In Memoriam

Even though I didn't ask (what child does?)..... today I'm not sharing my own words, but my Dad's:

Eulogy for Jeanne – April 2, 2014

I am sure DiDi (Minister present) has said many times, the Lord does not give you more burden than you can carry – but He does push the limit!  On behalf of Jeanne’s family, we want to thank you for the love, hugs, stories, support, and food you have given us.  More importantly, on behalf of Jeanne’s family, we wish to thank you for the love and support you provided Jeanne over the years.

Do you believe in fairy tales?

On June 7, 1968, a little princess named Jeanne was born in Fremont, Michigan.  Fremont is the home of Gerber Baby Food – what a great place to begin life.  She had two parents who loved her very much.  They watched her grow into a little girl who enjoyed fairy tales – listening to Snow White, Cinderella, and Humpty Dumpty.  Everything was good and right.

Those two parents and a loving aunt and uncle got up one cold November morning to stand outside for hours to help Santa buy a Cabbage Patch doll so a little girl would not be disappointed with Christmas and everything would be good and right.  If only life could remain so simple, we would stand out in the cold for days to make everything good and right.

The little girl was joined by two sisters and grew to be a teen.  Like her sisters, she was pretty, smart, and popular.  In high school she was Homecoming Queen, President of the Senior Class, and graduated near the top of her class to go on to complete a rigorous college degree in Engineering.

When the teen grew into a woman, her family expanded to include a step mother and two step sisters. Jeanne became a mother, bearing two sons who are handsome and smart.  She loved them very much and she was loved very much by her parents, sisters, and family. Everything was good and right.

But like Humpty Dumpty she had a great fall.  All the kings’ horses and all the king’s men could not put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

So, as with ourselves, let’s draw her faults in the sand and chisel her virtues in stone.  This woman’s stone will contain a very long list of virtues.   Yes, we still believe in fairy tales.

Parents are not supposed to lose children, but we have gained some solace from the Serenity Prayer:

God, Grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Grant me patience with the changes that take time, an appreciation for all that I have, tolerance for those with different struggles, and the strength to get up and try again, one day at a time.

When the conversation turns to...

Ha - this is not a post for or about the kids.  It's just a humorous thing that happened to me the other day.  Well, more like a humorous thing that happened in my presence.  I'll take out the specifics but here's the gist...

So, let's say your company was hiring a new employee and you are one of the people who is reviewing and interviewing candidates.  Each candidate is brought in for a day long on-site interview that includes a tour, meetings with various people, a presentation, and a lunch.  That lunch (by the way) takes place at an awesome restaurant with awesome food.

Well, let's say one of the other people on the interview team is young and energetic; quite fun and a good person to make a potential candidate feel at home.  We'll say that person is - oh - an expert in women's issues.  Near the end of the lunch for the final candidate, it's revealed that this person is giving a lecture on the role of technology in women's lives throughout history - has it been a good thing, a bad thing, or neither?

The job candidate innocently asks - "well, which is it?" and the team member says that the audience will really need to draw their own conclusions; but there will be many examples.  Things like.... clothes dryers, microwaves, and "since we are done eating" - vibrators.

Let's say this launches a lengthy tale of the history of the vibrator - from medical device to sex toy (the 1920's and the advent of distributed porn caused that shift - and vibrators went "underground" so-to-speak).

OMG - awkward much?  Illegal?  I don't know!  I mean, you can't ask a job candidate if they are married but you can give them a history of a vibrator!  Hopefully - this candidate is not on twitter because if it had been me - I would totally have tweeted that #crazysexinterview.

We Skied - mostly

I have not posted about our ski trip....  So I'll do that now, as I've been too busy to make coherent thoughts about anything profound.

What can I say about skiing??  Oh yeah - it sucks to get an announcement over the loudspeaker that you have to return to ski school for your child.  Because, clearly, that means something like a serious accident has occurred.

But - Let me back up.

We went skiing the other weekend with some friends of ours who have slightly older kids, but are not skiers.  We signed Allison and Jacob up for ski lessons because it buys Brian and I two hours to go ski on our own, which is just about as much time as we need to hit most of the runs we want to.

So, we dropped the kids off in lessons at 10am.  We went clear to the other side of the ski resort to then started working our way, run-by-run, back to the ski school area.  This was pretty good for about the first 45 minutes.  Then my phone rang.  We thought it was Dad (who is recovering from his own run-in with a ski hill).  It was a local number.  I tried to answer it but my phone died..... too cold.

So, we deduced that it was the ski school and with no other info - we set off to return to the ski area as quickly as possible (including a foray through the trees that Brian later termed "ill-advised").  Clearly there was a crisis!

We ended up back at the base and decided that the ski school office was closer than the yurt (where they meet), so we went there right when our names were being called over the loudspeaker (across the whole ski resort).  We said they were looking for us at which point the girl said she didn't have any info, but we were supposed to head to the yurt.  Our child was refusing to participate in lessons.

Allison.

So, we showed up at the yurt to find Allison sitting at one of the tables, with no one but a ski instructor and two other girls in there that were clearly not affiliated with her.  He had no idea what had happened, except that they were severely understaffed as a bunch of instructors had called in sick and so they had broken the kids down by skill rather than age.  This - I guess - led to two problems.

(1) Allison had been required to ride the lift.

(2) She had been separated from her slightly-more-skilled brother.

At this point I left - because my ski binding had broken and (since there was no major crisis) I went to see if the rental shop could repair it (yes).  When I returned, Brian and Allison were still sitting there.  Allison's class had apparently returned to the yurt, but the instructor with them had no interest in re-introducing Allison to the group.  There was still one hour of lesson left.

So, we cut our losses and forced Allison to ski with us for the remainder of the morning.  That was when Brian took this picture:

She was entirely comfortable with the bunny area and magic carpet.  Which is also where the rest of her lesson group ended up.

After lunch, Allison was allowed to quit skiing and she and I went back to the hotel while Brian and Jacob skied the rest of the day - spending it entirely in the terrain park and on the "fun boxes."

Jacob is a big fan of skiing and can't wait to switch to snowboard.  Heaven help us.

On Sunday, Jacob and I returned to the ski hill for another morning of skiing.  I convinced him to go all the way to top of the hill (it was not crowded Sunday on account of it being about 10 degrees).

He skied the blue runs (snowplow all the way!) and then did it again.  Glad at least one of the kids enjoys skiing.  Next year, we'll have to ship Allison to Grandma and Grandpa's house for our ski weekend!

Piano recital

It has been a crazy-busy weekend here, including Jacob's piano recital debut.  He calls it "his worst performance ever."  I argued that since it was his first recital, that made it also his best performance ever.  He did not buy my argument.  I guess he played a song for his class without any mistakes.

To be fair, he handled his mistake well and finished the piece.  There were also A LOT of other kids making mistakes too.  Here's the video:

To the beach!

Allison came home on Tuesday - super excited - because Wednesday was Beach Day.  There was even a note in her folder to "dress for the beach" but no swimsuits allowed.

Initially I thought, "well, that's cute!"  It's been so very cold, and I can appreciate the school's lighthearted attempt to think of warmer weather.

Then, I realized the impossibility of dressing a child for the beach, when the child had to endure freezing temps getting to school, from school, and at recess!  Especially Allison, who clings to the "5th and 6th graders DO NOT have to wear their snowpants" rule like gospel.

So, we settled on a long, knit, strapless dress with flip-flops in the backpack, a sweater to wear to and from school, and a beach towel to wrap up in.  All set!  This probably would have been fine for the day - had they not decided to have a fire drill.  Because it makes total sense to ask the school kids to dress like they are going to the beach in FEBRUARY in WISCONSIN and then send them all outside (without coats) for a FIRE DRILL!

And, exactly where in the common core curriculum is the material on logic?

Allison's Math Test

Allison nearly aced her last math test.  Congrats!  The topic was multiplication with decimals and the test was pretty much just about the math and not about hokey math concepts and twisted word problems.  Support for my theory that Allison would be a much "better" student had she been born 20 years earlier....

But I also took a picture of the grading sheet.  It must really kindof suck for the teachers.  Each question with it's targeted objective.  Each (multiple choice) problem graded on a scale of 1-3.  Seriously, the benefit of multiple choice tests is that they can be graded quickly with one pass of a red pen.  No More!

Pinewood Derby Time!

Yesterday was the Pinewood Derby.  This is Jacob's den (gotten a little bit smaller this year).

 Jacob and Brian worked on Jacob's car this past week.  It came in at a perfect 5.0 ounces (it's the red car in the blue lane below).  Jacob was pretty certain it would win, but after watching a few practice runs beforehand, I was much less certain.

 None-the-less - he scored a first place win in his den, which means we got to stick around for the finals - where he raced all the ones he raced before the derby and didn't place at all.  But he was excited!

And here is Jacob with his friend Ian.  Immediately after the derby, Jacob and Ian headed over to their soccer game.  We got home and to bed around 9 pm, only to get up for the 8 am basketball game Saturday morning (honestly, the YMCA said "Games at 10 am *but the time may change."  Yeah - talk about a crappy time change!  Jacob asked which game the whole family was going to make it to and I was like.... uh, none.)