A Little Bit of Everything

And everything always includes Lola. Of course. She and I spend a fair share of our time waiting on boys. And now I have a smart phone. This could be a dangerous combination. I love the pictures my Nikon takes, but I sure hate lugging it around…

No words can express my love for this little girl.

I should also be honest and say that the boys spend some time waiting on us. At exciting places like Costco. I apologize for the gently used “new” books.

I adore my boys.

Char, my dearest best friend of 25 years, knew that I would need a break from studying, so she planned an afternoon at a spa for both of us (a belated 40th birthday celebration), topped off with dinner and dessert at a fancy restaurant—and hours and hours of uninterrupted conversation. Bliss. Her husband agreed to watch all 6 of the kids (their 2 and my 4) until Russ got home that evening. AND he did the pile of horrific dishes in my sink. Seriously?!! I have the best friends, evah!!

 

I spent the rest of the week on a picnic blanket with this view:

Not only did I get some studying done, but my legs were not fluorescent white when I put on a skirt and stood to speak in front of a crowd. My dear, brave friend Cheris watched my kids for two days while I lay out in the sun worked like a crazy woman getting everything ready for practicum. She also snapped this picture while I was distracted:

The three days went very smoothly, considering it was the first Oregon practicum of the season. I found out just how much I could not fit into a morning’s presentation. You would think that in roughly 16 hours of content/discussion I would be able to cover everything I needed to cover. Nope. And you would think that weeks of prep would have meant that I didn’t have to go home after a full day of speaking and finish prep for the next day. Nope. So I had several nights of nowhere near enough sleep. And Tuesday evening/Wednesday, Levi and I were fighting off a bug that seemed to be making its rounds through the practicum. I crashed into bed as soon as we got home on Wednesday evening. And I’ve been there a lot ever since. Ha!

A HUGE shoutout to my husband who took three days off work to be at the practicum with me, handling all the technology and completely taking charge of my PowerPoint presentation (I didn’t have to touch the computer once—wahoo!!). All 4 of the kids were with us, so he helped parent as well. Levi attended Logic camp, Leif participated in Geodrawing camp, and Lola hung out in Play camp. Luke didn’t want to go to a learning camp, so he spent all 3 days in the main session. Most of that time he was in a corner reading, napping, or playing on electronics, but the trade-off was that he performed three speeches in front of the crowd—one each day: The Gettysburg Address, Marc Antony’s speech from Shakespeare’s Julius Caesar, and one of Shakespeare’s Henry V speeches. That kid is fearless.

Russ and the boys went camping with friends yesterday and today. Lola and I joined them for a few hours yesterday. The afternoon was gorgeous, and the boys (fishing and ATVing) were in heaven. I have more pictures to post coming up.

We have a bunch on the to-do list this week, including a 10th birthday (and I have NOTHING planned yet). Then Russ is out on a business trip. Then I’m out speaking at the Hillsboro practicum. Whew!

I think that catches us up for now!