hosted a Synconized Swimming meet this weekend.  It was interesting to watch and the skills it takes are pretty amazing!  It was crazy the height they were getting on some of their jumps and their strength and control.  But when I swam Saturday morning - I pulled nearly 20 hair pins out of my lane alone.  And the bottom of the pool was covered with sparkles from their costumes.  

David has been enjoying swim lessons with Paxton and we get to see a bunch of other friends from school there too!  While David is there, I've been with James at the water polo class.  It's been a lot of fun!  This week James told Caleb about it and Caleb wanted to join, so this week we took Caleb with us to play water polo.  I think James is torn between liking to have Caleb there and getting annoyed with him.  And while I'm always glad to have more people wanting to play water polo - I miss the time with just the two of us!  

I was missing our time together, so on Satuday, I asked him to come out with me to run a couple errands and get a Jamba Juice.  We had a fun afternoon together!  

I've also had choir practices this week - I was heading there late from water polo and Dan and I would do a trade off of the kids.  

With all the crazy amount of stuff happening, Dan and I decided we really couldn't make do any longer with just 2 cars, so after talking to Paul, Dan got us a little electric car.  It's strange in some ways and in others it's a joy to think that we don't have to fill it up with gas.  :)  

Monday, Dan planned out a fun meal - we made dino chicken nuggets, mashed potatoes and broccoli and had a "Jurassic Meal" it was fun and tasty and the kids loved it! 

Evelyn has also gotten into band competition season - so the band has had a couple competitions - they are amazing and have performed well!  She loves these trips, and loves the time making music with friends, but she also alwasy comes home tired!    

Where has February Gone....

Life has been fun, but busy!  James and I have water polo together on Tuesday and Thursday.  It's been super fun getting to do this with him and he even admitted to enjoying it!  It's been a fun group of kids and they are learning together and having fun!  

Monday and Friday, we had our first Messiah choir practices.  We got some great work done and it was so much fun working with this group of singers and working on such amazing music.  

David is still doing swim lessons on Tuesday and Thursday with Paxton, and the boys are loving it!  They are getting better every time!  

James and one of the boys from water polo have been getting along well and his mom invited James to join him at his Parkour class.  James has wanted to try it for awhile and the boys had a blast together!  They ran around and tired themselves out good!  

A little while ago, David checked out a game from the library called Uncooked (I think) and the whole family has gotten into it - They play together and it gets kinda crazy, but they have been having lots of fun together!  "GET THE RICE!!!"  

Friday after school, David went to his friend Anna's house along with Paxton.  They had a blast playing together and eating yummy food and then got to go swimming.  

Saturday was the usual busy crazy.  David hung out with Paxton.  I went to play water polo at a scrimmage at the MAC.  It was a ton of fun - lots of people as usual and for once I actually played pretty well - usually I play poorly at that pool, so it was nice to not feel like I was messing everything up!  Part was through the game though, I took a kick to the ribs, so I was not upset when Joey wanted a turn in the cage.  That didn't stop me from taking Aaron and Evelyn to Open Polo though.  At first Open Polo was looking like just a lot of teenagers - thankfully Luke, Chris, Alex and Addison showed up late and we had a decent game going.  I mostly played on Evelyn so I wouldn't push myself too hard since my ribs were still hurting a lot.  But I still managed to score twice! 

Sunday was wonderful - fast and testimony meeting - then primary.  We had a couple visitors and we had a fun group, but a little full of energy!  In the evening, Sandi and James came over to play games - Sandi trounced us in Space Base, and we had a great time trying out the new game table!  Dan funded a kickstarter a few years back, so this week we got a cool new game table!   

two more days off???

And then they had Monday off for a holiday and Tuesday off for a teacher work day.  After 6 days, we were all a bit antsy!  

Tuesday, David had a music camp with Sister Shum - and Paxton went with him.  Then they came to our house to play for the day.  

Tuesday was also my first day coaching the Score class at Sunset.  James joined the class, so he and I had a lot of fun together!  It's been nice to spend this time with him having fun together!  Even if he doesn't ever want to play again - it's been fun having this one on one time with him!  

Wednesday, I went to the High School for curriculum night to plug the water polo and swim teams.  It was fun and we got some interest!  After, I went to the swim practice with the water polo balls and we had a fun time learning some skills and messing around!  

Thursday was our second Score class and once again, it was a ton of fun!  It was also the night of the swim banquet!  It has been such a fun season getting to help out with the team! 

Friday was High School State Swim Meets - day 1.  Mountainside didn't have many kids there, so mostly, it just meant a crazy lifeguarding shift during the day.  Then in the evening, I went to dinner with Dan!  

Saturday was crazy.  Because of State, there was no Swim practice in the morning, but I didn't get to sleep in much because it was also the day of the Portland Regional Music Workshop.  Evelyn and I went and the whole thing was wonderful!   After, I went to Parkrose with Aaron.  We had fun playing water polo.  Then we got home in time to grab some dinner and scriptures.  Then Evelyn had her Encore social - We were in charge of snacks and so I took Evelyn and got her and the snacks set up - and since there were enough other adults there, I snuck out to go put David to bed before heading to Open Polo.  We had a much better turn out than last week and it was a lot of fun!  

Sunday was also crazy - Ward Choir before church since we were singing during sacrament meeting.  Then a wonderful sacrament meeting - the song went so well and it fit perfectly with the talks given!  After church, we stopped by our house for a minute, then headed down to Dallas, OR to hear Seth give his farewell talk.  Then after second church, we headed to John and Melissa's house for food and fun.  Finally home and then Encore for Evelyn and I.  Such a wonderful weekend - but also rather exhausting....