Same ol'...same ol'... Week of August 24-31

Sunday 31 August 2008

We’ll go youngest to oldest this time.

Zach
Zach enjoyed having Haydn over to play with on Tuesday and Thursday this week. Zach and Haydn enjoyed taking toys out of the toy boxes in his bedroom. Rachel said the toys kept them occupied for quite a long time. She heard toys hitting the walls occasionally, so who knows what they were really doing in there. By the time the weekend arrived, it looked like someone had stirred all of the toys randomly together on the floor. Sorting it all back out into buckets was one of Troy’s projects on Saturday.
Zach caught a cold late in the week, so he stayed home from church today. Rachel stayed with him.

Claire
Claire had Green Eggs and Ham Day at school this week. She said she tried a little bit of the green eggs, and had a big piece of Ham. Claire is generally enjoying school. It is fairly easy to get her up and going in the morning.

Emma
With Emma on the other hand, we still get a whole lot of drama and/or trauma every morning. Here’s the morning ritual: First, Emma comes in to snuggle with her mom in bed for a few minutes. Then, mommy must get her clothes for her. After getting dressed mommy must come downstairs with her and fix her lunch while she gets breakfast. After breakfast mommy must put the princess’ socks and shoes on. Once everyone is ready to go, mommy must walk out to the car with her and kiss her forehead as she gets into the car. As we drive away, mommy needs to blow her kisses for Emma to catch. Emma usually pouts and whines a bit on the 8/10 mile to the school. Sometimes the pouting continues on the walk from the car to the classroom. As school starts and the rest of the kids gather she gradually finds her smile. Wait 24 hours, repeat. (Note from the "mommy:" I don't cater to her like this EVERY morning. I don't always put her socks and shoes on.....)
We predict that Emma will be the one living at home when she’s 32. Our one hope is that Emma finds her prince charming before then. Of course knowing Emma, she’ll talk prince charming into moving into our house with her!
Emma was the “Star of the Week” at school. She made a little descriptive poster about herself, and they did a little spotlight on her on Friday. Also on Friday, she got to attend a special pizza lunch with another 12 or 15 kids. She earned the chance to get her name drawn for the lunch by good deeds at school. She enjoyed the pizza and the extra attention.

Katie
Katie is reveling in her “Tween-ness”. A couple of times this week when asked why she was doing something, she informed her Dad that it is “Because I am a tweener”. Katie talked Rachel into making a trip to the store next week to find a training bra. “Because I am a tweener now, Dad!”.
Katie spent the night at Laura Pang’s house on Friday and reportedly had a good time.
Katie has been taking piano lessons, but with all of the homework this year, plus a couple of after school activities, she hasn’t had much time, or will to practice. She might not last much longer.

Troy
After the ward boundary re-alignment, Troy and the Elder’s quorum presidency have visited most of the new members of the Quorum now. We lost a few, and were especially sad to see our Secretary Jimmy Parent and his wife Tasha go, but we also gained some good Elders. It will probably take a few months and a couple of activities for people to get to know each other.
Troy took the girls over to the Pang’s house to swim on Saturday. Because of the three day weekend, he didn’t have to get all of his usual chores all done on Saturday, therefore he had a little extra time to spend. Part of the point was to wear out the kids so they wouldn’t make more messes and wouldn’t fight as much. Sure enough, they sat and watched a movie for most of the rest of the afternoon.
At work, Troy has been invited to do some training at a conference in Guadalajara Mexico on the 9th of October. One of his co-workers speaks Spanish, but he is fairly new, so he wouldn’t quite be able to do the job – so Troy gets to go. Troy might take an extra ½ day for some sight seeing while there. (Rachel's comment: This is during our Fall Break from school so I'll be getting all the kids all day all by myself. So, if there is anyone who enjoys the laughter of children and long hours of rewarding labor please get in touch with me and I'll fly you to Gilbert!)

Rachel
The usual busy-ness this week. Kid care, Rachel’s day care, Mom's homework and special assignment Service, Udall and Smith billing, Stake Primary coordination, making dinners, doing laundry, cleaning, etc etc… A mom’s work is never done. With kids and messes it’s like the old Doritos commercials with Jay Leno: “Clean all you want! We’ll make more.”
Rachel started a hip-hop dance class. The first week the teacher worked them pretty hard and she ended up with sore muscles. The second week wasn’t quite as strenuous. She comes home and shows the kids some of her new moves and then they have fun practicing them all together.
Rachel stayed home from church with Zach and Claire today. No extended family dinner today either. It was nice to have a day off.
Rachel’s brother Ken and his family are traveling down from Kingman, AZ tomorrow to spend some time with us. We will host cousin play time and spaghetti dinner.