Home Life

Oh no!  Stay off the sidewalks!  Sarah got her drive’s license today!  She’s official now and doesn’t need us in the car anymore!  Angela took her over to the DMV today and was really worried.  Sarah was pretty worried about a couple of things that she hadn’t practiced enough on, but things went very well.  The instructor that gave her the driving test was actually really cool and Sarah said it was fun!   He took Sarah and then assured Angela that everything would be fine and they left!  🙂 

Sarah said the driving test was really easy and she only hit the curb once while she was demonstrating up- and downhill parking.  Her big concern was backing around corners, because if you hit the curb, it’s an automatic fail.  She did it well and passed with flying colors!

For us, that means 2 things:  1) We don’t have to cart Sarah around to everything she needs to go to, and 2) we have to shell out a bunch of money for insurance now!  😐

Oh well, if Sarah can get herself to things without us always having to take her everywhere (especially with Brittany to Seminary in the fall, we are happy about it)!  Congratulations, Sarah!  Great job!

Last night and today, Zachary and I are enjoying our annual church Father’s and Son’s campout with our Ward.  Zach looks forward to this so much every year and about tackled me yesterday afternoon when I got home from work.  He was ready and excited to go!  In fact, he already had the tent, camp chairs, sleeping bags, air mattress, and other camp equipment out and ready by the door!  🙂  He is so cute!

We packed up and went to get some food and treats for the event.  We ended up going to KFC for some chicken and then went and got some junk food (including licorice, gummi coke bottles, and Cheetos).  We then headed up to Blackwell Forest Preserve to pitch our tent with many of the other dads and boys in the Ward and have some fun.

It’s funny how camping works here.  You go to a groomed forest preserve where you pitch your tent on mowed grass!  🙂  It’s very comfortable, but a far cry from what we did when we were growing up.

We ate our dinner and then sat around the fire, talking to all the other dads and boys.  Zach got tired of that and went off to play with the rest of the boys while the dads relaxed!  🙂

We then had smores when it started to get dark, and then Zach was tired and wanted to go into the tent.  I don’t think he was as tired as he was ready to eat junk food and watch a movie on Dad’s laptop!  We do this every year and I think that’s a highlight for him!  This year, he made it through the entire movie!  🙂

In the morning we got up and we made breakfast for the group while Zach went off and played with the boys.  We ate a great breakfast of pancakes, sausage, eggs, and juice before we packed up everything and came home.

We had a great time together.  I look forward to spending this time with Zach every year.  Next year, if Ben is potty-trained, he will get to come too!  That should be VERY interesting and FUN!  🙂

Today was the last day of school!  We ALL are very excited!  We love supporting our kids in their activities and love to see them perform, but May is always incredibly hectic with stuff going on almost every day.  Sometimes we have to split up because we can’t always cover everything together!  😐  It’s really crazy, and we keep saying that we need to cut down on the amount that our kids do, but the problem is that individually they don’t do a ton extra that requires us to be out of the house.  Sarah has Band, Student Government, Tri-M Music Honor Society, and Star Raiders (the last two don’t require any after school time).  Brittany was the busiest with Cross Country/Track, Musical, Chorus, and Orchestra.   She won’t have some of this next year, so that’s good.  Kirstyn has Band and Chorus, Zach has nothing right now, and Ben has nothing.  The problem is not really that our kids are over-programed, but that collectively, it takes a TON of time to do what they have.  Crazy!  🙂

Anyway, now that school is out, we can relax for a couple of weeks before things like Youth Conference, family vacation, EFY, and girl’s camp, marching band, etc. hit!  😐

Today was quite the day!  Brittany graduated from Still Middle School!  We went over to the school early to get a good seat and they made all the parents stand outside the door until 10 minutes before the graduation was to start.  🙂  There were some parents grumbling.  It’s funny how seriously people take some of these things!  🙂

Anyway, Brittany was part of the program and went up on the stage to introduce an award that was going to be given out.  This year, the ceremony was all student run and it was neat to see that.  Ben DeMaso was the MC who introduced everyone, and students (like Brittany) came up to introduce their parts of the program.  Brittany did a great job, spoke up loud, and you could hear her really well.  She sounded very confident!  🙂

One of the most prestigious awards that you could receive as an 8th grader is the Rotary International Service Award.  We were sitting there and all of a sudden, Brittany’s name was announced as a finalist for the award!  We perked up and listened…  They then announced the winner and it was Brittany!  🙂  What a great honor!  She came up and received the framed award and was VERY surprised and happy!  🙂  To get this award, you need to have been determined as a person who extends yourself in volunteer and service efforts benefiting your fellow students, and have made the school a better place be.  In order to be eligible, you need to be nominated by a teacher.

After her award and a couple others were presented, they started with the actual graduation ceremony.  They decided to split the 8th graders up into 2 groups and hold 2 ceremonies because of the numbers and lack of seating space in the gym, so the actual ceremony went pretty fast.

Afterward, there were many pictures and people hugging and crying and spending time reminiscing about the year.  The thing that really stinks is that many of these kids are going to be split from many of their friends next year as about 30% of the kids will go to Metea and the rest will go to Waubonsie.  Brittany also has a friend who is moving away to India soon and she won’t get to see her again.

Brittany with some of her fellow presenters on the program.

Brittany with Marc DeFarno, one of her core teachers.

Brittany and Christina Guillano

Great job Brittany, we are very proud of your accomplishments!  Keep up the hard work next year in high school!  😐

Today Sarah found out that she made Marching Leader for the Metea Marching Mustangs again next year!!!  Yea Sarah!  She was very excited that things turned out for the best!  Also, Brittany decided to join the marching band as well and play in the pit.  They were looking for people to play the bells, marimba, cymbals, and congas!  She’s very excited to learn instruments in addition to her violin!

This coming year, the band is going to do a Billy Joel theme!  Below are the songs that they are going to do (performed by a band):

• 1-We_Didn_t_Start_The_Fire_Piano_Man
• 2-Just_the_Way_You_Are
• 3-Air
• 4-My_Life_Only_The_Good_Die_Young

Enjoy!

We had a Homeowner’s Association meeting today and Angela attended on behalf of our family.  She wasn’t expecting it, but they asked her to fill an open position on the board and after some coaxing from them, she accepted.  It shouldn’t take too much of her time, but now our family is in a place where we can push for some changes in the neighborhood.

A couple of these are the type of fence that they MAKE you have (if you want to have a fence) and the UGLY mailboxes that they force us to have that I think MOST people in the neighborhood hate (and are overpriced)!  Hopefully Angela can go in and help convince everyone to make these allowances.

We’ll keep our fingers crossed!

Today, Angela spoke in Stake Conference!  She spoke on faith in our callings and did a WONDERFUL job (as everyone expected)!  🙂  There were probably 900 people in attendance in the  building with the meeting streamed over the internet to another 2 buildings in the area.  She was a little nervous, but you couldn’t tell at all!

Great job Angela!

Today was Zachary’s final soccer game of the Spring 2010 season.  The weather was perfect and the kids had a GREAT time!  And…  They won!  They were so excited!  They played really hard and scored 5 goals to the other team’s 3 goals. Zachary played all the different positions, including goalie which he hadn’t played before.

The humidity was up so it wore them out and it was funny to see how they volunteered to sit out for a little bit when we were substituting.  🙂  This year has been great!  The parents have been really supportive of the kids, and my assistant coaches were wonderful (Coach Jay and Coach Pete).  After the game was over, we took a team picture (since WAA only does official pictures in the fall).

Great job team!  Zach was bummed that he wouldn’t get to play soccer again until the fall.  We may actually have him try out football in the fall and see how he likes it.  He’s built like a football player!  🙂

Today Sarah had Marching Band Leader tryouts and worked hard on her interview questions to be able to do well.  She was a little nervous, but she said everything went great!  Her teachers were very impressed (like they were last year).  Good luck Sarah!

Tonight was the first annual Metea Music Awards where all the kids in the music programs came to receive their awards.  Sarah got her letter for her jacket as well as pins for Marching and Pep Bands and her Tri-M pin for the Music Honor Society.

Great work Sarah!