November on Speed

We had a birthday- yeah, Rob loves getting older!!  I wonder how long he will live past 451.

We had friends visit from Virginia.

We made Thanksgiving and ate it on Wednesday.

Yep, Wednesday.

 I worked my first 12 hour night shift since Colorado on Thanksgiving night and Jodi had to be back to work on Friday Morning, so it was just easier!  I loved it!  It made Thanksgiving totally relaxing for me, instead of running around trying to finish all the last minute things I needed to!  Instead, I went to the Turkey Bowl with everyone else!  And I actually played the last 3 downs!  They had 2 big kid games going

and one little kid game going.

I loved how Joseph was in charge of the huddle!

Rob actually got to be the quarterback a couple times

and I stripped the ball from Emma like a pro!  One time when Rob was trying to scoop up a fallen ball, Sam came up to him and did the best wrestling take down move I have ever seen!  Everyone was impressed with that- Even the guys from the other game saw it!  I got to go in, because old men were straining hamstrings and achilles tendons all over the place!  You've got to wonder about men and their idea that they can not exercise all year long and then come out on the field on Thanksgiving and relive their glory days!!

We tried a fresh turkey this year- the guy at the grocery store convinced us and we are all about new experiences!  It was sort of gross to see the feathers they hadn't gotten out, though!

We had a Wii tournament-

 Girls won- thank you very much!

We stretched a quilt onto a frame. 

This is my third quilt and the third time I am doing something different.  This time I am going to try to hand quilt at least some of it.  I go to a quilting group and they were all impressed that I decided to try something new, again.  It inspired at least one of the group to get out of her comfort zone and try something different next time.  One of these times I will do the same thing more than once, so I can get good at it, but where's the fun in that?

We played Fusball with our little friends.

We played at the park and everyone went down the long slide.

Some of us used the wax paper to make us go faster

and some of us just wanted to go slow.

We wrestled.

We shot ourselves with rubber bands while trying to shoot off helicopter thingies!

We made the traditional pies, 

rainbow jello and turkeys.  Nobody really likes gum drops, so this year we used sour gummy fruit for the wings and gummi bears for slipper feet! 

We also did cookie/chocolate turkeys-

 yummers!  Little Max couldn't wait and took a bite of his immediately!

And yes, I worked 12 hours at night and was able to drive the 20 minutes home without falling asleep!  I even had enough energy to go black friday shopping, but decided against it.  I went to bed and the kids all went with Rob bowling.  The next day all the sales were still on and we got everything we wanted without the lines and the rude people!

And now we are going through boxes and putting up Christmas, planning our move and Emma's 16th birthday (It's got to be big, people!)  Of course that's just what we say for fun.  It's actually going to be pretty simple.  We decided against the invite the whole seminary and all your school friends and blah, blah, blah party!  That's just work and stress for everyone involved!  Still, in my mind it's going to be big- a big deal!  Only 2 more years with our Princess!  :(

Sam gave his second talk in Sacrament and did a great job.  He told everyone that Rob was the spiritual leader of the family and the one you go to for advice and then he said that I was the one that made everyone love each other, because even when you don't do anything wrong she makes you apologize.  Nice!

Thank you for joining us for November on Speed.  See you again in December!

The Year of Robin Hood

Ohio is crazy! 

 Our football team was co-champions for the conference, but they didn't go to the play-offs. Instead 2 teams that they had beat went.  Our football team played a non-conference game at the beginning of the year- like a lot of schools do.  We lost that one.  They used that game to determine that we didn't get to go to the play-offs.  Doesn't quite encourage teams to branch out and challenge themselves, hu?

Ohio also decides when you get to go trick-or-treating and it's never on Halloween.  This year it was suppose to be on a Tuesday-??  But then Sandy came to play and so they decided to change it to Saturday the 3rd of November!  Even New York and New Jersey who got the brunt of the storm, still trick-or-treated on Halloween, but not us!  

On Saturday we got dressed up and went out and begged for candy on our official Beggar's night. 

Everyone thought the two littlest boys were both Robin Hood (because let's face it, how many people have actually heard of Link!)  But one Grandma thought they were all Robin Hood!  Ha ha!  It was the year of Robin Hood!

Good thing they changed beggar's night to Saturday.  We wouldn't have wanted to go trick-or-treating in the sleet! {Sarcasm!}

October craftiness

Emma got the ball rolling this year, as I was content to sit on my laurels and do nothing.  She had a Halloween dance to attend and decided she wanted to be Little Red Riding Hood.

I found material at Joanne's for $3 a yard and it took something like an hour,

so it wasn't that big of a deal, but then one thing lead to another.  Next my friends were all thinking of making or had made these bags for treats that they found on Cluck, Cluck, Sew. 

Since we are throwing thing away by the truck loads and consolidating as much as possible, I thought, "what a great idea!"  I could throw away all those big chunky plastic pumpkins that they have taken every year and take up almost a whole plastic tote on their own and replace them with a very small bundle of cloth bags.  So I went to one of their homes and had everyone help me make my first bag. 

I always have to do things with lots of help the first time, then I am good to do it again, and improvise from there. 

I added a band at the top and tucked the straps in between the two layers instead of stitching them on the outside.

I finally finished 4 bags, 3 days later.  Trunk-or-treat was just the next day.  Max wanted to be Robin Hood- check, already have that costume from past years.

Sam is too old to go trick-or-treating, but not old enough to be in the going to parties crowd, so check for him, too!  (He did say he would throw a ninja costume together by himself today to do the trunk-or-treat.  Mom will be at work.)  But Joseph was being a pain.  He wanted to be Link.  Which was fine last year, because we just used the Robin Hood costume and added a few things.  Unfortunately, the Robin Hood costume is being used this year.  Then I had a light bulb moment.  Rob had just thrown out his army greens (They don't wear them anymore.)  Now Link's green is a different color, but I said, take it or leave it.  He took it.  And after only an entire day, we went from this

to this! 

Not bad, hu?

My little $200 machine did that.  I had to add the green stitching on the shoulders to cover a couple oopses!  Hopefully, I can continue to channel this craftiness for a little while longer- I really want to replace the kid's ugly, ugly Christmas stockings and finish Emma's quilt for Christmas!  I have my finger's crossed!--- Of course that's not the best way to sew!

A Good Thing for Emma

Being cut from the high school soccer team was pretty tough on Emma.  She has been our little athletic girl all her life.  She finally decided to sign up for rec league soccer, instead.  She got on a team that won about 1/2 of the time and then lost big time the other 1/2.  They one time lost 10-0.  In soccer, that is a crazy score!!  The great thing about the team was, they valued each other and they had fun even while playing hard.

Operation Socks

 When they started loosing badly, they made it more fun, by doing cartwheels and doing the baby carry (the goalie put the ball in his shirt and just carried it all the way up to mid-field before they stopped him!) 

Operation B.O.B (boobs over ball- soccer term to help them kick with power)

Nobody yelled at anyone else about how horrible they were doing or who should have done what.  In that atmosphere, Emma blossomed.  She was an animal her last game!

Last game

I was so impressed.  The other team was full of guys who were on the JV boys team who wanted to play a little extra.  They were really good.  (The varsity guys team is rocking the state this year.)  They also were a little too physical against a team with at least 1/2 girls.  One guy even got a yellow card after he knocked Hannah down, again!  Soon after, Emma put her foot out, got the ball away from him and knocked him down in the process.  She also scored a goal with it.  The other team's coach was like, "Dude, I think you just lost some of your manhood back there."  It was awesome!  When she was on the School team, she was yelled at often and there was a lot of cattiness going on.  In the end, she never did anything with the ball, but get rid of it as soon as she had it.  She never did any footwork and she didn't try real hard to get the ball.  She didn't score once, during the whole season.  But with this team, she was their second highest scorer.  (Second only to David who came from Germany, having played on a German league, but who came too late for summer training and only made it to the try-outs.  They wouldn't even look at him.  See how crazy the politics are in this place!  Unreal!)

Operation Warpaint

So thankful for fun teams and people who remember what sports are all about!

Grandma and Grandpa come for a Visit

Grandma and Grandpa decided to take a massive road trip and dropped in to see us.  I am sure we wore them out and they were ready for a nice lazy drive in the end.  We took them to 2 football games, several soccer games, Rob took Dad to work to see his experiments,

we took them to museums

 and shopping and church and out to eat at favorite spots.  And that was all in 3.5 days.  They were troopers.  We got Mom one of those driving carts, but it was too slow for her.  It was a good time seeing Grandma and Grandpa!

What do you mean 2 more week?

This is the time of year when we are so done!  So, so done with all these sports.  We love that our children participate.  It keeps them active and healthy and out of trouble, but it keeps us driving and not much else.  We are tired!

Since gas is $4 a gallon these days we are paying somewhere around $16 a day in gas.  Besides having to do homework in the car and homework in the morning while we eat breakfast and doing loads and loads of laundry every day.  We have to eat around 4:45pm, but since I am still helping with homework and trying to get people ready, unless I have been proactive and made a crockpot meal, it's fast food time, again!  By this time of the year, I dread 2:30pm when my children start showing up home from school, because I know that the race has begun!

Luckily, this is the time of year when it's almost done. 

 Monday was Max's last soccer game.

Today was Sam's last home game and tomorrow is his last, last 7th grade football game.

Emma's last soccer game is on Thursday.  Joseph's last football game is Saturday....At least that is what we thought until this morning when Rob went to the gym and talked to the quarterbacks Dad.  And his comment was, "only 2 more weeks!"  Wait- what!  Yep, the regular season ends on Saturday, but then there are play-offs, don't you know?!  Collective groans escaped our lips!  Luckily, it has been a hard year for our children as far as teams go- Emma's and Sam's teams have about a 50-50 record, but when they loose, they loose big.  I am talking huge!!  Like 10-0- in soccer!!  Max's team may have won once or twice, but Joseph's team hasn't won a single game all year, so we are positive that the play-offs are really just a one game thing for us!  So we are back to the thought of... Just 2 more games!  Sometimes being on the loosing team has it's advantages!

Homecoming

This year I only had one little guy with me for the Homecoming parade.

Max and I hung out while Emma was off reffing a soccer game, Sam was playing a football game and Joseph was marching in the parade.

They spray painted all their hair. Joseph still has some orange we can't get out!

  We got there in plenty of time to get good seats,

so we could drop off Joseph, see the parade unobstructed and catch lots of candy!

But that meant we were also bored.

  We kept each other occupied, though.

Max is a little pilferer!  I had to tell him to stop, when he was snatching candy underneath the 3 year old sitting next to us, though!  He was crazy!!

In the end Emma's game never happened- it was canceled, because of the Homecoming parade.  So she sat at the fields and waited for us to be done watching the parade.  At least she got paid to hang out and watch soccer.  

Sam's game was their first loss, but on a brighter note, he got to play almost the entire game.  It was a B team game, and I guess the defense coach could feel my dagger eyes on him Wednesday night at the A team game when Sam didn't get to play even 4 downs.  Sam came off so frustrated that his eyes were all red.  I was ready to have a little talk with the coach.  I had mixed emotions hearing that he played both offense and defense the entire time at the B game, though, because that means that the kid whose position is Corner back on the B team, just lost his spot.  I'm sure his parents are now shooting daggers at the coach!  Not cool!

We went to the high school game the next day.  By the time we made it to the gate, Emma peeled off to go sit with the students.  She wasn't sure she wanted to be seen with us!  We had a great time, except we brought friends with us and it poured on us!  Ohio likes to just be sunny one minute and then have a torrential downpour the next.  That would have been OK,  but they had a 3 month old baby with them! Then the lightning started and that's when they cancelled the game.  They finished it the next day and I don't think the other team was even trying.  We won 16-44.

As a mom of a teenage girl and a Young Women's leader I get to hear all about who went to the dance and who got asked and what they wore, etc.  Last year, I encouraged Emma to go with her friends.  This year, she asked about it and I said no!  Now that she is so close to 16 she can taste it and she has boys that she texts on an hourly basis, I thought it wasn't such a good idea.  That going out with friends, might have turned into hooking up at the dance.  She didn't fight it too much, which makes me still think she is a pretty good girl.  But just for good measure,  her dad and I have been making fun of one of the guys she texts constantly.  Got to give her some balance!  Ha ha!

It's always fun to see what the girls come up with to wear to the dances.  We had two that made their dresses and three that bought theirs and then wore shrugs or cami's with them.  It really is impossible to find anything decent to wear at Homecoming!  Prom is a little easier, but the Homecoming dresses are generally shorter than mid-thigh and are strapless or close to it. 

I don't know how you even move in something like that- let alone dance!  

They tell me that at the dances there are two gyms.  One they call the bad gym and one they call the Mormon gym.  Rob asked, what do they do in the bad gym to make it the bad gym?  Emma told him that they all grind there.  He doesn't understand grinding.  We tried to explain it, but he still didn't get it, so I found a Youtube video for him.  Emma was shocked that I would look up such pornography, but I showed her that I found a video on how to tastefully grind with someone you don't know.  You didn't even know that was possible, did you!?  Apparently, it is!  And you too can learn from Tweet Boogie 

just how to tastefully grind on Youtube! hmm hmm!

Sam built a tree house at a friends house.

They even made the rope ladder that goes up to it.

I told him that he was going to fall out of it eventually and hurt his arm so that he couldn't play football.  Well guess what he did on Saturday?  Yep, fell out and hurt his arm.  It's all swollen and scratched up.  He says to me, "Mom, what are we going to do about this for football?"  I looked at him and said, "nothing."  "But it's going to hurt."  "Yep!  Sorry!"  Nice nurse mom!

I think Max's fort is a little safer!