The Highlights

We've been cruising along here with the same-old, same-old. Nothing very interesting to report. You know... Wake up. Get everyone out of the house. Run house. Chauffeur children. Feed family. Bed children. Repeat.

Here are a few highlights...

1. Thanksgiving was really relaxed, which was great. We had to convince a few children that they needed to get dressed and brush their teeth before coming to the dinner table.

2. The day before Thanksgiving, Megan came home from school and shortly thereafter started to complain about her ear. Typical - it's a holiday. We establish that it is inside but she has no fever so I basically ignore her. She eventually asks me to look at it. I see what looks like a kidney bean cut in half and shoved in there. We move to better light with some tweezers, my really pointy ones for sewing, and after a few tries I extract a plastic googly eye from the construction paper scarecrow that she brought home earlier. Why couldn't she have just told me what was in there from the beginning?

3. Tim doesn't want to wear underwear, or use the potty for that matter.

4. I'm thinking of getting a family portrait done for our Christmas card this year. Unfortunately for those of you who would like a card, this is still in the thought stage.

5. I'm sure that Tim did something as funny as Megan (see #2) a few weeks back but I can't remember what it was. He's just funny in general.

Stay tuned for a music update. 4 concerts in the next 15 days. Tis the season.

Swimming is our Life

We have swimmers. 5 of the last 6 weekends we have gone to swim meets. Sometimes they take FOREVER. Sometimes we are home around noon. They all start EARLY.

We are ducklings in a pool of sharks when it comes to speed and skill. Ellen and Drew are at the young end of their age group. Megan is old at YMCA meets because they have 6 and under races. Even still, there is always some eager beaver 6 year old who swam last year.

What I am getting to is that they like to swim. They improve their times. But they don't win events. They don't even win their heats.

But I think that we may be making progress. Last weekend the girls swam in a pentathlon. That means that they did each of the 4 stroke - butterfly, backstroke, breast stroke and freestyle. The fifth race was an IM. Ellen improved her time in every event, even though she got disqualified in butterfly. And, she won 2 heats. You should have seen her on breast stroke! She has been working on this one, in particular. She has corrected her kick and it is finally legal. She was trailing by about 2 strokes as they approached the turn. She made up a little time there. With half a length to go, she was determined. I never saw her look fast in the water until then! She gave it everything she had and eked out a win (in her heat).

Then there is Megan. She only swims once a week and I was pretty sure that she would be DQed in 3 events, which she was. But you have to admire her guts. She went off the blocks that came to her chin. She swam a total of 16 lengths Saturday, including warm up. She has never gone that far in a week. Ever. One teammate pulled herself out of the pool after the butterfly length of her IM. Megan might have been disqualified, but bless her heart, she finished the race! 4:07.47 for 100 yards.

You can see how they have been doing here. The times look funny for last week because they add them all together to determine the winner. So, if you finish the race but get DQed, they add 2 minutes to your time. If you scratch from an event, they give you 5 minutes as your time even though you didn't swim.

Halloween Night

Here they are... the only picture that they allowed. To clarify-
Drew - vampire
Ellen - Anikin Skywalker
Megan - Hello Kitty
Tim - Mickey Mouse

It was close this year. As of 9AM Halloween morning, neither boy had a costume. Drew has outgrown the costume aspect but is not ready to forfeit the loot. The girls were ready because they had their classroom parties last Friday. No, I don't know why not Halloween. And actually, Ellen's party was a no-costume event.

What a great night for trick-or-treating. It was about 60 with clear skies and no wind. Timothy was awed by the night sky. He really doesn't go out after dark. He said, "It's beautiful. I just want to look at the sky." Fear not, no sky would distract him from the true spirit of the day - CANDY. He made it to about 25 houses before heading home amidst protests. He introduced himself to almost everyone he encountered, "I'm Tim!" He shied away from one ghost. He wasn't sure he wanted to get dressed up but it all clicked once he started collecting the goods. For the record, he likes Milky Way. He must have a bigger connection with the sky than I thought!

The other kids had fun, but this was really all about Tim. It was the first year he got it. And, my only child to pose - pre-candy, of course.

I went along, too, for the first time in about 7 years. I was always in charge of manning the door. But this was more fun.