two milestones

We celebrated two big events in two of our kids' lives on the same day.

Christopher finally decided he wanted to be baptized, and Zach turned 12, so he was able to be ordained a deacon and receive the Aaronic priesthood.

For Zach it was an easy decision, I'm sure the thought never even entered his brain that he could choose otherwise, because we always have a choice, but I admit I held my breath a little bit when Christopher had his interview with the Bishop. (He's been known to say "No, I can't follow Jesus...")

But he passed.  And we celebrated both events.

This worked out great because we were able to have both grandmas and their favorite Aunt Corrine come out and be a part of it.

Sadly, I got very few pictures of that day, and none of the grandmas.  I'm sure my mom is fine with that, but I'm wishing the day was better documented.

I did try and take Christopher to the temple to get his picture taken.  He wanted to go to the Mesa temple like we did with Zach when he was baptized, but we were running out of day light, so he wasn't cooperative,

and the temple grounds were closed,

and I had the added issue of trying to work around the fact that the letter "R" fell off the building....

But, despite all that, I am so proud of my boys, and it was a good day.

Twelve

Zach turned 12 this year.

When he was 2 1/2 I had him observed or diagnosed or whatever you want to call it for some developmental delays.  He had been talking, and then he stopped talking, and apparently that's a huge red flag for autism, and they say early intervention is key.  So I had people come in and do their studies, and I filled out surveys and questionnaires and answered a million questions,

And although some of the things were concerning (his inability to communicate) I remember telling the lady that Zach was a joy to be around.  I remember this because it struck me as so, so sad that her response was something to the effect of  "That's so great to hear, because mostly I just hear moms talk about how hard or difficult their kids are to deal with".

But the truth was (and is) he was a joy.  There were hard moments, yes, but when it was just him and I, and the rest of the world quieted, he was a joy.

He's my blue eyed boy with a contagious belly laugh and a tender heart. He's smart and talented, and with a little motivation can do anything he wants to do.  (Which is why he will never quit piano, He'll thank me one day.)  He's a loyal and good friend who is slow to judge and quick to forgive.  And he has the quirkiest sense of humor, which can best be seen on the random comic strips I find around the house from time to time.

Happy Birthday, Zach

Choir camp revisited

It's kind of ridiculous how much I love this choir and these kids.

I've never felt that I personally belonged in a choir. but I love being a choir mom and cheering from the sidelines.

Funny (sad) story- the other night I was saying goodbye to some of Nick's choir friends, and I almost said "See you tomorrow!" but then I remembered I'm a 39 year old mom and not actually in high school anymore.  But you know, you hear a little gossip, see their posts on facebook, cheer them on in their achievements, hang out on Friday night and watch an old Audrey Hepburn movie together, and you can see how I'd be confused...Not that I actually want to be back in high school, but Nick does have some pretty fantastic friends.

Anyways, Choir Camp.

I got to go again this year.  It was better in some ways because I knew the kids better, but the part that wasn't nearly as awesome was that the school wouldn't allow us to do the high ropes course.  (No zipline.) Instead they said the kids could do archery.  (Cause that's totally safer)

So in addition to lots of singing (and there was lots of that) the whole point of the weekend is lots of fun team building activities, because apparently closeness and friendships make for better choirs. (Which I'm not knocking.  I just have no first hand knowledge of this fact.  I do however use the term "fun" somewhat loosely, as some of the activities "fun-ness" could be in question, but the kids were good sports and overall I would say that choir camp is fun.)

Of course I'm trying to write this six months after the fact, and all I really have are some vague memories and about a thousand pictures to go on.  So I think I will just go with that.

There was climbing. Cause boys.

And more climbing.  They even managed to include climbing into their skit.  The skits are actually a highlight.  I generally hate skits because it usually involves a lot of arguing (during the planning and practicing), and I think they are rarely actually funny, but I've been impressed so far.

And Nick even managed to climb at least one tree.

One of their team building activities involved having to swing from a rope, and then get all the kids onto a small platform.  (Side note- despite the fact that it is now midnight and I just spelled "rope" r-o-a-p, I am determined to finish this tonight. Please forgive any spelling and/or grammatical errors)

Another one involved having the kids walk across a low ropes course without touching the ground.

Nick and his friend Liam even managed a selfie somewhere in the middle of it.

Speaking of Nick and Liam, this is one of my favorite pics from the whole trip.

 It totally cracks me up.

Since they couldn't play on the high ropes course which included the zipline, because it was dangerous, they sent them to play with deadly weapons. But out of our group only Nick and Pieter persevered and found the archery range.  It was hidden behind a building and we took a wrong turn, and went for a long hike in the blazing sun instead. Everyone else gave up and went back to get water and hang out in the cabins.

And that's pretty much choir camp.

 

1st day of school

These kids do insist on growing up. 

I haven't figured out how to stop them. 

Nick's first grade teacher called me and asked me to stop sending this lunchbox to school with Nick.  Apparently he was driving it on all the kids as he stood in line for lunch. 

So maybe a little bit of growing up isn't such a bad thing.

These two used to bicker all the time. This year has been so fun to watch them become friends.

 And they have.  Of course I hear Nick is ridiculously overprotective of her, and I think it might be a good thing that he will be gone on a mission next year when she starts dating.  

Nick is a Senior and Maddie is a Freshman in high school.  They both still play the viola, enjoy both sides of drama (acting and teching) share many of the same friends.  Nick still has yet to convince her to add a little more craziness to her schedule and join choir, but he's working on it.  (It's not a hard sell, she just has all those other pesky little classes to deal with like math and science and what-not)

Zach is in jr high.

Seventh grade!!

He was a little worried about school this year.  Both Nick and Maddie had a hard time for various reasons, but Zach seems to have it under control.  He decided to be a rebel and is taking band (trumpet) instead of orchestra. 

Christopher is doing awesome in the 3rd grade.
  

The school is awesome, the teachers are awesome, the paraprofessionals are awesome.  He has a new best friend that he talks about all the time.

awesome.  awesome.  awesome.

 

Looking at all these pictures, I'm feeling all sorts of emotions- firstly, boy do I miss those little faces.  Maybe it's the fact that I seem to be surrounded by little sci-fi geeks, but some days I wish more than anything for some kind of time machine where I can just whisk myself backwards or forwards in my life and relive moments, give extra hugs, or even just peek ahead to see how things turn out in the end.  Why does life insist on being so linear? Secondly, what's up with all the bad haircuts? 



 



High School Reunion

Some days I can't believe how old I am.  My high school had it's 20 year reunion this year.

TWENTY.

I wasn't that old when I graduated in the first place.

A whole life time ago.

I have a kid that's graduating this year.

And I'm sure every one can tell you the same thing, that it "doesn't feel like it was that long ago"  or "I remember it all like it was yesterday..."

But even so, I was a different person back then.

And then of course so much has changed and you find yourself sitting in a room staring at people's name tags not sure if they went to your high school or not, and you are wondering who in the heck all these old people are???

I was able to catch up with some old friends, and see a couple that I've sorta kept in contact with.
It's a little hard when you don't live in the same state, but yay for facebook and instagram because I do get to keep in touch with people that I love. 

Of course not everyone that I would have loved to have seen showed up, but I was oh so happy to see the ones that I did.

And then there was that one girl.  Which was the weirdest thing ever. We were best friends in elementary school.  Like inseparable.  But then jr high came, and she dropped me because I wasn't cool enough for her.  She was trying to create a new image with cool kids and skater boy friends and didn't understand when I wouldn't buy a stupid t-shirt that cost over 1/4 of my entire clothing budget for the year.  I did get bangs the summer before jr high because she told me I had to, but that apparently wasn't good enough and so she did her best to belittle me in front of her other friends until I stopped eating at her lunch table.  The End.

I moved on.  And after a couple of years she started to drive me crazy.  She was one of those weird drama types (which karma seems to be biting me in the butt because I am raising two of those weird drama types.)  Except she was especially annoying.  You could hear her down the hallway.  This high pitched cackle that made me insane. 

Anyway, I've done my best to try and forgive and move on.  Being forced to find a new lunch table eventually led me to find new friends, and so many of them I still treasure to this day.  It hurt then, but I got over it. 

Anyway, back to the reunion, I walk in to the room, and who do you think is the first person who sees me?  She walks straight up to me and pretty much corners me against a wall, and grabs my arm so I can't get away.  And then proceeds to go on and on very dramatically, using all her best drama skills about what good friends we were, and how just the other day she was thinking about her good friend Kirsten from elementary school, and did I remember all the great times we had, and what ever happened to us? Did I even go to her junior high, because she sure can't remember me. I seriously sat there stunned.  I think I stammered something about her having other friends, and then she wanted to know if she was mean, and I managed to nod my head or stammer out something to the affirmative and then thankfully I spotted a friend across the hall and quickly excused myself.

And seriously I was left pretty stunned and a little annoyed.  She cut me right out of her life, and refused to make eye-contact or acknowledge my presence for 6 years, (and I was happy to do the same) and then forgot about it?  And I had moved on, and even though the loss of her friendship was quite the crushing blow to my 12 year old self, it wasn't something I dwelt on, or had any real desire to tell her off or any of that stuff.  As they say, "life's too short"... but it was still a little upsetting to be cornered by someone as they demanded to know why we stopped being friends. 

And speaking of awkward high school moments, I totally had to pose with this dress.  I never got one of those dresses.  I really wanted one, but only because all my girl friends had one, and it meant going to Disneyland with the Senior Choir. But my singing was so bad I had to spend my Senior year in the Sophomore girls choir class because I totally sucked and that was the lowest possible class he could put me in and I needed a fine arts credit to graduate.  And back in the day, they made you buy these dresses, and they all had these lovely matching purple dresses, which I cannot actually tell you if back then I thought they were cute or ugly.  (I'd love to say I thought they were ugly, but given the clothes I actually wore and thought were cute, that would probably be a lie.)

And at the end of the day, I'm glad I went.  In some ways it was high school all over again, both the good and the bad, and the awkward, and the ugly.  And even though so much time had passed, so many people and things were still the same (good and bad) and it was a little surreal to feel like two completely different people (my 18 year old self, and 38 year old self) all at the same time.