Summer Break!

The kids are finished school! Wahoo! Or, Dear Lord please help me get through the summer with my sanity intact :)

So we're off to a banging start. Somewhere in my head I thought dismissal was at 12:45 on Wednesday, and that the kids would be back sometime shortly after 1pm. So around 11:30 I took S&J off to run a few errands in town and pick up some balloons to greet E&W at the bus stop with. We got back around 12:15, I made them lunch & then got down to coloring in a poster for Evie and William, planning to meet them at the bus with the balloons and the poster & the little kids.

Damn if the doorbell doesn't ring at 12:50, Evie and William home from school. Crap! I do this EVERY SINGLE TIME they have early dismissal. WHY do I always think it's at 12:45 and not 12:30??

Anyway, the balloons were a hit with everyone, as were the Mrs. Field's ice cream sandwiches, in their choice of Oreo cookie or chocolate chip (I preferred the oreo, myself.) I do get bonus points for buying 5 balloons instead of 4, in case one popped. Evie popped hers within 5 minutes of being in the house - by accident, of course :) I lose those points for not taking any pictures.

One thing that kind of struck me this afternoon, while they were eating their ice cream, Evie asked why I was so happy. I know I need to work on my attitude a fair amount, but how to explain to your 8 year old that it's a moment in time that's exciting & fun whereas the rest of the time she's always arguing with me about every.damn.thing.under.the.sun while I'm trying to get through what needs to be done with the house/chores/little kids/make dinner/yadda yadda yadda. I WISH I were a bit (ie: a great deal) more laid back, but we have to play the hand we're dealt I suppose.

After dinner and blowing off steam outside for a few, the girls got glitter toes and then all were off to bed. No rest for the weary, swim team starts first thing at 9am today and continues through the first week of August. Hopefully my bag of tricks is well-stocked to keep small people entertained, and I've got the camera packed to take pictures of all the happenings, in case anything wild and exciting - maybe the bear shows up? - happens, or if Jason's looking especially cute :)

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Monday evening Evie and William had a piano recital, Evie's second and William's first. I get SOOOOOO nervous for them! I hate that feeling in the pit of my stomach, I used to have it whenever I had to play solo in public - UGH. I'm always afraid they'll mess up and be embarrassed - because I've been there and it sucks - but I forget that they are not-quite 7 and not-quite 9 and things don't affect them the same way. Anyway - I think they ROCKED!

Here's William - he was one of the younger kids there, has been taking lessons for one year, and I believe may have been one of the youngest ones to play two songs from memory:



And here's Evie - girlfriend REALLY surprised me - she always RACES through her songs when she practices & sometimes stumbles through her lessons, so I was really happily surprised to see what a great job she did - go Evie!



Sorry for the crappy iphone video, but I really have no idea how to get the video off the HD video camera, and really don't feel like devoting the time to it :) Also - that kid in the front row in the orange shirt? His parents were two rows in front of us and in every.single.picture I took, he's turned around, mouth open, trying to talk to them. Memories :)