Today Angela went over to Gombert Elementary and helped Zach’s class with their “Super Science” activities. This is something Angela always loves to do and it made Zach SO happy that his mom came to help out in his class. He is such a sweet little guy and loves his mom!
Today the basketball tournament started for the middle schools. Kirstyn played hard, but they lost in the first round. 🙁 They are now done for the season. Kirstyn played hard and we are so proud of her efforts! She received a certificate in which she got the “No More Mr. Nice Girl” award! 🙂
At the first of the season, she was pretty timid. Now she gets her game face on and loves to go after jump balls and fight for rebounds! 🙂 Great work little lady!
Meanwhile, in the area of new beginnings, Angela had her first Cub Scout meeting today as a new Den Mom! She is really excited to be working with the boys! She went over to the store today and bought her new shirt, patches, books, etc. Very cute! 🙂 It’s really fun to see her in her new uniform! 🙂
Today, Kirstyn played her last regular season game. Unfortunately, they lost, but she had a great time and can’t wait for the tournament to start. It’s a single elimination round, but she is excited to play at least one more game. We’ll see how they do. We are so proud of Kirstyn and how hard she has played this season. For her first exposure to competitive basketball, she really has come a long way. She puts her heart into it and that’s what we LOVE to see! Great job Kirstyn! 🙂
Today was a really busy day! To start off, Kirstyn had her Solo and Ensemble Festival. She performed both an instrumental number with her clarinet (which Angela accompanied her on) and a voice piece with a group of her friends from chorus. They did well. Kirstyn thinks that she did MUCH better on her clarinet solo than she did on her voice performance. We’ll see what kind of score each got. Great work Kirstyn! We love listening to your music!
While Angela was off with Kirstyn, I took Ben and dropped him off at a birthday party for his little friend that was born the day before him. He was so excited to go and couldn’t wait to get there. Zach was pretty bummed because they invited him to go to but he had his basketball game.
We then ran Zach up to his game. They played really hard and ended up in a tie. The strange thing is that they played Indiana (the same team name and jersey color as them). The Wheatland folks goofed when making the team assignments. 🙂
After the game we came home and did some much-needed house cleaning. 🙂 We then worked on Ben’s cake for his birthday party tomorrow! It was quite the chore, but it turned out really good. He wanted a train with multiple cars, etc. Below are a couple pictures…
In the meantime (while we acting as master cake architects), Sarah had a date!!! 🙂 The 4 of them went to the dollar store, picked out presents for each other, then came back to our house, had laughs at what they bought, ate ice cream Sundays, and had a fun time just talking and hanging out!
Today Kirstyn had a game at Still. Unfortunately, they lost, but she was more aggressive this game than in previous ones. In fact, she got a great rebound and went up for another shot and got fouled. She got to go to the line for the first time. 🙂
Unfortunately, she didn’t make either shot, but she came close on one. It was fun to watch! 🙂 Keep playing hard, Kirstyn!
Today we also got Zach’s basketball pictures back and they are really cute…
Today there was no school and so I took a vacation day from work to spend time with the family. The day went VERY quick, however!!! Angela and I got up early and went to the temple. We got back at around 11 and relaxed with the kids, played some games, watched a movie, etc. Turns out that Angela had a Relief Society activity at the church and that we both had an ARTSpeaks meeting at Neuqua tonight as well (so much for the entire day with family)… 🙂 We decided to split up and Angela went to her RS meeting and I went to ARTSpeaks. When we finally got home, we were pretty tired and are now going to go to bed and sleep well!!! 🙂
Today the kids didn’t have school due to the holiday. They had Solo and Ensemble Festival for the High Schools today as well. Brittany and Sarah both participated in it and they did a GREAT job! Brittany played her violin and Sarah played her flute. Unfortunately, we didn’t get any pictures. I wanted to stay home from work today and spend time as a family, but I had a huge amount of stuff to do at work, along with a bunch of meetings I couldn’t get out of. The kids have tomorrow off as well so I’m going to take a vacation day and spend time with them.
OK, we are now 3 games in 1 week! We could call this week “February Madness!” 🙂 Today they played Middle School at home. They lost pretty badly, but Kirstyn got a lot of playing time and had fun!
She was probably the most aggressive she has ever been and it shows from the pictures above. She got a couple of rebounds and actually was called for a foul!!! 🙂 Yea!!! 🙂 We also got her team and individual photos today and they are so cute! 🙂
Today Kirstyn had another basketball game, this time at Fischer Middle School. She was really excited for this because Fischer hasn’t won a game yet either. She got a lot of playing time and got to start the game with the jump ball again…
They played really hard and well and WON!!!! Kirstyn was SO excited after the game. The final score was 10-12 and was very close, but a win is a win! Congratulations, Kirstyn! Great job!
Tonight Kirstyn had her band and orchestra concert at Still. She did a wonderful job and we are so proud of her! Ben came with and the only way we can get him to sit still is to bring the iPad or iPhone. 🙂 One of his little friends from church was there as well so they both sat quietly with their electronic devices!
With Ben nice and quiet, the concert went really well. The band, chorus, and orchestra all performed. Kirstyn did 3 numbers for each.
Keep up the great work Kirstyn! Practice makes perfect! 🙂
Today Kirstyn had another basketball game, this time at Crone Middle School. She is getting better and better each game. We are working on encouraging her to be more aggressive. 🙂 Today she got to play a lot more and she even got to start the game with the jump ball!
She did a great job, but in the end, they came up on the short end. It really doesn’t bother Kirstyn much as she is just SO excited to be out there playing what she is really loving doing! 🙂
Great job Kirstyn! Keep up the good and hard work!
Today was a crazy and busy day. To start (after a full day of work and other related items), Kirstyn had her basketball game. She played hard but they lost. Every game she’s getting much better. It’s great to see! 🙂
After the game, we ran home, and got Zachary ready to go to the Gombert Elementary Open House. He was so excited and had worked hard to put things together to show us. We really felt bad for him because we had a BIG ARTSpeaks event tonight and so I took him over to Gombert, quickly looked through everything (while Angela went to the event to help with the pre-event coordination), and then I ran Zach home and went over to the event myself. He was a little down, but I did my best to look at everything in the time we had. He brought a bunch of stuff home that he was proud of, so we’ll give him some one-on-one time to look at his things with him.
As soon as I got Zach home, I ran over to the ARTSpeaks event at the Neuqua Valley Gold Campus. It was titled How the Arts Create the Competetive Edge for Students. We had 3 featured speakers from around the country: Brian Pertl who spoke on “Everything I needed to Know about Business I learned at the Conservatory,” Sean McCollum who spoke on “Why you Can’t Keep a Band Kid Down,”, and Professor David King from Harvard the spoke on “Conducting Oneself into College and a Successful Career.” Their BIOs are below:
Brian Pertl, ethnomusicologist, received a B.M. in trombone performance, a B.A in English from Lawrence University and an M.A. in Ethnomusicology from Wesleyan University. He then moved to Seattle to undertake his Ph.D. in Ethnomusicology from the University of Washington. Before completing his degree, he was offered a position as an ethnomusicologist at Microsoft. He, along with a team of other ethnomusicologists, helped pioneer the use of music and sound in multi-media reference titles, by selecting, licensing, and captioning over a thousand music excerpts for Microsoft’s Encarta Encyclopedia, Encarta World Atlas, and Encarta Africana. For ten years, Brian managed the Media Acquisitions Group, Microsoft’s central resource for selecting, tracking, and licensing all forms of audio, images, and video.
Sean McCollum was born in South Dakota, raised in Wisconsin, and now lives in the hills above Boulder, Colorado. Along the way, he has been lost in nearly 50 countries, climbed mountains and volcanoes, and sailed across the South Pacific. He has counted birds for the Audubon Society, scuba-dived the Great Barrier Reef, taught in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and ate a goat’s eyeball in the Sahel. A writing prof once told him that to become an interesting writer, lead an interesting life. He is an accomplished writer of many children’s books and is currently writing a book about the CIA, creating Web site materials to celebrate the 40th anniversary of Marvin Gaye’s album “What’s Going On,” and researching an article about sports rivalries.
David C. King is a Lecturer in Public Policy at The Harvard Kennedy School and Faculty Chair of two programs: Harvard’s Program for Newly Elected Members of the U.S. Congress and Harvard’s executive program for leaders in State and Local Governments. He lectures on Legislatures, Political Parties, and Interest Groups. Professor King joined the Harvard faculty in 1992. In the wake of the 2000 presidential elections, Professor King directed the Task Force on Election Administration for the National Commission on Election Reform, chaired by former presidents Gerald Ford and Jimmy Carter. That effort culminated in landmark voting rights legislation signed by President Bush in late 2002. He later oversaw an evaluation and new management structure for the Boston Election Department.
The event was facilitated by Chip Staley, the Fine Arts Department Chair for Neuqua Valley High School. The presentations by all three speakers were wonderful and we had a great time! There were about 200 people that came! We had hoped for a few more than that, but the room was just the right size. Brittany came with us and she enjoyed the event as well. After the speakers, it was opened up to the audience for questions, which there were many of.
After the event, Angela and I went over to a restaurant/bar for with the rest of the ARTSpeaks Committee and the speakers for an after party. We had a great time talking to everyone. We had a fascinating conversation with David King. He lives right down the street from Mitt Romney and that ended us up talking about BYU, the church and other fun things (like big Catholic families and big Mormon families). 🙂 We had some great food and then were on our way. What a great (but exhausting night)! 🙂
