Sunday, April 24, 2011

Spring ?? Catch-Up

I’m pretty behind on this blog this spring. It’s the season of spring, according to the calendar, but the world around us barely knows. We have only had a few teasing days of sunshine and warmth thus far and the 10 day forecast doesn’t look all that promising…perhaps somewhat better than most of the last 10 days, not quite as cold, but still chillier and wetter than normal. Let’s just say, if you were a skier in Washington state, you’d be having a lovely long ski season with lots of fresh powder.

Want proof? I took this picture on April 14:

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That was just the beginning of an early morning snowfall that created quite a buzz on Facebook. Everything was covered by the time it quit, but by the time I had another chance at taking a picture, it was slushy. So, no, it didn’t stick around long at all, but generally we don’t get big fluffy snow that sticks everywhere in April.

April is also the month of projects. First up was Bethany’s musical instrument. (I’ll be sure to snap a picture of that this week at the Creative Arts Week Open House –CAWOH- at school). Next we completed Bethany’s invention, which of course involved building with wood in Grandpa’s shop. More pictures and details will come after the CAWOH.

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Sarah’s currently writing a report on Zambia and Bethany’s working on her “Penny Book”, which is basically a scrapbook of her life where she has to write about each year and answer certain questions, etc.

Becca had a diorama to complete, which about drove me bananas trying to figure out how to put long hair on a smaller-than-Polly-Pocket-sized figure. We ended up just leaving well enough alone, but again, I’ll get pictures at CAWOH.

Spring has also brought the beginning of crazy sports season in our house. Somehow, with 4 girls and two non-athletic parents, I thought we might miss these experiences. But, everyone seems to want to try it out, so we’re just enjoying it all.

Sarah has started Junior High track and her first meet will be this Wednesday. She’s running the 800m, 1600m, and competing in the long jump. She also plans to do either the javelin or the 4x200m relay. She has to try out for the relay this week, so I guess we find out at that point.

Bethany is in fast-pitch softball, which she wanted to do because her friends are in it, and we wanted her to do because she needs exercise and fresh air. It is a little stressful at times, because she gets pretty nervous about the games, but she is really doing well for a girl who is anxious and not really into the sports thing. They have a 2-1 record so far. I’ve decided that in 5/6th grade fast-pitch, if you’re the home team, you have a pretty good chance of winning. The rules are different: 6 innings, 5 run limit –unless you’re behind by more than 5, then you can score enough to tie. And the last inning is unlimited runs for both teams.

This was her first game. It was FrEeZiNg that morning!

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This was from this past Saturday’s game, which started out cold, but got warmer – I even took my coat off by the end of the game!

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Becca has started soccer, but so far it’s just practices. Games start this week.

We’re thrilled with everyone’s coaches: Sarah has the same coach she had for XC this fall; Bethany has a school dad who is super encouraging and very smart (his most-often-said-line to the team is “Cheer her on, girls!”, which I LoVe!); and Becca has two of my friends from church as her soccer coach, and they both played soccer for Calvin and one is apparently a “legend”, so it’s a great experience all around for all of them! Poor Elise just gets carted around to all these events and sometimes we forget she’s there and even have been known to lose track of her for a few minutes. Although we’ll probably make sure that doesn’t happen again…

Last week was Palm Sunday and all four of the girls were involved in the service.

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Well, that’s enough for now…we hope you had a very blessed Easter, celebrating the gift of eternal life that we have through faith in Jesus because of his death and resurrection and VICTORY!

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